The scaffolding isn’t pretty, but God is working out everything for your good and His glory.
Imagine three men looking at a building. When you’re introduced, in each case they say, “I built that building.” The first is the owner and architect, the second the construction superintendent, and the third is the project manager. Regarding both the first and second creations, these roles are filled by the Father, Son, and Spirit. We have examples like these: “Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us is God, who also has sealed us and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee” (2 Cor 1:21-22) and “according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ” (1 Pet 1:2). So who built the temple in Solomon’s day? We read, “Solomon began to build the house of the Lord…This is the foundation which Solomon laid for building ” (2 Chron 3:1-3). Yes, “He overlaid…he paneled…he carved…And he decorated the house” (vv 4-6). And so on, and so on—in fact, 18 times we are told “he made” it all. But we aren’t saying he actually handled the tools. Wasn’t it Huram doing the work? Yes, that too. We read that “Huram made the pots and the shovels and the bowls. So Huram finished doing the work that he was to do for King Solomon for the house of God” (4:11). But wait! Weren’t there also “seventy thousand of them bearers of burdens, eighty thousand stonecutters in the mountain, and three thousand six hundred overseers” (2:18)? Yes, that too. So it’s true: “It is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure” (Php 2:13). And Christ said, “I will build My church” (Mt 16:18). But we also are “workers together with Him” (2 Cor 6:1). What a plan! What a project! What a privilege! I can hardly wait to see the finished masterpiece.