2-Cor. 3:12-16 The life and ministry of Christ is the revealing of the glory...
2 Cor: 3:12-16 · Mike Doyle · Jan 16, 2022
Letters to the Corinthians, No. 91
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/49261925387958

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Morning. You know, I had them read all those verses because they kind of slide together. And when we get to verse 12, one of my favorite questions in teaching the Bible is whenever you see the word therefore, I love to ask, well, what's therefore therefore? Why is it there?

So to start with today, read a quote from William Kelly. Christianity is no system of restraint on evil in the first man, with laws suited to the flesh and the world and God afar off in the dark, but founded on the grace of Christ, who after establishing righteousness by the cross, is gone up into heavenly glory and is ministered by the Holy Spirit in power. I think that's really a good quote because just in a few words, describes the difference between a law-based system and a grace-based system.

So, verse 12, therefore, having such a hope, we use great boldness in our speech. So the question is, what's the therefore, therefore? If you back up a few verses, he will say, for indeed what had glory, which was the law, in this case has no glory because of the glory that surpasses it, the Lord Jesus Christ. For if that which fades away was with glory, much more that which remains is in glory.

So he's drawing a conclusion based on those two verses. Fades away is an interesting word. We talked about it last week. It's that word ketergeho, which we see in a lot of different places. We see it and it has to do with Roman six identification truths.

What I put down today is in Hebrews 2.14, It said, Christ became a man that he might destroy or render powerless. That word destroy or render powerless is the word katogeho. Hal Malloy's favorite saying was to take it offline or to put it out of business. In other words, to stop it from functioning. The law system, and the glory that it had has been done away. It's been annulled, it's been taken offline, it's taken out of the building, we don't use it anymore.

Whereas the glory introduced by Christ abides and stays now forever. There's been introduced by the Lord Jesus that which remains for eternity, it won't ever be taken away. And the glory of that is so surpassing that it completely eclipses any glory that once existed in the connection with the law, as verse 10 points out. So because of that, Paul says we have such a hope. Why do we have such a hope?

Well, if you take a look at Vine's expository dictionary, he translates this as favorable or confident expectation. It has to do with unseen things in the future. It describes a happy anticipation of something really good. In Titus 1-2, it says that in the hope of eternal life, which God who cannot lie promised long ages ago, that is a good deal. That is a good hope. the object upon which the hope is fixed, like in 1 Timothy 1, where Paul says, Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, according to the commandment of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus, who is our hope?

So it's a very positive thing when he says we have such hope. Boy, it's really a good thing. The interlinear kind of interesting here says, having therefore such hope, comma, with much boldness we act. So it fits the grace paradigm that we do things out of grace because it's so incredibly wonderful. So this is the wonderful character then of the ministry with which Paul the apostle had. and was entrusted to him by the Lord himself personally. The character of it influenced how he presented the gospel. So he speaks here of having not just hope, but such a hope.

It's special. Verse 12 says, therefore, having such a hope, we are great boldness in our speech. There's no reserve now in connection with Let me back up. There was a reserve in connection with the law. They're careful to present it. For men couldn't stand it, especially in the presence of Moses's face and the glory that was on his face.

Having hope, he was able to confront men with great plainness of speech. He was really bold about the gospel. And also with great openness and with absence of reserve. So the unseen, the future, the everlasting come together on the believer now having such a hope we can be thoroughly outspoken about it. I think when you grasp a hold of the salvation message and what it really means, there's an incredible hope there because you recognize, wow, this news from God about salvation is so incredible. I need to speak it boldly, not to be timid about it. It creates the greatest motive for openness in every way in contrast with kind of a vagueness or a distance or a reserve that the law would lay down.

Not only did God and Christ come down to man, but now man's evil has been judicially and conclusively dealt with in the cross. man can now go up. Even has already sat down at the right hand of God in the person of his savior and the head of the body. We're positioned in Christ now. We have a right to be there. It's not a strange place for us. That's our home. By Christ accomplishing redemption, he closed out the ministry of death, which was the law system. And he opened up the way and became the basis of the ministry of the spirit so that we could all abide in glory.

