The Weekly Perspective
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor
The Holy Spirit is always “hovering around” when a new creation is being built in the scriptures, and that’s important for us to meditate on every once in a while.
The Spirit hovers over the creation in Genesis 1, when the world is first made. Later, with Noah on the ark, the Spirit shows up in the form of the dove (later on we see the dove imaging the Spirit at Jesus’ baptism) hovering over the new world. When Israel comes out of Egypt, the Spirit is hovering over them in the cloud as they are made a new creation, a new nation. The Spirit fills the Most Holy Place in the Tabernacle upon completion, signifying that the Spirit fills Israel as his new creation. The same thing happens upon the completion of the Temple: the Spirit-Cloud fills the Temple sanctuary, bonding with Israel as his sanctuary. Gabriel promises Mary that the Spirit will “overshadow” her at the conception of Jesus, and the Holy Spirit alights on Jesus in the form of a dove at his baptism, anointing him as the Messiah. At Pentecost, the Holy Spirit shows up in rushing wind with tongues of fire on the saints, symbolizing them as living temples.
Which brings us to you, your baptized children, and your baptized brethren: you all are “overshadowed” in the Holy Spirit, and we are personal temple dwellings of the Spirit, continuing the apostolic line of Pentecost! Filled with the Spirit, we live to glorify God in our bodies, because we are glorified beings as his temple!
Remember Paul’s admonition? “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body” (1 Cor. 6:19–20).