2 Corinthians 5:1-4 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

For we know We pursue, not seen, but unseen things, and do not faint in our work, because we know that if our earthly house Which is only a tabernacle or tent, a mere temporary habitation; were dissolved Were mouldered back to the dust out of which it was formed; or if our zeal in the service of the gospel should expose us to martyrdom, which should destroy it before its time; we have And should immediately enjoy; a building of God A building of which he is the great architect and donor; a house not made with mortal hands Nor to be compared with the most magnificent structure which hands ever raised, exceeding them all in its lustre, as much as in its duration, though that duration be eternal in the heavens Placed far above either violence or decay. “Whether we consider this divine building as particularly signifying the body after the resurrection, in which sense Whitby takes it; or any vehicle with which the soul may be clothed during the intermediate state, considerable difficulties will arise.” “I therefore,” says Doddridge, “am inclinable rather to take it in a more general view, as referring to the whole provision God has made for the future happiness of his people, and which Christ represents as his Father's house, in which there are many mansions.” For in this While we are in this state of suffering, or while our soul sojourns in this mortal body; we groan earnestly Eagerly long for that future state, and the felicity of it, and grieve that we do not yet enjoy it; desiring to be clothed upon That is, upon this body, which is now covered with flesh and blood; with our house which is from heaven To enter the heavenly mansion which God hath provided for us. To be clothed upon with a house, is a very strong figure; which yet the apostle uses here and in 2 Corinthians 5:4, having in his thoughts the glory which each should wear, instead of being clothed, as now, with that mortal flesh which he calls a tabernacle, as it is so mean, inconvenient, and precarious an abode. If so be that being clothed With the image of God, while we are in the body; we shall not be found naked Of the wedding garment. He seems to allude to Genesis 3:7; Exodus 32:25; our natural turpitude of sin being a nakedness abominable to God. See 1 Peter 5:5; Colossians 3:12, where the same metaphor of being clothed with divine graces is made use of. For we that are in this tabernacle Who still dwell in these frail and corruptible tents; do groan, being burdened therewith. The apostle speaks with exact propriety, a burden naturally exciting groans: and we are here burdened with numberless afflictions, infirmities, and temptations. Not that we would be unclothed Stripped of our bodies, for that is what we cannot consider as in itself desirable; .but rather, if it might be left to our choice, we would desire to pass into the immortal state without dying, or to be clothed upon with the heavenly glory, such as that which will invest the saints after the resurrection; that mortality, το θνητον, that which is mortal Corruptible, and obnoxious to so many infirmities, disorders, burdens, and sorrows; might be swallowed up of life As if it were annihilated by the divine power, which at the resurrection will exert itself in and upon us; namely, as the case was with Enoch and Elijah when they were translated, and as it shall be with the saints that are found alive at Christ's second coming. The meaning of this and the following verses is evidently this; “That though it appeared most desirable of all to pass to future glory without dying, yet a state in which mortality should be swallowed up of life, was, at all events, desirable; and an absence from the body to be not only submitted to, but wished for, in a view of being so present with the Lord, as even in the intermediate state they expected to be.” Doddridge.