Verse 3 explains why they long to put on the heavenly body.

So that: this indicates the purpose of being protected by the heavenly dwelling. In some languages it will be more natural to begin a new sentence here saying something like “We want to do this so that…” or “We long to put on this God-given body in order that….”

On the verb putting … on, see comments on 5.2. Instead of the word for putting on, a few manuscripts have the verb for “taking off.” The two verbs differ in spelling by one letter only. The editors of the UBS Greek New Testament chose the reading “taking off” but indicate that the correct reading is very uncertain. Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation both accept the reading putting on: “by being clothed with it [the home which comes from heaven].” New American Bible, on the other hand, follows the reading “taking off”: “if indeed, when we have taken it [the earthly body] off, we shall not be found naked.” Either way the message that results is basically the same. Paul longs to put on the heavenly dwelling in order not to be found “without a body.”

The verb be found naked has no explicit agent in the Greek. Revised English Bible takes the verb as reflexive: “we shall not find ourselves naked.” Both the passive and the reflexive may present problems in other languages, but it may be possible to say simply “be naked” or “not have any covering.” And in languages where the metaphor is changed in the previous verse, this verse may be rendered “therefore, when we are hidden there, we are not homeless.”

Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Ellingworth, Paul. A Handbook on Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1993. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .