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without a body of any kind would be a form of spiritual nakedness from which all his
mind shrank" (1 and 2 Corinthians, p.200).
All this would be perfectly clear to Christians today if their minds were not clouded by
tradition concerning the immortality of the soul and the idea that this part of each
individual goes straight to heaven after death because it is immortal. It comes as
something of a shock when the sincere Bible students finds this is not true. Specially as it
is backed up by countless hymns which are sung in places of worship Sunday be Sunday.
However we can say with certainty that in the revelation of the Word of God there is no
life after death apart from resurrection and if we do not accept this then we can never
understand the teaching of II Cor. 5:
Redemption and Resurrection are the key to the final fulfillment of the purpose of God
as it touches heaven and earth and this is central in the revelation of Christ as mediated
through the ministry of the Apostle Paul. It is fundamental to the realization of hope
whether in the Old Testament or the New. Paul contrasts the temporary dwelling in the
body (likened to nothing more than a tent) with the permanent building, the resurrection
body in the heavens. Its sole maker is God; no human hands have constructed it or
played any part in its maintenance. It is indeed `a building of God, a house not made
with hands' (5: 1) and it is fashioned to suit the sphere of glory that God wills, and it lasts
for ever. Even now while Paul `sighed with anxiety' (groaned), owing to the burdens
which he was continually bearing, this glorious future hope greatly strengthened and
cheered him. It would then be true that `mortality (death) would be swallowed up by life'
(verse 4) thus bringing us to the same point as he makes in the great resurrection chapter
of I Cor. 15: 53-55. Resurrection is the time when immortality is attained and not
before. It is `put on' then, and death at this point is annihilated for the believer. We may
be sure that for such there is no consciousness of any interval between the dissolution of
the `tent' and the investiture of the permanent `house from heaven' and as far as
experience goes, this should be all that matters as far as the believer is concerned.
The Apostle goes on to assure us `that He Who has prepared us for this very thing is
God Himself' (5: 5), that is the endowment of immortal resurrection bodies. Further, He
has given us the Spirit now as a guarantee ("Who gave us the earnest of the Spirit") that
all this will one day be realized in glorious fact.
The result of all this is `being always of good courage'. With such a wonderful goal
in view despair could not enter, however great the present trials:
"and 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 of good courage, I say, and are willing rather to
be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord" (5: 6-8 R.V.).
It should be noted that the Apostle does not say (as is so often misquoted) `to be
absent from the body is to be present with the Lord', meaning in some disembodied state
immediately at death. There are only two states envisaged by Paul here (1) being at
home in the present body (2) being at home with the Lord in the resurrection body, and of
the two it is the latter obviously that he `considers good' (eudokeo, translated `willing'
A.V. and R.V.). To read traditional views into this passage, as is so often done, ruins