Veiling and Unveiling
3: 12-18
Veiling and unveiling DIG: The Spirit of ADONAI brings freedom (3:17). Freedom from what? Freedom to do what? What is the basis of the hope for Jewish or Gentile unbelievers? What are the practical results of the New Covenant for Isra’el?
REFLECT: How is your ministry to Jews (Romans 1:16) assisting in their unveiling? When and how was your veil lifted? Can you tell of your unveiling in two minutes or less? Your testimony is very valuable? How can you cooperate with the Spirit’s work of transformation?
Whenever someone turns to ADONAI, the veil is taken away.
The historical event (3:12-13): Recognizing the great transformation that takes place as the Spirit energizes the lives of those who receive Yeshua (to see link click Av – A Glory Transformed), Paul declares that a new reality had dawned. A new hope. His ministry and the ministry of his co-laborers is contrasted with previous servants of God like Moses who put a veil over his face so that the people of Isra’el would not see the fading brightness come to an end (3:12-13). And why did Moses have to wear this veil or barrier? We can think of Moshe’s veil functioning in a similar way to the veil or curtain in the Tabernacle. Just as the common Israelite could not enter the Most Holy Place to behold God’s glory, now they could not behold the glory of God reflected in Moses. That brightness on Moshe’s face was to indicate something of limited value – as it was fading away – and that the veil placed over his face represents a barrier to be removed because of the greater glory inaugurated by Messiah who was yet to come. Paul makes the point that with such a veil on Moshe’s face, the ancient Israelites were unable to clearly see the goal at which the Torah aims is the Messiah (Romans 10:4b), the permanent atonement they needed, and hence a greater glory that would not fade away (3:11b).
The national application (3:14-17): The sad observation that Paul made, in the First Century, was that it was not merely the ancient Israelites in the wilderness who could not see the Redeemer’s ultimate ministry coming. There was, and is, a persistent stubbornness in their descendants, the majority of Paul’s contemporaries. What is more, the minds of the unsaved Jewish people were made stonelike (Romans 11:7). As Deuteronomy 29:4 reminds us: To this day ADONAI has not given you a heart to understand, eyes to see or ears to hear! Isaiah 29:10 also speaks of the reality of how ADONAI has poured over you a spirit of deep sleep, He has shut your eyes to the prophets and covered your heads to the seers. And Psalm 95:8 cries out: Do not harden your hearts, as you did at Meribah, as you did on that day at Massah in the desert. This condition can be seen where sin has been perpetuated, not merely erecting an obstacle between YHVH and His people, but where the people themselves become increasingly calloused toward God and His intended ways and purposes.
To this day (Paul’s day), but still true in the present day, the same veil remains over them so that when they read the TaNaKh in the synagogue they do not see that it points toward Yeshua the Messiah as its goal and fulfillment. It has not been unveiled, because only by the Messiah is the veil taken away (3:14). When the TaNaKh, the ministry of death (3:7) and condemnation (3:9a), would be read, they would not be convinced to turn to YHVH in repentance – much less turn to the Lord in repentance and receive Yeshua as their Messiah!
Yes, till today, whenever Moshe is read, a veil lies over their heart (3:15), singular, referring to the community as a whole, which resists being open to the truth of Yeshua and exerts social pressure against searching the Scriptures to see if these things are true (Acts 17:9), although throughout history individual Jews have been open to the Gospel and received it. Therefore, the issue here is not that Isra’el cannot understand the implications of her history and her resulting need for her Messiah. Rather, the problem is that she will not accept it as true for her. Isra’el’s stiff-necked condition continues to veil her response to Jeremiah’s B’rit Chadashah and subsequent new life in the Spirit.
Dear Great Heavenly Father, Praise You for Your wisdom and love. Your love is so wonderful! How awesome that You offer Your love to all who choose to love You back as their Lord and Savior. You open the door to all, male and female, rich and poor, all skin colors, all ages. For all of you who were immersed in Messiah have clothed yourselves with Messiah. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female – for you are all one in Messiah Yeshua (Galatians 3:27-28).
Praise you that Yeshua proclaimed a broad invitation spoken to the crowds: Come to Me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest (Matthew 11:28). How sad that though the invitation was given to a big crowd, yet only a few would choose the narrow path to love and follow Yeshua. Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and those who enter through it are many. How narrow is the gate and difficult the way that leads to life, and those who find it are few (Matthew 7:13-14).
