Scripture: 2 Corinthians 4:16-18
Date: December 4, 2011
Speaker: Sean Higgins
Christian life and ministry is hard. Saints walk in light while the world walks in darkness. Disciples of Jesus serve, while the world waits to be served. Believers embrace suffering while the world fears suffering. The resurrected are happy dying while the world wishes in vain to avoid dying. They live on unseen things.
Living on seen things is like living in bizarro world. A person living on seen things might as well be walking around on his head, he’s seeing things upside down. He is riding blindly, or maybe, riding backwards, facing the wrong direction, focusing on the wrong things at the wrong time. He spends his effort on the outer man, pampering a not quite dead corpse. He gives himself to superficial, silly, vain games (literal and figurative). He lives for the new, for the now, and he misses the truly meaningful and lasting.
It is hard to stay the narrow course. We face others who don’t understand what we’re doing, some who oppose what we’re doing, some who hate us for it. They would have us relax, quiet down, or even leave off the journey altogether. A multitude of alternate routes fork away from the pilgrim’s path. And like we’ve bought a GPS unit with a faulty signal unknown to us, we keep trucking down the wrong road.
John Bunyan, a 17th century Puritan, lived and wrote about the pilgrim’s progress, about the dangers and difficulties of traveling to a better country, the Christian’s final home, the Celestial City. He wrote for pilgrims as a pilgrim, enduring slander and imprisonment and all sorts of trouble on his Christian journey. As he sought strength for the journey in the promises of God, he looked to 2 Corinthians 4:16-18.
We, like Bunyan and like the apostle Paul, are threatened to despair, to give up, to lose heart. This is a paragraph of promise for every spiritual pilgrim.
Christians do not despair no matter how hard it gets, now matter how much their clay pot is pummeled.
So we do not lose heart.
This sentence starts the final paragraph of chapter four just as it launched the first paragraph of the chapter. The repetition piques our attention like before and after pictures. The phrase bookends the entire chapter about the apostle Paul’s life and work, and his was a hard, often ineffective, often afflicted ministry. For the sake of the gospel, Paul slaved for others (v.5), he endured difficulties to bring grace to others (vv. 7-10, 15), he died to bring life to others (vv. 10-12).
He considered himself a weak, clay pot (v. 7), carrying the treasure of the gospel ministry, suffering for and speaking about the truth of the Lord Jesus. He was afflicted, perplexed, persecuted, and struck down (vv. 8-9). He was thumped and thrashed around. He was worn out in his work for the Lord. Through all of it he maintained his confidence, We do not lose heart .
He means that his soul was secure. Though threatened, he couldn’t be defeated. Though tempted to wander, he wouldn’t go AWOL. He wasn’t completely crushed, or driven to despair, or forsaken, or destroyed. His daily dying brought grace and life to others. He wasn’t going to stop. The plural, we do not lose heart , wraps every ministering pot in this confidence.
In the first paragraph (4:1-6) Paul explained that we don’t lose heart because our ministry is driven by the Spirit and because it is a privileged calling. In this paragraph (4:16-18) he will double-underline the promises that keep us on course.
While there are great promises that give us confidence, it doesn’t always appear that things are okay.
Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.
Paul concedes, that is, he acknowledges and admits, that his best life was not now, contra Joel Osteen. He says, but (even if) our outer self is wasting away, (and it is) . He yields the point as if he were in an argument, that the outer self , the exterior, the part of us that can be seen, hurts. He’s not referring to the “old man” of the flesh, though the outer man is connected to the body and the struggles of life. It recalls the earlier descriptions in chapter 4: “jars of clay” (v. 7) and “mortal flesh” (v.11).
We are wasting away , being destroyed, “decaying” (NAS), “perishing” (NKJV). The word could describe the corrosive effects of rust, slowly eating away and ruining. We are being worn out constantly. It is the aging, decaying, draining process in view here, a process that never sleeps, however that dying might be happening. Wasting away isn’t necessarily and enemy scheming to assassinate us, though that would bring a sooner end. Our bodies and physical lives are being ruined.
There’s no need to deny it. Our confidence doesn’t come because we escape pain and affliction. Christian pilgrims concede that it’s hard. For the pilgrim, however, for the one who has the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ in his heart, the ruin of the outer man isn’t the only process at work. Even as the outer man is wasting away (and it is), our inner self is being renewed day by day . The inner man , the soul of a man, is being renewed , and that renewal is as constant as the sunrise, day by day . The resurrection of Jesus fuels every believer’s inner engine. It is a hidden strengthening in visible suffering.
A pilgrim’s life is hard. The pilgrim’s Lord takes care of the most important thing: his eternal spirit.
Even our concession about the reality of afflictions can’t cause us to lose heart. And there is more to say, as verses 17-18 explain the renewal process.
God operates behind the scenes in ways not everyone sees or knows about. There are principles at work in the universe, principles established by the Creator of the universe, that show afflictions and hardships in this life lead to something better. Clay pot pilgrims have three considerations about afflictions.
That is, the essence or the attributes of difficulties. Afflictions are light and momentary.
For this light momentary affliction
There is no doubt that pilgrims encounter afflictions. Paul chronicled his abounding afflictions throughout 2 Corinthians, including being brought to the breaking point over and over (vv. 8-9). He just conceded that the outer man is wasting away. But afflictions can only do so much.
”The momentary lightness of afflictions” would be a good translation. The primary focus is on the adjective light . What kind of lightness? Light afflictedlness. We normally feel light when we’re not afflicted. We speak about how difficulties weigh on us; they burden us down. But Paul claims that they are light . How can he possibly say that?
Afflictions are not slight (insignificant, or inconsiderable), but they are light in comparison to the weight (the heaviness) of glory that is coming. So, that does not mean that our trouble is trivial. It really hurts. It does bring us to our breaking point. It’s not a game; it’s not recess; it’s not semantics. It will feel like we can’t take any more. The burden is too heavy. The point is that the pilgrim’s heavy and hard way is light and easy when put on the balance with the glory we’ll receive later.
Not only are they light, our afflictions are also momentary . The best they can do is consume consecutive minutes. But they are confined to moments. And again, by comparison, these are short compared to the eternal weight of glory. No clock or calendar can quantify the infinite duration of our coming experience. Afflictions for the pilgrim are light and momentary.
Afflictions are not useless or vain. They are working hard on our behalf.
this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,
Present trouble is preparing for us an inexhaustible future of joy. The infinite and eternal glory is real. We can’t see it now, but it exists. Not only is it real, it is almost unbelievable. It is an exaggeration. Paul says it is far beyond all comparison , “far more exceeding” (KJV), a glory that “far outweighs them all” (NIV). The Greek word is ὑπερβολὴν, from which we get our English word hyperbole. It means to take something to an extraordinary degree. The glory is “according to hyperbole unto hyperbole,” one hyperbole heaped on another, meaning that it is exceeding exceedingly glorious in the highest possible degree. “You may pass from one degree to another; from one sublime height to another; but still an infinity remains beyond. Nothing can describe the uppermost height of that glory, nothing can express its infinitude” (Barns, quoted in Calvin, 213).
How are afflictions preparing glory for us? What are afflictions affecting? They aren’t making the glory more glorious. They aren’t making things in heaven better. They are making us better able to enjoy the glory.
Our joy buckets are so small, so easily filled. We are easily satisfied. In order to know and enjoy this kind of glory, God is increasing the size of our joy thimbles, by afflictions, into honker buckets for joy. The afflictions are working for us a greater experience of glory. No pain, no glory.