And the next verse contrasts. It says, and not like Moses, who used to put a veil over his face so that the sons of Israel would not look contently or stare at him, at the end of what was fading away has been established. The previous state of concealment which men had such reason to dread, being in the sight of glory according to the law, it presented in Moses putting a veil on his face when he spoke with the children of Israel outside, whereas he has invariably put it off whenever he went in to talk to Jehovah. You know, we live in an environment today where we live in grace and we desire to behold the glory of the Lord. You can imagine Moses coming down from the mountain and talking to the Jews and they see this glory in it, they shy away from it. They don't want to be near it because it convicts them.

So why did Moses put this veil on his face? It's interesting when you do a little homework, Different people have different opinions. Perhaps Paul meant that the consequences of Moses putting the veil over his face was that the Israelites could not see the fading of his glory. That's what Constable says. Moses removed the veil when he spoke with the people in Exodus 34, 33, and when he spoke to God in the tabernacle. He wore it at other times, evidently, to teach the Israelites their unworthiness to behold God's glory. Well, there's another motivation.

Moses also put the veil over his face so the departure of the fading glory, that which he received, would not discourage the Israelites. Okay. What's interesting is, is in the Old Testament, it never does say why. he had the veil on or why he took it off. But it implies that Moses covered his face so the Israelites would not see the glory that was there. So was it to keep them from seeing that the glory was fading? That it would be, it just would not last?

William Kelly attacks this interestingly, he says, Having the veil on his face, and this is implied in our version, quote, till Moses had done speaking with them, he put the veil on his face. But the difference, it's a different account, he spoke to them without the veil with his face shining and glorified. So some people think, well, he spoke to the Jews with the veil off, some said, no, only had it on. So Kelly goes through a bunch of greeky geeky stuff that I don't understand at all.

But his conclusion is, when he was done speaking, he placed the veil on his face, that not because of what they were afraid to look at him, but as here that they might not look on the end or the fading of transitory glory. So he criticizes a guy named Dean Alford, which a lot of these brethren quote in a lot of their writings. And he equates it to how Alford worked the Septuagint and the letter of Hebrews.

So here's what he says. While Moses talked to the people without, outside, he covered his face. but remove the veil when he went in to speak with Jehovah. I think that's the right answer. He says that Exodus 34, 30 is clear, that because his face shone, the people were afraid to come near him. And he therefore put the veil on, which he took off when he went to speak to Jehovah. So I think that's probably right, that, He had the veil on because it intimidated the Jews, it made them feel guilty, that glory, there's something about seeing the glory of God. If you're a sinner, it drives you away. Those of us who have been redeemed, the glory of God draws us in.

J.B. Stoney said, We must bear in mind that Paul is here contrasting the difference between the ministry of death and the ministry of righteousness. You know, for the last week, we talked a lot about that the law is a ministry of death, even though it was shown in glory. It still was a ministry of death. The glory in the law necessarily consumed because it only appeared with a claim on man. who was unable to meet the claim. Righteousness wasn't established in the glory that could not freely express itself, because it said, you've got to perform.

You've got to do it. Though Moses' face bore the marks of a transforming power, still, the power of that glory of that law said to man, you have to perform. Because of man's condition, it was fearful on Mount Sinai and its bearing on man and his unrighteousness. Yet no one could be involved in it without sharing in its moral dominance. And therefore, Moses' face bore the traces of the power. Moses couldn't be in front of God and not have this glory reflect on him.

But Paul says, look at the contrast now. It is now the ministration of righteousness from the glory of God. Instead of coming to man and saying, you've got to be righteous, God comes to man after the work of the cross and through the apostle Paul, and he says, well, we are presenting a ministry of righteousness where we're starting with the fact that you are already righteous. you already have a standing with God. The Son of God has come to establish righteousness from that same glory from which had come the law. Only the demand or the claim of it, and therefore, if the glory had the power to produce such effect on the face of Moses, when man is in the condition, couldn't look at it much more now. when in the ministration of righteousness.

