“… do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own?” 1 Corinthians 6:19
We are the body of Christ.
Our bodies are the flesh-and-blood temples of the living God.
We have an awesome responsibility – to provide a dwelling place that is fit for God's habitation.
When we look at ourselves through time, and at the masses around us, we see a huge diversity of worship-places . Each of us comes in a variety of incarnations and denominations, as we shape ourselves, or life shapes us to produce temples worthy of God.
When we are children our temple is raw green wood: a developing wonderland where life is new and breath-taking, and we worship in the wide world of our senses .
Our worship is a dance, a bike ride to the creek, the midnight call of a Morepork, the wag of a yellow dog’s tail, the smell of Vicks vaporub on a feverish chest, and a pat on the back by a beloved teacher.
Our brains are expanding, growing, making connections. Our body is building, cell by cell, memory by memory, experience atop experience to place at the altar.
Our initial trembling step, the first time we read a sentence then a chapter book all by ourselves; the pride of a lone wobbly ride on two wheels instead of four, and the night we learned to sleep with the light off, trusting that the dark was safe, and God was there, and would watch us as we dreamed. These milestones are building blocks in our temple.
The Spirit inhabits a gap-toothed scabby-kneed temple with wonderful potential: cohabiting briefly with the tooth fairy and the Easter bunny, but they move out as the temple grows up. Worship is ad-libbed, spontaneous and joyful, and likely to erupt at any time. The altar may be adorned by a transformer, My Little Pony, or a tadpole in a jar. Chippies and Fanta are the Host. The Spirit is a pure smokeless flame, with outwardly undying energy.
Adolescence is a strong temple, occupied between the overcrowded one of childhood and one the congregation will grow into. It’s a bit rough-sawn and tentative at times, and excitement flares intermittently as it struggles to establish its own final identity.
This temple is a fun fair, a changing room, a quiet place, a hall of mirrors, an advisory service to friends. Fences are built and torn down again, allegiances formed and shattered. The temple is redecorated and worship maps redrawn as new styles are tried on and discarded, but it strengthens and grows, and starts to put down roots as it becomes more sure. The Spirit burns brilliantly where it lands, and pours out its energy on a listless world.
Some youthful temples are Las Vegas wedding chapels complete with sad short couplings, impersonators and flash fakery. My teens were built on that model. I thought that by ignoring the Spirit he would disappear - but once invited he’s a guest who is hard to budge. While I felt my life was Godless, looking back Holy fingerprints were there, and took the form of conscience, and intuition, and a belief that I could do and be more. My trashy temple was acceptable to God who waited for me to rebuild and recommit. Our Lord is not afraid of trashy temples.
Adults provide the greatest selection of temple architecture.
A new parent’s temple is busy, tired, untidy, sprinkled with baby-powder. The architecture can be a muddle of old and new as budgets are stretched beyond previous limits and priorities change. The lights go on and off at odd times, dictated by the youngest member of the congregation. Toys can be found scattered under the pews, and an old rusk in the lectern. The communion glasses and wine are stored high out of reach of children and their frazzled parents. Music softens, contemplative silences are treasured and far-apart, and private spaces are rare. When the Sunday School takes part in services the building rattles along with it, every word known, every action mimed. The Spirit is hot h-o-t , hot, and is bright, but has a kiddie guard around it just in case.
A student’s temple is a bizarre mix of party hall and library. It is young, trendy, ambitious, unsure if it wants bean bags or pine pews. Architecture is not a priority, nor is design (except, of course, to students of these subjects). The altar is decorated with a vibrant mix of candles, incense, and an old lava lamp. God is alive, and faith has not usually been tested enough to waver. Communion wine might be served in yard glasses (as a joke, of course), and the bread might be lost in the back of the fridge, but the commitment is fresh. Especially near exam times, and other testing periods. The Spirit is bright incandescent flame that issues a challenge. The student temple opens all hours, depending on the academic and social timetable.
An athlete’s temple is fit, dynamic and alive. The building structure is strong, vibrant, spare. There are plenty of bike parks out the front. Doors and windows are muscled open, fresh air barrels down the aisles and between the pews, blowing away the cobwebs of ages, ruffling the hymnals, and flicking the edges of the notices reclining on the corkboard. Light flushes the building, any flaw is exposed and worked on relentlessly. The flowers on the altar have been squashed in the gym bag – their bruised scent pervasive. The Host is rice bread – for the protein and organic fruit juice. The Spirit is energy, consuming, focussed. It burns on every forehead and the service is rocking, pulsating, with drum and timbrel and upraised hands and may include a rousing haka. The strong heart of worship beats energetically. The sermon exhorts action, mission, accomplishment. Act! Be busy, the Kingdom of heaven is racing towards us. The athlete’s temple opens for the ten-thirty service, giving enough time for a half-marathon or 100km bike ride beforehand.
The builder’s temple has attention to detail but is never quite finished. Its working hands are clasped in prayer to the carpenter who came before. The Host is dwarfed in these hands, so like those of the one whose body was broken. The Spirit is on the level, and burns cleanly in a well-constructed fireplace.
The teacher’s temple is the world. Like the child, the teacher needs to be open to all senses – to be sensible and wise. The teacher’s temple is bright and airy, with coloured wall hangings and a mat for a pulpit. The congregation crosses their legs and folds their arms and receives the lesson without wiggling too much. They nibble The Host from lunchboxes. The teacher’s Spirit is bright, bursting with the stardust of knowledge passed on.
Pastors, writers and eternal students are contemplative sites of studied worship and scholarly discourse. A well-stocked library is required, and real coffee is enjoyed by those who thirst. The temple is welcoming, respectful. It fosters growth, renewal and restoration, and all who seek may be embraced. Service can be experimental and mix liturgy with drama. It is not dull, even though congregants may not be clocking sub 4-minute miles, or rocking in toy strewn aisles. The door is propped open and the air still. The nave has darker areas where one may sit and reflect, kneel to pray and perhaps chant quietly. Light slants softly through high windows, turning dust motes golden in their twirling fall from grace. Flowers are dried arrangements, no water to stain the manuscripts, and no plants to feed. The Host is nourishment, time out, to be shared and lingered over. The Spirit is hot coals, smouldering, burning heat that lights the page, burnishes the hymnals and invites those who are cold to warm themselves.
Maturity renovates the temple still further. It opens early for the first morning service. It is a little older, perhaps a bit wider in the aisle and worn softer in the pew. It is more comfortable, less driven. It has weathered many storms and quakes, witnessed a lot of change, and is grounded in unchangeable truths. It’s unflappable, serene, solid. The lectern is unmoveable, and bathed in coloured puddles of light trickling from stained glass windows, bought a long time ago. Flowers sit behind the pulpit, unruffled, real, home-picked flowers. Nothing showy or distracting. The service is familiar, the hymns are known, the worship downbeat, comfortable. There is a warmth and generosity and stability about this temple. It is a place of true belonging. The Spirit is the eternal flame, lovingly tended and sent prayerfully on wings of love and peace to bring hope to a despairing world.
The infinite variety of human temples mirrors the differences in culture and denomination and opportunities for worship in the world. Is it an accident that mega-churches arise in cultures where obesity is endemic?
God is present in mud huts, on street corners, in stadia, private homes and synagogues. Our Lord is within us, woman and man, child and adult, short and tall, stout and athletic, old and young. The shape and style and upkeep of our temple does not matter.
God will wait in us, quietly showing us grace and light and love, whispering encouragement and advice, and loving us till we listen, respect the temple and rededicate it all over again.
Encouraged, the spirit will burn in our hearths, warm our worship spaces, providing heat and light for ourselves and the cold, lost world.
We are God's temple. We are the Body of Christ.
Let God, through us, nourish the world.
