< 2 Corinthians 5 >
1 For I know, if this earthly tent of mine were struck, I have a mansion built by God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. (aiōnios )
2 For in this tent I am groaning, earnestly longing to be under the cover of my heavenly habitation; if so be that being so covered,
3 I shall not be found naked.
4 For in this tent of mine I am groaning in deep trouble; not that I wish to be unclothed, but to be clothed upon, that what is mortal may be swallowed up in life.
5 And He who has wrought me out for this very end is God, who has given me his Spirit as pledge.
6 Therefore I am always of good courage, because I well know that while I am at home in the body, I am in banishment from the Lord,
7 for I am walking by faith, not by sight.
8 So I have good courage, and am well pleased rather, to be in banishment from the body and to be at home with the Lord.
9 And for this reason I also make it home with the Lord.
10 For we must all be made manifest, in our true characters, before the Judgment-seat of Christ; so that each one may receive according to that which he has done in his body, whether good or evil.
11 So, because I know the fear of God, I "persuade men." What I am is manifest to God, and I hope manifest also to your conscience.
12 I am not "commending myself to you again," but I am giving you an occasion of boasting on my behalf, so that you may have an answer ready for those who boast in externals, and not in the heart.
13 For if I was "beside myself," it was to God; of if I am now "of sound mind," it is for you.
14 For the love of Christ overmasters me; because I thus judge that if One has died for all, then all have died;
15 and that he died for all in order that the living may live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again for them.
16 Therefore henceforth I know no one simply as a man - even if I have known Christ as a man, yet now I do so no longer.
17 So there is a new creation when any man is in Christ. The old life has passed away, behold, the new is come.
18 And all this is from God, who through Christ reconciled me to himself, and gave me the ministry of reconciliation;
19 how that God was in Christ reconciling a world to himself, not reckoning to men their trespasses; and that to me he has entrusted the message of that reconciliation.
20 On Christ’s behalf, then, I come as ambassador. It is as though God was entreating you, through me, on Christ’s behalf I beg you to be reconciled to God.
21 Him who knew no sin, in our behalf he has made to be sin; so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
