It has been many years since I was a child, but I can still remember my uncle asking me what I wanted to do when I grew up. My answer was, "I want to build my house!" Another time when I was still young, this same uncle asked me, "If I give you a bucketful of nails and a hammer, will you pound them into the old tree stump in my back yard?" I said, "Sure!" Now that is something I would even enjoy doing today; I love to pound nails. When I grew up and was married, I did build my own house, but that did not satisfy my desire to build. It was only a beginning.

I am not the only one who has an itch to build. There is some of it deep down in all of us. This yearning is almost as natural for us as eating, sleeping and walking--it is just something we automatically want to do. It is in our genes, ingrained in our spirit. Like it or not, we were born to build!

Do you think I might be exaggerating a little? If so, then just get a hammer, some pieces of boards and a handful of nails; then place them in front of a child and watch what happens! Granted, they may need to have their building skills developed, but the desire is there.

You may think I am just referring to little boys and that little girls would rather play with a doll than a hammer. Don't think that this yearning to build is just in boys; girls can become excellent builders, even better than boys. Women are inclined to use their building skills in a more important way than men. They build things like families, relationships and character while men tinker around with objects that have no feelings whatsoever. Of course, not all women are good builders; some leave a lot to be desired. The Bible says, "Every wise woman buildeth her house: but the foolish plucketh it down with her hands" (Prov.14:1). When Boaz announ- ced his marriage to Ruth, the people and the elders at the gate said, "The Lord make the woman that is come into thine house like Rachel and like Leah, which two did build the house of Israel . . ." (Ruth 4:11). Yes, women can be great builders; men too, that is, if the building is done with wisdom. This urge to build is a powerful thing, and if it is allowed to go out of control or is used in the wrong way, one could end up with a Tower of Babel! (Gen.11:4).

There are incredible monuments that bear witness to the building ability of man. Take a journey in your mind to view some of them. Start at the pyramids of Egypt, then go walk on the Wall of China; take an elevator up to the top of a skyscraper in New York City and look down from a window to the street below and see how high up from the ground man has built; ride the Chunnel that travels through the tunnel man has built under the ocean between England and France; and to top off this journey, take a look at the enormous amount of building that man has put into one tiny computer chip!

There is no doubt in my mind about where all this building ability in people comes from. The Bible says that we were made in the image of God. I believe this ability we have to build is a gift from Him; He is the One who put that urge to build within when He made us.

Have you ever considered what a builder God is?! It is no coincidence that Jesus as a boy worked in His foster father's carpenter shop, but that was not His first taste of being a builder. He was a Masterbuilder long before that. He is the Builder of all builders! The Bible states that Jesus is the Word of God (Rev.19:13): "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him; and without Him was not any thing made that was made" (John 1:1-3).

If you really want to get a view of some building masterpieces, take a look at some of the things the Lord has made! If you have the opportunity to spend a day and a night near the ocean in the east, make the effort to rise early in the morning, go to the shore and watch the sun rise up from the horizon. Or go to an area where you can watch the sun set itself down behind a lofty mountain range. Take the time, on some warm, clear summer night, to get alone outdoors in a quiet place where there are no distractions and look up into the heavens. View the stars and think how Abraham must have felt when God brought him forth and said, "Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them . . . So shall thy seed be." (Gen.15:5).

If you would like to see some of the garments the Lord has made, go to the beautiful fashion show held every fall when the trees display their brilliant coats of colored leaves, or take a good look at the clothing of a lily of the field. King "Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these" (Mat.6:29). Our Lord has made an endless array of things for us to see and enjoy. The Bible says, "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork" (Ps.19:1). Most of God's "handywork" can be reproduced to be seen in photographs, on videotapes or on a painter's canvas. In today's newspaper there was an article called "Eye In The Sky" telling about how the Hubble Space Telescope, which has traveled deep into space, is now probing what scientists call the outer limits of the universe. They report that it is sending back to earth astounding three-dimensional photographs revealing a universe of ". . . breathtaking beauty filled with wonders beyond imagination!"

