For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee. So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.
Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.
The message today is on last things, and this text sets before us our death and judgment, which is part of that.
The main point of this text is one that feels too gnostic to some of us. Gnosticism is the idea that the body – physical things – are bad, or inherently less spiritual. But verse 1 tells us, this earthly body is a temporary tent. Vs 2 - While we are in the body, we groan and long to be with the Lord. It is better to be with the Lord apart from the body, vs 8.
This is a good corrective, when we think we are correcting past errors, gnostic or pietist. Don’t try to reinterpret this text into your anti-gnostic lens. Just believe what the verse in front of you says:
Being in the body on
earth brings burdens, vs 4, but we should remain of good courage, vs 6. This courage is not a stoic, “I’ll muscle
through this, even with my bad back.”
No, vs 8 says this courage is looking ahead to the future when we will
be home with the Lord, with the bodily problems of pain, disease and death all
gone.
So, today, you may
need to confess putting too much stock and worry into your physical condition
and situation. God can bless you, even
when (especially when) you are frustrated with your body or job or house.
Or you may need to
confess giving your physical situation too little thought, to how it impacts
your spiritual life, which it certainly does.
This reminds us of our need to confess
our sins.
9/4/22
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