Paul asks us a question in his second letter to the church at Corinth: Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?

Before exploring this remarkable text, I must ensure you are oriented correctly to the word “God.” Paul’s scriptures conditioned his thinking. They comprise what has come to be called the Old Testament. The apostle has a Hebraic worldview, as do all the authors of the New Testament. God is not some vague, abstract, or philosophical concept to them. He is the self-revealed Holy One of Israel, YHWH.

In Western culture, the term ‘God’ is meaningless to most and full of confusing concepts to the rest. We use the word so casually that it slips off our lips. We read right past it. Not Paul. As a Second Temple Jew, he thinks about God concretely, historically, and relationally.

Hebraic thought can hold seemingly contradictory ideas in tension, like universality and particularity. YHWH is the Maker of all things and, therefore, the God of everyone (universal). Yet he has chosen Israel (particular). Even now—though salvation has come to all through Israel’s King, Jesus—the Holy One is still the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He chooses to identify himself by his covenant relationships.

Paul is applying these New Covenant ideas of temple and indwelling. What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God (2 Cor 6:16). He continues by quoting the Hebrew Prophets:

I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty.

The God who created and upholds the universe is a humble God.

Notice he begins with, I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them. The high and holy One, who is utterly transcendent, lowers himself. He desires to come down and be near those who are humble and contrite.

Peter, also quoting from the Hebrew scriptures, applies this idea: All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because “God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble” (1 Peter 5:5).

This is the paradox of the upside-down Kingdom of God. It would be natural to assume that to get closer to God; you would need to get higher and higher. But our ways are not his ways. They are quite the opposite. If you want to get close to the most high God, make yourself lower.

To that end, he pours out his Spirit upon his people. Water is one way the Bible images the Spirit: The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life (John 4:14). God’s Spirit is like water which leaves the high places and seeks out the low places.

The LORD’s most extraordinary, unprecedented act of humility is when he came down as a man. The infinite became incarnate in the finite. And what characterized Jesus of Nazareth, whom God anointed with the Holy Spirit and with power? Humility.

Have the same mindset as the Messiah in your relationships with one another (Phil 2:5).

He humbled himself, even to death on the cross. And because he went down to the lowest place, to the grave, on your behalf and mine, God has elevated him now to the highest place, at his right hand forevermore!

Not only do we read in 2 Corinthians that the LORD will come down but that he will walk among us. My friends, our Savior has a place of promise for all of us. Metaphorically speaking, crossing the Jordan into the promised land means more than heaven. It is entering the place of promise in your life where you fulfill your destiny: For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them (Eph 2:10).

For each of us as individuals and corporately in our marriages, families, and communities of faith, YHWH has an appointed place of promise. So, how do you get to the place of promise in your life? The answer is shockingly simple. You walk there. Jesus is leading us to the promised land.

You must leave the Egypt of your captivity to sin and lies and travel by way of Mt. Sinai, the place where he discloses his wisdom and will in His Word. Redemption is followed by revelation in the biblical pattern: I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

The Son of God dies and is raised during the Feast of Passover. The Father pours out the promised Spirit at the Feast of Pentecost. God’s self-disclosing revelation is to bring you to a place of responsibility. As you walk responsibly with God, your journey through the wilderness brings you into fuller restoration and into the place of promise.

Who is like this God? He is neither passive nor indifferent. This is no deistic conception of one who sets the cosmos in motion and watches us from a distance. The LORD God is passionate and determined to draw near to lead his beloved to the place of promise, the place of fruitfulness: Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing.

There are no battles in the world to come.

But for now, we face adversity: in the world you will have trouble. In our walk to the appointed place of divine promise, we encounter enemies. We have to fight for our birthright. However, God does not leave us alone: take heart; I have overcome the world.

YHWH walked with and fought for Israel in the cloud of his glorious presence. He enables and equips his people to reach the appointed place of promise. How? By his Spirit.

The Hebraic perspective of Jesus and the New Testament authors must become our default way of thinking; the move of God’s Spirit is always down and into the earth. God is not trying to get you out and up to heaven. He redeems to rule. Why? To restore you. Why? So that together we can create a sanctuary, a dwelling place for him, so that he can come into the earth and fill it with His glory.

We are living stones.

What animates and enlivens us? What knits us together as a temple for the living God? The Spirit. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you (Romans 8:11).

What is the result of setting ourselves apart for his purposes? Then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty. This God is the sovereign Creator of the Heavens and the Earth. He is the one before whom all the works of his hands bow low with voices raised in praise: Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!

It is he who Jesus has taught us to call Father. And as his son, as his daughter, he desires to affirm you, bless you, instruct you, and walk with you. How do you learn to walk by faith, not by sight? Where do you go to learn to walk in the Spirit? Draw near to God and he will draw near to you.

For that, too, is a work of his Spirit.