The conclusion claimed is that Paul taught in the third chapter of Second Corinthians that the moral law is done away, and that the seventh-day Sabbath is no longer binding. The invisible premises from which this conclusion is drawn are that the apostle, in 2 Cor. 3:7, speaks of the Sabbath, and that what he refers to as being written and engraven on stones is the moral law, and that this has given place to something better, and is no longer binding.
Second Corinthians 3 is the stronghold of certain expositors, for a certain purpose. When a man is in the condition described in Rom. 8:7, and feels that he must in some way show that the seventh-day Sabbath is no longer in force, but has been abolished and is done away, he flies to 2 Cor. 3:7 as his first defense and stronghold for that position. Let us, then, look at the statements of that chapter which are claimed to support these conclusions. Paul writes: “But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance; which glory was to be done away.”
There! says the antinomian, you see the law was a “ministration of death,” and that has been “done away,” or, according to verse 13, “is abolished,” or, as stated in verse 14, “is done away in Christ.”
But hold a moment! What was done away?
Why, the old Jewish Sabbath.
But we do not find the Sabbath mentioned in the text nor in the context. The word “Sabbath” does not occur in the whole chapter from beginning to end. Think again. What was “done away”?
The old law, which has given way to something more glorious.
But hold! We do not find that it says “law” once in the whole passage, nor that anything that is said, is said of the law.
But it was what was “written and engraven in stones,” and that was the law, was it not?
The passage does not say that the law was written and engraven in stones; and besides, it does not say that that which was written and engraven in stones was done away. These anti-Sabbath conclusions find no premises to stand on yet.
Well, if the Sabbath was not written and engraven on stones, and is not done away, pray what was it?
Read Paul’s words again: “But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was glorious,” etc.
Now what is a “ministration”?—A service of a minister; the acts performed in carrying out a service, or the application of a law.
But there was no “ministration” engraven in stones. Therefore that expression “ministration of death, written and engraven in stones,” taken by itself, does not mean the Ten Commandments. It only means the service of Moses in bringing them down to the people and establishing that dispensation of which the Ten Commandment law was the germ and the center.
As there was no ministration engraven in stones, the sentence is evidently elliptical; and doubtless Bloomfield has the meaning of the expression when he interprets it as the ministration of that which was written and engraven in stones. He says: “If the ministry or office of promulgating a covenant, which, in the letter (when written on tables of stone), brought nothing but death with it, was glorious,” etc.
All that is said of that ministration is that it “was glorious.” It was so glorious that Moses, through the part he acted in it, was so imbued with the divine presence that the skin of his face shone as he went down to minister before the people; and they were not able to look upon him (Ex. 34:29–35); and Paul says that that “glory was to be done away;” and that is all that was done away, so far as Paul’s record goes. As time passed, the light that shone from Moses’s face gradually waned away, indicating that the system which he established would finally give away to something better. To this end the children of Israel could not look; that is, to the giving place of this system to the more glorious ministration of the Spirit. So the veil which Moses put over his face temporarily, they threw over their hearts permanently, and blinded their eyes to Christ and His higher work. But if they would once accept Christ, as He is revealed to them and the world, they would see the relative glory of the two ministrations which Paul is here contrasting—the ministration of death, and the ministration of the Spirit. Then the vail would be done away in Christ; for there would be no room for any doubt and obscurity that might have hovered over the situation, while they lived under types and shadows and ceremonies. They would see that the ministration of the Spirit, that which remains, excels in glory, and the other has no glory by reason of this; as the glory of the moon and stars disappears before the rising sun.
That which is called, in verse 7, “the ministration of death,” is called, in verse 9, “ministration of condemnation.” That tells the whole story between the old and the new. “He that despised Moses’s law died without mercy under two or three witnesses.” Heb. 10:28. The priests acted as judges, and the witnesses and the people inflicted the penalty. Deut. 17:2–7. One accidentally killing another, had to flee to a city of refuge to save his life. Deut. 19:5. This was the letter that killeth, “the ministration of condemnation,” “the ministration of death.” The death penalty as it existed under the theocracy, now, under the ministration of the Spirit, is taken from the hands of human judges, and held in abeyance till the judgment. What does Christ say?—“If a man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not.” John 12:47. And to the woman taken in the very act of adultery, he said, “Neither do I condemn thee;” that is, to death by stoning, which was still the theocratic law of the land. And the Lord disposes of all cases in this dispensation by saying, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.” Rom. 12:19. But men take advantage of this mercy, and abuse it; as Solomon says, “Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.” Eccl. 8:11.
