Homily 8 — Second Corinthians 4, verses 1 to 7

“Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we do not lose heart; but we have renounced the hidden things of shame.” [a]

He had said great things, and had set himself and all the faithful above Moses. Now, aware of how high and how great the things he had said were, notice how he tones down his language again. Because of the false apostles, he had to lift up his hearers as well; and yet he also had to calm that swelling down again — but not to do away with it, since that would have been the act of a trifler. So he manages it another way, by showing that none of it came from their own merits, but all of it from God’s love for humankind. That is why he says, “Therefore, since we have this ministry.” We contributed nothing more, he means, than that we became servants and put ourselves at the service of the things God gave. That is why he did not say “bounty” or “provision,” but “ministry.” And he was not content even with this, but added, “as we have received mercy.” For even this itself, he says — serving these things — comes from mercy and love for humankind. Yet it belongs to mercy to rescue from evils, not to give so many good things besides; but the mercy of God includes this as well.

“We do not lose heart.” This too must be credited to his love for humankind. For take the words “as we have received mercy” as said of both: of “this ministry,” and of “we do not lose heart.” And notice how earnestly he tries to play down his own part. “For a man who has been counted worthy of such great things, and that from mercy and love for humankind alone, to show such labors, and face dangers, and endure trials — that is no great matter. So we not only do not sink down; we even rejoice and speak boldly.” So, having said, “we do not lose heart,” he added, in verse 2: “But we have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully.”

And what are “the hidden things of shame”? We do not, he says, claim and promise great things and then show something else in our actions, as they do. That is why he also said, “You look at things according to outward appearance.” But we are just what we appear to be. There is no double-dealing in us; we do not say or do the kind of things we would have to hide and cover over with shame and blushing. And to explain this he added, “not walking in craftiness.” What they considered praiseworthy, he proves to be shameful and contemptible. But what does “in craftiness” mean? They had the reputation of taking nothing, but they did take, and kept it secret. They had the name of holy men and approved apostles, but they were full of countless evils. But we, he says, “have renounced” these things — for these are what he calls “the hidden things of shame” — being just what we appear to be, and keeping nothing covered over. And that not only in our life, but in the preaching itself. That is what “nor handling the word of God deceitfully” means.

“But by the open display of the truth.” Not by our looks and outward show, but by the very proof of our deeds. “Commending ourselves to everyone’s conscience.” For we are plain to see not only to believers but to unbelievers too. We lie open to all, so that they may test our actions however they choose; and this is how we commend ourselves — not by playing a part and carrying around a handsome mask. We say that we take nothing, and we call you as witnesses. We say that we are aware of no wickedness in ourselves, and for this too we take the testimony from you — not like them, the false apostles, who cover up their affairs and deceive many. No, we set our life out before all people, and we lay the preaching bare, so that everyone understands it.

Then, because the unbelievers did not know its power, he added that this is no fault of ours, but of their own lack of perception. That is why he says, in verses 3 and 4, “But if our good news is veiled, it is veiled in those who are lost; in whom the God of this world has blinded the eyes of the unbelieving.” As he also said before, “To some an aroma from death to death, to others an aroma from life to life” (Second Corinthians 2, verse 16), so he says here too. [c]

But what is “the God of this world”? Those infected with Marcion’s ideas say that this is said of the Creator, who is only just and not good; for they say there is a certain God who is just but not good. The Manichaeans, for their part, say that the devil is meant here, wanting to use this passage to bring in another creator of the world besides the true one — which is utterly senseless. For Scripture often uses the word “God” not because of the dignity of the one so named, but because of the weakness of those who are subject to it, as when it calls mammon “lord” and the belly “god.” But the belly is not therefore God, nor is mammon Lord, except to those who bow down to them.

But we say that this passage speaks neither of the devil nor of another creator, but of the God of all things, and that it should be read like this: “God has blinded the minds of the unbelievers of this world.” For the world to come has no unbelievers; only this present one does. And even if someone reads it the other way, as “the God of this world,” that still gives them no handle, for it does not show him to be God of this world only. He is called “the God of heaven” (Psalm 136, verse 26, and elsewhere), yet he is not God of heaven only. We say, “God of this present day,” yet we do not say it to limit his power to that day alone. He is called, besides, “the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob” (Exodus 3, verse 6, and elsewhere), and yet he is not their God alone. And one can find many other such testimonies in the Scriptures.

