This blog offers a meditation on the Common Lectionary daily readings, along with a headline from world news:
RUSSIAN INSTRUMENTS OF PEACE FOR SYRIA 
2 Corinthians 4:1-12
Complete Jewish Bible (CJB)
4 God has shown us such mercy that we do not lose courage as we do the work he has given us. 2 Indeed, we refuse to make use of shameful underhanded methods, employing deception or distorting God’s message. On the contrary, by making very clear what the truth is, we commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God. 3 So if indeed our Good News is veiled, it is veiled only to those in the process of being lost. 4 They do not come to trust because the god of the present age has blinded their minds, in order to prevent them from seeing the light shining from the Good News about the glory of the Messiah, who is the image of God. 5 For what we are proclaiming is not ourselves, but the Messiah Jesus as Lord, with ourselves as slaves for you because of Jesus. 6 For it is the God who once said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” who has made his light shine in our hearts, the light of the knowledge of God’s glory shining in the face of the Messiah Jesus.
7 But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it will be evident that such overwhelming power comes from God and not from us. 8 We have all kinds of troubles, but we are not crushed; we are perplexed, yet not in despair; 9 persecuted, yet not abandoned; knocked down, yet not destroyed. 10 We always carry in our bodies the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our bodies too. 11 For we who are alive are always being handed over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that Jesus’ life also might be manifested in our mortal bodies. 12 Thus death is at work in us but life in you.
Again today I’ve used the Complete Jewish bible translation so that more indications of Paul’s Jewishness can be seen in his letter. In his time, for example the Greek “Christos” would not have seemed like Jesus second name, but simply as the Greek translation of the Hebrew Mashiach, Messiah.
Paul emphasises here that his blunt speaking is part of his honest witness to the truth of Jesus Messiah. Only those whom the evil powers of the world deceive, can blind themselves to the light of the good news that Paul announces, for this is the light of Jesus Messiah, the image of God. The glory of God, from which Moses had to be shielded by God’s hand, shines in the face of Jesus. This shining is the character of Jesus Messiah, not some supernatural vision. 
Jesus shines in those who share his suffering and his glory. The precious treasure is kept in clay jars that may suffer damage at any time, as Paul eloquently portrays in his antitheses: perplexed but not in despair….knocked down but not destroyed. For Paul this is an essential part of Jesus’ character, his “dying”, and only those who are ready to share it can have any grasp of his “living”. This equation also works for evangelism: only those who make themselves the slaves of their converts and put their lives at risk can communicate the vitality of Jesus.
In all this Paul tries to write honestly about profound experiences of faith which are nevertheless not “religious” in the way of other religions of his time, but existential, practical and human. His life as a missionary exposes him to constant dangers and to menial service of others, gladly undertaken for the sake of those whose lives will flourish because of his message. His is a true “radicalism” that draws strength from the roots of Messianic faith revealed by Jesus. We need to recover the word radical from its careless and prejudicial use by anti-Islamic journalists.
Emmock's Blog 