Competence from God

2 Corinthians 3:1-18

Welcome! Today we are going to resume our series on 2 Corinthians, looking at Chapter 3. We are going week by week, line by line, through this entire letter. Since we took two weeks off, appropriately focusing in on the death and resurrection of Christ, I thought it would be good to give you a very quick overview of some of the things we have talked about.

This letter was written by Paul to the Corinthian church, a church that Paul had spent a year and a half founding and building into, a body of believers that Paul had come to love with a special love. After he left Corinth to continue on with his missionary journey, introducing other cities to Christ, the Corinthian church began to develop a number of problems. There were problems with immorality, and even in boasting in that immorality. There were problems with their meetings – people coming just for the food, people dominating the meetings, people being disrespectful with regards to speaking out of turn and then saying that the Spirit made them do it. And there were problems with false teachers and with factions. The people divided themselves, some saying they followed one person and others another.

Paul received word of this and wrote the letter we call I Corinthians, speaking into these problems. From what we can gather elsewhere in Scripture, including in portions of 2 Corinthians, a number of these issues were taken to heart, and the church made some progress in some areas.

But we can also deduce that some of the problems remained. In particular, the problem of false teachers was very serious. One of the things these false teachers did was to try to discredit Paul in any way they could. They attacked his personal life, his personality, his teachings, everything! They did this because what they taught and what Paul taught were completely at odds. Because of this, you see throughout 2 Corinthians Paul defending himself and his teachings.

In Chapters 1 and 2, Paul defends and explains why he didn’t visit them recently, even though at one point it had looked like he would be able to. In so doing this, he reaffirms his love and commitment to them. Reading between the lines, you can see how the false teachers were attacking him – they were saying that he wasn’t a trustworthy person, and that he didn’t really care about them.

Interwoven with this, Paul teaches and reminds them of powerful truths about God. One such truth is that God the Father is the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, the one He loved and yet sent to die on a cross to redeem us from sin. Because of this we see that God is the God of compassion, loving us, and eager to forgive us. And He is the God of comfort, cum forte, with strength, powerful and yet eager to help us with that power. But not only that, we are called, equipped, enabled, intended to comfort one another with that same comfort that God gives us.

Another powerful truth is that love, real love, is supposed to hurt. The type of love God has for us has caused Him unimaginable suffering – remember Christ sacrificed for us. And in the same way, Paul reveals that his love for the Corinthians has caused him anguish, and this is a model for us. We are not supposed to love at a safe distance, to keep a professional distance, as medical schools teach doctors to do. We are all called to open up all we have to God and to each other, loving deeply and vulnerably. Will we get hurt? Probably. But that is what we are called to do.

And another powerful message has to do with forgiveness. Yes, we are to be vulnerable and love deeply, and yes, we will sometimes be hurt just as deeply as a result. We shouldn’t deny these feelings. But we also shouldn’t remain in them. We are called to not dwell on our hurt, but to move past these feelings. Eventually, like Paul, we should work to prevent hard feelings, even saying “it’s nothing to me any longer.” Paul describes a situation in which there has been repentance and says to forgive them, but not only that, but to actively comfort them. Christian forgiveness is complete, maybe even beyond complete. Does this not describe how God’s relationship is with us? We sin and offend God. How deep is that sin, that offense? We have no idea. God is holy. And the cost for God to forgive us is immense – it costs Him His Son. But does God have hard feelings? Does He forgive but then keep His distance? No, He lavishly pours out His Spirit on us, comforting – cum forte – us and building us up, loving us like only God, who is Love, can do. This is the model for us – we are to do this as well.

But even as Paul is sharing this, he is remembering that the false teachers in Corinth have turned many of the people against him, and more seriously against the message of the gospel towards their false teachings. Let’s pick up the letter at Chapter 3, Verse 1.

Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, like some people, letters of recommendation to you or from you? You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody. You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. – 2 Corinthians 3:1-3

Those who have applied to college, or helped those who have, know all about letters of recommendation. Fundamentally, what is a letter of recommendation? It is a letter about a person written by someone who knows that person given to someone else who doesn’t know that person. Letters of recommendation are also found in Scripture. Paul used them when there were strangers he would send somewhere. Here is an example:

Now about the collection for God's people: Do what I told the Galatian churches to do. On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with his income, saving it up, so that when I come no collections will have to be made. Then, when I arrive, I will give letters of introduction to the men you approve and send them with your gift to Jerusalem. – I Corinthians 16:1-3

These letters were important during this time of persecution, because a stranger coming to a church could be a spy for those who were persecuting the churches. Paul’s letter let them know they could trust these people. They were needed because these people were strangers to the Jerusalem church.

And I Corinthians itself was, in part, a letter of recommendation – for Timothy:

If Timothy comes, see to it that he has nothing to fear while he is with you, for he is carrying on the work of the Lord, just as I am. No one, then, should refuse to accept him. Send him on his way in peace so that he may return to me. I am expecting him along with the brothers. – I Corinthians 16:10-11

Ironically, we also see it in Acts 9, where the pre-saved Paul (then called Saul) requested them so that he could continue his persecution of believers in far-off places where they hadn’t heard of him.

Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord's disciples. He went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. – Acts 9:1-2

These letters from the high priest had the same essential purpose – people who didn’t know Saul, with these letters, could trust him in his work persecuting Christians. They never really got put to use, however, because God Himself introduced Himself to Saul on that road to Damascus. And God didn’t need a letter of recommendation! In no time at all, Saul had no doubts whom it was that was introducing Himself to him. (I love irony!) So back to our passage:

Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, like some people, letters of recommendation to you or from you? You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody. You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. – 2 Corinthians 3:1-3

What is Paul asking? He is saying, don’t you know me at all? I, who lived with you, loved you, poured my all into you for a year and a half? Or do you need an acquaintance letter about me, a letter of introduction, all over again? Notice also the three words, “or from you”! What does that mean? Paul is asking whether they think Paul needs letters from them so as to establish his credibility at the other churches he had helped to plant. Notice also the three words, “like some people.” Who is he referring to? The false teachers who had come to Corinth and taught a false gospel and attacked Paul! The phrase “or from you” implies that at least some of these men had moved on. But before they left, they had asked for and received letters of recommendation from the Corinthians. Do you see their likely scheme? Pick up letters wherever you go and use those to ingrain yourself into the next church. These guys were likely on their own missionary journey of sorts, but rather than spreading the life-changing, life-giving gospel message, they were sowing confusion and discord, all for the purpose of personal gain. And so Paul contrasts these men with himself and asks, “Am I like that? Is that what you think?”

And then he says something beautiful: You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody. What does he mean? He is saying, anyone who looks at you, Corinthians, and sees how your lives have changed, even with the remaining problems, can see that the gospel is real, that the gospel is true. You are a letter from Christ! For Christ is the message of the gospel. Paul is just saying words, but the transformation of the Corinthian lives is proof that Jesus saves, that Jesus sanctifies, that Jesus transforms, that Jesus redeems.

And this is true of us, of you. You are Christ’s letter. This is such an incredible picture of sharing the gospel. For when you tell someone about Christ, you are Christ’s letter. You are coming to someone who doesn’t know Him, and you are saying, look, this Guy is all right. In fact, He is far more than all right. He is my Savior, and He can be your Savior too. Will you allow Him to come and meet with you? Will you open your door to Him when He comes? You are Christ’s letter of recommendation. Isn’t that awesome?

One more comment - written not with ink, but with the Spirit: what a contrast! Ink is dead; ink fades; ink disappears over time. But the Spirit – the Spirit is alive; the Spirit never fades; the Spirit is eternal. You are Christ’s letter, written with the Holy Spirit. You! If you struggle with self-esteem issues, if you are your own toughest critic, if you have regrets that you feel will always haunt you, then write this down: I am Christ’s letter, written with the Holy Spirit. Write it on a piece of paper and tape it to your mirror so that you cannot look at yourself without seeing it. It is truth! Reprogram your mind to internalize this truth! And of course, Christ is not done writing. Christ’s letter, written with the Holy Spirit, grows a little longer every day. You don’t think you can overcome a certain sin? You are Christ’s letter, written with the Holy Spirit! In Him you can. You don’t think you can forgive? You are Christ’s letter, written with the Holy Spirit! In Him you can. You don’t think you can share the gospel with people? You are Christ’s letter, written with the Holy Spirit! In Him you can.

Then Paul begins to present a powerful comparison between the Old and New Covenants, between Sinai and Calvary, that continues through this entire chapter. The tablets of stone of course refers to the 10 commandments, given to Moses by God, written by the finger of God, up on that mountain. This is contrasted with the writing of Christ. Jesus’ finger doesn’t write on tablets of stone, but on human hearts. This brings to mind Jeremiah 31:

"The time is coming," declares the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them," declares the Lord. "This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time," declares the Lord. "I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. – Jeremiah 31:31-33a

By the way, why do you think Paul brings up this comparison? It must be because this was at least one of the main teachings of the false teachers; they were Judaizers, people trying get people to seek salvation through observing the law rather than leaning on the completed work of Christ at Calvary.

Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God. He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant—not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. – 2 Corinthians 3:4-6

Such confidence as what? That Paul can say that he needs no letter of recommendation, because the Corinthians are his letter, written by Christ. Paul says this with boldness. But he is quick to point out that this is not him boasting in himself; rather, he is boasting in Christ. He is confident that He is competent, because God is making him competent. I choose this phrase, “Competence from God,” as today’s title, so I want to make sure you understand what it means. It does not mean that if you decide today to become a boat-builder, you will be a competent boat builder by relying on God. (Not unless your name is Noah. If your name is Noah, that’s a different story.) But no, God has never promised to make us competent in whatever we want to do. Even if it is a good thing, it may not be how God has chosen to gift us.

So what has He made us competent to do? Read the rest of the passage. He has made us competent as ministers of the New Covenant. That word minister is diakonos in Greek. The meaning is servant. Paul is a servant of the King, that is, the King of kings, and he serves by sharing the gospel and building up people in the knowledge of Christ and encouraging the day-by-day walk in Christ. And us too! This is what God makes us competent to do. This is why, 2000 years after Christ died on the cross, the church is growing and more and more people are coming to faith in Christ. He makes every believer who seeks to do His work, every believer who desires to be a servant, competent to be a minister of the New Covenant. Listen: Every believer can share the gospel. Every believer can grow to maturity in Christ. Every believer can encourage the body, strengthen believers, pray powerfully and effectively, give their testimony in public, lead a Bible study, and so on. Why? Because it is God that makes Christians competent as ministers of the New Covenant. If God can take a Christian persecutor, a close-minded, proud, angry, venomous, full-of-himself over-educated hothead like Paul and turn him into a humble, profound, loving, self-sacrificing servant of Christ, just think what He can do with regular folks like you and me! If we remain yielded to Him, if we let Him rule in our lives and we serve Him, He will make us competent and much more than competent.

Again, at the end of this part of the passage, Paul compares the Old and New Covenants, calling them the “letter” and the “Spirit,” and then he says a rather shocking thing: the letter kills. Yes, the Spirit gives life. But it doesn’t just say that the letter doesn’t give life; it says that it kills. What does this mean? How does the Law, exemplified by the 10 Commandments, kill?

Now the Law is not evil. That’s not what it is saying. Leviticus 18:5 says that if you obey the Law, you will live. The Law, if you follow it completely, is a path to goodness, to blessing, to life. The problem isn’t that the Law is evil; it’s that we are. The Law is like, well, turning on a light in a dark room and watching a hundred cockroaches caught in the act of well, doing things cockroaches do, and then, trying to run and hide. The Law is like that; it reveals the cockroaches in our lives. The Law not only reveals sin, but it reveals the just punishment for that sin. And that punishment ultimately is death. In this sense the Law kills. I love how Paul puts it in Romans 7:

What shall we say, then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! Indeed I would not have known what sin was except through the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, "Do not covet." But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of covetous desire. For apart from law, sin is dead.Once I was alive apart from law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death. For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me, and through the commandment put me to death. – Romans 7:7-11

I think of Adam and Eve, given just one simple commandment; and yet, the very giving of it resulted in the same thing. Sin, seizing the opportunity, deceived them – yes the serpent helped – but ultimately it was Adam and Eve themselves, and through that one commandment they received the sentence of death. The letter kills, but the Spirit brings life.

