2 Corinthians 5:1

For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven... For we walk by faith and not by sight. We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. (2 Corinthians 5:1-8)

Our bodies are fading tents—but God has prepared an eternal home, and the Spirit He's given us is the down payment that guarantees it.

Eternal Life Is to Know Him

Just before Jesus was betrayed by Judas, John 17 shows Him praying to the Father on behalf of us, His church. We often call the prayer of Matthew 6 or Luke 11 "the Lord's Prayer," but that is really the disciples' prayer—the one we are called to pray. To see how Jesus actually prayed, you go to John 17, where in verse 3 He prays, "And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent."

This is what we are about: life in Christ, knowing Him. You can learn a great deal about God by studying the 66 books of the Bible, but we want more than knowledge about Him—we want to actually know Him. In Christ, we have been given that opportunity, and it is one of the primary reasons we exist as a church.

Know, Grow, and Go

Furthermore, we want to grow in Him. Peter said in 2 Peter 3:18, "But grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. To him be the glory, both now and forever. Amen." When we gather on a Sunday, we come to know God and to grow in Him, so that we can go and make Him known.

So we endeavor to do three things: know, grow, and go—into our community here throughout North County and wherever the Lord would take us. Over the years He has opened doors to Russia, Belarus, the Philippines, Ukraine, Belize, Peru, Africa, and now new things happening in China. This commission belongs not just to pastors, elders, and leaders, but to everyone in this body. If you are a believer, you are called to carry the glorious gospel wherever He carries you—a corporate office, a construction site, a college campus, wherever it may be.

We Labor Because of What God Has Done

In this passage we are given one of the reasons we do this. Look ahead to verse 9: "Wherefore we labor." There are many in this world doing good acts of service to get something from God—to inherit eternal life, to reach some level of perfection or nirvana. Non-Christians do it, and even some who call themselves Christians do it, trying to earn favor with God. But here we see the opposite. We labor because of what God has already done for us.

Notice the confidence with which Paul speaks: "For we know." This is sincere, absolute assurance of a work God has wrought. He says that if our earthly house, this tabernacle—this body—is dissolved, we have something greater.

This Body Is a Fading Tent

Throughout the Bible, our physical bodies are called a tent or tabernacle, a temporary dwelling place. This is not our home. It's much like owning a house: when it's new, everything works. But over time you have to keep investing just to keep the plumbing running, the roof from leaking, the air conditioning going.

This body is the same. When it first starts out, it's new and everything works well, but as time goes by the joints start to go, the plumbing starts to go, the climate control doesn't work quite as well. Depending on how hard you've used this tent, it may decay more quickly. Some of you lived a hard life before Christ and have things falling apart faster than others your age. Paul calls it corruption and mortality in 1 Corinthians 15—it's decaying. Yet Paul speaks with bold confidence: "We know"—not wishful thinking—"we have a building of God, a house not made with hands that is eternal in the heavens."

Do You Have This Confidence?

My prayer is that everyone in this room has this confidence, though with a gathering this large that's likely not the case. If you don't have it, why not? Have you placed your faith in Christ for salvation? Do you trust that His finished work on the cross is sufficient to justify you and rescue you from your sins? Or are you still trusting in your own works of righteousness, always saying, "Well, I really hope I make it. People like Billy Graham are okay, but I don't know about myself"?

You will never be good enough. You will never perfectly keep God's holy law. The law is so weighty that it is impossible for man to keep it. Why, then, did God give it? Not so we would keep it and make ourselves righteous, but to show us we are imperfect. As Paul says in Romans, he did not even know he was a sinner until the law said, "Thou shalt not covet." We are not judged by other people or by our keeping of the law; we are measured against the perfect, righteous character of God. Paul says in Galatians 2:16, "Man is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Christ Jesus. For by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified." God set the standard impossibly high to show us that we need Him.

The Faith of Abraham

This hope-filled confidence comes only from Christ, and it is essential for an abundant life of joy. If you want the abundant life Jesus spoke of in John 10—"I have come that you might have life and that you might have it more abundantly"—it is found only when we have this confidence, like that of Abraham, the father of our faith.

Hebrews 11, the "hall of faith," lists Abraham. Notice the first two words in verse 8: "By faith." Not by good works. By faith Abraham obeyed and went out, not knowing where he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, dwelling in tents, "for he looked for a city which hath foundations whose builder and maker is God." And Sarah "judged him faithful who had promised"—it was not her faithfulness but His. These all died in faith, not having received the promises, confessing that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth, desiring a better, heavenly country. "Wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he hath prepared for them a city." They looked for the house not made with hands that is eternal in the heavens.

Trials Greeted with Joy

If we have this hope, then trials, tribulation, death, or any woeful thing in this life is greeted with a joyful reminder of what is to come. Everyone on this planet faces hard times, but only the Christian goes through them remembering, "This is not all there is." We don't love the trial, but we are joyfully reminded that this is the worst it will ever be, and God has prepared something far greater.

In Romans 8:18, Paul says, "For I reckon the sufferings of this present age are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us." This is not a man in a plush mansion with the nicest chariot in Tarsus. This is a man beaten, whipped, imprisoned, and shipwrecked. In the midst of it, he says these sufferings aren't worthy to be compared with the coming glory. What a different mindset than the world's.

Why the World Is Depressed

When trials, distress, persecution, and loss touch a non-believer whose whole hope and treasure is this life and this tent, they are devastated—and rightly so. When they get the call from the doctor that it's cancer, when they lose a loved one, a home, or a job, they're devastated, because their whole hope is here.

We see this perfectly illustrated in 21st-century American culture. Multitudes are distressed and depressed because everything they hoped in is failing—the economy, the job that was supposed to build a retirement, the house that lost its value. So we look to politicians in a campaign season, weighing them out, asking, "If we give you a chance, will you make us happy?" They won't. Every one of them, Republican and Democrat alike, will fail to make you happy, because happiness cannot be found in this life. Peter tells us it's all going to burn with fervent heat and be consumed in smoke.

But if you treasure and hope in things that are eternal, the things not seen, walking by faith and not by sight, what a witness that is to a world consumed with this life. When you face the same trial as your co-worker and receive it with joy—not because you enjoy the trial; nobody enjoys a trial, and anyone who claims to is just trying to be super-spiritual—the trial reminds you that God has something greater. Don't waste your trial being all broken up by it. Embrace it, knowing God has something great for His glory in the midst of it. It sets us more steadfastly on heaven, to the point where we say, "I'm looking forward to getting out of here."

Set Your Affections Above

Paul says in Colossians 3:1-2, "If then you be risen with Christ, seek those things that are above, where Christ sits at the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth." Why this exhortation? Because if Christians set their affections on earthly things, we will be disappointed, and it brings a poor witness to our good and loving Father.

Remember Hebrews 11:16—those who seek an eternal kingdom, "God is not ashamed to be called their God." The implication is that there are some of whom God is ashamed, whose treasure is here on earth, who are constantly devastated as it all falls apart. They tell people, "I'm a Christian," and when asked, "Don't you believe you're going to heaven?" they answer, "Yeah, but man, this life is terrible." Eeyore Christians. John warns in 1 John 2:15-17, "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him... And the world is passing away and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever."

Groaning for Our Heavenly Home

So Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:1 that if this earthly tabernacle is dissolved—and we all know it's failing—we have absolute certainty of a building of God, eternal in the heavens. "For in this we groan." How many of you can agree? We groan, "earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven." As time goes on, God develops in us more and more of a longing for eternity.

The real you is the soul God has given. In Genesis 2, God breathed into man the breath of life, and he became a living soul—different from the animals. We are not just the highest form of animal, as our secular world insists and as our children are taught in school, that your purpose is whatever you decide because there is no intrinsic value to who you are. That is depressing. Why do you think kids go on mindless rampages? Because they're taught they're animals, and survival of the fittest is what animals do. But there is something more.

A Spiritual Body Raised in Glory

We are going to receive a new body. This soul, who is really who we are, will depart this tent one day—not absorbed back into all existence as Eastern mysticism teaches, but transformed as God has declared. In 1 Corinthians 15:42-44, Paul says, "It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: it is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body."

In verse 50 he continues, "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I shew you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump... For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality... then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory." We eagerly wait for this great spiritual body, and every trial only inspires us to desire it more.

Swallowed Up by Life

Verse 3: "If so be that being clothed, we shall not be found naked. For we that are in this tabernacle do groan." As we live in this earthly body, we groan more and more. When you wake up in the morning—those first twenty steps sound like a bag of chips being crushed. It wasn't always that way.

Verse 4: "Being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life." Our groaning is not merely to be unclothed—we don't simply want to die. We groan for something beyond death: to be clothed in new life. The unbeliever who creaks and groans tries every medical means to stop it, because they don't want to die; they treasure this life. We treasure this life too—God created it, and we should enjoy it—but our groaning inspires a greater desire to be with the Lord. This is no suicidal longing for death; it is a longing for the great, full, abundant life with Him, that "mortality might be swallowed up"—not by death, but by life. You think you're living now? This is nothing compared to the life God has prepared.

God's Guarantee: The Holy Spirit

Verse 5: "Now he that hath wrought us for the selfsame thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit." God is the one who has performed this. He has given us a down payment, a guarantee, to prove He will accomplish what He promised.

Twice in 1 Corinthians Paul reminds us we are the dwelling place of God's Spirit. "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" (3:16). "What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?" (6:19). This reality is only possible under the New Covenant. Under the Old Covenant, sinful man could only approach God's veiled presence at a physical temple, never appearing directly before Him. But after His resurrection Jesus breathed on His disciples and said, "Receive ye the Holy Spirit" (John 20:22). The veil was torn from top to bottom, and now God indwells us.

That indwelling presence is the abiding reminder that God will make good on His word. Jesus said, "Let not your heart be troubled... In my Father's house are many mansions... I go to prepare a place for you." That place includes the heavenly body He is preparing. Paul confirms it in Ephesians 1:13-14: in Christ "ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, which is the guarantee of our inheritance, until the redemption of the purchased possession." And in Romans 8:15-17, "ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: and if children, then heirs."

Always Confident

Verse 6: "Therefore we are always confident." If you base your relationship with God on your good works and law-keeping under the Old Covenant, you will never have this. You'll say, "I really hope I make it; I'm not as good as Pastor Josh, but I hope I make it"—and the basis of that hope is your own works, not the finished work of Christ. But Paul says, putting our confidence in Christ's finished work, "we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord: (for we walk by faith, not by sight:) we are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord."

We are not sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves (2 Corinthians 3:5). We cannot keep the law in a way that makes us ready for heaven—that's exactly what the law reveals. So God, knowing this, gave the law to show it to us, and then at the right time Christ died for the ungodly to show, "I am the only way you can be made righteous."

The Only Way to Certainty

There is no other religion and no other worldview in this world that gives absolute certainty of life beyond the grave. Christianity is the only one. That is why we can confidently—and without arrogance—say He is the only way. Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam—none of them offers anyone confident assurance of being instantly with the Lord at death. Only Christ.

Why is it not arrogant to say He's the only way? Because it's a statement of fact, and because Jesus said it. If you want to call it arrogant, you'll have your chance to stand before Him—and at that moment every knee will bow and every tongue confess. So say it now. Come to that recognition now.

Absent from the Body, Present with the Lord

To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord—instantly. No soul sleep, no disembodied wandering. When a family member, friend, or brother or sister in Christ dies, yes, we sorrow that we won't see them next week, but we sorrow not as those who have no hope, because we know they are instantly with the Lord. Even the most painful death possible is nothing compared with the glory to be revealed in us.

Paul will later speak of a man caught up to the third heaven who "saw and heard things that cannot be uttered." That is a glimpse of what awaits us when we step out of this existence into eternity. So we sigh and groan at the wickedness of this world and look forward to it, with complete confidence in Christ, because we are not sufficient in ourselves.

The Closing Question

So we end with this question: Do you have this confidence? Can you speak with the same assurance Paul does—that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, that if this earthly body is dissolved we have a building of God eternal in the heavens? If some space junk fell from heaven the moment you walked out these doors, do you have absolute certainty you would be with the Lord? I guarantee you, that certainty changes everything about the way you live.

If you don't have that confidence, your treasure will be this life, and when things start to fail, you'll be troubled. That confidence is only found in Christ, who made a way you and I cannot make on our own. And if you do have it, our mission—the moment we walk out these doors—is to go into this world, because we know Him and are growing in Him, to make Him known. We let people who are disconnected from God by sin and death know they can be connected to Him through the cross of Christ, because of what Jesus did and not because of their own works. This is the gospel. Some call it narrow, some call us arrogant, but it is the truth, and we stand upon it. May God's truth be manifested in the way we live.

Closing Prayer

Father, we need Your grace every minute of this life. We thank You that Your mercies are new every morning—great is Your faithfulness. We thank You that it is by Your grace that we are saved, and by Your grace that we live continually, day in and day out. God, manifest Your glory in us as we enjoy Your grace, and extend Your glory through us in our workplace, at school, in our neighborhood, wherever we are. Help us to connect people with You.

If you do not have this confidence today—the assurance that if you died you would instantly be with the Lord—God desires that you would know with certainty, not based on your works but on the finished work He accomplished on the cross. The law brings the recognition that you have sinned and fallen short of God's glory, but the gospel brings to light life and immortality because of what Jesus has done on our behalf. If that is you, step out from where you are and come down to the front, where the pastors and elders are ready to pray with you and share the gospel more clearly. Perhaps you believe in God but have been trusting in your own works—Jesus finished the work; don't try to perfect it in your own strength. Come and pray.

Father, we glorify You for the work that You are doing. We thank You for the way You have revealed Yourself to us and desire to do so through us. I pray for my brothers and sisters here that, as we prepare to go from this place, You would enable us by Your abiding presence and Your grace to be witnesses of You. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.