We read a few verses again—familiar verses, familiar to us because they have been before us several times already in the second letter to the Corinthians.
I want to read just the last verse of chapter 3:
But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord the Spirit.
Therefore, seeing we have this ministry, even as we obtained mercy, we faint not; but we have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by the manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.
But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled in them that perish; in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, Who is the image of God, should not dawn upon them.
For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. Seeing it is God, Who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness,” Who shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Now, in these hours which we have been spending, and are still spending together, we have been brought again to a recognition of the service of the people of God—the church universally, locally, and individually—the ministry to which we are called.
“We have,” says the apostle, “this ministry.” As we go on, we add and add and add to this ministry the many things that are said about it, seeing it from its various standpoints and in its various aspects, as we have been doing.
As we get on—not by any means to the end, but as we get on—it becomes necessary, and very important, that we should focus it all upon its main and supreme issue.
If, after all that has been said and all this time spent, we were asked to put into a brief phrase what this ministry is, I wonder what we should say. I wonder how you would sum up all that has been said and define this clause: “Having this ministry.”
If we can only get hold of that concisely and precisely—be able to grasp what this ministry really is—and go away with that, not merely with a whole lot of teaching and things said, but with the issue of it all: what does it really amount to? What are we committed to, perhaps more deeply than ever? What is going to characterize us as those called to this ministry henceforth in a new and much more positive way? Can we put it into a phrase?
Now, it is not difficult to find, in these first four chapters of this second letter to the Corinthians, the answer. I remind you that it is mentioned no fewer than thirteen times from verse 8 of chapter 3 to verse 2 of chapter 4. This whole letter’s central object is put into one word, and that word is glory.
Now, just put a ring round it, if you like. Henceforth, you have got the key to the letter; but you have got more than that. You have got the key to all that this ministry committed to us really means.
It is nothing other, nothing less, than the glory of the Lord Jesus.
It would be a very fruitful study to take that word and carry it right through the letter, back into the first letter, and through the second letter, and see what it means—what the glory of the Lord Jesus really does mean, what it is set over against, how it solves all the problems, and how it becomes the dynamic, the all-governing concern, of the people of God.
The glory of the Lord Jesus—that is the test of everything. It is the test of behavior. That takes us back into the first letter, does it not? The behavior of the Corinthians was so unworthy of the Lord Jesus.
After the apostle had left them to themselves, without his present, current influence, for four years or more, their spiritual life declined, and all that came in was shameful, reproachful, and unworthy of Christ.
The glory of Christ stands over against all behavior and conduct—what we do and how we live.
There is so much more which is not my present occupation. I want to come right to this whole matter: glory as the governing thing in the active life and presence of the people of God in this world.
We have said some things about it already—how it works out. We commenced with a recognition of the fact that, if the glory of the Lord Jesus is the very object for which the Lord’s people are here in this age, it is a costly way.
We noticed all that the apostle said at the beginning of this matter about the afflictions of Christ, the sufferings of Christ abounding unto us, and how real they were in his own experience. The costliness of standing for the glory of the Lord Jesus.
Now, for time’s sake, let us come to this fourth chapter. In these last verses, we have these well-known words: “Seeing it is God, Who said, ‘Let light be.’” Literally, that is what is here: God, Who said, “Let light be.”
Presently the apostle will return to the new creation. This is what is at the back of his mind: God, Who said, “Let light be,” shined into our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, Who is the image of God.
The glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ—now in our hearts.
We have already dwelt considerably upon the light upon the face of Moses when he came down from the mount. When he stood before the people and read the word of God, he had to put on a veil because they could not look steadfastly upon his face.
The apostle says, in effect—and this is what he means—the light of the glory of God was on the face of Moses, but it could not enter into the hearts of the people then. They had not the capacity or the ability to receive it into their hearts.
But the light in the face of Jesus Christ—the same glory of God, now in the face of Jesus Christ—the veil is taken away, and it has entered into our hearts. It has got inside.
