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This Old House
2
Corinthians 5:1-9
At Christmas we visited the
Biltmore Estate in
I want you especially to
notice what Paul is saying here. He says, "For we know [not we hope or we
expect or even that we believe] that if our earthly house of this tabernacle
were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands,
eternal in the heavens." This is a very positive "know." He knows because of
the fact that the Spirit of God has made it real to him.
The word for "tabernacle"
is skene, which means "tent." That is the same word that was used for the
wilderness tabernacle of the Old Testament in the Septuagint, a translation
of the Old Testament into the Greek. The Old Testament tabernacle, the
Mosaic tabernacle, was a skene, a tent. It was a flimsy sort of thing.
The bodies we have now are
like loaners until we get the real permanent thing.
Ours are broken as soon as we receive them, under the curse, and
scarred by sin all our lives.
But praise God someday He'll take my body as a trade in and I'm gonna trade
up in a way unthinkable here on earth.
It won't be a fair or even trade at all, but in God's grace I'm gonna
receive my glorified body and it's gonna be really good!
We need to realize that
there is an outward man and an inward man. Paul talked about that in the
preceding chapter. The outward man perishes, but the inward man is renewed
day by day. A great many people misunderstand that.
One preacher testified:
"I had a letter from a man who said the Bible is filled with
contradictions, and he said, 'I can prove there are contradictions. You talk
about So-and-So having gone to be with the Lord, and then you talk about the
body that is going to be raised and say that the person is going to be
raised from the dead down here. Now that is a contradiction.' This man has
missed the entire point. The body is put in the grave, but the individual,
the real person, has gone to be with Christ -- if that individual is a
believer.
ill.--Kerry buried in the
snow / he hated snow / but its just a shell lying in that cemetery.
The things that are seen
are temporal. Often preachers say they are going to come here and see me,
and I do my best to talk them out of it, because they'll be real
disappointed once they get here.
They think we're a big, rich church w/ thousands of people and that I'm some
big time preacher. Well, if I'm
gonna maintain that illusion I have to talk them out of it!!!
A few have come by and they
just saw this house, this old tent, I live in. They saw my short stature,
knocked knees, crooked teeth, and a beer belly on the way!
And it won't be getting better before it gets worse.
Solomon described old age
in Ecclesiastes: "In the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble,
and the strong men shall bow themselves, and the grinders cease because they
are few, and those that look out of the windows be darkened, and the doors
shall be shut in the streets, when the sound of the grinding is low, and he
shall rise up at the voice of the bird, and all the daughters of music shall
be brought low" (Eccl. 12:3-4). The "keepers of the house" are the legs, and
my knees and hips are beginning to tremble and ache on my treadmill. "The
strong men," which are my shoulders, will eventually bow themselves. My wife
tells me to stand up straight, and I tell her I can't stand straight, it's
not comfortable. "Those that look out of the windows" are my eyes -- I am
going to have to get a large print Bible. "The sound of the grinding is low"
-- I don't hear as well as I used to hear, unless you are talking about the
ringing, which grows ever louder. This is old age taking place in the
outward man. The things that are seen are temporal.
Also, there is an inward
man, and the inward man is spiritual. It is difficult for us to understand
that. God is a person, but God is not a physical, material Being. God is a
Spirit. "God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in
spirit and in truth." And I'm
glad our Spirit can be renewed and we can grow stronger all our lives,
spiritually.
I hear people say they
don't like getting old. I am enjoying it. I have a good doctor who reminds
me not to be stressed, but to enjoy life and do what I want to do.
Sometimes my wife gives me a to do list and I just say, "Look, my
doctor tells me to do what I want to do, and I don't want to do this thing
that you want me to do." Sometimes I can get by with that, but not always!
Seriously, it is wonderful
to know that every passing year brings me closer to Him. I am going to see
Him someday; I am going to see the face of the Lord Jesus, the One who loved
me and gave Himself for me. I rejoice in that prospect.
Someone asked President
Adams how he felt after he had become an old man. He answered, "I feel fine.
This old house that I live in is really getting feeble. The shingles are
coming off the top and the foundation seems to be coming out from
underneath, but Mr. Adams is just fine, thank you."
We have a house eternal in
the heavens. This body of ours will be sown a natural body, but it will be
raised a spiritual body. He is going to give us a new body up yonder.
For in this we groan,
earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven
[2Cor. 5:2].
I hear you groaning, and
I'm not talking about the groaning you emit at my jokes.
It's another sound you make, we all make, but not forever, and maybe
not for long!
It's not about physical
pain as much as tiring of it all and yearning for things to be the way God
intended for His children before we chose the way of sin.
One just can't help but groan in this cursed world.
I groan as I open bills.
I groan when I eat too much.
Sometimes I groan in the water closet after eating too much!
And yes, we come to a place where we groan with pain sometimes from
exercise, work, or just from getting up!
ill.--My wife tells me,
"You ought not to groan like that." I remind her, "It's scriptural to groan.
Paul says we groan in this house, and I'm going to groan while I am in this
house of mine."
If so be that being clothed
we shall not be found naked [2Cor. 5:3].
This is interesting. One of
these days Jesus is going to call His own out of the world. We will be
caught up to meet our Lord in the air, and we are going to stand before Him.
What will it be like for us? We will be clothed in His righteousness. We
will not be found naked.
