We call where we are staying— our place.
Paul likened us to Bedouin-backpackers. He made a distinction between us and our address (2Cor 5:1).
Another way this gets tricky is when we try to work out what Paul meant when he said, that when he did wrong—in his place, it wasn’t really him, but sin “living in him” (Rom 7:17). Sounds like he’s was saying that sin lived at his address and that he had some responsibility—and needed mercy— for what happened at his place… without confusing his place with some sense of himself…
Who wants to doubt that there is something mysterious and mystical going on here?
Yet somehow Paul was able to keep his feet on the ground. While echoing the ancient songwriter who referred to God as our “dwelling place” (Psalm 90:1; Acts 17:28) he still had a realistic sense of identity with the “the body” he had been given as a place to be, meet, and stay in touch with others.
And when Paul met with others, we know that one of the things they often talked about was what it meant for God himself to say through Jesus, “this is my body… “broken for you.”
I wonder whether they also talked about whether God ever points to them (both individually and together)— and says to the eyes and ears of heaven, “This is my body”… “Here I am staying”…
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