The call to seek heavenly reward is not a call to selfishness for this reward comes through pleasing Christ.  Heavenly reward seems to involve enjoying more of Jesus and reflecting more of his beauty.  It is a reward that glorifies God.

We have a great tent.  I call her the ‘Blue Lady’.  She is technically a nine-person tent, but realistically she takes six comfortably.  We don’t go camping as much as we should, but I love waking up on a sunny morning in the tent with all the bright light and sunshine.  That being said, the last time we had the ‘Blue Lady’ out it rained pretty much all of the holiday.  That was less fun!

 The writer, Paul Tripp, is not a big fan of camping.  He says that the whole purpose of being in a tent is to make you long for home.  Yes, everything is okay at the beginning.  But then the tent starts to get smelly.  After a few nights sleeping without a mattress and cooking on a portable stove you start dreaming of your bed and a properly functioning kitchen.  He doesn’t want to be a tent-dweller.

 In these verses the apostle Paul talks about tent-dwelling, and he says that he is longing to be at home.  His tent is this aging and decaying earthly body.  We won’t truly be home until Jesus returns and we have an impartial glorious body.  We know that if the tent that is our earthly body is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens (1).

 In the previous verses Paul has been telling us not to lose heart.  Following Jesus is not meant to be easy.  Indeed, when people reject us or oppose us for our faith it can feel like dying.  But we each have been given a wonderful ministry.  We get to model and speak about the mercy of God demonstrated in the cross of Christ.  We also don’t lose heart because though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.  For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that for outweighs them all (4:16-17).

Paul knows what it is like to be in prison, shipwrecked, alone, robbed, sleepless, cold, beaten and stoned, and let down and deserted.  Yet these afflictions are light and momentary compared to the weight of glory that awaits him.  This heavy weight of glory is the prize that awaits at the end of time.  It is to this weight of glory that we turn our attention to now.

The Weight of Glory Gives Us Hope (1–8)

 When Jesus returns every follower of Christ will receive a resurrection body.  Our current body is like a tent—it is fragile and temporary.  Our resurrection body is an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.  It will be glorious and permanent.

Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, because when we are clothed we will not be found naked.  For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life (2-4).

Those are complicated verses.  Paul seems to be referring to what some call ‘the intermediate state.’  You see, when Christians die they go to be with Jesus is heaven, but even in heaven His people are looking forward to His return for it is not until He returns that we receive our resurrection bodies. 

But how do we know that we really will receive a resurrection body?  How do we know that we really are Christians?  How do we know that the day of Jesus’ return is going to be a good day for us?  We know we belong to Jesus because God has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come (5). 

Jesus said that becoming one of His followers is so radical that it is being ‘born again’.  He also called it being ‘born of the Spirit.’ 

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