Real Estate Transfers: Trading Tents for Mansions

2 Corinthians 5:1-8

“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. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. 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. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee. So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.”

When we are absent from the body (a kindly way of saying dead, kicked the bucket), the Apostle Paul tells us in this passage of Scripture that we will be present with God. What an encouraging reminder to believers! Just because the doctors pull the white sheet over our heads, there is no reason for concern – Christians will immediately take up residence in their Heavenly mansion.

The prospect of death of the earthly body (tent), that we reside in daily, has little appeal to most people. For many earth residents, the worst possible event they can imagine is the death of themselves or their loved ones. I must be a peculiar resident, as death to the physical body is not the worst possible scenario in my humble opinion. I know I am Heaven bound based upon my confession of sins and acceptance of Christ as my Redeemer, Forgiver and Savior.

Personally, the thought of one of my loved ones dying and not knowing if he or she had accepted Christ and sought forgiveness for his or her sins, is the worst possible event my mind can wrap itself around. I cannot imagine my grief to watch a loved one die and not have assurance to his or her eternal destiny.

None of us are certain of the day or hour of our last breath. That is why we must not tarry. We must be prepared. Our sins must be forgiven and we must have confessed with our mouths that Jesus is the Lord of our lives. We must believe. He knows we will not be perfect. He is well aware of how we will fail and sin, even before we commit the transgression. Yet, He still maintains a Heavenly Home for us as we struggle through life on earth.

To release myself or a loved one at the moment breath leaves our lungs into the hands of our Father is not the end, by any means. Death of the physical body is simply relocating from these temporary, flimsy, tents of bodies we are now residing in for our permanent, Heavenly homes. It is the best transfer ever to be experienced – a move up to the best neighborhood imaginable. Real estate values are not a concern in Heaven. Properties there are as priceless today as they were before the economic upheaval. We won’t have to be concerned about the neighbors – we will all be redeemed and forgiven. Our mansions will be custom built by God Himself (and I doubt the roofs will leak).

Reflect upon these Scriptures if you have any doubt that when your heart beats for the last time if you will have a Heavenly Home awaiting you.

Romans 10:13
For “whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.”

I Timothy 2: 3-4
3 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

Ephesians 2:8-9
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast.

Acts 16: 31
31 So they said, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved,

John 3:15-21
15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but[b] have eternal life. 16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. 17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
18 “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. 21 But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”