God Didn’t Need to Tell Us This

He who has prepared us for this very thing is God.

2 Corinthians 5:5

Christian brother or sister, God has prepared you for this translation from the tent to the building. He did this by sending His Son into the world to prepare a place in heaven for you. And He sent His Spirit into your heart to prepare you for your place in heaven. The One “who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee” (5:5).

When the Old Testament describes the tabernacle, which was a tent, we are told that the cloud of God’s presence came into the tent (Ex. 33:8–10). Now Paul says that your body is a tent, and the Holy Spirit of God comes down to dwell in this tent with you. Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit. Christ lives in you. He is with you in the tent! God makes His home with you in the tent, until the day when you make your home with Him in the house that is eternal in the heavens.

This marvellous revelation about the Christian’s life in heaven is a gift from God. He did not need to tell us anything about life beyond the tent. He could have said, “Trust me. Wait and see.” But God did not do that.

God pulled back the curtain so that believers can say, “We know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens” (2 Cor. 5:1). And when you find yourself groaning, knowing this will keep you from losing heart.

What does it mean to you that God has told us about life beyond the tent?