the architect
“Remember, there is only one foundation, the one already laid: Jesus Christ. Take particular care in picking out your building materials. Eventually there is going to be an inspection. If you use cheap or inferior materials, you’ll be found out. The inspection will be thorough and rigorous. You won’t get by with a thing. If your work passes inspection, fine. If it doesnt, your part of the building with be torn out and started over. But you won’t be torn out; you’ll survive - but just barely. You realise, don’t you, that you are the temple of God, and God himself is present in you? (1 Corinthians 3:11-16)
God likens us to a building being erected. Gradually, we are being built up in structure, slowly growing to become a tower of strength. But God cares not just what the building is, but what it is made of. If the materials we are made of are cheap and flimsy, we’ll be found out. And if we’re found out, God has no qualms about tearing it down and starting over.
It’s chilling reading this, because this isn’t an abstract concept Paul is talking about. He’s talking about us - humans made in His image, created and fashioned by a Creator who has poured His heart and spirit into us. Yet, this being He has created is not stagnant. We’re organic, always growing, learning, soaking all around us and above us. And it seems God isn’t scared of looking at us, and re-creating something new at the expense of the old. Because the old stinks. It reeks of self-centred, independent living. It takes short-cuts on what truly matters to God, refuses to invest time, effort and will to listen to His instruction and inspiration. And God inspects, examines, and quietly decides: out with the old, in with the new. And we are torn down.
In the hands of a megalomaniac, this would be a frightening thought. But God is Love. God cannot stand when I base my life on the philosophies of this world. Cannot stand when I look to other sources of healing, because I’ll never be whole this way. Because what the world calls smart, God chides it and calls it stupid. Useless. Hot air. Unable to redeem us as children of the living God.
Many times, I’m so scared of being found out. Deep down, I’m scared of exactly this: that all I’m made of is cheap and inferior. That God will find me out, and I’ll be reduced to a quivering mess, unable to function, robbed of all I depend on for sustenance. I’ll be naked, and the world will stand and laugh. Look at this little boy. This child is a measly nothing.
That’s why everything about our relationship with God hinges on whether we truly trust God’s love and goodness. Once we are unafraid of our own nakedness, when His work of love overpowers our guilt and shame, we’ll stand tall. It will be a moment when this world will be befuddled at who we are. So brave in our own flaws, yet so free from the world’s answers. When ‘God is Love’ is allowed to recreate us as His, we are glorious.
Oh Father. You are the architect. The architect who is recreating us daily, tearing us down if need be. Such is our fear that we often run away from it. But today, with fear and trembling, I say come. Come, touch me with your goodness, show me your love. Cut the chains that bind me. Amen.
