A Sorry Excuse For A Temple

"Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple." 1 Corinthians 3:16‭-‬17

Breathe in the wonder of this thought. Stand in awe of this truth that is more colorful than any sunset filled sky. Do you understand this fact that is too deep for words? Said so simply, so briefly - just quick answers on a page - these words hold doctrine that should change your life forever.

My God, your temple? How can I even grasp that? How am I supposed to understand how the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, all-loving, good, and perfect God is dwelling within this crust of a shell? This dust? This wreck of a creature that, in human terms devoid of providence, should never even have been created?

The spirit of God dwelling in this?

But my Lord, I am falling apart. My body is so frail. I'm in pain so often, my body unable to understand it shouldn't attack itself. I need sleep to survive, and food, and water, and give me a single day without any and I am nearly useless to anybody. My flesh is constantly plagued with sinful desires, battling against the new me and so often winning. My hair is thinning. My skin is begging to age. My person, Lord, myself - it's not much better than the dust it came from and the dust it's going straight to. 

How can this be holy, set apart, special? How can this be the temple of the Most High God, who sits on his throne in majesty and controls all things through all time?

This is your chosen temple?

This is the temple you wanted?

Oh my Lord, it is too much to bear within this human heart - it bursts at the thought of your kind of love. The kind of love that chooses a being it created for its own, even when that being hates him back. The kind of love that sees an evil, sin-stained being and chooses to die for it. The kind of love that reigns in glory and also reigns within me. The kind of love that trades throne rooms for crosses. The kind of love that is more satisfied with me as a temple than with a temple inlaid with gold.

The kind of love that loves me because you love me.

The kind of love that loves me.

Lord, my heart's desire, I don't even have to ask you to make me your temple. You're already here. By force and by right, by desire and love, I'm your temple and will be ‘till my last breath.

And so I sit here at your feet, humbled and silenced by what all of that means, and I thank you. I can’t do anything but thank you.

Thank you for my love for you.