Revering the Word
2 Corinthians 3 The veil has been removed.
Good morning, everyone. This morning we are in 2 Corinthians chapter 3. In 2 Corinthians chapter 2, the last verse says, we are not, for we are not like many, peddling the word of God, but as from sincerity, but as from God, we speak in Christ in the sight of God. You might recall that Paul was being challenged by false teachers who were trying to undermine Paul's ministry and Paul's authenticity, and he had done a great work in the city of Corinth and in the church there, but these false teachers and people making accusations against Paul were trying to turn people away from him. And here's what he says in the beginning of chapter 3, kind of continuing that topic from verse 17 of chapter 2, are we beginning to commend ourselves again, or do we need, as some, letters of commendation to you or from you? So back in the day when they would go to a city to teach, sometimes they would bring letters of commendation in order to legitimize who they were in their ministry. You might recall an example of this actually on the other side of the coin was Saul, this same person Paul who was writing here, when he was trying to arrest Christians, and when he was there, given the approval of the martyrdom of Stephen, he had letters of permission to arrest Christians at that time, so that when he was, you know, persecuting the Christian church before he became a believer, you know, he had a letter of permission to do that, so that was just something that was done in that day. But in verse 2, Paul says, "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 the tablets of human hearts." Paul is saying really the best letter of recommendation we have is the fact that through the gospel message that we brought to you, you guys have become children of God, you are now no longer under the law, but you now have the spirit of the living God in you, and our letter is written on, not on tablets of stone, like in the Old Testament, but on the tablet of the human heart, because now through faith Jesus Christ is living inside of you, we don't need any further letter of recommendation than that, and the fact that your lies have been changed through our ministry. That's what the apostle Paul is saying. Verse 4, "Such confidence we have through Christ toward God, not that we are adequate in ourselves," and he's saying, you know what? I have confidence in God in what we're doing. I know that the Lord has called me to ministry. I know that the Lord is using me to help your church, to help people like you come to faith. I've got confidence in Christ, in God, that He's using us in that way, but in a humble way, not that we are adequate in ourselves. I mean, Paul was persecuting the church. She wasn't a believer until Jesus Christ met him on the road to Damascus and said, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?" And set him up to meet at an IS in Damascus and have his eyes be opened and scales fall off his eyes. And finally, he was able to see Jesus for who he was and God literally transformed his life. So he's not saying this in pride. He's not trying to say, "I have this confidence in myself, but it's the fact that what you've done in me, God, that's where my confidence is, my adequacy is in you." 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. Now, he's beginning to really delve into another topic here, and he's talking about the Old Testament and the law of the Old Testament, and now he is saying that he is a servant or a minister of the new covenant. One of the main covenants of the Bible that lasted for many, many years was that of the Mosaic covenant, the Old Covenant, which was the law. In that, if Israel was obedient, they were going to be blessed, but if they were disobedient, they were going to be cursed. Unfortunately, God's people were not really true to that covenant. They broke that covenant, and really they were under the curse of the law. Now, Jews were seeking to still live under that covenant because that was the season of history that God had them in. Not only did they have the Old Covenant, but then they added to it, and they made laws upon laws and rules upon rules. They had some 128 pages of writing at one point in Jewish history to say what it meant to honor God and the Sabbath. God did not authorize or have all of that. That was something they added. Essentially, it became something that killed. It became something that left them wanting, left them feeling like we can't measure up. That's what Paul is saying here, is that when we were under that law, it killed us. We just couldn't live to it, but the Spirit gives new life. That's part of the new covenant. You might recall that many years into the Old Covenant, a prophet came along, his name was Jeremiah, and about halfway through the years of that covenant, which, gosh, how long would that covenant was in place? It was in place. I'm just going to throw out a number right now, maybe like 1200 years, that that covenant was in place, the Mosaic one. About 500 years into it, around 700 BC-ish, Jeremiah said, one day there's going to be a new covenant. It's not going to be like the one that you broke when my father's brought you out of Egypt. It's going to be written on the heart. I will remember your sins no more. It's going to be an amazing covenant. That covenant came into place through Jesus Christ, 700 years after Jeremiah predicted it, Jesus ushered it in. He began to really usher it in at the Last Supper. He said, "This is the new covenant in my blood." Then when he died on that cross, he shed the blood to inaugurate a new covenant, that new covenant really came into full fruition on Pentecost, then when his Holy Spirit came, and that's what Paul is really saying here. He said, "Who made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter, not of the law, not of the Mosaic law, but of the spirit for the letter kills, but the spirit gives life." Ever since Pentecost now, people who believe in Jesus have the spirit written on the human heart, and we have his help and his aid to live this Christian life, and we're not under the law anymore. Verse 7, "But if the ministry of death," and he's really referring to, he is sharing a derogatory term now to live still under the old covenant when we now have a new covenant to live for, it's death. We no longer live under the old covenant. We are under a new one now through faith in Jesus Christ, and praise God for the grace we receive in this covenant. But if the ministry of death, the old covenant in letters engraved on stones, remember they wrote the Ten Commandments on stones, that's what he's referring to, came with glory, and it did come with glory. The Old Testament law ended up becoming a curse, but when they first received it, it was glorious because God was giving them God's instruction for the very first time. They were learning on written stone, and through the mosaic books of the Bible, they were learning what it meant to follow God, and what a blessing it was to learn that, but it ended up becoming a curse for them because they couldn't follow it, or they didn't follow it. But it did come with glory. I mean, it was glorious that God revealed himself to them through the Old Testament law. And when it was revealed in glory, listen to what it says, 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. Now, what that's referring to is in the Old Testament when after actually the golden calf incident, which was a terrible incident in the story of God's people, where they began worshiping a golden calf when Moses went away for a while, but Moses went up on the mountain again. He got new tablets. He came down from the mountain, and when they saw Moses, his face was shining because of the fact that he had spent time with God. And as a result of partially anyways, the golden calf incident, and just they had a fear of God back then. It's something that we've kind of lost today because God was powerful, and sometimes he dished out his punishment that they could see. One day he's going to come back, and there's going to be judgment on this world for those who've rejected him. And we are supposed to have a proper fear of respect of God. And they did in that day because they saw the things that God had done. Well, anyways, when Moses came off the mountain, his face shone. And it was so unusual to them. They actually were afraid of it. They were afraid of how his face just looked so different from everyone else's. So then when he spent time with them, the people of Israel, he would put a veil over his face because they couldn't, they were afraid to see it. And then when he would go and visit with God on top of the mountain, he would take the veil away, and then go back to deal with Israel again, and he put a veil over his face. And that's talked about in the Old Testament. And here's what he's saying here, 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? And it is, the New Testament is filled with even more glory and greater glory, especially because that's the covenant that's in place now, the new covenant. For if the ministry of condemnation has glory, and he's really referring to the condemnation that is of the old covenant because they were under the curse of the law, because they didn't live to it, much more does the ministry of righteousness abound in glory, because now through faith in Jesus, we've received righteousness right standing with God. What a glorious thing that is, and it does abound in glory. For indeed, what had glory in this case has no glory because of the glory that surpasses it. What he's saying is, yes, the Old Testament at first was glorious, but no longer is it that way, because now we have a new covenant of grace through faith in Jesus, we've received righteousness right standing with God through faith in Jesus. The glory of this new covenant is so much greater, it surpasses whatever glory the previous covenant had. For if that which fades away was with glory much more that which remains is in glory. And the Old Testament has faded away, not the Old Testament, the Old Covenant has faded away. We still need to learn and know, because that's the foundation of the Bible, and it helps us to understand the new. How would we understand what's new if we didn't understand what was old? But much more that which remains, that is the new covenant that we live in now is in glory. Hallelujah. Therefore, having such a hope, the hope of eternal life, the hope of forgiveness of sins that's promised us through this new covenant, we use great boldness in our speech and are not like 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. 