The ministration of death, as we have seen, is also called “the ministration of condemnation,” so the ministration of the Spirit has an additional, explanatory name; that is, “The ministration of righteousness.” 2 Cor. 3:9. “The Spirit giveth life;” and Paul says, in verse 17, that “the Lord is that Spirit.” The ministration of the Spirit is therefore the ministration of the Lord; and the Lord gives righteousness, which is life. The ministration of the Spirit is the offering of life through Christ to all who will accept of Him. This the apostle says was His business. Mark how he speaks: “Who hath made us able ministers of the New Testament; not of the letter, but of the Spirit: for the letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life.” Verse 6. Then the New Testament has a letter that kills, as well as the Old. What is this letter?—That which kills the sinner. When will it be executed?—In the judgment at the last day. Men tell us that the penalty of the law has been done away; and therefore that shows that the law is no longer binding.
But that is a wrong statement, and a wrong conclusion. The penalty has not been done away. Its execution is not now left with men, but is delayed to the Lord’s own time. It is there, and is to come.
It is that “vengeance” which the Lord says is His, and declares that He will repay. Rom. 12:19. “The soul that sinneth, it shall die” (Eze. 18:20), is a sentence that has not been relaxed in the least; and “the wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23), is still in force; and when the settlement is made, the demands of the law and the Sabbath will be met. No; the penalty is not abolished; and it is the death penalty, as at first. The ministration of the Spirit, which we are now under, makes the difference. Under this ministration, provision is made whereby righteousness can be imputed to a man, and sentence against an evil work be not executed speedily. Life is offered under the new covenant.
These covenants occupy distinct divisions of time. The new covenant was promised in the days of Jeremiah. Jer. 31:31–34. Paul quotes that prophecy, and says: “In that he saith, A new covenant, He hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.” Heb. 8:13. So the first has passed away; and the new is molded and governed by the ministration of the Spirit.
The things which govern our relation to God are ministered differently now, from what they were before. The warp and woof of our experience are not now condemnation and death, but assurances from the new covenant which offer us righteousness and life. Were we living under the old covenant, “every transgression and disobedience” would receive, here and now, “a just recompense of reward.” Heb. 2:2. But now “we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” 2 Cor. 3:18. So much more glorious is the ministration of the Spirit than the ministration of death. But this is digressing.
What was done away? In considering what Paul has taught in 2 Corinthians 3, one should keep in mind what he has taught elsewhere on the same subject. If it is said that in the passage mentioned, he teaches the abolition of the Sabbath or the doing away of the law, it is well to keep in mind what he has said in other places on these points; for we must not involve him in self-contradiction. This is a question of vital importance; for it involves the question of obedience to, or violation of, the moral law, and so affects our eternal destiny. Of the law Paul says: “Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good.” Rom. 7:12. He says, “Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.” Rom. 7:7. This agrees with his words in Rom. 5:13: “Sin is not imputed when there is no law,” and in chapter 4:15: “For where no law is, there is no transgression;” and he rivets the whole subject by saying, “Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.” Rom. 3:31. So long as sin and transgression exist in the world, so long the law exists to detect and condemn them.
Now after the apostle had taught the Romans in this way, dare any one charge him with turning around and teaching the Corinthians, the same year, the very opposite doctrine; namely, that the law has been abolished, set aside, and done away in Christ?
Peter speaks of some who wrest the words of Paul to their own destruction. 2 Peter 3:16. Those who accuse him of teaching that the law has been abolished and taken out of the way, certainly wrest his words. And note the result. Suppose, on the strength of that, they turn against the law, and transgress it, and then find at last that the law has always been binding, and will judge us in the last day (James 2:12), and that they themselves are sinners, condemned beyond rescue; what will be the result? Peter says they wrest the words of Paul to their own destruction. They must receive the wages of sin; and that is death.
Beware, then, lest you trifle with the words of the sacred writers, and make them contradict themselves. Remember that Paul does not speak of the law in 2 Cor. 3:7, only incidentally, and that the489only thing he says is done away is the glory of the former dispensation. The law is not entrenched upon, nor its sacredness questioned; and the glory that is done away is done away only because the glory of the dispensation of the Spirit is so much greater. Its more ample provisions exceed in glory, and before its brightness all lesser lights of consequence disappear.