Please, if you are not already there, turn to 1 Corinthians 3. We have read a good deal of the context. And so I'm going to read in particular verses 16 and 17, which is the text we'll be concentrating on this morning. 1 Corinthians 3. starting in verse 16. Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If any man destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, and that is what you are. Thus the written word of God which we will consider this morning, an awesome text, a very rich and profitable text. We've cried to God that he will indeed bless to every soul who hears, let's pray. Our Father, we have been reminded today of what a solemn thing it is to bring you worship, what a weighty thing it is to appear before you and to offer you our worship and our service. And you are a God great in saving grace and a God greatly to be feared for your awesome acts. You know our hearts. You know each one of us, our Father. You know our purposes. We ask that you would give us your Holy Spirit in plentiful measure so that the word of God will indeed be spoken faithfully to these people, to this congregation, and that we would be able to apply it to our lives. Grant us all your Holy Spirit. Give me help and liberty as has been prayed many times. Grant, Lord, that I may be able to speak your word faithfully with all boldness. Keep me faithful to your holy word. that only your truth may proceed forth from my mouth and to the ears of your people. And be pleased, our God, with the thoughts of our hearts, the intentions of our minds. Help us, we need your grace. We ask it in Jesus' name, amen. In January of 1979, Daring, groundbreaking magazine first hit the magazine stands. I don't suppose that many of you will remember what that magazine first edition was. The title was Self, January 1979. Now your reaction when you first saw it, saw this magazine, would depend on how much you had been influenced by the trends of our culture for the decades before self came out. For decades, People have been conditioned by entertainment, by what they call these days influencers, psychologists, politicians, human resource personnel in various companies have been preparing the culture and our people to receive this magazine, and magazines like it, So people have been taught to think that preoccupation with self was reasonable, natural, and healthy. Mental health experts assure us that we need a positive self-image. As I was thinking about this this week, I realized that not only the youngest children here have been influenced by this, these ideas, but if you were born since, I'm going to say the 1960s, you have been hearing songs, seeing programs, the most important thing for you is a positive self-image, and thus, the magazine, Self. Now, people who think biblically, when they see the magazine, Self, think, what a travesty. What an awful thing to be putting before people, without any apologies, without any justification, to think only about self. Well, the result of these trends, these preoccupations, is that independence and selfishness have become the norm for many people. Many people think that self is what everybody should be preoccupied with. Many people, non-Christians certainly, think this way about themselves, and even professionals. this way about themselves. The problem with self-image, the self-image most people are seeking, is that it's unbiblical. It's non-Christian. That's the way most people think. They don't go to the Bible, and if they do, they twist it horribly in order to justify a preoccupation with themselves. Now, it's not bad, I hasten to say, to have a self-image, but the self-image we need to have is the way God sees us. We need to see ourselves as God sees us. Well, this issue of self-image and self is true of us, not only in our individual lives, and this is what self does, self-image and self-preoccupation does, it separates people, because, of course, Again, in the new world's thinking. But this also has an impact upon our corporate identities. And I said to myself, well, the brethren understand what I mean by corporate identities. I mean group identities. We have various group associations, which form a part of our Your identity, your self-image will involve your family. See, I'm a Duwana, a very small family. It will involve your occupation. You might be a sheet metal worker. You might belong to a guild of sheet metal workers, for example. I don't know of any here. But your occupation, your nationality, and hopefully your Christianity, the way you think about yourself and your identity will evolve. Hopefully, I am a Christian and I'm thankful and not proud of myself, but proud of the grace of God. In fact, once, Self-image, one's personal self-image can never be entirely divorced from his corporate relationships. And I hope that this little introduction, I'm gonna tell you how this fits in with our text. I hope you begin to see that a self-image is rather an intricate and complex thing. So now the question is, what does this have to do with 1 Corinthians chapter 3. And if you just think about the problems that come with it, you'd say to yourself, well it has a lot to do with 1 Corinthians chapter 3, a great deal to do with these Corinthian believers. Their self-image, remember, was tied to their favorite preachers in a clearly selfish way. Paul has already been exposing their sinful self-view of themselves when