Paul’s most personal letter is in the midst of a teaching digression here, and really from 2:14 all the way until 7:5. He is exalting God by upholding the sincerity of his New Covenant gospel ministry, while at the same time refuting the ministries of all those who oppose him. Let’s take a look.
1) V1-6 – 1Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, like some people, letters of recommendation to you or from you? 2You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody. 3You 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. 4Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. 5Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God. 6He 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.
Paul begins here with a couple rhetorical questions. The answers to both are unequivocally “No.” Perhaps some of the false teachers accused Paul of boasting, especially after his words in 2:14-17. Sam Storms says, “The ‘many’ who peddled the Word of God (2:17) are the ‘some’ who promoted themselves (3:1) and gained a foothold in Corinth on the strength of letters of commendation. Paul does not deny the validity of using such letters in certain circumstances, but insists that [,having been with them for 18 months,] he does not need them when it comes to his relationship with the Corinthians.” He doesn’t boast except in the Lord. He’s gone over that, and he’ll go into it in much more detail (not as a self-exalting tirade, but as an unbiased testimony out of necessity for furthering Christ’s Kingdom) in chapters 11-12.
Instead of written commendation from Paul or for Paul, the Corinthians are his living letter (1 Corinthians 9:2), a work of God’s grace through his ministry. This is a brilliant remark, not only to one-up his opponents, but also to reveal the truth of God’s sovereignty over His people in conforming them to the image of His Son and the unity they share as the Body of Christ! By claiming the Corinthians as his letter and “a letter from Christ” (v2-3), “known and read by everybody” (acknowledged), Paul is showing that God fulfilled Old Testament prophecy by writing His truth on their hearts (Jeremiah 31:31-33; Ezekiel 11:19; 36:26-27) and thereby using them as ministry tools. It’s better than having the tablets of stone containing the Ten Commandments! It’s the idea of seeing a sermon rather than merely hearing one. Sam Storms offers an excellent explanation of the various views of the New Covenant here: http://www.enjoyinggodministries.com/article/31-18.
From v14 of chapter 2 all the way through 2 Corinthians 6:13, we have Paul’s explanation of true gospel ministry. After the introduction (2:14-3:3), there are essentially three components: promoting a glorious New Covenant (3:4-4:6); trusting God in the midst of trouble (4:7-5:10); and speaking the message of reconciliation (5:11-6:13). He’ll shoot down the false teachers signs of eloquence, deep philosophical thinking, and worldly standards of excellence, for they do not make a gospel ministry valid.
We see first in v4 that Paul’s confidence comes through Christ. In 2:16, he asked, “Who is sufficient?” The theme of this book, as is the case with Hebrews, might be the sufficiency of Jesus Christ. V5 reveals, not Paul as sufficient, but God’s work in Paul as sufficient. Paul would claim nothing of his own doing, for he knows everything he thinks, does, or says is wrought by God (1 Corinthians 15:10). It’s not only that he, along with every other man, is insufficient, but that we are all incompetent, unfit for any good thing apart from the power of Christ in us (v6). And v6 displays the glory of the New Covenant: our legal standing with God comes through faith (by the Spirit, not by the Law)! The Law, apart from the gospel, condemns and gives no power for life, while the Holy Spirit is the power for life through the gospel.
2) V7-11 – 7Now 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, 8will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious? 9If the ministry that condemns men is glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry that brings righteousness! 10For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory. 11And if what was fading away came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which lasts!
When Paul speaks of “the ministry that brought death,” he’s thinking of the Old Testament Law for those who are disobedient (everyone). It was still glorious, as seen in “the face of Moses,” but there’s no comparison to the glory of “the ministry of the Spirit.” Calvin says, “As the moon and stars, though in themselves they are not merely luminous, but diffuse their light over the whole earth, do, nevertheless, disappear before the brightness of the sun; so, however glorious the law was in itself, it has, nevertheless, no glory in comparison with the excellence of the gospel.”
Paul makes the contrast clear: the ministry of death (unbelief and disobedience to the Law) is condemnation, while the ministry of righteousness (belief in obedience to the Spirit) is permanent glory. He’s portraying the truth that justification leads to sanctification, and sanctification leads to glorification. Let’s make sure we realize that Paul is not claiming that Moses and the Law are bad, like the false teachers in Corinth, and that he and his gospel ministry are good. No. Paul would side with Moses and the Law much more faithfully than any Judaizer would. He’s simply saying that he is better off than Moses, for he is on the other side of Christ! He sees that which Moses only hoped for. He sees Christ to whom the Law pointed. And just as the Jews failed to listen to Moses (and the Prophets), so unbelievers fail to see Christ pointed to in and as the fulfillment of the Law. They are blind; Paul will elaborate in chapter 4.
3) V12-18 – 12Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. 13We 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. 14But 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. 15Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. 16But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect [or contemplate] the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
The Reformation Study Bible offers this footnote for v12: “The splendor of the New Covenant, which will not fade or pass away, provides hope and fuels boldness.” Paul’s boldness is evident throughout the letter, a more-than-adequate refutation of his enemies’ claims that he vacillated. He preached the gospel with an unveiled face; the glory of God was evident in the fruits of his ministry – namely, believers! But Moses veiled his face. Why? There is some disagreement among scholars.
Some say that those who heard Moses did not believe, and were therefore unworthy to cast their eyes on God’s radiance; thus, Moses veiled his face. Robert Rayburn says, “What Moses did in covering his face, which we can figure out simply from the narrative of Exodus itself, was to rebuke and reproach the people for their lack of faith. They had no right to the privilege of gazing on the glory of God because they were unbelievers. It was an enacted judgment upon the people when Moses covered his face. You know Romans 3:23: ‘for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.’ The NEB, the New English Bible, interestingly, renders that text: ‘for all have sinned and have been deprived of the divine splendor.’ That’s what Moses was doing. He was depriving the people of Israel from the glory of God. He was acting out how their faithlessness would eventually deprive them of God’s glory. On account of their unbelief, they had no right to it.” That generation was unsaved; but the generation to which Paul preaches is a saved generation. Daniel DeFoe, author of Robinson Crusoe, wrote this short poem speaking of the English Church in his day: “Wherever God erects a house of prayer, the Devil always builds a chapel there, and ‘twill be found upon examination, the latter has the largest congregation.” But it was not so in Corinth. Rayburn says, “It was Paul’s great relief and happiness to know that from Titus.”
Others side with my footnote from v13, which declares, “Some think that Moses’ veil was to protect the Israelites from being harmed or frightened by the brightness. More likely, the veil was to keep them from seeing that the glory was fading away because of the temporary and inadequate character of the Old Covenant (Exodus 34:29-35). By contrast, Paul needs no veil, for the glory of the New Covenant ministry does not fade away.” Sam Storms quotes Barnett, saying, “Paul is pointing to ‘the veil on Moses’ face as masking an already-being-abolished glory, whose function was to point forward to the greater and permanent glory of the new covenant (v4-13)’ (Barnett, 192).”
Calvin’s commentary here is interesting. He says “As…the law was rendered glorious by the luster of Moses’ countenance, so now the veil was an emblem of the blindness that was to come upon the people of Israel, for the person of Moses represents the law… The Jews, therefore, acknowledged by this, that they had not eyes to behold the law, except when veiled. This veil is not taken away, except by Christ [v14]. From this [Paul] concludes, that none are susceptible of a right apprehension, but those who direct their minds to Christ.”
Our hope and boldness (confidence, unashamedness – v12) and freedom (v17) are found in believing the simplicity of the gospel message, whereas to the contrary, confusion and/or bondage (“their minds were made dull” – v14) and guilt, fear, and/or apathy (“a veil covers their hearts” – v15) result from self-inflicted bondage to unbelief, claiming the obscurity of the Law. Here’s one more footnote quote on v14-15: “Even today, Paul says, many Jews can’t see that the Mosaic Covenant is temporary, and its glory fades. The metaphor shifts somewhat (in v15) as it often does in Paul’s writings. The veil is now not on Moses’ face, but on their hearts. The effect is the same – they can’t see that the Old Covenant fades.” And this is no fault of Moses, for he did what was asked of him. The people are to blame for “their minds were made dull” (v14). “Only in Christ” (v14) can we be healed (Romans 10:4; 11:7-10, 20-27).
In v16-17, we learn that the Spirit removes the veil “whenever anyone turns to the Lord.” Freedom results from an unveiled face. Storms turns to another theologian, saying, “Gordon Fee suggests that the ‘Lord’ in v16 to whom a person now ‘turns’ in faith is the Spirit, i.e., the energizing power of the New Covenant. Therefore, when Paul comes to v17 he is simply making this identification explicit: ‘Now, the Lord that I just mentioned in v16, the one to whom a person turns in faith, is none other than the Spirit Himself’ (v17a).” Finally, in v18, Paul says, “We…all reflect the Lord’s glory.” All Christians contemplate, or experience, this unveiling freedom, a glory that is guaranteed to permanently transform (a New Covenant experience) us into an increasingly Christ-likeness (“ever-increasing glory” or “from one degree of glory to another”). Storms concludes, “Beholding is a way of becoming. That is to say, you become like that which you behold! We will take on the characteristics, values, and qualities of that which we most cherish and to which we devote our hearts and minds.”
The lyrics to “You Are Near,” by Hillsong United, comes from this passage: “In awe of You we worship and stand amazed at Your great love. We’re changed from glory to glory; we set our hearts on You our God. Now Your presence fills this place; be exalted in our praise! As we worship I believe You are near. Blessing and honor and glory and power, forever, forever.” Amen.