My body...a temple? Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief!

My body...a temple? Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief! Mark 9:24

Patricia Ann

Imagine being given all the funds necessary to build the house of your dreams. You fill it with the best of everything - all things new and beautiful. You have diamond chandeliers hanging from the ceilings, gold bricks on the floors, rubies and emeralds adorning every room. Your furnishings are plush.
Your new home looks and feels like a temple --- it must belong to a God or Goddess, or at least someone very important.
And since this is the house of your dreams - complete with anything you might ever desire, you want to cherish it and take care of it... forever.  You love it!!

The Bible, God's Holy Word, tells us that we are to know that our bodies, given to us by Him are a Temple of His presence within each of us.
“Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?

You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore, honor God with your body.”  1 Corinthians 6: 19-20
But how often do we even let that thought cross our minds in a day?        
Our bodies... a temple??

The definition of a temple is:  a building for the worship of a divinity or divinities, anything viewed as the dwelling place of God or a divinity.

Do we really treat our bodies as a temple?
Or do we seemingly do whatever it takes to destroy the beautiful temple God has provided by eating wrong -- too much fast food - addictions - stress, always in a rush to get things done in this busy world, so we choose to do what the world wants done. And we forget to recognize that God desires for us to take a moment to recognize Him, to slow down and care for what He has provided us - our bodies -- His Holy Temple within us. 
We are a picture of His perfection, His glory, His love, His faith, His light, and His nature...

all made beautiful by Him for each of us. 

You see,  life on this earth is a Blessing for each of us. Sure there are bad times, tough times we think we will never get through and sometimes some of us don't make it through the tough times. But why?
Could it be because we are lacking in faith or the belief that God's Word is True and real in our lives in today's world,

as well as yesterday's world?

Even the disciples lacked belief that they could cure an epileptic/demon possessed child!
The father of the boy told Jesus that even the disciples could not heal his son.
Displeased with their unbelief, Jesus answered and said, "O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him hither to me." Matthew 17:17.
The boy had been sick with his affliction since childhood and the father was distraught and lacking in faith that his son

could be healed.
He said to Jesus, "...And ofttimes it hath cast him into the fire, and into the waters, to destroy him: but if thou canst do any thing, have compassion on us, and help us."
Jesus said to him, “If you can believe, all things are possible for him who believes."
Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears, "Lord I believe, help my unbelief!"
When Jesus saw that the people came running together, he rebuked the foul spirit, saying unto him, "Thou dumb and deaf spirit, I charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him." And the spirit cried, and rent him sore, and came out of him: and he was as one dead; in so much that many said, He is dead. But Jesus took him by the hand, and lifted him up; and he arose.

And when he was come into the house,  His disciples asked him privately, Why could not we cast him out?
And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting."

We know they lacked confidence because Jesus said their problem was "unbelief" in Matthew 17:20.
And Jesus said unto them, "Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you."

Faith moves God [Hebrews 11:6]. Fasting food takes us out of the natural realm and helps us to be sensitive to the spiritual realm of God. Fasting forces our flesh to submit to our spirit man. God becomes our total source. We live by the Word of God alone. Fasting makes our body listen to our spirit man.  We tell our body to line up with the Word of God and it obeys. Our spirit man dominates our body or fallen flesh. Prayer does the same thing. Prayer disciplines our flesh to submit to our spiritual man. Prayer trains our flesh to submit to your spiritual man. Prayer and fasting are spiritual disciplines that we need to be aware of and use.
You see, just as the father of the boy did not have enough faith, the disciples also lacked in the belief that they could cast out demons.

In a sense, they were insecure in their abilities, even though Jesus had been teaching them about such things.
The story of the demon possessed boy is told in Matthew, Mark and Luke making it very clear that Jesus wants us to know and understand that we need to exercise faith and prayer in order to receive His healing. He also tells us to love unconditionally. If we find ourselves falling short in our belief, it is OKAY to call on Jesus for help. He is always close to us and will help our unbelief and answer our cry!

 
Sometimes this world we live in seems too hard, with too many struggles and pains. 
We hurry through each day just trying to survive. 
Perhaps we should try really hard to remember each day what a blessing it is to have a physical body that is a working Temple of Our Lord and Savior - the Holy Spirit - residing in each of us. 
 We are not our own - bought at a price by Jesus who took all of our sins, so that we may live life healthy, whole, fulfilled and confident in His glory.

My prayer for today is that we take the time daily to seek Him out and show Him our love as we bring Glory to God through our desire to recognize our bodies as a Temple of the Holy Spirit. May we seek to care for our bodies as the precious and beautiful creations that they are - made in His great image. May we know in our hearts that it is OKAY for us to ask for extra belief and faith when we feel we need it. Jesus is forever at at our side and He seeks for our temples, our bodies, to be filled with the Holy Spirit, love, peace and joy!

In His Precious Name, Amen.