What does it mean that we regard no one according to the flesh (2 Corinthians 5:16)?

Verse 16 springs out of this, as the first word, "Wherefore," bears witness. Because Christ is no longer among us in the life of this world, and because we also now live in connection with Him, a new order of things has come in. Even Christ Himself is known by us in a new way. Paul had not been amongst those who knew Christ "according to flesh" in the days of His flesh. But even if he had been, he would have known Him thus no longer. But also we know no man after the flesh. That is not because men are not in the old condition according to flesh; for the great mass of them are. It is because of the subjective change wrought in ourselves. The Christian learns to look at men in a new way, not because of what has been wrought in them but because of what has been wrought in himself.

Verse 16. "So that we from henceforth know no one after the flesh," etc. There will seem no strangeness in this language to one who has rightly estimated what precedes. Men know and judge, according to the light in which they personally are, and the language of true faith will represent the truth on which faith lives. But that truth is Jesus, as the Spirit now reveals Him to His own. As men already dead with Christ, the apostles, who gloried only in His cross, had lost their natural fellowship with flesh; as risen with Him, they see natural objects with an altered eye, and return to natural relationships in a new and different spirit and power, as well as with another aim. But if apostles tell us their experience, it is that we also may have fellowship with them (1 John 1:3-4). Mankind are now contemplated by those who are spiritual, according to the new power of discernment which has been conferred on them through the unction which they have received (1 John 2:20, 27). They are known, therefore, as "of God," or "of the world," as "within," or "without," as brethren beloved in Christ, or as strangers, if not enemies, to the truth of God; as believers or as unbelievers, as confessors or deniers of the faith of God's elect; and being thus distinguished, they are owned or disowned, accordingly — the practical decision of the spiritual man being proportioned always to the measure of his faith, while the sole standard of comparison is Christ.

And as with our fellow-creatures, so also with the Lord. This is strongly expressed in the latter part of the verse. "If even," says the apostle, "we knew Christ after the flesh, yet now know we Him no more." He is evidently contrasting here, in the first place, a natural knowledge of Messiah — such as a well-trained Israelite might have received by tradition from his fathers, and of which Paul, as a disciple of Gamaliel, had drunk largely — with the true and divinely-given knowledge of Jesus as the Christ, according to the discerning power of the Holy Ghost (1 Cor. 12:3). But there is a further meaning in his words. They relate also to the changed condition of the risen Lord. Paul had not, like the first apostles, known Him in that companionship in which nature had so large a part; when they saw, and heard, and touched the word of life, with but little knowledge of the excellency of that Presence which was all their joy (John 16:6), and which ended by them all forsaking Him. His discipleship did not begin until the marred visage of the Man of sorrows had put on the brightness of that ancient glory which, for a while, He had veiled under a servant's form for our sakes (John 17:5; Heb. 1:3).

What can be better than a Messiah come to bless man in this world? But the Christian is not occupied with this at all. According to the Old Testament he looked at it, but now that the Messiah is seen dead and risen, now that He is passed into heavenly glory through death, this is the glory for the Christian. "Henceforth know we no man after the flesh:" this puts the saints in a common position of knowledge. "Henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh." As for a living Messiah, and all the expectations that were bound up with Him and His coming here below, all this is passed away for the Christian. It is not that the Messiah will not return as such; but as for the sphere and character of our own relations, they are founded on death and resurrection, and seen on high. Such is the way the apostle treats it. He looks at Christ in His relationship with us as One that has passed out of this earth and the lower creation into heavenly places. It is there and thus we know Him. By knowing Him he means the special form of the truth with which we are concerned, the manner in which we are put into positive, living association with Him. That which we know as our centre of union, as the object of our souls, is Christ risen and glorified. In any other point of view, however bright and glorious, "now henceforth know we him no more. Therefore if any man be in Christ," etc.

When, then, the force of no man or even Christ being known any more after the flesh is apprehended, it will be seen that it in no way touches the question of the natural relationships in which we have been placed by the will of God towards one another. It is, in fact, only in the Epistles that bring out our full place in the risen Christ that we find the full recognition of those relationships, as furnishing us with the heavenly springs and motives for a walk in them according to God.

And this meaning is clearly proved by what follows in Corinthians — "wherefore, henceforth know we no man after the flesh." This is the simple and necessary result (for faith, not for sight): if all have died, they are in the flesh no longer; we walk amid a world where men are either alive in Christ or but as it were dead men. But not only so: "yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we Him no more." Even Christ has not taken up again the life which He laid down. He has not returned (that is,) to His former state upon earth. That is over; and the Christ we know is One who is in resurrection in the glory of God. An immeasurably higher condition, you say. Surely it is; but the former one is passed away, and passed away in that which affirmed God's sentence upon it. Where, then, are we who live? In Christ; and "if any man be in Christ, it is new creation: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."

