True and Greater Temple - Jesus
SYNOPSIS - Jesus is the Greater and Final Temple foreshadowed by the ancient Tabernacle and the later Temple of Israel.
However, the idea of a future rebuilt temple stands
in tension with the New Testament portrait of Jesus as the Greater and True
Temple that was foreshadowed by the religious structures and rituals of ancient
Israel.
If Jesus is the True Sanctuary
in which God’s presence dwells, and the real “light of the world,” why must another stone
edifice “made-with-hands” be built, one in which His glory will not
reside? If he is the “once-for-all sacrifice” for sins, the “priest
forever after the order of Melchizedek,” the inaugurator of the New
Covenant, the one who “achieved the purification of sins,” and who fulfilled
all the “law and the prophets,” why the need to regress to
the old and obsolete regime? What was the point of his death, or
did he simply “die in vain,” to borrow a phrase from the Apostle
Paul - (Galatians 2:21, Hebrews 8:13)?
Consistently in the New Testament, Jesus is presented as the true
and greater Temple, the habitation of God that was prefigured in the earlier
portable Tabernacle and the later Temple complex in the city of Jerusalem. He is
the true Bethel, the “house of God” and the real mediator
between heaven and earth. He is the temple “made-without-hands” that was
destroyed by evil men but raised from the dead by his Father - (John 1:14,
1:51, 2:17-21, Colossians 1:19, 2:9).
With his death and resurrection, questions about the proper location of the temple are no longer relevant. With the arrival of Jesus, “The
hour is coming and now is when the true worshippers will worship the Father in
spirit and in truth” - (John 4:20-24).
In Christ, all the fullness of God dwells forevermore. Jewish and Gentile believers are “circumcised with the circumcision made-without-hands.”
Once restricted to the outer sections of the Temple, Gentiles now have full
access to the presence of Yahweh through Jesus. The “middle wall” of
separation between Jew and Gentile has been dismantled in him forever. Why
erect it again? - (Colossians 2:9-17).
Believers are quickened in him. No longer are they subject to the calendrical
cycles and dietary restrictions of the old Levitical order. Such
practices were no more than “shadows of the coming things.” What was
foreshadowed in the old system has come to fruition in Jesus.
God never intended to achieve perfection
through the Levitical system; otherwise, He would not have promised a greater
priest and a “better sacrifice.” A change of priesthood means a “change
of law.” The Levitical system was powerless to perfect anyone, therefore,
Jesus became the “guarantor of a better covenant,” appointed to a better
and an “un-transmissible priesthood” - (Hebrews 7:11-28).
Jesus inaugurated a “new
and better covenant,” one
legislated on better promises.” The old covenant was “not
faultless” - It was unable to achieve “purification of sins.” With
the arrival of the new covenant, the old one “has been made obsolete” -
(Hebrews 1:1-3, 8:1-13, Jeremiah 31:31-33).
Jesus is the supremely
superior high
priest, the final mediator who entered the “greater
and more perfect Tabernacle, one not-made-with-hands” to appear in the
presence of God for us. He is
the “true light of the world,” not ancient Israel, and certainly not a
stone building in the Middle East - (John 1:4-9, Luke 1:78-79, 2:32, Acts
26:23, Hebrews 9:11-24).
Jesus came to the “circumcision to confirm
the promises made to the fathers.” This included the promise that the “Gentiles
might glorify God for his mercy.” As Isaiah prophesied, Jesus was the “root
of Jesse risen to reign over the Gentiles.” He reigns over the nations in
this present age - (Romans 15:8-9, Revelation 1:4-6).
The gospel is proclaimed to all nations “for the obedience of
faith,” as promised by the prophets. The scriptures foresaw that God would
justify the heathen. As Yahweh promised Abraham - “In you will all
nations be blessed.” This has now occurred in Abraham’s seed, Christ - (Romans 16:25-26,
Galatians 3:16).
When he testified before the Sanhedrin,
Stephen reminded the temple authorities that “the Most High does not dwell
in places made-by-hand.” The temple buildings and the Tabernacle
were man-made structures – Shadows and types of the true
habitation of God’s Spirit – Jesus Christ and his “body.”
With the victory of Jesus, the time of shadows has come to an end. He is the “goal” of the Mosaic legislation. The structures of the old regime have reached their intended end – Now, Jesus is forever the True and Final temple - (Romans 10:4).
The single passage that describes the “thousand
years” during which overcoming “saints” reign makes no mention of
any temple, tabernacle, sanctuary, altar, animal sacrifice, Jerusalem, calendrical
observations, or Israel - Those ideas must be imported into the
text - (Revelation 20:1-10).
The expectation of a millennial temple is
based on chapters 40-48 of the book of Ezekiel and Isaiah
2:2-4 - (“In the last days the mountain of Yahweh’s house will be established
on the top of the mountains…and all nations will flow to it”). There are
two main problems with this interpretation:
First, only one biblical passage refers to the
thousand-year period and it makes no mention of a temple. Second, Revelation locates
Ezekiel’s ideal temple in the city of “New Jerusalem” AFTER
the “thousand years.” What Revelation does place in the “thousand
years” is the “binding of Satan” and the “reign” of the “saints”
- (Revelation 20:1-10, 21:1-22:5).
John declared that he “saw no temple” in “New
Jerusalem”; however, he was referring to its lack of a physical
building. In the city, the “Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb
are the Temple,” and the holy sanctuary encompasses
the entire New Creation.
The New Testament has not abandoned the promise of an ideal temple
- It has reinterpreted it in Jesus - In his Death and Resurrection.
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