The Architecture of Man

 "For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." 2 Corinthians 5:1

"Now He that hath wrought us for the self-same thing is God." 2 Corinthians 5:5

       I understand the meaning to be that man was not made, or ''wrought," for the present world, but for another world; we are living in a shifting tabernacle, and we have the furniture of a permanent building. There are three sets of houses with which we come in contact; two of them are quite intelligible; the third is always a puzzle. There is the small house with poor furniture; we know that this means the life of toil. There is the large house with grand furniture; we know that this means the life of riches. But there is a third - the small house with grand furniture; and this mystifies us. There is an incongruity about it. We feel that the furniture was not made for  the edifice - that it was meant for another and a better edifice. So it is with man. The most pronounced feature about him is his incongruity. He is not a miserable creature; he is not a divine being; he is a mixture of both. He is a little house with gigantic pretensions. The furnishing is quite inappropriate to the edifice. The edifice is a shifting tabernacle with no permanent resting-place. But in front of it there are magnificent grounds laid out - grounds which must be lost unless there be a permanent building. The grounds are the aspirations in front of reality. We are confined within a narrow space; but we are seeking nothing less than a Christ.
       Yes, Thou fair Christ, I am in search of Thee! From my tiny window I stretch out my hands to catch the heavens. It is not only in what men call religion that I seek Thee; all my aspirings are aspirings after Thee. In the study of art I am seeking Thee; I am in search of a perfect beauty. In the reading of fiction I am seeking Thee; I am trying to figure a life fairer than the children of men. In the love of music I am seeking Thee; I am striving to imagine a harmony deeper than that of the spheres. Thou art the inappropriate garden in front of my tabernacle. Therefore I know that I have a building somewhere. I know that these permanent grounds would never be laid out for a shifting tent. I know that the electric light would never have been furnished for a house which cannot stay. Thou wouldst not build a massive ship if the sea were to be dried up. I behold as yet no trace of the waters; but the ship is already here; that is my hope of glory.