John Gunter: Hey, everyone. This is John Gunter. Thank you for listening to this podcast. I'm the preaching minister at the Eagle Community Church of Christ in Mont Belvieu, Texas. You found our teaching podcast where we're right at the end of a series we've called Emmanuel A Study of God's Dwelling Places.
Week one we talked about the garden and God's plan there. Week two we talked about the tabernacle. Week three Solomon's Temple. And here in the last week we talk about Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Again, I'm so thankful that you would tune in and let me encourage you if you haven't listened to the others, go do that It's helpful to see how God from beginning of the Bible to the end in Revelation wants to live and wants to dwell with all of us.
So again, we thank you. Come see us sometime.
John Gunter: And we are so glad that each of you are here this morning. Today is our last sermon in the series that we have called Emmanuel as we study God's dwelling places from the beginning of the Bible to the end which we will cover today. And again just as a reminder this is the book that I've used to kind of help shape that. That is the Temple and the Tabernacle. That is Daniel Hayes is the author.
Doctor Hayes, when we went and visited him, I got see him in a seminar. He was teaching through a book for a lot of different pastors and everybody there called him Danny, but I am not brave enough to do that. So he was doctor Hayes, but a really, really good resource right here if you're interested in that. We have used this this verse from Matthew as kind of our centering thought as we've gone through the series. Again, from Matthew one verse 22, all this took place to fulfill what the lord had said through the prophet.
The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son and they will call him Emmanuel which means what church? God with us. Thank you for saying that. Donald and Sue have to sit through two services. They gotta say it twice.
So you're you're good. Thank you for for doing that and hopefully as we have gone through this series you have seen the reason we have studied that because a lot of us have have some bad have had some bad teaching about who God is And so as we've studied this, we've seen over and over that God has desired to live and dwell among us. Have we not? We began in the garden three weeks ago as God wanted to live as he created everything and called it good. His desire was to walk right alongside Adam and Eve.
There was no holy place, most holy place. He was just gonna live with them. And of course we know how that turned out, don't we? Two weeks ago we talked about the tabernacle as God, though things had to change, he couldn't walk side by side anymore because of the sin who had entered the world, God still desired to be with his people. So he did that through the tabernacle.
And then after that, of course, last week, we studied the temple and how Solomon built this elaborate temple for God to inhabit. And and though Solomon didn't really follow all of God's commandments and building them or or what he had, God still decided to live within that temple, to have his presence within that place. Anybody else's view of Solomon changed after last week? Kinda hard to read it the same again. I'm sorry for that.
But it's interesting I think when we come to a story like that and we're so used to reading it with American eyes, reading it through our the lens of our culture. We we like houses. We like beautiful houses. We like things well put together. And so we get to a story about something so elaborate and nice.
We're like, yeah. Right? And then what we found out was the writers kind of giving you hints all along that Solomon is not really doing this the right way, is he? And so, from that point on, god, of course, as as I reminded you last week, god does not just run away when Solomon has too many horses, does he? Saul, god does not just leave his presence out of the temple because Solomon got a bunch of gold and silver, did he?
The reason God leaves the temple is that the hearts of the people have turned away from him. This is not I went out and just you know had a lapse and lost my temper while I was driving and God's gonna run away from This is God looks at these people who he loves and is trying to dwell with and they have said, no thanks. I'll worship these other gods, these other idols. And so, that's actually what it takes for God to say, okay. We've got to separate.
We've got to go away. To understand the rest of the story, you have to go to Ezekiel. Ezekiel was a prophet of God and he is blessed by God with this vision of of kind of God's presence leaving the temple and and the big why as to why that happened. So when God comes to the prophet Ezekiel, the Israelite people are now far away from home. They had been captured.
They had been exiled. And of course, you remember that was their promised land that they got to. Right? And so can you imagine if you got to the promised land that God had given you and all of a sudden you looked around and you thought, man, other nations are conquering us and taking us to other places, you'd have a lot of questions, wouldn't you? Is is God not real?
Is God not as powerful as maybe these other gods that these other places are that they have? That was a big question. You go back to some of the stories that we've covered when you look at Elijah. That was a battle of the gods. Right?
Let your god show up. Let ours show up. See what happens. So, was a fall but when god comes to Ezekiel, what he shows Ezekiel over and over, he he gives him this vision of back in the temple. And over and over, God takes Ezekiel to these different places throughout the temple where people are doing things kind of in the shadows.
