Paul: walking by faith, not by sight

Faith is important in Christianity from start, to finish. We become a Christian by faith, by believing in Jesus as our Savior, by trusting our life to him, by believing that all our sins are forgiven. And we continue in Christianity by faith that, when we die, we will go to be with the Lord, and in the judgment, we will be accepted by God because Jesus has covered all our sins.

OK, but what role does faith play in our lives between now and then? I’ll briefly mention two things.

First, when we live by faith we continue to trust in Christ for the forgiveness of our sins. We do not need to become neurotic about whether God is going to accept us into his kingdom. We do not need to be like Martin Luther, who spent hours examining himself to make sure he identified every sinful thought and repented and asked forgiveness for each individual sin.

No, faith gives us peace of mind that we are accepted by God day by day, from now until the end of time.

Second, faith makes a difference in the way we live – it makes a difference in our behavior. We can look in the Bible for examples of people who lived by faith. We see Abraham, who believed God and left his homeland and trusted God to give him more descendants than he could count. We see Deborah, who went out with the army of Israel because she believed that God would give them the victory.

We see a teenage boy named David who trusted that God would help him kill a giant, because God had already helped him kill bears and lions. We see a teenage girl named Mary who accepted the will of God for her life.

There are lots of other examples there, of young people and old people, who trusted God. And how do we know that they trusted God? Because it made a difference in the way they lived. Abraham believed, and he did something. Deborah believed, and she did something. David believed, and he did something. The apostles believed, and they acted on their beliefs. It changed their lives, from start, to finish.

We can tell that they had faith because it made a difference in the way they lived. – and it should make a difference in our lives, too.

Let’s look today at the life of one of the apostles – the apostle that we know the most about – the apostle Paul. This man wrote a lot about the importance of faith, and his life is an illustration of faith working itself out in someone’s life.

This is the man who said, “We walk by faith, not by sight.” I want to look today at the context of that statement. It’s found in Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians.

This is an interesting letter because it does not deal with any doctrinal controversies. The problem that it deals with is a personal one – the Corinthians were saying that Paul is not a very good leader, he is not on the same level as the other apostles, that his style is ministry is much too weak to be real. The Corinthians wanted leaders who looked good, spoke well, and took charge – and Paul just didn’t have what they were looking for.

So Paul explains that ministry in the new covenant is not a matter of worldly success. Rather, it is patterned on the example of Jesus Christ, and the example he set was of humility and rejection and persecution. That’s what ministry is like in the new covenant era.

Let’s see what Paul wrote about it in 2 Corinthians, chapter 4, starting in verse 7. He is saying that he has the priceless message of salvation in a rather ordinary container. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. The message is a treasure, but the messenger is a clay pot. Why? So that people will look to God rather than the messenger.

I’m afraid that many Christian churches in America are more focused on the messenger than on the message. When it’s time to find a new pastor for the church, they want to make sure that he looks good, speaks well, has great leadership skills, etc. They would not like somebody the way that Paul describes himself in verses 8 and 9:

8 We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.

Paul had problems, but the problems did not stop him. He was sometimes perplexed, but he did not give up hope. He had troubles, but he knew that God had not abandoned him. He was knocked down on several occasions, but he always got back up.

Verse 10: We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. When Jesus was a mortal human being, he did not look impressive in the eyes of the world. In fact, they wanted to get rid of him.

And when we share in the life of Christ when we are mortal human beings, it should be no surprise that some people will judge us as a nuisance they’d like to get rid of. Persecutions and problems should not be a big surprise. And indeed, people might wonder – and maybe they should wonder – why we make some of the choices in life that we do. When we choose to help other people instead of being selfish, then we are revealing the life of Jesus. The way we live should be some evidence in favor of Jesus. But it takes faith to live like this, doesn’t it?

Verse 11: For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. And that seems to include you and me, not just apostles and missionaries. Our life should reflect his life.

Verse 12: So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you. We have both death and life working in us – this mortal body will die, but at the same time, we have life that will last forever.

2Co 4:13 It is written [in Psalm 116:10]: “I believed; therefore I have spoken.” With that same spirit of faith we also believe and therefore speak, Because Paul had faith in Christ, he spoke about Christ. He had confidence that this message was true, that it was helpful to others, and that it was his duty to share it with them.

And just what was it that he believed? Verse 14 says, because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you in his presence. Paul is able to persist in speaking, despite the persecution, because he knew that God would raise him from the dead, just like he raised Jesus. And it’s not just him – everyone who believes the gospel will live forever together. He shared the gospel because he knew it was not only a message of life for himself, but also a message of life for the people in Corinth.

And as he says in verse 15, All this is for your benefit…. You guys are criticizing me for being persecuted, but you seem to have forgotten than I am doing it for your benefit. The only reason you guys have the good news is because I was willing to risk my neck for you.

Paul sets the example, and he says it directly several times, that life is supposed to be lived for the benefit of others, not for ourselves. And it takes faith to do this – not just a mild little belief that God exists, or that Jesus is the Son of God, or even that he was raised from the dead.

