"How to Keep Your Heart in Ministry"

Introduction

Today, so many people seek to be in ministry because of the glam, glitz, and privileges that come along with ministry. Give or take some years ago, people ran from ministry because of how people treated those already in ministry. When God calls you to minister, he calls you to do His will and not your own. When he calls you to minister, he calls you to carry out his mission with the proper motive. When he calls you to minister, he calls you stand steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Yet, how do you keep your heart in ministry…when others flame out, the minister is expected to carry on....

2 Corinthians 4

Paul moves from the general experience of all Christians in 3:18 to his own particular experience as an apostle of the new covenant. The “we” is an authorial we. God has made him sufficient for a ministry like that of Moses, who conveyed God’s laws to human beings. Unlike Moses, his ministry writes these laws spiritually on people’s hearts.

Remember God’s Mercy and his message

He understands this calling in terms of God’s mercy (1 Tim 1:13, 16) as well as God’s grace (1 Cor 15:9-10). God took a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent man and turned him into a devoted apostle and humble servant of the church. Paul refers to his calling when he say that “he has been mercied,” and such language shows that he regards his ministry as a gift from God, not some personal achievement. “Ministry did not choose you because you were perfect; God chose you because of his mercy.” With this gift comes the formidable responsibility to spread the gospel faithfully and to speak the truth forthrightly. The reference to mercy also remind us of how God has mercied him by delivering him from deadly persecution and giving him the strength to carry on his ministry.

The verb translated in the NIV as “we do not lose heart” (egkakoumen) can have a variety of meanings. It can mean “to become discouraged,” and in the next section Paul lists plenty of reasons why he might lose heart in this sense of the word (see 4:8–9; 6:4–5). The constant threat of persecution, so fierce at times that it caused him to despair of his life (1:8), and the backstabbing by fellow Christians would have quickly demoralized many a lesser figure. But others contend that the verb means “to become weary” (see Gal 6:9; 2 Thess 3:13) or “to be remiss,” “to be lax,” or “to be reluctant.”490 If we allow the context to help ascertain the meaning of the verb, the translation “to be cowardly or timid” fits best. The opening sentence of this unit would then parallel 3:12, [NIV “Since we have such a hope, we are very bold”] “Having such a hope we exercise much frank speech,” and restates that thought in negative terms, [NIV “Since … we have this ministry … we do not lose heart”] “Having this ministry … we are not timid.” In Eph 3:13 the verb follows a reference to boldness in 3:12. When the verb reappears in 2 Cor 4:16, its antonym is tharreō, “to be courageous, confident” (5:6). Paul therefore says that because he has this ministry “he does not draw in his horns.” He is not fainthearted. Plummer comments: “Such faintheartedness takes refuge in silence and inactivity, in order to escape criticism, and therefore is the opposite of παρρησιͅα [parrēsia].” The Spirit enables Paul to preach and minister an unveiled gospel. He insists that unlike such con men he did not adjust, water down, or tamper with the gospel to stroke his listeners’ egos or to avoid ruffling their feathers. He is not a flatterer using God’s word only to delight the audience and bewitch them with enchanting interpretations that never question their conduct or character.

David E. Garland, 2 Corinthians, vol. 29, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1999), 206.

Remember what God has trusted you with

Paul begins this unit by announcing that we have this treasure in jars of clay. He writes in 5:1 that “we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.” That building is for a time yet to come. Now is the time for earthen vessels (4:7), affliction (4:17), and being away from the Lord (5:6). In this aeon treasure is stored and carried in earthen pots. Paul does not specify what he means by treasure. He could have in mind “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ” (4:6), but that would also include the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ (4:3–4) that is so priceless and cherished by all Christians. It is more likely that means light revealed by the gospel than by his apostolic ministry (3:7–9; 4:1). But the treasure may also include his ministry since he describes it in terms of proclaiming the gospel of the glory of God (3:18; 4:4, 6). He understands himself to be a vessel that contains and conveys a message. The term earthen vessels (ostrakinoi skeuē) implies something fragile, inferior, and expendable. Picturing himself as an ordinary, everyday utensil conveying an invaluable treasure is as striking an image as Paul’s picture of himself as a defeated but joyous prisoner marching in God’s triumphal procession (2:14). Such an image underscores his weakness. An earthen vessel is “quintessentially fragile,” prone to breakage, easily chipped and cracked. A breakable vessel offers no protection for the treasure (except from dust and water). The image therefore serves to emphasize the contrast between Paul’s own pitiful weakness and the great power of God. Second, the image highlights Paul’s lowliness. He does not depict himself as an object d’art such as an exquisitely crafted Grecian urn, or bronze vessel, or delicate goblet with gold inlay. He has in mind earthenware jars or, perhaps, the small, cheap pottery lamps. Neither were things of beauty. They lacked any outward luster in contrast to the treasure, and their cheapness would disguise the fact that they contained anything valuable at all. The contrast would emphasize the priceless value of the treasure compared to Paul’s relative worthlessness. What the earthen vessel contains is the only thing that gives it importance.Third, the image highlights Paul’s expendability. Earthen vessels had no enduring value and were so cheap that when they were broken no one attempted to mend them. They simply discarded them. Broken glass was melted down to make new glass; an earthenware vessel, once hardened in a kiln, was nonrecyclable. Easily broken, they were also easily replaced and not worth repairing. But the vessel is essential.

