2 Corinthians 3:4–6

"Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God." Christianity does not only shut out despair; it gives assurance. And that assurance stands on the firmest ground there is with God — Christ Himself. His work puts the believer into the same acceptance, nearness and favour that our Lord enjoyed through His own personal relationship with God and His perfection as man. That is what a Saviour like Him means, aims at, and achieves. Anything less would treat Him and His work lightly. But here the apostle speaks of confidence about his ministry, which is just as true and flows from the same grace.

The effect of his preaching was a joy to see in the changed lives of the Corinthians, which the Spirit had produced. This leads the Apostle to speak of his confidence about his ministry. He was confident that, by the grace of God given to him through Christ, his ministry was the truth that the Spirit could use to give life.

He knew, sadly, that the flesh was in believers, and even stood out in them. So his confidence about them had to be confidence through the Lord. And that is why it is a ground of confidence that never fails. He was sure that they really were God's own workmanship, and so he could speak as he does here.

What trust? Is he thinking here of his own fitness as a minister of the Church by the grace of God, or of the effect of that ministry? I have no doubt that the second is the main meaning of these words, though the first is of course included… And to an eye that saw as Paul saw, Christ's letter, then on open display at Corinth, might look ugly. It was full of blots and rubbed-out lines. Its genuineness even looked doubtful, because God's finger had traced it so faintly, while the flesh had written in its own bold insertions. Yet Paul did not stumble at this evidence of the enemy's power. He still trusted, through Christ, in the One who is above that proud enemy.

God had not chosen the apostles because they were able in themselves for matters so great and wonderful. Such work is far beyond any human ability. But when He chooses someone, He supplies the ability to carry out the work He entrusts to that person… Paul would not separate the ability from its source in any way. Do that, and the ability is lost at once.

Eternal issues hang on the true preaching of Christ, whether the words are Paul's in the first century or ours today. No wonder the question comes up: "Who is sufficient for these things?" Paul raises it there but does not answer it at once. He answers it in verse 5 of the next chapter. The whole thing is of God, so there is no sufficiency but of God. If only every servant of God kept this in mind! It would make us deeply earnest and dependent on the power of God.

The thoughts of man are not the thoughts of God, and an apostle of Christ is no exception… Self-help is the most attractive of nature's idols, and as a minister of God he would have nothing to do with it. What is right and even necessary in everyday matters must be given up in the true service of Christ, and overcome there as an obstacle… Paul admits that he can neither think nor act out of himself. The thought is the parent of the work, and man's thoughts can neither plan nor direct the work of God. He was emptied of self so that he might be filled more completely with the energy of God.

Even the apostles, who were able ministers of the new covenant with wonderful gifts and qualifications, used to say that they could not of themselves think anything as coming from themselves, and that their sufficiency was of God. If such mighty men of God declared their inability to think a right thought apart from the teaching of the Spirit, how appalling it is in these days to find so many relying on learning and natural ability, and expressing their opinions of the Scriptures with such boldness.

"Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God." Christianity not only shuts out despair but gives assurance, and on the firmest ground with God, even Christ… Yet with it goes the most earnest denial of any competency of his own, while he owns that God gave it to him for service under the new covenant.

Paul does not allow that the power is "from" God, as something apart from Him, given over to us. No — it is divine, and yet inseparable from Him who works. It is "of God" and yet not "of us." That does more than deny that the power could be ours: the word Paul uses stresses even more strongly that the power is of God and not from us.

God did not choose the apostles because of any competency of their own. Matters so great and wonderful lie far beyond human competency in any case. But when He chooses a vessel, He supplies the ability for the work He entrusts to it… Paul would not separate the competency from its source in any way. Cut it off from its source and it is gone at once.

All the Lord's servants must learn this lesson sooner or later. They have nothing in themselves, in their position, or in their circumstances that God can use. In a word, all our resources and strength lie outside ourselves, in Him: our sufficiency is of God.

Everyone who works for the Lord should remember that the work needs power from on high. To take up His work apart from His grace and His Spirit is presumption. It slights the Lord, it harms us, and it gives Satan an opening he is quick to seize.

The apostle had confidence before God about this. He claims no personal competency for such service. He says instead that his competency comes from God, who had made him a competent minister of the new covenant — not of letter, but of spirit.

So God had made him, with others, a competent minister of a new covenant. It was not a covenant of letter, as the old covenant of the law was, but a covenant of spirit. The new covenant is, as we know, entirely the declaration of God's "I will"s: not a demand upon man, but an assurance of what He works for and in men. So it must be a covenant of grace.

With whom is the new covenant primarily made? With the house of Israel and the house of Judah. We, as Gentiles, are neither one nor the other, and so may well ask what application it has to us. 2 Corinthians 3:6 gives the answer — we are ministers of it, not exactly of the doctrine of it, but of its practical reality and present application. Look at what comes next: "not of the letter, but of the spirit." The letter is what we have literally, in Jeremiah. The spirit is what lay behind God's mind: the principles on which He will deal with Israel when they are restored under the new covenant. He applies those principles to us now… We get all the blessings of the new covenant now, in the spirit, but not in the letter.

We get the expression "the letter" twice in verse 6. The same word, in a slightly different form, comes again in verse 7, where it is translated "written." The New Translation renders it "the ministry of death, in letters, engraved on stones." This shows that in this passage the term "letter" refers to the law. The law kills. Its ministry is to death. The Spirit gives life.

For the letter kills, as a rule imposed on man. The Spirit gives life, as the power of God in grace — that is, God's purpose brought home to the heart of man by the power of God, who gave it to him so that he might enjoy it.

The law, the letter, killed. It was meant to show man what God required, and so to give him the sentence of death in himself. The gospel, on the other hand, ministered righteousness. It provided righteousness instead of requiring it, and so it was life to souls, not death.

This statement is often wrongly interpreted. The word "letter" does not mean the entire written Word of God. Many have taken that view. They declare that the Bible must not be taken literally, just as it says… The question here is not between the literal words and meaning of Scripture and its spiritual meaning. It is a contrast between the old covenant and the new, between law and gospel.

Whether the words are the law's or the gospel's, taking them in with the mind alone only leads to formality and death. Only what is "of the Spirit" can result in life.

We must never suppose for one moment that we can do without the letter of Scripture. Nor can we have its spirit apart from the letter… If we tried, we would land in mysticism of a most dangerous kind, and fall prey to the imaginings of the human mind.