TO PREPARE A PLACE

And Jesus said, "Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am." (John 14:1-3)

Jesus promised that he would go and prepare a place for us to be with himself.

He promised to send us the Holy Spirit to lead us into all truth.

The Holy Spirit at Pentecost came and inaugurated the birth of the Church, which is the Body of Christ.

God poured out His Spirit on all flesh - men and women and children - on that day.

Jesus fulfilled the daily sacrifice in Himself as the Lamb of God.

Jesus fulfilled the Holy Priesthood when He became our High Priest.

At the moment of His death on the cross God the Father ripped the veil in the Temple from top to bottom.

Why?

To signify that an end to this old form of worship was fulfilled and had come to an end.

The Temple of God is now composed of living stones.

The Priesthood of God is now expanded to include every single believer in Jesus as the Messiah.

The blood sacrifice is no longer necessary. Bulls and sheep and doves are no longer laid on the altar. Instead, every single follower of Jesus is a living sacrifice to God.

Where is the place that God will prepare for us?

In Revelation 21:9-10 we see the Bride of Christ coming down out of Heaven like a city. This city is the Bride. In verse 21 it says, "I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple."

Within this city there is no Temple. Why? Because Jesus is our Temple. Yet, we are called the Temple of God where Jesus dwells.

"Behold, this is a profound mystery," Paul says in Ephesians. "I am speaking of Christ and the Church," he says when referring to how a man and woman will become one flesh.

In 2 Samuel God promises to send a Messiah from David's seed who will build a house for David, and establish a Kingdom which will have no end.

Instead of allowing David to build a Temple for God, God promises to build a Temple for David.

Yet, when Jesus came to this earth in fulfillment of this prophecy there already was a Temple in Jerusalem.

Standing in that Temple, after clearing it of the money changers, Jesus said, "Destroy this Temple and I will raise it again in three days". We know that he was speaking of the Temple of His Body.

We are His Body.

His Body. His Temple. A House for Himself. A House for us where we will be with Him.

What Jesus is building is His Church. A Bride for Himself. A Temple for God. A House for us to dwell with Him forever.

The Church, the Body, the Bride, is the promise of God fulfilled, and in process.

We are the place He is preparing for us to dwell with Him forever. He will purify His Bride until we, the living Temple, are presented holy and unblemished. Then, He will dwell within us, and we will dwell within Him.

What if the "many rooms" Jesus speaks of are the individual members of the Body? What if we are the rooms where Jesus dwells, and where we dwell within Him?

If we are the Body of Christ, and the Temple of God, and the Bride of Christ, then imagine how important it must be that we love one another.

Love is what holds us to Him, and it is what holds us to one another.

There is only one Bride. There is only one Temple of God. There is only one Body.

Let the Temple of God be built as we love one another and hold fast to Jesus, our Lord.

"As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him— you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." - 1 Peter 2:4-5

"As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you." - John 15:9-12