Pastor, author and Bible teacher, Alan Wright. Wherever there needs to be correction in your life, if you want to know if it's God that's speaking to you, He'll point out your sin. But as He does so, you're going to be drawn into Him with vast hope, running into your Father's arms.
Because He loves you so, and He wants so for your life to flourish and to see you be who you actually are. That's Pastor Alan Wright. Welcome to another message of good news that will help you see your life in a whole new light. I'm Daniel Britt, excited for you to hear the teaching today in the series belonging to God as presented at Reynolda Church in North Carolina. If you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program, I want to make sure you know how to get our special resource right now. It can be yours for your donation this month to Alan Wright Ministries. As you listen to today's message, go deeper as we send you today's special offer. Contact us at PastorAlan.org or call 877-544-4860.
877-544-4860. More on that later in the program. But now, let's get started with today's teaching.
Here is Alan Wright. Destroy this temple, the very meeting place between God and humanity, the holiest place on earth, the very longing of our lives was to have it rebuilt and once it had been rebuilt to never see it torn down, and you're going to say destroy this temple, and you're going to rebuild it in three days as long as it takes to rebuild the temple. They were furious. And this saying of Jesus was used to mock Him the rest of His life, even to the point that He was on the cross. The text says people came and wagged their heads at Him and said, look at Him. He said, this is the one who said He'd destroy the temple and rebuild it.
He can't even save His own life. Even the thieves next to Him on the crosses joined into the mockery. Destroy this temple. And Jesus was not only speaking prophetically about the fact that in 70 AD indeed that temple would be destroyed and has never been rebuilt, but He was speaking about something altogether glorious.
That day that He drove out the money changers and He said this whole system has to go. He was saying that this process by which people come desperately looking for an adequate sacrifice to make, this is coming to an end for a new covenant was being inaugurated. The system of the law, the system of sacrifices, the system of ritual at the temple, all of it coming to an end for Jesus Himself was the Lamb of God who came to take away the sin of the world. He is the one who Hebrews 10, 10 said, has made us holy because He has entered once and for all figuratively into the holy of holies and sprinkled His own blood there so that anyone who would accept Christ is no longer under a system of coming to an altar to offer a sacrifice whereby you can be accepted by God. When you become a Christian you are not accepted by God by any of your own sacrifices.
You are accepted by God solely by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Destroy this temple, tear down the old to make way for the new, for the old is gone and the new has come, a new covenant of grace Jesus said. The temple considered to be the holiest place. There is an interesting midrash in the Jewish rabbinical commentary that has been developed over the centuries regarding Psalm 79 that caught my fascination. That Psalm has an introductory note that says it is a song of Asaph and it is actually a psalm that is a great lament over the destruction of the temple. The psalm says God the nations have invaded your inheritance, they've defiled your holy temple, they've reduced Jerusalem to rubble and in the midrash a student had once asked a rabbi the question why does Psalm 79 have as its introductory note that it is a psalm or a song of Asaph? Shouldn't it be called a lament of Asaph? How could there be anything praiseworthy about the destruction of the temple?
So the student asked. The rabbi answered with an interesting parable. He said suppose there was a king whose son was to be married and in the king's joy of the upcoming wedding he built a magnificent nuptial home for his prince and his future daughter-in-law. Shortly before the wedding the prince went wayward and fell into sin and refused to be married.
The king and his anger went and destroyed the beautiful home that he had built for his son. A minstrel who might have played at the wedding seeing the destroyed house picks up his flute and begins to play. A passerby asked why does the minstrel play when the house has been destroyed?
And the minstrel answered putting down his flute. I play for joy that the king took out his wrath on stones and wood rather than on his son. And the rabbi answered the student God vented his wrath upon wood and stone and did not vent his wrath upon Israel so it is a song of Asaph. It is an extraordinary little piece of midrash because do you see what God in the end did in Jesus Christ was he did let his wrath come not upon wood and stone but upon his only begotten son. And therein and therein only through the destruction of the body of Jesus where he became sin who knew no sin. Through that Jesus said I will then in a resurrection raise it up and anybody who is in Christ therefore has become engrafted into the new temple which is Jesus Christ. The implications of this are mind-bending.
Please think about it. All week long as I think about being the temple of the Holy Spirit I just got to keep saying this must be one of the most mis-believed verses in all the Bible if we really believe this oh my you Christians are the temple of the Holy Spirit can you imagine the implications of such a thought. At Pentecost we had the new Sinai they're shaking quaking and there's fire this time as tongues of fire they've come upon every believer and the Holy Spirit is now poured out upon all flesh.
Instead of being relegated to keep the distance from the holy presence of God now through the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ the believers encounter God directly. It means that you're the temple of the Holy Spirit that God has wanted and chosen through Christ to make it possible for his desire to come true and that is to be with you at all times in all places. God wants to be with you at all times in all places. He wants to be up close and personal with you. He wants to share his glory with you. He wants to share his inheritance with you. He wants to share his holiness with you. He wants to share his truth with you.
He wants to share his joy with you. Everything that God has everything that God is He wants to make available available in your life by making you His holy habitation. Wherever you are therefore, God is. Wherever you go, God goes. This means that if God is in you, that not only everywhere you go, God is with you and God goes, but it must necessarily also mean that whatever God can do, wherever He is, must be possible through you, no matter where you are at what time it is.
It means that when you are against adversity and you do not know how it is that you would possibly face it, it means that God is there with you powerfully on your behalf. That's Alan Wright and we'll have more teaching in a moment from today's important series. I don't want to pressure my kids and I sure don't want to shame them, but I do want them to try hard and be all they can be.
That's the desire of every well-meaning parent. For over a decade, Alan Wright has been teaching all over the nation about the toxic effects of shame and the amazing power of the gospel of grace to heal and set free. Now, for the first time, Alan has been joined by his wife Ann to produce a video series about shame-free parenting. It's called Good News for Parents, Raising Grace-Filled Kids in a Pressure-Filled World. The eight DVD video sessions are chock full of humor, deep gospel insight, and loads of practical advice.
Use them for personal growth or with your spouse, and they're also perfect for use in your small group. The DVD album comes with a detailed step-by-step study guide as well. When you make your gift this month, we'll send you the DVD album as our way of saying thanks for your partnership. Make your gift today and start raising kids by the power of the gospel. The gospel is shared when you give to Alan Wright Ministries. This broadcast is only possible because of listener financial support. When you give today, we will send you today's special offer. We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Alan Wright Ministries. Call us at 877-544-4860. That's 877-544-4860. Or come to our website, PastorAlan.org.
Today's teaching now continues. Here once again is Alan Wright. I was reading a pastor this week who said his little girl wanted so bad to go out and play in the backyard soccer with her older siblings and neighborhood kids that were older. And he was like, honey, but they're so much bigger than you. And she just begged and begged till finally he let her go out there. And sure enough, within about five minutes, she fell down, got nearly trampled, and was crying her eyes out. He went out there and he scooped her up. And he said, well, you're all right, you're all right. And she said, but I still want to play. And so the daddy did something very interesting. He just went out and held her in his arms and played the game for her.
While she giggled and laughed the whole time. Where the one who was so little now is the biggest one on the field, sort of. You are so big on the inside because you have God inside of you. Every time that you're up against those that seem faster and bigger and threatening, you have to remember I'm the temple of the Holy Spirit. Everywhere I go, therefore, God goes.
Everywhere I am, God is. Everything God can do can happen in and through me. It means that every part of your being, spirit, soul, and body, is impacted by a new identity that you're the temple of the Holy Spirit. You see, the Bible doesn't teach that the body is bad and the Spirit is good. The Bible teaches that the entire spirit, soul, and body created by God in the image of God is good. God made you in His own image. It's not that the body is bad and the Spirit is good.
It's that God has redeemed all of you. And one day you're going to get a whole new heavenly body. But in the meantime, you are spirit, soul, and body, but you're one person. And so the things that go on in your spirit are affecting the things that go on in your mind. The things that are going on in your mind are affecting everything that goes on in your body. And everything that's going on in your body is linked also to your spirit. This is what Paul's saying.
That's why I'm saying a man can't go and just join himself to a prostitute and say, well, it's just a thing, you know, of the body. He says, no, do you not understand that your body is actually members of Christ? Do you understand your body, your physical body, your presence here on earth? You're the temple of the Holy Spirit. So you're the very hands and feet of Jesus. Jesus is not here in the flesh. He's here by spirit.
And we are here, the ones that are in the flesh now, all over, all over this entire globe. A great sea of saints spread all over everywhere and every place, meeting here today, meeting over in another campus on the other side of town, meeting underground in China. Everywhere the body of Christ is, there is a temple of the Holy Spirit. And God is just saying it matters very much, therefore what you're doing with your temple. And in the context of this, you must understand that the way in which God and the way in which Paul is bringing us to the point of the conviction of the Holy Spirit is he never tried to correct our sin by telling us how wretched of a sinner we are, but the way in which you're called up out of lifestyles of sin is by being reminded of who you actually are. This is the man who calls us saints, and now in correcting some of the gross sexual immorality that was taking place even amongst the Christians in the Corinthian church, he is calling them up and out of it by reminding them you're the temple of the Holy Spirit.
So you're always, always, always, always, always, always going to go further and gain more victory by a proclamation of who you are rather than a condemnation of who you are. Jesus came not to condemn, but to save. And so wherever there needs to be correction in your life, if you want to know if it's God that's speaking to you, He'll point out your sin, but as He does so, you're going to be drawn into Him with vast hope, running into your Father's arms because He loves you so and He wants so for your life to flourish and to see you be who you actually are. I read this week of a father who had to discipline his son and he had told him that the son continued in this behavior, he was going to give him a spanking and so the boy did and to be discreet, there were a lot of people around, the father took him into the bathroom and he spanked his bottom, not abusively, just a gentle but a form of discipline and as soon as he admitted this discipline, the little boy just threw himself into his father's arms, just threw himself into his father's arms and just wept and just said, Daddy, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I love you, Daddy, I love you, I love you, I love you. And the father said, well, son, I love you too, I love you so, so much. And he said, I'm almost surprised at your response, you know, and the boy said, Daddy, I looked while you spanked me, I could see in the mirror and I could see your face and I realized for the first time how much it hurt you to have to discipline me. You can't ever understand the discipline of the Lord unless you understand the love of the Lord because His love is profound, it's infinite.
