THE SPIRIT IN THE TEMPLE

GOD MOST HIGH

"However, The Most High does not live in houses made by human hands, as the prophet says: Heaven is My throne and earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me? Says The Lord. Or where will My resting place be? Has not my hand made all these things?"

- Acts 7: 48-50

Isha Upanishad - verse 1

The Lord is enshrined in the hearts of all.

The Lord is the supreme Reality.

Rejoice in him through renunciation.

Covet nothing. All belongs to The Lord

- Shvetashvatara Upanishad

This is the Great Lord. The Lord of creation, preservation and destruction; ruler and refuge of all. He is The Creator, the giver of conscious awareness. Known by the mind. Perceived in the heart. Brahman the highest, the subtlest and the greatest, concealed in all beings, one that encompasses all of the universe, formless, without sorrow, changeless, all pervading, kind, one who applies the power of knowledge, the Purusha, one with the whole world as it is, one with the whole world as it has been, one with the whole world as it will be. God is the Self of All, the Highest Self, The Udgitha.

- Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 3.4.2

You cannot see That which is the Seer of seeing; you cannot hear That which is the Hearer of hearing; you cannot think of That which is the Thinker of thought; you cannot know That which is the Knower of knowledge. This is your Self, that is within all; everything else but This is perishable.

- Shvetashvatara Upanishad 3.21

I know this undecaying, primeval One, the Self of all things, which exists everywhere, being all-pervading and which the wise declare to be free from birth. The teachers of Brahman, indeed, speak of It as eternal.

- John 4:24

God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.

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INTERPRETATION

It is the Self in all of us that is eternal, in realizing that we are the self we get closer to God. We exist in and with one another yet none of us can claim perfection; there is One God that resides supreme in all our hearts and as God. God is love, a Spirit, The Lord of Spirits; The Great Spirit. We were created both significant and insignificant, which is neither here nor there as all give all in life; inclusive of a 'cosmic dualism.' All things being equal, there is One God.

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SPIRITUAL BODY

1 Corinthians 15:42-44

The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body.

Qur'an, The Forgiver, The Forgiving One [40:39]

"O my people! Truly, this life of the world is nothing but a (quick passing) enjoyment, and verily, the Hereafter that is the home that will remain forever."

Qur'an, The Stories [28:83]

"We grant the Home in the Hereafter to those who do not seek superiority on earth or spread corruption: the happy ending is awarded to those who are mindful of God."

Shvetashvatara Upanishad (1.9)

Conscious spirit and unconscious matter Both have existed since the dawn of time, With maya appearing to connect them, Misrepresenting joy as outside us. When all these three are seen in one, the Self Reveals His universal form and serves As an instrument of the divine will.

BHAGAVAD-GITA Chapter 2, Verse: 13 - 16

As the embodied soul continuously passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. A sober person is not bewildered by such a change. O son of Kunté, the nonpermanent appearance of happiness and distress, and their disappearance in due course, are like the appearance and disappearance of winter and summer seasons. They arise from sense perception, O scion of Bharata, and one must learn to tolerate them without being disturbed. O best among men [Arjuna], the person who is not disturbed by happiness and distress and is steady in both is certainly eligible for liberation. Those who are seers of the truth have concluded that of the nonexistent [the material body] there is no endurance and of the eternal [the soul] there is no change. This they have concluded by studying the nature of both.

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Spirit is differentiated from flesh. In overcoming the world, attainment of moksha and oneness of being we learn to accept Heavenly tidings and put off Earthly attachments. A concept that is always arising throughout sacred texts: to be of sober mind, not swayed by pleasure or the senses nor pain; toward liberation from cyclic death-rebirth.

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SPIRIT IN FELLOWSHIP

However, The Most High does not live in houses made

by human hands, as the prophet says:

Heaven is My throne and earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me? Says The Lord. Or where will My resting place be? Has not my hand made all these things?

- Acts 7:48-50

What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?

- Corinthians 6:19 KJV

For where two or three gather in my name, there I am with them.

- Matthew 18:20

May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

- 2 Corinthians 13:14

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The Lord dwells in the hearts of all. The Lord is not in the temple so much as in the fellowship. The Spirit's divine presence in the temple or Shekinah (dwelling) is that it is a holy meeting place (Shiloh).