There is the change in the dispensation. It was all external and objective; it now becomes inward. He has shined in, or into, our hearts.
God said, “Let light be,” in the first creation—outward and objective. In the new creation, inward: He has shined into our hearts.
Let us pause for a moment with this way in which the apostle puts it. It is a figurative way. We have to get our mentalities adjusted over many of these things.
Of course, naturally and immediately we get mental pictures. When it says, “the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ,” we quite naturally and instinctively think of the countenance, of His face.
But that is not what the apostle is talking about. He is only using it as a figure.
The same word is translated in another way in this letter twice. It is otherwise translated “person.” You find that in 2 Corinthians 1:11:
Ye also helping together on our behalf by your supplication; that, for the gift bestowed upon us by means of many, thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf.
That word “persons” is the same word in the Greek as “face” in chapter 4. Then you have the same thing again in 2 Corinthians 8:24:
Show ye therefore unto them in the face of the churches the proof of your love.
The same word: “in the face of the churches.” You know what that means—not the physical faces of people in the churches. It means before the people themselves.
So this one case just means the person of Jesus Christ: the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the person of Jesus Christ. He is the personal image, embodiment, and impress of the glory of God.
You know that in Hebrews 1:3. That is exactly how it begins: the express image, or impress, of the divine glory.
It is not the shining face as such that the apostle is speaking about. May the Lord give us more shining faces! That does not excuse our miserable faces. Lord, have mercy on us for our faces.
But the apostle is saying here that Jesus Christ is the personal embodiment and expression of the glory of God, and He has been revealed in our hearts.
It is the realization of what Jesus Christ really is and means—His significance in God’s universe—that has been revealed in our hearts.
The apostle faced his whole life and ministry on this: “It pleased God to reveal His Son in me.” The counterpart of the outshining of the glory on the Damascus road is this: it did not stay outside; it got inside.
And in that light, as I contemplated Jesus of Nazareth, I saw how different He was from what I had thought and believed Him to be beforehand, when I persecuted Him.
I saw Him—Who He is, what He is. I saw the outshining of the divine glory in a man, in a man. Christ was the image and representation of God manifest.
I think it is a rather wonderful and impressive thing. We think that we have got a lot of light now about the Lord Jesus—a tremendous amount of light about the Lord Jesus.
Perhaps we think, or imagine, that all that we know now is new since He was here in this world. Nothing of the kind.
All that we know now, all that ever we shall know, or the people of God will know about the Lord Jesus after His ascension, was true of Him when He was here. It was all there.
Who He was, what He was, what His significance was, what was vested in Him—everything of eternity was there in the man called Jesus of Nazareth. Nothing has been added to Him. He has not been enlarged or increased. It was all there.
John was able to say, “We beheld His glory,” when He was here—glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. It was all there.
But no one saw it unless it was revealed to them by the Father. When that happened, even in the days of His flesh, it was an amazement to those who had the revelation.
When He asked His disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” Peter, by inspiration, revelation, illumination—by a divine act—said, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
Jesus said, “Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee.” I think Peter himself was as astonished as anybody that he had said that.
But, you see, it was something by illumination. You are familiar with the two on the Emmaus road. Jesus joined them, but it distinctly says that their eyes were holden, that they should not know Him.
Then, for a given moment, their eyes were opened, and they saw Him. What a difference it made! They returned joyfully, and their exclamation when they arrived back in Jerusalem showed that their eyes had been opened.
It was all there. Everything was there in Him, but no one saw it until God gave them the ability to see.
God, Who said, “Let light be,” has shined into our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory.
What is this ministry? It is the result of a divine act—something that God has done in us, in every one of us.
God has done something which is on the same principle as when this earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep, and the word of God was proclaimed, “Let light be,” and there was light—a divine fiat, an act of the word of God.
Now Paul says, on the same principle, something has happened to us. Something has happened to us. That happening has come from God into our lives.
