Athough it isn’t always true in life, the term “handmade” is usually assumed to mean better than machine made, of superior quality. In the world of handmade custom suits, the word is “bespoke.” Bespoke tailors like Caraceni in Milan or Anderson & Sheppard in London can throw some pre-dust rags together for upwards of $3,000.
Scripture presents a different standard, as should be expected. They speak of precious realities made without hands. What are these blessings untouched by man’s intervention?
Christ the Builder
Petulant, aggrieved, envious, “The chief priests and all the council sought testimony against Jesus to put Him to death, but found none…Then some rose up and bore false witness against Him, saying, We heard Him say, I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and within three days I will build another made without hands” (Mk 14:55-58).
Their wicked hands would scourge, smite, slay Him. But when men had done their worst, and the Lord of Life lay in a sepulcher, the most amazing thing happened. There in the darkness of the tomb, the Cornerstone, elect, precious, laid in the lowest place, began in the raising of a holy temple, constructed of living stones “built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit” (Eph 2:22). Every stone is laid in place by Christ through the Holy Spirit, untouched by men’s artifice. It is the only building that will survive the collapse of the universe.
Christ the Victor
Not only did Christ redirect men’s destructive forces to make way for His constructive triumph, but “we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens” (2 Cor. 5:1). Our bodies, with all the damage sin has done and the limitations we feel, are scheduled for replacement. These new bodies, not temporary tents for our pilgrim journey, but houses “not made with hands,” will last as long as the eternal ages, never showing signs of wear, aging, failure or fatigue (Isa 40:31).
Christ the Purifier
In the meantime, we carry on down here. Yet it is possible to already begin to take on the character of our heavenly home, to “bear the image of the Heavenly” (1 Cor 15:49). “In whom also you are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ” (Col 2:11). It will not be by human effort, that we will win the long war within, but by the circumcising surgery of the Great Physician who tenderly hurts to heal.
Christ the Redeemer
It is also a remarkable fact that, while we are not yet “at Home” in heaven, we are welcome to visit there. How can it be? “Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation. Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption” (Heb 9:11-12). His redemptive work opened heaven to us. We may now enter within the veil of the true tabernacle, of which the earthly tent was only a shadow.
Christ the Ruler
In Daniel 2:34-35, the prophet describes, and then explains, the king’s dream: “You watched while a stone was cut out without hands, which struck the image on its feet of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces. Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold were crushed together, and became like chaff from the summer threshing floors; the wind carried them away so that no trace of them was found. And the stone that struck the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.”
Anyone familiar with Daniel understands the vision. World empires rise, flourish, and fall, the last being crushed by God’s King, and “no trace of them” will be left. This transfer of power, when “salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ have come” (Rev 12:10), needs no help from man. God the Father will initiate this, sending forth His Son to rightfully and regally claim His everlasting kingdom. It was by Himself He bore our sins; it will be by Himself that He shall bear the glory (see 1 Pet 2:24; Zech 6:13).