I’m a huge fan of the Bible. I’ve read it almost a dozen times (Want to join me?) and there are parts that hit me every time. I buy purses only if they’ll fit my Bible, shake with anxiety when I hand it over to be rebound, and still read with a pencil in hand. Because the Word of God is ever ancient, ever new. I just love it.
But some parts are terribly boring. I know in theory that they’re good somehow and every once in a while I’ll meditate on how God loved each person in the interminable Genesis begats, loved each one so much that he recorded their names for all the world to read forever. But mostly Jesus and I have come to an agreement: I skim. When it’s repetitive lists of numbers or names or dimensions, I just skim. And I’m okay with that.
Yesterday I hit 1 Kings 6: Building of the Temple. I sighed and began to skim. But I was about to give a talk on the Theology of the Body and I guess I had beauty on the brain, because all of a sudden I got it.
God spends a lot of time describing his dwelling place in the Old Testament. Exodus 25, 26, 27, 30, 36, 37, 38, and 40 describe in mind-numbingly minute detail how the ark and the tent and the lamps and the altar are to be made. There’s even a tally of materials to be used–he was very specific. 1 Kings 5 and 1 Chronicles 28-29 describe the materials dedicated for the temple while 1 Kings 6 and 2 Chronicles 3-4 describe Solomon’s temple exactly–to the point that we believe we can make accurate models today. After Solomon’s temple is destroyed, we have two entire books (Haggai and Zechariah) encouraging Israel to rebuild the temple, as described in Ezra 5. Then, of course, there’s the interminable description of a new temple in Ezekiel 40-48 and the (different) new temple in Revelation. It’s enough to drive a person to distraction!
But what if all this temple nonsense isn’t a waste of time? What if it’s in the Bible because it’s of infinite importance? What if God mapped out every cubit of space, every pomegranate and cherub, every tent pole and gate, down to even naming the pillars…to teach us something?
Obviously, there’s plenty we can do with this: Jesus is the perfectly made temple of God, God incarnate; the temple was pure and undefiled, so Mary (the temple that held Christ) must be as well; if beauty and liturgy mattered then, they matter now. But what grabbed ahold of me yesterday was this key to the meaning of all this temple business:
Do you not know that your body is a temple of the holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been purchased at a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body.1
Christians have used this passage at every chastity rally since chastity rallies began. Before that, little Regency-era ladies whispered it to their daughters before they took a turn about the garden with a suitor. I’m pretty sure that had the early virgin martyrs had tattoos, they would have been of this passage. We know this passage. “You are a temple of God” means “keep your clothes on.”
Or maybe it means don’t smoke or eat right or exercise or something. Whatever it means, it’s definitely a threat.
But what if it’s not? What if it’s a love letter? What if God calls you his temple in the hope that you’ve struggled through the endless descriptions of his temple of stone and will realize what he’s saying about you? What if he’s saying that you are fearfully and wonderfully made?
Dear heart, you are not an accident. There is no part of you that is not willed–deeply, desperately desired–by the God of the universe. This God of yours–the God who made oceans and volcanoes and lilacs and hummingbirds–he was just warming up. The greatest beauty in this world is nothing compared to you. From the beginning of time, he was preparing for you. And when he made you–your body, not just your soul–he made you right.
He planned every bit of you. Every atom in your being was accounted for. You think he spent a lot of time thinking about the temple? That house of stone has nothing on you, his living home, his beloved. Your proportions are just what he wanted. Your coloring, your shape, your hair texture have purpose and meaning just as much as any horns or wheels or basins.
And the result, my friend, is ineffable beauty. You are his temple, stunning and lovely. Every bit of you is covered in glory, as the inside of the temple was covered in gold. You are so much more than the sum of your various parts. Listed out on a page, taken piece by piece, it may be easy to overlook you, easy to skim over you. But all together, you are marvelous, a wonder, a sight to behold.
Now wait a minute. You–rolling your eyes. Shut up. I’m not making this up. This isn’t sappy nonsense about how you’re so pretty just because you’re you. This is truth. Written in the word of God. The God who tells you that you are all beautiful and there is no blemish in you.2 Did you hear that? No blemish. This God who made your creepy long second toe and your moles and your love handles, this God who can see every bit of your body and soul says there is nothing wrong with you. Nothing.
You might struggle to accept the fact that you’re lovely, but if you refuse to believe it your self-loathing might just become heresy: the heresy that God screwed up. That even though he tells you in Scripture that every bit of the temple is perfect and planned and that you are his temple, he’s wrong. Got that? Hating yourself is saying that God is wrong.
I know this is hard. I spend my life trying to convince beautiful women that they’re not worthless. I’ve asked young women across this country–hundreds of them–if at some level they hate themselves. One girl one time said no. So I know that many of you are absolutely certain that no matter what you do you will never be enough. Believe me, I know. I’ve been there. Many days, I’m still there. But every once in a while I get a glimpse of this fundamental truth: God doesn’t make junk. He didn’t plan out every square cubit of the temple down to the last talent of bronze and then lament that it wasn’t decorated well. He didn’t form you in your mother’s womb to sigh over your frizzy hair and your acne-ridden skin. He made you–just as you are–on purpose. He thinks you’re stunning.
Stop telling him he’s wrong.
