The glory of the Lord had departed from the temple in
Ezekiel 11 and stood on the mountain to the east of the temple while the city
was besieged and the temple destroyed. Ezekiel
now sees a new temple, a restored but smaller one and the glory comes back to
that temple from the east, from whence it had departed. It fills the temple once again, an
encouragement to this generation to rebuild in order to experience the wonder
that Solomon and that generation saw in original dedication and that Moses and
that generation saw in the tabernacle's dedication. The Lord promises that if they build it, He
will come. Ezekiel sees it in the Spirit
and is told to remind them of the design of the temple and the statutes of
God. Paul says that we are the temple of
the Holy Spirit now. Jesus is the
reminder to us of the design and statutes for our lives.
Jesus casts out a demon and the work is ascribed to
Beelzebul, the Lord of the flies, a demonic entity. Jesus speaks into that misunderstanding by
referring to His work being accomplished by the finger of God. Do you know where He got that reference? It comes from Exodus 8 when the plague of
gnats appear and none of the magicians of Pharaoh can duplicate the sign. They tell Pharaoh that this is not magic at
all, it is the finger of God, it has His imprint. A fingerprint is unique to one person and
Jesus says that the Jews who have seen this healing are like Pharaoh, unable to
see and identify the work of God. They are
seeing the glory of God but missing it.
Jesus offers a better sacrifice than the blood of bulls and
goats, His own blood. As His sacrifice
is better He is allowed not only into the Most Holy Place but further still,
into the very throne of God. The writer
says those other sacrifices are unable to perfect the conscience of the
worshipper but Jesus' sacrifice is for the cleansing of sin entirely, making it
possible for the Holy Spirit to take up His dwelling within us, but we have to
continually confess our sins and cleanse the temple of our body in order to
allow Him to fill us. We know what the
temple is supposed to look like, we know that it is the finger of God that
works within us to cleanse us from unrighteousness, let us this day implore Him
to do the work only He can do that we might shine forth with His glory.
No comments:
Post a Comment