"However, the Most High does not live in houses made by human hands. As the prophet says..."
{Acts 7:48} (NIV)
We live our lives in our homes, our schools, our workplaces, on our roads, and playing fields, but when we enter church we hush, we change our language, we imagine that God is here, and therefore we act different. We say words on Sunday that we may never say through the week. We sing songs on Sunday that we may never even think of again, let alone sing during the week.
Stephen is addressing men who imagined that they were God’s people because they had God in a building. What a building it was! A very impressive building, a great building suitable for a great God! The problem that Stephen is pointing to, and that Isaiah pointed to, is that God doesn’t dwell in buildings. He dwells with those whose hearts are broken before Him. When our hearts are not broken and contrite, when we imagine that we have God in a ‘room’ that we can visit every now and then, and then do certain things that will cause Him to bless us and our families - when we reduce the worship of God to activity that is separate from our ‘real’ life, we make the mistake that the Jews who killed Stephen made. We make a huge mistake! To be so close to God and yet so far! How many millions of people throughout the ages have made the tragic mistake of thinking that God belongs in a special room, and if we just do what the priests tell us, we have peace with God.
Friend, don’t make the same mistake! Let us humble ourselves before our God right now, this very moment, wherever we are. "These are the ones I look on with favor: those who are humble and contrite in spirit, and who tremble at my word." (Isa 66:2b)
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