<p>3:6 <i>Who also made us sufficient as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the spirit- </i>The imputation of righteousness mentioned in :4 and :5 is a result of the new covenant. Under the new covenant, the Spirit is ministered. As explained in Romans 8, believers are transformed by the Spirit in practice into what they are by status. The idea of &quot;servants ministers of a... covenant&quot; makes us parallel with the Angels under the old covenant. The Law of Moses (and the whole Pentateuch? Consider Acts 7:38,53; Gal. 3:19; Heb. 2:2) was given by Angels. That the Angels ministered the Word in the past is picked up by Paul in 2 Cor. 3 when he says that because we have taken over the role of the Angels in this respect, we should teach the word boldly: &quot;...Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech&quot;(:12). The context refers to our preaching, that it should not be with the &quot;enticing words of man's wisdom&quot;. See on Rev. 22:9. However, the reference to being ministers of the covenant may be an allusion to the Lord Jesus, in whom we are, and to Joshua /&nbsp; Jesus (Rom. 15:8; Heb. 8:2; based on Joshua / Jesus who was the minister of the Tabernacle, Ex. 24:13; Josh. 1:1). Our sufficiency, our sense of adequacy and competence, is of God (:5). Without this positive confidence we are unable to do any task well, and this is especially true of spiritually ministering to others. But that confidence is not of ourselves; it is a confidence in God&rsquo;s confidence in us.</p><p><i>For the letter kills but the spirit gives life- </i>Faced with baldly stated commandments, we will fail. The letter thereby kills. It is the ministration of the Spirit which leads to eternal life. This highlights the importance of the Spirit in our lives. It is a matter of life or death. Paul writes from personal experience; for he had been 'killed' by the attempt to obey the law (Rom. 7:11 s.w.). &quot;Gives life&quot; is the language of future resurrection of the body (1 Cor. 15:22,36,45); but clearly in view is the new life given within the believing heart right now. It is the presence of the Spirit within our minds now which is the basis upon which our mortal bodies shall be made eternally alive (Rom. 8:11).</p>