Your invitation is so gracious. My heart is heavy for my family and friends who do not yet love you. Dear Father, please work mighty miracles in the lives of . . . and . . . May You guide even their sleep so that they see your great love and desire to respond back with their love for You. Please help them to realize that even if they will be laughed at for following You, it is well worth the great joy of living with you in heaven for all eternity. For I consider the sufferings of this present time not worthy to be compared with the coming glory to be revealed to us (Romans 8:18). Thank You and loving you deeply. In Yeshua’s holy name and power of His resurrection. Amen
This passage is aimed directly at the resistance to Yeshua from non-Messianic Judaism. There is no criticism here against Jews, either ethnically, racially, biologically, culturally, nationally as a people; least of all is there any implication that Jews with stonelike minds have less inherent mental ability. Rather, it is a spiritual veil, not a lack of intelligence that prevents unsaved Jewish people from seeing that the goal at which the Torah aims is the Messiah (Romans 10:4). Yeshua Himself made the same point to the religious leaders in Jerusalem of His day when He said: You keep examining the TaNaKh because you think that in it you have eternal life, and it keeps bearing witness to Me! Yet you don’t want to come to Me in order to have eternal life . . . But don’t think that I will be your accuser before the Father. Do you know who will accuse you? Moshe, the very one you have counted on! For if you really believed Moshe (that is, the Torah) you would believe in Me, because it was about Me that he wrote. But if don’t believe what he wrote, how are you going to believe what I say (John 5:39-40 and 45-47)?102
But there is hope. In fact, Paul uses a verse from the TaNaKh itself, from the very passage that speaks of Moses’ veil, to point to what that hope is. It is the same hope that Paul wrote about in Romans 10:11, where he quoted Joel 2:32, “Everyone who calls on the name of ADONAI will be saved.” The Hebrew of Exodus 34:34 reads: But when Moses went in before ADONAI to speak to Him, he took the veil off until he came out. So Paul’s midrash applied this verse to anyone seeking the LORD.
In verse 15 it is Messiah who takes away the veil, and one is reminded of Luke 24:25-27 and 44-45 where Yeshua Himself explained to His companions how prophecies in the TaNaKh applied to Him (see the commentary on The Life of Christ Mh – On the Road to Emmaus). Next we see that ADONAI is the cause of the veil’s removal. “But,” says the Torah, “Whenever someone turns to ADONAI, the veil is taken away” (3:16). Finally, we learn that “ADONAI” [in this text] also means the Spirit (3:17a). It is the Spirit who has the specific ministry of convicting of sin, righteousness and judgment (John 16:7-11). It is He who makes a Jew or a Gentile willing and able to see Yeshua in the Jewish Scriptures.103 Thus, in the final analysis, it is the Trinity that takes away the veil.
When Moshe put the veil over his face, cutting off the Israelites from the glory manifested in His ministry, they were kept from perceiving God’s presence, and thus His glory. That would be the heart of the B’rit Chadashah, a covenant in which all of the covenant people would know the Lord and have their hearts transformed (see the commentary on Jeremiah Eo – I Will Make a New Covenant with the People of Isra’el), when all would be able to go boldly behind the inner veil of the Tabernacle (which also stands as a barrier) into the Most Holy Place of ADONAI because their sins have been forgiven forever (see the commentary on Hebrews Ch – Let Us Draw Near to God).104
Where the Spirit of ADONAI is, there is freedom (3:17b). It is freedom from the condemnation arising from the inability to keep God’s Torah through the old sin nature (see the commentary on Romans Bz – Application to Believers in Yeshua). Furthermore, it is a Spirit-empowered freedom so that the requirement of the Torah might be fulfilled in us who do not run our lives according to what our old nature desires, but according to what the Spirit wants (Romans 8:4). The B’rit Chadashah as promised by the prophets was not a covenant of lawlessness, but a covenant under which people would be moved by the Spirit to follow God’s decrees and be careful to keep His mitzvot (Ezeki’el 36:27) and to have His Torah in their minds and written on their hearts (Jeremiah 31:33).105
The personal application (3:18): The power of the B’rit Chadashah notably goes well beyond the Torah’s commandments being written on the heart, and even to the permanent peace believers have with YHVH. It enables the redeemed to fully see the Lord as any veil or barrier separating us from His presence, which existed over our hearts when we were unregenerate sinners is now gone! There is nothing between us and God, our faces unveiled, with open hearts, not stonelike, with the brightness of His face. And so we are transfigured much like the Messiah (see the commentary on The Life of Christ Gb – Jesus went up a High Mountain and was Transfigured), our lives gradually being changed into his very image (Romans 8:29b), from one degree of glory to the next by ADONAI [who is] the Spirit (3:18). This is how the Spirit gives life.
Once we become part of God’s family, He wants us to grow into spiritual maturity. What does that look like? Spiritual maturity is becoming more like Yeshua in the way we think, feel and act. The more you develop a Messiahlike character, the more you will bring glory to God. ADONAI gave you a new life and a new nature when you accepted Messiah. Now, for the rest of your life on earth, God wants to continue the process of changing your character. The Bible says: May you always be filled with the fruit of your salvation – those good things that are produced in your life by Yeshua Messiah – for this will bring much glory and praise to God (Philippians 1:11 NLT).106
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