They're not making sacrifices to God. They're worshiping other gods. They have followed other idols. And what Ezekiel is is shown there is that God wants to be there but the the people have said no. The people have followed other other gods and that is the reason why god has left.
And so from that point on, there are six hundred years between the time that God's presence inhabits the temple before God decides to show back on earth. And how does it get here? Jesus. Right? And that's what we're gonna cover today.
We're we're we call this Jesus and the spirit. I could've just as easily called it Jesus and the spirit and you and you'll see in just a just a few minutes why. I am gonna cover a lot of scripture and a lot of times I I love to read scripture because we're just not getting enough, I think, a lot of times. But today, we're gonna skip around. So if you miss anything and you need it, don't have time, let me know.
I can send you send you these slides or whatever you need. So, let let's get going as we we talk about this. We go back to Ezekiel 36 verse 24. God is telling Ezekiel here. He says, for I will take you out of the nations.
I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back to your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you and you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. So, what's going on here is god is is telling Ezekiel in this moment that listen, I know it feels bad. You're in exile.
You're not around your home, but I do have a plan. We are gonna make this thing right. Now, again, this is kinda like when we talk about Jeremiah twenty nine eleven being taken out of context. You know, we're okay with the I have plans to prosper you. You know, we're good with that part.
We're just not good with the, oh, it's gonna be seventy years part. And so that's why Ezekiel's seeing here. You know, I'm not I'm not giving you a date, but here's my plan. I will sprinkle you clean. We will make this right.
He says, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. Hard heart. Heart that's open. We pray for that all the time, right?
That's what he's saying here. And I will put my spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. What's God's plan here? I'm going to give you my spirit, he says to Ezekiel. Now I can't imagine what Ezekiel thought in this moment.
How he thought this, you know, how he comprehended this playing out. This is what God says. I have a plan to make you clean. I have a plan to give you my spirit. And John John is a whole lot different from Matthew, Mark, and Luke.
Anybody read that? You know. It just begins, middle, and end. It's just different. In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God.
That's how John wants to start his gospel and tell you, this guy we're talking about is god and skip down 14 verses later. He said, the word became flesh and made his dwelling where? Among us. God made his dwelling among us. Now that word made his dwelling is the verb form of tabernacle.
He you could say he tabernacle among us. You see the tie? The god dwells within the tabernacle and god's desire is still to live among us. So, he sends his son and he makes his dwelling among us. Says, we have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only son who came from the father full of grace and truth.
In John chapter two, it says, as Jesus and these Jewish people are sitting here talking, the Jews responded to him, what sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this? So John has told you in the beginning who Jesus is, but obviously these people don't believe. Right? So they're asking, what authority do you have? What can you show me to make me believe this?
Jesus answered them, destroy this temple and I will raise it again in three days. They replied, it has taken forty six years to build this temple and you're gonna raise it in three days. Uh-huh. Yeah. But the temple he had spoken of was his body.
After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken. So, what what you're seeing right there is insight. Like, we didn't get it at We didn't understand what he was saying. There's a lot of things Jesus says where people like, alright.
Go us and then later, you'll you'll get this quite a few times throughout the gospels. Oh, yeah. I remember when he said that and that's what he's doing. That's what John is saying here. We didn't know what he was talking about there but later, we realized that he was talking about his body.
So so the temple was in that effect Jesus' body. He said, you tear it down. I'll I'll raise it in three days. Now we also think there's something else going on here because we think Jesus is kinda doing a little double entendre where he's taught, he is talking about his body but he's also talking about the temple. Remember, they they looked out at this and you you can read other places of scripture.
Look at these stones. Jesus said, not one of them is gonna be laid on top of the other. Remember that? You can go to Israel right now. Well, I don't think you can.
I think they just locked it down because of the new COVID variant. But if you get a chance to go to Israel, these are the stones from the temple that Jesus is looking at. You can walk right up to them, touch them. As I showed you the picture yet last week about the the Muslim mosque, the dome of rock up up top. That's all flat and things were just pushed off and you can walk right up beside this.
You can see them all on this side. Ain't that fantastic? This many years afterward. I mean you're talking almost two thousand years and you can go and touch them. By the way, just as I thought it was awesome.
