For the apostle, Christian life is one in all its fullness and at all its stages. Before, prior to the coming of Christ, every person's life was clearly divided into "before" and "after," into life and...
For the apostle, Christian life is one in all its fullness and at all its stages. Before, prior to the coming of Christ, every person's life was clearly divided into "before" and "after," into life and life after death, which could not be called life in the full sense of the word even under the most optimistic view of it. For most people, life after death meant a world of shadows, where there is no life but only its likeness, where a person turns into his own shadow, forgetting earthly life and almost losing awareness of his own existence.
There were, of course, less pessimistic views of life after death, which assumed the immortality of the soul and recompense after death, but even then the matter concerned only the soul, not the whole person. Paul speaks of something else. He starts not from hope in the immortality of the soul, but from the expectation of the resurrection of the whole person, entirely and completely. And for him this process has already become reality, together with the Kingdom that has entered the world.
For a person living the life of the Kingdom, the difference between "before" and "after," if it does not disappear completely, becomes nonessential. The life of the Kingdom is one, and a person who has come to share in this life is no longer subject to death in the form in which it is present in the fallen world. Of course, insofar as the Kingdom has not yet entered the world completely, a person cannot be completely free from death. This refers first of all to the physical body, which in its fallen state can become a barrier between a person and God.
It was not intended to be this way. God created man so that he could remain with Him in the fullness of communion. But after the fall everything became different, and the embodied nature that had once been the place of meeting between man and God became a barrier separating man from God. A barrier that can, of course, be overcome, but one noticeable enough that it cannot be ignored. That is why the apostle says that the fullness of communion with God presupposes liberation from the body in its present state, not in the sense of complete rejection of it, but in the sense of its transformation, such a change in its nature that it would not hinder communion with God, but would instead help it.
In any case, this communion with God begins not somewhere in another world and not sometime after death, but here and now. The first stage of the path into the Kingdom begins when a person decides to follow Christ and enters the Church. And already at this first stage, more is decided than one might think when looking at fallen man.
At the first stage it is determined what the following stages will be, if not entirely, then to a great extent. God prepares the heavenly dwelling for a person, but the clothing that will be on that person when he stands at the threshold of that dwelling is prepared by the person himself during his earthly life. Life in the Kingdom begins here and now, and it is precisely here and now that what we will become later, at the next stage of our path, is determined. This is what the apostle reminds the readers of his letter.
5
5:1 Our earthly house - Which is only a tabernacle, or tent, not designed for a lasting habitation.
5:2 Desiring to be clothed upon - This body, which is now covered with flesh and blood, with the glorious house which is from heaven. Instead of flesh and blood, which cannot enter heaven, the rising body will be clothed or covered with what is analogous thereto, but incorruptible and immortal.Macarius speaks largely of this.
5:3 If being clothed - That is, with the image of God, while we are in the body. We shall not be found naked - Of the wedding garment.
5:4 We groan being burdened - The apostle speaks with exact propriety. A burden naturally expresses groans.And we are here burdened with numberless afflictions, infirmities, temptations. Not that we would be unclothed - Not that we desire to remain without a body. Faith does not understand that philosophical contempt of what the wise Creator has given. But clothed upon - With the glorious, immortal, incorruptible, spiritual body. That what is mortal - This present mortal body. May be swallowed up of life - Coveredwith that which lives for ever.
5:5 Now he that hath wrought us to this very thing - This longing for immortality. Is God - For none but God, none less than the Almighty, could have wrought this in us.
5:6 Therefore we behave undauntedly - But most of all when we have death in view; knowing that our greatest happiness lies beyond the grave.
5:7 For we cannot clearly see him in this life, wherein we walk by faith only: an evidence, indeed, that necessarily implies a kind of "seeing him who is invisible;" yet as far beneath what we shall have in eternity, as it is above that of bare, unassisted reason.
5:8 Present with the Lord - This demonstrates that the happiness of the saints is not deferred till the resurrection.
5:9 Therefore we are ambitious - The only ambition which has place in a Christian. Whether present - In the body.Or absent - From it.
5:10 For we all - Apostles as well as other men, whether now present in the body, or absent from it. Must appear - Openly, without covering, where all hidden things will be revealed; probably the sins, even of the faithful, which were forgiven long before. For many of their good works, as their repentance, their revenge against sin, cannot other wise appear. But this will be done at their own desire, without grief, and without shame. According to what he hath done in the body, whether good or evil - In the body he did either good or evil; in the body he is recompensed accordingly.