Now in ch3 we find the third anchor that gives Paul, and us, real `confidence’ (3:4) amid the stresses that befall us. Among other things, it can transform our whole attitude to evangelism…
Paul is being criticised; people are saying scornfully that he is `unimpressive’. But – deep down – Paul trusts God; trusts that God is keeping his promise that we fed on last time; that as Paul “does his best”, God his fellow-worker (yes! 2 Cor 6:1!) is doing something supernatural. He is enabling Paul truly to `minister the Spirit’ (see 3:3,6,8).
An odd (therefore thought-provoking) phrase? Well, let’s indeed think about it. For Paul, it seems that helping to `make disciples’ isn’t only about passing on fresh ideas; it’s bringing the activity of the Spirit into the lives of others. The Corinthians are Paul’s `letter’ `read by everybody’, and the material, the `ink’ with which he `wrote’ that `letter`, is the Spirit: the Spirit flowed out from Paul like ink from a pen, he says(v3). (What an incredible thing: as we work with God, he manifests, even we can say incarnates himself, through us!)
Well, we may feel, that’s might be what we would expect from Paul; after all Paul, unlike us, was an apostle. Not so. Jesus promised us very clearly that his Spirit will flow in the same natural way from every believer who is (as he put it earlier, John 3:8) `born of the Spirit`; here’s the key passage: `”Whoever believes on me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.” By this he meant the Spirit’ (John 7:38-39)!
Now that is a quite remarkable promise. Each of us who believes, `impressive’ or not, says Christ, is a walking channel of the Spirit, and through us Christ’s life flows out into the desert of our culture. That does assume, of course, that we aren’t blocking the channel by sin. (`Grieving the Spirit’, Eph 4:30; because the Spirit is a Person.) Or, rather, that as sin indeed happens day by day, so we get the channel unblocked by daily repentance – he is the Holy Spirit, and expects holiness from us – and then on that basis ask, daily and confidently, for his renewed filling (Eph 5:18). (Lord, please help me actually to make a daily habit of doing these things.) But if the channel is clear, then Christ’s promise is equally clear: as we’re drawing on his nature through his Word and prayer, something of the Spirit’s life, his love, joy, peace and power for good, will be flowing out to others through us. (So if a believer works in a particular office, there will normally be a certain presence of peace and gentleness that was not there before. And it happens, doesn’t it?)
As we think of all the pain and darkness around us, this becomes a crucial promise. Each of us is at the cutting-edge, fountains of the Spirit’s life into the world. Whoever we are, whatever we’re doing, we bring him too; `impressive’ or not, we are containers, walking `temples’, of this personal Holy Spirit (1 Cor 6:19). Trobisch writes of how the Spirit develops us believers, until sharing his new life, sharing our faith, becomes “natural”: `Not as a duty that they must add to their many other Christian duties. Not as a programme they have to adopt, a special technique they must learn. Not as a must at all…’ The Spirit’s will, he says, is that our faith `flows out of Christians without their even realizing it. It arms them with contagious health. It becomes… natural. To use a biblical term, it becomes automatic…something which goes on even though the communicator – the sower – “knows not how” (Mark 4:27).’ The Spirit will flow, promises Christ, from `whoever believes on me’; that conviction is what Paul builds on here!
Such a faith affects our whole approach to evangelism. Many churches have so little impact on our surroundings. And often it’s because we think only of activities and our involvement in them, rather than deliberately building friendships with outsiders through which this `ministry of the Spirit’ can happen. If we’ve grasped Paul’s confidence here, we’ll want to ensure that we do all have relationships where not-yet-Christians can be touched by the Spirit, reaching out to them from within us. (One of the most helpful writers on this topic, by the way, is Rebecca Manley Pippert, in Stay Salt and her earlier Out of the Saltshaker.) Like Corinth, we are called to be a `letter from Christ… known and read by everybody’!
This `confidence’ surely doesn’t mean we pretend to be perfect. Far from it. The church is a hospital where broken people get mended; and sometimes we are very broken indeed! But we’re called to believe God’s word here, and to trust that, even while we don’t have perfection, we do each have reality. (We may see that reality most easily in the lives of others, in our friends who are serious about Jesus.) `Such confidence as this is ours through Christ`, says Paul, `Not that we are competent in ourselves… but our competence comes from God. He has made us ministers of the Spirit’ (3:4-6)! It’s his work, and Jesus clearly expects us to trust him to do it; that every believer who really wants it, and pursues it in prayer and holiness, will find the Spirit himself opening ways for his truth and love – `random acts of senseless beauty’ – to be expressed through them.
May we sense the thrill, the sheer glory, that God really is manifesting himself fruitfully through each of us like this! `Therefore, since through God’s mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart!` (4:1)! Lord, thankyou; I believe you! Please help me to seek your Spirit’s fullness, day after day, and to notice your possibilities for its expression…
