2 Corinthians 3: Freedom to Come, to See and to Become

Introduction

Trent Vineyard, in Nottingham, has just come out of a conference weekend on freedom. One verse was quoted again and again: “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty” (2 Corinthians 3:17). On Sunday morning, John Bodley, who leads the church, asks the congregation a simple question: what does that actually mean?

The answers that come to mind all hold some truth: freedom in worship, deliverance from an addiction or an illness, a breakthrough in a situation, or the idea that with the Spirit we no longer need rules. But the pastor wants to know what this verse meant in its context. So he rereads the paragraphs leading up to it, starting at verse 7, with Moses, the stone tablets, the glory and the veil.

His conclusion comes down to three words. The freedom the Spirit gives is the freedom to come, the freedom to see and the freedom to become.

Message outline

1. A Question of Context

Paul writes that if the service of death, engraved on stones, came with glory, so that the children of Israel could not look steadfastly at the face of Moses, will the service of the Spirit not be with much more glory? (2 Corinthians 3:7-8). After reading the passage, John Bodley slips in: “Anyone confused yet? We’ve said ‘glory’ a lot, haven’t we?”
The passage goes on to the veil Moses put over his face, the veil that remains when the old covenant is read, and then that decisive “but”: whenever someone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. “Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty” (verses 16-17).
The pastor’s question then becomes: what do Moses, veils, glory and stone tablets have to do with freedom?

2. Moses, the Veil and the Old Covenant

All this imagery comes from the book of Exodus. The Israelites are slaves in Egypt, and God calls Moses from a burning bush to lead them toward freedom and the promised land.
God defines his relationship with Israel through a covenant. The pastor explains it as a solemn agreement, a vow, a relational contract between two parties, like a marriage where mutual promises are made. “I will take you to myself for a people. I will be your God” (Exodus 6:7).
Moses goes up the mountain to receive the terms of the covenant, the ten commandments. Lightning, fire, smoke: no one else can even set foot on the mountain, so intense is God’s presence (Exodus 19:12).
When Moses comes back down, the skin of his face shines because he has spoken with the Lord, and the people are afraid to come near him (Exodus 34:29-30). “It would frighten you, wouldn’t it, if someone’s face shone in a supernatural way?” So Moses puts on a veil, and it becomes a habit.
In this covenant, Moses serves as a go-between. He alone speaks to God face to face, and a veil is needed to shield the people from God’s glory.
As glorious as it was, with its “dramatic launch party” on the mountain, the old covenant had its limits. The relationship was real, but with a barrier. It depended on the people’s faithfulness to the law, and the people turned away from God again and again. The result was judgment, condemnation and distance.
The new covenant, established by Jesus in his life, his death and his resurrection, leads not to condemnation but to freedom, not to barriers but to freedom of access to God.

3. The Freedom to Come

John Bodley tells the story of his two children. His daughter, when she was very small, slept in a cot and called her parents every morning to come and get her out. When she moved to a proper bed, she kept behaving as if the bars were still there. “She didn’t realize she was free.”
His son, at the same age, understood from the very first night. A few hours after being put to bed, he came down the stairs on his bottom, pushed open the living room door and declared: “It’s dark in here. Where’s everybody gone?” He had understood that there was “a new deal,” that the barrier was gone. “And life was never the same.”
The Christians in Corinth needed to be reminded that the barrier was gone, that they were no longer in the cot. Christianity emerged from Judaism, and there were centuries of “muscle memory”: no one could enter the holy of holies in the temple, where God’s presence dwelt, a great curtain closed off access, and the relationship with God went through priests and sacrifices.
They read prophecies like Isaiah’s: in the latter days the mountain of Yahweh’s house will be established on the top of the mountains, all nations will flow to it, and many peoples will say: “Come, let’s go up to the mountain of Yahweh” (Isaiah 2:2-3). It was their dream. Paul tells them: we no longer need to wait, it has already happened.
By dying on the cross, Jesus took on himself the judgment for human rebellion, fulfilled the requirements of the old covenant and opened a new covenant. “For through him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father” (Ephesians 2:18). Jesus made the way, and the Holy Spirit guides us along that way into the Father’s presence.
Having such a hope, we are free. “We don’t need to stand at the bottom of the holy mountain just looking up into the clouds and wondering if God’s up there.” We can draw near with boldness to the throne of grace (Hebrews 4:16).
The pastor speaks to those who are searching for faith and who think God will want nothing to do with them because they are not good enough. “You’re not worthy? No, you’re not, because none of us are.” Even the heroes of the Old Testament were not perfect. No one is holy enough to stand before the Lord, except Jesus. But God, who is rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, made us alive together with Christ, and it is by grace that we are saved (Ephesians 2:4-5).
“He’s not a disapproving parent with unachievable expectations of you. He’s not an intimidating boss who lives on the top floor of the skyscraper and we don’t even get to speak to him, let alone know him. No, he’s your loving heavenly Father. Yes, he is holy. Yes, he is awesome. To approach his throne is no small thing. But the invitation is nonetheless open. You are free to come.”