he reminds them that one is saying, I am of Paul. My self-image? I'm Paul's guy. I am of Apollos. I am of Paul. I am of Christ. I am of Cephas. So you have these names, and they're saying, this is my self-image, this is my identity. And in this text that we're considering this morning, Paul is bringing a biblical self-image to bear on the Corinthians' thinking and conduct. And it did indeed involve them as individuals, but it also involved them and their church relationship. As you remember, there were problems at Corinth, big problems of attitude and division at Corinth. There were very serious consequences for the church and for those in leadership. And Paul sees these dangers and identifies them for the good of the Corinthians, because they need to understand the problems of their self-image, the way they think about themselves, and the way it divides the church. and impacts the church. And Paul sees three particular dangers. We've already looked at two of them. In verses 10 and 11, Paul speaks about the replacement of the foundation. Remember, Paul says, I was a wise master builder. I laid a foundation and other men are building on it. Let each man be careful how he builds. Paul is concerned that the foundation will be eroded away. That's a problem that he's facing at current. That's verses 10 and 11. Second thing, poor quality building. Now Paul doesn't only deal with poor quality building because he says, some men build with gold, silver, precious stones, that's good. But you can easily see that Paul is more concerned about that, is at least just as concerned. with the damage which is being done by poor quality building. And actually, the largest part of the section, verses 12-15, is taken up with poor quality building. And then the third problem, which we're looking at today, is intentional havoc and ruin, verses 16-17. I'll read them again, just to bring them before your minds. This is the third danger. Do you not know that you are a temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwells in you? If any man destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him, for the temple of God is holy, and that is what you are." Isn't that interesting that this morning Pastor Tate should take the example of Ananias and Sapphira who were defiling God with their lies, and God destroyed them. So we have an illustration already before us of what Paul is talking about in this great danger, the actual intentional havoc and ruin by some who get in the pulpit, who have pastoral responsibility, You see, it's possible, and again, I appreciate what Pastor Tate was saying this morning, because he made the point. Men can slip in. Jude talks about people who crept in unnoticed. Paul tells the Ephesian elders in Acts chapter 20, from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them. So, You might say, well, pastors are pastors. Pastors are always good and faithful. No, they are not. You have to have your eyes opened about these realities. So, this is what we're looking at today. Paul especially is addressing in verses 16 and 17, actual, intentional havoc and ruin. And the way that Paul does this, and you see how my mind was directed, I trust by God's grace to self-image as an illustration and a principle, because this is what Paul starts with in these two verses. He deals with their identity in verse 16. Do you not know that you are a temple of God, or God's temple, and the Spirit of God dwells this very dangerous situation. So, Paul reminds these Christians that the Spirit of God dwells in them. He brings up this indwelling principle of the Holy Spirit, you'll remember a little later in 1 Corinthians 6, when he says, your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. Now that's the individual infilling of the Holy Spirit, but Paul is talking now about the corporate indwelling. of the Holy Spirit. So it's not exactly the same as 1 Corinthians 6, but it is the same Holy Spirit who dwells in the church as a corporate entity. The Paul reminds these Christians the Spirit of God dwells in them. Paul is speaking of church identity. These Christians are God's temple in view of the fact that the Holy Spirit dwells in them as a church. And he's speaking again about the spiritual reality of the Holy Spirit working in the gathered church. And again, Paul is telling these people, not that they meet in a temple, but that they are God's temple. It's said before, they are God's building, and I was glad that Pastor Tate went back to that verse, because there it is, right there. He tells them, you're God's field, God's building, and since they are God's building, they are God's temple. As a matter of fact, the only building God ever had, I know they had a temple in Jerusalem, I know they had various moving tents in the history of Israel, but these people, Paul tells them, represented. They are, as a matter of fact, we should say, you are. We are. We, the people of God, who make up the Church of Jesus Christ here on Flatbush Avenue, we are God's temple. And the Spirit of God dwells in us. Not sometimes, brethren. Not sometimes. God, Spirit, dwells in His people. On days when you feel a sense, when one of those hymns you sing, your heart wells up within you, faith increases, your soul is buoyed up by the things that, yeah, those times, the Spirit of God dwells in you. But those times when you come here for one reason or another and