By Dr. Temitope Okuwoga
The Easter celebration, for me, is the greatest celebration in Christianity. A lot of us know that Jesus was birthed into the world only to die and be resurrected to save us from our sins and put us in right standing with God since the blood of animals could not do it. Isn’t that pretty much it? What else?
As Myles Munroe said, “Christianity has become a celebration of what Jesus did rather than a reception of the reason he did it.” Jesus was born, lived, died and returned to Heaven so we could have again the most important thing man lost at the Garden of Eden: THE INDWELLING PRESENCE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.
Between the fall of man and the resurrection of Jesus, the Spirit of God had to reside in consecrated arks and temples built with wood and stones by human hands. He would occasionally come upon people but could not permanently reside within them. The great plan of Jesus’ life and death was the restoration of man to God for the ultimate purpose of restoring God to man!
The Holy Spirit is a ‘HOLY’ Spirit and has to be in a holy place. The death of Jesus made every man free of sins, granting us justification (just as if we have never sinned) and sanctification (set apart for a sacred purpose). This was the whole point all along. Something had to happen before we could be temples again and the death of Jesus was that sacrifice.
Man was created to have relationship with God. How will you please God if you don’t have his Spirit to govern your actions? If you wanted something, you would have to communicate it to another person. Apostle Paul said, “For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God” (1 Cor 2:11). We need the Spirit of God to be vessels of God and instruments for him.
Jesus died for you even when you didn’t know him. What if you would never accept his sacrifice? It was a big risk but a necessary provision because ultimately, all men will acknowledge God. Even now, God is looking for willing vessels. God has done everything on his part to restore and redeem you. Will you accept his love and his Son, becoming a temple where you fellowship with the Spirit everyday and every time to be used for his good pleasure?
All you need to do now is: believe with all your heart that Jesus Christ is the son of God, confess with your mouth, and repent (change you mind) from every sin and everything unpleasing to God. Voila! It’s that simple. You are now saved, the Holy Spirit is now your guide for this life and you now have eternal life in Heaven.
