I’d never seen a man look so tortured as did this inmate on a Kairos Prison Ministry Weekend. Joseph1 was in his early 40s at the time, yet his back bent over and his shoulders hung low as though ladened with an impossible load only he could see. His contorted facial features betrayed relentless angst with no relief. I later learned he’d been so burdened by his crime that the only reason he did not take his own life was his insistence that he suffer. But when Joseph walked into the prison chapel the Sunday morning of that Kairos Weekend, his face glowed. I speak not of a visible light source as measured in lumens, rather the beacon of joy beaming as one forgiven in Christ Jesus and liberated by the Spirit of God. He said, “When I looked in the mirror this morning, for the first time in 19 years I liked what I saw.” I saw Joseph many times over the next several years, and his smile never waned.
In 2 Corinthians 3:7-18, Paul contrasts the glory of God’s old covenant of the Law given to us through Moses and the glory of God’s new covenant—His Spirit living in us through faith in Christ. The old came engraved on tablets of stone; the new is engraved in human hearts. The old brought condemnation, but the new gives us right standing before God. The covenant of law brought certain death, for we could not keep it, but the Spirit in us is life. And though the old covenant brought glory—for Moses had to veil his glowing face before the people—it was yet fading; the surpassing glory of the new covenant, however, shines forever. The apostle then asserts: “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. But we all, with unveiled faces, looking as in a mirror at the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.”2 From glory to glory: we are released from lockup under the Law3 and raised to freedom in the new covenant in Christ. This is true of all who believe in Him.
Yet “glory to glory” holds another promise for us in the sense that our transformation into the image of Christ yields in us ever-increasing glory, a refined splendor radiating from the inside out. As our old self perishes, our new self flourishes. Peer into your mirror. Has the Spirit of God been working in you what is pleasing to Him”?4 Isn’t He faithful in this way; can you now see it? If not, ask Him to show you. Then praise Him for His transforming work in your life. Enjoy what you see.
Father, you are at work in us, both to will and to work for your good pleasure.5 This is love and for this we thank you through lives submitted to you. In Christ we pray. Amen.
1, This name is changed for privacy purposes.
2 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 NASB
3 See Romans 7:6
4 Hebrews 13:21
5 Philippians 2:13
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Paul Nordman—Author 