you do not feel, the sensible presence of the Holy Spirit. We want that. We should pray for that. We should mourn when we don't have it. But, I assert, on the basis of this text in particular, in fact, the teaching of the Bible, always dwells with his people. It's not now and then, sometimes, but not all times. No, the Holy Spirit dwells with his people, and so he dwells with us so that we may worship in his presence and enjoy fellowship with him. The things that we do in our worship are the means of grace whereby we enjoy sweet communion with our God. And this is God's purpose with men. In fact, it's the very center of all God's purposes with men, from the beginning of time until the day that Jesus Christ returns, and then we go and we dwell with God forever in the new heavens and the new earth. This is God's ultimate purpose with men. It's realized in the New Covenant, in the Church. It was really this way at Corinth, so that as the Church gathered for worship, for prayer, for fellowship, for evangelism, for benevolence, they were God's temple. And again, that is what we are. Now, we need to go a little bit further to understand posthumine. Because the Bible, the New Testament in particular has, and Pastor Tate knows this, has two words for temple, by the way, two words. Hieron. which involved all the temple buildings, the court of the Gentiles, all the furniture, all the place in the temple. That was here around, that was the temple. But then there was Naos, and Naos was the holy of holies. It was that place where the high priest entered only once a year with blood on the day of atonement. That was the word that Paul uses here. the temple, the Holy of Holies. And you know, again, that people, not anybody could just go into the Holy of Holies and do what they pleased. You know, you go in the wrong time, the wrong way, God will strike you dead. But when Jesus died on the cross, Righteous Hebrews tells us that the veil of the temple was split from top to bottom. Read some background information on that. And they said that this was a very thick veil that man could not easily tear. But God took his finger and split it. And he made the way of access into the most holy place. And here's the awesome fact. that when we gather for worship, we are brought by the Holy Spirit into the closest communion with God that men can know this side of glory. That's what Paul is saying. You are the Temple, the Naos, the Holy of Holies. You are the place where the Holy Spirit dwells. You are the place where you have the closest communion with God that man ever knows in this life. So that's what Paul's saying. And again, Paul's reminding them of their identity. And I hope you appreciate what we're hearing here. This is profound. and profoundly affects our view of what we're doing and how God deals with us. The way that Paul asks this question is challenging. Do you not know? Paul, in his Greek writing, he could ask a question that the answer's obvious. That's what he's doing here. For example, I'll give you an example of this. Imagine you children went out to the park. on a lake where there was ice and you could do some ice skating, but you know, it's starting to get warm and the ice was starting to melt and you get out on there and you fall through the ice and somebody has to fish you out. What does your mother say? Didn't you know that that was dangerous? You see the way it's asked? Didn't you know it was dangerous? The question is the answer as well. That's the way Paul writes this. Don't you know that you are the temple, the naos of the Holy Spirit? Didn't you know? Again, the Corinthians reading it in the Greek would have known. Paul's not just asking a question, he's making a bold are and you ought to have known you ought to have known that the ice was too thin to be safe and the Corinthians ought to have known that they were the temple of the Holy Spirit you know it's it's a it's a challenge and it's reproof to these people because they're not thinking that way you're not thinking that way about their self-identity their corporate identity is the church of Jesus Christ they ought to be that's true of us brethren into the worship of God, being members of Christ's church. We are a living temple, not a physical, not the physical building of churches where they would basically say, you know, that your building is God's temple. There was a little girl one time who understood what was being said and it wasn't, what was being said was not good. She thought that any statue in there was God. And that the building of the church was a real temple. She asked her parents one time, why they turned the light off on God? Why you turn the light off on God? Well, that was an awful misconception. That's a little girl. So, here Paul, with an edge of reproof, reminds the Corinthian Christians, don't you know, do you not know, that you are the temple of God? It's like that question Jesus would ask the Pharisees. Have you never read? Don't you know? You ought to know. This is a reproving reminder. The vital identity of the people of God. That's how Paul starts this section. And the way Paul wants them to think about this is, again, related to church building. Paul's in this section where he's talking about the way people build, the way ministers build, and in one sense, brethren, the way we as members build. So that's the vital identity. Don't you know that you