Tired Tents

https://odb.org/MY/2023/05/03/tired-tents

Paul likes to use the expression “tent” to refer to our earthly bodies. I guess tent is a good analogy as it is temporal and moveable. Tents are also symbolic of our faith forefathers, who were nomads who left their permanent abodes by faith for a faraway land in response to a calling from God, for a place flowing with milk and honey where their descendants will be like the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore.

As we grow older, we can not avoid the effects of ageing. We are not as strong as we used to be. We are slower in movement. Our eyesight is getting worse. If we could easily do 30,000 steps a day when young; 17,000 steps are challenging now. Now, we will probably take a week to recover from an overseas trip. Even our memory is failing. Our tents do get tired and worn out.

Thus, 2 Corinthians 4:16-5:5 give us that hope that even as our earthly tents are decaying, our spirit man is getting stronger. Our inner being, which was created by God before the foundations of the world to be holy and blameless before Christ (Ephesians 1:4), is getting stronger by the day. One day, our inner man will become our new physical self as we are transformed into our glorified bodies as the spiritual realm merges with the physical in the new heaven and earth, in the new Jerusalem (Revelation 21:1-2).

My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, do not be dismayed if we are afflicted by ailments and medical complications. Some are due to the years of neglect, and yet some are just unavoidable as we age due to wear and tear. Focus on what is unseen as what is unseen is eternal – the words of Paul in 2 Corinthians 4:18. But note his words again in 2 Corinthians 5:1 – for we know if our earthly tent is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. If we had neglected our temporal tents all these years, don’t make the same mistake with our eternal bodies!