Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary 2 Corinthians 5:1

"For we know that if the earthly house of our tabernacle be dissolved, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal, in the heavens." — 2 Corinthians 5:1 (ASV)

Apparently for the first time in his apostolic career Paul reckons seriously with the possibility, even probability, of his death before the return of Christ. Previously, to judge by 1 Thessalonians 4:15, 17 and 1 Corinthians 15:51, he had expected to be among those Christians living when Christ returned. But now, as a result of his recent devastating encounter with death in Asia (1:8–11), he realized that he could die before the Parousia.

As a Cilician leatherworker whose duties included tentmaking, Paul naturally likened his present body to an “earthly tent” (GK 2103 & 5011; cf. vv.2, 4) that might at any moment be dismantled or destroyed. This would simply mark the termination of the process of weakness and decay already at work in his body (4:16). But this possibility did not daunt him, for he was the assured recipient of a permanent heavenly house—a spiritual body provided by God.