Reconcilation

Reconciliation is the process of making enemies friends. It is bringing two parties together as friends.

2 Corinthians 5:16-21

From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard Him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to Himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making His appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.

Paul uses the word reconciled or some form of that world five times in this passage.

Paul makes it very clear that God wants to reconcile people to Himself. God wants us to be His friends.

In this passage Paul tells us:

What God has done.

How God did it.

What our part is in God’s plan.

What God has done.

God has provided the opportunity to be reconciled or to be made friends with God.

According Genesis 1:27 God created us as humans in His image. We are the only thing that God created in His image. One of the things that it means for us to be created in God’s image is that we are capable of having a personal, intimate, love relationship with God.

God’s desire for each of us as His human creation is that we be friends with Him. That we live in intimate relationship

The way God did this was in two ways by one instrument.

When we are reconciled with God, we are made into a new creation.

When we were born, we were born with a nature to sin. Our default setting is that of sinning. This is why Jesus tells Nicodemus in John 3 that you  

must be born again.

When we surrender our lives over from our authority to Jesus’ authority, we are born again and become a whole new creation. We get a new nature that is empowered by the Holy Spirit to obey God.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is receiving a new nature and living in that new nature.

When we are reconciled with God, we take on us His righteousness because He took our sins.

Being reconciled with God means that I am righteous, not because of anything I have done but because God has declared me righteous based on Jesus’ finished work on the cross.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is accepting God’s declaration that I am righteous and living that way.

This new nature and new righteousness come solely because of Jesus’ death on the cross for our sins.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is all about the cross.

Our part in God’s plan of reconciliation is that, once we have experienced being reconciled to God, we are to become ambassadors of God’s reconciliation. We then become the messengers of reconciliation.

That means I don’t view any person according to the flesh. I don’t view people from a human viewpoint, but I view them as Jesus does.

In Matthew 5:44 Jesus tells us to:

Love our enemies

Pray for those who persecute us

I recently sat in a meeting with a group of church leaders and a discussion arose about the homeless in our community. The discussion became about how bad and dishonest these people were.

That is not being ambassadors of reconciliation.

Being ambassadors for reconciliation is:

Loving my enemies

Praying for those who persecute me

Loving people even if they disagree with me or don’t like me

Not judging people based on outward appearance

Sharing the truth of Jesus’ love, mercy, and grace

Allowing Jesus to overcome man-made barriers to the Gospel

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is being ambassadors of God’s message of reconciliation.

With Jesus, Reconciling People to Himself and Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

Joe