Wherefore^ Scb kul, wherefore also, i. e. because we desire to be with the Lord. Longing after communion with him pro- duces the desire and secures the effort to be found acceptable to him. Those who have this hope purify themselves as he is pure. 1 John 3, 3. It is impossible that those who regard the presence of Christ, or being w^ith him, as heaven, should not desire and labour to be j^leasing to him, by living in obedience to his commandments. We labour. The word </)iXoTi/xctor.^at means more than to labour. It signifies literally, to love hon- our, to be ambitious ; and then to make any thing a point of honour, or to set one's honour in doing or attaining something. So Paul says, he made it a point of honour not to build on another man's foundation. Rom. 15, 20. And here he intends to say that as ambitious men desire and strive after fame, so Christians long and labour to be acceptable to Christ. Love to him, the desire to please him, and to be pleasing to him, animates their hearts and governs their lives, and makes them do and suffer what heroes do for glory. Whether present or absent. These words may be variously explained. 1. The sense may be, ' Whether 23resent in the body, or absent from the body,'' i. e. whether living or dying. Comp. Rom. 14, 8, " Whether we live, we live unto the Lord ; or whether we die, we die unto the Lord." 1 Thess, 5, 10, "Whether we wake or sleep, we live together with him." The connection is then either with ^iXoTt/xot'/xe^a, ' we strive whether in the body or out of the body; i. e. the desire in question is active as well in the living as the dead ; ' or, as is better, with cwpecr- Toi dvai, ' we strive to be accej^table whether in the body or absent from it.' 2. The sense may be, ' Whether present loith the Lord, or absent from the Lord.'' This is only expressing the same idea in a different form. Whether living or dead, as in Rom. 14, 8. 3. Meyer takes the words literally, 'Whether at home or abroad.' But this is utterly incon- sistent with the context. The objection to the first interpre- tation, that the desire to be acceptable to the Lord when actually saved, must cease, inasmuch as the object is attained, is of no force. The thing desired, to ^-qrovfjiivov, as Chrysostom says, is that we may be pleasing to Christ whether here or there, whether in this world or the next.
10. For we iirast all appear before the judgment- seat of Clirist ; that every one may receive the things