Second Corinthians 4:1-4 The glorious gospel of Christ and those who are blinded

Well, good morning. Nice to see all of you. We're gonna start chapter four today. And for folks maybe that are visiting, we teach verse by verse, chapter by chapter, line upon line. So we're in 2 Corinthians. We started 1 Corinthians a year and a half ago. We're now in 2 Corinthians chapter four.

And this is a couple of cool verses. If you listen to J. Vernon McGee, every verse is always the best since the last verse. So, and these are wonderful verses. Okay, so I've titled today's section, the first four verses in chapter four, The Glorious Gospel and Those Who Are Blinded.

So we actually have some encouraging messages and then some sobering, some sobering messages. So let's look at the outline. This outline is kind of a combination of what I borrowed from my brother, Hal Malloy, and then some of my own ideas. So Christ's life and ministry is shown through the glorious gospel and those who are blinded. Christ's life and ministry is through the glorious person of Christ and the gospel. And then as we get to the later verses, 8-12 and 12-15, God ordains trial and suffering to reveal his glory. And we kind of have a couple parts to that. So we're going to focus on the glorious gospel and those who are blinded today. So here's the verses. I'm just going to read them again. And this is the new American standard.

Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we do not lose heart. But we have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word of God, but by manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. in whose case the God of this world has blinded the minds, plural, of the unbelieving so that they may not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

So before I start, I just wanted to get some, maybe some definitions, especially the last, let's do verse four. It's just a tremendous verse. And it talks about kind of two marvelous things. It talks about the gospel, and it talks about the glory of Christ. And the glory of Christ, actually, it's really neat.

Our brother Andrew Malloy was sharing today in our class in Sunday school about the definition of glory. And when Gloria's use of God or of Christ, it really don't think so much of a blinding light, even though we know in scripture that whenever man sees God, he is a blinding light. Remember in the Mount of Transfiguration in the gospels there, gospel accounts, that they were blinded. They couldn't see. Man cannot approach a holy God. He blinds him physically.

But that word glory is so much more than that. And actually, a kind of working definition, the glory of God or of Christ is the sum total of His infinite attributes. You know, the attributes of God, you can list them. He's holy, He's righteous, He's just. He's omniscient and so on. So think of it as a sum total of who He is. That's who God is. His glory represents who He is. So when it says in the last verse here, the gospel of the glory of Christ, that really focuses on our wonderful God and Savior, His infinite attributes.

And then secondly is the gospel is glorious because we have a glorious God. So when it says this kind of a mouthful, the gospel of the glory of Christ, that's just, you know, the gospel is a wonderful thing, and it's only because we have a wonderful and glorious God. And then we'll talk about the gospel too. The gospel is the good news, and people use that, that's another term that's probably overused a lot. and we hear it used just in the vernacular too.

So we'll see that shortly here. So Paul's first gonna, we're gonna first look at the first two verses and they're kind of gonna, he's gonna talk about his ministry, which he's been doing if you've read the first three chapters. He talked a lot about his ministry. His ministry in this book he's writing to the Corinthian church in Corinth. But it has application to us as ministering God's word as well. So let's go on. So we're gonna start in verse one.

It says, therefore, since we have this ministry, so therefore, it's actually two words from the original, because of this, since we have this ministry, or actually I like Merriman's translation, having this ministry as this one is. So Paul had this wonderful ministry, and his ministry was giving out the good news about our Savior, the gospel message.

So actually we've seen this, he's kind of been building up to this, we see in previous verses he talks about his ministry, In 2 Corinthians 3.8 he says, how will the ministry of the Spirit fail to be even more with glory?

So here, here's our word glory, it was used as Mike taught it in chapter 3 about the glory of God in giving the law. When he gave the law on Mount Sinai, people couldn't go up to Mount, it was too glorious, physically too, they couldn't approach it. In fact, if they did approach it and touch it, they were going to die. So the gospel, the message from God at Mount Sinai, the giving of the law, was glorious.

But what Paul's pointing out here is the ministry of the Spirit about the gospel is even more glorious. And this is the next verse says that, much more does the ministry of righteousness abound in glory. Then another verse says, we use great boldness in our speech and are not like Moses who used to put a veil over his face.