The difference is almost incomparable. The veil has been totally done away in Christ. It's gone. Constable says, on the meaning of the word boldness, it means barefacedness. Paul had a barefaced boldness. Paul could be barefaced in his confidence because of the permanent character of the covenant under which he ministered.

Now remember last week we talked about Moses, or about Paul being and us all being brought to the mediator of the new covenant. The Lord Jesus Christ is the mediator of the new covenant, and because we are in him, we are involved in the carrying out of the tenets of the covenant. That's what a mediator does. He makes sure that whatever the agreement is between the parties, that they get carried out just exactly as it says. We have that ministry, the ministry of righteousness.

Moses, in contrast, could not. He ministered with a veil over his face much of the time. Paul's implication then was that Christians can behold God's glory more fully in the new covenant, and it's never gonna fade away. So, verse 14 says, but their minds were hardened For until this very day at the reading of the old covenant, the same veil remains unlifted because it's only removed in Christ. The new King James uses the word, but their minds were blinded. So it's a statement of fact, it's not a supposition. Hardness or blindness, that Greek word means something like a petrified stone. It's not going anywhere and you can't see through it.

Israel refused to gaze on the effects of God's glory of the law on Moses' face. They didn't want to look. And man, I think, naturally shrinks from something like that when seeking to maintain his own righteousness. from admiration and due appreciation of the transforming power of God. This glory has a transforming power, and if I, in sin, look at it, I don't want transformation, I wanna stay where I am, I'm convicted. Israel, in wanting Moses to put the veil on his face, only declared the moral distance that they had from Jehovah, and that distance was in their hearts. from God, and therefore the veil went from visual to covering their hearts. It blinded them. This word, unlifted, in the sense of reversal, it has not been revealed to them that the veil has been done away with in Christ. They won't hear of Christ.

I've told you when Rabbi Pomerantz used to live across the street from me, And we used to stand out in the middle of the street and talk, and he would say we were kibitzing. And whenever I would bring up grace, or the Lord Jesus Christ, or anything like that, it got real silent, the conversation was over, and he went home. We could talk about almost any other thing, but righteousness, holiness, and the Lord Jesus Christ. Couldn't talk about that.

And it's because there's a veil over his face. He didn't understand. To him, Christ was just another man who grew up in Jerusalem. So it's unfortunate that their minds are blinded, and they use the law as though it was a kind of a badge or a feather in their cap, and it somehow gave them a preeminence among all the nations of the world, because they had God's rules. It is though the veil that once was upon the face of Moses has been taken off of Moses and transferred to the minds and hearts of all the Jews. Israel, through unbelief, slighted the grace that was given them, and when it was shown to them, and it was shown to them abundantly, and they forgot the promises which God had made to the fathers, which faith would have remembered, and given them a need, knowing that that's where they should go. So they did not, they therefore did not doubt for a moment of their own ability to keep his law and so maintain their place with him.

Granted, it was based on their deepest ignorance, both of God and as a judge according to the law, and of themselves as guilty and powerless sinners, and that scripture reveals their ruin under the law, and that the Gentiles would avoid the snare and find their resources, strength, and blessing, all and only in Christ, and they would do it by God's sovereign grace, by grace alone.

If you look at Romans 11, verse seven and eight, Paul says, what then? Question mark. What Israel is seeking, it has not obtained. But those who were chosen obtained it, and the rest were hardened. Just as is written, God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes to not see and ears to not hear, down to this very day.

Romans 10.4 says, for Christ is the end of the law, for righteousness to who? To everyone who believes. The law provided man with a very difficult road for his feet to travel, and that road led to Christ. I think every road leads to Christ, every single road.

This is a quote from Harry Ironside. I thought it was great. Thousands of Jews have looked through the Old Testament telescope to Christ as a fulfillment of all the types and shadows of the law, the true Messiah of Israel, the promised Redeemer, that righteousness which God promised to reveal in due time. And finding him, the veil was dropped from their eyes, and they are rejoicing in the new covenant. And there's a cool thing that Ironside says, the same privilege is yours, every man.

