2 Corinthians 5:6–10

The word "therefore" is not linked, as you take it, with this glorious future state, as if that made him confident. It is linked with what he already had while in the body. "He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee. Therefore we are always confident," and so on. Now you cannot fail to see how immensely important this is to the whole question. It was what Paul had already as God's workmanship, which made him so courageous at all times.

"Therefore we are always confident." Think of such language! Think of it as the apostle's words describing our portion, and in full view of both death and judgment! "We are always confident." … But he did enjoy it deeply. What is more, he puts it as the common enjoyment of all Christians. It is not just a question of his own personal feelings. It is about what God gave him to share now with God's people as God's people.

Where it is a question of the word of God, or the work of the Lord Jesus, the believer is entitled to have the fullest confidence. So the apostle Paul, in 2 Corinthians 5, in full view of all the perils of death which daily confronted him, does not hesitate to say "We are always confident," and to repeat it, "We are confident."

So we are courageous at all times, whatever God's way with us may be meanwhile. And we know that while we are at home in the body, we are away from the Lord. This world is not our rest; it is polluted. He is not here but risen and in glory, and our hearts are with Him where He is, and we look for Him to be like Him as well as with Him.

This is not the ground of our confidence, as Calvin strangely misread it. Nor is it an exception to it, as Roman Catholics and Rationalists have thought. It goes along with our good cheer as part of what we know as Christians. And it explains why we are ready in mind to leave the body when called, and to go home with the Lord.

Here we are absent from the Lord, there we shall be present with Him. Here at home in the body, there at home with the Lord. Even here our spirits enjoy communion with Him, in spite of this sinful world and the poor sinful bodies we live in. How much more in that safe place, where it will flow on unhindered, in an unbroken stream.

Understanding this rightly will not lead to loose living, or to being at ease and complacent. It leads instead to spiritual energy. As the apostle said, "We are always confident … we make it our aim to please Him." In every way, as he presses on, the true soul seeks to please the One who suffered for him. He wore the crown of thorns, but He now wears the crown of glory and honour.

Verse 7 is a very important aside: "For we walk by faith, not by sight." It rules our whole life while we are still in a body of flesh and blood. All the spiritual blessings we have are real to faith, but we cannot see or touch them. We are away from the Lord, so we have not seen Him with our eyes. Yet faith carries great certainty, and Hebrews 11 says the same: "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1).

This verse has given scholars much trouble, though the general sense is plain enough… The way the New Testament uses the word leaves us with "appearance," unless we keep the sense of "sight" that the older English translators chose. That meaning is doubtful in any writer, religious or not. Either way it comes to much the same thing. We walk by faith, not by appearance, being absent from the Lord and heaven. We do look at the unseen and eternal, but we look by faith. We do not yet see the things or the persons themselves, as we will when we are there.

Nothing else given to a believer on earth compares with faith. More than anything else it honours God and the word of His grace, because it makes us lean on the good Shepherd through the Holy Spirit… For we walk by faith, not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7). Israel did not march through the desert that way. They were guided by the cloud and the pillar of fire, which they could see. The Christian now, whether a Jew or a Gentile, has to walk through faith, of which the Lord Himself was the blessed pattern and perfection.

But there is always this great difference between the Jew and the Christian — "We walk by faith, not by sight." The Jewish religion was mostly by sight. "The law is not of faith." Sadly, much of what is in many believers is Jewish as well as Christian. So feelings, works and ceremonies take a large place with many.

This is where a Christian stands right now. If I am ruled by anything I can see, I have left the path of faith… The moment I am ruled by something around me that I can see, or treat it as my motive or my aim, or look to it for guidance, direction, or understanding about my path, I have left this simple, blessed path of faith. It is the path God has marked out for His own.

It was so then, and it is so now. "We walk by faith, not by sight." (2 Cor. 5:7) "What we will be has not yet appeared." (1 John 3:2) We are shut in by the body here, "away from the Lord." In fact we are in Egypt, yet in spirit we are in the heavenly Canaan. Faith brings the heart under the power of divine and unseen things, so it can rise above everything down here, in this place "where death and darkness reign."

