In our lesson from the Hebrew scriptures today, we find King Solomon consecrating his magnificent temple as the dwelling place of God. From time immemorial, we have been trying to ensure that God's presence remains with us by creating dwelling places for the Holy One. Frequently we have assumed it is God's will and that we are given the design for the dwelling place by the Divine. We see Moses building the ark of the covenant to contain the stone tablets of the ten commandments, covered with a solid gold lid to be God's mercy seat, the dwelling place for the Holy One. (Ex.25) Something so holy needs protection so Moses quickly had the tabernacle, the tent of meeting built to house the ark. (Ex.26-27)

Solomon's temple is the next example in scripture of our desire to settle God down in one permanent place where we can expect to find the Divine, where we can worship and praise. That the temple was destroyed at the time of the Babylonian exile and again in 70 C.E. in the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans hasn't yet gotten our attention that God isn't interested in edifices, no matter how spectacular. God wants our hearts, the center of our being, for the divine dwelling place.

The apostle Paul got it. He told the Corinthians that "you are God's temple and. . . God's Spirit dwells in you." (I Cor. 3:16) We are the temple of God! Wherever we are, God is here. Whatever we are doing, God is here. Whatever we say, God is here. God's dwelling is in the here and now, surrounding, upholding, keeping us in Divine Love, making us whole and holy as we are transformed into the image of God we were created to be.