4. The Freedom to See

Paul takes up the image of Moses’ veil to speak of spiritual blindness: centuries later, when the old covenant is read, a veil remains and keeps people from recognizing the promised Messiah. This veil is taken away only in Christ (2 Corinthians 3:14-15). “It’s tragic,” says the pastor.
Many have already seen this veil in someone: a friend with whom the relationship is warm, but whose face changes as soon as Jesus comes up. There can be several reasons, sometimes a wound linked to the church. But Paul affirms that this can change: when someone turns to the Lord, the Spirit takes the veil away, they are free to see Jesus, and everything changes.
The pastor asks those who remember a time when they could not see Jesus to raise their hand. Across the room, many bear witness: “There was a time when I couldn’t see, then something changed, and now I see.”
It is also Paul’s story. An expert in the law, more zealous than anyone, he persecuted Christians to the point of taking part in their execution. On the road, God throws him to the ground, a blinding light surrounds him and God speaks to him. Paul stays blind until Ananias, a little frightened, comes to pray for him: “Brother Saul, the Lord, who appeared to you on the road by which you came, has sent me that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 9:17).
“Where the Spirit is, we can see.” Something like scales fall from Saul’s eyes, he is baptized, and he will go on to write a good part of the Bible. The Spirit took the veil away from him, physically and spiritually.
The Spirit still takes the veil away today. The pastor encourages the congregation to come to the next baptism service to hear these stories: “This is what my life was like before Jesus, then I saw him and everything changed. I’m not perfect yet, but I’m changing and my life is coming back to life.”

5. Free to Behold His Face, Anywhere

Paul adds that we behold, with unveiled face, the glory of the Lord (2 Corinthians 3:18). “You read that and think: that’s nice.” But in the time of Exodus, only one man was allowed to see the face of the Lord, and it was unthinkable for anyone else. Now, because of what Jesus has done, it is available to everyone. “We’re all free to be like Moses.”
Even more incredible, there is no longer any need to climb a mountain or go to the temple. “I’m probably going to regret saying this, but you don’t even have to go to a church building or to your small group to encounter the face of the Lord.” He makes clear that the small group remains important for being part of the church. “But you are free to have a face-to-face encounter with the Lord of creation whenever you want and wherever you want. It’s crazy, isn’t it?”
In bed, on the bus, doing the dishes, changing nappies, the Spirit is there and says: “I’m ready, come and spend time with me.” You are free to pray about what is on your mind, to say nothing and simply stay in his presence, to open the Bible, read the Gospels and imagine yourself next to Jesus. You are free to look him in the face, with no fear of being condemned or rejected, because he loves you and gave his life for you.
This freedom is very real, because nothing can take it away. The pastor cites the testimony of a Christian woman published by Open Doors: imprisoned in Iran because of her faith, held in isolation, she thought this might be the end of her life. “Will I see my family again? Is this the end of my story?” Yet, she says, it was in that place of weakness, silence and suffering that she met God more deeply than ever before.
This echoes Paul’s conclusion to the Romans: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Could oppression, or anguish, or persecution, or famine…?” Nothing will be able to separate us from it (Romans 8:35-39).
The pastor then speaks to those who have followed Jesus for a long time and forget the privilege they have. We have access to the Father by the Spirit, and yet we spend hours looking at a phone or at series, which are not evil in themselves. “It’s like having the Mona Lisa in your living room and deciding to put a flat screen TV in front of it to watch that instead.” This freedom came at great cost: let’s make the most of it.

