One of the things I love about Paul is that he cannot speak about any aspect of his experience as a Christian without celebrating, bursting into praise, or pausing to meditate and enjoy what God has done for him in Christ.  Having just mentioned the ‘eternal glory’ that awaits us in the New Creation, Paul camps out (no pun intended!) on the eternal hope we have in the Gospel.  If you were at our study day in August, you’ll be all over this!  Paul is underlining the physicality of our future.  We are not ultimately looking forward to a ‘spiritual’ (i.e. ethereal) destiny.  Yes, we will have to be ‘naked’ (without a physical body) for a period.  But only until the end of this age, when we will be re-clothed with our eternal resurrection, glorious body!  The contrast with the body we have now is as different as the contrast between a tent and a house (my hunch is Paul has in mind the Tabernacle and the Temple here).

Paul is shaped by a complex blend of realities that compound each other until he is overwhelmed by God’s grace, and pressed into an inevitable Christ-likeness.  He is caught in a kind of pincer movement of grace.  His past, present and future determine his character, his behaviour and his relationship with the Church.   His experience of God’s love, his fear of the Lord, his anticipation of standing ‘before the judgment seat of Christ’, his anticipation of participating in the New Creation, his experience of that New Creation embryonically right now, his grasp of all that Christ has achieved in the cross, the thrill of his being caught up in Christ’s mission of reconciliation... all this and more presses in on Paul, shaping him and pressing him forward into his being transformed into the image of Christ.  It cannot do anything but...

Questions:

How often do you think about the New Creation, and your resurrection body?  How does that help you live as a Christian here and now?   What difference would it make whether it was a ‘spiritual’ or a ‘physical’ future? 

Paul speaks with great assurance of his hope, using words like ‘guaranteeing’ and ‘confident’.  How important is that sense of spiritual security?  How would you help someone who didn’t share it?

Do you share Paul’s sense of ‘groaning’ (see also Rom.8:22), and of being ‘burdened’ in this age?  What underlies and causes this reaction?

What is God’s purpose in fashioning us in this way (v.5)?  How does it affect you to know this is His purpose for you?

How helpful is it for you to see Paul use appearing before the judgment seat of Christ as a motivation for making it your goal to please Him (vv.9-10)? 

If we are saved by faith alone, how come we get judged by what we have done (v.10)?   Does that prospect increase or decrease your hope?  Why?

What is Paul trying to persuade others about in v.11?  How does the fear of the Lord feed into that? 

Do you ‘know what it is to fear the Lord’?  How could we cultivate such a fear?

What is the logic of vv.14-15?  How can you deepen your awareness of having ‘died’?  What does Paul mean by saying that because ‘one died for all ... therefore all died’?  How does realising this help you live ‘for Him’?

How are you involved in ‘the ministry of reconciliation’ that God has given us?  Do you think of yourself as God’s ambassador?  How would bearing such a title change you?

What does Paul mean when he talks about Christ being made sin for us?  ...and of us becoming the righteousness of God?