2 Corinthians 3:3,4 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Forasmuch as ye Some of whom were once so immoral, but who are now so pious and virtuous; are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ Which he has formed and published to the world; ministered by us Whom he has used herein as his instruments; therefore ye are our letter also; written, not with ink As epistles generally are; but with the Spirit of the living God Influencing your hearts, and producing that variety of graces and virtues, which render many of you so conspicuous for holiness and usefulness; not in tables of stone Like the ten commandments, which did so great an honour, and gave such authority to Moses; but in fleshly tables of the heart To which no hand but that by which the heart was made could find access, in such a manner as to inscribe these characters there. The sense of this verse, as Mr. Locke justly observes, is plainly this; “That he needed no letters of commendation to them, but that their conversion, and the gospel written, not with ink, but with the Spirit of God in the tables of their hearts, by his ministry, was as clear an evidence and testimony to them of his mission from Christ, as the law written on tables of stone was an evidence of Moses's mission; so that he, St. Paul, needed no other recommendation.” Such trust have we through Christ to God-ward That is, we trust in God that this is so. This the apostle adds, and also what follows, to obviate all imputation of vanity or vain-glory, on account of what he had advanced in the two preceding verses.