6. The Freedom to Become

It is by beholding the Lord that we become like him. “At the end of the day, we become what we behold.” We are transformed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as from the Lord, the Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:18).
The world tells a different story about freedom: to become free and become the person you are meant to be, look inside yourself, discover who you really are and express it. For the pastor, this story is “almost true,” with one key difference: “We really discover who we are when we first see whose we are.”
When the veil is lifted, we see the one who made us, who designed us, who died for us, who loves us and who lifts us up out of our brokenness. As we seek his face, he does a work in us.
Ezekiel had announced it: “I will also give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes” (Ezekiel 36:26-27). The stone echoes the stone tablets of the old law.
There is no longer any need for an outside law to live by: God transforms from the inside. The pastor has God say it this way: “It will be like you’re no longer trying to navigate through life with a map. I’m going to put a GPS inside of you, an inbuilt GPS system that will guide you.”
This is not theory. A man who was recently baptized testified: “I used to think strength meant being the toughest person in the room. Now I understand that real strength is self-control, forgiveness, humility, and love.” Another said: “I always knew about Jesus. But since giving my life to him, I’ve become a new person with empathy and love on the inside and a heart to serve others. He’s freed me from the darkness.”
The pastor sums it up: freedom to come to him unashamed, freedom of access bought at great price, freedom to see him as he is and to become the one we behold. “I believe that is true freedom. Do you want it?”

Key takeaways

In 2 Corinthians 3, the freedom the Spirit gives is first of all freedom of access to God, offered by the new covenant in Jesus.
The old covenant was glorious but limited: a real relationship, with a veil and a barrier. In Christ, the veil is taken away.
You are not worthy, and no one is. But God, rich in mercy, invites you to come to him as a Father who loves you.
You are free to behold the face of the Lord anywhere and at any time, and nothing can separate you from his love.
We become what we behold: as we spend time with God, the Spirit transforms us from the inside.

Personal application

Are you still living as if the bars of the cot were there, waiting for someone to come and fetch you so you can approach God?
What makes you think you are not good enough to come to the Father, and what does the gospel of grace say about that?
Who around you seems to wear a veil when Jesus comes up, and how can you pray for them?
At what ordinary moment of your day (on the bus, doing the dishes, in bed) can you build the habit of beholding the face of the Lord?
What “flat screen” have you put in front of the Mona Lisa, and what would change if you moved it this week?

Verses cited

Frequently asked questions

What does “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty” mean in 2 Corinthians 3:17?

For John Bodley, the context of 2 Corinthians 3 sheds light on this verse: Paul contrasts the old covenant, where the people could approach God only through a veil, with the new covenant established by Jesus. The freedom the Spirit gives is first of all freedom of access to God: the freedom to come to the Father, to see Jesus and to become like him.

Why does Paul talk about the veil of Moses?

In Exodus, Moses’ face shone after he had spoken with God, and he covered it with a veil in front of the people. This veil shows the limit of the old covenant: a real relationship, but with a barrier. Paul also uses it as an image of spiritual blindness. When someone turns to the Lord, the Spirit takes the veil away.

What does “we become what we behold” mean?

According to 2 Corinthians 3:18, those who behold the glory of the Lord with unveiled face are transformed into the same image. John Bodley sees here the freedom to become: as we spend face-to-face time with God, the Spirit transforms us from the inside, as Ezekiel announced with the heart of flesh replacing the heart of stone.