2 CORINTHIANS 3:1–18
BRYAN CLARK, SENIOR PASTOR
LINCOLN BEREAN CHURCH
The new covenant is the powerful answer to the Adventist health message. The finished work of the Lord Jesus administered in our lives by the indwelling Holy Spirit is what purifies and sanctifies us. Ascetic practices and lifestyle cannot help us become more like Him.
I was pastoring a small church in rural Nebraska when leaders from a large church in the state’s capital contacted me and asked if I would be interested in moving to Lincoln to become part of their staff. The arrangement was that I would share some of the preaching and teaching duties, work alongside the senior pastor, whom I knew, and maybe—possibly—over five or six years, transition into the role of senior pastor. What appealed to me about that offer was the chance to work in ministry with someone I highly respected and to be trained and mentored to grow as a leader. So, I agreed to come. That was October of 1993; I was thirty-four years old.
A couple of months later the senior pastor was diagnosed with cancer, and in less than a year I was voted in as the new senior pastor. I was absolutely overwhelmed; I felt I was totally inadequate for my calling. Now, more than twenty years later, I realize that I might not have been right about a lot of things in those days, but one thing I was right about—I was—and am—totally inadequate for my calling. In reality, you are inadequate for yours, too—and we know that fact, don’t we? We feel it. We think about talking to a neighbor, or a co-worker, or in some way carrying out the ministry to which God has called us, and we feel a sense of inadequacy—because we are inadequate.
So what do we do? How do we find a sense of confidence? How do we find a sense of strength and boldness?
This dilemma is what Paul addresses in 2 Corinthians, chapter three. In thinking about 2 Corinthians, especially the early chapters, it’s probably best just to ignore the chapter divisions and think of this passage as a running train of thought. At the end of chapter two, Paul introduces us to a graphic Roman imagery called the Roman Triumphal Entry. He paints the picture of Christ as the conquering general and us as the conquered slaves that come in with Christ. Paul reminds us that when the parade comes through town, there is only one who receives the applause—and that is Christ Himself.
Furthermore, Paul also reminds us that when God smells us—our performance and our behavior—what He ultimately smells is the sweet aroma of Christ. Whether we think we performed very well this past week or whether we think we performed very poorly, when God smells us, He doesn’t smell our personal performance. He smells the sweet smell of Jesus and what He has done for us. In fact, Paul reminds us that Christ is the big divide between those who will experience eternal life and those who will experience eternal death—a reality which then raises the question, “Who is adequate to be a messenger of this gospel?” Paul says, “Well, the ‘adequate’ are not the religious peddlers; they are those who are sincerely called of God.” So, in chapter three, Paul continues to discuss the subject, “Who is adequate?”
Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, as some, letters of commendation to you or from you? You are our letter, written in our hearts, known and read by all men; being manifested that you are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts (2 Cor. 3:1-3).
It was very common in the first century for religious teachers to carry with them a letter of commendation that was their credential for ministry. We know that the false teachers in Corinth were religious legalists, and it is very likely they carried with them letters from Jerusalem that identified them as official messengers of the message and served as their credentials. The previous passage sounds as if the false teachers are raising the challenge, “What are Paul’s credentials? We’d like to see his letter.”
Paul responds by saying to his readers, “Do we have to go through those credentialing questions again? My credential is that your lives have been radically changed by the Spirit of God through the power of the gospel.”
Paul had lived with the Corinthians for eighteen months. During that time he delivered the message of power, and their lives would never be the same. Now he says, “Hey, your lives are my credential; you’re the letter. The Spirit of God has written on your hearts that you have been radically changed.” In this way he’s drawing a contrast between religion and the message of Jesus.
The legalistic peddlers were peddling mere religion. Religion does have the ability to do a bit of remodeling—to put a little paint over certain areas and to produce external change temporarily. But only the Spirit of God, through the power of the gospel, has the power to change someone from the inside out. Therefore Paul says, “This letter that commends me isn’t written in ink; it is written by the Spirit of God. This isn’t a tablet of stone; this is someone’s heart that has been radically changed. These changed hearts are the credentials.”
