Proclaiming the gospel- that is, sharing the gospel in the form of words and sentences- is the greatest means God has chosen to use to bring about change in a life, whether it be new birth, or growing to maturity. This proclamation needs to come from the midst of a community that is being transformed by the God of the gospel. Yet it is the proclamation that God has chosen to use to do the transforming.
Paul trusted that the gospel was powerful enough to transform. He explains this in 2 Corinthians three and four. Paul is had been having a hard time with the Corinthians, after planting the church false teachers had come in among the flock, and had been spreading rumors about Paul, trying to make him look bad. These teachers, bringing a false gospel, mocked Paul’s weak preaching, and his humble appearance. And now it seems they were telling the Corinthians that they need not worry about or listen to Paul. Who was he, after all? Why should he carry so much authority with them or anyone? Apparently these teachers came with recommendations from others. They were qualified- Paul, he was not. And Paul is shocked, and hurt, because it seems as though the Corinthians are buying it. Paul is thinking “don’t you guys know me? Don’t you remember me? Don’t you remember what happened when I came to you?”
And so Paul says to them “All the evidence that you need is the changes that came about in your lives when I came and ministered to you.”
3 Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, as some do, letters of recommendation to you, or from you? 2 You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all. 3 And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered 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.
And then He quickly points out that these changes did not come about because he is so powerful or wonderful, but because the message he brought is so powerful and wonderful.
4 Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. 5 Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, 6 who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant,
And then he lays out just how powerful this new covenant, this gospel message, is. He does that by drawing a comparison. It is as if he is saying to them “don’t you realize the power of this message? Don’t you see that this new covenant that you heard about from me is all that you need, that anything else is false? Whatever these new guys are bringing to you, don’t listen, because it won’t do what the new covenant does and did in you.”
This is what I think we need to hear and consider. Before we run to anything else to experience change, let’s hear why Paul thinks that the gospel message is a message of transforming power.
What Paul does is this: He compares two things- the old covenant, and the new.
There was an old covenant before this new one. There was an old way. The old way is a way of death. It was a ministry of death, and condemnation. It was the law, given to Moses. This old way does not bring change. It can’t. It only brings death to us. God, in His mercy, did reveal himself to us, He told us what He requires in order for us to be at peace with God, in order for us to enter into His presence, and the demands are staggering. They are contained in the law of Moses, and when we are faced with them they reveal our absolute poverty.
Think about where you stand before God by the law. The law gives you this code to live by and you fail at every point. You sin. And it is not just that you sin, it is not just that you do wrong things, but the law reveals that we are sinners. That is, we are not just people who do wrong things, we are wrong people. We do not just do evil, we are evil. Just let that sit in your head for a moment. We are evil, we are outcasts and criminals in the universe. Your very nature is corrupt. And nothing you can do can fix it. You do not have the ability to change it, and you do not have the means to pay the penalty for it. And if you doubt or question the depth of your evil, if you find that you are struggling to really understand how horrible what you have done is- just stop and think about it. God, in his wisdom, is the best judge of all things. God could tell us, he could judge for us, how bad sin is. Maybe we are not good at it, maybe we have a hard time understanding the depth of it, but God knows. He could tell us. He can weigh things rightly.
And what happens if we go to God and say “help me understand the weight of sin. Help me understand how evil I am and how bad what I do is”? What happens is he takes one, just one sin, and he says “look at this. This sin, this one small sin in your eyes, do you know what the weight of it is? One sin weighs the same as a forever, an eternal existence in fire, pain, torture, cut off from every good thing, from ever hope. Not just for one person, but for countless millions.” Now, if we think God knows what he is talking about, then thinking of sin that way, that is eye opening.
And that knowledge of sin, that understanding of death and condemnation came through the old way, the law. This law, this old way, it brings death. Paul calls it a ministry of death. A ministry of condemnation. The covenant that was fading away.