For until this day remains this veil untaken away in the reading of the Old Testament, which veil is done away in Christ. The glory that shone in the face of Moses was really just a faint reflection of who Christ is. But Israel couldn't see it. Had they seen it, they would have condemned themselves and waited with eager expectation for the coming of Christ, the Deliverer.

Verse 15 says, but to this day, Whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their hearts. Boy, what an indictment. If I'm a Siddic Jew sitting in a synagogue, and Moses is read, and a Siddic Jew's concentrated only on the first five books of the Bible, that's where they land. for them to go through everything that they go through and to realize that when the rabbi gets up and reads the first five books of the Bible, there's a veil over their hearts and they don't understand what is there. There is, of course, an election of grace today amongst Israel, believers. Nevertheless, it's still true of them as a nation that they read the Old Testament with the veil on their hearts. It's interesting, I think these Hasidics have been in our neighborhood for what, 15 years now maybe? And the blindness that they have about anything that has to do with even reading Moses and the Talmud, they don't get it.

They are so interested in keeping little minute things about the law that they've imposed upon themselves And like Donna says, well, most of them have terrible yards because they're too busy keeping these other laws. They don't have time to mow their grass. They're terrible neighbors, you know?

So it's interesting to watch how they operate. And as you get to know some of them, like one of the things they won't do is that I can shake a man's hand, but I can't shake his wife's hand, and he can't shake my wife's hand. It's a really important issue. I mean, you know, it makes for a lot of camaraderie in the neighborhood. And you know, you can always go walk around Halloween and tell which houses are the Jews. All the lights are off. They're not giving anything away, you know.

So anyway, William Kelly, human thoughts of unbelief suits reason and conscience guided by it, and our estimate of self as well of God, where Christ and his work have no distinctive and commanding place. Now that doesn't only fit with the Jews, it fits with all of us. Therefore, not only do the utmost extremes meet here, whether it's Romanism or Puritanical, but it's also via, Kelly wrote this in 1850, the media, which pleases the moderate man of all parties, whether he's a rationalist or a nonconformist, who on the one hand, rightly revere the law as clothed in God's authority, but on the other, they see not the holy new position of grace. and this position that grace has placed us in by redemption, answering to Christ glorified on high, who has sent down the spirit that we might enjoy it to its full and walk according. So we look around at Christendom today and we notice this ritualistic system which conveyed to the Israelites Only precepts, and here's what the Jews did, they focused on, well, we gotta kill a lamb or a goat or a bullock with the blood brought in before God and to sprinkle themselves in with water of separation or the like.

One of the things I used to ask Rabbi Pomerantz, I said, you know, in my Bible, which has the first five books, There's this discussion about without the shedding of blood, there's no forgiveness of sins. So what do you do on the day of atonement? And he said, well, we go up to the synagogue and we pray and we confess our sins and God forgives them. I said, but where are the goats?

He said, well, we don't do that anymore because we don't, you know, can only sacrifice in one place in Jerusalem. And the conversation ended there. Why? What kind of an answer does he have? Out of his very own book, the first five books of the Bible, with the veil over his eyes, he can't see the difference between the fact that if you don't have a sacrifice, you don't have forgiveness of sin. To me, it's pretty simple. To him, you know.

Anyway, the law made nothing perfect. And it, not the speculation through the Greek nor the political wisdom of Rome, was the true nursery of man and his element, the divine teaching shutting up every human being to faith. We find our privilege Godward, typified in Moses, unveiled, not veiled.

How awful then the darkness which has deliberately put Christendom, which is, Christendom's a brethren term for contemporary Christianity, back into the self-same position of the law as the rule of people to live by after the proclamation of God's mercy. What's the rule, ask any Christian, what's the rule of your life? Is it you live by grace or you live by laws, statutes, things you have to do?

This is what not only multitudes believe, but the leaders of Reformed theology have taught. Denominations, no less than Rome, this is the prevalent doctrine, like Presbyterian, Methodist, Congregational. It is the mind active and exercised on what God used as a probationary system, Judaism. But it's unusable to look to the end of it as the Jew of old, rebellious against his transient character and blind to the surpassing glory of what is now revealed in Christ.

