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One Flesh: What does it Mean?
<page 63>In Chapter 8, I shared two truths from 2 Corinthians 3 that describe what God does for us in the New Covenant. They are:
He writes His laws on our minds and hearts (2 Corinthians 3:2-3; 6).
He makes us righteous by the blood of Jesus, even when we do not yet act righteously (2 Corinthians 3:9).
Chapter 9 laid out some principles about Church discipline. We will now return to 2 Corinthians 3 to look at two additional truths that show how we should respond to God based on what He does for us. How should His work affect our attitudes and actions?
We can be honest about our weaknesses and His transforming work within us (2 Corinthians 3:12-13).
We behold His glory and are transformed (2 Corinthians 3:18).
The first truth about our response has to do with transparency in relationships.
Therefore, since we have such hope, we use great boldness of speech – unlike Moses, who put a veil over his face so that the children of Israel could not look steadily at the end of what was passing away.
Paul used the example of the glory of God on Moses' face (Exodus 34:29-35) as a contrast to the way in which New Covenant people should present themselves. When Moses talked with God, his face shone, and this was symbolic for the glory of the Old Covenant (2 Corinthians 3:7-11). God's plan, however, was to replace the old with something better, and as a sign of this future change, the glory on Moses' face did not last (it had an end and was passing away). Moses hid this fact behind a veil (he wore the veil so that the children of Israel could not look steadily at the end of what was passing away). Paul contrasts this with his own approach: "great boldness of speech."
In this we see two distinct lifestyles. The first hides a passing glory while the second shares an increasing glory. The first tries to make human beings look better than we are by pretending that we are not so flawed that even good laws kill us. The second admits human depravity while it proclaims the love and grace of God that transforms us.
I remember reading 2 Corinthians 3 more than forty years ago while in college. I believe the Holy Spirit opened my eyes to see that there would always be a temptation to hide my sinfulness in the hope that I could move past it before anyone found out. I concluded that I should instead find ways to honestly present myself as an imperfect human being who was gradually being transformed by God's grace. Although it often wouldn't be wise to do this before everyone, to the extent that I could transparently share my struggles, I should remove the veil that kept me <page 64>and others from seeing the true source of my life. I should live as a flawed person receiving God's power rather than an image of success.
Moses' veil continues today (symbolically). It remains over the heart of any unbeliever who tries to live by "the letter."
But their minds were blinded. For until this day the same veil remains unlifted in the reading of the Old Testament, because the veil is taken away in Christ. (emphasis added)
Those who live by "the letter" tend to mishandle what is happening inside of them. They want to believe that they are righteous people, yet sin is rising up. They see the goodness of the Law, yet something within them pulls them away from it. How do they manage that? Rather than openly admitting the poison in human hearts, they disguise what is happening so that both they and others won't perceive the inner contradiction. They figuratively put on a veil that protects them from the shock of seeing both the sinfulness of their true selves and God's greater glory in Jesus that could save them. Rather than facing the brokenness at the core of their being, they cover over it.
Unfortunately, this veil is more than a form of discretion to guard their reputation. It is a gut level spiritual deception that blinds them to the light of the gospel.
But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.
If a person doesn't see their need for a Savior, they won't choose to be saved. That is the tragedy of veils. They seem to protect us from shame and guilt, but they actually keep us from opening our hearts to the gospel of the glory of Christ.
The veil is taken away in Christ (2 Corinthians 3:14), but it often takes time for us to walk out what this means. Many of us continue to present ourselves as if our life depended on our ability to look competent long after we have been saved by grace. This tends to be especially true when our sins are sexual in nature. Sexual sin can produce a shame and fear that goes beyond other sins. Also, other people often react strongly against it, so the fear of being exposed is heightened. Because of this, many who fall to it hide themselves, veiling their difficulties from God, themselves, and everyone else in order to avoid dealing with the emotional fallout that would occur if they were honest. They do their best to put on an image of spirituality and success, even as their hearts cascade down into disgrace.
Paul's says that a New Testament mindset takes us in the opposite direction. We use great boldness of speech. In 2 Corinthians 4, He continues this theme, saying that he had:
<page 65>…renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God …For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord
There was an openness in Paul about his weakness as seen in the light of God's strength. He didn't pretend he had everything together, because doing that would have been walking in craftiness rather than a manifestation of the truth. He didn't need to hide the fact that not only had he sinned in the past, but apart from Christ he would continue to sin in the future. He was willing to say, "I am just a man, full of weaknesses. Let me tell you about the One who loves me as I am and is doing a work that goes beyond anything I could ever imagine." He did not preach himself, but Christ Jesus the Lord.
