For we know that if our earthly tabernacle house be destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
Paul has just called the body an earthen vessel, and here he tells us what happens when that vessel is destroyed. The verse sets a tent against a building, and the temporary against the eternal.
Paul does not begin with a hope. He begins with knowledge.
What calm and confident knowledge the apostle here credits to Christians, simply as Christians! What a contrast with the dark uncertainty of unbelief, or with its godless boldness! Eternal things are no less sure in hope because they are not seen.
This knowledge is for the hour when death comes close.
Let us look calmly at death; it may soon touch us. How shall we greet the "King of Terrors"? That is the world's name for death. God, speaking to His people, calls it Sleep… "We know!" What assurance is here; and again, the confidence rests on God. The shifting tent gives way to the building of God.
Two things are true of this body at once.
The tent that is our earthly home is the body of the believer, the earthen vessel of the previous chapter. It is called a tent because it is only a temporary lodging. By grace, believers are strangers and pilgrims on the earth. Yet in this earthen vessel, this frail tent, there is a divine indweller, the Holy Spirit.
Paul does not treat death as settled for every believer.
The apostle speaks of our earthly house being destroyed: "if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed." He does not say "when we die." He only states the possibility that the tent may be taken down… "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed" was the mystery revealed through the apostle in his first letter (1 Corinthians 15:51). The change of the believer's body is certain; its destruction is not.
One writer warns against reading extra ideas into the verse.
Let us not make difficulties for ourselves by putting into this verse what is not there. The destruction of the body is in view. The contrast is between the tent that is our earthly home — the most temporary of all dwelling places, easily shifted from one place to another — and a building. And it is a building "of God," not one "made with hands"; eternal in the heavens, instead of temporary and earthly.
Paul writes in the present tense about a house no one has moved into yet.
"We know" is the proper language of Christianity. There is no cause for alarm if this tent is destroyed, for it is only meant to be temporary. We do not have the new house yet, and still the verse says, "We have a building from God." It is as certain as though we were already living in it.
The new house is not a repaired version of the old one. It suits a different world.
The new and glorified body we are destined for will be like a house of God's workmanship. None of the frailties that come from human origin will exist in it. It will be able to sustain all the joys and services of the heavens for eternity. It would in a way be a poor thing if we came into the heavens with Christ, into all the brightness of the Father's house, with bodies that grow tired and weary.
Commentators differ over when this house becomes ours. Some tie it to the Lord's return:
This refers to the resurrection body, which we shall have when the Lord returns. We do not receive it when the tent-house is destroyed… The tent-house is subject to death; the new body is called "eternal."
Another writer rules out one common misreading, and finds more in the verse than the resurrection body alone:
Some will have it that this house not made with hands is heaven itself. But how then could it be called a house "in the heavens"? The house and heaven itself are carefully distinguished. Others, with less error but with an incomplete view of the passage as a whole, think only of the resurrection body. But it does not follow that the passage throws no light on the state of the soul between death and the resurrection.
- Tent — the present body is a traveller's lodging, temporary by design. The Holy Spirit lives in that frail vessel now.
- If — Paul says "if," not "when." The Lord may come first, so the change of the body is certain, but death is not.
- Building — the new house is God's work, not human work; permanent, not passing; heavenly, not earthly.
- Have — Paul speaks of the future body in the present tense: as sure as if we lived in it already.
- Know — certainty, not guesswork, lets a believer face death calmly.
For indeed in this we groan, ardently desiring to have put on our house which [is] from heaven;
Paul has just spoken of a building from God, eternal in the heavens. Here he tells us what that certainty produces in him: a groan. The sigh rises from confidence, not doubt, and what he wants is not death but something better.
The confidence of verse 1 and the sigh of verse 2 do not clash. One writer traces the groan back to that assurance.
Look at the certainty we have: "a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." That very certainty makes us groan to have it. The apostle did not groan in doubt or uncertainty. He did not groan under the weight of guilt or fear. Still less did he groan because he could not satisfy the desires of the flesh or of the mind. Nor did he groan because he could not surround himself with this world's possessions, which all perish. No; he longed for the heavenly building — the divine, the real, the eternal.
The world sighs too, but in the opposite direction.
Men are never eager to be rid of the body unless they are sure of having something better. In fact, they grasp this present life with intense eagerness. They tremble at the thought of the future, which is all darkness and uncertainty to them. They groan at the thought of leaving the body; the apostle groaned because he was in it.
The longing starts with having already tasted what is coming. The groan lives in the gap between seeing and having.
