Chapter 3

Are we beginning again to commend ourselves? Or do we need, as some do, letters of commendation to you or from you?

You are our letter, written on our hearts, which is known and read by all men;

clearly you are a letter of Christ, composed by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on fleshly tablets of the heart. Excellence of the New Law

Such is the assurance I have through Christ towards God.

Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything, as from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God.

He also it is who has made us fit ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the spirit; for the letter kills, but the spirit gives life.

Now if the ministration of death, which was engraved in letters upon stones, was inaugurated in such glory that the children of Israel could not look steadfastly upon the face of Moses on account of the transient glory that shone upon it,

shall not the ministration of the spirit be still more glorious?

For if there is glory in the ministration that condemned, much more does the ministration that justifies abound in glory.

For though the former ministration was gloried, yet in this regard it is without glory, because of the surpassing glory of the latter.

For if that which was transient was glorious, much more is that glorious which abides. The Veil Is Taken Away

Having therefore such hope, we show great boldness.

We do not act as Moses did, who used to put a veil over his face that the Israelites might not observe the glory of his countenance, which was to pass away.

But their minds were darkened; for to this day, when the Old Testament is read to them, the selfsame veil remains, not being lifted to disclose the Christ in whom it is made void.

Yes, down to this very day, when Moses is read, the veil covers their hearts;

but when they turn in repentance to God, the veil shall be taken away.

Now the Lord is the spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

But we all, with faces unveiled, reflecting as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into his very image from glory to glory, as through the Spirit of the Lord.