Hard wood floors, maybe?
I don’t know if people still go camping in tents. And I don’t know if tents have improved since my parents took me camping back a million years ago. But, from my experience, tents have no HVAC and no indoor plumbing. They leak and tear. Tents may or may not keep out the bugs. And if a bear wants to eat you, it’s like opening the refrigerator door—one swipe of a paw and dinner is served.
Don’t get me wrong—I enjoyed camping. But never, ever did I confuse a tent with a house. We never put hardwood floors in our tent. We didn’t hang works of art in our tent. We didn’t put a sectional and a TV in our tent. Why not? Because a tent is temporary. We don’t plan on living in a tent forever.
In 2 Corinthians, chapter five, Paul compares our earthly bodies to tents. Just like a tent, these human bodies are temporary. Our tent bodies are subject to aches, pains, viruses, wrinkles, gray hair, disease, injuries, wrinkles, and death.
“We inwardly sigh as we live in these physical “tents,” longing to put on a new body for our life in heaven” (2 Corinthians 5:2). We instinctively know our earthly bodies are temporary and come with limitations and problems. From scraped knees to heart disease, our “tent bodies” show their temporary nature.
That’s the bad news. The good news is these tent bodies will one day be replaced.
“For we will discard our mortal “clothes” and slip into a body that is imperishable. What is mortal now will be exchanged for immortality” (1 Corinthians 15:53). When Jesus returns, every believer receives a shiny-new, indestructible body. What now is susceptible to bee stings and frost bite will be impervious to both. The diseases that now wreck our tent bodies will no longer affect us.
Nothing can hurt Superman, right? That’s the kind of bodies we will have, except better, because even kryptonite won’t be able to weaken them.
When Jesus returns, death is defeated forever. Death will have no power over our supernatural bodies.
And when that which is mortal puts on immortality, and what now decays is exchanged for what will never decay, then the Scripture will be fulfilled that says: “Death is swallowed up by triumphant victory!”
1 Corinthians 15:54
I hate death. I believe God hates it, too. Death wasn’t part of God’s original plan for us. Death entered earth because of sin. The power of sin has already been broken. And one day, the Lord Jesus will return to earth and the power of death will be defeated forever. Our bodies will be transformed. What is now subject to injury and illness will be free from that tyranny.
Let’s not miss out on this. Let’s place our faith fully in Jesus so we are ready for his return and ready to have our earthly, fragile bodies transformed into immortality. What a day that’s going to be!
Dear God, place a picture of heaven in my heart. Let me bring you glory while I am serving you on earth but help me remember my eternal destiny. Thank you for the transformed body I will receive when you return. Thank you for loving me, forgiving me, and saving me. In Jesus’s name, amen.
Family Worship Center Devotionals 