are a temple of God, a temple of God That's verse 16. At the beginning of verse 17, there is a warning involved in their identity. A warning involved in their identity in verse 17a. If any man destroys my translation, defiles that word, it has a broad enough range of meaning to include both of those things. If any man defiles or destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him. Actually, the word in the first half and the second half of the verse are identical. So, the word defiles in your translation is the identical word as destroyed. So, I think I appreciate that. better. If any man destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him. That's the way Paul writes. God will not take lightly those actions which defile or destroy his church. Vicious men labor to destroy. Now that puts a little light on Ananias and Sapphira. Exactly what Paul's talking about here is what God did with Ananias and Sapphira. Maybe they thought, no big deal, no big deal. You know, we want to keep back some of this money. we would like the reputation of being very generous Christian people. That's what was in their hearts and in their minds and in their discussion. Boy, Barnabas, everybody loves Barnabas. Yeah, and there was other Christians who sold their property and gave it to the church. Everybody's looking up to them. Their name is on everyone's list. On the prayer meeting, people are thanking God for Barnabas and thanking God for this brother and this sister. They're thanking God because they think he's done something great. You know, we would like to do something great. I know a young man. He wants to do great things for God. Well, spiritual ambition is a dicey thing, if I can put it this way. You want to be. You don't want just a reputation. What you are, in reality, you want to be that person, you see. If you're going to get credit, you want to be that person. Not just get the reputation. Ananis and Sapphire said, we want the reputation. So here's what we're going to do. We want the reputation and we want our money too. We want to sit at both ends of the table, as it were, and taste every dish. So, We'll sell our property and we'll put some of that money at the apostles' feet. Now it doesn't say whether they gave the apostles 10% or 90%, and it really doesn't matter. They lied to God. They lied to the people of God. And they gave this much when they had sold it for this much. And interestingly, in the following context in Acts there, Peter reproached him and said, while it was yours, was it not in your own power? You didn't have to say you were giving it all. You didn't have to give it all. But the problem is that you thought you would lie to God. Actually, you just, you just, no, no, let's put it, let's put it right. What did they do? They said, it's just Peter. We'll just lie to Peter. No big deal. It's not like we're lying to God. They were wrong, weren't they? awfully wrong, because Peter reproves him and says, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit? You have not lied to men, but to God. Now, that's a fearful thing. Get hold of that principle. It's a very easy thing, not only to have the wrong self-assessment, but the wrong pastoral assessment, the wrong leadership assessment. I'm just lying to him. I'm just lying to her. No! You're lying to God's people! I tell you what, we shouldn't really be worried about lying to anyone. Lying at all. Peter sets them straight. See, Peter sets the rest of the church straight. God, the Holy Spirit, sets the rest of the people straight. This is how serious it is. This is how serious it is. God will not take lightly those actions which defile his church or destroy his church. God will respond in kind. Evidently, what Paul's doing in 1 Corinthians 3 is indicating that some men have wormed their way into the leadership and they work to destroy. God's action here, God's action in Acts 5, reveals what God thinks of it, you see. So, Ananias and Sapphira say, not a big deal, come on, that's not so much. God says, yes, a very big deal. with very evil consequences for my church. It's defiling my church, it's destroying my church, and guess what? I'm not gonna stand for it. God takes it personally. So, that's what God does. Paul points this out. God is actually pointing out what some men did. Some men are doing to the church what evil kings do in the Old Testament temple. You remember some kings brought other gods, other idols. They modified the temple so that it looked like the temple in Damascus. Manasseh was one of those kings. They modified the temple, they changed it, they destroyed it. That's what they did. So, the Old Testament temple was designed to be a dwelling of God by way of type, but the church is not a type. A church is the reality, that's what Paul is saying. You ought to know, a church is God's temple and the Holy Spirit does dwell. So that the things that we do, we have in this place, in our public worship, we do to God, we do them to God's temple. So again, one of the things we need to understand about this is that innovative worship is not a neutral thing. And a lot of churches today, they are what they call seeker-sensitive churches. That's a buzzword in the evangelical community. How do you order your worship? Well, we want seekers, you see? And it sounds very spiritual and evangelistic, but it's actually not. We don't have the right. to customize and