In the power of this life I find myself dead in practice, and I see my house in heaven, as verse 2 puts it. This makes me groan. But why do I groan? Because I have seen and tasted the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, but in person I am not there yet. The groaning is not from disappointment, but from earnest desire... As yet we do not actually hold this glory, but we long for it... So there is no Christian, however weak, who does not have a title to long for the glory to which he has been predestined.
The verse calls the body a tent, and the name carries a lesson. This longing is not the product of hard days, either; it presses hardest when life is at its most pleasant.
It is called a tent because it is only the temporary lodging of those who are, by grace, strangers and pilgrims on the earth... The groaning is not because of weaknesses, hardship, deprivation or unsatisfied desires. It is deeper than that. It is the longing for the promised glorified condition with which we shall be clothed... Dear fellow-believer, we may live close to God and enjoy the fellowship with His Son into which grace has called us. If we do, then even in the finest scenes and the most attractive conditions on earth we shall know something of this groaning.
The phrase describes where the new body comes from, not a movement down to us.
The particular word used for "know" shows conscious knowledge. There is a certainty about it that makes an inward impression. This is why we groan. We feel how contrary everything is here, where we live in this tent-house... The words "from heaven" do not mean that our house comes down to us. They mean it is "out of" heaven — heavenly in source and character.
Being with the Lord after death is a real blessing. Yet Paul longs for more than that state of the spirit apart from the body.
Paul preferred (verse 8) to be absent from the body — that is, the present body of sin and death — and to be present with the Lord. But it was not the thing he earnestly desired. What he desired was quite another thing: "to be clothed upon with our house which is FROM heaven." The passage sets this in contrast with death and the separate state, and clearly prefers it.
Putting a garment over what is already worn points to a change without dying — which is the Lord's return.
We groan, but not to be unclothed — not to lay down the body in death. We groan to be clothed upon. That brings in the true normal hope of the Christian, that is, the Lord's coming. This hope is so ingrained into the Christian's life that it does not need to be stated. Then all that is mortal will be swallowed up by the power of the life we have in Him.
God allows one sound from us and rules out another.
This portion is assured to us, so the Apostle can twice say, "We groan." With the glory of the new body in view, we groan with earnest desire to have put it on. Feeling the burdens that press upon the mortal body, we groan with longing to have put it off... God permits a groan, but never a grumble.
- Certainty groans. The sigh is not doubt about heaven but desire for it; the surer the knowledge, the deeper the longing.
- Glory tasted. We groan because we have already seen the glory of Christ and are not yet in it. Every believer, however weak, has a title to long for it.
- Heavenly in source. "From heaven" marks the origin and character of the coming body, not a descent to where we are.
- Clothed, not stripped. Paul's earnest desire is not death, but being clothed over — the change that comes when the Lord returns.
- Groan, never grumble. God allows the longing to put on glory and to put off the burden. He does not allow complaint.
if indeed being also clothed we shall not be found naked.
Paul has been writing about the new body believers are waiting for. Here he adds a short condition, and it raises a hard question: how can a person be clothed and still be found naked?
The answer depends on who Paul is describing.
So it is possible to be clothed and yet naked. It is the unbeliever who will be found naked; so that the resurrection body of the unbeliever, while clothing his soul and spirit, will not cover the shame of his nakedness. This verse then guards against unbelief assuming itself safe. True confidence is only for the child of faith.
Resurrection is not a privilege of the saved only.
The apostle would warn every soul. In the day that is coming, everyone will be clothed. That is the resurrection of the body, when souls are no longer found without the body but clothed. Still, some, even despite that clothing, shall be found naked. The wicked are then to be clothed no less than the saints, who will have been already raised or changed. Their bodies shall be raised from the dead just as truly as those of the righteous. But when the unrighteous stand in resurrection before the great white throne, how bare will they appear? What will it be in that day to have no Christ to clothe us?
One writer traces the picture back to the garden. Adam covered himself with something he had made.
There is all the difference in the world between the "apron" that man made and the "coats of skins" which the Lord God made and put on them. In Adam's apron God did not put a single stitch. That is man's effort to reform himself, his self-improvement, and his own works. All your efforts and mine are worthless; we are as naked after as before. The coat that God made was His own work, and man had put no stitch in it. It is salvation by sovereign grace... Paul, so to speak, says, "Do not be like Adam." He was found "naked" when he thought himself clothed.
Another writer names what the naked never received.
There would be those clothed in bodies of resurrection who would be found terribly naked before God. They never received the "best robe" (Luke 15:22), and never became God's righteousness in Christ, as the last verse of the chapter says.