That is the basis of our testimony, of the church’s ministry—the ground of the church’s living in the good of it. That must be actually true of the whole church. First, there is a professing church, and there is the real church.
But this is the vocation committed to the people of God in this dispensation: to reflect the glory of Christ from our inward being.
The mirror is the mirror of our renewed, regenerated spirit, reflecting the glory. That is the word here—or reflecting the glory. That is the ministry.
I do not want to multiply words, but I feel that we must really be very clear and practical.
When we first come to the Lord, when that thing happens—put it how you will, use whatever form of explanation you may: being converted, born again, or whatever it is—when that thing happens, there is the breaking into us of the glory. It does shine out, does it not?
What a wonderful thing it is when the Lord Jesus, the Lord of glory, comes into your heart. Is it not wonderful?
Of course it was, with all of us. It was wonderful. I know when that happened to me, I was preaching in the open air five nights a week, and the other nights—well, they were in February—for the rest.
Week after week, at any opportunity, I testified to the Lord Jesus. I can see it now. It was just like that—all so wonderful.
Gathered around was a whole group of young men who had come into the same experience, and what a glory time it was. We were called the “Glory Boys.” Truly.
But that is not what I am wanting to get at. We come into experiences of trial, adversity, and suffering. The apostle is talking much about the sufferings of Christ which abound unto us.
The danger is, as it took place in Corinth, that we should lose the glory. We should lose the glory. That is our peril.
In difficulties, adversities, and trials, things do not go as we would like them to go. These things become quite difficult for us.
And do not, dear Christian friends, put a divide between your secular life and your spiritual life, and say, “Well, you see, things happen to me. They are part of my job in this world, the work that I am doing, the place where I have to work. That is one thing; my Christian life is in another realm.”
Do not do that. Do not do that for a moment. You will find that the assault upon the glory is made more by evil powers than by people.
Oh, people may be the difficult ones, the awkward ones, the ones that give you a bad time. They may all be in that human realm, you think.
But do not forget that if you have been called into fellowship with God’s Son, you have been called into the ministry of the glory. There is nothing—there is nothing—in all your life and our life which the enemy will not take hold of to rob Him of the glory in us, whether physical, circumstantial, or whatever it is.
There is something more than the ordinary happenings and circumstances of human life. Remember that.
Young Christians need to be reminded of that. We older ones are not ignorant of his devices. We know quite well that the simplest thing in ordinary daily life, as we think, can be a trick of the devil.
The telephone rings at the most inopportune moment possible, related to something. We were in prayer, getting hold of the Lord. There is something more than the thing that goes wrong.
Paul says there are hosts of wicked spirits—hosts of them. You cannot count them; they are everywhere. We do not want to get our eyes on them, but we do want to note this: they are after the glory.
Their whole attention is focused upon the glory of the Lord Jesus.
You can see, from some things we have already said, and if you read this second letter to the Corinthians again, that by a whole host of incidents in Paul’s life—the reactions of this influential and powerful group in Corinth to him personally, discrediting him, defending him, detracting from his ministry—they were trying to expose his weaknesses.
They spoke of his physical disabilities, saying that his personal presence was contemptible and his speech contemptible. All these things were against him.
Then there is the list of things which he gives us in 2 Corinthians 6 and 2 Corinthians 12. What a lot of things there were—all against him. He knew what he was talking about when he spoke of perils, shipwreck, and the many shipwrecks to which he refers.
All these other things—these evil forces—were out to destroy the ministry of the glory of Christ in and through this man. That is the meaning of it. They are after the glory.
They knew very well that God had shined into the heart of this man the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Therefore, he was a marked man, for the glory in him was marked.
The terrific battle is the battle of the glory.
In using this word, “veil,” Paul has used it about Israel. There is a veil over their face even to this day. They cannot receive the glory; they cannot see the glory.
Using that phrase, “the veil,” he takes it up in another connection: “If our gospel be hidden, it is veiled in them that believe not, in whom the god of this world hath blinded” lest the light of the glory should shine into them.
