Bible Commentaries

The Triumph of Continuance

2 Corinthians 4:1

"We all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, as from a Lord who is Spirit." St. Paul follows these sublime words with a reference to his own life labour. "Therefore seeing we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faint not." "We faint not." We expect, perhaps, a clearer, prouder, more triumphant note. The word, for its place, seems tame and quiet The Apostle is not stricken in spirit, but neither does he seem flushed with hope. When, however, we look closely at the expression, it yields us the truth that in the service of the Gospel continuance is triumph. The Christian has some humble task alloted to him—to teach in a Sunday school, to preach in a village church. The years pass; old associates depart, make their fortunes, return. They find their friend where he was—older, feebler perhaps, graver certainly, obscure and unmarked as before, but still at his post They compassionately contrast his lot with more dazzling destinies, and 2 Corinthians 4:1

The word "ministry" has a general meaning, as it has, indeed, all through the New Testament. It applies to all God's people, as witnesses for the Lord Jesus and as bearers of the glorious Gospel of the grace of God. The text may be divided into three sections:—

I. There is a glorious ministry. (1) The ministry is a ministration of righteousness. The Gospel is based upon the righteousness of God, who is absolutely just in dealing with sin. (2) It is also a ministry of life and blessedness. (3) It is the true ministry of the spirit.

II. The text refers to a glorious experience, and that is the sine qua non for all Christian workers. Those who have not received God's mercy cannot by any means take the ministry of God to others.

III. There is a glorious optimism expressed—"We faint not"

—C. B. Sawday, The Baptist, vol. LXXI. p443.

References.—IV:1.—T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. iii. p242. J. M. Neale, Sermons Preached in a Religious House, vol. i. p238. IV:1-6.—Expositor (4th Series), vol. iii. p92. IV:2.—W. P. Balfern, Lessons from Jesus, p285. J. Caird, Sermons, p1. Archbishop Magee, The Gospel and the Age, p295. Christian World Pulpit, vol. li. p79. H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit, No1674 , p431. Expositor (7th Series), vol. vi. p90. IV:3.—T. Arnold, Christian Life; Its Hopes, p339. Expositor (4th Series), vol. i. p201. IV:3 , 4.—F. D. Maurice, Sermons, vol. i. p117. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxviii. No1663. IV:4.—W. H. Hutchings, Sermon Sketches (2Series), p114. Penny Pulpit, No1665 , p359. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxxv. No2077; and vol. xxxix. No2304. Expositor (4th Series), vol. ii. p285; ibid. vol. x. p42; ibid. (5th Series), vol. ii. p88; ibid. (6th Series), vol. vii. p278; ibid. vol. ix. p233. IV:5.—J. G. Rogers, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xlvii. p52. H. H. Henson, The Record, vol. xxvii. p596. H. Harries, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xliv. p267. Expositor (6th Series), vol. ix. p272.

The World's Indictment of Christianity

2 Corinthians 4:6

I. There are in the Main Three Counts in the Indictment which the spirit of the age brings against Christianity.

(a) In a tone of tolerant benevolence the educated man of the world says to us: "Your ethics on the whole are sound and good, but they are entangled in a mythology which has become incredible and almost barbarous. Keep the best of the 2 Corinthians 4:6-7

The thought in the preceding verse is that God has made us light-bearers. The glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ has shined upon our hearts, filled our inner lives, spread thence to the outward life, and made us Divinely kindled lamps, mirrors to show Him to the world. Then, as the Apostle thinks of the feeble and unworthy instruments which are employed for this high purpose, he glides into another figure. The light is Divine, the light-holder is weakly human. The thing which holds has no intrinsic beauty and dignity; it derives them from the treasure entrusted to it.

I. We have here the lowly confession, the self-depreciatory language of all the saints, that they are the feeblest of instruments made strong and serviceable by the indwelling power of the Almighty. Left to ourselves we are among the creatures that crawl and grovel; united to the Holy One we receive power to become the sons of God. In that simple truth there is the casting down of every proud imagination, and the lifting up of the soul to a throne of power. There man loses himself, and finds his lost self again glorified. The secret of all religious strength lies in this profound conviction. It is to be conscious of a Divine power that raises us from the dust and upholds our feeble goings.

II. The second thought is that through these feeble instruments God manifests Himself to the world. Human souls irradiated with His light are the best and truest, and in one sense the only certain, witness of His presence and working on the earth. The Church does not win way in the world by her creeds and defences, but by her moral superiority. The real power of the Church has always been in the heroic, self-forgetting, saintly lives that it produced.

III. The human instrument is to forget itself in the work, to hide itself as far as possible that the Divine power may have full play, that God alone may be magnified, "that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us". Wherever the Divine fire burns, in the heart with purest flame, there the servant will most forget himself in the enthralling desire to make the Master all in all. The best of the old Greek vases, those which were fashioned with most delicate and exquisite skill, were so thin and transparent that they showed all the treasure within and could hardly be seen themselves. And surely those are Christ's best workmen who seek to make their own lives like that.

—J. G. Greenhough, The Cross in Modern Life, p134.

2 Corinthians 4:6-7

Fra Bartolomeo, the great Italian painter, stole into a monastery to get away from the din and guilt of the world, and threw his paints and canvas away because he thought they were stealing his heart from God. But then his fellow-monks said to him, "Why should you not paint again for the glory of God?" and he painted those charming, thrilling pictures of Gospel scenes and holy martyrs which are still seen in Italy today, and before which men stand, and even kneel, with tears in their eyes. Now, when his brother-monks bade him, as was the custom in those days, to write his name at the foot of each picture, he said: "No; I have not done it for my own glory, but to show forth Christ to men"; and so he just scratched on each work: "Pray for the picture, or pray for the painter—for the painter that he may do his work in a better way, for the picture that it may more clearly show the Lord: and let the name of the artist be forgotten".

Reference.—IV:6 , 7.—J. G. Greenhough, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xlix. p307.

The Treasure in Earthen Vessels

2 Corinthians 4:7

I. What is the special treasure to which Paul refers? It is definitely mentioned in the preceding verse: "The light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ". Knowledge of any kind has a certain value. But though in a broad sense "knowledge is power," many things we learn are of small account, and of transient advantage. Indeed, some knowledge we should be better without, for there is no fallacy more fatal than that which tempts a young man to "know life," which usually means to have experience of its doubtful or its wicked enjoyments. Whether in literature or in amusement it is infinitely better to remain, as far as possible, ignorant of evils which God hates, and sent His Son to put away. But as the heavens are high above the earth, so the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ is exalted above all knowledge of that kind. This knowledge, supreme above all others, may come in glimpses to the student of nature with her marvels, or to the student of history with its evidences of Divine control; but it only shines radiantly and constantly in the face of Jesus Christ. Remember, we cannot cany the treasure unless we receive it. The light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ must shine in our hearts; or else we shall never help to irradiate the world with it.

II. Let me now suggest a few thoughts on the earthen vessels which contain this treasure. Paul always acknowledged that the vessel existed for the treasure, not the treasure for the vessel. Therefore he recognised that it was of little consequence that he was personally frail, knowing as he did that the truth in him—the Christ in him—was not dependent on his life, nor on his eloquence, nor on his excellence. It is a lesson which it would be well for us all to learn, for self-abnegation is very rare, and very unpopular. It is the treasure, not the vessel, we are to be anxious about; just as Aladdin cared much for the gold and jewels in his cavern and little for the earthen jars which contained them. (1) Now from this we may learn a lesson of humility. (2) Again, if it be true that the treasure is in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power (the cause of success, and therefore the credit of it) may be of God and not of us, we may be hopeful as well as humble. God will take care of His own treasures, though the earthen vessels which hold them are exchanged for others, or are broken into fragments.

—A. Rowland, Open Windows and other Sermons, p102.

The Ministering Vessel

2 Corinthians 4:7

Let us examine the passage as workers for Jesus Christ.

I. In the first place Paul thinks very humbly of himself. He calls himself a vessel, an earthen vessel. A vessel, something which is carried, carried by his Master, or else something which merely carries that which his Master puts into it. (1) In the first place, of course, it is necessary that the vessel shall be a clean vessel. The Master will not use dirty vessels. "Be ye clean," says 2 Corinthians 4:10

The modern Christian need not seek to make a martyr of himself, yet he may still bear about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus in other ways.

I. Bearing about the Remembrance.—First of all by bearing about the remembrance of what the Lord Jesus did, and how He died for us, so that the thought of it may unconsciously affect our views of things, and may give a tone and colour to all our thoughts and ideas and opinions. Most of us know what it is to mourn over relatives and friends. Some of us can never quite forget father or mother, child or brother or sister who has gone. We always carry in our secret hearts a fond and loving remembrance of all that they were to us when they were here—a reverent and affectionate regard for the carrying out of their wishes. The old librarian at the Bodleian used every morning to look up at the portrait of John Bodley at the top of the staircase and say to himself, "I will try to do today all that I am sure you would wish me to do".