It is the will of God, that they that go to heaven should go thither hardly or with difficulty. The righteous shall scarcely be saved. That is, they shall, but yet with great difficulty, that it may be the sweeter. (Seasonable Counsel, Advice to Sufferers, in The Works of John Bunyan, vol. 2, p. 725)
I imagine that if a thimble had a mouth, a thimble would cry out in pain when put in the furnace to be heated, hammered and shaped into a bigger bowl. It is stretching for a kettle to be heated and beaten into a cauldron. But if we would enjoy an exceeding weight of glory forever, the suffering of the present life prepares us.
Comparatively, afflictions are light and momentary. Effectively, afflictions work infinite and eternal joy for us.
How do we know that our inner man is being renewed day by day, especially since we see the outer man being ruined? How do we know that brutal, constant suffering is for our good, and relatively short and painless? How do we not lose heart? By living on unseen things.
as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.
This is the money quote, take it to the bank. This is the fast car, ride it home. The pilgrim either keeps walking on or quits depending on his focus. We’re not looking on the things that are seen . “Looking” includes more intention than simply seeing what’s in the periphery. The word is σκοπέω, paying attention to, watching closely for. Our eyes survey, scan, and scope out unseen things.
The things that are seen are the things of this world, both bad and good. Afflictions and comforts, the outer man issues, circumstances and situations, people and problems, the clay pot being smashed and bashed. Seen things may be sicknesses, bills, broken appliances, recessions, and earthquakes. Seen things may also include good things such as health, resources, friendships, and family.
The reason that pilgrim’s don’t look to or depend on “seen things” is because they consider that the things that are seen are transient (“temporal” NAS, “temporary” NIV). The seen things only last for a time. They are transient , impermanent, passing, fleeting, here today and then gone. Seen things are short-term investments; “the world is passing away along with its desires” (1 John 2:17).
Christians look to the things that are unseen . Of course there is irony in “looking for” things that can’t be “looked at” but, more importantly, what are these unseen things?
The immediate unseen thing is our soul, and the souls of men. It is the inner man. As “sojourners and exiles” we must “abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against [our] souls” (1 Peter 2:11). We ought to be sober-minded and watchful for sake of the most important unseen thing in us: our souls.
The ultimate unseen thing is God Himself. Paul wrote at the end of his testimony, “To the King of ages, immortal, invisible, the only God” (1 Timothy 1:17). The author of Hebrews wrote that “(Moses) left Egypt by faith, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible” (Hebrews 11:27).
Bunyan himself saw God as the primary unseen thing in 2 Corinthians 4:18. In his autobiography, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, he wrote about his two-step plan to prepare his soul for prison.
Before I came to prison, I saw what was a-coming, and had especially two considerations warm upon my heart; the first was how to be able to endure, should my imprisonment be long and tedious; the second was how to be able to encounter death, should that be here my portion…[T]hat saying in 2 Co. 1:9 was of great use to me, “But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but God which raiseth the dead.” By this scripture I was made to see, that if I would ever suffer rightly, I must pass a sentence of death upon everything that can properly be called a thing of this life, even to reckon myself, my wife, my children, my health, my enjoyments, and all, as dead to me, and myself as dead to them… .
The second was, to live upon God that is invisible; as Paul said in another place, the way not to faint, is to “look not at the things which are seen, but at the things that are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.” 2 Co. 4:18… .
That was the key to John Buynan’s Christian journey: not to look to the seen, but “to live upon God that is invisible.” In other words, Buynan survived by living on unseen things.
”Live on” is close to “look to”; it expresses the same idea. To “live on” something is to survive solely by consuming a certain thing. Live on coffee and nicotine. Paul calls us to look to, to live on, to survive and endure by depending solely on unseen things, starting with the invisible God.
I’d like to add, though, that Paul could have said, “not looking at the seen things, but looking to the unseen God.” That’s true, but that’s not exactly what he wrote. I’m okay with understanding God as part, or even the primary part, of unseen things , but I think we can be more precise. When we live on unseen things, I think Paul is referring to gospel promises.