And then lastly, what Mike covered last week, but we, only the very first part of that, but we with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror, which is a word of God, the glory of our Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ. So as we look into God's word, we see his glory, we see who he is. And that's a marvelous thing. OK, let's go on. And now he talks about as we receive mercy.

And it actually is modifying the idea of his ministry. and some verses about his ministry. And we have that back in verse 6 in chapter 3. Who made us adequate as servants or ministers of a new covenant. Remember we covered the new covenant back then.

The new covenant focuses on the new covenant that Christ would shed His blood for the sins of the world, and the Father would raise him up again. That's in essence, that's called the eternal covenant, but it also is our wonderful gospel message. That's the true gospel message. Christ would lay down his life for the sins of the world, and the Father would raise him up again.

And they agreed on that before man ever came on the scene. Then he talks about by the mercies of God, and the Amplified kind of expands the idea of the mercies of God, His favor, His benefits, and ultimately our salvation. And then the main part of this, Paul's gonna say, as we get to the last part of these four verses, we're gonna talk about men being blinded, and you might get kind of, that's kind of a downer, right? You're gonna say, men are blinded. How can I possibly tell them about the Lord Jesus if they're blinded? So he's kind of laying the stage. He says, we're not to lose heart. We're not to faint. I think in the King James.

And Merriman and, I kind of combined Merriman-McCauley here, the two M's, actually Merriman-McCauley and Malloy, as people have pointed out, the three M's. The glorious nature of the ministry of the gospel is what upholds and sustains the true minister of the gospel, even if he receives negative reaction to the gospel. And when you, you know, some people have observed, when you see that men are blinded, they say, well, wait a minute, God has tied my hands. How can these people ever come to know the Savior if they're blinded?

So we're gonna see there's that tension or that competition, that war, it's a war for man's minds from his understanding is going on right now in every person. So now he's gonna talk about some things he's not gonna do. He's gonna renounce some things. So he says, but, so we're gonna continue the idea of not losing heart.

Paul and his team, in the context of 2 Corinthians, and all who minister the good news, every person, even if you're just talking to your children, or talking to your neighbor, have renounced or rejected, and that's it. Paul says, I'm gonna renounce and reject for my own benefit, the middle voice, for ourselves or benefit, And it's the idea that he's going to say, I'm not going to use this approach. In today's world, there's all kinds of approaches people use.

If you're in the computer world, I'm going to blast emails. That's kind of old school. You're going to have a special website, and it's going to really If you have a business, that's going to bring people to your website. Not to your door anymore, but to your website. That's kind of the deal. Well, Paul's going to say, I'm not going to use man's approach. I'm going to use God's approach.

And he talks about this as the hidden things of shame. And the Amplified says there's a disgraceful, he's talking about these things of shame. There's a secret thoughts, feelings, desires, methods in the arts of men hidden through shame. Underhanded ways people manipulate another person.

And basically he's talking about, Merriman says, he's talking about the public ministry of the gospel. And so now he's going to get specific here. He says, we have renounced. That's the main idea. And he's going to talk about three areas. Two are going to be negative and one positive. He's going to renounce with the idea not walking in craftiness. That's the first one.

Secondly, not adulterating the word of God. And as we get to the last part of the verse, he's gonna say, it's kind of a hard thing to kind of, he's gonna say, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, commending ourselves. And you think, well, it sounds like he's gonna boast, I'm commending ourselves to every man's conscience. And that's actually gonna be a positive thing, because he's gonna talk about, I'm gonna tell you about God truthfully, and I'm gonna commend, and that's gonna commend me, because you realize, I'm telling you about the Lord Jesus. Isn't it wonderful when a brother or sister shares something, if you're in a one-on-one, they share something about the Savior, and you say, wow, that's great. Well, in a way, they're commending themselves that they know the Lord Jesus, that they're putting themselves at the forefront, and that's not a bad thing. So let's look at the negatives first here. They were announcing two disgraceful ways, not walking and craftiness.

This word craftiness, I'm not gonna pan or something. It's the idea of shrewd or cunning. It's the idea that, and you've heard this, we're gonna use every means. You know, some people say, in my, whatever I'm doing, I'm gonna pull all the stops out. I'm gonna use every single means at my opportunity. Well, Paul's saying, I'm not gonna do that. I'm not gonna be shrewd or cunning. I'm gonna present God's word just as it is, just as God intended it. And he said, I'm no longer going to go to walk in this way with this craftiness.

And Ephesians kind of uses the same word at the end here in verse 14, Ephesians 4.14. We are no longer to be children tossed here and there by ways and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by the craftiness, the same word as in our verse, in deceitful scheming. So that's the first one, not walking in craftiness.

The second one, not adulterating the word of God. Now, adulterating, we've actually seen another form of this word earlier, is to ensnare, hence to corrupt, to mingle the truth with the word of God and false doctrines. You know, I was trying to think of, Vani always encourages me to, well, think of good examples of these. Sometimes I get so intense on the, the words and the verses, I forget to find good examples. So I couldn't find a good example of adulterating, but we see it in a sense when we see people take, they wanna take something about their life and put it into God's word.

They wanna justify what they're doing by saying, well, that's part of God's word, and they do it with a motive to make themselves look good, and the Lord doesn't want us to do that, basically. mixing human traditions with the pure word of the gospel. And here's this comparison we had earlier in 2 Corinthians where we had the idea of peddling the Word of God. We're not to be peddlers. Peddling the Word of God means I'm gonna peddle it and I'm gonna get something back. I'm gonna get some monetary reward. And Paul says, I'm not gonna do that. I'm not gonna peddle it to get rich. And we see that pretty badly abused in our scene, in the Christian scene. There are some, unfortunately, that it seems to me they peddle the Word of God, and that's terrible. Okay, and he says, they're renouncing by not adulterating the word of God. So that's the second negative. So now we switch to the positive part of the verse. We renounce by presenting ourselves to man's conscience. And this is a strong contrast from the negatives.

Commending ourselves. Like I said, it sounds like you're puffing yourself, I'm making myself a big person, but it actually has a good motive here. It's the idea to present a favorable, and this came out of vines, so some of the words by the acquaintance of a favorable notice, I struggle with that a little bit. So I like this.

This is what we studied earlier in chapter three, verse one. Are we beginning to commend ourselves again, or do we need as some letters of commendation to you or from you And it says, you are our letter. So Paul's talking about the Corinthians. He said, rather than me sending you a letter saying who I am and this is my credentials, he's gonna say, just look at these people who've come to the Lord. They're my credentials. That commends me that I gave out the true word of God. So that's commending in a good sense. And then later on, we'll study this down the road a bit in 2 Corinthians 10, 18.

For it is not he who commends himself that is approved, but he whom the Lord commends. So basically, to every man's conscience in the sight of God. So conscience is, you know, that's a moral thing in our minds. What is good and what is bad? And we sort through that. You know, God has given us a conscience. And that's a whole study unto itself. But anyway, it's what we, and it depends tremendously upon whether we know the Lord Jesus as our Savior. Our conscience as an unbeliever is much different than our conscience as a believer.

Okay, it says, in the sight or presence of God. And the idea of being in the sight or presence of God, imagine if the Lord Jesus were here and sitting down in the front row. Lord willing, I wouldn't say anything different than I'm saying right now. But I would be, you know, just think of the New Testament times. I mean, first of all, I can't imagine that. But what's cool is, if you read Scripture carefully, we're actually in a better position having His Word right now than having Him physically present. That kind of blows your mind there a little bit, so. Anyway, but this verse is that your conscience is in the sight of God as if he were physically here.

By the manifestations of the truth, making visible or observable as manifestations. That's the idea of that word. That's a cool word I like. One of its root forms is, imagine if you had a container and there's something really valuable or special inside. You remove the lid and you remove the lid so you can, oh wow, look what's in there. Look what's in that container. So that's it.

A manifestation is to take the lid off. That's a kind of vernacular definition. And it's basically by means of an open declaration of the truth. So that was Paul's desire, open declaration of the truth. Commending ourselves by a clear manifestation of the truth. So as we as believers, we commend ourselves as we give a testimony about who our Savior is and about what scripture says. We're commending ourselves, and that's a good thing. All right.

So now before we get into the last two verses, I thought we'd just go back a little bit and go back to chapter 3, because we're going to talk about the veil and the Old Covenant. And Paul's going to use the veil kind of in a different sense in the last two verses. Now in chapter 3, we'll start with verse 13. He used the veil in this way. And Paul's speaking here, and I'm kind of starting in the middle of a verse.

