“We look not at
the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things
which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2
Cor. 4:18).
As mentioned in
our first reflection, I want to connect 4:18 with 4:6 and with 5:16, having
done that we will, the Lord willing, work our way outward into the other
sections of 2 Corinthians.
“For God, who
said, “Light shall shine out of darkness,” is the One who has shone in our
hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of
Christ” (2 Cor. 4:6).
To what is Paul referring
in quoting God?
Of course he is
directing our attention to Genesis 1:3, “Then God said, “Let there be light”
and there was light.”
Did you notice
that Paul’s quotation is slightly different in form than Genesis 1:3? In
Genesis 1:3 we read, “Let there be light.” In 2 Corinthians 4:6 it is, “Light
shall shine out of darkness.”
I don’t know if
someone has tracked down another version or a variant to reconcile the two verses,
but I don’t think they require reconciliation because while the form of the
quotation may be a bit different, the content is the same. Genesis tells
us that there was darkness, that God said, “Let there be light,” and that God
separated the light from the darkness. Paul’s quotation, “Let light shine out
of darkness,” gets to the heart of the matter.
We ought to take
note of this, for we want to learn to look beyond the outside of the seed,
outside its form, and look inside; we want to learn to look beyond appearances and
see the heart of the matter.
“It is the
Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken
to you are spirit and are life” (John 6:63).
It should not
surprise us that Paul writes, “The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2
Cor. 3:6) and that he does this in 2 Corinthians, in which he writes that we
are not to look at what is seen, but what is unseen.
Why does Paul
direct his readers’ attention to Genesis 1:6? He does so because the Genesis
Creation narrative is our narrative in Jesus Christ, it is our story as new
creations in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ, the Word, created all things, He is
the Light of the world – He is the very Light that shines in darkness! “The
Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overpower it” (John 1:1 –
5!).
As the earth
came out of the waters in Genesis, so you and I come out of the waters of
baptism as new creations in Christ Jesus.
Note that Paul
continues the Creation narrative in 2 Corinthians Chapter 5, “Therefore if
anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; new
things have come” (5:17).
In 2 Corinthians
4:2 – 4 we see darkness, in 4:6 we see Light. Is it the Light we expect? That
is, are the results of the “Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the
face of Christ” what a reasonable person might anticipate?
Verse 7 begins
with a BUT, and what a BUTit is!
Paul immediately
reminds us that the treasure of the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God
in the face of Christ is found in earthen vessels, frail vessels, vessels
subject to breaking, shattering, cracking, leakage. What does being a New
Creation in Jesus look like?
“We are afflicted
in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but
not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always bearing about in the body
the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our body.
For we who live [that is, we who have the Light of Christ and the glory of
God!] are constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that
the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death
works in us, but life in you” (2 Cor. 4:8 – 12).
Sounds like a
good time, doesn’t it?
Is this not one
of many reasons why Paul writes that he and his friends don’t look at what is
seen but rather at what is unseen? To read 4:8 – 12 and not to see beyond the
outer cover of the seed being sown, is to despair, to be confused, to even
perhaps reject the Cross which we are to daily embrace and to love.
We are going to
return to this passage in our next reflection in this series, but for now, I
hope we will see that when Paul reads Genesis Chapter One, that he sees beyond
the outer, beyond the visible, and he sees Jesus Christ; he sees the story of
our becoming new creations in Jesus Christ. Paul sees, in Genesis, the process
of transformation into the image of Christ which he portrays in 2 Corinthians,
for example in 4:7 – 5:15, what we might term sanctification and spiritual
formation. (He introduces Eve and the serpent in 2 Cor. 11:3!)
When Paul reads
and ponders Genesis Chapter One, he sees the invisible.
After God said, “Let
there be light,” there was still work to be done. After God says, “Let there be
Light in Susan, John, Christine, Pete, Martha, and Patrick, there is still work
to be done.
As we ponder the
invisible and as we learn to see it and live in it in Christ, let us recall:
“The Lord is the
Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with
unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being
transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the
Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:17 – 18).
What does this transformation
look like?
It looks, in
part, like 2 Corinthians 4:7 – 18.