In 2 Corinthians 4:13, Paul describes his ministry with a quote from Psalm 116:
And since we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, "I believed and therefore I spoke," we also believe and therefore speak…
The full quote from Psalm 116 is not what we might expect:
I believed, therefore I spoke, "I am greatly afflicted." I said in my haste, "All men are liars."
The psalmist describes a time when he experienced a mixture of faith and confusion. He believed God was with him in his affliction, and yet he spoke in haste. He found God's goodness, but his emotions led him to make mistakes along the way. …And that makes Paul's use of this quote perfect in the light of what he had just written:
But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed – always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.
When we are hard pressed on every side, perplexed, persecuted, struck down, and always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, we tend to get confused. Our emotions call for us to fight or run for cover. We face fear, anger, and lurking despair.
For indeed, when we came to Macedonia, our bodies had no rest, but we were troubled on every side. Outside were conflicts, inside were fears. (emphasis added)
<page 66>For we do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in Asia: that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life. (emphasis added)
The struggle Paul describes in 2 Corinthians, both the outer conflicts and the inner fears and despair, shows that the excellence of the power was of God and not of him. If he had been unmoved by what he faced, it would have looked like he had the power. The fact that he was burdened beyond measure and above strength, that he needed God to carry him forward, let everyone know who was doing the work.
Sometimes, this sort of affliction influences us to speak words that express our imperfection – we speak in haste. We see this often in the Psalms:
I will say to God my Rock, "Why have You forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?"
Obviously, God hadn't forgotten the psalmist – yet many saints have found that it can be helpful to speak words like this while praying. Our goal is to connect with God. We have no answer for our sense of His absence other than Him, so we transparently speak our fear, anger, and sorrow to Him in the belief that He will help us with them.
Our statements may look like unbelief, but true unbelief would lead us to ignore God, not pour our hearts out to Him. The fact that we are making Him front and center in spite of our displeasure shows our faith. We believe that He will move as we cry out. He understands our broken condition and is greater than it. As we come in our weakness, His power will be made perfect in it (2 Corinthians 12:9).
When Paul said that he spoke with the same spirit of faith as the psalmist, he was saying that his faith was like the faith portrayed in the book of Psalms. It was based on a relationship with the God who meets us in the middle of our frailty. We come as honest people facing what it means to be human beings struggling on a sin-scarred planet, and Jesus reshapes our faltering efforts with His love.
With as frightening as this sort of transparency might sound, especially when we struggle with sexual issues, it makes sense. If we know that God is writing His laws on our hearts, and if we know that we are loved and accepted because of Christ, we find ourselves in an environment where we can be honest about how difficult our attempts to walk with Him may be.
With sexual issues, this means that we will admit our problems when it makes sense to do so (always with God and sometimes with others). We believe we are headed toward life and freedom rather than sin and death. Connecting with others while we are in the transformation is a way of participating with them in God's grace. It proclaims His power in ways that mere words never could. We share the reality of being weak earthen vessels who are in the process of seeing Him do the impossible (2 Corinthians 4:7).
<page 67>Unfortunately, there are all sorts of difficulties that come with transparency, especially when sexual sin is involved. Spouses might be hurt. Children could learn more than they should. Those who can't handle the details of our problems might be exposed to too much information. Others might judge and mistreat us, which could lead to unnecessary damage to us and our families. For most of my life, these sorts of difficulties have convinced me that it wasn't wise to be as open as I would have liked to be.
I was often tempted to blurt out the details of my struggles. I preferred the simplicity of being open, but I also recognized the importance of considering others and not bringing unnecessary suffering upon those I love or myself. So I gradually learned to practice transparency with God, myself, and a few others (as opposed to with the entire world). God was teaching me how to adopt the basic approach of 2 Corinthians 3 without unnecessarily complicating my life and the lives of those around me.
Now that I am publishing books that describe my issues, I am potentially broadcasting my struggles to the whole world. On the one hand, I like doing that, because it is what I always wanted to do. On the other hand, I am concerned that I might cause the problems I have been avoiding. Nevertheless, it seems to be what God wants at this point in my life; I have a chance to use my story to help others. Paul wrote that our lives are an epistle that is known and read by all men (2 Corinthians 3:2-3). Perhaps my life will become that in a fuller way. My hope is that God will take my words and show what it means to be someone who is overcoming great human weakness by His power.
Veils keep others from seeing this sort of transformation, and this makes it more likely that a veil will remain over their eyes. They often think that the goodness they see in Christians comes from human effort, so they have hope that they can duplicate it without Christ. That can change when we honestly admit our sin and brokenness. Our humility points them toward everyone's need for a Savior. The Holy Spirit moves, offering them the courage to face their own darkness and to embrace the One who is the answer to it. They discover the freedom to behold the Lord who transforms us from glory to glory.
Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.
The second way in which we respond to God differently in the New Covenant, like the first (transparency), is a natural outworking of the fact that we live by the Spirit rather than "the letter" (2 Corinthians 3:6). If we were relying on "the letter," our emphasis would be on our efforts to study commandments (to get them into our minds) and practice (to get them out into our actions). We have already looked at why this doesn't work; sin is at work in our humanity, and it sabotages our best efforts.
With the Spirit, however, studying and practice take on a different flavor. They are still important, but we alter our approach to them. Rather than emphasizing our efforts, we emphasize beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord (2 Corinthians 3:18). Hard work is still involved, but we shift the focus from us to Jesus. We emphasize who He is, what He has done, <page 68>and what He is doing rather than who we are, what we have done, and what we are doing. We behold Him, meditating on His word and works, and as we do, God does a miraculous change within us. We are transformed into the same image (the image of the glory of the Lord) from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord (2 Corinthians 3:18).
Sometimes on this journey we do also need to look at ourselves, but we do so in the light of who He is. There will be times of deep repentance as we realize our past failures and His offer of a better future. At other times, we will grow to understand our weakness and His strength. Sometimes we spell out what we should do and how God will enable us to do it. We continue to add to our faith virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love (2 Peter 1:5-7). But we don't gain these qualities by chastising ourselves into obedience; we gain them by beholding the glory of the Lord. It is only in the light of who He is that we can understand who we are.
If we don't develop this sort of relationship with Jesus, the Christian life will be impossible for us. We may be able to force ourselves to live it for a time, but we will be living out of a Law based approach that has passed away. In spite of our hard work, we will be putting a veil back over our eyes, and sin will eventually rise up to deceive us. Nothing but a glory to glory transformation that flows supernaturally out of beholding Him will get the job done.
In the rest of this book, I will refer to this sort of Christian life as the "unveiled approach to life." I picked this name many years ago, and I have considered why I chose it rather than any of the many other possible names I could have chosen. Why not "the glory to glory approach" or the "New Covenant approach?" I believe that "unveiled" stuck with me because I had to deal with a sexual orientation problem and a sexual addiction problem. If ever there were two sins that would make a person want to put a veil over his life, those were the two. I had to consciously choose to go against culture in general and Christian culture in particular in order to unveil myself before God, myself, and a few others. It has been a tough balance, and wisdom has been necessary, but I don't believe I could have found answers to my problems in any other way.
I will close this chapter with more detail about how the glory to glory change process has worked for me. I have come up with a model that takes into account both the power of God and some of what is believed about human psychology. In this approach, I break our personality into three parts. I will call the first part our emotional core. If I understand the human brain correctly (and I am not an expert), our emotional core is centered in our limbic system. It is the part of us that feels and reacts to situations. For a person with sexual addiction, it has learned to desire and pursue sexual pleasure as a way of dealing with many situations in life, and it pulls them strongly even when they resist.
The second part of our personality is our logic-and-willpower center. This is located in the prefrontal cortex of our brain. This part of us can look at facts and make decisions based on truth. These decisions often do not agree with our emotional core, and this is especially true if a Christian is suffering with sexual issues.
The conflict between truth and emotion can be distressing. We may decide that God's ways are best …we might stand up and testify about how horrible it would be for us to commit some <page 69>act …we might even believe that we could end up in hell …yet all of this conviction tends to falter when our emotional core drives us powerfully.
As a general principle, deep and strong emotions don't listen to logic alone. When we override them, we may succeed in acting well, but our emotions often refuse to join us in our decision. That is not to say that we shouldn't make the good decisions anyway (we should), but we should also realize that our feelings are often not under the direct control of our will.
Unfortunately, our obedience may even make our emotions grow more stubborn, rebellious, and obstinate. This is especially true if we lack the wisdom to work well with them. I wrote the following words to describe a time when this happened to me:
Deep in my heart, discontent brewed over the fact that I was being robbed of the chance to be who I felt I truly was, and that discontent grew greatly in the late 1990s. Something in me was still deeply bound to my wayward sexuality, and denying that part of me felt like violence against my soul. God seemed cruel to require me to give it up. The mental gymnastics I went through in order to suppress it were tearing me apart.
I could hold down the repressed anger that resulted, but there was no denying that it was there. More than twenty-five years of serving Jesus had only made it grow more entrenched. God's rules seemed to be oppressive, and though a part of me liked having Him in my life, I was mad that He appeared to either be demanding too much from me or helping too little.[17]
It is clear that I was still, in some ways, living by the letter that kills (2 Corinthians 3:6), but I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. I yielded to the Holy Spirit in every way I could think of. I also sought the counsel of others and submitted to it. Still, something was missing. Sin was warping my emotional life, and it seemed like it was only a matter of time before I broke from the strain.
