davidbowerkingwood

What is Your Reaction When You Read that Statement?

Over the last several weeks, the COVID-19 Pandemic has dominated the news; governments, all over the world, have reacted dramatically to try and protect citizens from the virus. Now I make, what appears to be, a radical statement about mankind not being harmed by the virus. Do I have any solid basis for making such a statement, I believe I do!

As is usually the case, I base that statement on the Holy Bible; I believe the Bible makes a vitally important distinction that definitely involves you! I believe the Apostle Paul does the best job of explaining what I’m talking about; in 2 Corinthians 5: 5-8 it is written:

“5 For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. ² For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, ³ if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. ⁴ For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. ⁵ Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.

⁶ So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. ⁷ For we walk by faith, not by sight. ⁸ We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.”

The point I’m trying to make is this:

YOU ARE NOT YOUR TENT!

Let’s review how it all started; in Genesis 1:26-27 and 2:7 it is written:

²⁶ Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” ²⁷ So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

⁷ And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.

From those verses, we learn we are created in the image of God and our living essence was placed in a body made of the dust of the ground. Paul later refers to our body of dust as a tent; I like that analogy for it emphasizes the temporary arrangement we have with our mortal bodies.

Our living essence, created in the image of God, will exist forever; there will never be a point where every human being who has ever lived, is not present in some form or fashion. In later chapters, Genesis explains about Adam’s disobedience and spiritual death, we learn, in the New Testament, that all mankind died in Adam when he died spiritually in the Garden of Eden.

When you were born, you were born spiritually dead because of Adam; you were born with a virus, the virus of sin. God, in his grace, mercy, and love has provided a free cure for this virus, salvation from sin by faith in Jesus Christ as Savior.

While Your Tent is Vulnerable to the Afflictions of this Earth, You are Not!

Although it is difficult, we simply must view our tents with detachment; as Christians, they are the only part of us that was not redeemed when we were born-again by faith in Jesus Christ as Savior. Our mortal bodies can have no part with us in eternity. Fortunately, “we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”

Yes, of course our tents, made of dust, are vulnerable to all of the afflictions we experience on earth, including COVID-19 but let me remind you again:

YOU ARE NOT YOUR TENT!

The time you spend in your mortal body has already been determined by God; in Psalm 139:16

¹⁶ Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.
And in Your book they all were written,
The days fashioned for me,
When as yet there were none of them.

I don’t know about you, but I delight in the thought that God has planned my life and my death; I love the thought of my times being in His hands!

The headlines are filled with stories of death and destruction; while these events are affecting our bodies of dust, only one thing, and one thing alone affects our living essence and that is what have we done about the virus of sin we inherited from Adam. There is a sure cure available to all who believe; believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be cured of this virus.

It breaks my heart to see all the attention being paid to tent damage and so precious little being paid to the cure for the sin virus; this is the only virus that can truly cause damage for all eternity and we ignore it at our own peril!

Receive Jesus Christ as Savior and be Cured from the Only Virus that can Actually Kill You!

Image courtesy of kingcounty.gov