The Others Can Live

The Others Can Live

Paul writes in 2 Cor. 4 about the glory we can come to and attain to if we can just understand to take it right in the situations we are faced with in life. Everything has to do with to my inner man and my relationship with God. This is especially true when the behavior of others, or the way they react, makes things uncomfortable for me or brings me into temptation.

Paul writes in verse 4 about the light of the gospel, and in verse 6 how it is God who has commanded that this light should shine into our hearts. It was God’s light over Paul’s own life that illuminated his inner man and showed him his darkness, so that he could see more of his own sin and selfishness. We go on to read that the light God shines into our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, should radiate from us. This is the new life, the life of Jesus Christ and His virtues, which then shine forth. The light brings judgment, which in turn brings acknowledgment and cleansing when I love the truth, and by this death of my “I”, life grows forth.

“But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us.” V. 7. For Paul, this was a rich treasure from God. This new life was hidden with Christ in God, and was certainly not founded on Paul’s own strength. No, on the contrary, it is precisely when our own strength is broken down that God’s power, the new life, emerges. This rich treasure will then be a true power within us, in our earthen vessel. It doesn’t matter how fragile this earthen vessel is. When the power within is from God, it will endure through all of life’s situations, keeping us in what is good and in love.

Paul worked with this very consciously, as with a tool or weapon, in the particular situations and tribulations he had to go through. V. 8-9. For him, the very help, and very solution in all these tribulations was: “Always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.” V. 10. He repeats this again in verse 11. It was precisely through light and judgment and self-acknowledgment that the dying of Jesus worked in Paul, and the life was manifested. Everything of himself, that was hidden within him, was put to death, and the life became visible, little by little. This is exactly what we read in verse 6, that the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ should shine from us.

For Paul, this was a light—the light of the gospel. It was a rich treasure from God that he bore about in his body. That’s why in verse 12 he could explain so simply, “So then death is working in us, but life in you.” The others were to experience and taste this life from Paul. It was to flow to them as a blessing and enrichment from God through the work of grace that was taking place within Paul.

How is it with us? Has this light, this treasure, become light and life in me, and a blessing for my loved ones and my fellow men? This is God’s will, our sanctification. 1 Thess. 4:3.

When this is at work in me, I can let the others live. As far as I’m concerned, they don’t need to change. They don’t need to bow themselves or humble themselves on my account. I can humble myself. I can take the lower place. I can acknowledge and allow Jesus’ death to work over my selfishness so that the life can be manifested.

How often is it that when things are going on, that it is the others who have to give in, or the other person who also has to acknowledge and not only me? No, the light of the gospel and this rich treasure opens the way to life when I can acknowledge and bow myself. Precisely by doing this, by this light and the life that is then manifested, the others can also get a longing and desire to find this path to life. In this way, we can be examples and guides showing what is good, and we will be able to help draw people to Christ.

This is the new and living way in Jesus’ footsteps. It is only by following Jesus here, that I can personally come to life and be of help to others, so that they also can find this way to life and gain possession of this rich treasure in earthen vessels.