A faith about Christ is not enough – we need a faith that connects us with Christ, a faith that knows we will be resurrected to be with him. And when we know that we share in his life, then we will be willing to carry his death in us as well, because we know that that won’t last forever – but we will.

So, Paul says in this verse, he preaches the gospel in order to help other people, so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God. Paul saw this as a way of praising God.

You know, we can stand and praise God all day long, but God will get even more praise if we go out and recruit some more people to praise him. Paul shared the good news so that more people would realize how good God is, and they will be thankful for the grace he has given them, and they will give him more glory.

Verse 16: Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. Death was working in his mortal body, but he did not quit, because he knew that Christ was also working in his life and promised him life eternal.

Verse 17: For our light and momentary troubles – that’s what he could call them even if they threatened him with death – are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. It’s like what he said in Romans 8:18, that our trials are not worth comparing to the glory that we will be given. We have to have faith in the future in order for that faith to transform the way we live right now.

So what did Paul focus on? In verse 18 he says, So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, not on the life we have right now, but on what is unseen – on the eternal life that we have been given. For what is seen is temporary, this life is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Paul continues this line of thought into the next chapter, and it’s a passage we have often ignored because it didn’t fit in with our old theology. And we haven’t said much about it in the past ten years, so let’s take a fresh look at it, keeping in mind the context that Paul puts it in: He preaches the gospel despite persecution because he is confident in living forever with Christ.

Chapter 5, verse 1: Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. What is the earthly tent we live in? It is our mortal body. It will eventually be destroyed, but we have another building to live in, an eternal dwelling place made by God. As he says in the resurrection chapter, this mortal body will put on immortality, it will be changed from perishable to imperishable, immortal, eternal, and filled with glory. We are trading in our camping tent, and we are going to get a glorious mansion.

Verse 2 Meanwhile in this life we groan, we have difficulties, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, We would really like to have bodies that have no aches and pains, no bumps and bruises, no need for sleep, where we can eat all we want and never gain weight.

Verse 3: because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. Here Paul is referring to an idea that the Greek philosophers had. They thought that the human body was bad, and that the spirit would be better off without any body at all. Paul says no, we do not want to be naked and have nowhere in particular to live. God will not make us homeless, but will give us an eternal home. The body we have now isn’t all that great, but the solution is not to reject all bodies, but to get a better one, and that’s what God will give us.

Verse 4 For while we are in this tent, in this life, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. We do not want to be disembodied spirits floating out in space. No, we want a heavenly dwelling, a dwelling that is like the resurrected Christ, and that is what God has prepared for us, so that this mortal body might be replaced by an immortal and glorious body.

Verse 5 Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come. The fact that the Spirit lives in us now is evidence that God wants to live with us forever. He shares his life with us, starting now and going into eternity.

6 Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. So here is Paul’s faith, knowing that he has two choices in life: he can be in this mortal body, or he can be with the Lord. And that’s why he was not too worried about his mortal body, that’s what gave him boldness in preaching the gospel.

And verse 7 is the one that many people quote without its context: We live by faith, not by sight. Or as it says in the King James, we walk by faith, not by sight. The context is not about naming it and claiming it, or having prosperity if we just have enough faith.

No, the context is why Paul is willing to put up with hardships, persecutions and perplexity, because he has faith not so much for good things in this life, but for good things in the next life. His faith in the present was based on faith in the future. In a life of faith, we can be bold because we are confident that if we are killed, then we will go to a better place. We have confidence in God’s promise to us, not in the physical things around us that are temporary.

Verse 8 We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. So Paul would rather put this earthly tent aside, and trade it in for a better one above. He would rather be with the Lord; that would be a lot better, he says in Philippians 1:23. So whom then shall I fear? We are not afraid of what people can do to us, because we are confident in what the Lord has already promised.

Verse 9: So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. We don’t need to please the people around us, because their opinion doesn’t count. Our future is in the hands of God, so that’s where our focus ought to be.

Verse 10: For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.

^{2Co 5:10} For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad. So this life in the body does count for something – there will be a judgment, and as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3, if we have filled our life with perishable things, then they will all be burned up. We will still be saved, but we won’t be rewarded for filling our life with the things of this world. We need to focus on the things we cannot see, not the things we can see. We need to focus on the things that are eternal, not the things that are temporary.

Now, there is one more thing that I’d like to talk about. It didn’t seem like there was much relationship between the life we lived here on earth, and the idea of going to heaven. Some people said they believed in Christ, but they lived like the devil, and they thought they’d go to heaven anyway.

Those suicide bombers in Iraq think they are going to heaven, too, but their faith cannot save them because they believe something false. Faith, by itself, cannot send us to heaven. We go to heaven only if our faith is in something true, only if we are actually going to heaven.

So I want to share with you a story that has helped me think about the relationship between life today, and going to heaven when we die.

I read this story several years ago in some other magazine. It was one of those stories that encouraged people to be nice, to think nice about other people. But for some reason the story stuck in my head, because it seemed like something was missing, and I recently figured out what it was.

Well, anyway, the story goes like this: There was a group of friends who all had season tickets to the local basketball team. Maybe it was the Lakers. They all sat in the same block of seats and enjoyed the games together.

