Last week we had two messages based upon the first 13 verses of chapter 5. Paul focused strongly upon the aspects of things beyond this life: the transformation of our earthly body to a building made without hands in the heavenlies, our being newly clothed in our eternal apparel and last Sunday night the fact that all of us will be judged one day for all we have done, said, not done and not said when we are before the judgment(bema) seat of Christ.
As amazing as these truths are Paul says the most compelling thing that should motivate us in our love for Christ is what He did in giving His life for us. Greater motivation than how great heaven will be or how horrible to face judgment.
Knowing all these things to be true and to be prepared for then what do we need to know about ourselves and our message as believers to make sure we are prepared for the amazingly important events Paul just wrote about?
14 For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; 15 and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf. 16 Therefore from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer. 17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.
18 Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, 19 namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
21 He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
This morning I want to break these 8 verses up into three sections and use three words to look at specific truths: Motivation – Transformation - Application
MOTIVATION: WHOM WE ARE TO LIVE FOR: 14 For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; 15 and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.
1. Our motivation is that we have a compelling love within us. It is meant to be so compelling as to have a controlling impact upon our lives.
a. It is not saying that ‘our love for Christ motivates us’ but it is something much more. There should be something within our heart that draws out of us a love for God but the COMPELLING aspect, CONTROLLING degree that impacts us to the level of changing our daily DNA of behavior comes from understanding the true depth of His love and His works on our behalf.
b. “We love Him, because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19). There is an intense level of inspired love that we should have because of our realization of His love for us and what that led Him to do for us.
having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; 15 and He died for all
c. A person who is apathetic about God’s purpose for their life is someone who has yet to understand what God potentially has done for them through Christ.
2. Our motivation is so powerful that we build our lives around His agendas and not ours: so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.
a. What has the love of Christ compelled you to do this past week: How has it changed a conversation you had? How has is changed your choices when watching TV? How has is made you do things you might not have otherwise done?
b. The ‘default’ lifestyle of the average person in this country is to ‘live for themselves’. People even build their religious beliefs around the idea that God exists for them and lives only to bless their lives continually.
Paul says the opposite is true in the life of someone who truly understands and has been impacted by what Christ has done for them.
Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.
3. A danger is that we can lose a sense of the magnitude of God’s love for us. We can hear the gospel so many times, read it, heard it, seen it on flannel board and has become so familiar that we lose our love for His love for us.
a. There was a church in the book of Revelation that suffered from this problem. When Paul wrote to this church in the Book of Ephesians he wrote a letter celebrating the amazing grace of God in our lives and how it impacts us in so many ways.
Now a generation later a short message/letter comes through the Apostle John on Patmos which indicates they had lost their love for Christ.
Revelation 2:1-5 "To the angel of the church in Ephesus write : …..2 'I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot tolerate evil men, and you put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and they are not, and you found them to be false; 3 and you have perseverance and have endured for My name's sake, and have not grown weary.
4 'But I have this against you, that you have left your first love.
b. The church in Ephesus was still doing religious things: deeds, toiling and fighting wrong teachings and teachers but their first love was long gone. They were not doing what they were doing because they were COMPELLED by the love of Christ. What are some evidences they had done this and warnings to us also?
5 'Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place -unless you repent……
c. Jesus tells them through John that somewhere along the way they fell away from the most important things. They need to remember where that was and turn around/repent. It was the place where they stopped doing the ‘first things’.
When was it that you stopped being in awe of God’s presence when you prayed? When was it that coming to church started becoming to you like a group meeting and no longer an amazing opportunity to experience God?
When did the Bible become just a book of things to know and no longer an amazing book from the One we love communicating His truths to us?
d. Our tendency when that happens is to take the Martha Road and just begin to do ‘busy work’ for God instead of going back and sit with Mary and rediscover what we lost in understanding the freshness of His love for us.
I have realized that most believers today cannot even begin to defend their faith in a way that addresses the prevailing problems they will face in witnessing. Most believers still share their faith, if they share at all, in a way that targets a 1980’s America. That was an America that had not been poisoned spiritually to such a level as we have seen with newer generations.
We now exist in a highly pagan and reprobate culture that has been constantly bombarded with ‘anti-Christian’ messages through our entertainment and education. The barriers we face are not the same, the answers they need have changed. It is no longer telling them the Bible says so but to help them understand why they should even care what the Bible says.
