The Temple Is Being Fruitful and Multiplying
"Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth."
(John 4:21-24, ESV)
Here, Jesus says a most startling thing about the coming of the future of God's temple. The thing that I want you to see here is that the temple of God is being fruitful and multiplying. If you are like me, you might think of the temple as a place of sacrifice, which it was. But do not forget that the temple was structured like a garden, with every design element, every piece of furniture and ornamentation, designed to remind the worshipper of the garden of Eden. The temple was a picture of Eden, just larger and more glorified. Justice Kavanaugh called gardens and temples microcosms. And what did God command man in the first microcosm? Be fruitful and multiply. The directive to be fruitful and multiply is repeated to the post-diluvian Noah (Gen 9:1), and again to Jacob, that a company of nations shall come from you, and kings shall come from your own body (Gen 35:11). Fruitfulness and multiplication might be the most underappreciated themes in redemptive history.
After Jesus told this Samaritan woman that God is seeking such worshipers who worship him in spirit and truth, Jesus said something to his disciples that may be even more startling. He said, "Do you not say, 'There are yet four months, then comes the harvest'? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest" (John 4:35). What was going on in Samaria at that time? There was a whole mission field ready for harvesting, right in front of the disciples' eyes, but they couldn't see it. Jesus wanted to lift their eyes to see more — more of the harvest, more fruitfulness—which was his habit. Did you remember how he says to Peter and Andrew, "Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men"? Jesus is acting out the fruitful and multiply prophecy of Genesis 1:28 in the pursuit of the division of the nations at the tower of Babel — the division which was being healed at Pentecost, where people from every nation, tribe, and tongue were being gathered under the preaching of the gospel. And when Paul says in Colossians 1:6 that the gospel is bearing fruit and increasing in the whole world, he is using the fruitful and increasing language of Genesis 1:28.
In the 1800s, Herman Bavinck said, "We dream of a Christianity that fills the whole earth," meaning one day, the empty heavens and earth we now see will be completely filled with God's glory. And the mechanism for filling the whole earth with God's glory is the temple of God being fruitful and multiplying. Note something: there is actually only one temple in redemptive history. The history of the temple is the history of a building being torn down and built back up again—better, more glorious, and bigger each time. Think through it: three stages of one temple. First, the garden, pattern of glory. Then the tabernacle and the temple, pattern copy. Then, Jesus, realized glory, dies on the cross and says, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." And Paul says, "Do you not know that you are the temple?" And Peter says, "You yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house." The temple was fruitful and multiplying. It has taken these shapes over history—one building going up, coming down, and going up again more glorious. And, note this: wherever Jesus went, the temple was being fruitful and multiplying. Wherever people who are the temple are multiplying, the temple multiplies. One glorious mountain of God grows and fills the whole earth, a mountain that cannot be shaken and will never be moved.
- Adam and the elders