Not everyone will be
clothed in His righteousness when they are raised from the dead. Christ
"...was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our
justification" (Rom. 4:25) -- that is, our righteousness. But some folk have
not accepted His righteousness. They have rejected Christ. Therefore, there
is a resurrection of the just and of the unjust. Paul mentions this in Acts
24:15, "...that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just
and unjust." Jesus said the same thing in John 5:29. "And shall come forth;
they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have
done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation."
You are going to stand
in His presence someday. Will you be clothed in the righteousness of Christ?
Are you accepted in the Beloved?
For we that are in this
tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but
clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life [2Cor. 5:4].
If you feel like groaning,
you just groan. It's scriptural. We are burdened. Yes, we are. That is why
we groan in these bodies. It is not that we are worried about being
unclothed; we know that we shall be clothed with the righteousness of
Christ. If He is our Savior, He is our only hope.
Now he that hath wrought us
for the selfsame thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of
the Spirit [2Cor. 5:5].
The earnest of the Spirit
implies there is more to follow. He has given us the Holy Spirit down here
in these weak bodies with all our feebleness, all our frailty. The Holy
Spirit is just the earnest. Earnest money is the down payment. Christ has
purchased us, and the Holy Spirit indwelling the believer is the down
payment. One of these days we will move out of this old house and we will
meet the Lord in the air. How wonderfully this opens up such a vista for us.
Therefore we are always
confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent
from the Lord [2Cor. 5:6].
Let's be honest, we many
times feel at home in our bodies...they are all we have ever known.
I know every scar, and can point directly to moles on my back that
I've never even seen w/ my eyes!
However, as long as I am at home in this body, I am absent from the Lord.
(For we walk by faith, not
by sight:) [2Cor. 5:7].
How could Paul be so sure
that when we leave this body we will be present with the Lord? Paul says
that we walk by faith. We take God at His Word. I would rather take His Word
than anyone else's word. Faith is taking God at His Word.
We are confident, I say,
and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the
Lord [2Cor. 5:8].
Another translation would
be "at home with the Lord." It contrasts being at home in the body with
being at home with the Lord. Remember that the soul does not die. The soul
never dies; the soul goes to be with Christ. It is the body that is put to
sleep. It is the body that must be changed. Remember that there will be a
generation that will not go through death, but their bodies will still need
to be changed. "Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we
shall all be changed...For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and
this mortal must put on immortality" (1Cor. 15:51, 53). It is the body that
goes to sleep and it is the body that is raised. Resurrection does not refer
to the soul or the spirit. The English word resurrection is the Greek word
anastasis, which means "a standing up." It is the body which will stand up.
Knowing these things, we walk by faith.
Wherefore we labour, that,
whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him [2Cor. 5:9].
The Greek word philotim
that is translated "labour" literally means "to esteem as an honor" -- to be
ambitious. It is the same Greek word which is translated "study" in 1
Thessalonians 4:11: "And that ye study to be quiet, and to do your own
business, and to work with your own hands...." Be ambitious to mind your own
business! In the verse before us it is translated "labour" -- we should be
ambitious, we should labor, in such a way that we will be accepted of Him.
This is not ambition to become a great somebody, but to do our best to
please God.
We are accepted in the
Beloved. Paul makes this clear in Ephesians, "Having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good
pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he
hath made us accepted in the beloved" (Eph. 1:5-6). Being accepted in Christ
is my standing before God. God sees me in Christ, and He is made unto me all
that I need: wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption (see
1 Cor. 1:30). He is my perfection. God sees me in Christ, and I am complete
in Him. You cannot add anything to completeness. When a person has 100
percent, that person has all of it. We who are believers have Christ, and we
are accepted in the Beloved. Accepted in Christ is the standing that all
believers have before God.
But to be accepted of Him
is a different thing. This has to do with our present state and refers to
the way we live our lives. Do we live for Christ? Are we ambitious to be
accepted of Him? To be ambitious to be accepted of Christ does not mean that
we are to crawl over everybody and step on them in order to get to the top.
ill.--Dr. G. Campbell
Morgan tells how he wrestled with this problem. He was a school teacher when
he was called as a minister. It was a very solemn moment for him. He felt
that the Lord was saying to him, "You have been set apart for the ministry
of the Word. Now do you want to be a great preacher, or do you just want to
be My servant?" The first thought that Dr. Morgan had was, I want to be a
great preacher. That ought to be a wonderful ambition, but after a while the
Lord began to press it in upon him, "Do you want to be a great preacher, or
do you just want to be My servant?" Finally Dr. Morgan came to it. He saw
that he had to make a choice. Finally he said, "O blessed Lord, I would
rather be Thy servant than anything else." He was willing to be an obscure
preacher. May I say that in my opinion God made G. Campbell Morgan not only
His servant but also made him a great preacher. Sometimes we think that our
ambition ought to be to do something great for God. God says that He wants
us to be His servants. That's all. You and I need to come to the place where
we can say, "Lord, just take me and make me and break me and do with me what
You will."
God gave this word through
Jeremiah: "And seekest thou great things for thyself? seek them not..."
(Jer. 45:5). That's putting it plain enough, isn't it?
Are you trying to get great
things for yourself? Do you really want to be God's servant? If you do, then
you can accomplish something for which He will be able to reward you. To be
honest with you, I'm beginning to become just a little worried about this. I
want to make sure that I am His servant while I'm here in this old house.
[with
helps from J.
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