Our physical bodies are temporary housing; they’re like a tent handed out by the Red Cross to provide temporary shelter after a natural disaster. If that tent gets torn down, which it will when the day finally comes when we are called to die for the sake of the gospel, we will find ourselves provided by God with permanent housing. I mean really permanent, eternal housing. God Himself will make a body for us to live in.
As you grow spiritually you’ll start to get a glimpse of some truths that will transform your whole way of looking at life.
· You’ll start to see yourself as an alien living in a foreign country even though you’re living in the nation you were born in.[1]
· No matter how you feel about the country of your birth, you’ll begin to recognize that what you really are is a citizen of a heavenly kingdom.[2]
· You’ll begin to feel like you are living in a temporary exile, waiting for a chance to return to your real home.[3]
Even the body you live in will begin to seem like a temporary shelter and you’ll find yourself longing for your permanent home, your resurrection body.
If we find ourselves living until the return of Christ we will move immediately into that resurrection body; and if we die before the return of Christ we will spend our time in heaven waiting for our resurrection bodies.
Heaven is an amazing place and everyone there is filled with joy, but even in heaven God’s people know that they are not “complete” yet. We were made to live in bodies – that’s just our nature. So even as they experience the wonders of heaven the human spirits there look forward with keen anticipation to their resurrection bodies.
The fulfillment of all of God’s amazing plans for us includes that resurrection body. The work that the Spirit is doing in you right now is just a foretaste of the fullness of God’s life and power that we will all experience in our resurrection bodies.
[1] “Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul.” 2 Peter 2:11
[2] “For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.” Philippians 3:20
[3] “All these died in faith . . . having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For those who say such things make it clear that they are seeking a country of their own.” Hebrews 11:13, 14
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