1524AFC061215 – Whole World View
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2 Corinthians 5:6-7 – 6 So we are always confident; even though we know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord— 7 for we walk by faith, not by sight.
Aloha pumehana, ʻŌmea. Warmest Aloha Beloved. You may hear this short passage in a couple of days. When I read it earlier this week, I was certain I had cited this pair of verses previously. After an extensive search, I found that I had not used this very familiar section from Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians. Paul probably wrote this sometime around 57 AD, about six years after he helped form the church in Corinth. Corinth was a busy crossroads of trade and culture. The citizens of Corinth had an international reputation for wanton excess, debauchery, drunkenness, and blatant immorality. There was even a specific word, korinthiazethai, which meant to “live like a Corinthian.” It was the center of the worship of Aphrodite, the goddess of love and sexual pleasures. Corinthians were well-pleased to live like their favored goddess – temperamental, manipulative, party-party people, unfaithful in marriage, philandering, flirting, and lots of boozing. If you called a woman a “Corinthian girl,” that was a euphemism for prostitute. In fact, perhaps as many as 1,000 “attendants” of Aphrodite helped enrich the temple through fees charged to worshipers for sexual rites practiced on the temple grounds with the approval of the temple officials. Corinth was a pretty filthy place for many reasons, and if there was something that was nasty, it showed up in Corinth and was widely welcomed. Because it was an important city, whatever went on in Corinth influenced other cities. Doubtless, Paul had that in mind when he decided to seed a church in Corinth.
In his first letter to the Corinthians, he took them to task about their behaviors at the “Agape Meal.” He had learned some of them were getting drunk, having a little too much “agape,” over eating, and pretty much using the Love Feast as an opportunity for orgy. There was in-fighting, some serious heresies, and a failure to understand the message of the Gospel. Yet, Paul knew there were also persons who were good, solid Christians – folks like the Roman tent-makers he stayed with named Priscilla and Aquila. In fact, these two actually traveled and ministered with him. They also are believed to have instructed Apollos, one of the key contemporary evangelists Paul mentions in his epistles. Paul was concerned, though, about the lingering worldliness in the Church in Corinth. They still clung to the old habits of focusing on the appearance of devotion without truly experiencing devotion. Let me show you what I mean.
Some of us are familiar with the word religiosity. It is the state of being excessively or sentimentally devout and describes someone who is self-righteous, a sanctimonious, “holier-than-thou” person who is into religion for the sake of religion and how that enhances her/his appearance in the community. It is religion for status and therefore a religion of Self. How they look is more important than how they are. They are “keeping up appearances.” In Corinth, the Christians (although they were not called by that name yet) still wanted to “fit in” with their neighbors, so they brought their party lifestyle to church, so to speak. Paul criticized this kind of superficiality several times. For instance, in 1 Corinthians 9:19-23, Paul states (quoting in part) “I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some.” His conformance is for the sake of the Gospel, not for his self-esteem. In Romans 12:2 he says, Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect. In this verse, “transformed” means “transfigured,” or “changed in form” as in metamorphosis. We see a similar concept expressed in 1 John 2:15-17 where John says, Do not love the world or the things in the world. The love of the Father is not in those who love the world; … the world and its desire are passing away, but those who do the will of God live forever. Together these passages for the basis for the popular adage “Be in the World but not of the World.”
The World calls us to act in our own best interests. Faith calls us to act in the best interest of God first, others second, and ourselves last. We should not try to live our life by appearances, but rather to live genuinely; and even if we cannot observe the effects of our living in faith, we should continue to live by the core values of our faith. We do not live our lives merely for the appearance of being faithful. We live in faith so that our faith, not our religiosity, is what others see.
This is important when looking at this particular Bible passage because many of us have understood it incorrectly. Count me in on that. In earlier days, I understood this verse to mean something like “walking in blind faith.” Or maybe the opposite of that? Either way, I thought it had something to do with walking through life with the faith that even the things unseen could not harm us. We didn’t need to see where we are going in order to get there because “faith does the seeing.” I don’t need to worry about getting to my goal – Heaven – despite being unable to see it. I just have faith that it’s there and keep marching in that direction. That certainly is practical advice, and a good way to set our course for Heaven. But it is not what this verse means. That catchy little prepositional phrase at the end – not by sight – actually means “not by appearance.”
In the Latin Vulgate, this verse reads “per fidem enim ambulamus, et non per speciem.” By faith we walk and not by appearance. Speciem means a sight, a look, a view, an appearance, an aspect, a mien, bearing, expression, or manner. It has nothing to do with the act of vision, but everything to do with the thing seen. We walk – live our lives – in faith, not by tangible things. We live by trust, not by what we can see. We live in the hope of what we choose to believe will happen, not by our limited understanding of reality. If seeing is believing, then we believe without having seen (think of Thomas). J. B. Phillips put it this way: for we have to live by trusting him without seeing him. We don’t need the presence of Jesus – his appearance – to believe in him. In Greek, it’s the same concept. The word is εἶδος, (eidos), { i’-dos} and it means visible form, shape, appearance, outward show, kind, species, or class. It is something observed by its outward appearance. It is not “looking where you’re going.” That’s a lot different from what I thought earlier.
And while it is different, it is also clearer, and for me, more meaningful. One reference expressed it this way: “Eidos refers to the outward form taken on by each of the three Persons of … God.” The Holy Spirit’s appearance as a dove; Christ’s appearance at his Transfiguration; or, as in John 5:37 And the Father who sent me has himself testified on my behalf. You have never heard his voice or seen his form.” If I walk – and here walk means to live my life – by faith, I do not need to depend on having to rely on his appearance to believe in him. I believe him because I have faith that he is the true, only-begotten, ever-living Son of the Father. I walk by faith and trust my faith more than my perception of him. I can do that because I know in my heart – and my mind and spirit too – that I am walking with him because he is walking with me “every moment of every day.” “We walk by believing, not by seeing” is an imperfect understanding of Paul’s words. There is a whole world to see, but our faith is not in the world or of the world. It is what appears beyond the world that inspires our hope.
Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever — at your service, Beloved.
Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License
Unless otherwise indicated, all scripture passages are from the New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE) New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) http://biblehub.com