Deeping my abilities to face questions which I never asked or needed the answers for has built an unbelievable new level of faith in my walk with Christ.
TRANSFORMATION: WHO I AM IN CHRIST:
16 Therefore from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer. 17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.
Verse 17 of chapter 5 is one of the most amazing verses in the Bible.
It packages for us an unbelievable truth about who we now are.
C.S. LEWIS: The Christian way is different: harder and easier. Christ says "Give me All. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want You. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. I don’t want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked—the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours."
Three things should now be true of our perspective of things:
1) We should see one another differently: from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh
a) We are all members together of the Body of Christ. Individually we are unique in many ways. Jobs, families, houses, politics
b) We should have a sense of one another beyond the limitations and mile markers of this world: We have embarked upon eternity together.
The unique things that define us here are just as passing as the costumes that we might have worn at last year’s Harvest Festival.
“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 3:28).
c. The next time you are tempted to treat a brother or sister in Christ badly or to talk about them in a damaging way you might do well to remember Whose child they are. Their Father is going to be concerned how you are treating them.
2) We should see Jesus differently: even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer.
a) There are so many accounts that we can read of the life of Jesus in the Gospels. We can fill our minds with the various things He has done or taught and not transition as we should to Him being the Living Lord He is.
b) If this happens then we might talk about Him or tell others about Him but then fail in our own lives to experience the fullness of Whom He truly is.
c) Remind yourself continually Who Jesus is for you now, today, this moment:
His presence is to be your strength, His love is to be your warmth,
His power is to be your victory, His purpose and will is to be your marching orders.
Don’t just tell the world about Who He was but show the world Who He is.
3) We should see ourselves differently: if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.
a) Question: IF anyone is in Christ(is this true of your life, if not then..)
b) Answer: he is a new creature(metamorphosis has happened)
c) Proof: the old things have passed away; behold new things have come
This does not mean we turn over a new leaf, get reformed or rehabilitated but are brand new, TRANSFORMED
Imagine a caterpillar hanging out on a branch when a beautiful butterfly lands right in front of him. It thinks it is amazing what a butterfly is and can do and wants to be one himself. The next Sunday the caterpillar dresses nice and shows up at butterfly baptist church. When the invitation is given to become a butterfly the caterpillar walks(not flies) down the aisle. The whole Butterfly Church rejoices with the decision of the caterpillar and Reverand Monarch ends the service.
After the initial excitement wears off it becomes obvious to all that the caterpillar still walks like a caterpillar walks and hangs out where caterpillars hang out, it still watches the same old caterpillar TV has the same caterpillar appetites it had before. Even more than that the caterpillar wasn’t doing anything that the Butterfly book says that butterflies are supposed to do. The old things were still there and it wasn’t doing anything really new. Just because you clip a pair of wings on a caterpillar does not make it a butterfly. Just because we call someone a Baptist,(attach church membership to them) does not make them a Christian.
THE EVIDENCE IS THAT THERE WILL BE A TRANSFORMATION.
Some normal evidences to look for: New desires, new priorities, new perspective on life, new passions, freedom from old addictions, a new power to live for God.
MOTIVATION(Who we are to live for)
TRANSFORMATION(Who we are in Christ) and now finally:
APPLICATION: WHO WE ARE TO BE IN CHRIST:
18 Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, 19 namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation. 20Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
Paul gives us two titles that should be normal expectations of those whose lives have been truly transformed and compelled by a love for what Christ has done for them.
1) MINISTERS OF RECONCILIATION(Peacemakers/Matt 5)
a) We are surrounded by people who need reconciliation with themselves and God.
b) Romans 5 says that when God saved us we were ‘ungodly’ and ‘enemies’.
We needed to be reconciled to God and the message of the gospel showed us how that was possible.
c) It would be a shame to be given a job you never do: Just because you go and hang out with others who have the same job does not mean you are doing the job. Just because we go to church and hang around Christians does not mean we are living out our calling from God.
d) Jesus did not give His disciples the GREAT CONSIDERATION: If you don’t have anything else to do then you can work on this for a while.
IT was the very reason He left them and didn’t just take them up with Him when He was leaving. GO…Make DISCIPLES…TEACH…TRUST ME
He has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Have you ever been given an important message to pass along? God has not made other plans to get the gospel out other than His Church.
What if everybody working down at the Post Office just sat around reading the letters to themselves and never delivered them? Would they be doing their job? This book first and foremost contains a message that needs to be delivered through us to a lost world and not just something to study for ourselves.
Time of Henry VIII. Postmasters were given relays of horses to carry messages for the king to cities in England. Because some couriers were irresponsible and wasted time in taverns on the way, a drastic law was put into effect demanding that every carrier should "ride for his life." This meant that anyone caught delaying his messages would be publicly hanged. Often there was drawn upon important letters the figure of a man suspended from a gallows. Beneath was this ominous warning: "Haste, post, haste! Haste for thy life!"
A number of men did suffer death but in the 1800s the practice was discontinued. However the expression ‘post haste’ still remains as a reminder that care and urgency are required when the king’s business is involved!
2) AMBASSADORS FOR CHRIST: ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
a) God’s appeal to the world comes through us.
b) When was the last time you made somebody feel like you cared about their eternal destiny? When was the last time you changed your life so that other’s lives could be changed?
Roman Empire had two kinds of provinces: Senatorial provinces and Imperial provinces. Senatorial provinces were made up of people who were peaceful and not at war with Rome but the Imperial provinces were not peaceful; they were dangerous because they would rebel against Rome if they could. Rome sent ambassadors to the imperial provinces to make sure that rebellion did not break out.
Christians in this world are as ambassadors of Christ because this world is in rebellion against God. This world is an “imperial province” as far as God is concerned. He has sent His ambassadors into the world to declare peace, not war.
And in Paul's day an Ambassador was as highly respected as it is today, if not more so. When the Romans would conquer a particular country they would put into that country as many as ten ambassadors in that country to represent their interests.
This Ambassor:
Spent his life with those who are strange to him.
He had to speak their language and learn a different culture.
He has to deal with different life styles and traditions.
In that foreign world he represents his own king, his own kingdom and he brings the message that he was responsible to bring.
George Shultz, when Secretary of State during the Reagan administration, kept a large globe in his office. When newly appointed ambassadors had an interview with him and when ambassadors returning from their posts for their first visit with him were leaving his office, Shultz would test them. He would say, "You have to go over the globe and prove to me that you can identify your country." They would always go over, spin the globe, and put their finger on the country to which sent.
BUT when former Senate majority leader Mike Mansfield was appointed ambassador to Japan and was put to the test Mansfield spun the globe and put his hand on the United States. He said: "That's my country."
Shultz says: "I've told that story to all the ambassadors going out. 'Never forget you're over there in that country, but your country is the United States. You're there to represent us. Take care of our interests and never forget it, and you're representing the best country in the world.'
He has committed to us the word of reconciliation WHAT is this wonderful message the world needs to hear to be reconciled to God? VERSE 21: An amazingly COMPACT presentation of the Gospel.
21 He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
John MacArthur raised the question, "Why did Jesus have to wait 33 years before dying on a cross?" Couldn’t He have just made it a "weekend project"? Why would He become a little baby, spend thirty years growing up, three more years in ministry, and then die on a cross?
When John the Baptist argued with Jesus and said that he wasn’t worthy to be baptizing Jesus, Jesus said "Permit it to be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness."(Mat 3:15)
Jesus spent 33 years on planet earth living a life of righteousness, a life of doing the right things. He healed people, raised the dead, fed the hungry and many, many other things. Those good deeds were righteous but His "righteousness" is that He never took a step into the realm of sin and lived a perfect life.
What is most amazing is that I now get the credit for all of that. His righteousness was placed upon my account. And unbelievably my sins, your sins, the world’s sins for all of time were put upon His account as He died for them upon the cross.
1 John 2:2, "He is the propitiation for our sins and not ours only but the sins of the whole world."
1 Timothy 2:6, "He gave Himself a ransom for all." Hebrews 2:9, "So that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone."
Most religions keep a “running tab of sin”. But in Christianity the debt has been wiped out completely.
Col.2:14 “having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. PUT UPON HIM
How can a love like that not COMPELL you to give your life to Him? To live each day for His interests and not your own? Anything else would make no sense at all but many people do it all the time.
