TEMPLE OF GOD

“Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone
defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.”
I Corinthians 3:16-17 NKJV

We are the temples of God. This is a reality most of us believers haven’t fully grasped yet. God lives in us,
not in the church building. The physical church building is a place for we believers to come together and
commune and share the love of God that has been shared abroad in our heart through the Holy Spirit
(Romans 5:5). The Holy Spirit has been given to us as a free gift of receiving the salvation and eternal life
Jesus Christ has purchased for us. God lives in us, not in the building. The main problem I’ve observed
with us coming into this full realisation is the fact that most believers don’t fully understand and agree with
the fact that presently God actually lives in them, so they take it as a future reality, not knowing that as a
believer in Christ, right now God lives inside you. The kingdom of God is within you (Luke 17:20-21).
You need to accept that fact for you to experience the fullness of the kingdom of God, which resides inside
of you, because God lives inside of you. The kingdom of God is anywhere God is. It is anywhere God’s
will is being done. Just like in the Lord’s prayer we say 

“ Our Father in Heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven…..”

If God doesn’t live there, then it can’t be referred to as the kingdom of God. Anywhere God’s will is being
done/made manifest, that is where His kingdom resides. God lives inside of Us that is why His kingdom is
in us also. God does not stay in a building made by Human hands. It is arrogance on our path for us to
think that we can actually make a dwelling place for God to reside in. He created this whole world and
everything in it, so how can the creation now create a suitable dwelling place for it’s creator. It’s not
possible. God who created the whole world including you is perfectly capable of creating His own
dwelling place also. Paul spoke of this reality when he was conversing with the philosophers at Athens.
This he said

““God, who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in
temples made with hands. Nor is He worshiped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He
gives to all life, breath, and all things.”
Acts 17:24-25 NKJV

God does not live in the church building. God lives in you. He can only reside in a temple made by His
own hands, and that temple is our bodies. Our bodies where made in the image of God, by God Himself
and He put a spirit in Us to be His dwelling place. I believe He did this particularly so that He could put
Himself in us because He is a spirit (John 4:24). He did this So that in a way, we would be God living in
man here on this earth, in a similar way as Jesus was. God didn’t plan for us to go through all this hardship,
sicknesses and troubles we are experiencing today. He wanted us to enjoy this world. He created us so that
He can have intimate,personal relationship with us. We were meant to be god’s and sin robbed us of that
great gift, but thanks be to God, we have now been given back our true positions in Him.

“Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, “You are gods” ’?”
John 10:34 NKJV

“I said, “You are gods, And all of you are children of the Most High. But you shall die like men, And fall
like one of the princes.””
Psalms 82:6-7 NKJV

God created us to be like Him. He made us in His image. We are not God as in divinity, but we have a
similar nature of kingship and authority here on this earth, because God who created this whole world and
us has given the dominion of this earth over to men.
“Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over
the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping
thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created
him; male and female He created them.”
Genesis 1:26-27 NKJV

We are all created in the image of God. An image is an exact replica of the main thing. We are not God,
but He made us to be as He is in likeness. He has the power, and He has given us a portion of that power
when He breathed His Spirit into us.
In the book of Genesis, after God created everything by the word of His mouth, it says that “He formed
man out of the dust of the ground”. The Hebrew word for “Formed” that was used there is “YATSAR”.
That word means to fashion or to form, it is a word potters use to describe the process of creating or
moulding of an object. 

Yatsar is the Hebrew name for God meaning to fashion, to frame, the potter. Yatsar is this incredible
descriptive Hebrew word that actually means to take shape by squeezing. Yatsar is a potter's term.
(Source is Google)

God literally formed us out of the dust from the ground through His words. He made us in His image. Out
of all creation we are the only beings that God formed Himself and gave authority and blessings. What a
huge privilege we have. 

“And the Lord God formed (Yatsar) man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath
(Ruach) of life; and man became a living being.”
Genesis 2:7 NKJV

The second Hebrew word there “Ruach” means breath or wind, it is most times referred to as the Spirit of
God in the Old Testament. God didn’t breath oxygen into man. He put A spirit inside us and then we
became living beings. God lives on the inside of Us. The book of James also made reference to this same
reality.

“For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.”
James 2:26 NKJV

You don’t die when oxygen leaves your body. You die when the spirit God has placed inside you leaves
your body. It is evident in life, people can be on oxygen and still be brain dead. Physical breath or oxygen
is not what gives us life, it is the spirit that God placed on the inside of us that gives us life, and when that
spirit leaves our bodies we die and the spirit returns to the lord. 

I’m making this long journey just to help us understand that we are the temples of God. We have always
been, since from the Old Testament, but the only thing that stopped us from being a suitable place for
God’s dwelling was our sinful nature(spirit) that was a result of Adams disobedience. Because Adams
spirit was now dead (separated from God) because of sin, we also inherited that sinful nature. That was
what Jesus Christ came for. He came to change that spirit inside us, by giving us His own spirit. It was like
a way of creating us all over again. Before He departed from the world He breathed on His disciples in a
similar way the book of Genesis describes the creation of man.

