Mobile Tents in an Immobile World

[HKHaugan]

“Given personal trust in Jesus and His daily plan of reliance on Him, it is the spiritual equipment we’ve been given that needs to be developed.”  That is our tents, meaning our bodies, our congregations and the universal Body of Christ (from last segment).”

 

In the NIV there are 346 references for ‘tent.’ 99% of them are found in the Old Testament. In each can be found something spiritually adaptable to our individuality.  That is the point of the Old Testament.  It lays the groundwork for transition into the spiritual dimension, to view it spiritually.  It is through Christ that the Old Testament becomes a framework for God’s self-revelation.  Remember that the first Christians had only the Old Testament as their Scriptures, Jesus as their Messiah and the promised Holy Spirit as their interpreter.

So when Paul was writing his letters to the believers in Corinth he was led by the Holy Spirit to look back and see the spiritual reality behind the visible journey the Hebrews were taking.  The journey, the people of God, the plans, the equipment, their tents and the environment through which they traveled were all spiritual markers, spiritual signs, spiritual symbols God set in historic sequence to prepare for the coming of His Son.  Peter even says this, “I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of this body, because I know that I will soon put it aside, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me (2Peter 1:13-14 NIV).”

For example who can fail to see the spiritual significance in the dramatic presentation of Abraham and his son Isaac on the journey to make a sacrifice to God (Gen.22)?  Through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that historical image shifts our gaze to behold the future sacrifice of God’s Son on the Cross.  It would be in His Son Jesus that we, each one of us personally, could identify ourselves with Him in a unique way as He calls us to take up our cross each day. 

 

We are on a journey with a unique people, each of whom has been given a unique spiritual mind, heart and soul, created in God’s image, living in the shadow of the Cross.  Again, that image of God in us is unique and no other in history will ever be the same.  Keeping that in mind the equipment we have been given in spiritual history, our body with its unique mind, heart and spirit, Paul calls a tent, a temporary dwelling in which we are being prepared for eternity with God.  Here’s how he puts it, “¹ For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. ² Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, ³ because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. ⁴ 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 (2Cor.5:1-4 NIV).”

 

What stands out in this passage is the Genesis image of disobedient Adam recognizing his nakedness (Gen.3), which was his realization of his separation from God.  He had broken contact with the Spirit of God and was spiritually unclothed.  In other words, his sense of having lost contact with God led him to realize he was naked.  God was out there somewhere resulting in Adam hiding, feeling guilt, being afraid, experiencing aloneness, trying to cover himself, refusing to take responsibility and looking to blame someone for his condition (which he does, Eve and God “…the ‘woman’ -- ‘you’-- put here with me…”).  These are the seven barriers that made up the walls of sin in Adam and Eve.  They continue in each of us as the walls of the strongholds we construct apart from God to face our separation from God and one another, to deal with the pain of conflict, uncertainty and the unknown that characterizes every next moment.

 

The thing about sin is that our uniqueness, this magnificent gift of God, is subverted to promote and expand our ways of self-indulgence, manipulation of others and rejection of God through compromise and conformity to secular standards.  The devil stands on our shoulder encouraging us to take control of our uniqueness, our tents, consider that we are really good persons at heart and do whatever we want whenever we feel the urges of the moment.  After all we don’t really intentionally sin and sin probably doesn’t exist anyway.  Our intentions are good and that is the cover for us even though at times we might make a mistake or two.  This is the path of rationalization and self-justification, the evidence of pride that begins our personal and unique sin cycle dragging us into the whirlpool of strongholds isolating and alienating us into eternal death.

 

But the good news in Jesus is that His Cross and Resurrection have shown us the uniqueness of an eternal life dying as a sacrificial substitute for our unique and straying sinfulness.  He experienced death and rose from it to save, recover and restore our unique personal being forever. This is what makes the idea of the tent so meaningful.  We are on a journey through a sinful wilderness alone and isolated but Jesus entered our aloneness and continues His rescue of each of us.  He came in His tent to start a caravan of tents moving toward His promised land. 

 

The Message Bible says it like this:

“For instance, we know that when these bodies of ours are taken down like tents and folded away, they will be replaced by resurrection bodies in heaven—God-made, not handmade—and we'll never have to relocate our "tents" again. Sometimes we can hardly wait to move—and so we cry out in frustration. Compared to what's coming, living conditions around here seem like a stopover in an unfurnished shack, and we're tired of it! We've been given a glimpse of the real thing, our true home, our resurrection bodies! The Spirit of God whets our appetite by giving us a taste of what's ahead. He puts a little of heaven in our hearts so that we'll never settle for less (2Cor.5:1-4).”