change God's worship so that people will like it. What we wanna make worship is what God likes. That's John chapter four, right? John chapter four. Think about that text where Jesus says that the Father seeks worshipers who will worship him in spirit and in truth. Real, spiritual, personal engagement with the living God That's worship in truth. Spiritual is with our entire being, as one man liked to put it in a useful term, with all our redeemed humanity, all our faculty, so that my mind is engaged, my heart is engaged, my will is going out in acts of worship to God. And the Father seeks worshipers. to worship him in spirit and in truth. So, who are we supposed to be pleasing when we order our worship? When we think about the question, well, how should we start our worship? What should be the first thing we do in our worship? I'll put it this way. Here's an issue. Where do the announcements belong? See, in a lot of churches, The announcements don't come at the beginning of the worship. Why not? Because most of the people aren't there – yet. And so they sing the first hymn, maybe the second hymn, and then before the offering, well, we have these announcements now, we'll be meeting at 7.30 on Tuesday, or whatever. Is it 7 here on Tuesday or 7.30? I forget. But, you get my point. The question is not what pleases God. What makes worship convenient for people? That's why some churches have an espresso machine in the foyer of the building. Because that's what gets people. That's what people want. The question is not what people want. We don't innovate and customize our worship to please people. Because God has a certain worship He wants. and your worship, if it becomes innovative, if it becomes merely to please people, that's defiling God's worship. And you dare not mess with God's worship. All the questions of worship have to do with these issues. The church is the temple of God. The Spirit of God dwells with His people. very careful what you do with God's worship. And again, Paul is saying, yeah, people are doing it on purpose. They would never say that. They would never say, who cares what pleases God? We want people in our church. They would never say that. And I'm sure some of these people who are modifying church worship just to please people would never say that. But you see, God knows the hearts, right? God knows the hearts. Think back to those seven letters of the seven churches and the one place where they had this woman Jezebel, God said, okay, I'm going to throw her on a bed of sickness, I'm gonna kill her children with pestilence and all the churches will know that I see the heart. That's what Paul's talking about. If any man destroys, modifies, defiles God's temple, God will destroy him. And then what Paul does in our text is Paul takes a step back, as it were, the reason for God's strong action in verse 17b. Paul had already basically said this kind of thing. earlier in the verse, right? It said, if any man destroys the temple of God, well, God will destroy him, for the temple of God is holy. It's holy. Holiness is that concept, something which is set apart for sacred use. You had bulls and snuffers, you had a big vessel of water in the temple, why? for holy purposes. You had holy people. The priests were holy. That is, they were set apart for God's use. The anointing oil, the fragrant incense were all specially designed for God's use. And nobody else could make those proportions for perfume for themselves. Because it's holy. It's separated for God. That's what holiness is. Separate of a special use and a special value. Paul says, here's the reason for God's very strict action. The temple of God is holy. That's what you are. Now, think about this for a moment. Think about who Paul's writing to. He's writing to the Corinthians. They had a lot of problems. There were a lot of ways in which the Corinthian Christians were not very holy. But that's what they should have been. And that was God's purpose and design for them. That's why he gave them the leaders that they did, why he gave them the Apostle Paul, so that they would be holy people and they would not defile God's temple. This is what Paul does. He gives the reason for the strong reaction of God, and that should have touched the hearts and minds of the Corinthian Christians. God has set his people apart for himself. So, again, the people that God has directed to is these Corinthian Christians. And this relationship here, I'll try not to be too long on this point, but there's a relationship here between the people in charge and the people in the pew. Because what Paul's speaking to now is the people in the pew. You are God's temple. It's not just the pastors are. It's not just the preachers are. No, it's the whole church. So the whole church has a stake in the holiness of the worship and then the glory of God. Pastor Tate has a very weighty responsibility. Being a pastor at City of New Baptist Church, he does. His responsibility does not negate yours. Because you brethren, as long as the worship of God is being conducted honorably to him, very good. But should the day ever come, and I'm not saying it is, I'm not saying it has, but should the day ever come when somebody stands in this pulpit and starts redirecting you to worldly worship, to carnal worship, to unbiblical worship or life, somebody's gonna have to stand up and say, not here! Never here! And it doesn't