And are not like Moses who used to put a veil over his face so that the sons of Israel would not look intently at the end of what was fading away. But their minds were being hardened, but their minds But their minds were hardened, for until this very day, at the reading of the Old Covenant, the same veil remains unlifted, because it is removed in Christ. But to this day, whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their heart. But whenever a person turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. in verse 18, which we covered last week. But we, with all unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord the Spirit.

So we see through here, the veil is used, the first part, Moses put the veil on, and if you're careful about that, he put the veil on so they wouldn't see, he was with God on the mount, and he came down, and in essence, it wasn't so much it was so bright for them, he didn't want them to notice it would fade over time.

So he put the veil on. So that's a veil in that sense. And then there's a veil in the sense of the hardness of their heart. And that's kind of a term that is used here, that they hardened their hearts because they focused on that law, the Mosaic law. And we have a much more glorious message that that veil is removed. And it kind of goes down, so the veil is used in a sense here.

And then we come down to verse 18, it says, talking about the believer today, and in Paul's time, but we with unveiled face, A believer has no veil between himself and the Lord. There's no encumbrance to that. And there's also, there's no encumbrance to that glory, who God is, going out from the believer. But we're gonna see that on the other side, the recipient side, if he's an unbeliever, there is a veil.

And that's what we're gonna see in these verses to come. Hopefully it doesn't get too confusing, the veil used in a couple different ways here. Okay, so now, and even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. So he returns to the idea of a veil, and he says, so it actually is stated, the if is, it's assumed to be true, and even if our gospel is veiled, and it's true, it is truly veiled.

And this is one of the favorite words of, Bonnie says, Roger, this is one of your favorite words, is, is my favorite word, right, among many others. And this word, amy, so this veil, this situation exists constantly, it doesn't change. So the gospel is constantly veiled in our world today. And the veil is the idea to cover, conceal, so that no trace of it can be seen through it. And the sense of it is it was veiled in the past, the gospel was veiled in the past, and it continues to be veiled into the present. So the gospel, the glorious gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is veiled 24-7 right now. Even though we're not veiled, it's going out from us. Anyone who's proclaiming that is going out, that glory is going out 24-7. but it's veiled to the recipient, to certain recipients.

So this is a general statement about the gospel in this present evil age. And the present evil age is kind of defined here. It says in Galatians, talking about Christ who gave himself for our sins so that he might rescue us from this present evil age. Okay, so let's go on. Now we go to the second part of the verse.

So who is this affecting? Our gospel is veiled to a particular group, to those who are perishing. So who's that? And it's literally the perishing ones. It's not that, in fact I'm getting ahead here. I'll just use the points here. So perishing is the idea that those who will suffer eternal death And the tense here, this is all about this tense of this verb here. It's present tense.

They're in the process of perishing. Perishing describes the unbeliever, and we'll see that shortly. It is not that he will perish, but he's already in the state of perishing. He is perishing. All men are born perishing, just like all men are born sinners. This is another kind of a corollary to that. All men are born sinners. All men are also born perishing, which is a pretty, you think about that, it's a pretty, it states a fact that most men reject, sadly.

So in 1 Corinthians 1.18, for the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. So this is the problem right here. It's foolishness. You tell a man he's perishing, he says, get out of here. I don't want to listen to what you're saying.

That's what most men say. These people are to be, and I thought Marian had a really good point. I listened to Ron Merriman, this is back in the 70s and 80s, and he says, those people are to be snatched out, we gotta snatch those people out of that group of perishing ones. That's what he was saying, for salvation.

Okay, we go to verse four. So now it's kind of progressive, it's perishing. Let me go back for a second here. Even if our gospel is veiled, statement one, it is veiled to those who are perishing. So we have some more information. Now he's gonna tell us in whose case the God of this world. So what's that about? So now he's gonna tell us the cause for this veiled condition. in whose case speaks about those who are perishing, the God of this world, or literally is the God of this age.

So the original word in the Greek is actually for age, but we're gonna see that Satan is described both as in terms of the age, he's the God of this age, as he is the God of this world. So there's several verses that talk about Satan being the God of this world. Matthew 4, 8, this is a situation where Satan took the Lord Jesus up to the mount and he said, I'll give you all these different things. So in this verse he says, I kind of compacted it here a bit, and the devil showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and all these things I will give to you. So just by the context you say, if he can give it to him, he's in control of it. And that's something that was given to him, you know, God the Father gave that to him.

