Dr. Rodney Plunket

I want to begin by looking together at 2 Corinthians (2Cor) 3:12-18, so please open your Bible to that passage and follow along as I read:

Since, then, we have such a hope, we act with great boldness, not like Moses, who put a veil over his face to keep the people of Israel from gazing at the end of the glory that was being set aside.  But their minds were hardened.  Indeed, to this very day, when they hear the reading of the old covenant, that same veil is still there, since only in Christ is it set aside.  Indeed, to this very day whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their minds; but when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed.  Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.  And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

The book of 2 Corinthians is written by the apostle Paul, and in these verses Paul refers to an Old Testament story found in Exodus (Ex) 34.  In Ex 34:29-35 Moses comes down from Mount Sinai with the tablets of stone upon which are chiseled the Ten Commandments, but Moses does not know that his face is shining with the glory of having been with God upon the mountain.  The people shrink back from him.  Even his brother Aaron the high priest shrinks back.  Moses has to cover his face with a veil so the people are not frightened of him.

In 2Cor 3:12-18 the apostle Paul is noting that the veil which shielded the glory of Moses’ face is like the veil that he sensed when he tried to teach Jews the saving message of the new covenant.  They could not see the wonder, the saving power, the truth of that message.  He taught them using the words of Moses, but they could not understand.  Paul could all but feel the veil which obstructed their vision, but he could not penetrate it, and he knew that they would continue to be veiled in their understanding until they turned to the Lord.

And that brings us to v 18.  Let’s read that verse again.  Paul says,

And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

When the veil is removed look what happens.  Believers have an unimpeded view of the divine glory and are transformed because they are able to focus upon that glory.  Paul also makes clear that the transformation process is continual; it is ongoing.  He proclaims that we are “transformed from one degree of glory to another.”

Victor Paul Furnish in his Anchor Bible commentary on 2 Corinthians has powerfully captured the force of this verse.  He looks down at 2Cor 4:4 where Paul calls Christ “the image of God,” then he looks down to 2Cor 4:6 where Paul refers to “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”  He then says, rightly I think, that the glory of the Lord in 3:18 refers to the glory of God which we are allowed to see “when the veil of unbelief is removed.”  And the mirror in which we see that glory is the face of Christ.[1]  In other words, as we stay focused upon the person of Christ we are looking upon the very glory of God.  And as we stay focused upon that glory we are transformed; we are shaped by that glory.  We become more and more like Jesus, more and more like God.  We display God’s glory.  We are transformed into the image of Christ Jesus our Lord.

Just moments ago we sang the song “A New Anointing.”  Through that song we declared,

This is the season for a new anointing.–––This is the season for a fresh outpouring,–––that the sons and daughters of the King of glory may arise and shine, . . . .[2]

I believe that God is preparing Broadway for a season of new anointing.  I believe that God is calling us individually and congregationally to grow from glory to glory.  I believe we are being called to “arise and shine.”

Broadway’s Mission, Vision, and Values team was created last year.  That team’s purpose was to articulate God’s calling for this church.  New Mission, Vision, and Values statements were composed to do just that.  I believe God is using these statements to clarify who we, as a people of God, are to be.

This morning we will look at the new Mission statement.  Next Sunday we will focus upon our new Vision statements; and on the following Sunday, we will focus upon our Values statements.

Our new Mission statement is “Discovering Jesus.”  This statement replaces “Ever Becoming a People of Love.”  I, like many of you, was quite attached to “Ever Becoming a People of Love.”  I hoped we would not change it.  But when “Discovering Jesus” was born within that team I quickly was drawn to it as the team was.  We found that our younger children could remember it and understand it more easily.  I was drawn to it by the fact that it is much more explicitly Christian than “Ever Becoming a People of Love.”  I realized that a non-Christian organization could espouse the purpose of “Ever Becoming a People of Love.”  But the mission of “Discovering Jesus” is explicitly focused upon our Savior whom we confess as Lord.

2 Corinthians 3:18 is, for me, a foundational passage in understanding what “Discovering Jesus” means.  Why?  Because the mission statement “Discovering Jesus” declares that it is our purpose to stay more focused upon Jesus in order to be “transformed . . . from one degree of glory to another.”  To put it another way, when we say that “Discovering Jesus” is our mission statement, we are declaring that it is our purpose to discover through knowledge and experience the fullness of Jesus the Christ and to be transformed continually through that ongoing discovery process.  We want to grow from glory to glory by focusing upon Jesus, who is like a mirror because He accurately reflects and transmits to us the very glory of our God.

But this verse in 2 Corinthians is not the only biblical reference which calls upon us to fulfill our mission statement.  The writings of the Apostle John use a certain Greek family of words in a specialized way.  I am referring to John’s use of the Greek word ginoœskoœ and other words related to it.  This word family refers to knowing and knowledge.  It is a common word group in the New Testament (NT), but the apostle John gives it a distinctive role and meaning, and John’s Gospel has more occurrences of the word ginoœskoœ than any other NT book.  John uses “knowing” to refer to the relationship/the fellowship/the experience of community that exists between God and Jesus, and John also uses it to refer to the fellowship/the experience of community that is to exist between Jesus and the people who put their faith in Jesus.  In fact, John’s writings make clear that the type of fellowship that Jesus and His disciples are to have is explicitly patterned after the type of fellowship that God and Jesus have.  Please listen to John 10:14-15a.  Jesus says, “I am the good shepherd.  I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father.”  “I know my own and my own know me.”  That is the kind of relationship/the kind of community that Jesus desires to have with His followers.  And the depth of that relationship is conveyed by what Jesus says next.  The kind of knowing Jesus desires is that it be “just as the Father knows me and I know the Father.”  These words of Jesus call us to a life of “Discovering Jesus” with the goal of knowing Jesus like the Father knows Jesus and like Jesus knows the Father.  These words of Jesus call us to discover Jesus so that our relationship with Him will become more and more like His relationship with the Father.  That is accomplished as we become more like Jesus as we move toward loving as Jesus loves, being obedient to the Father as Jesus was, being in tune with the Father’s will as Jesus was.

What we must realize is that to discover Jesus involves our hearts, our souls, our minds, and our bodies.  We are talking about “Discovering Jesus” with and in our entire being.

That means that “Discovering Jesus” impacts our emotional lives.  This mission statement calls upon us to discover and live out the way that Jesus feels about others, the way Jesus feels for the lost, the way Jesus feels about situations in our community and in the world.  To discover Jesus is to be drawn up out of emotional lives of negativism and despair.  “Discovering Jesus” calls upon us to have emotional lives that conform to the feelings, the attitudes of Jesus our Lord.

Discovering Jesus also impacts our religious and spiritual lives.  This mission statement calls upon us to discover through experience the prayer life of Jesus.  It calls upon us to discover through experience the way Jesus was so tightly connected to the Father.

“Discovering Jesus” also calls upon us to discover and embrace Jesus’ way of thinking.  For example, we more and more will think with the humility of Jesus.  Jesus is the Son of God, but He loved the lowly.  Jesus is the Son of God, but He lowered Himself “to the point of death––even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:8).  As we discover Jesus through walking in His steps, we will think in a humble manner.  We will move further away from selfishness, pride, and arrogance.

“Discovering Jesus” impacts us physically.  “Discovering Jesus” will cause our words and our actions to be more and more like the words and actions of Jesus.  Our words and our actions will be baptized in love, as were the words and actions of our Lord.

Please feel and embrace the way that “Discovering Jesus” draws the whole of our beings into an ever-deeper relationship with the risen Christ!

In Ephesians 3:16-17 Paul writes as follows:

I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love.

The mission statement “Discovering Jesus” calls upon us to experience the affirmation of that prayer in our lives.  To discover Jesus is to have Christ dwelling “in [our] hearts through faith.”  To discover Jesus is to experience “being rooted and grounded in love.”

In Colossians 1:27-28 we read:

To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.  It is he whom we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone in all wisdom, so that we may present everyone mature in Christ.

“Discovering Jesus” is a call to maturity in Christ.  Paul, in these verses, makes clear that he stayed focus upon Jesus to generate maturity of faith.  We must do the same.

One more passage from the apostle Paul, Galatians 2:20:

I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.  And the life I now live in the flesh I live by the faithfulness of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

“Discovering Jesus” is based upon the desire for each of one of us to say what Paul said.  Our desire is to be able to say that we are dead.  The persons people now see are the persons that Christ within us is causing us to be.

Sisters and brothers, let’s discover Jesus.  Let’s “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18).

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