matter who the man is, whom you have to face down. Because you, brethren, are God's temple. God dwells here. I agree 100% on this point. Because, you know, you already know the news. He's not going to be here forever. I'm not going to be here forever. Some of you are going to have to face it. Get ready. Be ready. Be clear on who you are and what it is you're doing in this place. A couple of things by way of final application. A couple of applications. Beware of becoming man-worshippers. Beware of becoming man-worshippers. That's a problem with the Corinthians, don't you know? I'm of Paul, I'm of Apollos, I'm of Cephas. Those are good men. But you never want to have your identity tied to mere men, but to God. Beware becoming man worshipers, even good men worshipers. Even angels don't want you worshiping them, and good men don't want you worshiping them either. But you see, that's where it started with the Corinthians. It started with too great an opinion of men. You have to watch it. Beware of becoming man-worshippers. You may and you should value those who are faithful to you. You really ought to, and actually Paul says that in Philippians chapter 4. I won't turn you there, you can look it up and see where Paul tells you that you ought to highly esteem men like these. That's right, but not worship, and they don't replace God, and they don't replace God's Word. So be very careful about becoming a man or men worshippers. I could go much further and tell you people are being women worshipers also, because I'm telling you, brethren, there are churches today where women worship. They wouldn't, they won't, you know, they wouldn't say that themselves. No, but that's what's happening. We want to be. worshippers of God, because we're God's temple and God is here. Let me urge you to at least make it a matter of prayer that you really care, you are really truly compassionate for people who are going the wrong way. Sometimes, somebody will preach about this in at least one sermon, maybe a series of sermons. Think about what Paul says here. If any man destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him. That ought to bother you on a number of fronts. First of all, it ought to bother you about yourself. I need to be worried about myself because if I go there for anybody who takes the initiative to try to tamper with God's worship. And if I started doing that, then you ought to pity me, and you ought to rebuke me, and you ought to pray for me. But isn't that true of anyone? Do we hobnob with people who are defiling God's worship? and we never say anything to them? Does it not matter that people are destroying God's worship and they don't realize that they are putting themselves in the crosshairs of God's bow? At the very least, you have friends like that, you know people like that, you certainly ought to be praying for them. Oh God, open their eyes. They're blinded, Satan has them in his grip. But if you do nothing, you say nothing. Are you being a faithful friend to them? Are you showing them the kind of compassion they desperately need? I know, I know we can't push a switch and turn them around, but we can certainly pray. Can we say something? Great God, give me something to say that will reach their hearts. Don't be callous. Don't be careless. Think about it. There are people all around us with the name of Christian. God is going to destroy you. So, Don't be careless about these kinds of people. Further, one more. Remember where your children are growing up. And I'm not just talking about kids who are now in their teens, I'm talking about children who have grown up in the previous generation, who've been in this place. Think about it. They've been growing up in the self-culture. and your children now, these children in this place are growing up in the self-culture, and they're being told that the most important thing is that they have a good self-image, they feel good about themselves, not like the Puritans. Remember, that's what your children are growing up with, that's what the children who have been born here in the last year or two are gonna grow up with, this culture. And their parents have a weighty responsibility to teach their children the truth effectively, to model the truth for their children. And those of us who have good relations with friends, we need to realize this is what the children are growing into. I teach now at a Christian school, you know that, brethren? And I'm seeing it. I'm seeing that children are thinking now, well, whatever makes me happy. I mean, those are commercials, in case you haven't seen them. Whatever makes me happy is good for me. Lies. Poisonous lies. That's why we need to preach the gospel. We need to tell sinners that they need to repent of their self-centered, selfish ways, which can be so subtle. It's over. I mean to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ, that Jesus Christ died to redeem men and women, boys and girls from selfishness, from the worship of self, from the worship of the world. And Jesus, by his grace, will make you happier in the long run, in eternity, than anything you can experience in this life. Remember the words of Jesus, what shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his soul? Let's pray and ask God to help us with these weighty principles from this very significant text. God will help us to respond with believing faith and obedience.