Remember God is preparing you for glory

The battering Paul has taken in the service of Christ has left him the worse for wear and makes him a shamed figure in the eyes of the world. His deteriorating physical condition and shameful plight caused some in Corinth, who took account of such things, to wonder out loud about his power as an apostle. They may have assumed that God would do a better job of safeguarding and bringing honor to an authorized messenger of the gospel. Some in the ancient world interpreted affliction as a sign of god’s judgment and as something dishonorable. After surviving the shipwreck on the journey to Rome and landing safely on the island of Malta, the islanders were sure when they saw a viper hanging from Paul’s hand that he must have been guilty of some great crime for which the gods were now belatedly punishing him. “Though he escaped from the sea, justice has not allowed him to live” (Acts 28:5). They expected him “to swell up or suddenly fall dead, but after waiting a long time and seeing nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds and said he was a god” (Acts 28:6). Like the Maltese islanders, some Corinthians were judging Paul only from outward appearances and from a wrongheaded view about how God works in this world and what God has in store for those who faithfully serve. Paul will confess in 5:16 that he too once judged Christ from the same outward, worldly criteria and, as a result, entirely misjudged him. Only after his conversion could he see beyond the damning judgment of the law, that everyone hanged on a tree is accursed of God (Deut 21:22–23; Gal 3:13), and recognize that the crucified Jesus was “the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal 2:20). He now no longer looks at persons from this superficial, worldly perspective; and the Corinthians should not either—particularly God’s apostles, who pattern their lives after the sacrificial suffering and death of Christ.The Corinthians need to understand that the Christian’s inner life is constantly being transformed into glory even as its earthly embodiment decays and dies. The present tense, “being renewed” (anakainoutai), points to a continuing process (see Col 3:10). The phrase “day by day” suggests that it is “not progressively accomplished but is repeated all over again each day.” Paul has said that this renewal comes through continual fellowship with the risen Christ and the power of the Spirit so that the believer “is being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory” (3:18). His image is the exact reverse of the plot in Oscar Wilde’s novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray. In that story the vain Dorian Gray has his portrait painted; and when it is finished, he laments: “How sad! I shall grow old and horrible, but this picture never will be older. If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! I would give my soul for that!” He got his wish. The portrait became a mirror of his soul, which showed every sign of evil and aging. He locked it away to prevent the world from seeing the truth about himself and deceived others with an outward appearance of one who was young, pure, and handsome. The contrast between the loathsome, evil, and wrinkled visage on the canvas fed by mad, ravenous passions, and his exquisite outward appearance grew more stark every day. In Paul’s case others may only see a withered, crushed apostle, pounded by overwhelming hardships. If they do not look at him with the eyes of faith, they will not see the real Paul on a portrait locked away in heaven that is ever being transformed into the likeness of Christ. As his outward life conforms ever more closely to the crucified Christ, his inward life conforms ever more closely to the glorified Christ.

Paul characterizes the present, which is marked by tribulation, as brief in duration and trifling in comparison to what God has in store for believers. He uses the same terms to describe this glory (hyperbolē, “beyond all measure”; baros, “weight”) that he used to describe his sufferings in Asia when he says that he was unbearably crushed (1:8; hyperbolē, “beyond all measure”; ebarēthēmen, “we were weighed down”). He now evaluates that affliction and all his afflictions differently. The incredible, eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison outweighs any earthly afflictions and makes them look like a tiny storm in a teacup (see also Rom 8:18; 2 Thess 1:5). Since the persecution affects only the outer nature that is wasting away, it is destined to pass and to be replaced by something far more glorious. On earth, our afflictions seem never ending while the more sublime moments seem to pass by in a flash. Looking at things from the vantage point of God’s new aeon puts everything, including affliction, in its true perspective. Furnish contrasts Seneca’s praise for the man who treats his affliction as of small account because of his ability to reason things out with Paul’s argument. Paul regards his suffering in this way because of his faith and hope in God who will deliver him. He does not commend his personal discipline or equanimity in the face of adversity that would overwhelm the normal person. He acclaims the God whose Spirit works in him and through his sufferings to bring about his inner transformation. Implicit in this statement is Paul’s belief that God is working through this trouble, not in spite of it, to bring about the eternal abundance of glory in us.