Teaching kids -- Inspiring teachers
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Teaching kids -- Inspiring teachers |
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Every Little Detail
By Patricia Meyers Have you ever read, thoroughly, all the chapters and verses dedicated to the building of the temple in Exodus? The specific instructions given to Moses by God Himself were amazing. Intricate, specific, detailed, and particular down to the minutest item and article. What is all that about? It’s crazy. You have details about the curtains, the thickness of the walls, the texture of this, the material used for that, the height of the other and the width of it, too. Extreme detail. Is God trying to tell us something through all of that detail. It would seem so. Who or what is the temple today? We are. “Don’t you know that you are the temple?” We are the temple. (1 Corinthians 3:16) Paul was talking to the church of Corinth in this passage. Not an individual. Later in 1 Corinthians 6:19 he mentions it again in a more personal, individual way. We are individually a temple, indwelt by the Spirit of God, and corporately built together as a temple to show His glory. And every single detail is important to Him. Just as the Old Testament is filled with detail overload about the building of the temple, God is still interested in the specific pieces that make up His temple today. He cares about every single piece in minute detail. You are one of those pieces. And he cares about you to a degree that is unfathomable to our little minds. He cares about everything about you. He wants you to be built up, encouraged, made complete and perfect as part of His temple. Not in a condemning way … but in an encouraging way. He wants you to be filled with the fullness of His love. He wants His body to “not be lacking in any gift.” (1 Cor. 1:7) He desires His body, His temple, to be perfect in every way. That doesn’t mean that we have no flaws and that we don’t have areas that we are working on, it means that we are allowing Him to shape us so that we are all fitly joined together. All of us. Each one growing more and more into the fullness of His grace. Think about the people in your church body. Include every person, every age category. Each one of them (including you) is a vital important part of God’s Body or His Temple. God gave equal detail to every portion of the temple: the structure, the furnishings, the decorations … everything. He has not changed. He still is interested in the details of every aspect of His temple. He cares about you. He cares about those you are close to. He cares about those you may have a personal struggle with. He cares about those that you don’t know well. He cares about the elderly. He cares about the middle aged. He cares about the teens. He cares about the children. He cares about the babies. Each one is a part of the temple. Sure some need to grow. Sure some are young biologically. And some are young spiritually. They need teachers and guidance. But still, if they belong to Christ, then they are a living stone and part of the body being fitly joined together. What a responsibility we have as teachers in the body. We are guiding these stones as they learn to pursue Christ and allow Him to shape them and form them as fits the design of His temple. I consider that a big responsibility and a huge honor. What an honor to be part of the body of Christ teaching these young ones to grow as Timothy was instructed in 2 Timothy 3:14-17: “…continue in the Scriptures that you learned from childhood.” They are sitting before us in their childhood to learn the Holy Scriptures and what other goal do we have but that they continue in them and grow thereby becoming fitly joined with all the other living stones and showing His glory through their life. Honorable? Yes. Necessary? Oh, yes. Easy … not always. But I don’t believe that anything with noble values and rewards is easy. Winning the freedom our country enjoys was not easy. Maintaining that freedom will not be easy. The apostles did not have an easy time as they stepped out and followed the leading of the Holy Spirit which ran smack in the face of the established church. But they did it. And so shall we. In the face of declining discipline, respect for authority, and attention spans … let us continue on in the pursuit of shaping these living stones, part of the glorious temple that God is building and forming into a glorious Bride for His Son. Remember, He cared about each and every detail. In every part of the temple. He cares about every detail having to do with the children … and every detail that has to do with you. If you need wisdom in any area, just ask. He cares. If you need advice … ask. He cares. If you need encouragement to continue on … ask! He cares. And He always will. The end. |
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