Polluted By Every Kind of Impurities

One of the first thing good King Hezekiah did was to cleanse the temple. He knew that his forefathers had neglected the House of God and let it be left is disrepair and filled with debris. The king knew that to bring the nation of Israel back to God that he must first prepare the House of God:

    “In the first year of his reign, in the first month, he opened the doors of the house of the Lord and repaired them. Then he brought in the priests and the Levites, and gathered them in the East Square, and said to them: ‘Hear me, Levites! Now sanctify yourselves, sanctify the house of the Lord God of your fathers, and carry out the rubbish from the holy place. For our fathers have trespassed and done evil in the eyes of the Lord our God; they have forsaken Him, have turned their faces away from the dwelling place of the Lord, and turned their backs on Him. They have also shut up the doors of the vestibule, put out the lamps, and have not burned incense or offered burnt offerings in the holy place to the God of Israel. Therefore the wrath of the Lord fell upon Judah and Jerusalem, and He has given them up to trouble, to desolation, and to jeering, as you see with your eyes. For indeed, because of this our fathers have fallen by the sword; and our sons, our daughters, and our wives are in captivity.’” (2 Chronicles 29:3-9)

Perhaps the first thing that comes to mind is that the temple was full of idols. But a closer reading of our passage does not say that; it says they were to “carry out rubbish from the holy place.” The Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown Commentary explains what it was Hezekiah had the priests do:

    Assembling the priests and Levites there, he enjoined them to set about the immediate purification of the temple. It does not appear that the order referred to the removal of idols, for objects of idolatrous homage could scarcely have been put there, seeing the doors had been shut up; but its forsaken and desolate state the temple and its courts had been polluted by every kind of impurities.

Most Christians do not openly worship idols; we may have some idols that we allow to seep into our lives, but most Christians are in a state of disrepair; they’ve allowed their temple to be polluted by every kind of impurities. The Apostle Paul tells us that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit:

    “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 6:19)

Have I shut up the doors of my heart to the Word of God that I have become polluted by every kind of impurities? Have I allowed stinking thinking to enter into my life because I give man more credence in my life than God’s Word?

If revival is to come to each one of us, I daresay that this area is a good starting place for each of us.

I know that’s where I’m starting.

How about you?

In Christ
Dave
Ps. 37:4

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    Copyright © 2012 David Jeffers

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