Trusting in the temple

“Do not trust in deceptive words and say, ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord!’” Jeremiah 7:4
Here, God was telling Jeremiah what to say to the people of Israel, who had forsaken Him. On the outside, they were coming to the temple to make offerings, but in their hearts they were serving the gods of the Canaanites and generally pleasing themselves. They had deceived themselves into thinking that because they had the temple of Jehovah, they were safe from destruction. But it doesn’t matter how many times you say ‘the temple of the Lord’, if your heart is not the temple of the Lord then you are just as lost as the next person.
We see the same thing today. People think that because they go to church in some fancy building, that they are home and dry. Not necessarily so. The building is not where God resides. The building is a facility so that a congregation can meet together and stay dry if it is raining. It is in the assembling together of believers, that Jesus promised to be in the midst (Matt. 18:20). Now, we are the temple of God, where He resides (1 Cor. 3:16).