2 Corinthians 4:2

2 Corinthians 4:2. but we have renounced the hidden things of shame those arts for gaining converts (referred to in chap. 2 Corinthians 2:17) which those who practise them are fain to “hide,” from their “shameful” character, not walking in craftiness such as was used to entrap our Lord into some treasonable utterance (Luke 20:23), and of Satan's subtilty in beguiling Eve (chap. 2 Corinthians 11:3); employed either in adulterating the truth (as in chap. 2 Corinthians 2:17), or in so trimming as to keep out of view or shade off those features of it which are distasteful to the natural mind, and bring into artful prominence whatever may attract,

but by the manifestation of the truths the naked truth, whose intrinsic majesty and Divine claims are its best recommendation,

commending ourselves to every man's conscience in which it ever finds an echo, when once apprehended, and that even though resisted,

in the sight of God to whom alone we look for judgment upon our work (1 Corinthians 4:3; 1 Corinthians 4:5).

Second reason why “we faint not,” the awful power under which some resist, and some yield to the truth we proclaim: