Exposition of 2 Cor. 3:7

THAT the apostle has in this chapter introduced the service of the two covenants; all must admit. We will carry out the comparison by an examination of other scriptures concerning them.

In Heb. 8:6, Paul says Christ is the mediator of a better covenant, that is, of the new covenant. But "a mediator is not a mediator of one." Gal. 3:20. There must be at least two parties between whom he mediates. The parties in this matter are God, the Father, the Lawgiver, and man, the sinner. "For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus." 1 Tim. 2:5. Therefore, as Christ is the mediator of this covenant between God and men, he is not the party covenanting, but the Father is.

"Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt." We know that these are the words of the Father, and not of the Son; for the Son is the mediator of the covenant, and, as already shown, there must be two contracting parties between whom he mediates.

Again, when the covenanting party says: "I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts," Jer. 31:33, we know that it refers to the law of the Father, the covenanting party, and not to the law of the Son, the mediator. It is through the instrumentality of the mediator that the law of the covenanter is put into the hearts of those with whom the covenant is made. See 2 Cor. 3:3; 5:18, 19, and many other Scriptures which show that Jesus puts away our sin and reconciles us to his Father.

God publicly proclaimed his law to Israel when he made a covenant with them at Horeb. He wrote it upon two tables of stone. When Moses brought down these tables, when he came from the presence of the Lord, his face shone with glory so that he had to vail it while he talked with Israel. The glory upon his face represented the glory of that covenant of which he was the mediator, as Paul plainly says, which is done away. The law (which was not vailed, and is not done away) was put into the ark, and over it the high priest sprinkled the blood of the sin offering, to take away their sins, showing that in regard to this law they were sinners. This was the law concerning which the covenant was made. Compare Ex. 9:5-8; Deut. 4:12, 13; Ex. 24:6-8. When God spoke to Israel by Jeremiah, six hundred years before Christ, concerning the covenant he made with their fathers, and promised to make a new covenant with them in which he would put his law in their hearts, and forgive their sins, their minds were at once directed to the law which was the condition of the first covenant; for their sins, of which forgiveness was promised in the new covenant, were transgressions of that law. In the old covenant the law was written in tables of stone; in the new, in "fleshly tables of the heart."

Coming down to the New Testament, Jesus said he did not come to make void the law, Matt. 5:17, and Paul says it is not made void through faith, Rom. 3:31; but by it all are condemned before God, for by it is the knowledge of sin. Verses 19, 20. He was convinced of sin by the law, Rom. 7:7; and he consented unto it as holy, just, and good, showing that his mind approved it, insomuch that he called it the law of his mind. Verses 16, 23. And not only did his mind approve it, but his heart embraced it, for he delighted in it after the inward man. Verse 22. All this shows that that preexisting law which faith in Christ does not make void, which the Saviour did not destroy, now proves men sinners, and that Paul, as a representative man under the new covenant, had this law put in his mind and written in his heart. And so the promise of the new covenant was fulfilled in him. And he also declared that the very object of the gospel of Christ is that the righteousness, or precept, of the law may be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. Rom. 8:4. By this is shown that they who violate the law walk after the flesh, while they who fulfill it through faith in Christ walk after the Spirit, which is yet further shown in verse 7: "Because the carnal mind (literally, the minding of the flesh) is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God." Paul also says "that the law is spiritual." Rom. 7:14. Of course the spiritually minded love and obey it, while the carnally minded can do neither.

Now, from the standpoint of these words of Paul, of his own experience, and of the promises of the new covenant, it is easy to perceive the drift of his remarks in 2 Cor. 3. We, the apostles, said he, are able ministers of the new covenant, not of the old. That was glorious; this excels in glory. In that the law was written on stones; in this, in these fleshly tables of the heart. When that was ordained, the mediator, or first priest, vailed his face to hide from Israel a glory which they could not look upon, the import of which they did not understand; in this, we all with open face behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. The law when written only on stone, can have no converting power, and there was no promise of forgiveness in that covenant; in this, the law is written in the heart by the Spirit of God, past sin is forgiven, and the subjects are changed into the same image, the image of the Lord, the mediator, from glory to glory. As our sins are taken away by the blood of the covenant, and the carnal mind, the enmity to the law is removed, we are reconciled to God, at peace with him, and can behold the glory with unvailed face, because we are partakers of the same glory.

One point, barely mentioned, deserves a futher notice in this connection. The law on the tables of stone were separated from all other laws, and was put into the ark over which the priests ministered for sin.

A certain writer, highly recommended by his denomination, when pressed to give a reason for this distinction and separation of the decalogue from all other laws, said:

"The decalogue is the constitution of the Mosaic code, i. e., it sustains the same relation to the laws that the constitution of the United States sustains to our laws. . . . I can easily account for God's writing only the ten commandments. They were the Jewish constitution, and constitutions are usually better cared for than other laws."

This is truth, and it is an important concession. And as our laws are subject to change or abolition without affecting the constitution, so were theirs; the special, local, or positive laws given to Israel were abolished, but that did not affect the constitution on which they were based. That was of force and convinced of sin before they were given, and it remains of force since they were nailed to the cross; for it yet remains a truth that "by the law is the knowledge of sin." We have traced these precepts from the beginning, and they have ever taken hold on man's moral relations to God. They are the basis, or constitution, of God's moral government on earth; and as long as that government exists—as long as man's moral relations to his Creator exist—so long must these precepts endure.

