I tend to be a closet grumbler, I grumbled this morning when I saw someone had smashed the sign out the front of the hall.
I went on the internet and saw something that put my grumbling in perspective, 17 Christian people in Nigeria killed by radicals of a different religion, The Coptic Christian Pope of Egypt calling for unity and calm in his country a country where his church members are persecuted.
I then thought about how the ‘Back to Jerusalem’ a Christian movement in China are looking at supporting fellow believers who are being persecuted in Southern Sudan. These people are being persecuted themselves but are willing to serve their fellow believers overseas.
Paraphrase of 2 Corinthians 5:11-21
Driven by the awe of God,
We try to show others how to understand him that way,
For who we are is seen by God,
What we are, should be plain to all,
Do you understand who you are?
Who you are, is not your outside appearance,
But what you are is what is in your heart!
Does that seem crazy to you?
If so, God says it is true,
Take it up with Him,
If it seems to you to be right,
You understand!
We are driven by Jesus love,
Because of the conviction we have that he is the Christ, the one,
That he died for all!
He died for all so that they may be free,
Free to live, free from themselves,
That is why Jesus died,
Conquering death he lived again!
Because of this,
We regard no one from a worldly point of view,
We did once, but having been made new,
We no longer do!
We are new in Christ,
We are new creations,
So it is for anyone who will be made new, through the Christ!
This is not for just a few!
Made new – a new creation,
Old is gone, there is only new.
This is from God,
Through Christ Jesus we come to God,
Clean and new,
Through Christ Jesus the world,
Is made clean and new.
Accepting this,
A man’s sins no longer count,
The message is about clean and new,
Reconciled!
The debt is settled,
Now we are free and it’s time to tell others!
Christ Jesus calls,
He calls us to be his ambassadors,
To speak for God, to be his representatives!
To telling them,
“Be settled with God!
That debt is settled,
So be settled with God!”
Christ Jesus has paid that price,
Being in my place, your place,
He brought my freedom,
He brought your freedom,
Be reconciled to Him!
Why?
That you might be right with God,
No longer like you were,
But like Jesus Himself!
[A. W. Moffatt: paraphrase of 2 Corinthians 5:11-21]
Last week I spoke about being “born again” and that in Christ and by the Holy Spirit we are born again, I read from John’s gospel chapter three where we had a description of a meeting between Jesus and a member if the Jewish ruling council by the name of Nicodemus. The result of the meeting was that Jesus told Nicodemus that a person must be “born again” to see the kingdom of God.
This week I have started with a paraphrase of the Apostle Paul’s message about how in Christ a person is a new creation. To quote him “the old is gone, the new has come!”
Now let me be straight up with you, that passage of scripture challenges me!
There is something about this passage that also invigorates me, as it challenges me, you see Paul had been part of the world he was a sinful man through and through before Jesus appeared to him.
Paul was a strictly legalistic, religious, sectarian, tow the line, do it by the party rules kind of a bloke, even to the stage where he condoned the murder of Stephen, the first of countless Christian martyrs. He did all this thinking he was doing it on God’s behalf. But reality was he did it on behalf of a human institution and he realised this himself when he really encountered God!
Encountered God: Once he had encountered God Paul had an awesome fear of God, he knew what God could do – he had been blinded by the light of God, he had been healed of his blindness both physically and spiritually, knowing who God was, having had God’s power revealed to him. Having been reconciled to God through Jesus, Paul set about revealing who God is to others, what does that word reconciled mean, it means going from a place of tension or hostility with a person to becoming friends with that person. (Repeat) Paul became God’s friend.
Not only did Paul reveal God to people but he understood why he was doing it, there was no holding this man back, he had encountered the Christ, and he knew that Jesus had died for the sins of all men, he knew that Jesus had died and was raised from the dead so that all men might be set free from their sins, that all people could also have a non-hostile relationship with God that they could actually be God’s friends. Paul also now knew that he was Jesus representative, that’s what he meant by saying, “we are therefore Christ’s ambassadors as though God were making his appeal through us”.
His request of those hearing his letter in Corinth was, to “be reconciled to God” in other words have your act sorted out with God; accept that Jesus sorted out the debt of your sin and stay in that place. Then they could live as Jesus representatives.
So where to if you want to be reconciled to God?
Simple steps:
a) Accept Jesus as your Lord and saviour; confess this publically. Then the Holy Spirit, that is Gods Spirit will then enter into your life interacting with your spirit and life will never be the same again. Can I get an agreement with that?
b) Then stay in that place; it is something to make that move, but it’s hard sometimes to stay there when the challenges come. When the peer pressure comes on, some revert to their old ways like a pig returning to a wallow on a hot day they find the going tough out in the heat, so back they go to wallow in the old ways. / People who act like this find that they trip up and need to repent over and over again see- sawing from the world to God, from sin to repentance, from repentance to sin when they could be walking in the truth of God always. In The Salvation Army we believe it is the privilege of all believers to be wholly sanctified that their whole being may be blameless.
Also it greaves God when we return to those old ways, to call yourself a Christian [or little Christ sometimes interpreted as Christ’s one] and then act outside of his requirements for your life only casts shame on Christ himself and the rest of believers. There will come a day of judgement, Paul knew that, this was one of his reasons for living in fear of God, because he had to give account of his witness. We are called to live as Jesus representatives.
Do we act like one of those who have dual personalities, acting for Jesus one moment and acting as our old self the next? Some people are a double sided card in fact there is nothing secure about them, they live in a spinning blur. They are lost and will remain lost until they really repent and live for Christ rather than themselves. As Paul said, this is the reason Jesus died, “he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.” (verse 15)
Two things then:
1) Live for Jesus
2) Be ambassadors for Jesus
1) This living for Jesus is what we are called to; it does not mean that we squeeze all the fun out of life, counter to that true joy is a fruit of God’s Holy Spirit, because of our being reconciled to God we are able to encounter true joy.
Living for God is about making yourself completely available to him, as you do, life change will occur that is fascinating. As you allow the Spirit of God to lead you and direct your path, you will have life in its fullness.
This from Pauls letter to the church at Colosse in Turkey, “For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority.” (Colossians 2:9-10)
The truth is that the fullness of Christ is given to us, but also the truth is that often we hold it at arm’s length or we put that fullness conveniently on a shelf or keep it out of reach on some intellectual plane that allows us to continue living outside the full influence of Jesus, outside his leading but somehow foolishly remaining able to justify this to ourselves. This is not a judgement of others I’ve been there myself.
I don’t know about you but I’m over this; we either are living for Jesus or were not, we are either responding to Jesus or were not. I’m keen to respond to Jesus who is the head over every power and authority; rather than respond to my own whims and dreams. In them there is no salvation, in them the focus is narrow and selfish, no one is saved and no one encounters life change.
What is it Jesus wants from me? What is it Jesus wants from you?
It could be a start on a journey of faith, recovery, ministry, he could be asking you to seek employment, start a course of study, respond to those around you as he would, get off the couch, stop watching so much TV, to act justly, become involved in social justice matters, not to play so many computer games and get active for his kingdoms sake. To use what he has given you so that others may become alive in him also.
Jesus taught about responding to his teaching by using an illustration about a lamp he said this, 33 “No one lights a lamp and puts it in a place where it will be hidden, or under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, so that those who come in may see the light. (Luke 11:33) we are called to respond to Jesus teaching, to represent him.
For we are called to be his ambassadors.
2) So what does an ambassador look like? Well according to Wikipedia, “An ambassador is the highest ranking diplomat who represents a nation and is usually accredited to a foreign sovereign or government, or to an international organization.” Now that’s pretty full on!
This also puts in place a need to know what a diplomat is back to Wikipedia. “The main functions of diplomats revolve around the representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the sending state, as well as the promotion of information and friendly relations.”
This would put us all in a pretty responsible sort of a position, representing Jesus as did the Corinthians, Paul had written to them about leading sanctified lives, about developing Holy character. Corinth was not unlike the world we live in, with its vices and other beliefs, people were sexually immoral, money and the gaining of it took a large part in people’s lives. So the challenge was to live for God, being Jesus ambassador, living as Jesus representative.
The way of doing this was to live for him. You can’t do this when you are controlled by vices, bound by sin; not responding to his Spirit, not able to understand his word because you’re wrapped up in social media or our own hobbies to the detriment of his call on your life. God calls us to read his word, to pray, to regularly meet together, to contribute both our time and our finances to his work, in other words to live for him.
It bothers me when I see people I have been journeying with, who have sought advice over the last three years continue to fall into traps that they were caught in all that time ago. Why because they have Christianity in their heads and not their hearts. They find it easy to slip back into actions that will bring about death, those sinful actions that only bring grief into their lives instead of responding to the Spirit of God and living for Jesus. Why? I guess there is a huge array of reasons.
But listen to this Paul says “therefore if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation, the old is gone and the new has come.” (2 Corinthians 5:17) and these words of Jesus himself “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.”(John 3:3)
Again this passage challenges me, am I the best diplomat for Jesus? Am I the ambassador that Jesus would have representing him, or am I a ranter and a raver? Do I represent my own wants, is my thinking Andrew’s, not God’s, do I take and not give, am I living for God, am I loving my fellow humans as I would be loved? Am I living as Jesus representative?
I can’t do any of this myself I can’t be an ambassador of God’s kingdom if his Holy Spirit is not able to lead me, if it is all about me. I must be open to the Spirit of God I must at some stage have been born again. To represent God to be a Christian I have to be a new creation.
Various things may happen to a person who is born again, born from on high: All involve life change, and while the event that triggers life change may be experienced differently by different Christians, life change occurs.
Do you want to grow in your relationship with God; do you want to represent him as best you can? All this is possible as you allow his Holy Spirit to work in and through your life. Representing God, being a great Christian is not restricted to an elite body of saints, it is for all who are reconciled to Christ, for “he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them.”
Let’s pray. Father it is through the death and resurrection of your son that all may come to you and be reconciled, that they may become your friends.
Today we ask Lord that by your Holy Spirit we be made new creations, that we might truly represent Jesus, not just by name by our very natures, that in our lives we might be seen as his people for your kingdoms sake.
Amen.
