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Christ's Body, Our Body - Part 1

Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit - 1 Corinthians 6:19

This study is not about the idea of Christ's body being the church, although that is certainly true in a metaphorical sense (Colossians 1:18 - I talk more about this concept in study 4). Instead, this study focuses on the physical body which Jesus had when he walked among us on earth. I believe that by understanding the nature and the sanctity of Jesus' body, we will be able to more deeply appreciate the cross, as well as our own bodies. Part 2 of this study will talk about how our bodies are connected with our hope for the afterlife.

So, now that we're ready, let's dive in. But just before you go on, answer the following question to yourself: "When you hear the word temple, what do you think of?" ... My answer? The Taj Mahal - in all its glory. What jumped into your head? As we go on, we'll see what Jesus thought of when He said the word temple.

The Temple

Read John 2:13-22 (I'm serious, read it, this won't make sense unless you do...) Jesus clears the temple in Jerusalem. We know that story: He cleared it because the courts were full of greedy money changers, and they were disrespecting God and needed to be taught a lesson. There are some scoffers in verse 18, and it's their conversation with Jesus that I want to focus on. This is very early in Jesus' ministry. So far, He has only performed one miracle His whole life (see verses 11-12), and that was up in Galilee (north Israel, Jerusalem is in the south). So, Jesus is new on the scene – these guys have never heard of Him (things are very different next time He goes to Jerusalem), and they want Him to do a miracle to prove His authority.

Basically, these guys think that Jesus is a fake, someone with no authority to do what He's doing. They think He's just a normal man. They are just like many sceptics today, who think that Jesus is no one special, and who demand "proof" that Jesus was who He said He was. "Anyone could make those claims", sceptics say, "what proof is there that He was sent from God?" Jesus gave one answer to the sceptics of His day, and that is the only answer we should give today:

Jesus rose from the dead.

His body was destroyed, and then He raised it to life. That is our evidence that Jesus is genuine. That is our proof that He is God - He rose from the dead. There is a wealth of material to show just how compelling the evidence is that Jesus rose from the dead – "True and Reasonable" by Doug Jacoby is a great place to start.

So, that was Jesus' powerful answer in verse 19. Did they get it? Did they understand a word of what He was saying? Look at their answer in verse 20: "It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?" They totally missed the point: When they heard "temple", they thought "building". They thought he must be talking about the building in which they were standing - I mean, that is the temple, right?

Wrong! "The temple he had spoken of was his body" (v21). I have no doubt that most people today, when they think of a temple, think of a building. Aren't you that same? But this is because

The religions of men sanctify places, but the religion of God sanctifies people.

(To sanctify means to "treat as holy.") In Christianity, our body is our temple. What are the implications of thinking any differently? I would like to quote this story:

Readers will remember the assassination of India's Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi. The murder was prompted by revenge because she had sent the military into the Sikh temple, where weapons were being stored. She was murdered in order to preserve a temple. Jesus would have told them that they had actually destroyed what was intended to be His temple in order to preserve a place.
– Ravi Zacharias, "Jesus among other gods", page 72.

Many religions of men have elaborate purification rituals in order to enter supposed 'holy places'. In Christianity, God makes us holy (Hebrews 2:11), so that we can come directly to Him (Hebrews 4:16). The thinking of God is truly the opposite of the thoughts of men! It is our bodies that are the holy temple in God's sight. What does this mean? It means that our bodies are sacred. Our bodies are one of the greatest gifts which God gives us, and we need to hold them in the highest honour. Jesus knew that His temple was sacred, and our view of ourselves as well as our sin will be transformed when we realize that simple fact as well:

Your body is a sacred temple of the Lord your God.

The world will never understand this. In the world, our bodies are mere tools to use and abuse however we feel like. Some overeat, some starve themselves; some are slothful, some work themselves to the bone. People get drunk, take drugs, sleep around, dress lewdly, indulge in lust - people have no respect either of their own bodies or those of other people, and they abuse their bodies in the name of pleasure, freedom and independence. The world places no value on God's holy temple - we are encouraged to profane it daily. But sometimes the truth comes bursting through, like a bolt of lightning.

In March 1998, two boys, ages eleven and thirteen, went on a shooting rampage in their school in Jonesboro Arkansas, killing four girls and a teacher and injuring ten others. That tragedy at Westside Middle School was at the time the largest school massacre in America. On the night of the shooting, many were being counselled in small groups on the hospital waiting room. Friends and relatives were waiting for word of the victims. The whole scene was one of desolation and horror. In one corner sat a woman alone, looking dazed and helpless. A counsellor went to her to see if she needed any assistance and discovered that she was the mother of one of the girls who had been killed... 'I just came to find out how to get my little girl's body back', she said.
– Zacharias, page 70.

That mother just wanted her daughter's body - so that she could give her a funeral, remember her for who she was, and put her body to rest. That woman knew that her daughter's body was not some tool to be used and abused. At that point in time, there was at least one person on earth who understood the sanctity of the body. Our bodies are temples. We need to honour and respect them, and make every effort to never abuse them. Read 1 Thessalonians 4:3-8 with this in mind, and allow this profound truth to sink deeply into your heart.

The Cross

As a final turn in this tale, let us now consider the cross from this perspective. Jesus was broken, beaten, punished, wounded and mocked (Matthew 27:27-31). It was a temple that was being desecrated. As Paul painstakingly points out in Colossians 1:22, it is by Christ's physical body, that was "destroyed" at Calvary, that we are made holy.

This was not the first or last time that God's temple was violated. As prophesied by Daniel (Daniel 11:31), King Antiochus desecrated the temple in Jerusalem in about 160 BC. He stripped its alter and sacrificed a pig there - what a hideous abomination to God's people! As prophesied by Jesus (Matthew 24:15), Titus again desecrated it in AD 70, profaning the alter and ultimately destroying the building entirely. (It is ironic that this happened about 40 years after the conversation in John 2.) In AD 70, the temple building was profaned, destroyed, and has never been rebuilt. It lies in dust to this very day.

But we know that the temple built by hands was just a shadow of the reality found in Christ (Hebrews 8:5; 10:1). Jesus' physical body was the true temple, and it was profaned in the Pretorium, and then destroyed at Calvary. Unlike the buildings, though, Jesus' body did not remain in the dust.

Our God is a living God, and His temple is a living temple.

After Antiochus desecrated the temple, the Jews dedicated it again, and that day was one of the greatest triumphs imaginable for God's people. That day is still celebrated every year in the Feast of Dedication (John 10:22 – it is also known as Hanukah). As Christians, we also celebrate the restoration of a temple. But our temple is not a building, it is Jesus Himself.

Even today, God's temple stands in living, breathing glory - in you, in me, in all His sons and daughters. As it was in Christ's body, so it is in our body. The church rises as a holy temple to the Lord, shining the light of God to all nations. We worship a living God in His living temple. And that is something to rejoice about!

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