But, the objector says, this was the constitution of the Jewish government, and that having passed away, the constitution is no longer of force. A more plausible objection cannot be stated, but it is a fallacy. The fact that the ten precepts are moral and are indispensable for the welfare of society and the preservation of morality and religion, is quite sufficient to refute the objection. They are, in fact, the groundwork of all correct human governments; but the rise and fall of these governments has no effect on their perpetuity or power. Our government does not make it wrong to steal and to kill. It protects society by punishing these actions because they are wrong. And so it is in respect to all civil governments, the Jewish not excepted. Blasphemy, murder, adultery, etc., would have been wrong if the Jewish government or Jewish nation had never existed. According to the theory of the opposers of the law, these things first became wrong after Israel left Egypt! If it had been the basis of the Jewish economy only, having no force outside of that typical system, the objection would bear with force. But the most bitter opponents of the law accept the law as a necessity in society: they even pay a portion of respect to the fourth commandment by not discarding entirely its principle, for they choose a day as a substitute for the one enjoined in that commandment. We have proved that that law was the basis of the Abrahamic covenant, and also, by both Scripture and reason, that it was, and is, binding on the Gentiles as well as on the Jews. Therefore its being connected with any temporary system has no effect on its perpetuity.

But there is one very important fact, clearly revealed in Scripture, which this objection disregards. We insist that "the kingdom of Israel" is not abolished. It is only suspended for a season "till He come whose right it is." Eze. 21:25-27. Israel is the Scriptural name for the seed and heirs of Abraham, and therefore Israel cannot cease from before the Lord as long as the promises to Abraham stand sure. In Eph. 2, speaking to Gentile converts to Christianity, Paul said they were, before their conversion, "aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world."

Both covenants were made with Israel. Heb. 8:8, 9. To them pertain the covenants, the promises, the adoption, and the glory. Rom. 9:4. And therefore "salvation is of the Jews." John 4:22. The covenant made with Israel, Jer. 31:31, the promises, the adoption, the glory, the salvation, all remain to this day. These did not pass away that substitutes might be given to the Gentiles, but the middle wall of partition is broken down, and the Gentiles are "grafted in," Rom. 11, "that the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel." Eph. 3:6. The conclusion is drawn by the apostle in Eph. 2:19. Still addressing converts from the Gentiles, he says: "Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners [from the commonwealth of Israel], but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God." It needs no argument to show that when the Gentiles are graffed in and become citizens of the commonwealth of Israel, they are in duty bound to obey the constitution of that commonwealth. And this they will do if they are good citizens; and if they refuse to do this, they disfranchise themselves. See Rom. 6:14-16. In harmony with this idea, Rev. 21:12 says the New Jerusalem, the heavenly city, has its twelve gates named after the twelve tribes of the children of Israel. The "God of Israel" hath prepared for them a city, and because the commandments are Israel's constitution it is said, "Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city." Rev. 22:14. None but the "Israel of God" will enter those gates. Gal. 6:16. Compare Rom. 2:28, 29; Gal. 3:19.

The naming of the gates of the heavenly city after the twelve tribes of Israel is suggestive. That city belongs to the Israel of God. To enter those gates they must keep his commandments. When God gathered his chosen people on earth to the city which was called by his name, he gave by the Spirit a pattern of a temple. 1 Chron. 28:11, 12, 19. In this temple was an inner sanctuary, called the most holy place, in which was set the ark containing the constitution of the commonwealth. It was called the ark of the covenant. That city and temple are now destroyed, and the Israel of God, heirs of the promises, are taught to fix their hopes on the New Jerusalem, the city above, the mother of us all. And as in the earthly tabernacle the high priest was appointed to minister over the ark in behalf of the law which the people had transgressed, so in the heavenly, we have an High Priest ministering for sinners. And, as "by the law is the knowledge of sin," he ministers to remove their transgressions of the law, and to vindicate its authority. And thus we read, "The temple of God was opened in Heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament." Rev. 11:18. Here we behold Israel's High Priest in Israel's city, and the great constitution laid up in the ark. Truly the constitution is well "cared for," as it is of exceeding great value.

We are willing to submit this part of the subject to every candid reader. The following points are established:-

1. The ministration, or service, of the priests was not written on the tables of stone.

2. The distinction between the ministration and that which was written on stone is a necessary distinction, resting on an evident fact, and is sustained by such authors as Anderson, Olshausen, Bloomfield, Lange, Dean Alford, Connybeare and Howson, and Barnes.

3. That Paul speaks of the ministration, in a figure, as the above eminent authors clearly show.

4. The opposition view supposes that to be written on stone which, as a plain matter of fact, was not written thereon, and makes that void which Paul says is not made void, and perverts the gospel of Christ by substituting license for pardon.

5. Both the context and other scriptures, especially the promises of the new covenant, show that that which was written on the tables of stone is now written on "the fleshly tables of the heart."