Fortunately, God helped me to see what was happening. In an attempt to make my sexuality fall in line, I was refusing to allow myself to feel any emotion that tempted me toward sexual sin. In fact, because those emotions brought sinful images to my mind, I believed that to allow myself to feel them was to indulge in the sin of lust in my heart. Yet refusing to allow them to be a part of me kept me from honestly facing up to what they were so I could properly work through them. In terms of 2 Corinthians 3, I was putting a partial veil over my eyes that kept me from understanding the way in which sin was affecting my emotions.
That changed as I discovered a new level of honesty about my sexuality. I did this mostly with God at first. I kept my actions under control, but I let my emotions be what they were and examined them in the light of His word. I admitted that I was angry at Him; I felt as if He had abandoned me to face issues that were beyond my ability, all while threatening me with personal destruction and hell if I failed to find answers. I used all of the wisdom He had built into me over years of seeking Him to behold His glory as I considered my broken state.
<page 70>I saw that I didn't really want to turn back to sin. What I really wanted was for Him to do His work in my emotional core, which had been damaged and had never properly healed. He showed me His eagerness to embrace me in the struggle no matter how warped I seemed. He was willing to come into the middle of my twisted thinking and patiently walk with me for as long as it took to find real answers. At the same time, He helped me to keep my actions under control so I didn't damage myself or my family.
I had been looking for a quick solution; He offered one that took decades as He gradually revealed His unexpected plan. His love and tenderness melted my heart. I experienced what I had sought for my entire life – a God with whom I could be me, with all of my warts and weirdness, and with whom I could find the acceptance, patience, and wisdom I needed. I was able to honestly feel the worst parts of my personality. He showed me where those parts had gone astray, and He transformed them.
In the process, I learned to see my most frightening feelings as good gifts that had become twisted by sin. My sexuality was designed to play a part in a caring marriage in spite of the damage that had been done to it. Every part of my created being had a purpose. God wanted to heal my emotions and make them into the useful and the delightful abilities He had intended them to be. He was willing to carefully work with me for a lifetime as He remade me into the person He had called me to be.
I was learning an important lesson about the balance between my emotional core and my logic-and-willpower center. It is that when truth contradicts emotion, the answer isn't to choose one and neglect the other. It is, instead, to patiently work through both while beholding God's glory. We will find that though logic and good decisions, by themselves, can't change our emotional core, if they are mixed with an honest expression of our heart in a relationship with Jesus, something within us shifts. The presence, power, and insight of the Holy Spirit touches us at a deep level. A new set of experiences founded in a living relationship with our Creator moves our emotional core in a new direction.
This brings me to the third part of our personality. (The first was our emotional core, and the second was our logic-and-willpower center.) I call this third part our story-telling center. It helps us to piece together what God has been doing from beginning to end so that our emotions see our lives from His perspective. They grow to trust His story – His care, beauty, justice, power, and tenderness that works all things together for good (Romans 8:28) – and this changes our experience of life. We buy into His version of events, and we find ourselves lining up with His plan. Amazingly, the same emotions that once fought against His work switch to become willing participants in it.
Each of the stories God writes in us will be filled with details that are unique to us as individuals, but the overall plot is generally the same. It reads something like this: We were damaged by our ignorance and sinful choices, and by the ignorance and sinful choices of those around us. God loved us, however, and He revealed to us that He sent His Son Jesus to die for us. We embraced this truth by faith, and we entered into a relationship with Him in which he forgave our sins and filled us with His Spirit.
We spent time getting to know Jesus. We added to our faith virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love (2 Peter 1:5-7). We also spent time with <page 71>His people, because His word teaches us that Christians are His body (1 Corinthians 12:12-30). We let down our veils; we wanted to see something real rather than a make-believe appearance-based spirituality. It wasn't easy to be honest and caring, and we needed to deny ourselves a good deal, but growing to know Jesus together made the journey incredibly rewarding.
Jesus became much more than a theology for us. We saw Him move in our lives and in the lives of those around us. We experienced the reality of His work in ways we could only have hoped for when we began. His deep and personal touch met the deepest needs of our hearts. With unveiled faces, we beheld as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, and we were transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord (2 Corinthians 3:18).
Is this possible Lord? Is there really this sort of hope? We see it in Your word, but how can we experience it? Please lead us into it. Do what we can't. We want to know You in a way that touches our deepest hearts and transforms us. We lay down our hopes and dreams, and we ask You to build Your hopes and dreams in us.
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