I'm telling you how God would change your life and take you from this level to this level is you recognize yourself as the temple of the Holy Spirit and you know what Jesus called the Holy Spirit? The Helper. The Advocate.
The Parakletos. The one who comes alongside. He is perhaps the best term for the Holy Spirit, The Encourager. He's the best teacher in the world.
He's the greatest encourager in the world. I read this week of a state educational initiative in a particular state where they sought to help some students who were lagging far behind their peers with a remedial program and they funded it and they brought in some new materials and they had a select group of students that they were studying to see if it would work. And this remedial program, what they found was that almost none of the students made any real progress.
And despite all their funding and all their initiative, it wasn't working and they finally concluded that the students, part of the problem was they knew they were in this remedial program and that somehow they didn't have any initiative because they just felt stuck with the stigma of being students that were behind others. All except for one student whose name was Edie. And she progressed wonderfully.
In fact, she came all the way up to the same level that she should be at at her age level. And so the researchers decided, well we're going to research and find out what happened with Edie. And they came to Edie's teacher and all they knew about Edie was that she was a track star for the team.
They called her Speedy Edie. And that's all that they knew. So they came to the teacher and they said, what have you done differently with Edie? And she said, I didn't do anything different.
They said, well did you think hard? Did you use any other books? And she said, no I used the exact same books you're supposed to use with all the other students.
I said, did you bring any additional curriculum to bear? And she said, no I didn't do it. They said, please think, there must be something that has happened with Edie that's different than other students because she's the only one that has grown and excelled through this. And finally, as almost an afterthought, the teacher said, well did you know that Edie runs track? They said, oh yeah, we've heard of Speedy Edie. And she said, well, I started going to her track meets and cheering for her.
That's the only thing I know of that's changed. Sometimes if just one person begins to cheer for you and encourage you, every other dimension of your life will come up. I wonder if the Spirit of the Living God, were there encouraging you at every moment, would it not bring up every facet of your life? The temple was the holiest place to the Jews of all the earth. They believed by tradition that it was the very spot in that Holy of Holies that God first formed Adam out of the dust. They believed that it was at that spot where God would meet humanity and His glory would be manifest. And Jesus said, destroy that.
Why? Because the Holy Spirit was to come. And when you accept Jesus Christ, though it bends your mind, the scripture clearly teaches you now are that temple. You have become the holiest spot on earth, which means not only is God with you, but all things are possible in you.
And that's the gospel. Alan Wright, there's good news here today in the teaching God's Holy Temple from the series belonging to God. Alan is with us here in the studio and we're back in a moment with additional insight on this for your life. In our final word today, I don't want to pressure my kids and I sure don't want to shame them, but I do want them to try hard and be all they can be.
That's the desire of every well-meaning parent for over a decade. Alan Wright has been teaching all over the nation about the toxic effects of shame and the amazing power of the gospel of grace to heal and set free. Now, for the first time, Alan has been joined by his wife and to produce a video series about shame-free parenting. It's called Good News for Parents, raising grace-filled kids in a pressure-filled world. The eight DVD video sessions are chock full of humor, deep gospel insight and loads of practical advice.
Use them for personal growth or with your spouse and they're also perfect for use in your small group. The DVD album comes with a detailed step-by-step study guide as well. When you make your gift this month, we'll send you the DVD album as our way of saying thanks for your partnership. Make your gift today and start raising kids by the power of the gospel. The gospel is shared when you give to Alan Wright Ministries. This broadcast is only possible because of listener financial support.
When you give today, we will send you today's special offer. We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Alan Wright Ministries. Call us at 877-544-4860.
That's 877-544-4860. Or come to our website, PastorAlan.org. PastorAlan.org. Alan, you said earlier in our teaching a few days ago even, maybe even practice saying some of this out loud. Claim it and believe it and see yourself as God's holy temple. Yeah, you would get further in your ongoing spiritual growth and sanctification if instead of getting up in the morning and saying, Well, I'm going to try to be holy today and I'll try to be worthy of God in some way. You'd get much further, I believe, by stating your real identity according to the word of God.
According to Hebrews chapter 10 is, I have been made holy. And then if you want to even go deeper about the reality of that, you say, I'm God's holy temple. Where I go, therefore, God's going, which is an incredible thought. It's just extraordinary to think that from the earliest times in Israel, the temple was known to be the holiest place on earth. It's the meeting place of God and man. And then when Jesus came, He was that temple. And in Him, God and humanity met. But now we, the church, we are His temple. We are the very inhabitation of God. And it proves we must be, to God, the holiest place on earth. It's just an extraordinary thought.