If Christ is the covering, when is He put on?
It is very solemn to think that it is here, and here only: when we depart to be with Christ, there is no putting on Christ in heaven. If we have not put on Christ here, we shall be found naked... The just will have been clothed too, but the clothing of their resurrection body does not leave them naked, but shows them like Christ. Now men may use clothing to cover up what they really are in the eyes of others. But in the resurrection state all must be shown as they are, whether just or unjust.
A believer who dies is unclothed. That is not the same as naked.
If we are true Christians we shall never be found naked in that way. We may be unclothed, but that word describes the state of those saints who are "away from the body" in the presence of the Lord. Paul himself, and countless others besides, are unclothed at this moment; but that unclothed state, blessed as it is, is not the great object of our desire.
Commentators differ over the opening word. Read as "since," the clause becomes comfort instead of warning, and one writer refuses that reading.
There are those who give this a very different turn, and make it a verse of comfort instead of warning. But such a view robs us of the true scope of the clause. It does not mean "since being clothed we shall not be found naked," which has no worthy lesson for any soul.
Another writer leaves room for a different sense of "naked."
That reading took "naked" as a contrast between the soul apart from the body and the soul clothed with the resurrection body — "our house which is from heaven." The ground for it was the word "we." Judgments have always differed widely on the subject. It is quite possible that "naked" may refer to those who will be left behind at the Lord's coming — that is, to the unconverted. In that case it will be equivalent to being without Christ.
- Clothed — every person will be raised with a body; a body is not proof of salvation.
- Naked — the word describes the soul without Christ, standing before God in nothing God gave.
- Now — Christ is put on here, in this life; there is no putting Him on afterwards.
- Unclothed — the believer between death and resurrection is unclothed, never naked.
- Shown — resurrection covers nothing; it reveals what each person already was.
For indeed we who are in the tabernacle groan, being burdened; while yet we do not wish to be unclothed, but clothed, that [what is] mortal may be swallowed up by life.
Paul is still living in the frail tent of his present body, and he admits that it weighs on him. Yet his longing is not to get out of the body. It is to have something put on over it.
(Some writers below say "clothed upon." That is an older translation of what the ESV calls "further clothed.")
The burden is honest. One writer traces where it comes from.
Truly knowing that we have Christ as a living possession does not deaden our sense of the groaning creation. It greatly increases it… Our body is the tent we live in. It is itself part of a creation that was made subject to futility. We who are inside it groan under the crushing sense of its total ruin. That is not because we are not delivered in Christ. It is because we are, and so we feel deeply what is held under the bondage of corruption.
This groan is not the sound of a man unsure of his standing.
The apostle did not groan in doubt or uncertainty. He did not groan under the weight of guilt or fear. Least of all did he groan because he could not satisfy the desires of the flesh or the mind. Nor did he groan because he could not surround himself with this world's perishable things. No; he longed for the heavenly building — the divine, the real, the eternal.
The same writer contrasts this with how people feel about dying.
People are never eager to be rid of the body unless they are sure of having something better… They groan at the thought of leaving the body. The apostle groaned because he was in it.
These two words point to two different events.
Our desire is not so much to lay aside the frail body and die. It is to go through the change spoken of at the end of verse 4. Not to be unclothed — that is, to die, the body laid in the grave and the spirit going to the Lord. Rather, to be clothed upon: the spirit dressed in its new clothing, clothed with its new home, the glorified and heavenly body, at the coming of the Lord. Then, instead of the frail body being swallowed up for a time by mortality, mortality itself will be swallowed up by life.
The groan does not ask for death. It does not excuse restlessness either.
He has no wish to deny the sorrow and weakness… There is no mere wish to get away from this present scene with its sadness and trial. It is never right to be impatient. To desire to be with Christ is right. But to be restless under what ties us to shame and pain is not of Christ… His wish was not to die, but the very opposite: that the mortality already at work in him might be swallowed up by Him who is eternal life, and our life.
One writer corrects a common mistake about what happens at death.
Very many Christians go wrong in their thinking here. They imagine that the moment the spirit escapes from its prison, it enters perfect bliss. The passage just quoted proves that this is not the case. Nothing can fill up the measure of the believer's joy but his being clothed upon with his house which is from heaven.
Another writer keeps the balance.
In that passage he shows that the "clothed" state — when we are clothed upon with our bodies of glory — is better in every way than the "unclothed" state. Yet the "unclothed" state is still far better than the best we can know while we are clothed in our present bodies of humiliation.
The last clause names the outcome. A life the believer already has will swallow up all that is mortal in him.