II. Bearing about its Transforming Power.—And then there is another way in which we may bear about the dying of the Lord Jesus. We may show in our daily life the transforming power of His death. Our whole life ought to be changed and affected by the fact that Christ died for us, so that all with whom we have any intercourse may see we have been affected and influenced by that death; may see upon us, in fact, the mark of the Christian, not outwardly, of course, but in the inward tone, in the general manner and demeanour of those who are so affected.

III. Bearing about its Victory over Sin.—And then, too, we will show the dying of the Lord Jesus in that daily dying to sin and living unto holiness, which is so essential to the Christian, and in the mortifying, killing, and extinguishing the evil thoughts, the bad desires, the crooked, perverse ways, and the aggravating temper, which are today our inheritance from the first Adam. In thus ruling and controlling ourselves we shall be carrying about in our body the dying of our Lord Jesus, we shall be showing to the world that His death has enabled us to have the victory over sin.

IV. Bearing it about Always.—Lastly, let us remember the word "always". Always bear it, never lay it down. Always bear it, not in discontent, but in humility.

From Death Unto Life

2 Corinthians 4:10

The greatest truth of the life and death and resurrection of Christ must be found in the lives of Christians. It always has been so and always will be so. The early Apostles realised this, and so they made it their aim not only to preach Christ but to live Christ. If Christianity is ever to be a power in the world it must first be seen to be such in the lives of those who profess it, and if this was necessary in the first century it is just as necessary in this twentieth century. The world does not ask so much for Christ to be preached as it does for Christ to be lived. That is the meaning of our text.

What does it mean, and how is it to be done? We must now die the death that Christ died in order that we may live again here and now, and be ourselves proofs of the truth of this resurrection.

Consider what the death of Christ means.

I. It was an Act of Complete Self-renunciation —the voluntary death of self. There was no thought of self in the death of Jesus. What a large place self occupies in our hearts. Self must die and Christ must reign in its place. That is one way in which we may bear about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that His life may be made manifest, that men may know that self indeed is dead in us and that Jesus lives instead.

II. It was a Death to the World.—Christ might have been an earthly king surrounded with all pomp and power, but His kingdom was not on this earth. It is as hard to die to the world as it is to die to self, and yet if we are to bear about in our bodies the dying of the Lord Jesus we must die to the world as He did. It takes time for people to say that the business and pleasures of the world cannot satisfy, and yet it is perfectly plain that any man serving Jesus Christ properly must put Him first in all things.

III. The Death of Christ was an Act of Completion.—For some of us this struggle goes on through all our life, and is only ended with actual, physical death, yet this death to self and the world should take place now and here. Jesus Christ did not remain in death, and as He rose so we must rise to a new life altogether.

References.—IV:10.—Expositor (6th Series), vol. xii. p142. IV:10-12.—Ibid. (5th Series), vol. iv. p119. IV:13.—T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. i. p199. IV:14.—Expositor (4th Series), vol. x. p107. IV:15.—T. Binney, King's Weigh-House Chapel Sermons, p198.

Progress Through Decay

2 Corinthians 4:16

It will be well for us at once to set this triumphant utterance of the Apostle Paul in a wide and universal setting. He assures us of an experience in which decay and renewing go on together. It is surely of importance to know that this striking statement is not an isolated and unrelated fact; that it is not a peculiarity of Christian faith which is not repeated anywhere else in the wide world.

I. All progress must take place through change, all growth must be accompanied by decay. When we look deep enough, the antagonism between decay and renewal disappears, for the former is seen to be one of the necessary elements of progress. It is the superficial glance at decay that constitutes our danger, and is likely to lead us into grave mistakes and pessimistic fears. (1) To infer that the man is perishing because his body is decaying is not only a violation of Christian faith, but also an unjustifiable ignoring of all pervading principles of life and thought. (2) Turn to nature, and you find the principle in unceasing action. What is the real meaning of this continual change and decay? They are simply the external sheath of an unresting development. (3) In the world of human thought the same principle is written in characters so large that he that runs may read. The history of our race is strewn with the wrecks of human systems of thought. Can the wisdom of the wise and the visions of the good and great perish utterly? History supplies the answer with unmistakable clearness. By submitting to outward decay, they secure continuance, progress, and immortality. (4) Turning to the sphere of religion, and even that of the Divine 2 Corinthians 4:16

The visible man feels the wear and weight of years; the friction of life gradually exhausts; the eye grows dim, the ear loses its sensitiveness, the limbs miss their firmness and flexibility, the feet their elasticity and fleetness; but the interior man need know no ageing. An unintermitting growth in inward strength and joy is the duty and privilege of every one of us. We are too apt to care for the soul by fits and starts, and against this error the text warns us. God does not perfect us at a stroke, but by constant and protracted discipline. Little by little does God by His spirit bring out of us the infinite beauty and glory which He first put into us when we were made in His own image and likeness.