Then in John 12, 31, now judgment is upon the world. Now the rule of this world will be cast out. That's Satan's ultimate destiny. And then lastly, so here he's called the ruler of the world, not the god of this world, the ruler of the world. And lastly, in John 16, 11, and concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged.

So he's gonna be cast out, and he's gonna be judged. So good news, he's already condemned, he's gonna be cast out and judged. That's already, and in God's eyes, that's already happened. Because he looks at time, there's no, you know, he's not in time, he's outside of time.

Okay, let's go on. So this is progressive information. In whose case the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving. So now we're getting down to the really interesting part here. He has blinded. So the idea of blinding here, this word, is the idea to, and it comes from a root, to burn. It's like a smoke or a smoke screen. And it's a fact. It's a past point fact, Aristotle's past point fact. The blindness is like a smoke screen. But it's even more interesting. It's hiding the glory of the gospel. It's hiding that because the smoke screen puts, so the unbeliever can't really see what's going on.

So what does that really mean? So now we gotta get down to what does he mean by the mind or minds? The minds of the unbelieving. So this word for mind is, it's really the idea of the thoughts and understanding. are thoughts and understanding. And unbelievers' thoughts are confused as to the glory of Christ. They can't sort out the glory of the gospel of Christ.

So I'm gonna use myself as an example here. Before I was a believer, I came to the Lord later in life, in my, I don't know, my 30s. That's right, anyway, but I was thinking back. I was thinking back to when I was a teenager. I grew up in Miami, Florida, and I can remember being at a bus station in Miami, Florida as a teenager. I was going, that's back when you rode buses. I mean, you still ride buses, but I don't know, today you ride airplanes, and I don't know, you drive in your car, but anyway, and a gentleman came up to me, and he basically gave me the gospel. And I was going to church at that time. I had been baptized, and he told me this stuff, and I said, well, sir, I'm baptized. I'm good. I gave him the thumbs up. I'm good. And I walked away from him. I didn't know what he, it was just confusing what he was saying. Well, fast forward into my 30s and 40s.

I go to a Bible study, and we're reading in Hebrews. And I say, this is confusing. I don't understand what they're saying. The first book I read in the Bible was Hebrews. That was a tough go there. I don't understand what is being said here. And I just, I kind of, sort of a prayer to my, I really would like to understand this, and the Lord was faithful. Over time, it took over a year for, to accept Christ as my Savior. But I was confused, so this really speaks to me, that we're blinded, we're confused about what is, what's going on here, what's happening. Satan confuses us, he blinds our minds.

So, and then I actually wanted, there's a little contrast here. You know, in chapter three, we talked about hardening of the hearts. That's kind of a different picture I see. Some try to connect these two, the hardening and the blinding, and I'm not sure I exactly agree with that. But anyway, it talks about a hardening in chapter three. We're talking about this blindness in chapter four here.

Okay, so let's go on. So here's the purpose. So why does Satan do this? He does it for a very particular reason. It tells us right here. So that, with a purpose that, the unbelieving might not see. So Darby has it, should discern. It's the word mind game. It's in our minds. That's where the battlefield is. So the purpose of the God of this age, Satan, is to prevent the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ from shining on the unbeliever.

So now we're gonna talk about this wonderful phrase, the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ. So I'm gonna have a bunch of statements and I, well, that's just the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ. Given the definition I gave you earlier, it's just such a marvelous statement here. The glory of the gospel needs no human embellishment. The gospel of the glory of Christ cannot be dimmed.

So the picture is not that it's dim, it's that there's this blinding or smokescreen or misunderstanding or confusion about the gospel that's going on in the recipient. But it's not being dimmed. The gospel is always shining forth. The unbeliever's thoughts or understanding is a target for blinding. So it's the thoughts and understanding, that's the battleground.

So here's some statements from Chester McCauley. The glory of Christ describes the gospel. The glory of Christ is revealed in the gospel. It shows that he loved us, he died for us, and rose again. The glory of Christ also gives us a test. of the gospel message.

I thought this was just so good and I got so excited about this. Here's a test. When someone says, I'm gonna give you the gospel message, you can test that. You can say, okay, tell me what it is, I'll listen and I'll tell you from scripture whether you've given me the right message or not. This is really, really good. And we all can do it. There's not a person in here can't.

