Bodies - 2 Corinthians 5:1-5

5:1-5 - Chapter 4 ended with Paul talking about affliction turning out for our good and there was a lot of discussion about our physical bodies doing the work of the Lord, or carrying the “treasure” of the gospel to the people all around. Paul had discussed briefly his own experience with persecution for the sake of the gospel complete with beatings, whippings, mobs chasing him, etc. I had a thought while driving to work this morning that made Paul’s physical persecutions were seen by him or others as his penance for imprisoning and physically persecuting the early Christians before his conversion. Anyway, we know that Paul ends up being executed for his beliefs, and possibly Paul knows it’s coming at this point too. In this life, looking at it from the perspective of the mortal world, death is the ultimate endgame, there is no coming back from that.

 

In verse 1 when Paul teaches that if “our earth house of this tabernacle were dissolved,” meaning when death comes, those who believe in the gospel believe “we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” I read this phrase two ways, first referencing our eternal spirits within us and second our pending resurrection. Paul kind of bemoans the plight of the mortal righteous because he says that we are anxious to be resurrected “that mortality might be swallowed up of life.” It’s a really difficult concept to reconcile because on the one hand, we begged to be given bodies in the pre-mortal world. Our physical states here on this earth is the pinnacle of our existence so far. We are supposed to have joy in this life, and we are supposed to be happy and have good attitudes, and that’s hard to do when we “groan” in anticipation of getting our resurrected bodies. I know that at least for me, this isn’t a healthy state of mind. I can have hope to help me look forward to something better in the future when I’m down, but I can’t harbor active distain for my present situation or I’ll spiral really quick into a black hole of misery and depression.

 

It’s definitely a balance between contentment in life and hope for the future. Too much effort trying to be content in life and it ends up devolving into a hedonistic downward spiral with no regard for the spiritual consequences. Too much effort trying to focus on hope of a better future and it becomes a devolving downward spiral into bitterness and negativity with no regard for the physical or spiritual consequences. So like I said, it’s a balance and honestly for me, that tight rope walk is pretty tenuous for me a lot of the time. I vacillate wildly between “I need to go to Jiu Jitsu so I can be happy in life because I need to do something,” and “this is the worst life ever, I can’t wait to die.”  Lots of gray area in between those two extremes so it’s honestly a pretty wild ride for me emotionally a lot of the time.

 

The IM speaks to this to this balance saying, “in both ancient and modern times, some people have mistakenly believed that the physical body is a negative thing and that a disembodied state- living as a spirit only- is preferable. When writing to the Corinthians, Paul expressed his desire not to be rid of his mortal body, but to be ‘clothes upon’ with an immortal, resurrected body.” We can’t control when we die or when we are resurrected, but Paul isn’t talking about hating his body, only hoping for a better existence, a better body and therefore a better spirit. If we keep in mind that a perfected, resurrected body is coming for us, then we can have more motivation to keep the commandments and be happier in our afflictions. But It’s not just that added source of motivation that can be gleaned from Paul’s statements here, there is also a message of what we can do in the here and now to improve our circumstances.

 

We can’t resurrect ourselves, that’s all on God’s timing, but we can do whatever is possible in our power to improve ourselves physically. This is definitely a message for me because I for sure need to step up my game taking care of myself. I absolutely have food issues and with quarantine I can’t go to Jiu Jitsu right now and it is soul crushing for me. I have never had an activity that I have really physically enjoyed before until now. I love it so much and I want to go back so bad but we can’t right now. But I don’t cook, I don’t eat well, I really need to work on this because I’m getting older and there are definitely some things that I can’t do or that are limited because of my unhealthy lifestyle. Maybe this is God’s way of telling me that I can’t control my resurrection, but I can control my lifestyle so that I can be closer to what a resurrected body would be like.