I. Let us daily instruct and uplift our mind through communion with the truth. Goethe said that we ought every day to see at least one fine work of art, to hear one sweet strain of music, to read one beautiful poem. Wherever such inspirations are practicable they are unquestionably most desirable. But far more than we need this bread of mental delight do we need daily bread for our spiritual imagination and reason, for the building up of our highest life in the glory and contentment of righteousness.

II. By daily fellowship with God let us preserve the soul pure and vigorous. We need daily cleansing. All reputable persons are ever solicitous concerning their physical purity; they scrupulously attend to their personal appearance many times a day; the satirist reproaches some of us for living between "the comb and the glass"; and the cleansing of the soul must be maintained with the same system and ardour if it is to abide in strength and beauty.

III. Make the best of everyday discipline. Carefully improve life's routine and commonplace as well as study to improve its extraordinary occasions. The fullest sanctification of daily routine is one of the greatest secrets that the serious have to learn.

IV. Day by day let us do all the good we can. What a source of sanctification is the life of service! We clamour for large opportunities which are rarely, if ever, granted, missing meanwhile the little openings of daily life. "No day without its line" was the canon of the great painter of antiquity; and thus, one by one, his masterpieces came to perfection. Let our motto be: "No day without its helpful word and deed, however obscure our sphere"; and we too in the kingdom of souls shall turn out masterpieces which no artist in marble or colour may rival.

—W. L. Watkinson, Themes for Hours of Meditation, p1.

Constant Renewal

2 Corinthians 4:16

I. Note that spiritual renewal is the demand and the gift of the Gospel.

II. This spiritual renewal is progressive and constant. Day by day. The fundamental idea is that this renewal does not accomplish itself at a bound, but by slow stages, by constant approximation to a goal far ahead.

III. This progressive renewal is continuous only while we adopt the means. (1) By the steady contemplation of Christ and eternal realities. (2) By the resolute excision and destruction of the old nature.

—A. Maclaren.

References.—IV:16-18.—Hugh Price Hughes, Christian World Pulpit, vol. liii. p337. IV:17.—C. O. Eldridge, Preacher's Magazine, vol. xviii. p216. Expositor (4th Series), vol. i. p34. IV:17 , 18.—H. S. Holland, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lii. p248. G. Body, ibid. vol. lvii. p228. W. Page Roberts, Reasonable Service, p66.

Seen... Not Seen

2 Corinthians 4:18

I have been thinking much about words you will find in the Second Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians, chapter IV, verse18. "Seen... not seen; temporal... eternal,"—the two languages each with a grammar of its own; two styles of music, two gamuts, two different ranges altogether of utterance. Here is a new standard of proportion and a new light of colour and a new expression of life; here, indeed, is a new language bigger and better than our mother tongue. "Our light affliction"—of which we made so much and groaned so deeply; we turned the summer into winter and the day into night: and, lo, a voice came to us suddenly, and found our hearts in a thrilling whisper saying, "light affliction," hardly anything worth mentioning, quite a matter of the surface; there is no duration in it. You should look in the right direction if you would see your own self, O soul; what is now accounted by you as a severe affliction is working out something beyond itself; it is working out for you a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. What does "eternal weight" mean? I never heard these two words put together before; what is the relation of "eternal" to "weight" or of "weight" to "eternal"? It should be thus expressed: Weight upon weight of glory, dawn upon dawn of light, morning upon morning of blaze and radiance. And how does this wondrous vision come about? It comes about whilst we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen.

I. The creed is seen; faith is unseen; that is the distinction. You can alter a creed, you cannot alter faith.

Denominationalism is a thing seen; worship is a thing not seen. Sectarianism is temporal, the Church is eternal.

We might apply the same thought in even the highest direction of all. The Bible in a certain sense is but a book; it was written by men, copied by men, printed by men. We do not look at the merely mechanical book; when we speak of the Bible in our highest moods we speak of the revelation. We do not ask the printer's permission to read it, we know it; we do not ask the priest, the robed fraud, to read it for us, we claim to read it for ourselves, for it is the Father's speech to the son's heart, and between the Father and the 2 Corinthians 4:18

Everything reminds us that what we see is shortlived, a passing show, a bit of stage scenery, a bird on the wing, perishable and perishing; and yet, hidden in the midst of all that, and unseen, there is always something which abides, which outlasts time and decay, which speaks to us of immortality, which bears the mark of a changeless and eternal God.

I. There is decay and death in all things, and imperishable life in all things. God preaches a sermon to us on this text with the coming of every season, and it is but a sample of what He is teaching us every day. It is only the outside that perishes. The tree has life within itself, which will break into joyous beauty again when the springtime comes; the very flowers drop their seed and live again; nature only casts its garments and sleeps awhile, and awakes again, when morning comes, as strong and beautiful as ever. Each human life reads the same lesson if we have only wisdom to receive it. We are always changing as we grow in years; yet there is something deeper in us which changes not We are always dying, yet behold we live. You get the same lesson if you look at human life on a larger scale. The fashions of the world change, and there is perpetual flux, waste, and decay. Humanity puts on new garments, takes up new thoughts, opinions, ambitions, and desires, yet there is something everlasting which abides. God has written eternity in the hidden heart of all things, not to mock us with vain dreams, but to make us certain that there is a happier and nobler life behind the veil.

II. If you would live well and sweetly, you must believe at every point that there are unseen eternal things beneath all that is temporal and seen; you must believe it concerning your own moral endeavour. Look through your worrying weaknesses and failures to that deeper, nobler self which the Spirit of Christ is making for you—the man that is to be—the man of faith and love and goodness, meet to be partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light. You will need it, as St. Paul needed it, in the dark and cloudy days when the heart has its trouble and fears, when there is perhaps more pain than joy, and when one thing after another which has been dear to you slips away as the day fades into the night. Then you will be happy again, as he was, when you remember that it is only the outward man that perishes, and that all the deeper things remain; that, of all which God has given you, nothing will be permanently taken away which it is good for you to have; and that the pain, whatever it may be, is the short night's discipline which prepares you for the joy in the morning.

—J. G. Greenhough, The Divine Artist, p61.

References.—IV:18.—Bishop Winnington-Ingram, Under the Dome, p186. F. D. Maurice, Sermons, vol. iv. p245. H. S. Lunn, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xlviii. p349. C. Vince, The Unchanging Saviour, p278. J. M. Neale, Sermons for the Church Year, vol. ii. p49. John Watson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xlix. p316. C. Bradley, The Christian Life, p1. H. Drummond, The Ideal Life, p127. T. Jones, Christian World Pulpit, vol. li. p40. R. W. Church, Village Sermons (2Series), p171. E. M. Geldart, Echoes of Truth, p90. John Watson, The Inspiration of our Faith, p348. E. H. Bickersteth, Thoughts on Past Years, p59. F. W. Farrar, Everyday Christian Life, p70. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxiii. No1380. Bishop Moule, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lxii. p9. Expositor (4th Series), vol. i. pp34 , 208; ibid. (5th Series), vol. v. p383. A. Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture—Corinthians, p323. V:1.—R. Rainy, Christian World Pulpit, vol. liii. p387. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxix. No1719. W. F. Shaw, Sermon Sketches for the Christian Year, p135. C. Cross, Preacher's Magazine, vol. v. p323. J. D. Jones, Elims of Life, p220. Expositor (4th Series), vol. i. pp34 , 138; ibid. vol. x. p303. A. Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture—Corinthians, p333. V:1 , 2.—R. Higinbotham, Sermons, p28. V:1-3.—Expositor (4th Series), vol. i. p169. V:2.—F. W. Farrar, Christian World Pulpit, vol1. p195. V:2-4.—Expositor (4th Series), vol. iv. p192. V:3-6.—Ibid. (6th Series), vol. i. p210. V:4.—T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. i. p237. J. S. Flynn, Church Family Newspaper, vol. xv. p1028. J. G. Greenhough, The Mind of Christ in St. Paul, p177. V:5.—W. L. Alexander, Sermons, p168. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xvi. No912. Expositor (6th Series), vol. iv. pp187 , 274. A. Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture—Corinthians, p343. V:5-10.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxii. No1303. V:7.—E. J. Boyce, Parochial Sermons, p1. C. S. Macfarland, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lix. p235. W. H. Evans, Short Sermons for the Seasons, p142. A. H. Bradford, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lvi. p136.—H. Woodcock, Sermon Outlines (1Series), p214. C. Voysey, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lii. p43. Bishop Westcott, The Incarnation and Common Life, p263. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xii. No677. Expositor (5th Series), vol. i. p144. V:8.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. vii. No413. A. Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture—Corinthians, p353. V:5.—J. M. Neale, Sermons for the Church Year, vol. ii. p35. R. Higinbotham, Sermons, p220. Expositor (4th Series), vol. ii. p59. A. Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture—Corinthians, p361.