We enter into this glorious prospect by the Spirit, whom God gave as the guarantee of it, and so we are "always confident." If we are still at home in the body, and so away from the Lord, we are confident, for we walk by faith, not by sight. If called to pass through death, before the Lord comes, "we are confident," for this will mean the blessedness of being "present with the Lord."

In this passage the word translated "present" means "at home with," and the word translated "absent" literally means "to be away from home." Our beloved sister was taken from us so suddenly three days ago. She is clearly away from home as to the body, since we have put it in the grave. But that she is at home with the Lord is not evident if we judge by sight or appearances. It is only as we walk by faith that this fact becomes real to us.

God has prepared all of us Christians for the house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. He has not given it to us yet, but He has prepared us for it. He has also given us the Spirit as the pledge. This is what gives me confidence. He calls it "our house," not my house. So I have two certainties. I am prepared for it, and I know it now while I am here, because God has given me the Holy Spirit.

It is unusual to find men willing to be absent from the body. Even the devil once said, "All that a man has he will give for his life." So we have to ask what the ground of the apostle's confidence was. His own words in Romans 5:8 tell us all we need to know: "God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Know this and believe it, and all dread of death leaves the soul.

The apostle never says that he desired to be absent from the body, but that he was willing rather. That is, it was not the object of his desire, but he preferred it to being in the body… He knew God had prepared him for this glory, and he had received the Spirit as the pledge. So if death did come, he was no less confident. And please remember that he had actual death right in front of his eyes.

Here he speaks of what is best of all. "We groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling… not that we would be unclothed" — that is, death and the separate state — "but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life." He longed for the change at Christ's coming.

Paul's confidence was such that he was willing — more than willing, pleased — to be absent from the body and present with the Lord. This is his portion today, and the portion of all who have died in the faith of Christ. They are absent from the bodies which have been laid in the grave, waiting for the moment when they will be clothed in bodies of glory. But even now they are present with the Lord, in all the conscious blessedness of His presence.

On one side, there is no excuse for the unbelief which makes everything of going to be with Christ after death. It stops short of the only adequate answer: our resurrection and change at Christ's coming. On the other side, it is a real slight on God's grace and on Christ's redemption to darken the state of the soul apart from the body, so as to heighten the splendour of the resurrection morning… To be with Christ is far better than remaining in the flesh, though far short of the triumph we shall share when He comes.

The prospect braced up the soul of the apostle, stirring him to tireless zeal in everything he did, so that he sought only the approval of Christ. In fact, this is exactly what it does for us. It enables us to bring all our actions into the light of His presence now, and helps us to do them for Him and to Him. This is where our strength lies.

The common version gives a completely misleading idea. If anyone took it in fully, it would destroy the gospel. The danger is greater because the translators put philotimoumetha as "we labour" or "endeavour," and euarestoi as "accepted." That comes dangerously close to suggesting salvation by works in the most open way. Already accepted in the Beloved (Eph. 1) we aspire — it is our zealous aim — to serve Him well, whether present or absent. His favour is better than life, so we devote ourselves to the pleasure of the One who delights only in what is good, holy, true, lowly and loving.

Euarestos occurs nine times in the New Testament. Translators render it "acceptable" four times, "well-pleasing" four times, and "accepted" only once — here in 2 Cor. 5:9. Why they translated it that way in this one place, I do not know. We may well take our pen and strike out the word "accepted," and put in the word "well-pleasing."

The word used here is "ambition." The literal translation is, "Therefore we are ambitious." Another rendering is, "We make it our aim." It was true that the apostle groaned, longing for his house from heaven. But as long as the Lord left him here, he was ambitious to please Him.

What more beautiful ambition for every true Christian — to be "well-pleasing" to the Lord, no matter whether it is in life or in death. Worldly ambition has brought ruin to multitudes of the Lord's soldiers and servants. All around us we see loved saints of God whose lives announce their ambition for riches or honour or ease or learning or fame. But how rarely do we meet someone whose ambition in life is to preach the gospel where Christ is not known, and, whether in life or in death, to be well-pleasing to Him.