In other words, Paul is saying that what makes us adequate is not ourselves—the minister is not adequate—but the ministry of the new covenant is adequate. It’s not the messenger that’s adequate; it’s the message that’s adequate. The adequacy is not in the individual, but it is in the Spirit of God—in the power of the message of the new covenant.
In addition, the whole idea of religious credentials has always been a problem in the church. In various denominations today there is still a strong emphasis on a clergy class in contrast with everybody else. We separate the clergy out by titles; we separate them out by clothing; we separate them out as a class and apart from everybody else. That separation looks much more like the old covenant than like anything that appears in the new covenant.
The fact of the matter is, in the new covenant there is no such distinction; there is not a clergy class and everybody else. In fact, in order to be adequate for ministry one does not need to go to Bible college; one does not need to go to seminary; one does not need to be ordained nor have credentials. For example, I am a licensed minister of the gospel, and I have four college degrees. I have been at this work for over thirty years, yet none of that makes me adequate for ministry. The only thing that makes me adequate is the Spirit of God changing my heart and the power of the message. Adequacy is not in the minister; it’s in the message. It’s in the ministry of the new covenant—and that is what Paul is saying.
And such confidence we have through Christ toward God (v. 4).
In other words the Corinthians might be saying, “Wow! He sounds really confident in his relationship with God.” Paul says, “I am, but that confidence doesn’t come from myself; it comes through Christ.”
Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life (v. 5-6).
Paul is very quick to say his adequacy comes from God, and that adequacy comes from the fact that he has been called to be a servant of a new covenant—as we also have been called. In other words, we are messengers of the new covenant. The Greek language has a couple of different words for “new”. The one in this passage is a particular word that means new as contrasted with old, which is the meaning we would expect, but it also carries with it the idea of superiority. Not only is this covenant new as compared to old, but it is far superior to the old—and that is the argument Paul is going to make. In philosophical circles we would say, “He is going to argue from the lesser to the greater, and what gives us adequacy is the message of the new covenant.”
Next Paul gets very graphic in his terminology when he talks about the fact that this covenant is “…not of the letter, but of the Spirit”. And then he says. “…the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” This graphic language certainly raises the question, “What is he talking about?”
But if the ministry of death, in letters engraved on stones, came with glory, so that the sons of Israel could not look intently at the face of Moses because of the glory of his face, fading as it was, how will the ministry of the Spirit fail to be even more with glory? (v. 7-8).
With this sentence, the mystery of what he is talking about is gone. Paul is clearly referring to Exodus 34 when Moses went up Mount Sinai and received the law. He came down with tablets that God had engraved. This law became, in essence, the foundation of the old covenant. Paul refers to it as a “ministry of death”. The law kills. He refers to it as a ministry of death, but he does say it was from God, and there was glory that came with it. When Moses came down the mount, his face glowed. He reflected the glory of God but—and Paul is quick to say and will say it two more times—the glory didn’t last.
There is great theology in the fact that the glory faded away. What God was saying is that the old covenant would not last. It would fade away and give way to a new covenant that would be far more glorious. So Moses came down—he had the glory—but the glory would fade. This fading glory was God’s way of saying, “This covenant is temporary. It will serve a purpose, and when the purpose has been completed, it will fade away and will be replaced by a new covenant.” God through Paul goes on to say, “If that glory was true of a covenant that faded away, how much more glory is there going to be in this new covenant that is a covenant of life, a covenant of the Spirit?” Again, Paul is making the argument from the lesser to the greater.
One thing I want to bring up right here is the idea of the Ten Commandments. There is absolutely no question that the Ten Commandments are part of Paul’s reference here. They were on the tablets; they’re what Moses carried down the mountain. Every statement here about the Old Testament law must include the Ten Commandments. The law kills; it’s a ministry of death. We as Christians often talk about the Ten Commandments, but theologically, I am not sure we “get it”. We want them in our parks. We want them in our courthouses. We want them in our schools, but somehow we pull them out and separate them from the whole law. Why?
I am raising that question now, and I will come back to it later in the article.
For if the ministry of condemnation has glory, much more does the ministry of righteousness abound in glory (v. 9).
Again, the language is graphic. The letter kills—it’s a ministry of death, but now he is referring to it as a “ministry of condemnation”. What is he talking about?
All these references depend on understanding the purpose of the law. The law, in essence, was the foundation of the old covenant. Everything in the old covenant was meant to point to the coming of a Savior. God had made a promise. We track it all the way back to Genesis, chapter 3, where God promised that through the seed of a woman would come One who would crush the head of the serpent. By the time we get to Genesis 15, we can make the case that it will be God Himself who will become a man and shed his blood to atone, or to pay for, our inability to keep the covenant. All of the old covenant, therefore, was pointing to the fact that God had made a promise, and the promise was that He would send a Savior.
But there is a problem: all of us, deep within us, have a desire to be our own god. This desire first shows up in Genesis 3, and it shows up in our lives over and over again. Religion plays into this desire because religion tells us that we can “do it ourselves”. Deep within us there is something that says, “I want to do it myself,” and religion says, “You can. You just have to keep these rules. You just have to jump through these hoops. You just have to do this and that, and you can make yourself good enough for God.”
So God sent the law. The purpose of the law was never to be a means of salvation. Sometimes I hear people say, “Well, people were saved one way in the Old Testament and another way in the New Testament”. That idea is false. In fact, it is bad theology! The only difference between salvation in the Testaments is that people in the Old Testament were saved looking forward to the cross, while people in the New Testament are saved looking back at the cross.
In essence, people in the old covenant were saved on credit—believing that God made a promise, and He would keep His promise and would send a Savior—and they died believing by faith that promise would be true. But the tendency we have—because we have a natural desire to be our own god—is to think that God grades on a curve. Thus we tend to measure and compare ourselves, and this comparison is the problem with religion. Religious people tell themselves, by and large, “I’m better than most, so surely God’s going to grade on a curve; and if anybody gets in, I’ll probably get in”.
God, though, sent the law to say, “Whoa, whoa, wait a minute here. We’re not going to do it that way, and I’m not grading on a curve. Here’s the standard—six hundred thirteen commandments—and this is what I want you to use to measure yourself. Unless you can keep every one of these perfectly—every day—you are condemned.” He wanted people to understand that they could not do it themselves. Therefore, they needed a Savior. Therefore, they would believe, by faith, that God would keep His promise, and He would send a Savior.
The law was a ministry of death; it was a ministry of condemnation. It was a constant reminder to humanity, “You don’t measure up; you need help.”
Greater glory
Paul reminds us that the old covenant did come with glory. However, if there was glory in a ministry of condemnation, how much greater will be the glory of a covenant of righteousness? Paul doesn’t go back and restate the gospel in this passage; he’s already stated it several times for the Corinthians. If we look back to 1 Corinthians 15, Paul states clearly that Jesus—God in the flesh— died for our sins, was buried, and rose again. He affirms that those who, by faith, believe Jesus died for them—did for us what we could not do for ourselves—that on that basis, God forgives our sins, and we are reconciled back into a relationship with God, both now and forever.
Therefore, our standing before God has nothing to do with our behavior. It has nothing to do with our religious performance. When God smells you He only smells the sweet smell of Jesus. Therefore, the new covenant is a covenant of righteousness—meaning that on the basis of what Jesus did for us on the cross—today believers in Jesus stand righteous in the presence of God. Now, we may have had a really good week, or we may have had a terrible week spiritually. Either way we stand before God right today, because our standing is not on the basis of our performance but on the basis of what Jesus did for us on the cross. Therefore, instead of a ministry of death, instead of a “ministry of condemnation”, this new covenant is a “ministry of righteousness” and is good news filled with hope and life. If the old covenant had some glory, how much more glorious must this new covenant be? Furthermore, if the new covenant is so much more glorious, why would anyone cling to the covenant of condemnation from the past?
This argument of “greater glory” is the argument that Paul is making.
For indeed what had glory, in this case has no glory because of the glory that surpasses it. For if that which fades away was with glory, much more that which remains is in glory (v. 10-11).
Paul is saying that the new covenant is so glorious it’s as if the old covenant had no glory at all. The new is so superior that, by comparison, the old had none. In fact, he reminds us again that the old fades away, but the glory of the new gets more glorious with each passing day. Paul was dealing with false teachers in Corinth who were religious legalists. We sometimes refer to them as the Judaizers. These were not people who denied the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Rather, these were people who believed and affirmed those events, but they were quick to say, “But that’s not enough”. They were attempting to mesh the old with the new: “Okay, we like the new, but we are not ready to let go of the old.”
For the Judaizers in the ancient world it was, “Yes, Christ died for us, but we also need to be circumcised; we also need to keep the Sabbath; we also need to keep the yearly festivals and feasts.” They were trying to mesh the old with the new, and Paul is making the case that the new is so vastly superior, it makes no sense to cling to the old.
We have the same problem today when people try to mesh something to the finished work of Jesus on the cross. We all know people and denominations that would affirm Jesus’ death on the cross. They celebrate Christmas; they celebrate Easter. They say, “We believe all that. It is Christ and …. Christ and baptism … Christ and communion … Christ and keeping the Sabbath … Christ and these legalistic rules and regulations.”
Our tendency is to say, “As long as they get the death, burial, and resurrection right, then the rest of it doesn’t really matter. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with being a little bit extra-cautious and doing a few more things on the side, right?”
Paul totally disagrees with that conclusion. When Paul wrote to the Galatians, he said, “If you add one thing to the gospel, it ceases to be the gospel.” In fact, this understanding of the gospel was the great divide of the Reformation: salvation is by Christ alone—nothing added.
Therefore having such a hope, we use great boldness in our speech (v. 12).
I want to highlight the word “therefore” in verse twelve. Paul is using this transition to say, “Because salvation is by Christ alone, and because the new covenant is far more glorious than the old, therefore we move out with boldness; we move out with confidence; we move out with courage.” Why? Because the minister is adequate? No, because the ministry is adequate—the ministry of the new covenant. It’s not the messenger that’s adequate; it’s the message that’s adequate. So Paul says, “Because this adequacy is true, we have a message of hope; we have a message of life; we have a message of righteousness. In fact, this superior message gives us our courage and our boldness. We just speak it, and the rest is up to God and His Spirit.”
… and we are not as Moses, who used to put a veil over his face so that the sons of Israel would not look intently at the end of what was fading away (v. 13).
Paul, again, is going back to Moses. Moses would put a veil over his face because the glory was fading away, and he didn’t want the people to see that it was fading away, so he would hide its fading glory. Paul says, “Hey, we’re not like that. The glory of the new covenant isn’t fading away; it becomes more glorious with each passing day.”
But their minds were hardened; for until this very day at the reading of the old covenant the same veil remains unlifted, because it is removed in Christ. But to this day whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their hearts; but whenever a person turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away (v. 14-16).
This is a very interesting part of this text. Paul is saying that Moses hid the fact that the glory was fading, so that up until that moment in the first century as Paul was writing, when the old covenant was read, the people failed to recognize that the old covenant was fading away. Yet its entire purpose was to point to the coming of the Messiah. Paul even told us, at the end of 2 Corinthians, chapter one, that Jesus is God’s “Yes”. In other words, Jesus was the fulfillment of everything that was promised, but the hearts and the minds of these Jews were veiled. They couldn’t see that the old had faded away, and it was replaced by the glory of the new.
Now that Jesus has come, what is the purpose of hanging onto the old covenant? Why would anyone settle for the old when something far superior has replaced it? Paul says, “The only way to be set free from that old covenant is in Christ. Only when I am willing to accept that my salvation is not on the basis of my religious performance or on my ability to keep the law, but that I’m saved on the basis of what Christ did for me on the cross—only then does the veil come down. Only then can I see that the system that condemned me is gone, and I am now entering into the life of the new covenant which is a system of life and hope—a system of the Spirit.”
