We had a couple of doves building a nest in the giant jade on my front porch. We’ve had doves nest nearby a few times—a wonder and privilege—but never quite so close.
Yesterday, I came home from running errands, forgetting that my little friends might be nearby. There was a frantic flurry in my big blue pot, and the husband and wife flew off in a hurry, nearly getting caught in my hair.
I took a peek in the pot to see if there were eggs in there yet, and there weren’t. They might choose a more hospitable location. If so, I pray it’s somewhere close so I can behold the beauty of it all.
Real-life doves--symbol of the Holy Spirit--need optimal conditions for their babies.
The Holy Spirit does, too. A sullied vessel won’t do.
Defilement is a grievous offense, human and spiritual. Jesus agrees, confirming the concept of holiness and the indwelling Spirit throughout scripture, with different imagery reflecting His intimate union with us. Parent and child, bride and groom are favorites. How beautiful that doves usually mate for life.
Unsparing, Jesus said:
“What comes out of a person is what defiles him. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.” Mark 7:20-23 (ESV)
No mincing words. Paul goes even further in writing to the wayward Christians of Corinth, a morally bankrupt pagan Greek city—bad company indeed (1 Corinthians 15:33).
16 Don’t you realize that all of you together are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God lives in you? 17 God will destroy anyone who defiles this temple. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple. 18 Stop deceiving yourselves. If you think you are wise by this world’s standards, you need to become a fool to be truly wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness to God. 1 Corinthians 3:16-19a (NLT)
“Ouch” is an understatement.
Among many other roles, the indwelling Holy Spirit is the active agent that convicts us of sin and enables us to resist it with our humble cooperation (aka obedience).
I can testify that we can silence it in various ways. Not good.
The upside of this “nesting” is that it’s not exhausting, high-intensity striving. It’s restful and compliant abiding, letting Christ’s Spirit live in and through us.
The “downside” is a posture of humble dependence, which comes at the expense of our egos and all our often self-serving, self-seeking, self-effort, and everything else.
Our willingness to surrender makes it easier, but if we have a problem, God will bust out the pruning shears or some other metaphorical agent…like fire.
This, too, is LOVE, to protect the beloved baby in the nest.
I have learned this through crushing firsthand and observed experience.
Please, friend, don’t hang your hopes on “I will never leave you nor forsake you” or some other diluted truth you heard in church. "Half-measures availed us nothing."
Who is leaving and forsaking who in this sacred bond?
Scripture is clear:
So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. Galatians 5:16 (NIV)
You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ. Romans 8:9 (NIV)
If we're not walking by the Spirit and honoring the Spirit, we have to ask if the dove was ever nesting in us, if the dove is grieved by our raucous to-and-fro, or where that precious dove has gone.
Maybe we're living our professed faith in, for, and by someone or something that isn't faith in Christ at all.
As you all know, I could go on and on, but instead, I'll stop here and urge you to read the rest of the Bible verses below, explore more, and talk with God about it.
Do it soon.
I’ll close with Paul’s convicting charge to those crazy Corinthians:
Because we have these promises, dear friends, let us cleanse ourselves from everything that can defile our body or spirit. And let us work toward complete holiness because we fear God. 2 Corinthians 7:1 (NLT)
PRAYER: Lord Jesus, please forgive us if we’ve grieved Your Spirit in any way. Purify us. Help us be a suitable nesting place for and by Your Spirit. In Your Most Holy Name, I ask it, Amen. Thank You. I love You. 💖
Pray | Read | Ponder | Listen | Pray
Matthew 12:43-45 (NIV)
43 “When an impure spirit comes out of ," a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. 44 Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’ When it arrives, it finds the house unoccupied, swept clean and put in order.45 Then it goes and takes with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that person is worse than the first. That is how it will be with this wicked generation.”
1 Corinthians 6:18-20 (NIV)
18 Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually sins against their own body. 19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.
Galatians 5:16-20 (ESV)
16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19 Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality,20 idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions,21 envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.
Hebrews 6:4-8 (NIV)
4 It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, 5 who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age 6 and who have fallen away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace. 7 Land that drinks in the rain often falling on it and that produces a crop useful to those for whom it is farmed receives the blessing of God. 8 But land that produces thorns and thistles is worthless and is in danger of being cursed. In the end it will be burned.
Hebrews 19:26-31 (NIV)
26 If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, 27 but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. 28 Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. 29 How much more severely do you think someone deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified them, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? 30 For we know him who said, “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” and again, “The Lord will judge his people.”31 It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
Ephesians 4:30 (NIV)
30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.
2 Timothy 1:7
For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.
Romans 8:9 (NKJV)
But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now, if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.
Psalm 51:11 (NIV)
11 Do not cast me from your presence
or take your Holy Spirit from me.
(Emphasis added throughout.)
See also:
John 15-16
Divine Addendum
If you made it this far, then I trust you're someone who wants to know. Maybe this word is for you…or maybe you sense the urgency of what I'm sharing and will seek God about it.
Here's the backstory to this post, hinting at more to come.
“Anything that defiles us defiles Christ.”
This truth is more urgent and important than it might seem.
“Anything that defiles us, defiles Christ,” are the words that woke me up around 3:30 this morning. It wasn't an audible voice, but it was crystal clear.
It's not unusual for me to wake up in the wee hours, inspired and compelled to get up and write. Having an unmistakable Creative (Big "C") concept of what I want to write is not unusual either. What was unusual was the weight of the words. But I didn't sleep until after 10 last night, and I was tired, yet felt a persistent nudge. I asked God if he wanted me to get up, as I sometimes do when I'm awoken this way and not totally on board with the idea. I sensed "yes." Again, not an audible voice per se, but an undeniable directive.
These days, more than ever, if God prompts me to do something (or not), I do it (or don’t). Lickety-split.
“Anything that defiles us defiles Christ,” echoed again. I repeated it out loud, almost involuntarily.
I made coffee and a fire and meandered a bit, not panicked but prayerful and purposeful. I wrote most of what you just read and felt I was 97 percent done when I went on a typical last-minute nerdy bunny trail I thought was mere fact-checking. Not. I was promptly led to the passage below, which made me gasp and literally sob with concern and shock because it seems so true, real, and relevant to now.
Please remember that this is Paul writing to the seriously wayward Christians in Corinth, an equally wayward pagan Greek city
10 Because of God’s grace to me, I have laid the foundation like an expert builder. Now, others are building on it. But whoever is building on this foundation must be very careful. 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have—Jesus Christ.
12 Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials—gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. 13 But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person’s work has any value. 14 If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. 15 But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames.
16 Don’t you realize that all of you together are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God lives in you? 17 God will destroy anyone who defiles this temple. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple. 18 Stop deceiving yourselves. If you think you are wise by this world’s standards, you need to become a fool to be truly wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness to God. As the Scriptures say,
“He traps the wise in the snare of their own cleverness.”
20 And again,
“The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise; he knows they are worthless.”
21 So don’t boast about following a particular human leader. For everything belongs to you— 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Peter, or the world, or life and death, or the present and the future. Everything belongs to you, 23 and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.
1 Corinthians 3:10-23 (NLT)
WOW! Loaded! I was sideswiped and stunned by the passage's momentous gravity. I asked God what He wanted me to do, but I didn't wait for the answer. I decided to take a break and regroup.
I confess I really didn’t want to highlight this passage because of its undeniable threat. Believe me when I say I share it only to honor God. I prefer my Guideposts devotionals, finding poignant—not terrifying—spiritual truth in everyday life. You can see that's how this one started with the nesting doves, undeniably and providentially connected to “Anything that defiles us, defiles Christ.”
Several hours of battling dastardly detours later, I'm posting it.
I've since checked the headlines, and they have already shifted to the blame game and plans for the future. The apocalyptic images are halfway down the page.
I heard from a friend in LA who wrote that everything was returning to normal. A contractor friend in Utah was already offered rebuilding work.
People. Really?
What, or better, Who is your foundation?
Whether you profess Christ or not, lost a home in the fire or not, this is no time to sweep God under the rug or rubble of a burnt-down town or other wreckage.
We all need to pause, pray, and then proceed as God directs. God alone.
Please, let's heed the warning shots, forest fire or otherwise, and re/turn to God. There is, in fact, a time when it's too late.
Because we have these promises, dear friends, let us cleanse ourselves from everything that can defile our body or spirit. And let us work toward complete holiness because we fear God. 2 Corinthians 7:1 (NLT)
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