You see these little you see where these people are lined up. You see these little doors? That's where the money changers were. When Jesus gets really upset, grabs a whip, and starts doing some don't know what. So the money changers were sitting up here taking advantage of people when Jesus said, oh, you don't turn my my father's house into this den of thieves.
He says different things there. Yeah. You can go right here and and and believe that's what Jesus is saying. Both his body and this temple that you guys look at and you have so much pride in. But guess what scripture doesn't tell us that God's presence ever existed in Herod's temple that he was talking about that they were looking at.
He's in Solomon's but never is it mentioned in Herod. So it's six hundred years before Jesus God in the form of Jesus comes into the world again. From Hebrews chapter 10, and I love where where Heath went this morning for our communion thoughts. He should have kept reading a few more verses. He'd really nailed it.
And I may read that at the end, Heath. Hebrews 10, the the Hebrew book is really just a sermon. And the whole theme of the sermon of Hebrews is Jesus is greater, Jesus is enough. I mean, that's it. He's talking about, you know, comparing to Moses, comparing to the angels, comparing to anything, comparing to the sacrifices we have.
Jesus is it. That's all we need. So, from Hebrews 10, it says, therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way open for us through the curtain, that is his body and since we have a great priest over the house of god, let us draw near to god with a sincere heart and with the and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. What you see here, you remember in the tabernacle and the temple, everyone was welcome in the courtyard. You remember that?
And you walk right into the room that was the the the holy place. And all the Levitical priests were allowed there. And then there was the most holy place which only the high priest was allowed there. You see? And what you have is a graduation of holiness.
You know, you had to be so holy to to enter this place and even the holy priest and the holy of holies, you know, one time a year have to have the incense burning, had to be ripe. And what the Hebrew writer is saying here because of the sacrifice of Jesus, none of that is necessary. That we all have access to the glory of God now, which by the way is what God wanted in the beginning, wasn't it? As God created man and he walked alongside, that's what he wanted, and we walked away. And so now through the blood, through the sacrifice, Jesus, we get to all experience that if we put our trust in him.
In Acts two, this is this is more familiar to us, right? And we'll get to a point here and you may can quote some of this. When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly, sound like a blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated it and came to rest on each of them.
All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the spirit enabled them. I'm gonna start speaking in no. There's somebody got nervous right there. We're not talking about that, but notice how the fire comes down. What they what they notice is the fire.
You notice that theme in scripture when God shows up in fire? You get this cleansing, get this pure aspect. So in Acts two, when the church is beginning, what they experience is these tongues of fire coming to rest on them. The sign that God is showing up as he had promised. Again, Ezekiel 36 that we read.
Right? And so that's what you you start experiencing. Verse 14 of Acts two. Then Peter stood up with the 11, raised his voice, and addressed the crowd. Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you.
Listen carefully to what I say. These people are not drunk. They thought they lost their mind. They thought they'd lost it. He said, these people are not drunk because you suppose it's only nine in the morning.
They've got a real problem if they're already drinking. Right? There there there's some stuff going on that they can't comprehend. What is happening here? He said, no, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel.
Peter is saying here, look at your Bible. Now, they didn't have access to the Bible like we do but he's saying, go read the scripture. We read Ezekiel. He's saying, alright, go back and read the prophet Joel. Here is what god told the prophet Joel.
He said, in the last days, god says, I will pour out my spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy. Your young men will see vision. Your old men will see or will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my spirit in those days and they will prophesy.
So, another promise that god will pour out his spirit on his people. He says, I will show wonders in the heavens above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the lord and everyone who calls on the name of the lord will be saved. Amen. This is god's desire for us.
Again, the he pours out his spirit into us. That's kind of different from Jonathan Edwards sermon, right? The the view that that God hates you so much that he is so pure and we are so filthy that he doesn't want anything to do with us. But what we have seen through all of this is that God's constant desire is to be with us. That's what we see in scripture.
And God pours his spirit out on his people. In verse 32, God has raised this Jesus to life and we are all witnesses of it. Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear. He said, Jesus fulfilled this. Go read Joel.
Go read what god has said about this promise of the holy spirit and he's saying, what you're seeing right now is that happening. You're seeing fulfillment of scripture that god is pouring out his holy spirit to his people. The people who believe in him. Verse 36, you guys can all quote with me if you want to. This is our theme verse, right?
Therefore, let all Israel be assured of this. God has made this Jesus whom you crucified both lord and Messiah. When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, brothers, what shall we do? Peter replied, repent and be baptized, everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and you will receive the gift of what church? The Holy Spirit.
