CHRIST CHURCH
June 14, 2009, 10am

2 Corinthians 5:6-10

It's often said that the most frequent topic of conversation is the weather. Certainly when we greet someone, it's either with a “How are you?”, or “It's a much better day today”.

We may then go on to talk about our families, sport or whatever. One thing that never crops up is death. Death, the one future certainty to every living person is the one topic we studiously avoid. It may enter our thoughts from time to time, and certainly must do when a relative or close friend dies. But- possibly because it's the one inevitable future event, and because what comes after is beyond our ken, it strikes fear into the human heart. We like to feel we are in control. Death is one thing we can't control.

In today's reading from 2 Corinthians, Paul tackles the subject of death full on. Not only so, he speaks of death and of what may follow with absolute conviction and confidence. In verse 6 he says “We are always confident”, then in verse 8, “We are confident.

It is in our faith in Jesus that we find confidence. Verse 7: “We walk by faith, not by sight”. No we can never have that certainty which relies on things we can see, feel or touch.
But you only have to attend two funeral services, one of a Christian (especially, of course, if the family be Christian), and the other that of an unbeliever. In the latter case, there may be thanksgiving for a life, and a brave stoical approach, but at the end there is unadulterated grief, fear and sadness.
The other thing which bears an amazing testimony to the fruit of a living faith in Jesus is where a person is facing a terminal illness, for which there is no hope of recovery, but only the certainty of pending death within months or even weeks. I have been privileged in the last eighteen months to know of three Christian believers who have faced the closing stage of their life with absolute confidence and trust. There can surely be no firmer witness that issues from faith in and life with Jesus.

But back to Paul.
Firstly, we notice that verse 6 of 2 Corinthians 5 begins with a “therefore”. When we have “therefore” at the opening of a sentence, we need to know what has preceded. In the opening verses of this chapter, Paul had in essence compared our human bodies to a tent, whereas, he says, after death we will have house to inhabit. We shall move from a temporary structure to a permanent one. For the Christian, death is not “leaving home” but rather it is “going home”.
But our human nature would rebel at such thoughts. The natural instinct of fear of death regards death also as a unwelcome interruption in life's pleasure (and pains) and also a move into an experience of the unknown- if there will be anything to experience at all!
But such thinking is, or should be, foreign to the Christian. Death is rather the journey into that fuller life for which God designed us; that fuller life which Jesus came to bring. There will be joys (“In the presence of the Lord there is fullness of joy”, as the Bible tells us); joys which we can experience in part, but which will be far outstripped by what is to some. “Eye has not seen nor has it entered into the heart of man, what good things God has prepared for those who love him”.

Secondly, Paul speaks of his being absent from Jesus in his earthly body, whereas after death he would be with Jesus. Clearly Paul's preference was to be with his Lord. He speaks similarly in the Philippians passage I spoke of; his reason for continuing in the body was so that he could continue to serve the church in Philippi.
Whilst death is that journey; that gateway into fuller life, yet this life, need I say?, remains very significant. Paul realised that God had work for him still to do, and so long as we remain 'away from the Lord' we know that it is only for a season, and that as pilgrims, we still live life for Jesus, and as God's gift.

Lastly, in verse 10, he speaks of the fact that “we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ”. For that reason in verse 9 Paul says that we aim to please him. Judgment is for the believer something very different from that of the unbeliever. For the believer the judment known as the Great White Throne where there is the great division based on belief and unbelief, there is no fear; that fear is removed by the knowledge that “There is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). The judgment seat of Christ uses the Greek word  “bēma”  This was the tribunal bench in the Roman courtroom, where the governor sat while rendering judicial verdicts. Remains of such a bēma exist in the Corinthian forum today. And there we will give account for how we have lived in the body. It is that based on our works- works done for Christ; works of this Spirit. If our works are of precious metal we shall be rewarded for them, but if they were of rubble, straw, they will be burnt up and we will suffer eternal loss. We shall be (1 Corinthians 3:14) be saved as though through fire.

One last word.
In verse 5 Paul had said the God who gives us a “house”  for our eternal dwelling has also given is his Spirit as a guarantee. The Greek word implies that The presence of the Spirit in Christians’ lives now is the down payment or guarantee that they will receive resurrection bodies when Jesus returns.

When our time comes, then in Jesus we may face our own mortality in confidence.