God’s Promises Fulfilled in Christ

Christ was so much the center of Paul’s life and thought that the Apostle had to speak even of seemingly mundane things with ultimate reference to Jesus. We see this in today’s passage. Paul has been referring to changes to his travel plans to defend himself against the charge that such changes made him untrustworthy or double-minded. In 2 Corinthians 1:18, he remarked that his “word” to the Corinthians has been true and faithful, and this leads him in verses 19–22 to offer a substantive declaration regarding the greater “Word” from God—His Son, Jesus Christ (see John 1:1–18).

Paul was not lying when he revealed his original intent to visit Corinth twice after his in-person admonishment of the Corinthian Christians during his “painful visit” (2 Cor. 2:1; see 1:15–17), and he was not lying or being double-minded when he, Silvanus, and Timothy proclaimed Christ to them. That is because in Christ “it is always yes” (1:19). Paul here affirms the utter trustworthiness of Jesus Christ, the “Faithful and True” (see Rev. 19:11). The Christ whom Paul proclaimed is the true Messiah. Paul reminds the Corinthians of this because, as we will see in due time, false apostles were troubling the church in Corinth by preaching another Christ (2 Cor. 11:3–4).

Not only is Christ Himself perfectly true, but He is the substance and fulfillment of all the promises of God. “All the promises of God find their Yes in him” (1:20). If we want to know how our Creator has fulfilled His promise of salvation and how He will complete our salvation, we need look only to Christ, who has purchased our redemption by His blood and will renew and restore creation at His return (Rom. 3:21–31; 8:1–30). Because of this, we “utter our Amen”—we say, “It is so”—to God through Christ (2 Cor. 1:20). In other words, we affirm the trustworthiness of God and affirm that Jesus is the “Yes” of God to us by agreeing with God that Jesus is Lord and Savior.

This provision of Christ as the “Yes” or fulfillment of God’s promises and our response is thoroughly Trinitarian. God the Father makes the promises and God the Son is the substance of the promises (v. 20). We are then established in faith through God the Holy Spirit, who is the “guarantee” of God’s promises (vv. 21–22). A better translation of “guarantee” is “down payment.” Just as a down payment is a pledge of a full payment, the regeneration of the Spirit and His presence in our hearts proves that our redemption will be completed in our glorification, when our bodies and souls are made fully new.