An earthly tent....
As I said yesterday, I was to attend a funeral of a friend...his earthly tent had given out and he went to live in his eternal home...
It had seemed that he went too early, younger than many, leaving behind family and friends who will miss him. But, he went in God's time, called to walk those gold paved streets with my husband...and others ...I wonder if they look at those streets of gold and wonder why they strived and searched for gold here on earth when it it just pavement there...
It goes along with making wise the simple or other oxymorons that we may find in life...Gods thoughts are much more complex and infinite than ours...
An earthly tent...I liked Mr. Stedman's analogy of living in this tent....as well as the Word's...the structure of a tent is so temporal...manmade materials which can be heavy canvas or the lightweight nylon...waterproof or not, metal or wood struts and stays, small or large in area, quickly collaspible or semi permanent, windows or not, multitude of colors and shapes, inexpensive or very expensive ....replaceable ...and it wears out after much use...made for the side of Mt Everest or as a play tent in a toddler's room...so varying in use...just as we all are...
Thank YOU for this earthly tent..help me to take care of it, use it wisely, and to let it go when it's use is over...and for those tents around me...remembering that You take care of the Soul ....
Ecclesiastes 12:1-5 Remember your Creator In the days of your youth,before the days of trouble come and the years approach when you will say,“I find no pleasure in them”— before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars grow dark,and the clouds return after the rain; when the keepers of the house tremble,and the strong men stoop,when the grinders cease because they are few,and those looking through the windows grow dim; when the doors to the street are closed and the sound of grinding fades;when people rise up at the sound of birds,but all their songs grow faint; when people are afraid of heights and of dangers in the streets;when the almond tree blossoms and the grasshopper drags itself along and desire no longer is stirred.Then people go to their eternal home and mourners go about the streets.
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| Beyond The End |
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| A daily devotion for September 12th |
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| From your friends at RayStedman.org |
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| Now 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 Corinthians 5:1). |
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What marvelous words! It is obvious that here is a description of the present body of flesh and bones we live in contrasted with the same body, risen and glorified by the activity of the Spirit of God. When you compare these words with those in 1 Corinthians 15, you can see that Paul is talking here about the resurrected body, that body we shall receive in which he says mortality will be swallowed up in immortality. He uses the same terminology here. It is the body, he says, that we shall enter in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, we will be changed and this new body will be given to us (1 Corinthians 15:52). Here he is contrasting the two. The present body, he says, is like a tent. We are living a temporary experience, as people do when they live in a tent.
I sometimes feel uncomfortable in this tent of my earthly body. I am sure you do, too. A tent is not very satisfying. The stakes begin to loosen, the poles begin to sag, the tent itself sags in various spots, the cold penetrates, and it is not very comfortable. Some of us feel that way as we grow older. But we are looking forward to the resurrection body, the permanent building, that which God had in mind when He made us in the beginning, the permanent dwelling place designed by God without any human help, a house not made with hands. Nothing human produces it or adds to it; nothing that the undertaker does while our body is being prepared for the grave adds a single thing to what God will do that will produce the body of glory that is to come. The point Paul makes is that it is already ours in eternity. We have, he says. Notice the present tense: not We will have. We have an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands already there, waiting for us to put on.
The apostle says that this new body, the resurrected body, is an experience of not being disembodied but being further embodied. He changes the idiom from the building to the body and says it is like being further clothed, so that it is more than we have at the moment. If you feel like you are clothed by being in a body, then in that body you will feel even more clothed, further clothed. No one wants to float around in a bodiless existence. Paul says your actual experience will be this: You will be further clothed upon death as believers. You will have a new body. That is a weight of glory beyond all description, and it will come instantly, for the one who has prepared us for this very thing is God.
I thank You, Lord, that when that moment of glory breaks upon my startled heart, I shall at last see Him whom I have long loved and served.
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| Life Application |
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| Have we forgotten the expectation and hope of our glorious future, for body, soul and spirit? |
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| For more on this portion of Scripture read the message: |
| Beyond the End |
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| Copyright © 2014 Ray Stedman Ministries — This daily devotion is from the book The Power of His Presence: a year of devotions from the writings of Ray Stedman, compiled by Mark Mitchell. It may be copied for personal non-commercial use only in its entirety free of charge. All copies must contain this copyright notice and a hyperlink to RayStedman.org if the copy is posted on the Internet. |
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