And here is what he says- that old way, when it was given, came with a glory that was beyond what you can imagine. Think about how the old covenant came. Imagine the Israelites at the foot of Mt. Sinai, ready to receive the old covenant- and here is how it came to them: God Himself descended upon the mountain, in a thick smoke and fire. Incredible lightning and thunder came forth, the whole mountain is covered in smoke, and a very loud trumpet blast comes from the mountain, so that the people tremble (ex 19:16.) The Lord continues to descend on the mountain, and as he does the smoke goes up from it like from a kiln, the bible says, and the whole mountain trembled “greatly”. Then the sound of the trumpet grows louder and louder and louder, and there Moses standing at the foot of the mountain bathed in the glow of the fire of God, speaks to God, and God answers with thunder. Then Moses would go speak with God on the mountain, and when he came back, his face would glow. What a picture of power, what a picture of awe inspiring majesty that would have made any of us here tremble and fall on our faces as though dead.
And Paul says that that was the ministry of death- and so what will the ministry of life look like when it comes? Paul says that whatever he is dealing with now, this new covenant, it makes all that look like no glory at all.
10 Indeed, in this case, what once had glory has come to have no glory at all, because of the glory that surpasses it. 2 Co 3:10
That is the power that Paul sees in the New Covenant. That is the incredible power that comes in the gospel.
Do you see it as that? Do you really think that the message that is in the gospel is more powerful than quaking mountains and the fiery presence of God? It is! More than we can imagine!
Yet there was something not right with that glory. The glory that Moses experienced, and took to the people, it was fading. It wasn’t a lasting glory. And so we are told by Paul that he wore a veil so that the people would not see it fade. But Paul says that there is a problem- this veil, it is still there. But it has moved. It is no longer covering Moses’ face, it is covering the glory. But the problem is that the glory it covers has changed. You see, they still think it’s all the same stuff that Moses brought, and so the veil remains. They still think it’s the old way, the law. So the veil remains, only now it is on their hearts.
The glory is hidden- with Moses the veil hid the fading glory, and the veil still hides glory, but not fading glory- an eternal glory. And not just for them, but for you and me too.
This is what we are told in chapter four. Paul goes on to explain -
3 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled only to those who are perishing. 4 In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
There is still a veil, it exists in every unbelievers mind, and it is a veil that the enemy longs to keep in place, because it covers something. It covers a glory- the glory of Christ, the glory that is seen in the gospel.
What does that mean?
“…the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ…”
Why such wording? The light-that is, the truth- of what? Of the gospel, that is, the good news. The truth of the good news- of what? What good news? This is interesting- we see this same word come up again- the good news of the “glory”, the glory of Christ. What does that mean? It means that Paul thinks that the glory of Christ, it is good news. What is the glory? We saw the glory of the Old Covenant- the power with which it came, the awe and beauty, though fading, that accompanied it. And here we have Paul telling us that the gospel is the good news of Christ’s glory. His “set apartness”- his difference from us in his perfections- His perfections, on display. That is to say, His beauty.
Listen, that glory that Moses’ face had, it faded. When you looked at it, it did not last. But when you look at Jesus’ face, you see a glory that does not fade- you see a beauty that is the beauty of God Himself-
6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
And that is what the enemy wants to keep a veil on. Because to see it transforms. All I am saying is is that the Cross is the perfect lens through which to see the glory of God, that the truth of the Cross makes God look really attractive- beautiful- so much so, that if it is really seen, it makes you want him, to makes you want to be at peace with him, and it makes you want to not transgress his ways, and it makes you see him as all satisfying. In other words, it makes you love Him. So the cross is the means to peace with God, but also what makes us want peace with him to begin with. It transforms- it changes our wants. We want Him now, we want to please Him, we love Him. He who is forgiven much loves much- and when we see that forgiveness, and how glorious he is, we love Him. It is the means, and the source of the desire both.
This is what it is like: Imagine three criminals. One is a petty thief, a pick pocket. And he gets caught. And when he gets caught, he realizes that there is a punishment for what he has done, and he does not want to go to jail and suffer, so he “repents.” His repentance is not real- he has not really understood what he did wrong, he just doesn’t want to suffer.
The second criminal is a businessman, who embezzles money from his company. His white collar crime shames him when he is caught, and he repents. His repentance is not real, because he is only sorry that he now looks bad in front of his co-workers and family. He does not understand how what he did is wrong.
You see, I wonder if we understand why sin is sin, and why what we do is so wrong.
