'Christ Jesus Himself being the chief comer stone, in whom, all the building, fitly framed together, groweth into a Holy Temple of the Lord; in 'whom ye also are builded together for a habitation of God in the Spirit,' — Eph. ii. 20-22.

We have here again the fulness of God. The Father for Whom the habitation is built. The Son, Jesus Christ, the chief corner stone, in Whom the holy temple groweth. The Spirit, the Builder, through Whom all the living stones are united with each other and with the chief corner atone, and thus in perfect fellowship with God. As in heaven, so in the Church on earth, and in the heart of every believer, the thrice Holy One is the God of our salvation.

The great thought of the passage is fellowship — the fellowship of the Spirit, as seen in the temple. That fellowship is spoken of first as the fellowship of believers, built up into one

holy temple. Prom verse 11 Paul had spoken of the Gentiles as strangers from the covenant of the promise, who are now made nigh in the blood of Christ; of the enmity being abolished and nailed to the Cross, that we both might have access in one Spirit unto the Father, In verse 19 he says, 'ye are no more strangers but fellow citizens, and of the household of God.'

As Jew and Gentile both had access by one Spirit unto the Father, so here by the same Spirit they are built up into one temple. The cross has made an end of all separation among men, Jews and Gentiles, Greek and barbarian, the wise and the foolish, — all are one in Christ Jesus, National and social distinctions are as nothing compared to that unity which the Spirit gives in Christ Jesus, The cement by which the living stones are held together, the bond by which all are members of one household and one body, is nothing less than the Spirit and the Life and the Love of God Himself,

The fellowship with Christ the corner stone is also the work of the Blessed Spirit. In Him the believer on earth and the Father in heaven find their bond of union. We often suffer much, even in religion, from regarding as an end what is only a means. Men think of pardon and of peace, of obedience and of holiness, as an end, while they are only means to the great end of bringing God and man into perfect union. When we speak of the Mosaic worship, how we prize and press the thought of the atonement through blood, and the access of the High Priest to sprinkle that blood on the mercy-seat, as the image of what Christ has done for us, while we forget there was something higher, — nothing less than the presence and fellowship of God Himself. God dwelt in the sanctuary in the midst of His people that He might be their God, and that they might enjoy His guidance and His blessing, His mighty deliverance in their time of need, and His abiding Presence, And this is what we need above everything to fix our hearts on in God's Word, that fellowship with the Father and the Son, that communion, intimate, holy, and unceasing, is what man was created for, and has been restored to, in Christ Jesus.

As believers accept and realize their dependence on Christ, their inseparable union with Him, and trust the blessed Spirit ever to maintain within them the faith of His Presence, they will come to know that the Presence and the Power of God is the highest of all the blessings with which He has blessed us in Christ Jesus. In the Apostolic benediction 'the fellowship of the Spirit' indicates what His chief work is.

Through Him alone can we have our access in Christ to the Father. He reveals Christ to us and the reality of our union with Him, and the nearness to God which He gives. He not only builds the temple, but reveals the indwelling God. He not only builds the temple as a whole, but makes each heart a temple, and reveals how God is willing and able to be and to do in our heart what He is and does in His heaven above. Yes, what to so many Christians appears an impossibility, that the presence of God Himself can we with them and can keep them all the day, is indeed possible, if we know and believe in the Holy Spirit as the power of God that worketh in us.

The fellowship with God, with Christ the chief corner stone, and with each other, constitutes the blessedness of our being built as an habitation of God in the Spirit, We need to know how in the Cross of Christ all selfishness has been destroyed, and the love that seeks no life but giving itself for others has been made possible to us. We shall then understand that a close fellowship with each other is as sacred and indispensable as the fellowship with God is. We shall not only see how entirely our spiritual life depends upon it, but how there is no way of proving to men our love to God, and the reality of God's love to us, but through the love of the brethren. When our Lord Jesus prayed, in the last night, 'that they may be one, even as we are one, that the world may know that Thou lovedst them, even as Thou lovedst Me,' He taught us that a divided church is powerless before the enemy; a love to the brethren life God's and Christ's will give us the victory.

The world will be compelled to acknowledge that Christ crucified in His love is present and working in us. As one has said, 'If without recognising the Unity of the Body, Pentecostal power were again to be made manifest, the Churches would appropriate the glory to themselves, and would not lay it down at the feet of the King.'

When the New Testament standard of the spiritual life is lifted up, and the love of the brethren takes the place God's Word has given it as the only proof of the reality of our love to God, and of the conformity of our life to the image of Jesus Christ and His love on the cross, our devotions will be delivered from the selfishness that so often hinders them. Our hearts will feel a new confidence that God will hear the prayers in which the Spirit teaches us to plead for the growing of a holy temple in the Lord, a fit and worthy habitation of God in the Spirit.

And we shall learn that by the power of the Holy Spirit God's presence with us, and our devotion to Him, can be the mark of our life all the day.

The Temple of the Holy Spirit