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Sunday 8 June 20205
Pentecost
 

Exodus 33:7-20
2 Corinthians 3:4-end

I understand that this term the sermons at evensong are focused on the Nicene Creed (marking its 1700th anniversary). Being Pentecost Sunday, we have the joy of reflecting on the statement ‘I believe in the Holy Spirit’.

We live in a time when we are bombarded with enticing offers of upgrades and improvements ranging from the latest model of phone to buy, updates to apps to be downloaded, or an improved self by following advice in books or online. With each offer we are promised an improved version over what we have now.

St Paul, writing to the young church at Corinth, contrasts the old covenant with the new covenant – the letter contrasted with the Spirit – the former bringing death, the latter bringing life. The upgrade from the old covenant to the new, Paul claims, is the ultimate upgrade.

As you may know, in 2 Corinthians Paul is defending his ministry and his competency in the face of opposition from various factions – both in the Corinthian church and from outsiders. He claims that it is God who has made him competent to minister the new covenant and then, as Paul does frequently, he goes off on a side discussion. In our reading, a discussion about the greater glory of the new covenant than the old; the superiority of the new covenant over the old. Paul argues that the ministry of the Spirit is ‘more splendid’ or ‘how much more’ [it is] on three grounds:

•    The Spirit’s ministry brings life rather than death
•    The Spirit’s ministry brings justification rather than condemnation
•    The Spirit’s ministry lasts rather than fades away

Note with me that Paul does not say the old covenant was bad or (in his words) did not have ‘glory’ [glory = splendour, weightiness, reputation, honour]. No, according to Paul, the ministry of the old covenant of the law had glory but ‘how much more’ will the ministry of the Spirit have glory:

•    If the ministry of death came in glory….how much more will the ministry of the Spirit come in glory? [v7]
•    If there was glory in the ministry of condemnation…..how much more will the ministry of justification abound in glory? [v9]
•    If what was set aside [faded] came through glory….how much more has the permanent come in glory? [v11]

I’m old enough to remember the first mobile phones – the car batteries with a handset attached and the early ‘brick’ phones. They were wonderful, ‘glorious’, giving the ability to make calls without being attached to a landline. In the early days of text messages, longer messages came through in segments – 1/5, 2/5, etc. But this new technology was ‘glorious’. Fast-forward to smartphones and how much more functionality is available and how much more ‘glorious’ they are? The early technology was glorious but the new technology is more glorious!

However, as with early mobile phones, there were limits to the old covenant. The old covenant, the letter, the law, was external and imposed and the consequence of breaking the law was death (often the actual punishment for breaches of the law).

Think about speed limits imposed on our roads. It would be glorious to not need speed limits because every road-user was considerate and drove at an appropriate speed but, because that is not the case, we have speed limits to constrain people that would otherwise drive at whatever speed they wanted. So with the old covenant law with its limitations to prevent people behaving however they wished.

Much like when someone is caught speeding and must face the condemnation of the courts, so breaches of the old covenant law resulted in condemnation.

And the glory of the old covenant faded. If we had read further in the Old Testament, we would have heard (as Paul describes) how Moses’ face shone after his encounter with God but the shine gradually faded until his next encounter with God.

Before ordination, I toured in the music industry. On one tour a keyboard player was late leaving the hotel and had not done her makeup, so was doing it on the tour bus. Unfortunately, she confused a shoe-shine wipe with a cleansing wipe and applied silicon to her face – resulting in a very shiny face. All I could think of was the shining face of Moses!

In contrast to the death, condemnation and fading nature of the old covenant, Paul describes how the ministry of the Spirit under the new covenant brings life, justification, and is permanent.

•    The ministry of the Spirit brings life because, instead of being imposed and external, the Spirit causes people to want to conduct themselves in line with God’s ideals (the promise that the Spirit will ‘write God’s law on our hearts’) and sins are forgiven rather than judgment being the consequence of law-breaking.

•    The ministry of the Spirit brings justification because, through faith in Jesus and the work of the cross, we can be in relationship with God.

•    The ministry of the Spirit does not fade because it will not be replaced.

On this Pentecost Sunday, I invite you to ‘believe in the Holy Spirit’ whose ministry brings life, justification and will not be replaced and is much more glorious than the glorious ministry of the old covenant which brought death, condemnation and was replaced.