A Beautiful Temple

REFLECTION QUOTES

“An Instagram-age reader will note that Narcissus, in his statue-like stillness, is posing, and that his obsession with his own, intangible image has come about as a punishment for pride and for scorning real-life relationships…. Narcissus’s isolation and loneliness, his inability to encounter, much less, to love, anyone in the flesh is recognizable to us as one of the core anxieties of our 21st century, digitally refracted existence.”

~Avi Steinberg in “The Murky Meaning of the Killer Selfie”
in The NY Times Magazine, December 11, 2015

“There are two things we cannot do alone. One is to be married and the other is to be a Christian.”

“The worst thing is not being wrong, but being sure one is not wrong.”

~Paul Tournier (1898-1986), Swiss physician and author

“If you alter or obscure the Biblical portrait of God in order to attract converts, you don’t get converts to God, you get converts to an illusion. This is not evangelism, but deception.”

~John Piper, American pastor and author

“Have you no wish for others to be saved? Then you’re not saved yourself, be sure of that!”

~Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892), famed London preacher

“The Bible was not given to increase our knowledge but to change our lives.”

~D.L. Moody (1837-1899), famed 19th century evangelist

“It is quite clear that between love and understanding there is a very close link…He who loves understands, and he who understands loves. One who feels understood feels loved, and one who feels loved feels sure of being understood.”

~Paul Tournier in his book To Understand Each Other

SERMON PASSAGE

1 Peter 2 (NASB)

1 Therefore, putting aside all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, 2 like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation, 3 if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord.

4 And coming to Him as to a living stone which has been rejected by men, but is choice and precious in the sight of God, 5 you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

9 …you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; 10 for you once were not a people, but now you are the people of God; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

11 Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul. 12 Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation.

1 Peter 3

8 To sum up, all of you be harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kindhearted, and humble in spirit; 9 not returning evil for evil or insult for insult, but giving a blessing instead; for you were called for the very purpose that you might inherit a blessing. 10 For,
“The one who desires life, to love and see good days,
Must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit.
11 “He must turn away from evil and do good;
He must seek peace and pursue it.
12 “For the eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous,
And His ears attend to their prayer,
But the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”

1 Peter 4

8 Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins.