May 14, 2016 Bible Study — God Does Not Live In a House

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading. I had been using One Year Bible Online, but it was time for a change.

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Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Chronicles 17-19.

    When David wanted to build a Temple, a house for God, God told him not to do so. God reiterates that His home is not a house, is not a building of any sort. God is not fixed to one locale. Other gods were specific to certain locales, but God is not so limited. The Tabernacle was the perfect idiom for God’s home. It was mobile and could be moved from place to place. Furthermore, God proclaimed that he would build a house for David. It would not be a house made of stone and timber. Rather it would be a house made up of David’s descendants who would serve the Lord. This passage reminds us that we, as humans, are constantly trying to limit God by building structures to contain Him. Sometimes those structures are buildings. Sometimes they are the organizations we create. We often do this with the best of intentions. Whatever our intentions, God has to intervene to remind us time and again that He is not limited to those structures, nor is He limited by those structures. We, the people who worship Him, are where He desires to live. We need to allow God to live in us. We need to live lives that make God welcome. When we do not behave in a holy manner we are desecrating the only Temple God desires.