That is why the Lord Jesus was so particularly interested in blind people. He seems to have had a particular interest in blind people. No blind person ever failed to have His sympathy, interest, and help.
I am not saying that He was not interested in the deaf, the dumb, and everyone else, but it seems that the instances which stand out most fully in His activities when here are those in relation to blind people.
And you know, the giving of sight to the blind man born blind is in the context of, “I am the light of the world. I am the light of the world.”
The seeing faculty is a divinely intended thing for the sake of the glory. Oh, dear friends, this is so challenging to me and to you.
The challenge comes here. I do not want to make it difficult, but if I make it difficult for you, I am making it equally difficult for myself.
The challenge is this: that which we have of truth, of teaching, of what we technically call light—and we have a lot. We have a tremendous amount of teaching. That is only another word, you know, for the word doctrine. Choose which you like: teaching, doctrine. Tremendous amounts.
There is an immense amount of light given to the church. Many others have come into that realm of large degrees of truth and teaching.
And the challenge is this: how much of that really becomes the outshining of His glory? Can we stand up to that?
Because, you see, the very principle of inshining is that the light of the glory of God should be in our hearts and should be reflected.
Put that in a practical way. How much, when we have finished our course, shorter or longer, will people be able to say, “Thank God for that man, for that woman, because really, through him, through her, I came into a living knowledge of the Lord Jesus”?
In some fuller way, perhaps, or at the beginning, the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ came into my life as reflected in that man or that woman.
That is the test of all our teaching. Now, I say, we have got so much of it, and yet we deny it in our behavior and our practice. So much contradicts it, does it not?
Here we are, having meeting after meeting, hour after hour, piling up the teaching. The test of it all is not going to be that we have a lot more that is technically called light.
The test of being here at these times, this very hour, and this value, is going to be: will people be able to see the Lord Jesus—and the glorious Lord Jesus?
You see, this is exactly what the apostle was getting at with these Corinthians. There had been a shameful contradiction of the gospel. Their behavior, their character, almost every way in that first letter—there was a contradiction of the glory.
Now he is coming back with a second letter, being on the positive side. He was, so to speak, on the negative side in the first letter. Lord have mercy upon us, if 1 Corinthians is negative! It is a sledgehammer, is it not? A sledgehammer in the negative thing.
But it was on the negative side of correction, correction, correction—showing the wrong, pointing it up: “I could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal.”
Now, having dealt with a thing like that and judged it, he turns over to the positive side and says, “Now really, Corinthians, the only justification of our existence as the people of God is that the glory of Jesus Christ is shining out from us, has come into us, and is being seen and known around us where we are.”
Clear your mental pictures of the glory of Jesus Christ. Sometimes it is just in quiet, patient endurance, whereas other people would begin to show their resentment and their bad temper and react to what is done to them and what is put upon them in an unhealthy, disagreeable way, with a vengeful spirit.
Go down under it—quiet, steady, humble patience, endurance, suffering wrong rather than doing wrong. That is the glory of Jesus.
You know Peter brings that right out, does he not, in his letter? If, when ye do well, ye suffer for it and take it patiently, this is grace with God. This is grace. And grace is the glory of God.
Yes, well, you are putting up with a lot this afternoon, are you not? But we really do want these times to have a practical outcome, do we not?
Do not go away and say, “We had some meetings at Easter, and the subject was so-and-so, and so-and-so spoke. We had a happy time. We got a lot of light.”
Oh, God save us from just that, repeated through the years again and again. No. It has got to be this: the light has got to get inside, and then men must see, in that light, the glory of the Lord Jesus.
I probably will go on in a minute about the new creation. He will say that if any man be in Christ, there is a new creation, brought about by this divine fiat: “God said, ‘Let light be.’”
The result in any man—or very personal, individual: if any man be in Christ—on this principle, God said, “Let light be,” and there is a new creation.
The same fiat for a spiritual new creation as for the former material creation.