In verse 4 he develops the thought of verse 2 and explains the intended use of the expression "clothed upon." We groan, but not to be unclothed — not to lay down the body in death. We groan to be clothed upon. That brings in, as one of its effects, the true, normal hope of the Christian, that is, the Lord's coming. This hope is so ingrained into the Christian's life that it does not need to be stated. Then all that is mortal will be swallowed up by the power of the life we have in Him.
- Burden. The tent-body presses on us, and Scripture lets the believer say so out loud.
- Because delivered. The groan comes not from doubt or guilt, but from having Christ. Having Him makes us feel the ruin around us more, not less.
- Not unclothed. "Unclothed" means dying — the body in the grave, the spirit with the Lord; that is gain, but it is not what Paul asks for.
- But clothed. Paul wants the glorified body, put on at the Lord's coming. Only that change completes the believer's joy.
- Life wins. Then the life we already have in Him swallows up all that is mortal — mortality ended by life, not by death.
Now he that has wrought us for this very thing [is] God, who also has given to us the earnest of the Spirit.
Paul has just spoken about groaning in a frail body and longing for a home from heaven. Here he answers the obvious question: how can anyone be sure of such a hope? The verse gives two answers. God has already prepared us for it, and He has already given us a first taste of it.
The hope does not rest on the strength of our longing. It rests on who did the preparing:
This hope rested on more than a desire stirred up by a view of the glory. God had formed Christians for this very thing. Anyone who is a Christian was formed for this, and for nothing else. It was God Himself who had formed him for this — this glory, in which Christ, the last Adam, is at the right hand of God. What happy confidence in the grace and the mighty work of God! Here the hope does not rest on a work done for us. It is the blessed knowledge that God has prepared us for this. We are His workmanship.
The wording matters. God did not prepare something on our behalf. The object of the verb is us.
"He who has prepared us for this very thing is God." Here God did not prepare something for us; He prepared us. That is a remarkable expression of His grace, linking us with His unfailing purpose in Christ.
The phrase points back to what Paul has just described: the mortal swallowed up by life. God began this work, so the outcome is not in doubt.
God, who cannot fail, does not begin a work and then leave it unfinished. He prepared us for this very thing: the swallowing up of the mortal by the life which triumphs for ever, the same portion as Christ. The One who did this is God. Indeed only He would have thought of it, and only He could have done it.
One writer ties this preparing to a work the Spirit has already done inside the believer.
He has already "prepared us" for this very thing. This refers to that spiritual work done in us and with us by the Holy Spirit. God by His Spirit has been the Potter, and we have been the clay... God will one day make our mortal bodies alive. He has already done such a work in our souls, and this present work looks ahead to what He will yet do in our bodies.
The older word "earnest" — the ESV has "guarantee" — is a business term. It means money paid down to secure a deal.
When someone sells a property, the buyer pays part of the price down as earnest-money to complete the bargain. In the same way, God graciously gives us the indwelling Spirit as the earnest of our inheritance. This assures us that we will have all He has promised. He also binds Himself (if we may put it that way) to carry out His own faithful word, for the earnest-money is both a promise and a pledge.
A deposit is part of the sum itself, not a separate token. So the Spirit is not just a receipt for future glory.
But there is more in the word translated "earnest." God has given us the Holy Spirit as a pledge. He will one day put us in possession of the inheritance He keeps in heaven for us. But more, He is the installment of that inheritance, the means by which we may already enter into its reality and joy.
Kelly also sets this gift apart from other ways the Spirit is described:
This is not the "anointing," which has a wider meaning, and it is not the "sealing" either. It is the aspect of the Spirit given to us that relates to Christ's coming again, and to our entering on the inheritance with Him.
The pledge is God's. So nothing in this life can undo it.
He is the Pledge on God's part that we shall be in the heavenly glory with and like Christ... Nothing that happens on earth, not our weakness, not even death itself, can alter the purpose of God by a hair's breadth or delay it by an instant. Because of that we are always confident (verse 6).
- Prepared. God did not just do something for us. He prepared us for this outcome. We are His workmanship, and He does not leave a work unfinished.
- For what. God shaped us for one outcome: the mortal swallowed up by life — the same glory as Christ, and nothing less.
- Given. The Spirit is the earnest — the deposit paid down, which both promises the full sum and binds God to His own word.
- Tasted. A deposit is part of the sum, so the Spirit is not just a receipt for glory but the means of entering its joy now, in weakness.
- Confident. The work is God's and the pledge is God's. No event, no weakness, not even death can delay it. That is why the next verse says we are always confident.