Spectacular displays of the works of our Wonderful Creator are being seen everywhere. But what He is building now is the best of all His works. (Perhaps that is why He has saved it to build last). Yet at this time in history, it is the least viewed of all His works. It is so glorious that just one good look at it could change your life forever! This magnificent work of God is the Last Temple being built on earth before the return of Christ.

Some cannot see it because, at this time, it is not open to the general public to view, it is not a tourist attraction. Many others who have been given the right to view it cannot see it either because they are looking for it in the wrong place. This sacred work of God cannot be seen at present in a natural way; it must be viewed through the eyes of faith. There are other names for it besides The Temple. It is the "city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God" that Abraham looked for (Heb.11:10); it is the New Jerusalem (Rev.21:2); it is the Bride of Christ (Rev.21:9). Looking for the Last Temple of God to be built on earth by the hands of men is nothing but a search in vain.

The actual building site is in the Kingdom of God. Someday it will be on display for all Heaven and earth to behold, but right now it is exclusively viewed on earth by the members of the Family of God. Even for family members to see it requires a private showing with the Holy Spirit as a personal guide. It is not a physical building, it is spiritual; it is not a temporal structure, it is eternal. It is not made for the world but rather for the Kingdom of God. We who belong to Christ can actually see and experience the building of the Temple of God; that is, if we live in the new creation, which is walking in the Spirit not in the flesh.

Some think they have to wait until they die physically before they can enter the Kingdom of God, but the Bible teaches that we enter the moment we receive Christ. We will remain in the world for awhile but we do not belong to it. We should be most thankful, for God ". . . hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son" (Col.1:13). Jesus said, "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! For, behold, the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:20,21).

The building site of the House of God is the "new creature" (2Cor.5:17), "the in- ward man" (2Cor.4:16), the new man which "after God is created in right- eousness and true holiness" (Eph.4:24). It is foolish for a child of God to walk in the flesh rather than the Spirit by trying to build their spiritual life in the old man crucified with Christ on the cross (Rom.6:6), or by trying to build a self image rather than letting the Lord build His House within their new inner spiritual life.

I consider it an awesome privilege to have been invited by my Heavenly Father to help Him in the building of His glorious Temple, especially when I realize that my own inner being is part of that Temple. I get so excited about this that I often want to take control and get the job rolling along at a faster pace. I get racing along, then ask God to help me rather than me helping Him! When I get on one of those foolish binges, the Lord just lets me go ahead until I realize that for me to try to build His House is nothing but a labor in vain (Ps.127:1).

About thirty-nine years ago a friend and I formed a masonry construction business. The building industry was highly com- petitive, so we worked hard to build a company that could do quality work at a fast pace. Sometimes we would finish our work on a school, a shopping center or an apartment building well ahead of schedule, which would benefit the builder that had awarded us the contract to do the job. We trained our workers to produce. I knew how to keep the job moving; I made a good traffic director in the fast lane of the rat race: I made sure my crew did not take long coffee breaks, and sometimes I drove them so hard that I would chew them out for taking time to go to the bathroom! Yet I would never push anyone as hard as I pushed myself.

My partner and I split the workers between us so that we could have two jobs going at the same time. Production increased greatly when we could get the two crews in a race. Things were going along fairly well; there was harmony among the workers who did not mind this competition between the crews. But that all ended when I took on a job that I thought was the cream of the crop among building contracts.

It was the masonry work on a huge, expensive house that a man was building in a nearby town. When I was bidding for the job, I asked for a "cost plus ten," which meant that the owner would supply the material and pay us an hourly rate plus ten percent. He agreed to that but with one condition: he insisted that the job be done his way. He would not rush us in any way, but the work would have to be done right, regardless of how long it took to complete the job. That sounded reasonable to me seeing that he was paying the bill. I talked it over with my partner and crew workers and they said, "Sounds good; go for it!" So I agreed to take what I thought would be "The Dream Job." I kept a small crew of my best workers to begin the job, instructing them to work slowly, be fussy and do an excellent job.

