(If you have found this sermon helpful, please visit us at www.HeritageRestorationProject.org or www.ChristianWisdom.info)
The Apostle Paul teaches, “You are our epistle written in the heart, known and read by all men” (2 Corinthians 3:2). Today I would like to challenge you to become a living epistle of Christ.
Maybe you have thought that being able to write a great book in praise of the glory of God would be the most wonderful thing to which you might aspire. It would, of course, be wonderful. But the Apostle Paul maintains that it is not the most wonderful thing to which we might aspire. There is something more wonderful, something that surpasses great literature, something more beautiful than the greatest symphony, more sublime than the greatest poem, and of more worth than the most eloquent sermon. That great and wondrous thing is the ability to elicit, to mirror and bring forth the remembrance of that which is written on the heart of others. God’s signature is written deep in the heart of all living beings. When we become an epistle that can be read, we become a mirror that reveals that signature, the lost image of God. We become epistles, letters that convey the mercy and love of the Lord Jesus Christ. Today, I challenge you to become such a letter and to carry that letter to others.
In order to become a living message of God’s mercy and love, we ourselves must first allow God to remake and fashion us as such. Paul praises the Corinthian church and challenges them to live up to this high calling when he writes to them in 2 Corinthians 3:3, “Clearly you are an epistle of Christ, ministered to by us, written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of flesh, that is, upon the heart.”
By yielding to the Holy Spirit who seeks to write God’s epistle upon your heart, each one of you can become a love letter from God sharing God’s redemptive grace with others. The Holy Spirit can transform your heart into a living epistle so that the Gospel is carried forward to others.
The Apostle Paul knew that the Old Testament had been misunderstood by the people of his day. The same may be said of the New Testament today. The New Testament is frequently misunderstood. For those who have not seen the love and mercy of God written upon the heart of Jesus, for those who have not yet experienced the illumination of the Holy Spirit, for those who have not yet experienced the veil of misunderstanding being lifted, there is a hunger within them seeking for that very thing. Indeed, the whole of creation strains for understanding, the whole of creation seeks to receive and read this epistle of God. We, who are called to be living epistles of the Lord, are to become living letters, God’s epistle written upon our heart by the Holy Spirit. We are to be healers restoring spiritual sight to the blind who are yearning to see. As Christians, this is our mission, our daily task.
Sight cannot be restored to the spiritually blinded by great speeches alone, not by great preachers alone, not by great poems, not by great hymns. Sight is restored to the spiritually blinded when they encounter an emissary from God carrying God’s letter addressed personally to them, and carrying God’s signature. When we become God’s living epistle, we become agents of redemption. We become the personalized epistle from God to every person we encounter each day. We are to care for and feed the spiritually hungry just as Jesus did for us, for, “when He saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd” (Matthew 9:36 NIV).
For my words to be effective, others must be able to see Jesus in and through me. Only the Holy Spirit can cause another person to understand my words. Only the Holy Spirit can cause another person to see God’s signature on my heart. People are not transformed by words alone, but rather by yielding to the influence of the Holy Spirit which brings meaning to those words. Great words, great speeches, and huge crowds are meaningless unless the Holy Spirit moderates those words touching the heart strings of the person to whom the epistle is addressed.
When God’s epistle is written upon our heart and when we know it well through the influence of the Holy Spirit, others can see in us something special—the unveiled glory of the Lord living within us. And secondly, they begin to see themselves as God sees them, with genuine love. We become a mirror held up to them in which they may catch a glimpse of the lost image of God within themselves, the lost image of God that Jesus is trying to reclaim.
In Genesis, it is said that God created man in His own image but through sin this image became so obscured as to become lost, unrecognizable, forgotten by humankind. It is said that when Adam first sinned, the soul of all humankind was corrupted. It is said that humankind’s relationship with God was broken because of knowledge of good and evil. This knowledge came about by the knowledge of God’s law. That law insisted that the penalty due humankind because of sin must be death. Jesus Christ came among us to provide an escape from death, reconciliation in our relationship with God, and restoration of the lost image of God in which we had been created.
We, as epistles of Christ, also act as a spiritual mirror which by which others might come to recognize the lost image of God that lies hidden within them, and the signature of their Creator upon their heart. We are to become the mirror held up for others to see themselves as their Creator sees us. Even those who crucified Christ were not an abomination to Him. They were precious lost souls for whom He, surrendered His life for their redemption (see Luke 23:34).
The Gospel of Jesus Christ is advanced by personal contact when others who experience the love and mercy of Christ living in us. And that is why I join with the Apostle Paul in encouraging you to be living epistles. Yield to the Holy Spirit who wishes to write upon your heart a message of God’s love and mercy. This is the way the Gospel is extended, one by one, by holding a mirror to the lost image of God within each person we meet. When others see Christ reflected in the image we hold up to them, when they experience being valued and loved and treasured, it is then that their hearts unfold like flowers. It is then that the veil is lifted. It is then that understanding is restored. It is then that sanctifying grace can truly begin its work of rebuilding the human soul.
The time has come for us to fulfill our high calling. Be perfect in your love, that your ministry might touch the lives of everyone you meet!
* COMMISSIONING (Unison): In the power of the Holy Spirit we now go forth into the world, to fulfill our calling as living epistles bearing the good news of God’s love and mercy, mirroring the lost image of God to those whom God seeks to redeem, that they, through the power of the Holy Spirit, might be awakened from slumber unto life everlasting through Jesus Christ our Lord.
(If you found this sermon to be helpful, please visit us at www.HeritageRestorationProject.org)
