Living Letters from Christ

While exhorting church leaders, Jim Cymbala shared, "Our fear as pastors should not be that people might leave our church, but rather that they stay in our church and remain unchanged."

The apostle Paul didn’t water down the message of the gospel to gain a following or financial prosperity. His heart’s desire was to see people transformed by Christ. And Paul not only assumed responsibility for the spiritual growth of others, he was confident enough in Christ to point to their spiritual transformation as living proof of the authority of his gospel ministry.  

Anticipating how his detractors would twist his words, Paul asked these probing questions: “Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, as some do, letters of recommendation to you, or from you?” (2 Corinthians 3:1). Paul is not saying here that he’s against someone writing a letter of recommendation. In fact, he often in his letters recommended ministers of the gospel who he sent out to serve other churches (1 Corinthians 16:10-11; Philippians 2:19-30). It appears that Paul is addressing those in the church who were projecting onto him what they in fact were guilty of themselves.

When Paul asked, "do we need, as some do, letters of recommendation?," he’s likely speaking of those in opposition to him. Letters of recommendations, which could be falsified, were the kind of things they relied on to convince others of their credentials. But Paul didn’t need to rely on shady tactics. In fact, because of the kind of man that he was, the fruit of his ministry among them was proof enough that Jesus was at work in and through his life. Paul continues: “You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all” (2 Corinthians 3:2).

Unlike his detractors, Paul didn’t need letters of recommendations. The believers in the church of Corinth were his letters of recommendation. The proof that Paul was ministering in Christ, was the transformed believers in the church who were being manipulated by self-appointed ministers among them. Paul not only identifies the Corinthian believers as his living letters of recommendation, he also explains how these letters were crafted. He writes: “written on our hearts, to be known and read by all” (v.2b).

In verse 3, Paul reiterates that they are living letters from Christ because of what the Spirit of God is writing on their hearts. But notice also that Paul didn’t just say that they were his letters of recommendation because of what the Spirit was doing in their hearts. He wrote: “You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts” (v.2). Incredibly, the Holy Spirit was not only writing on the hearts of the Corinthian believers, they were also written on Paul’s heart. Paul’s love for them was such that he couldn’t get them off his mind.  

The Corinthians were living letters from Christ because the Spirit birthed those living letters through Paul’s Christ-like heart and ministry. Paul was not the author of the living letters. But he was the pen, the Spirit-filled instrument that God used to write them.

In Galatians 4:19 Paul wrote: “my little children, for whom I am again in the anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you!” Unless like Paul, our hearts are broken over the lost state of humanity, unless we anguish over the spiritual ruin in our world, unless we have no rest in our spirit until God uses us in restoration, we will not see many spiritual births—we will not see many living letters from Christ being written by the Holy Spirit. We need to earnestly invite God’s Spirit to break us.
 
After explaining to the Corinthian believers that they were his letters of recommendation and that they were written on his heart, Paul continues:  “And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts” (2 Corinthians 3:3). Although Paul was the human instrument that brought many of the Corinthians to Christ and helped them grow in the Lord, he was not the author of these living letters from Christ. The Holy Spirit was the author. When the Corinthians turned to Jesus, the Holy Spirit removed the veil over their hearts and set them free to behold the transforming glory of Christ (2 Corinthians 3:17-18).    
 
Likewise, if you’ve come into a saving relationship with Jesus, you also are a living letter from Christ. You are a letter from Christ that is written not with pen and ink, but by the Spirit of the living God to be known and read by all. God saved us and put His Spirt inside of us not only for our sake but for the sake of our families, friends, co-workers, neighbors, and strangers. He saved us so that we become letters of hope from Christ to a world filled with people who have never picked up a bible.

Do you realize that as a living letter from Christ you’re the only bible some people will ever read? You’re not the only thing they need to read. But often, the reason people pick up a bible and begin to read it is because they read something in the life of a Christian that compelled them to do so.

The Corinthians were no doubt a work in progress. And yet, Paul said, “And you show that you are a letter from Christ…” Are you living proof of the power of the risen Christ? Is there something about the way you love, forgive, and serve that attests to a divine power at work in you? Our stories are still being written. No doubt we are all a work in progress. But if we avail ourselves of the means of grace by which the divine author of our faith fashions His letters, people will read Jesus in us and be drawn to the story that only He can write through our lives.  

Notice how living letters from Christ are brought about. Paul writes in verse 3: “And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us…”  The Greek phrase translated "delivered" in verse three can also be literally translated "ministered" by us. Paul was a servant of Christ who brought the gospel message to Corinth. He was the courier who delivered the good news of Jesus and also the vessel God used to plant the church in Corinth.

Beloved, if you’re saved, like the apostle Paul, you have received the Spirit not only to be transformed into the image of Christ, but to also make and deliver letters from Christ. Now, although like Paul, we are to deliver letters from Christ, we are not the authors. Again, Paul writes in verse 3 that letters from Christ are written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts” (2 Corinthian 3:3).

Under the Old Covenant, the law of Moses that governed the people of God was written on tablets of stone. Under the New Covenant, the law of Christ is written on human hearts. This New Covenant, which provides an internal heart transformation and not just an external written law, was promised in Jeremiah 31:33. Remember that the Corinthians were not only living letters from Christ written with the Spirit of the living God, the Spirit also inscribed the Corinthians on Paul’s heart. He couldn’t get them out of his heart and mind. He loved them, flaws and all. He loved them with a love from Christ.

As Paul also explained in Romans 8:34-35, because Jesus died, was raised and is seated at the right hand of God interceding for us, no tongue can condemn us and nothing can separate us from the love of God. He will not forget you. We are written on God’s heart (Isaiah 49:15-16a).

As we behold His glory in the word, in prayer, and in community, the Spirit transforms us into letters from Christ to be known and read by all. And not only that, as we draw near to Christ, His love will write people on our hearts who He wants us to minister His grace to.

When God writes people in need of His saving and restoring grace on our hearts, we will not cease to labor in prayer for them. We will not be able to cast them out of our minds. Our spirits will not be at rest unless we know we’ve done what we could in dependence on the Spirit to deliver them to Jesus.

Let us seek our Heavenly Father, who will never forget us, to make us instruments of His comfort—to write the names of needy people on our hearts—to make us letters of hope from Christ to a needy world and all to the glory of His name.  

In your service,
Pastor Marco