Drew Gunn

Order of Service

• Call to Worship — Isaiah 55:1-3
• Prayer of Invocation
• Sermon
• Pastoral Prayer

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Sermon Title: The Eternal Home That Awaits the Christian

Scripture: 2 Corinthians 5:1

I. The Earthly House: Our Frail and Temporary Bodies

A. Paul's use of "for we know" reflects genuine shared conviction with the Corinthians, rooted in his year and a half living and working among them (Acts 18:1-11)

B. Paul was a tentmaker by trade, dwelling with Aquila and Priscilla (Acts 18:2-3); the tent illustration was not lost on his audience

C. The body as an earthly, dusty dwelling — a house of clay

1. Adam formed from the dust of the ground — the body is earthy and perishable
2. Eliphaz in Job 4:19 acknowledges humanity as creatures dwelling in "houses of clay whose foundation is in the dust"

D. The tent as a picture of the Christian life

1. Tents are temporary, uncomfortable, and exposed to the elements
2. Israel wandered through the wilderness in tents, following the pillar of cloud and fire — a picture of the pilgrim life
3. The Christian is an alien and stranger in a dying world, sojourning not back to Sinai but onward to Zion

II. The Building from God: The Eternal Heavenly Dwelling

A. Two points of relief for the Christian in 2 Corinthians 5:1

1. The earthly house may not be destroyed — the Christian may live to see Christ's return
2. If the body is destroyed, the believer immediately goes to dwell with God in the eternal heavenly house

B. The eternal dwelling is a real place prepared by Christ

1. John 14:1-4 — "In my Father's house are many mansions… I go to prepare a place for you"
2. Heaven is not merely a location but is bound up in the person of Christ himself — to be with Christ is heaven

C. Christ himself is the building not made with hands

1. John 2:18-21 — Jesus declared his body to be the true temple; destroy it and in three days he would raise it up
2. Mark 14:53-61 — False witnesses accused Jesus of claiming he would destroy the temple made with hands and build another without hands
3. By his sacrifice on the cross, Jesus did in principle destroy the temple made with hands — the curtain was torn, the sacrificial system abolished
4. His body was broken, his blood shed, his soul crushed under the wrath of God in the place of sinners — the fulfillment of every animal sacrifice since the fall

III. The Gospel Application: Heaven Is Where Christ Is

A. Heaven is heaven because God is there; heaven is heaven because Christ is there

B. The believer's reward is Christ himself

1. To know Christ is to love him, follow him, and obey him
2. The Christian's eternal rest is, in the deepest sense, reclining upon the chest of Jesus as the beloved disciple

C. Call to the unconverted

1. Christ offers salvation to all who come to him this day — he will turn away none
2. Christ has paid it all; there is room in his house for every man, woman, and child who turns to him in repentance and faith