Christ is the great divide. Every single person reading this will make one of two choices: believe that Jesus died on the cross for his or her sins and thus by faith trust Christ alone, or decide, “I will do it myself.” There is no other option. Every religious system besides biblical Christianity is a way of saying, “I’ll do this myself.” Until we recognize that there are no religious observances we can do, that there is no measure of “being good” that’s going to be good enough for God, we will remain alienated from Him. However, when we finally admit that only what Christ did for us on the cross will satisfy God, the veil is lifted, and we see clearly that the old is gone and the new has come in Christ.
Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit (v. 17-18).
Paul reminds us that the Spirit of God who dwells within us is God Himself, and where there is the Spirit, there is liberty—there is freedom. What he is saying is that the only way to be set free from the pressure and the anxiety and the condemnation of a religious system of performance is through Christ. If we have the Spirit of God, there is only one reason He is in us: we have trusted Christ as Savior. If we have the Spirit, there is liberty—there is freedom.
The old system of the law—the system of religious performance, the system of legalism—is a system of death; it is a system of condemnation. It is a system of darkness, because every day one lives in the reality that he may not be good enough that day, and that pressure never goes away. Even though one may be trying to be good, one doesn’t know today if one is good enough, so one’s day is filled with fear and anxiety. Every day is filled with pressure to measure up, hoping one will make it in—if God grades on the curve.
When we understand, though, that we can’t be good enough, we finally understand why Jesus died in our place on the cross. When we believe by faith that Jesus did that for us, we have freedom. Then we have no more religious performance, no more pressure, no more fear, no more anxiety, and no more wondering every day if we’re going to measure up. On those days when I completely make a mess of things, and I have plenty of those days, I take solace in the fact that when God smells me, He only smells the aroma of Christ. I stand righteous before Him. The pressure is off; I have been set free.
Paul reminds us that the Spirit is in the process of transforming us into the image of Christ. He says we do this “with unveiled face”. Moses had to hide his face because the glory was fading. Our glory, though, isn’t fading. It’s becoming more glorious with each passing day. In fact, it will never fade. From glory to glory, it’s becoming stronger and stronger as the Spirit of God is transforming us more and more into the image of Christ. That word transforming is the Greek word from which we get our English word metamorphosis. The Spirit of God is “metamorphosizing” me on a daily basis—making me more and more like Jesus. The glory is getting greater, not less. But notice carefully the text; this is not something we are doing. It is something the Spirit of God is doing in us and for us. There is nothing we can do today to make ourselves more spiritual. There is nothing we can do today to make ourselves more acceptable to God or to make ourselves more righteous. If we are born-again believers in Jesus, all that makes us pleasing to God is being done for us on the basis of what Christ did for us on the cross. All God asks of us is that we would seek to live in alignment with what’s true of us in Christ—that we would live as if we actually believe that what He tells us is true.
Ten Commandments recapitulated
Now let’s go back to our discussion of the Ten Commandments. Many Christians try to make the case that the Ten Commandments are still in effect today. What, though, is the biblical basis for somehow pulling the Commandments out of the law and saying that what was said in 2 Corinthian 3 doesn’t apply to them? Of course it applies! They’re the very things Moses went up and received on the tablets and brought back. They’re a ministry of death; they’re a ministry of condemnation. So what are we saying? The Ten Commandments are out and we can live as we please?
The answer is “yes” and “no”. They are out—they were part of the law; they have faded with the glory of the law—but the Ten Commandments do reflect the moral character of God. Now, rather than externally trying to uphold a standard, we have the very person of God dwelling within us—metamorphosizing us into the image of Christ. Therefore, the moral character of God does not change and, since the Spirit of God is living within us, the Spirit of God is changing us—metamorphosizing us to live in alignment with the moral character of God. Therefore, under the Spirit of God, do I go out and violate those commands? Of course not! I would be violating the very character of God. But now my morality is from the inside out. Now it’s in alignment with the Spirit of God who’s molding and shaping me into the image of God—in fact, now my moral behavior is actually generated by the Spirit of God!
Some people try to make the case that the Ten Commandments are still in effect in order to support the idea of a new covenant Sabbath. As a matter of fact, some of you maybe have been asked the question, “Why don’t you keep the Sabbath?” Then, as you look through the Ten Commandments, you might have thought, “Well, boy—that’s really a hard question to answer.”
