| … that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. |
| —2 Corinthians 5:19-20 |
I hear a lot these days about reconciliation: racial reconciliation, religious reconciliation, civil reconciliation, marital reconciliation, even political reconciliation. I don’t hear nearly as much about spiritual reconciliation. And yet, spiritual reconciliation is at the heart of every other kind of reconciliation.
The whole basis for reconciliation is really a matter of the heart. It first begins when we realize that we need to be reconciled to God. He has opened up the pathway of reconciliation through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He has reached out to us. He has declared that He wants us to become reconciled to Him. And then, He has provided the only possible means for such a reconciliation.
If we want to reconcile a marriage, we must first become reconciled to God. If we want to reconcile political differences, we must first become reconciled to God. If we want to reconcile between the different factions within a church, we must first become reconciled to God. If we want to reconcile the differences between races, tribes, and peoples, we must first become reconciled to God.
The Apostle Paul knew that the Corinthians needed reconciliation—reconciliation with God and reconciliation with each other. That’s why he wrote these words found in 2 Corinthians 5:19-20:
…that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.
We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.
The natural outcome of reconciliation to God is that we become His ambassadors. I write often about this responsibility in my blog. That’s because far too few Christians realize they are, in fact, God’s ambassadors.
God chose us to belong to Him before the foundation of the world because He wanted to have fellowship with us, to adopt us as His dearly loved children, to receive the glory and praise that we would give to Him, to give us a great outpouring of His love, and—I emphasize again—to allow us to joyfully serve as His representatives, His ambassadors, to a dark, needy, and dying world.
We need to learn, by the gentle teaching of the Holy Spirit, how to become proper ambassadors. Then, we need to reach out in an ambassadorial and reconciliatory way to those who cross our pathway. Maybe, we should start doing this today? It’s certainly worth considering.
Based on a blog originally posted on Friday, April 7, 2017
