Awaiting the New Body
5 For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. 2 Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, 3 because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. 4 For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. 5 Now the one who has fashioned us for this very purpose is God, who has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.
6 Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. 7 For we live by faith, not by sight. 8 We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. 9 So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. 10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.
The Ministry of Reconciliation
11 Since, then, we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade others. What we are is plain to God, and I hope it is also plain to your conscience. 12 We are not trying to commend ourselves to you again, but are giving you an opportunity to take pride in us, so that you can answer those who take pride in what is seen rather than in what is in the heart. 13 If we are “out of our mind,” as some say, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. 14 For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. 15 And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.
16 So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:[Or Christ, that person is a new creation.] The old has gone, the new is here! 18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21 God made him who had no sin to be sin[Or be a sin offering ] for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. [Related to justification 5:17]
NOTES:
5:1 Our earthly dwelling: the same contrast is restated in
the imagery of a dwelling. The language recalls Jesus’ saying about the
destruction of the temple and the construction of another building not made
with hands (Mk 14:58), a prediction later applied to Jesus’ own body (Jn 2:20).
5:2–5 2 Cor 5:2–3 and 4 are largely parallel in structure.
We groan, longing: see note on 2 Cor 5:5. Clothed with our heavenly habitation:
Paul mixes his metaphors, adding the image of the garment to that of the
building. Further clothed: the verb means strictly “to put one garment on over
another.” Paul may desire to put the resurrection body on over his mortal body,
without dying; 2 Cor 5:2, 4 permit this meaning but do not impose it. Or
perhaps he imagines the resurrection body as a garment put on over the
Christ-garment first received in baptism (Gal 3:27) and preserved by moral
behavior (Rom 13:12–14; Col 3:12; cf. Mt 22:11–13). Some support for this
interpretation may be found in the context; cf. the references to baptism (2
Cor 5:5), to judgment according to works (2 Cor 5:10), and to present renewal
(2 Cor 4:16), an idea elsewhere combined with the image of “putting on” a new
nature (Eph 4:22–24; Col 3:1–5, 9–10).
5:3 When we have taken it off: the majority of witnesses
read “when we have put it on,” i.e., when we have been clothed (in the
resurrection body), then we shall not be without a body (naked). This seems
mere tautology, though some understand it to mean: whether we are “found” (by
God at the judgment) clothed or naked depends upon whether we have preserved or
lost our original investiture in Christ (cf. the previous note). In this case
to “put it on” does not refer to the resurrection body, but to keeping intact
the Christ-garment of baptism. The translation follows the western reading
(Codex Bezae, Tertullian), the sense of which is clear: to “take it off” is to
shed our mortal body in death, after which we shall be clothed in the
resurrection body and hence not “naked” (cf. 1 Cor 15:51–53).
5:4 We do not wish to be unclothed: a clear allusion to
physical death (2 Cor 4:16; 5:1). Unlike the Greeks, who found dissolution of
the body desirable (cf. Socrates), Paul has a Jewish horror of it. He seems to
be thinking of the “intermediate period,” an interval between death and
resurrection. Swallowed up by life: cf. 1 Cor 15:54.
5:5 God has created us for resurrected bodily life and
already prepares us for it by the gift of the Spirit in baptism. The Spirit as
a first installment: the striking parallel to 2 Cor 5:1–5 in Rom 8:17–30
describes Christians who have received the “firstfruits” (cf. “first
installment” here) of the Spirit as “groaning” (cf. 2 Cor 5:2, 4 here) for the
resurrection, the complete redemption of their bodies. In place of clothing and
building, Rom 8 uses other images for the resurrection: adoption and conformity
to the image of the Son.
5:6–9 Tension between present and future is expressed by
another spatial image, the metaphor of the country and its citizens. At present
we are like citizens in exile or far away from home. The Lord is the distant
homeland, believed in but unseen (2 Cor 5:7).
5:10 We must all appear: the verb is ambiguous: we are
scheduled to “appear” for judgment, at which we will be “revealed” as we are
(cf. 2 Cor 11; 2:14; 4:10–11).
5:11–15 This paragraph is transitional. Paul sums up much
that has gone before. Still playing on the term “appearance,” he reasserts his
transparency before God and the Corinthians, in contrast to the
self-commendation, boasting, and preoccupation with externals that characterize
some others (cf. 2 Cor 1:12–14; 2:14; 3:1; 3:7–4:6). 2 Cor 5:14 recalls 2 Cor
3:7–4:6, and sums up 2 Cor 4:7–5:10.
5:13 Out of our minds: this verse confirms that a concern
for ecstasy and charismatic experience may lie behind the discussion about
“glory” in 2 Cor 3:7–4:6. Paul also enjoys such experiences but, unlike others,
does not make a public display of them or consider them ends in themselves.
Rational: the Greek virtue sōphrosynē, to which Paul alludes, implies
reasonableness, moderation, good judgment, self-control.
5:14–15 These verses echo 2 Cor 4:14 and resume the
treatment of “life despite death” from 2 Cor 4:7–5:10.
5:16–17 Consequently: the death of Christ described in 2 Cor
5:14–15 produces a whole new order (2 Cor 5:17) and a new mode of perception (2
Cor 5:16). According to the flesh: the natural mode of perception,
characterized as “fleshly,” is replaced by a mode of perception proper to the
Spirit. Elsewhere Paul contrasts what Christ looks like according to the old
criteria (weakness,
powerlessness, folly, death) and according to the new
(wisdom, power, life); cf. 2 Cor 5:15, 21; 1 Cor 1:17–3:3. Similarly, he describes
the paradoxical nature of Christian existence, e.g., in 2 Cor 4:10–11, 14. A
new creation: rabbis used this expression to describe the effect of the
entrance of a proselyte or convert into Judaism or of the remission of sins on
the Day of Atonement. The new order created in Christ is the new covenant (2
Cor 3:6).
5:18–21 Paul attempts to explain the meaning of God’s action
by a variety of different categories; his attention keeps moving rapidly back
and forth from God’s act to his own ministry as well. Who has reconciled us to
himself: i.e., he has brought all into oneness. Not counting their trespasses: reconciliation is described as an act of justification (cf.
“righteousness,” 2 Cor 5:21); this contrasts with the covenant that condemned
(2 Cor 3:8). The ministry of reconciliation: Paul’s role in the wider picture
is described: entrusted with the message of reconciliation (2 Cor 5:19), he is
Christ’s ambassador, through whom God appeals (2 Cor 5:20a). In v 20b Paul acts
in the capacity just described.
5:21 This is a statement of God’s purpose, expressed
paradoxically in terms of sharing and exchange of attributes. As Christ became
our righteousness (1 Cor 1:30), we become God’s righteousness (cf. 2 Cor
5:14–15).
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