Sacred Selfie 4
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II Cor 3. 1-
II Cor 3. 1-
Have you ever been in a position where someone asks you for a reference to get a job and you find yourself in an awkward position? You don't want to lie, but you really can't tell the truth because it will hurt.
Robert Thornton, professor of economics at Lehigh University, once composed the ideal letter to fit the situation:
“I am pleased to say that this candidate is a former colleague of mine. In my opinion you will be fortunate to get this person to work for you. I recommend him with no qualifications whatsoever.
No person would be better for the job. I urge you to waste no time in making this candidate an offer of employment. All in all, and without reservation, I cannot say enough good things about him, nor can I recommend him too highly.”
Bits & Pieces, April 2, 1992.
This guy is a professional at saying nothing at all.
Twitter and Blue checks:
Someone on Twitter who thinks they are famous but in reality nobody has heard of (usually a B-list celebrity or a journalist who writes for a little-known leftist publication). The main factor which separates them from the verified accounts belonging to real celebrities is that the Blue Checkmarks lack the self-awareness to realize that nobody really cares about their opinions, yet they act as though they are God's gift to political discourse as they spout their self-righteous hot takes on Twitter.
Of course all of the Blue Checkmarks came out in droves to virtue signal about the latest election news.
-by Russian Dumplings November 25, 2020 - Urban Dictionary
Immediately Paul distances himself from the value of this letter of recommendation.
Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man?
Why he explains that the lives of those belivers in Corinth are not a proof of his ministry but of Christ’s ministry.
It is a good day when you stop doing your thing and asking God to bless it and instead find out what God is blessing and make it your thing.
Paul understands that like us he is a faulty tool in the hand of a perfect God. Paul was mared by flesh and sin and cannot be trusted. Just as he will point out in a minute that Moses was a mared and sinful man and therefore the glory was not innately his.
We get ourselves in the biggest trouble when we forget the greatest need we have is more of him and less of us.
You see the people of Corinth are not letters of recommendation for Paul but for Christ...
More directly -
Not for Paul but for the transformational Gospel that Paul preaches...
Transformational Gospel...
I. Christ has made you his Statement.
Your life is meant to be a statement about what Christ does when he gets a hold of you.
Your marriage is a statement of what God does when two souls lean on his grace and trust his word.
Children you are to be an example not of the latest trends but what a young person is like when Christ has their heart.
You are the sign in the world that the church is more than just a stuffy place to act religious. You are the manifestation that the Bible is more than just some made up stories in an old dusty book.
You are the proof that Christ should be trusted.
Notice the difference...
Not with ink (3) - but with the Spirit
Not with stone - but with the heart
But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel;
After those days, saith the Lord,
I will put my law in their inward parts,
And write it in their hearts;
And will be their God,
And they shall be my people.
And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh:
Paul is speaking specifically of the fact that what Moses wrote on tablets (the 10 commandments) was insufficient.
The transformation comes from the heart.
This begins a back and forth that Paul will use to identify the nature of this transformation that Christ has produced in you.
This is a statement is about the Worthiness of God the father to receive Glory.
And a life that is lived in light of Christ’s Gospel brings real glory to the Father.
Let me just declare that God is worthy of glory. (Nope I’m not going out here by myself.) It is good to Amen God is worthy of his glory.
He compares the two things:
The law of Moses - Follow the law and please God.
It was accompanied by a fading glory.
But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not stedfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance; which glory was to be done away:
just like the law you can try to keep it up for a little while but you can’t produce the glory of God in your own efforts.
Some in here today are trying to be good enough to go to heaven or to please God. This is a tragic misunderstanding of how the Gospel works. because it will always fade.
It is Temporary.
For if that which is done away was glorious, much more that which remaineth is glorious.
It only leads to death.
For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more doth the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory.
It acts as a veil and hides God’s glory.
And not as Moses, which put a vail over his face, that the children of Israel could not stedfastly look to the end of that which is abolished: But their minds were blinded: for until this day remaineth the same vail untaken away in the reading of the old testament; which vail is done away in Christ.
Ultimately...
It prevented Christlikeness
Then Paul compares it to the Transformational Gospel.
It is unfading glory
For even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect, by reason of the glory that excelleth.
It is eternal
For if that which is done away was glorious, much more that which remaineth is glorious.
It leads to life
How shall not the ministration of the spirit be rather glorious?
It functions like a mirror
Nevertheless when it shall turn to the Lord, the vail shall be taken away. Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.
Ultimately it...
Produces Christlikeness.
For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more doth the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory.
If you want to know what produces glory either the law keeping efforts of man and you think this is amazing. Remember the life changing Gospel that is revealed from glory to glory is even more amazing.
This is the concluding principle of Paul...
But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.
James tells us what this glass is. He is speaking of the book that the Spirit of God breathed through holy men of God. Namely the Bible.
God shows himself on the pages of this book.
You are transformed...
You look again
You are tranformed...
You look again
You are tranformed...
day after day a little more yeilded a little more Christlike.
Not through the efforts of keeping a law… but through the transformation of Christ in us.
“from glory to glory.”
until that day when the transformation is complete.
Nevertheless when it shall turn to the Lord, the vail shall be taken away.
When we are standing before him no veil...
We shall know him and see his glory.
Until then we keep looking and reflecting his transformational glory. Purchased for us at Calvary.