God forbid that we should even think of this as "knowing Christ after the flesh." The Jews and even His disciples had carnal and earthly expectations of what the Messiah would do. Some of these hopes were purely the ambition of pride; others the misapprehension of Scripture; and even those which were true were not to be fulfilled till after the completion of the present period of grace. "We trusted it had been He who should have redeemed Israel" tells of a blighted hope, which was to be displaced by something far more glorious — while later on the former prospects would all be more than realized.

Such hopes, unenlightened by the Scriptures and by the Holy Spirit, may be classed as "knowing Christ after the flesh" (with the careful guarding against applying such language to the future earthly hopes of Israel, as if they were carnal), but to know Christ as He is revealed in the Gospels is not in any way such as this. It is rather to become acquainted more deeply with His personal character, His faithfulness, love, hatred of sin, kindness and compassion. Let us never think of the Gospels as something lower than the Epistles. They present to us the Person of the Son of God, in His perfect earthly path, as He revealed the Father to us.

Thus the believer can look round full of joy upon his brethren; he can count up souls from every tribe, tongue, and station. Who has been overlooked in the comprehensive and active grace of our God? And what is he then entitled to see? Christ in them. And what a deliverance from self to see Christ in them! Yes, but Christ is "all" as truly as He is "in all." Oh, to forget all that which produces jealousy, pride, vanity, each and every feeling contrary to God and unedifying to man; to be comforted and to comfort others with such a truth — Christ is all, and Christ is in all! Such is God's word, and are we, or are we not, entitled to say so now? Sorrowful circumstances may, alas! require us to pronounce on evil ways in order to look into this evil doctrine or that; but the apostle speaks now of the saints in their ordinary and normal manner. Does not this still abide true? Am I entitled, as I look upon Christians henceforth, to see nothing but Christ in any and Christ in every one? Yes, Christ is in all, and Christ is all. "Put on, therefore" (says he, in the enjoyment of such grace. Now comes the positive character to be borne) — "Put on, therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved." How like the description is to Christ Himself! He was God's chosen One in the highest sense; He was the holy and beloved. Who ever appealed in distress, and did not find in Him bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering? Then follows that which could be said of us alone. "If any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye." Forgiving one another is fortified by His example who did no sin, neither was evil found in His mouth. Christ on earth was a blessed pattern of forgiveness and forbearance. "Even as Christ forgave you." He now brings Him in openly, and to ourselves.

Verse 3. 'Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory,' etc. The ordinary play of motive and power in the world is to be reversed among those who, if in the world, are in it only as God's witnesses. Christ having been solemnly acknowledged as the supplanter of self, through a true appreciation of the death and resurrection of the Lord, party-spirit and vainglory cease naturally, and can have no place so, long as faith is working effectually by love. Yet how easily these old and hateful forms of evil might reassert themselves, and both seek and find cover under the fairest pretensions of zeal, was even then before the Apostle's eyes at Rome, and had been already pointed out to his brethren at Philippi.9 He warns them, therefore, the more earnestly to shun the evil and pursue the good — to think lowly of themselves, remembering their deep and common abasement as lost sinners, and in love regarding one another in the Lord; none eyeing his neighbour grudgingly, with a desire to spy out his inconsistencies — that dear delight of our carnal minds — but rather noting with honour, each in the other, any trait of Christ that showed itself to love's quick eye, and in all cases remembering to estimate His people according to their value in His sight.

Are we willing to walk in that path? No one would deny we ought; but are we disposed to do it? Would our hearts be glad of the power of that grace which, holding the flesh as dead, can say, Here I am in the power of that love to walk as everybody's servant? We are to esteem others better than ourselves. If my heart is full of Christ, I judge myself for everything not like Christ, I judge the evil in myself because I see the blessedness in Christ. But what do I see in my brother? I see Christ in him. The effect of being full of Christ is to make me think little of self and much of my brother: there is no real difficulty about it if one is.

Are we willing to walk in that path? No one would deny we ought; but are we disposed to do it? Would our hearts be glad of the power of that grace which, holding the flesh as dead, can say, Here I am in the power of that love to walk as everybody's servant? We are to esteem others better than ourselves. If my heart is full of Christ, I judge myself for everything not like Christ: I judge the evil in myself because I see the blessedness in Christ. But what do I see in my brother? I see Christ in him. The effect of being full of Christ is to make me think little of self and much of my brother: there is no real difficulty about it if one is.