Now, occasionally things would come up and the people wouldn’t be able to go. Let’s suppose it was Bob and Doris. They really liked to go to those Lakers games with their friends, but one day a movie producer called them up and said, Hey, I want you to come shoot a movie with me next Thursday.

And so Bob and Doris have these tickets to the Lakers game that they can’t use, so what are they supposed to do? Well, this time they decided to give those tickets to Brian and Sian. Brian says, Hey, that’s great, thanks very much. Can I pay you for the tickets? And Bob and Doris say, no – they are our gift to you.

Well, the movie industry is not too good on keeping a schedule, and that movie producer called Bob and Doris back and said, Thursday isn’t going to work out. We’ll have to move it to Saturday instead. And they said, That’s OK, but they mentioned about how they had given their Lakers tickets to someone else. And the movie producer said, That’s OK – you can have my tickets instead.

So Bob and Doris go to the game, and at halftime they wander over to their old seats to say hi to their friends and to surprise Brian and Sian. But to their surprise, Brian and Sian were not there – there were a couple of strangers. They asked, Hey, how did you get in here? And the strangers said they bought the tickets from some guy in the parking lot.

Well, Bob and Doris were really miffed. What ingratitude! Here they had given Brian and Sian those tickets and they turned around and sold them to a complete stranger! But eventually Doris said, well, we did give them the tickets, didn’t we? If it’s really a gift, then we have no right to tell them what to do with it.

And so the article ended: a gift is a gift, and if it’s really a gift, then there shouldn’t be any secret restrictions on how it is used.

And I took that article and tore it out of the magazine and saved it in a manila folder labeled “grace.” It’s like God’s grace, I thought – he gives us eternal life, and if it’s really a gift, then he is not going to take it away even if we don’t use it the way he wanted us to.

But something about that story just didn’t seem right.

After all, it was reasonable for Bob and Doris to be a little miffed, a little disappointed. Now, it’s true that they had given Brian and Sian a ticket – but what they were giving was not really the ticket in itself – what they intended to give was a Lakers game. The ticket simply represented the game. So when Brian cashed it in, he was turning the experience of a Lakers game into a saleable commodity, and that is not what Bob and Doris wanted.

And when we come to think about it, this is true with God’s grace, too. He is not just offering tickets to heaven, as if a different destination is all that’s involved. It is not a “get out of jail” card that we can accept and then put it on our chest of drawers for whenever we think we need it. And God is certainly not offering tickets that can be sold or even given away to somebody else if we don’t want to use them.

People who live like the devil are not going to go to heaven even if they have a ticket in their coffin. That’s because if they really want to live like the devil, then they won’t even enjoy heaven – and God is not going to make them and everybody else miserable by forcing them to go.

See, salvation is much more than a ticket to heaven—much more than a nice place to spend our retirement years. Our eternity will be enjoyable not because of the location, but because of the relationships we will have there—a relationship with God, Christ, and according to Paul, relationships with one another.

We will have friendships filled with love and kindness as we all share in the love that flows out from God and fills us with a surplus that we share with others. Eternity would be unpleasant if we were surrounded by people who were belittling us, calling us stupid, cheating us, or even ignoring us. But God offers us an eternity of love and goodness—he offers us an experience, not a location.

See, eternal life is not just a matter of life that never ends—it involves a new and better quality of life. It is not just a location—it involves a transformation in our inner nature. God not only saves us from jail, he also saves us from bad habits that we have—habits that (whether we know it or not) make life miserable, either for us or for the people around us, such as lying, cheating, stealing, selfishness and other sins that grip our lives and tell us that we are no good. Salvation is not just a nice change of location—it is a change in who we are.

And the good news is that we do not have to wait until we die before we begin to experience the life of heaven. Paul tells us that we have been given the Holy Spirit, and that means God’s life is in us, and God’s love is available to us, not only to fill us, but also to flow from us to enrich others. It’s already there to change us to be more like God is, to free us from the grip of sin. We can have better relationships now even if we aren’t yet in the perfect location.

Paul worked to benefit others not just because he expected God to reward him on the day of judgment. No, it was because he knew in his mind that he wanted a life characterized by love. And when he really believed that love was better than selfishness, he lived that way in this life, too. It was a life of faith.

He knew that the eternal rewards that God offers are not rewards of selfish pleasures, like the Muslim heaven in which lovely damsels feed us delicacies all day long. That kind of heaven would be rather boring after a while, and it would be miserable for the damsels. This reward that Paul looked forward to was not just length of life or relief from the toils of earth – no, it is good because God is good, and love characterizes the life of heaven.

If we have faith that God guarantees us a place in heaven, and we have faith that it is supremely good to have that kind of life, then it affects the way we live right now.

God offers us a free ticket, but it’s not just a promise about where we end up when we die. Rather, it’s an offer of relationship—a friendship that can begin right now, a way of life that can begin right now. He doesn’t want the ticket gathering dust on our chest of drawers—he wants us to go to the game. And he doesn’t want us to be spectators—he wants us to be participants. That’s because we won’t be there by ourselves—he will be there, too, and he wants us to be there together.