And that takes me to the third criminal. He is a graffiti artist. And one night he breaks into a famous art museum and finds the most loved work he can find, and paints big black stripes all across it. Now, the next day he goes back to the museum when it opens, to admire his handy work. And the press is there, and a crowd is gathered around the painting. And he stand there smirking, looking at what he has done… and as he stands there he look through his graffiti, to the painting underneath, and sees the real beauty of it, and he weeps. He weeps that he has defaced something so incredibly beautiful. He has repented. And he need not anyone to tell him to not do it again. The thought of doing it again is sick to him. He hates what he did. He sees the beauty he has defaced.
Do you see? The Cross makes us face the beauty we have defaced- the beauty of a God who loves us while we hate Him. And this beauty wins our hearts. And this message is also about the way God has made, through His Son, to restore our relationship with Him.
Let’s not become so much about the message that we forget who It’s about- Him. But that is why the message is so powerful- it is the clearest lens through which to see Him in this place of rare glimpses. “Show us your glory!” We cry- and He says “look at my Cross.”
16 But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. 17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18 And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.
And your version may read “reflecting” not “beholding”, but either way, the point is that there is some interaction with this glorious New Covenant, this thing of great power that brings about change, and in chapter four we know more specifically that the enemy is trying to prevent the glory from being seen.
So, Paul believed that seeing glory is transforming. And he believed it was the glory of God that must be seen, and he believed it was seen in the gospel. The gospel is the power of God for salvation for all who believe-
16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.” Ro 1:16-17
Often times this idea is looked upon skeptically. Haven’t we all heard many sermons and read many books only to see no change at all? Our experience tells us that there are more effective means to produce change in someone’s life. But we must consider two important questions-
1- Shall we be guided by experience or by the Word?
We should be so committed to the Word that even if we did all it said and saw no change, we would not give up on God’s methods and trade them in for our own.
Yet some would argue that the Bible does teach other methods. Didn’t Paul share his life with those he ministered to? (1 Thess 2:8.) He says, in fact, he shared “not only the gospel”, so doesn’t that show us that the gospel alone is not what is needed?
This is certainly not Paul’s point in this passage. He is not trying to demonstrate that the gospel alone does not change us. He is not saying “in all the other cases where I shared the gospel only, those poor souls were doomed to never see change.” He is also not saying “I have always shared my own self in this same way with all I have ministered to.” What Paul is explaining is the special relationship he has with the believers at Thessalonica, a relationship all ministers should have with those they disciple! But to suggest from this text we learn that unless we are sharing our lives with each person we share the gospel with we will see no change is going beyond the text. We can, and many have, seen great growth in themselves through those who they have never even met, through the teachings of those long dead whose witness goes forth in books and writings, for instance. Of course, a believer will needs to have those in his life that are sharing themselves with him, there must be real, personal discipling going on! And the gospel being proclaimed from a community of believers who are being transformed is our goal! But that is not the “missing ingredient” that is needed to make God’s word work. His word works through the Holy Spirit, as His gospel is preached. Our experience may be that hearing someone preach brings no change to us or others. If that is the case, let us suspect the preaching before we suspect the Word. Perhaps we have not heard real preaching enough? Perhaps we have a famine of real preaching in our day, where God and His glory are not upheld as transformative, awesome, or beautiful. If preachers do not think that we are transformed by a vision of glory, they will not share anything that highlights that glory, and so sermons will be ineffective. We can not look at such sermons and then conclude that preaching that exalts the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ and puts that glory on display through the gospel is ineffective, and is in need of some help to bring about real change.
2- We also have to ask, “What kind of change are we encountering through these other methods?” It maybe that we are producing change, but not the kind of change that God wants or requires. People do change for many reasons. Have you ever wondered about the success rate of secular organizations when it comes to helping unbelievers avoid certain sins? We can not deny that many secular specialists have helped countless people overcome depression, eating disorders, addictions, etc. And we can not deny that there are things that take place in people’s lives that bring change other than hearing the gospel proclaimed. Near death experiences, a tragedy, even things like meeting a certain famous person, can bring about life long changes in unbelievers. People do change for many reasons, but we must understand that none of these changes are the types of changes that God is looking for, they are not new birth, they are not real Christ conformity. That kind of change comes about through seeing glory.
The point is not that we are to simply speak words, indifferently, to lost people. This is not what Paul did. We need to be a community who together loves and proclaims Christ, and shows Christ by suffering and doing hard things for one another and the lost. Yet, we can not forget that God has chosen what seems to be a foolish method of bringing about transformation- a simple message proclaimed! Do we believe this?
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