How, then, has he “blinded” them? Not by working to that end — far from it! — but by letting it happen and allowing it. Scripture often speaks this way, as when it says, “God gave them over to a debased mind.” For when they themselves had first refused to believe and made themselves unworthy to see the mysteries, he himself from then on let it be so. What should he have done? Drag them by force, and reveal things to people who did not want to see? But then they would have despised them all the more, and would not have seen anyway. That is why he added, “so that the light of the good news of the glory of Christ should not dawn on them.”

Not so that they would disbelieve in God, but so that unbelief would not see the things within — just as he also commanded us not to “throw the pearls before the pigs” (Matthew 7, verse 6). For if he had revealed them even to those who refuse to believe, their disease would only have grown worse. If you force a man suffering from inflamed eyes to look at the sun’s rays, you make his illness worse; that is why physicians even shut such people up in the dark, so as not to aggravate the disorder. So here too we must understand that these people became unbelievers of their own accord; but once they had become so, they no longer saw the secret things of the good news, since from then on God shut its rays off from them. As he also said to the disciples, “This is why I speak to them in parables, because hearing they do not hear” (Matthew 13, verse 13).

What I am saying can be made clearer still by an example. Suppose a Greek who considers our religion a collection of fables. How would this man gain more — by coming in and seeing the mysteries, or by staying outside? That is why he says, “so that the light should not dawn on them,” still dwelling on the story of Moses. For what happened to the Jews in his case happens to all unbelievers in the case of the good news.

And what is it that is overshadowed and does not shine on them? Hear him say it: “So that the light of the glorious good news of Christ, who is the image of God, should not dawn on them.” That is: that the cross is the salvation of the world, and his glory; that this crucified one is going to come with great splendor; and all the rest — things present, things to come, things seen, things unseen, the indescribable splendor of the things we look for. That is why he said “dawn”: so that you would not look for the whole of it here, since what is given here is only, as it were, a small dawning of the Spirit. That is also why, earlier, pointing to this, he spoke of an “aroma” (Second Corinthians 2, verse 16), and again of a “down payment” (Second Corinthians 1, verse 22), showing that the greater part remains in the world to come. Nevertheless, all these things have been hidden from them; but they were hidden because they refused to believe first.

Then, to show that they are ignorant not only of the glory of Christ but of the Father’s too, since they do not know his, he added, “who is the image of God.” So do not stop at Christ alone. For just as through him you see the Father, so if you do not know his glory, you will not know the Father’s either.

Verse 5: “For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake.” [j]

And what is the connection here? What does this have to do with what was said before? Either he is hinting at those men as exalting themselves and persuading the disciples to name themselves after them — as he said in the former letter, “I am of Paul, and I of Apollos” — or else at something of the gravest kind. What is that? Since they were waging fierce war against him and his companions, and plotting against them on every side, he says: “Is it with us that you fight and make war? No, it is with the one we preach, ‘for we preach not ourselves.’ I am a servant; I am only a minister, even of those who receive the good news, doing everything for another, and doing whatever I do for his glory. So when you make war on me, you are tearing down what is his. For I am so far from turning any part of the good news to my own personal advantage that I do not refuse to be even your servant for Christ’s sake, since it seemed good to him to honor you so, since he loved you so much and did everything for you.” That is why he says, “and ourselves your servants for Christ’s sake.” Do you see a soul clean of the love of glory? “For truly,” he says, “we not only take nothing of our Master’s for ourselves; we even submit ourselves to you for his sake.”

Verse 6: “For it is God who said, Light will shine out of darkness, who has shone in your hearts.”

Do you see how, once again, to those who longed to see that surpassing glory — I mean the glory of Moses — he shows it flashing with even greater brightness? “As on the face of Moses, so it has also shone in your hearts,” he says. And first he reminds them of what was made at the beginning of creation, the light of the senses and the darkness of the senses, showing that this creation is the greater. And where did he command light to shine out of darkness? At the beginning, in the prelude to creation. For it says, “Darkness was on the face of the deep. And God said, Let there be light, and there was light.” But then he said, “Let it be,” and it was; now he said nothing, but himself became light for us. For Paul did not say, “has now also commanded,” but “has” himself “shone.” That is why, by the shining of this light, we do not see the objects of the senses, but God himself, through Christ.

Do you see the sameness within the Trinity? Of the Spirit he says, “But we all, with unveiled face reflecting as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord the Spirit” (Second Corinthians 3, verse 18). And of the Son: “So that the light of the glorious good news of Christ, who is the image of God, should not dawn on them” (verse 4). And of the Father: “He who said, Light will shine out of darkness, has shone in your hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.” For just as, when he had said, “of the good news of the glory of Christ,” he added, “who is the image of God,” to show that they were deprived of the Father’s glory too, so after saying “the knowledge of God,” he added, “in the face of Christ,” to show that through him we know the Father, just as through the Spirit we are also brought to him.

Verse 7: “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power may be of God, and not from ourselves.”

He had spoken of many great things about that indescribable glory. So, in case anyone should say, “And how is it that we, who enjoy such great glory, remain in a mortal body?” he says that this very thing is the greatest wonder of all and a very great example of the power of God: that an earthen vessel has been made able to bear such brightness and to keep so lofty a treasure. And so, marveling at this, he said, “so that the surpassing greatness of the power may be of God, and not from ourselves” — again hinting at those who boasted in themselves. For both the greatness of what is given and the weakness of those who receive it show his power: he not only gave great things, but gave them to those who are small. He used the word “earthen” to point to the frailty of our mortal nature, and to declare the weakness of our flesh. For our flesh is made no better than earthenware: like it, it is quickly damaged, and death and disease and changes in the weather and ten thousand other things easily break it apart. He said these things both to take down their conceit and to show everyone that nothing we have is human. For the power of God is seen most clearly when it works mighty things through lowly means.

That is why in another place he said, “For my power is made perfect in weakness” (Second Corinthians 12, verse 9). Indeed, in the Old Testament whole armies of barbarians were put to flight by gnats and flies, and that is why he also calls the caterpillar his mighty army (Joel 2, verse 25). And at the beginning, simply by confusing their languages, he put a stop to that great tower in Babylon. In their wars too, at one time he routed countless armies with three hundred men; at another he overthrew cities with trumpets; and later, by a small and poor boy, David, he put the whole army of the barbarians to flight. So here too, by sending out only twelve, he overcame the world — twelve, and those persecuted and warred against.

So let us be amazed at the power of God; let us marvel at it and worship it. Let us ask the Jews, let us ask the Greeks: who persuaded the whole world to desert the customs of their fathers and go over to another way of life? The fisherman, or the tentmaker? The tax collector, or the unlearned and uneducated? And how can these things make sense, unless it was divine power that accomplishes everything through them? And what did they say to persuade people? “Be baptized in the name of the crucified one.” What sort of man was he? One they had never seen or set eyes on. Yet by saying and preaching these things, they persuaded them that those who gave them oracles, whom they had received by tradition from their forefathers, were no gods, while this Christ, who was nailed to the wood, drew them all to himself. [n]

Yet that he was crucified and buried was, in a way, plain to everyone; but that he had risen again, no one but a few saw. Still, they persuaded even those who had not seen it of this too — and not only that he rose again, but that he also went up into heaven and is coming to judge the living and the dead. Tell me, where did these words get their power to persuade? From nothing else than the power of God. For in the first place, novelty itself offended everyone; and when someone brings in novelty in matters like these, it becomes all the harder to bear — when someone tears up the foundations of ancient custom and uproots laws from their seat. On top of all this, the heralds themselves did not seem worth believing: they belonged to a nation hated by all people, and they were timid and ignorant. How, then, did they overcome the world? How did they cast out you, and those forefathers of yours who were thought to be philosophers, along with their very gods? Is it not perfectly clear that it was because they had God with them? For successes like these are not the work of human power, but of a divine and indescribable one.

“No,” someone says, “it was sorcery.” In that case the power of the demons ought to have increased, and the worship of idols spread further. How is it, then, that these have been overthrown and have vanished, and our cause has gone the opposite way? So from this too it is plain that what was done was God’s decree — and not only from the preaching, but also from the way of life itself. For when was virginity ever planted so widely everywhere in the world? When was there such contempt for wealth, and for life, and for everything else? Wicked men and sorcerers would have achieved nothing like this, but the very opposite in every respect. But these men brought in among us the life of the angels — and not only brought it in, but established it, in our own land, in the land of the barbarians, at the very ends of the earth. From this it is plain that it was the power of Christ everywhere that accomplished everything, the power that shines everywhere and, swifter than any lightning, lights up the hearts of human beings.

So, considering all these things, and taking what has been done as clear proof of the promise of what is to come, worship with us the invincible might of the crucified one, so that you may both escape the unbearable punishments and obtain the everlasting kingdom. May we all have a share in it, through the grace and love for humankind of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.