Now, of all the things that belong to that new creation, there is only one that I am going to mention now. It is this: when God, at the beginning, over the chaos and darkness, the unformed world, said, “Let light be,” and there was light, the coming of the light was only the beginning of a process.
It started something. It was not an end in itself. Light did not come and remain like that, merely the existence and presence of light.
It set things going, and because of the presence of the light, out of the chaos there came form, order, and fruitfulness.
In like manner, when the light shines into our hearts—the light of God shines into our hearts in the face, in the person, of Jesus Christ—it is the beginning of a formation, a constituting of a divine order in our lives.
Now, let me talk to you. It may not apply to you, but do you not feel that there is some gap somewhere, some defect, some lack, when somebody professes to accept Christ and all the disorderliness of their life remains?
However you mention it—outward things and other things, their behavior—these things do not disappear. They do not change. They bring their disorderliness over into Christianity.
There is a lot of disorderliness, is there not, in what is called Christian life?
Something is lacking; there is a gap somewhere. Maybe they have not been properly taught. The foundation has not been properly laid so that they have been made to understand what the Christian life really is: it is a new creation, where old things are passed away.
What are these old things that are brought over? Old things pass away; behold, all things are become new.
Now, what I am saying, whether it applies to you in that particular respect or not—behavior and appearance and all that sort of thing—it is not the glory of Christ at all. It is not in His interests.
I was told some time ago of something that happened at the Keswick Convention. A servant of the Lord was there, walking along the street, and saw a girl coming toward her in a miniskirt and with a lot less in other things than was modest.
There was the hair, and all the rest of it, and on her clothing a text—I forget what the words were—something about the Lord Jesus, coming to the Lord Jesus.
This dear servant of the Lord saw this poor child coming along like this, and it gave her heartache. She felt ill. So she spoke to the girl.
“Do you really feel that this commends your Master? Do you really think that this will convey a right impression of the Lord Jesus? You evidently profess to be His. You want to share Him with the world, but do you really think this will convey a right impression of the Lord?”
The girl said, “I never thought about it. It never occurred to me. No one ever said anything to me.”
Well, the work was done. The girl went and changed, and it was put all right. But you see what I mean. Now, it does not apply to any of you, but the principle does.
There are lots of old things that have got to go when Jesus is revealed in the heart. They are incompatible with the Lord Jesus. They are a contradiction to Him.
And if we really do see the Lord Jesus—not in those things that I have hinted at only, but in many other ways—we shall be putting things right, you know. We will shed many old things.
The point is: we cannot really see the Lord Jesus and go on in any way that contradicts Him. That is the message of this letter.
After all our teaching, the test is: have we seen? Is it evident? Is it evident that we have seen Him?
Is it evident in our home that something has happened in us? Is it evident in our place of work?
Not only, and sometimes not at all, by our preaching or by carrying a Bible in our hands, but by us—ourselves, our very presence there.
Something has been done by God in us. That is what we are here for, as companies of the Lord’s people as well as individuals: having this ministry.
We have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, but dishonesty is not in keeping with Christ. We are not walking in craftiness, or literally, not making merchandise of the word of God—using divine things for our own gain and interest, or handling the word of God deceitfully. Contradiction!
But we are commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.
It is testing; it is challenging. Now, you have had to put up with a lot. I have really been fighting to get to the heart of this.
I tell you quite frankly, friends, I am ministering all over the world to so many, and I get very tired of ministry—very tired of ministering. I often wish the Lord would spare me more ministry for this reason.
There does seem to be such a gap between their knowledge of divine truth and the measure of the expression of Christ in them.
You can have all this truth, as it is called, this light, as it is termed, and meet so much that is un-Christlike—un-Christlike in the people who have it all.
They can be cruel. They can be hard, exacting, like these Corinthians. What followed from them? They had the truth. Paul spent two whole years, day and night, pouring himself out to that church in Corinth.
I hope you are suffering this, not taking it other than with the grace of God.