Sent as Temples
Jesus was sending his disciples,
spiritually reborn, into the world. HE makes it sound like they were coming
from heaven into the world for the first time as newborns, just as he had come
from heaven to earth (16:28). Jesus says, “no-one can see the Kingdom of God
without being born from above.” (John 3:3, NRSV). As Jesus was from heaven, in
a sense they are now from heaven too.
He was born as a temple. In his
case, he was sent into the world, born in human form, “tabernacling” amongst
them in the temple of his body. In their case, it was spiritual rebirth as
temples. He puts his plan into action after his resurrection:
Jesus said to them again, “Peace
be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” And when he
had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
(John 20:21-22 ESV)
And this makes them temples of the
Holy Spirit, a community in which the breath of Christ lives. This is the fifth
step. Jesus has inducted his disciples into the ideas of the three-in-one God
of the temple. (Colin Green, God in 3D: Finding the Trinity in the Bible and
Church Fathers [Eugene, Oreg.: Wipf and Stock, 2019], 126)