I think, too, it is very telling that Paul calls it “the letter.” What was handed down in the desert was far more than 10 commandments. It was pages and pages of rules; rules for cleanliness, rules intended to cause separation between their people and the other peoples they would come in contact with; rules for ceremonial observances, rules for the priesthood, and much more. Many of these rules were there to help them to practice the first ten. And over time, by the time of Jesus, they had added countless rules on top of these rules, to help them keep the other rules. And the result was that one could spend all their time just focusing on the external rules, the ones other people could see, and forget about the internal ones. This is exactly what the Pharisees had been doing. Tithing your dill and cumin! Now understand, the rules were not bad; the people were. But the rules did not bring life; in fact, they could bring death through the fact that people could be lulled into thinking that they were keeping the all the commandments when in fact deep down they didn’t love God; deep down, they worshiped idols; deep down, they coveted, and so on.

And this goes on all the time today. And I’m not talking about Jews; I’m talking about people who call themselves Christian. If you don’t believe me, just come on campus or go to the mall and take an informal survey. Ask them if they are a Christian. Then ask them why God should let them in to heaven. Over and over people will say they are Christian, but then will explain that God should let them in to heaven because they are pretty good people; they haven’t killed anyone, or anything like that, and they are kind to their friends, or they work hard, or they are giving, or they pretty often go to church, or something like this. These people are living by the letter! It’s a new letter, not quite the same as the one the Pharisees used, more nebulous, but it is still based on following the law. Just like the Pharisees, they think they aren’t breaking the 10 commandments, when in fact, they are. Deep down, they don’t love God; deep down, they worship idols; deep down, they covet, and so on. And if they were to listen to the Sermon on the Mount, they would learn that they are murderers, and more. The letter kills, but the Spirit brings life.

Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of its glory, fading though it was, will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious? – 2 Corinthians 3:7-8

What is Paul talking about? He is referring to Exodus 34.

When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the Testimony in his hands, he was not aware that his face was radiant because he had spoken with the Lord. When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, his face was radiant, and they were afraid to come near him. But Moses called to them; so Aaron and all the leaders of the community came back to him, and he spoke to them. Afterward all the Israelites came near him, and he gave them all the commands the Lord had given him on Mount Sinai. – Exodus 34:29-32

Moses, even Moses, could not look at the Lord and live. God put him in the cleft of the rock, and revealed His glory only indirectly. But even so, being in the Lord’s presence, some of the Lord’s glory, manifested as light, transferred itself to Moses, so that his face shone. It says his face was radiant. This wasn’t just a bad sunburn! This was glowing, like the sun.

When Moses finished speaking to them, he put a veil over his face. But whenever he entered the Lord's presence to speak with Him, he removed the veil until he came out. And when he came out and told the Israelites what he had been commanded, they saw that his face was radiant. Then Moses would put the veil back over his face until he went in to speak with the Lord. – Exodus 34:33-35

Why did Moses put a veil over his face? I think in part because they feared him. But also, it was because his face was so radiant, so bright, that it hurt to look at him. It may have even blinded you to stare at him, like looking at the sun. And so Paul says, wow – look at how much glory came with Old Covenant! So much that we cannot even begin to imagine how much glory comes with the New!

If the ministry that condemns men is glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry that brings righteousness! For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory. And if what was fading away came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which lasts! – 2 Corinthians 3:9-11

It says in Exodus 34 that when he came out after being again and again in the Lord’s presence, his face was radiant again. This only makes sense if it implies that the radiance would eventually fade. In this case, maybe the sunburn analogy isn’t so bad! So it was a fading-away glory. But not so the New Covenant, the one written on our hearts, written with the Spirit. This one is living, and it lasts. It is eternal.

Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the radiance was fading away. But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. – 2 Corinthians 3:12-14

I can testify to this. I was raised Jewish. I knew the Bible stories, but they were veiled. I was veiled. My mind was dull. None of it made much sense. I questioned God’s goodness. I eventually questioned God’s existence. My family only kept parts of the law, the convenient parts, and said it was OK. I couldn’t see why. I couldn’t understand why they didn’t just restart the sacrifices. I couldn’t understand why they didn’t just rebuild the temple. Surely this was worth starting a war over! If ever there was a reason to start a war, this would be it! But my family, my friends, the leaders of our synagogue, everyone was just as veiled as I was.

Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. – 2 Corinthians 3:15-18

When Moses’ face was glowing, he was reflecting the Lord’s glory. But his reflection was, quite literally, only skin deep. And his was constantly fading. It was temporary. He had to keep coming back to the Lord to get another dose of glory. How like the Old Covenant! The sacrificial system was also in a sense only skin deep. You commit a sin, an animal is sacrificed. This was a skin-deep solution; a band-aid. It didn’t solve the real problem, that we are sinful; that is, we are full of sin. The sacrificial system didn’t do anything about our insides. It just revealed how rotten we were to the core. It condemned man, showing him just how dark and broken he is. Just like Moses’ face, the sacrificial system was a skin-deep solution, and it was a temporary solution. How long until you sin again? A day? An hour? A minute?

And we were slaves to our sin. Slaves. Sin was our master. It made us do what it wanted, and we could not resist it. But life in the Spirit, life in Christ, is something different entirely. This glory is totally different. It’s not our skin that glows, but our soul. It is our insides that are changing. And this isn’t something temporary, that fades, but something that is growing, strengthening, brightening. This glory is increasing, day by day, as we are being made more and more like Christ. And if you want at hint at what this glory looks like, consider the transfiguration. Recall that Jesus took Peter, John, and James with him up onto a mountain, similar to how God had Moses come up a mountain.

As He was praying, the appearance of His face changed, and His clothes became as bright as a flash of lightning. Two men, Moses and Elijah, appeared in glorious splendor, talking with Jesus. They spoke about His departure, which He was about to bring to fulfillment at Jerusalem. – Luke 9:29-30

Jesus too wore a veil so that we would not be afraid. Do you know that? But Jesus’ veil was not a piece of cloth; it was His body. Jesus did not reflect glory, like Moses. His glory was internal; and it wasn’t the reflection of God’s glory, but the real thing, the very glory of God, because He was God. God veiled in human flesh. And Jesus’ glory, unlike Moses’, never faded. Even at His “departure,” which is why He came to earth, His glory was manifest.

Do you understand that this is the glory that is what is being talked about when it says that we are being transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory? Our bodies too are veils, now, that is, if you are a Christian, one who has agreed with God about your sin, and put your faith in Christ to save you, promising that from now on, with His help, you will live for Him. Some of that spectacular glory is in us, growing, as the Spirit continues to convict us of sin, to draw us deeper into communion with Christ, to transform our lives. From time to time we should be able to see just a hint of that glory radiate even past our bodies, even through this veil. Listen again to the end of this passage:

Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. – 2 Corinthians 3:15-18

Paul told all this to the Corinthians, because those false teachers were trying to lull them into rejecting all this and turning back to the Law. Paul had to remind them how much greater the New Covenant is than the Old; how much greater the new glory than the Old; how much greater is eternal life, living by the Spirit, dependent on Christ, than living life under the Law, sentenced to death, dependent on self. And sometimes we need the reminder too. Even when battling temptation, when struggling with sin, live by faith. Depend on the Lord, on the Spirit, on the glory that is the very glory of God, growing within you. Fight not for the temple of Jerusalem (and I mean this both literally and figuratively), but the temple of your heart, and put Christ and His glory there.