The the things that are unseen are eternal , God is eternal, but so are His promises. Every word of God is “living and abiding” and “remains forever” (1 Peter 1:23-25), and the promises in 2 Corinthians 4 alone are enough to live on. The promised weight of glory is eternal, and that promise keeps us going even though we’re weary now. He promises a resurrected life that is eternal, contrasted with our mortal flesh (4:11) that’s wasting away. He promises that we’ll be brought into God’s presence, and that promise is as certain as God’s Son is alive (4:14).
The gospel promises of spiritual sight, life, resurrection, fellowship with Jesus, and weight of glory are not seen now, but they are eternal. They last. They are without equal and without end. His promises are everlasting, indelible. Pilgrim’s will not work, pray, suffer, sojourn, die, and keep heart unless they live on these unseen things.
Over and over in The Pilgrim’s Progress, Christian (along with his fellow pilgrims) was given faith glimpses of the Celestial City to spur his journey. Maybe the most fantastic and understated scene in The Pilgrim’s Progress finds Christian and Hopeful chained by Giant Despair in the dungeon of Doubting Castle. Despair has beaten them almost to death. They feared for their lives, and were tempted to take their lives. Then Christian remembered the key “in his bosom.”
Now a little before it was day, good Christian, as one half amazed, brake out in this passionate speech, What a fool (quoth he) am I, thus to lie in a stinking Dungeon when I may as well walk at liberty? I have a key in my bosom, called Promise, that will (I am persuaded) open any Lock in Doubting Castle. Then said Hopeful, That’s good news; good Brother pluck it out of thy bosom and try. Then Christian pulled it out of his bosom and began to try at the Dungeon door, whose bolt (as he turned the Key) gave back, and the door flew open with ease, and Christian and Hopeful both went out. (The Pilgrim’s Progress, 121)
“That’s good news;” Are you kidding? That’s good-tastic news! That needs an exclamation point not a semicolon. That noise you hear is Mr. Goose-bump knocking on the door. Giant Despair can do his worst, but there is a key called promise that unlocks every thick door out of the dungeon and enables our escape.
Bunyan knew the importance of promises. He said,
I tell thee, friend, there are some promises that the Lord hath helped me to lay hold of Jesus Christ through and by, that I would not have out of the Bible for as much gold and silver as can lie between York and London piled up to the stars. (Sighs from Hell, in The Works of John Bunyan, vol. 3, 721)
I’m afraid that if some of us had your choice, we would choose stacks of gold rather than the promises of God. But seen things won’t deliver anyone out of doubts and despair.
Bunyan also said,
God hath strewed all the way from the gate of hell, where thou wast, to the gate of heaven, whither thou art going, with flowers out of his own garden. Behold how the promises, invitations, calls, and encouragements, like lilies, lie round about thee! Take heed that thou dost not tread them under thy foot. (Come and Welcome to Jesus Christ, in Brown, John Bunyan, 300)
Are we living on unseen things, or ignoring them, or worse, despising them?
The survival of a pilgrim requires that he live on unseen things, that is, that he pay close attention to his soul, to God, and to God’s promises. Clay pots will look to get out of the rotation unless they’re held up by promises. We will lose heart if we do not live on unseen things.
One crucial clarification needs be made. According to 2 Corinthians 4, afflictions are light and momentary only for those looking on unseen things. In other words, only for those who believe the gospel promises. Those who are blinded by the god of this world to the gospel of the glory of Christ, those who remain in spiritual darkness, have “light and momentary afflictions” compared to the eternal weight of guilt and wrath being stored up for them on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed (cf. Romans 2:5). Their outer self is wasting away, and there is no renewal of the inner man. The inner man is rotting and being ruined right alongside the outer man. Your pain is but a taste of more pain unless you follow Christ by faith.
For pilgrims, our pain is but preparation for eternal glory, as we live on unseen things. We sang, “What hope is in our heavenly home.” That’s not a question, that’s an exclamation. Is that true of us?