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 with Christ. So think about that. They couldn't see, they didn't want to see Moses's face, they were afraid. It was almost like Moses's face was a revelation of who God was because he received this shining light on his face from being in the presence of God. And for whatever reason, Israel was like, oh, we can't see his face, like it scares us to see the glory of God. And when it's like that today, if you were stuck under the Old Testament, and this is where the Jewish people are who have not accepted Jesus Christ, it's as though they're still looking through a veil. They can't see God clearly because God now has revealed himself, he's shown brightly through his son, he brought his son to earth to live on earth for 33 years and to reveal to us who God was. And now those of us who have believed in him have his Holy Spirit actually living inside of us, Hallelujah. It's a new season, a new dispensation, a new covenant, a new age, and it's glorious. And if you still are stuck under the Old Testament and you haven't received the new and you haven't received the Spirit, it says, though you're seeing God through a veil, you're not seeing him clearly. And through Jesus Christ, that veil is removed, and now we get to see God clearly, Hallelujah. But to this day, whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their heart. But whenever a person turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away, Hallelujah. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty, there is freedom. Now, what's really interesting is that a lot of people, you know, uneducated in the Word of God will use that as a license to be like, well, you know, I'm free to, I don't know, live in center, I'm free to do anything that I want because of the grace of God. And that's not what this is about, what this is saying is, you're free from the bondage that the Old Testament put you under in trying to live to the law, but you couldn't obtain to it. So therefore, you were living under the curse of the law because we just couldn't live to all the laws of the Old Testament or didn't. And in Jesus Christ now through the Spirit, we've been set free from the bondage of the law. We've been set free from the old way. And now we serve God in a new way through the Spirit. But it's not as though obedience is not important. It's just now it's obedience to Jesus through the New Testament lens of understanding the Bible through what we learn in the New Testament and how to rightly divide the Old Testament through the lens of the new. And that's where we are today. But there's liberty, there's freedom from the bondage of trying to live up to the law and praise God that we don't have 128 pages of what to do and not to do on a Sabbath anymore. So there is there is a freedom of of not having to live to that Old Testament, Hallelujah, that Old Testament law. Let's put it that way. But we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord. See now, you know, Moses got to see the Lord and it's as though now that the veil is removed, we can see the Lord more clearly now. And as a result of beholding him in a mirror, the glory of the Lord, we are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory just as from the Lord, the Spirit. And that's really a powerful word. You know, one of the things that, you know, I've taught for years and years is that the very first command that God gave man is a very important one. He said, I've created you in my image and likeness and the image of God. I have created you be fruitful and multiply. God has God created mankind to be a reflection of who he is. And now through Jesus, when we behold him directly with unveiled face, because he is revealed who God is through Jesus Christ, we are being transformed by the Spirit into the same image from glory to glory. God is basically now through this new covenant through Jesus Christ, through the Spirit that living inside of us to help us. He's beginning to transform us into a greater reflection of who he is. And that's really our goal. We want to take on more of the character of who God is, more of his fruit, more of his light. And we are through the Spirit not being conformed to this world, but being transformed by the renewing of our mind to take on a greater reflection of God's image. That's not to say that, you know, we want to say, oh, I'm like God in a prideful sense, but no, what we do is we say Jesus revealed to us who God was. He revealed to us God's character qualities through Christ. And now we're trying to resemble that we're trying to take on his love, his joy, his truth, his peace, his kindness, all of these things that God has revealed to us. And he's given us the spirit to do at Hallelujah. Let's continue to be on this journey together of, you know, growing to be more the process of sanctification, becoming more holy, becoming more like our Lord. That should be something that we're seeking to do, not to earn our way to heaven, but to thank God for the heaven that he's already promised us. Hallelujah. God bless you all. You