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2 Corinthians 5
1For we know that if the earthly house of our tent is dissolved, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal, in the heavens.
2For most certainly in this we groan, to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven,
3if indeed being clothed, we will not be found naked.
4For indeed we who are in this tent do groan, being burdened, not that we to be unclothed, but that we desire to be clothed, that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.
5Now he who made us for this very thing is God, who also gave to us the down payment of the Spirit.
6Therefore we are always confident and know that while we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord;
7for we walk by , not by sight.
8We are courageous, I say, and are willing rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord.
9Therefore also we make it our aim, whether at home or absent, to be well pleasing to him.
10For we must all be revealed before the judgment seat of that each one may receive the things in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad.
11Knowing therefore the fear of the Lord, we persuade men, but we are revealed to God, and I hope that we are revealed also in your consciences.
12For we are not commending ourselves to you again, but speak as giving you occasion of boasting on our behalf, that you may have something to answer those who boast in appearance and not in heart.
13For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God. Or if we are of sober mind, it is for you.
14For the love of compels us; because we judge thus: that one died for all, therefore all died.
15He died for all, that those who live should no longer live to themselves, but to him who for their sakes died and .
16Therefore we know no one according to the flesh from now on. Even though we have known according to the flesh, yet now we know him so no more.
17Therefore if anyone is in , he is a . The old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
18But all things are of God, who reconciled us to himself through Jesus , and gave to us the ministry of reconciliation;
19namely, that God was in reconciling the world to himself, not reckoning to them their trespasses, and having committed to us of reconciliation.
20We are therefore ambassadors on behalf of , as though God were entreating by us: we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
21For him who knew no sin he made to be sin on our behalf, so that in him we might become the of God.
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Questions this passage answers
What is the Gospel?
The Gospel is news, not advice. It is the announcement that God became man in Jesus Christ, lived the life we owed, died the death we deserved, rose bodily from the dead, and now freely forgives and reconciles everyone who turns from sin and trusts him. It is something done, reported to us, before it is anything asked of us.
What happens after death?
Scripture teaches that death is not the end but a passage into God's presence for those who trust Christ, and separation from him for those who do not. For the believer, to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, and this immediate hope is followed by a future bodily resurrection at Christ's return. Death is appointed once, and after it comes judgment, which is why the question is never merely academic.
Why did Jesus have to die?
Jesus died because sin has a real penalty, death, and God chose to bear that penalty himself rather than simply overlook it. Scripture presents the cross as a substitution: the sinless one carrying the guilt of the guilty, so that God could remain just and still forgive. It was not an accident that overtook him. It was the plan he came to fulfil.