Temple of the Spirit

Study: # 649 –Church in the Houses From: August 24 – 30, 2010 TOPIC: "Temple of the Spirit" 1 Corinthians 2: 10, 1 Corinthians 6:17, 20

God has revealed many things to us by the Spirit; because the Spirit searches everything, even the deep things of God. The spirit of the man is the only one that knows everything there is in the man. And there isn’t anyone who knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. It is not the spirit from the world that we have received but the Spirit that comes from God so that we can know everything that has been given to us. So we do not speak the human wisdom but we speak what we have been taught by the Spirit interpreting the spiritual things for the spiritual. Those who live only for the physical life cannot understand the things of the Spirit of God. No one will be able to discover what there is in another man unless the person himself decides to uncover it. The natural person is the person that lives as if there wasn’t anything else beyond the physical life, and considers only the pure material life. That man lives limited to the things of this world and therefore cannot understand the spiritual things. When he is involved only in the things of this world, there is nothing else for him beyond that world. One must ask God for the mind of Christ because only when He lives in us are we safe from the absorbent invasion of the demands of the material things. We have escaped from the world by joining the Lord and His Kingdom. But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with Him in spirit. So, as I am one with Christ I will not allow anyone or anything of this world to dominate me. I will not allow my body to get its way; I want to remain with Christ, who inhabits in me, in purity. Paul spoke of freedom and the brothers began to interpret it at their convenience. The church of Corinth allowed the body to get its way; they did not live for the Spirit. They preferred the material things rather than the spiritual things. The stomach is made for the food, this attracted them a great deal, but the day will arrive in which both things will no longer exist. And later, what? It is better to look out for those things that can separate us from the communion with our Lord. The human being altogether is not made to disappear or to be excluded of what will be the eternal Kingdom of God, but rather to be united with Christ in this world and even more intimately in the future. If you gave your life to the Lord and were rescued and saved by Him, then your body belongs to Christ. If by one’s own right the body has been prostituted with another person, that is fornication. The body belongs to Christ. Now then, if it belongs to Christ and someone has prostituted the body, how is it possible for the body not to be affected? Fornication affects the body when it is prostituted. Paul wanted to deliver the Corinthian brothers from all this in body and soul. Other sins are external to the person such as gluttony, drugs and alcohol, but in undue sex there is sin against the body. That is why Paul said: "Flee from fornication." You cannot mingle with it or study, and even speak of it. Careful! We see this in Joseph’s life, the son of Jacob. (Genesis 39) Sometimes, it is more secure to escape than anything else. The call that has been made to us is saint and worthy. The Corinthian brothers had forgotten that their bodies were temples of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is in us, we are temple of God and our bodies are sacred for the service of the Lord. Jesus died to save us and gave His body, soul and spirit. Christ died and gave His life to save not only a part of us but all humans. Christ died to give us a redeemed soul and a pure body. So, we do not have a body to do with it as we please because that body belongs to Christ. Therefore, each one should use it, not to satisfy their own concupiscence, but for the glory of Christ. It is not up to us to use our body as we desire. We cannot allow anything to dominate us. Careful! We were bought at a price. In the cross we see the label with the price that the Lord Jesus paid for us. He considered us so valuable that He was willing to pay for us the price of His own precious blood. Being like this I cannot consider my body any more as my own possession. That is a great love, one too great to stain with pleasures that will take away from us the Spirit of God. In this life I cannot take what is not mine, I would be acting like a thief. Bates exclaimed: "The head thinks about The One (Christ) whose forehead was wreathed with thorns. The hands should work for The One whose hands were nailed in the cross. The feet are for us to launch ourselves to do the will of The One whose feet were trespassed. My body should be the temple of The One whose body was injured with pains that cannot be described. The body of the Master was very affected by a physical pain beyond our imagination. Therefore, let us be faithful to that love that has been given to us by the Lord which makes us new creatures. Let us love Christ, His sacrifice, His cross, and conserve our bodies pure for Him. Let us cultivate our spirit by means of prayer, the word, the cult, etc., and get closer to Him each day and not be in the flesh. Let us learn what Paul taught the Corinthians and walk in novelties of life. Amen.