The promise is for you and your children and for all those who are far off, for all whom the Lord God will call. Peter saying, go read your Bible. God promised to give you his spirit. You're seeing that right now. All you have to do is repent, believe in him, repent, be baptized, and you, all of you, get the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Ain't that awesome? Ephesians two, this is Paul speaking here. He says it this way, consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers but fellow citizens with God's people and also member of his household. Built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him, the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the lord and in him, you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which god lives by the spirit.
Now, what you should hear in this verse is not just an individual thing as in is just about me but also a communal thing. But it's not just about me but it's also about the church. That God has this desire to dwell among his people and just like we talked about you remember when we talked about the Lord's Prayer. Some of you were here when we went over that. And it's not, hey, Lord, would you give me this?
God, I really need it. You know, we use a lot of I language, me language, right? But when god, when Jesus teaches his disciples how to pray, he says, give us this day our daily bread. He uses this communal language. Can you imagine that?
The people of god should be focused on the needs of others. That we care. We say we are following god who is love and we should love other people and that's how Jesus teaches people to pray. But here he says, he built together become a dwelling in which god lives by his spirit. In Corinthians three, he says, don't you know that you yourselves are god's temple and that god's spirit dwells in your midst.
So, who's the temple? Yeah. If anyone destroys god's temple, god will destroy that person. For god's temple is sacred and you together are that temple. Going back to Hebrews.
What the Hebrew writer is saying right there, because of what Jesus did this can happen. Because Jesus sacrifice was enough. Remember when we talked about some of us had this idea kind of like Jonathan Edwards that we just God can't be around sin. He just can't be around you. He will not so any little sin God flees.
And we don't see that do we In scripture. Now if you decide to follow another God or another idol or whatever it is, you're at camp and the golden calves come out. You're like Aaron, you're just as surprised as anybody. Don't know what happened. Lord, I'm just sitting here roasting my marshmallow.
Didn't catch it on fire though because I'm a good Christian. Right? That's the best way to cook a marshmallow. I didn't get any booze so that's good. We got some good folks in here.
But I mean, you're you're you're looking at this and and god just wants to dwell with you Because of Jesus' sacrifice, he purifies us all. Remember that promise to Ezekiel? I'm gonna purify. I'm gonna make you clean. No longer is it necessary for the continual sacrifice.
Jesus is enough. So what this tells us if you're sitting here this morning thinking, man, you don't know about my life right here. You don't know about my struggles. You gotta wrestle with scripture, not me because scripture tells you right here, Jesus is enough to cover anything you have done if you would just follow God. That's it.
Repent. Come back to him. Corinthians six continuing on. He says, what agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God.
As God has said, I will live with them and walk among them and I will be their God and they will be my people. It's his desire. That goes back to Exodus. Right? Revelation 21.
So we have gone from Genesis in week one all the way to Revelation. Revelation 21 and John is seeing these visions. He says, then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. For the heaven and the earth had passed away. There was no longer any sea.
I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from god. Prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband and I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, look, god's dwelling place is now where? The people. And he will dwell with them. They will be his people and god himself will be with them and be their god.
He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain for the old order of things is passed away. Somebody say amen. I'm ready for that. Right?
But God God is gonna give us such a beautiful gift of being enough that we don't have to experience all the negative things that we experience. The god, again, in the garden, he wanted to provide everything for us and let us have all that we wanted except the one thing. And here at the end, God is saying, I'm gonna dwell among you again. We're gonna be together for all time and I will take care of every need. Verse 22 of that same chapter, John says, I did not a temple in the city because the lord god almighty and the lamb are its temple.
No longer do we need a certain place with certain dimensions or certain levels of holiness. You don't go to a place to worship god. God is the temple. You just go to god because of what Jesus has done for you. Isn't that beautiful?
The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it. For the glory of god gives it light and the lamb is its lamp. So then the angel showed me the river we're in chapter 22 of the water of life. As clear as crystal flowing from the throne of God and of the lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life bearing 12 crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month, and the leaves of the trees are for the healing of the nations.
No longer will the there be any curse. The throne of God and of the lamb will be in the city. And his servants will serve him. They will see his face and his name will be on their foreheads. There will be no more night.