If you can read, you can do this test. How do you know when you've heard the gospel? You know you have heard the gospel when man has been totally excluded. To some set of people, this would be, you can't say that. I'm really involved in this, Roger. I'm really involved. I did this and I did that, and they'd have all the list of things that they did. But the gospel doesn't mention man except in one area, and it's not a positive, it's a negative. Here's man's contribution. Man's only part is our sins. That's all that we contribute to the gospel message, our sins. Nothing else. We have to believe it, but being believing isn't a, it's a non-meritorious, that's a big word, we don't get credit for believing. Because we're believing in something that's already, that he's already done for us.

So the gospel is the objective truth about Christ. So where can we find this objective truth about Christ? There's only one place that we can find it. So here it is, the objective truth about Christ. This is what we're to believe. That Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures. He was buried, he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures. That's the gospel. Where do you see man in that verse, those verse and a half? The only place you see it, our sins. He died for our sins. That's the only place you see it. So that's that wonderful, and it's the glory of Christ, it's who Christ is, what he's done for us.

That's a glorious message. So now, if you think I haven't got, I'm gonna do one last little summary here. Maybe this is too long a message, but we'll, okay. So here's, this is to wake you up if you're not awake. Okay, well actually I have a little, I have to do this first.

We have to talk about the image of God. This is cool too. I got four verses, let me just do them real fast here. I wanted to kind of show you that in scripture it talks about the light of the gospel, the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. There's these wonderful verses that talk about how Christ is the image of God. So I'll just read several of them here.

In 1 Corinthians 1.15, he is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. Then in Hebrews it says, he is a radiance of his glory and the exact representation of his nature.

Then in John 14.9, have I been so long with you and yet you have not come to know me, Philip? He who has seen me has seen the Father. Then lastly, in john 1 14 and the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we saw his glory glory as of the only begotten from the father full of grace and truth so jesus christ is the image of God. That's what these verses are to show you. Now, this is a short summary. Two slides, three slides to go. You still with me? Three slides to go. Only three to go. Two slides in the summary and one final thought. And it's only one chart too. for those who have seen me in multiple charts.

Okay, so summary, so here it is. Remember, in verses three and four, there's this kind of progressive revelation. So being an engineer, I thought, well, gotta have block A, B, C, A, B, C. So here we go. A, the gospel is veiled, first piece of information. Two, it is veiled to the perishing. Three, how is that? The God of this world has blinded. Okay, fourth block, who did that? Not who, it's the minds of the unbelieving. The reason that they may not, I'm sorry, that the unbelieving might not discern or see, not see what? The light of the gospel of the glory of Christ. All right, so final thoughts, some have said, Well, wait a minute.

If men are blinded, how do I ever get through that? So how do you answer someone that says, well, if Satan has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, how can I ever get, how can I get the message to them? Does God have an answer to that, is the question.

Well, he does. Okay, and Dr. Chafer has had just a great summary here. But these restrictions, the ones I mentioned in verses three and four, can be overcome by the illuminating power of the Holy Spirit. So God in his wisdom already has, God the Spirit, God the Holy Spirit is already working 24-7 doing this.

With this in view, the Spirit reproves or enlightens the world with respect to the cardinal, that's a fancy word for most important, features of the gospel, namely, sin and righteousness and judgment. And that verse says, basically, he's gonna convict or convince the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment, so that's what the, so they're blinded, but God's Holy Spirit is out there, that is going out, and he's working the same target area, it's all in our minds, it's all in that area. and he's convincing them of their need for a savior. The scriptures are evidently their primary agency, which is used by the spirit to this end, for faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. And that certainly was the case in my case, as I read more in Hebrews there, that was many years ago, the more I read in Hebrews, and I understood, the more I came to understand that I was a sinner. and I needed a Savior. And I would commend that you look at God's Word and you come to that same conclusion about our Savior, that you're a sinner and you need His saving grace.

So let's close. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you so much, Lord, for your marvelous Word. We thank you for your clear information about what's happening to us and happening to all men. and how your glorious gospel is going out unhindered, 24-7, but men are blind. And we pray that your spirit would have its way in their hearts, would convince them of their need, convince them of their sin and their need for a savior. We ask it in his name, amen.