“So Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” And when He
had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of
any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.””
John 20:21-23 NKJV

This act from Jesus was symbolic to the time of the creation of man. He breathed on them to symbolise the
creation of new life and making them new beings. This new life He gave us is His own life (eternal life)
and it is made manifest when we receive the Holy Spirit. And as we should all know The Holy Spirit is
God’s own spirit. It is the way God communicates with us. He speaks only what He hears from the Lord
and makes manifest to us the deep things of God. 
“But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit(Holy Spirit). For the Spirit(Holy Spirit) searches all
things, yes, the deep things of God. For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man
which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God(Holy Spirit). Now we
have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things
that have been freely given to us by God.”
I Corinthians 2:10-12 NKJV

When you received Christ you received a new spirit, that is made in true righteousness and Holiness just as
Jesus is. 

“…….. and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created
according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.”
Ephesians 4:23-24 NKJV

For God to dwell in us, He had to change our nature and make us like His son, so that when we receive His
son, our sins are now paid for and we are now forgiven and made righteous and truly Holy as His son Jesus
Christ. So as a result of us receiving Jesus’ spirit, which makes us holy, we can now receive God’s spirit
(Holy Spirit) into us which gives us communion with the father. So God’s temple now becomes your spirit.
Your spirit is that life giving part of you. It is made truly righteous and Holy. Not your body, not your soul,
but your spirit man. The bible tells us that we are the temples of the Holy Spirit. We are the temple of God
(1 Corinthians 3:16; 1 Corinthians 6:19; 2 Corinthians 6:16). 

Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?
1 Corinthian 3:16

What agreement can exist between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God.
As God has said: "I will dwell with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be
My people."
2 Corinthians 6:16

The word translated Temple here is the Greek word “NAOS”. This word translated temple in greek usually
has 2 distinct definitions; the first being Hieron & the second is Naos. Hieron is used to refer to the outer
courts of the temple in the old testament, that is where people where allowed to enter and worship and
pray. Naos on the other hand refers to the inner sanctuary of the Temple; the Holy of Holies and the Holy
Place; the place where God’s dwelling place is and is usually only accessed by the priest who where
ordained. Naos is the inner part of the temple. Naos is the Greek word translated temple in 1 Corinthians
6:16 & 6:19. Our bodies house the Spirit of the Living God (Holy Spirit). In the old covenant Naos was the
dwelling place of God, but in the new covenant our bodies have become the temple (Naos; dwelling place)
of God. This same word “Naos” which was translated temple is seen 16 times in the book of Revelation. It
is the same word used in the gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke describing the moment when Jesus was
crucified and the veils of the temple where split in two (Matthew 28:51; Mark 15:38; Luke 23:45). It was
the veil of the “Naos” that was separated. The part of the inner temple where God’s tabernacle was placed.
It’s significance was in reference to the point that God no longer dwells in the physical temple, but in the
spiritual temple of our hearts (Spirit).

People always confuse the soul and the spirit as being the same thing, but they’re not. We are 3 part
beings. You are a Spirit, you have a Soul and you live in a Body. Our soul is the mental and emotional part
of our body’s, our spirit is the life-giving part of our beings and the body is the dwelling place of the spirit
and soul here in this physical earth. Your mind, will and emotions is what makes up your soul. Your soul is
a switch between your inner man (spirit) and your outer man (body). So the soul plays a vital role in the
process also. For you to come to the full realisation of God’s Spirit and temple living in your spirit, you
have to renew your mind(soul). You have to change the way you think to the realities in God’s word. And
the only way to truly renew your mind to this truths and realities is through and understanding of the word
of God, the Bible. The word of God is alive and active. It is spirit and life. It tells us who we truly are in
the spirit. God is a spirit and all who truly worship Him, have to worship Him in the spirit and in the truth
(the word of God is that truth).
God’s temple lives inside of us. He is building us all together into His body (the church) of which His son
is the head of that body, and the body is His dwelling place. 

““However, the Most High does not dwell in temples made with hands, as the prophet says: ‘Heaven is My
throne, And earth is My footstool. What house will you build for Me? says the Lord, Or what is the place
of My rest? Has My hand not made all these things?’”
Acts 7:48-50 NKJV

“And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God
has said: “I will dwell in them And walk among them. I will be their God, And they shall be My people.””
II Corinthians 6:16 NKJV

“Now he who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him. And by this we know that He
abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us.”
I John 3:24 NKJV

“having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief
cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in
whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.”
Ephesians 2:20-22 NKJV

“But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone
does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but
the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in
you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who
dwells in you.”
Romans 8:9-11 NKJV