Holy Land

For the first time, and quite possibly the last time, my wife and I are traveling to Israel. We will see many of the places where the great stories of the Bible took place. We will walk the roads of what is called the Holy Land.

What we won't see in Israel is the temple in Jerusalem. We'll see partial ruins of where it once stood, but the temple itself was destroyed in the first century and never rebuilt. All that remains is the Western Wall, what is called the Wailing Wall.

However, it's not entirely true to say that I won't see God's temple while on my trip to Israel. In fact, I'll see that temple every morning when I look in the mirror, just as I do every day. The apostle Paul twice told the Christians in Corinth that God's temple still stands today:

Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you? (1 Corinthians 3:16).

Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? (1 Corinthians 6:19).

I am a temple of God because God lives in me. He comes to live in every person who is born again of water and Spirit.

While preaching to non-Christians in Athens, Paul told them:

The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands (Acts 17:24).

There's no building that is more of a temple than I am. God lives in people, not buildings built by human hands.

I'm excited to go to Israel, to see the historical sites there. I'm anxious to come to know better the lands that I read about in the Bible.

I'm also truly excited to have the privilege of being a temple of God. I, too, am "holy land." "The God who made the world and everything in it" lives in me.

You can be holy as well. You can be a temple of God. Let him come live inside you. To know how to do that, visit our HopeForLife.org website or write to me attarcher@heraldoftruth.org.