Here is the answer. Number one: the Ten Commandments are OUT. Number two: we must understand the Sabbath. The whole purpose of the Sabbath—like the whole of the Old Covenant—was to point to the coming of a Messiah, the promised Savior. The concept was this: God works; I rest. This reality goes all the way back to creation when God created; then He rested, and Adam and Eve entered into His rest. Even before sin entered into the picture, God demonstrated grace. He did the work; we just entered into it.
The law of the Sabbath, however, is not in Genesis; it’s in the Mosaic law. In fact, the purpose of the law was that God works; His people rest. That purpose was completed when Jesus died on the cross. He did the work for me, and I rest in the finished work of Jesus.
Therefore, when people say to me, “Do you keep the Sabbath?” I say, “Yes, I do.”
“Well, what day is Sabbath?”
“Well, it’s today.”
“You mean Sunday?”
“No, it’s today. Ask me on Tuesday, and I will say, ‘Today’; ask me on a Friday, and I will say, ‘Today’. Every day I live in the finished work of Jesus on the cross. He worked; I rested.”
We make a tremendous mistake when we try to make the case that Sunday is the new covenant Sabbath. Moreover, the Sabbath question is not about whether or not you mow your lawn on Sunday—or Saturday. In fact, reducing Sabbath-keeping to doing or not doing physical tasks is just bad theology.
Sunday is not the new covenant Sabbath. Salvation is the new covenant Sabbath. We live in the finished work of Jesus. He worked; I rest.
Take away the veil
The old covenant—the covenant of law, the covenant of legalism, the covenant of religious performance, the covenant that reminded Israel that they needed help because we all need a Savior—that covenant has faded as it has been fulfilled in the person of Jesus. Jesus was God’s “Yes”. He kept His promise, and now that the new has come, the old has faded away. Why would we hang onto the old that has faded away when the new is vastly superior?
God, now in Christ, has made a way of salvation so that even on those days when I perform poorly, I stand righteous in the presence of God. I have been absolutely set free from religious performance, from anxiety and fear, from wondering every day if I am going to measure up for God. It is the Spirit of God within me who is metamorphosizing me on a daily basis to make me more and more like Jesus; and, instead of the glory fading, the glory of the new covenant of the Spirit is getting greater with each passing day and will culminate in the presence of Jesus.
Compared to the new covenant, the old covenant had no glory at all. What a magnificent message! Our adequacy is not in the minister; it’s in the ministry of the new covenant. Our adequacy is not in the messenger; it’s in the message—the message of the power of the Spirit of God and the life-changing message of the gospel. Paul reminds us of this magnificent message of liberty, this message of hope, this message of freedom, this message that allows us to stand righteous in the presence of a holy God. What an awesome message that is!
I’m so thankful that when we were lost in our sin, Christ died for us. I’m thankful that the Spirit of God dwells within us, metamorphosizing us on a daily basis into the image of Christ. I know there are probably people reading this that have been up to their eyebrows in religion. Maybe you think that if you are a really good religious person that God will find you acceptable. That’s an evidence of a veil blinding your eyes, blinding your mind. It’s critical to realize that trying to live up to religious standards is a system of condemnation—a system of death. That system kills. My prayer is that the Lord would lift that veil, that every person would understand that Jesus did for us what we could not do for ourselves, and that in trusting Christ as Savior, we receive His Spirit, and where His Spirit is, there is freedom.†
Bryan Clark has been senior pastor of Lincoln Berean Church in Lincoln, Nebraska, since 1994. He graduated from Moody Bible Institute, from Talbot Theological Seminary in California, and earned his M Div equivalency and Doctorate of Ministry degree from Denver Seminary. Bryan published his first book, All It’s Meant To Be, in June, 2000, and has written for Back to the Bible, AWANA Pathway Series, Haven of Rest, and Leadership Journal. He and his wife Patti have three grown daughters.
Copyright 2009, Bryan Clark. All rights reserved. Used by permission. Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE Copyright 1960, 1962, 1963, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1987, 1988, The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.
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