2 Corinthians · Chapter 3
2 Corinthians 3
Berean Standard Bible · Public domain · Source credits
Ministers of a New Covenant
1Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, like some people, letters of recommendation to you or from you?
2You yourselves are our letter, inscribed on our hearts, known and read by everyone.
3It is clear that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.
4Such confidence before God is ours through Christ.
5Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim that anything comes from us, but our competence comes from God.
6And He has qualified us as ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
The Glory of the New Covenant
(Exodus 34:10–35)
7Now if the ministry of death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came with such glory that the Israelites could not gaze at the face of Moses because of its fleeting glory,
8will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious?
9For if the ministry of condemnation was glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry of righteousness!
10Indeed, what was once glorious has no glory now in comparison to the glory that surpasses it.
11For if what was fading away came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which endures!
12Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold.
13We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at the end of what was fading away.
14But their minds were closed. For to this day the same veil remains at the reading of the old covenant. It has not been lifted, because only in Christ can it be removed.
15And even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts.
16But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.
17Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
18And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into His image with intensifying glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
Old Testament references
References from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. Text from the Berean Standard Bible.
Exodus 31:18When the LORD had finished speaking with Moses on Mount Sinai, He gave him the two tablets of the Testimony, tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God.
Joshua 3:10He continued, “This is how you will know that the living God is among you and that He will surely drive out before you the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites.
1 Samuel 17:26David asked the men who were standing with him, “What will be done for the man who kills this Philistine and removes this disgrace from Israel? Just who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?”
Psalms 42:2My soul thirsts for God, the living God. When shall I come and appear in God’s presence?
Psalms 84:2My soul longs, even faints, for the courts of the LORD; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
Jeremiah 10:10But the LORD is the true God; He is the living God and eternal King. The earth quakes at His wrath, and the nations cannot endure His indignation.
Daniel 6:26I hereby decree that in every part of my kingdom, men are to tremble in fear before the God of Daniel: For He is the living God, and He endures forever; His kingdom will never be destroyed, and His dominion will never end.
Exodus 24:12Then the LORD said to Moses, “Come up to Me on the mountain and stay here, so that I may give you the tablets of stone, with the law and commandments I have written for their instruction.”
Exodus 34:1Then the LORD said to Moses, “Chisel out two stone tablets like the originals, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke.
Psalms 40:8I delight to do Your will, O my God; Your law is within my heart.”
Jeremiah 31:33“But this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD. I will put My law in their minds and inscribe it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they will be My people.
Ezekiel 11:19And I will give them singleness of heart and put a new spirit within them; I will remove their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh,