A House Not Made with Hands

The year 2026 marks the 250th birthday of the United States of America. It has become a year long celebration for our nation. I will be the first to tell you that I feel very blessed to have been born in a free nation where I can worship and gather without fear. I do not consider myself to be a rich person but in comparison to other countries I am wealthy. The poorest 20 percent of Americans are richer. on average, than most European nations. The privilege of living in the US affords poor people more material resources than the averages for most of the world’s richest nations. The United States was built by visionary rulers who united fragmented groups and colonies and established centralized government. The United States government has changed over time by shifting power from individual states to a stronger central federal authority, expanding civil rights through constitutional amendments, and growing the power of the president and other federal agencies. The United States government faces deep political division, high national debt, and intense debates over executive power. I love my nation but one day all people in every nation will bow their knee to Jesus Christ.

 2 Philippians 2: 10-11 ESV so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. 

In second Corinthians chapter 5, the apostle Paul discusses the future hope and glorious reality that awaits believers in heaven. He begins by describing a spiritual, eternal dwelling place that God has prepared for believers after they die and depart this earth: “For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” Being a tent maker by trade, Paul considered the tent a fitting analogy for the temporary nature of our current earthly, mortal bodies. The human body is temporal, weak, and prone to decay, muck like the tents Paul made with his hands and much like my beloved country. By contrast, our future heavenly bodies will be permanent, beautiful, and glorious.

2 Corinthians 5:1 ESV For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

Right now, we live in a tent, but our permanent home is a heavenly house and our citizenship is in heaven. This “house not made with hands” is durable, built to weather every storm. No matter how much of a patriot you are you must recognize the possibility that one day The United States could cease to exist. As Christians we need not fear the fall of our nation or even death itself. As Christians, we need not fear death or the destruction of our bodies. No matter what happens to these mortal tents we live in now, we will inherit imperishable, glorified bodies. The house not made with hands in which we will dwell completes the transformation and redemption that comes through faith in Jesus Christ. After Jesus was resurrected, He told His disciples, “Because I live, you also will live.”

John 14:19 ESV Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live.

One day, this tent will be taken down. When we die, our physical bodies will be destroyed. When Jesus returns for His church, He will raise our dead bodies in glory. Body and spirit will be joined together for all eternity, comprising a glorious building from God, a house not made with hands.