This speaks of Paul's desire, his ambition toward God. He did not have the approval of man in view. He was not concerned about the honours of this world. His one thought was, as he says elsewhere, to be "agreeable to Him." That meant a pathway completely separated from the current of man's mind. But it brought the joy and peace and triumph that belong to a walk in communion with God.

Always remember this: absolute trust in God as our Saviour is the sole foundation of all acceptable service in His sight. In this verse the apostle says nothing about our personal acceptance as forgiven sinners... To draw from such a text the idea that a believer's escape from wrath is still uncertain, you must first shut your eyes to the whole drift of the apostle's teaching. You must confuse two very different things: acceptance with a Saviour, and acceptance with a master. One is a believer's standing as an heir of grace. The other is Christ's commendation of His chosen when their race is done.

In short, the judgment seat of Christ brings everything to light and rewards it. That solemn fact tends to check all lightness and laziness. It makes us eager to respond to the grace that wants to reward all that was done according to the mind of the Holy Spirit. To this end we need earnestness in the study of the Word, and diligence in prayer, so that we may know and be led into right activities.

To be well-pleasing to any person you must know him. It is the same with your Lord. You cannot know Him closely and well if you do not spend much time with Him. You must live to Him and not to yourself... Remember that when He chose His apostles, it was not first of all so that He might send them out to preach, but that they might be with Him. The preaching followed that.

The word "appear" in verse 10 is "manifested." We must all be manifested before the judgment seat of Christ. Our works and our ways as Christians will then come fully into view. Everything will come into the light. Nothing can be hidden, and the believer receives the things done in the body.

When the believer appears before the judgment seat of Christ, he won't be judged in the sense of condemned. That matter was settled at Calvary. But he will be revealed. It should be a joy for the believer to think that then, for the first time, he will see his own life exactly as the Lord Jesus sees it. And in our glorified bodies we will completely agree with this judgment.

The context seems to show that Paul's statement is general, in that it includes believers and unbelievers. But since believers will be there, he does not say, "We must all be judged." He says, "We must all be manifested." Perhaps for the same reason, he does not speak of judging persons, but of "the things done in the body." Remember too that we reach the judgment seat of Christ by the coming of Christ, and by it we shall be "changed into the image of the heavenly." So when we stand there we shall have a body of glory like Christ; we shall be like the Judge.

The Lord Jesus will sit on the judgement seat. He died for believers' sins and rose again for their justification. He is the believer's righteousness, and He will not judge His own work. God has justified the saint, so the saint cannot be judged. John 5:24 says he does not come into judgement at all. But he will be manifested. The things done in the body will be brought into review. He will then see it all in its true light, whether good or bad, and this will only exalt the grace that has saved him.

Many a sincere person — I mean a sincere Christian — does not see this place of his in Christ. He may say, I am a poor sinner, and the cross just suits me. Blessedly true. But change the phrase: I am a poor sinner, and the judgment-seat just suits me! That will not do. Yet we must all be manifested before the judgment-seat of Christ. There we must be fit for the judge.

It will also mean reward or loss, according to what has been done "in the body" — that is, in the whole of our lives of responsibility here. We see the same thing in 1 Corinthians 3:14-15. But there the question is the character of our work as servants of the Lord. Here it is more general and comprehensive, being a question of all our actions and ways.

Even in the saints, not all had been good. Everything has its result, though it never endangers the grace that saved them by Christ. God is not unrighteous, so He will not forget the work of faith and labour of love. Failure and wrong bring loss. The soul itself will understand fully, bow in adoration without a murmur, and bless Him who orders the place of each in the kingdom.

Then, for the first time, we shall judge everything truly. We shall understand the perfection of Christ's grace all through. We shall see how wrong and mistaken we have been in many ways down here. To limit the judgment seat of Christ to a reward for works robs it of much of its practical power.

Many, when they stand before that judgment seat, will wonder why they ever feared it for themselves. They will see their mistake and adore the grace that has been so much better than all their legal fears.