They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun for the lord god will give them light and they will reign forever and ever. What you hear here is just the the culmination of the rest of scripture. That god created in Genesis this perfect thing that he called good and that he wanted. He desired to have this relationship. The rest of scripture is us walking away from that.
And we have times going back and then, you know, we quickly fall away. And here in Revelation, John sees this vision of where at the end of all things, god again dwells with his people. There is no barrier to god. There's no fence to climb. There's no door to enter.
God is there and he provides the light. And through the blood of Jesus Christ, we all have access. Amen? Yes. We got a few points as we as we close.
Number one, god is not there. He is here. How many times do we think? Maybe when we pray, maybe it's just our in our general thought about God that God is like up on his throne, away from things. Maybe you think about, I don't wanna pray and ask God for such and such.
Because he's probably pretty busy because a lot of people have it rougher than I do. Anybody do that? I do. Yeah. Because we have this vision of god.
It's just, you know, somewhere else but what do we read today? Where is god? He's right here. The god in the Old Testament promised to pour out his spirit and then the New Testament, you see Peter saying, remember this? Remember when god said, remember when god promised Joel?
God's gonna pour out his spirit. You are the temple now. You are that person. God inhabits you. He's not somewhere else.
When you walk away from this place later today, you don't walk away from god. God goes with you. God is inside you. If you're a believer in him, you've been baptized for the forgiveness of your sins. You have been given the gift of the holy spirit.
So god is not there. He's right here. Number two, what we see in scripture is restoration, not condemnation. Again, the idea that some of us still carry with us that God is always just looking around every corner waiting for us to mess up. Is that what we've covered in the last four weeks?
Is that what you have seen of god in scripture these last four weeks? God's desire is not to dwell among us so he gets a better view of Paul so when he messes up or does whatever he can really get him. God decide god wants to dwell among us to restore that relationship that was lost in the garden so so many years ago. That's the the whole point of scripture is god getting back in that relationship, that right relationship with us. Restoration, not condemnation.
That's a whole lot better story to tell the world, isn't it? Jonathan Edwards sermon doesn't really preach, does it? Any of you go out this week and tell everybody they were like an insect being held over a fire or a venomous snake? Nobody led with that? Because that's not the picture of God.
When God pulls away is when we have decided we don't wanna be there Because God created people who could love him back, not people that had to. And so if you wanna move away from God, just decide to work at something. Decide to worship another God, have another idol in your life, have your priorities way out of whack. And you can pull away from God. But it's not because God is sitting there waiting for you to just say the wrong word while you're driving or not tip at lunch today.
Whatever the case may be. Number three, you are the temple. And we've covered this scripture, Lee, so I think you've got it. But I think the point here that I want to make is we have to carry that thought with us wherever we go. You are not the temple when you come into this room.
Well, you are but that's not the only time. You carry this with you. You are the temple no matter where you are. You leave these doors today, you are the temple of God. We are the temple of God collectively.
But you are also the temple of God no matter where you go this week. And so if I know that I am the temple of God, if I know that I've been given the gift of the Holy Spirit, which by the way we're going to talk about in a series coming up this next year. But if I know that, if I remember that I have this gift that it's got to affect me. Don't be sitting out here saying, this is just the way I am. Listen, Spirit of God has been given to you.
If you would just let go and let God handle some of this stuff. If you would ask God to help you in whatever the whatever it is that you're struggling with or not sure you can even change. Once you let go and let God handle that. You are the temple. And what a blessing that is that God would love you so much.
He want to come and even dwell with inside you with his holy spirit. So that's my challenge for this church. This week and every day going forward. That as we go about our lives that we understand who we are, whose we are. That we are God's that he has given us this sacrifice that is enough.
It's enough for all the things you have done that you're worried about that you don't think you can change that you're sitting here this morning saying boy I'd love to become a Christian but I need to fix or I need to learn or I need to the list has how long. Jesus is enough. But you don't get that gift if you never come to him. If you're just gonna sit there and try to handle it yourself, good luck. So what a blessing it is to have the Holy Spirit with you, helping you, guiding you, interceding in prayer for you, all the things that those things.
This morning, if you need to come back to Jesus, if you need to come to Jesus for the time, make it right now that you can walk with him. We're gonna offer an invitation song. We'd love to to pray with you if that needs to happen. We'd love to praise god if you got something you'd love for this church to know about. We'd love to do that as well.
Start that relationship with god. Restore that relationship if you lost it. But don't leave here without doing no stuff.