It's solemn to reflect on those, once the people of God, who are, I saw this term, loammi, A-M-M-I. It means you're not my people anymore. The figurative name given by the prophet Hosea to his second son by Gomer, the daughter of Diblem, to denote the rejection of the kingdom of Israel. You're not my children anymore. In zeal, there are forms rejecting Christ who gives them their real meaning and chief and major value. Be it so, it must be that way.

So J.B. Stoney says here, how can the infinite grace, gift of the Son of God, and then the witness of the Holy Spirit sent down from heaven in virtue of redemption have, if refused, any other consequence than utter ruin for those who have despised God? It is a rejection of God's fullest grace and heavenly glory, not merely the law which demanded and defined man's duty. God would be a partner to his own utter dishonor if he passed by the refusal of his son, dying in love for man's sin, or in the face of the spirit of grace who testifies of it in him. This the Jews, they did this formally before God swept them from their land by the Romans, not because the scripture did not express Christ in his work, but because of their own unbelief.

Then in verse 16, he says, but whenever a person turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. to turn about, to turn towards, Vine says. In the gospel of righteousness is revealed to faith. Righteousness isn't required, it's given. For Christ himself is the righteousness of the believer. And the work was done and accepted before God, sent out the gospel of his grace to man. The spirit, therefore, testifies to man at God's right hand, who suffered once for sins on the cross, and declared that by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses.

Still, good news, a moment is coming when the veil shall be removed. when at the last day the Jew and the legalist shall turn to the Lord in faith and repentance and the veil will be lifted off of their mind and the glory of Christ whom they crucified will burst upon them. It is the light of divine glory flowing from redemption. The Lord's title to be in heavenly glory is not His person only, but the work which God His Father gave Him to do. That is surely as we know Him in the Father, we should also know that we are in Him and He's in us.

Most wondrous yet simple truth of Christ and the believer. It's a wonder. for sovereign grace isn't natural to our hearts, though it alone reveals God fully. It's interesting that the believer himself never keeps grace afresh, pure, or even true apart from being consciously in the presence of the Lord Jesus with Christ before him. As in Christ as a result, it is simply It is simple and appreciated as one principle and power which suits both God on the one hand and those he saves on the other. Grace alone puts each in the place which befits him. The place that you and I, that befits us is in the presence face to face with the Lord Jesus Christ.

William Kelly says, conscience answers to the law when it condemns every evil way. But faith is needed for grace. Outside God's presence, it is but allowance of sin. In his presence, grace deals with sin far more awesomely than the law ever could. It is evident in the cross of Christ. Only there, Can the believer enjoy grace safely, happily, in a word he uses, holily, I like that word. And there is no possibility of having peace in his presence but through grace. Grace reigning through righteousness to eternal life by Christ Jesus. But what is so wonderful? as the truth. Christ accounts for it all. His works brings us who believe into all, such as grace and ministry of the spirit of righteousness.

If you go back to 1 Corinthians chapter two, verse two, Paul very succinctly said to the Corinthians, I determine to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. In Christendom, it is generally read as if Jesus Christ crucified. They don't put the end, A-N-D, in there. The meaning of scripture is really clear.

Jesus Christ personally and him crucified. So when we get to these verses, chapter three, starting way back in verse 5 through 16, Christ personally is presented as well as his work. He's seen in another aspect. As crucified, he bore death judicially. But as Jesus Christ, he's risen.

And therefore, our blessing is as you see him in glory. Even back in Isaiah 45, 22, look unto me and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth. Let's close. Our dear Father, how we thank you for the Lord Jesus and his work. And now we're discovering something even more gracious than that. that we can behold his glory, which we'll talk about next week, that you've not only invited us, but you have placed us in the heavenlies in glory where he is so that we can behold. And just tremendous things happen because of this beholding, and we thank you for your grace. We thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ, and we pray in his precious name, amen.