Much of the house was being built with cement blocks. The owner of the house had an agreement with the company that supplied the blocks that he would pay them to replace any that did not meet his requirements. Sometimes, out of a pallet of fifty blocks, there might be only five that would pass this stiff inspection. If the owner of the house were to find a block built into a wall that had the least little chip out of it, the wall would have to be torn down to that point, the chipped block removed and the wall built up again. I instructed my workers to carefully inspect every block before using it.

At the end of the first day, the builder looked over our work, then had me tell my workers to tear down most of it for it was not done well enough, and that we could start over in the morning. That was a first for me; no other builder had ever made us do that. I thought our work was always high quality, and that day we had taken extra care to do a good job. In the following days I felt we were going way overboard, being so picky, but even this did not satisfy the homebuilder. He still found fault with the building material and the workmanship and made us tear down much of our work.

The man never complained or even raised his voice; he just said the house had to be built his way. After a few days of tearing down almost as much as we were building, I realized I had just met my first perfectionist!

This went on for two or three weeks; then even my best workers were becoming frustrated beyond measure. I tried to calm them down by reasoning with them; I said, "You're getting paid well, no one is yelling at you, and you're not being rushed; so what is the problem?" They told me that the man we were building for was out of his mind (and I didn't argue that point), and also that if they could not go back to their old way of working, they were going to quit and get another job. I talked them into staying on awhile longer while I tried to find a way to bow out of the contract I had made with the homebuilder.

When we got off that job and onto another one, we were greatly relieved and glad to get back to our old way of working. I pushed the crew and myself harder than ever, and they, as well as I, seemed to enjoy it. As for the "dream job," I just regarded it as one of life's bad experiences that should be put out of my mind.

That I did, completely forgetting about it for thirty-five years. Then just a few days ago, right out of nowhere, the whole experience came back to my memory in sharp detail. Along with it came the revelation that God had set that whole thing up way back then to help me now in my understanding about working with Him in the building of His House.

That homebuilder back then, who I thought was too meticulous to be in his right mind, the one whom I considered to be an unreasonable perfectionist . . . all I can say now is that he could not even begin to resemble a perfectionist compared to My Heavenly Father. He is the Ultimate Perfectionist, especially when it comes to the building of His Holy House.

When we see years of our hard work of trying to build our own spiritual life come crashing down, that is all right; let it crumble. It will only make room for the Lord to build His temple within us. Even when our most cherished works fall apart, we should not feel sorry for ourselves, but rather greatly rejoice that God places such a value on us that He will allow nothing to be built within our new creation but His very best! He is so good to us to take it upon Himself to do all the building and to let us work with Him as He leads.

We who belong to Jesus are His House, and He is building us up in His perfect righteousness. Try as we may, not one ounce of the material in His House will be constructed with our own righteousness. The love that His House is being built up into is His perfect love. It does not grow in us. It does not grow at all for it has always been full grown; it is complete, just as all the fruit of the Spirit is. We grow in His perfect faith, His perfect joy, His perfect patience and His perfect wisdom.

My heart longs to see my life and yours built up in Christ. The greatest sight in the world is to watch the Father build His Temple. And to think that He has invited us to work with Him! He will not push us, He is the God of Patience (Rom.15:5). He will wait until we are ready to work with Him, until we are ready to believe that His ways are higher than our ways, that His thoughts are higher than our thoughts (Isa.55:8).

Just as I used to push myself and my workers back on the construction jobs, we can drive ourselves to witness, to preach, to organize meetings, to read the Bible, and a whole lot more without seeing any building of the Temple within our inner being through our efforts. But if we enter into the New Covenant (which is God doing the work in us); if we believe in the finished work on the cross and by faith claim the inheritance that Christ purchased for us; and if we enter into the rest that remains for the people of God (Heb.4:9), oh, what a glorious work we will see being done in us by the Hand of God!

Once we get a good look at His work in our lives, that urge to build will come into its rightful position; and our desire will not be to do our own building but to watch the Magnificent Builder do His Perfect work in the building of His Holy House.