Cleanse: Responding to God’s Grace By Henry Garza (2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1)

This is not just a call to holiness. It's an invitation to intimacy. The living god doesn't merely command his people from a distance. God is not sitting outside telling me what to say. God's right here inside. God's in this room. God's in you. God's everywhere. He comes near. He dwells among us. He calls them his own. He calls us his own. Invitation to in intimacy also tells you that we realize that our life is no longer ordinary space. It's sacred ground. [00:14:07] (58 seconds)  #SacredIntimacy

The ugly truth here is that these type of relationships will be full of tension, confusion, hurt, and conflict. Why? Because you cannot have full unity where there's no shared direction, no shared belief system. Sooner or later, the strain shows up. Conversations get harder. Trust gets thinner. Progress stalls. Authenticity slowly goes away. And that's the kind of tension Paul is getting at here. When a believer is joined to something that pulls against Christ, it creates spiritual conflict, and peace is compromised. [00:09:53] (46 seconds)  #MisalignedFaith

Holiness is not earning god's grace. Paul doesn't say, cleanse ourselves, we can receive the promises. He says, since we have the promises, this means that grace came first. Cleansing comes second. We do not have to do something for the grace. The grace has already been given to us. Holiness grows out of relationships. I'll be a father to you, and you'll be my sons and daughters. He's declaring the identity of family. As our father, we trust in him. [00:16:06] (44 seconds)  #GraceFirst

But what Paul is saying here is more than dead in inspection. God doesn't just inspect the temple. He built it. And most importantly, he lives in it. And if he lives in it, then it has to reflect him. And that's Paul's point here, Is that god himself lives among his people, lives within us. We are god's temple. Paul then reaches back and and quotes Old Testament. I will dwell among them. I will walk among them. I will be their god. [00:13:13] (46 seconds)  #GodDwellsWithin

either change your behavior or change your name. Either change your behavior or change your name and so it is with us as Christians. If we carry the name of Christ because we're the temple, we must also carry the character of Christ. Now, not that we might earn salvation that way because we too are called to the life and self and grace and salvation. We we don't earn it that way. Last week, pastor Steve challenged us. I'm going to take a quick time out. Please [00:19:22] (47 seconds)  #LiveLikeChrist

But Paul doesn't leave us here in this tension. He takes us deeper. And he he takes us to the root saying that if you belong to Christ, then your life is defined by a new identity. The identity of a Christian. In verse 16, Paul writes, we are the temple of the living god. He uses the word Niles. That's a Greek word for temple. The definition is the inner sanctuary, the place where god dwells. The inner sanctuary, the place where god dwells. [00:10:40] (49 seconds)  #TempleIdentity

The Corinthians were surrounded by pagan temples, idol worship, and constant pressure to blend their faith and their faith in Christ with the culture around them. Corinth was full of pagan feasts, temple trade guilds, idol sacrifices. The temptation was always there to mix devotion to Christ with the beliefs and practices of the world around them. Think of it as like in a hybrid religion. And Paul's concern here was really simple. Alliances like this, the hybrid, will pull believers away from Christ. So he drives the point home with several questions. [00:05:50] (59 seconds)  #FaithNotHybrid

Now, here's something important to understand about Corinth. At the time, temples were everywhere. You look at the skyline, you can see temples, all kinds of temples everywhere. There were temples to Apollo, Aphrodite, and many other gods, small g. They all had their own religious rituals, sacrifices, feasts, and many with immoral practices. That's what was happening in those temples. So when people in Corinth heard that word temple, their first image in their head wasn't about a nice, quiet church building. [00:11:28] (41 seconds)  #TemplesEverywhere