GOD WAS RECONCILING THE WORLD TO HIMSELF THROUGH CHRIST
2 Corinthians 5:14-21 - June 23, 2002
2 CORINTHIANS 5:14-21
14For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. 15And 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.
16So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. 17Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! 18All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20We 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. 21God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
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Dearest Fellow Redeemed and Saints in the Lord:
The word for today that is in our text is reconciliation. That is one of those long words, and yet in our text we found it defined by a description for us a couple of times. If we turn to the Webster diction-ary, he gives a beautiful definition there also. (We have to remember that Webster lived during a Chris-tian time in the history of the United States, so he was influenced by what Scripture had to say.) His defi-nition of reconciliation was "to make friendly again." That’s really what reconciliation is--that Christ by His sacrifice on the cross has made us who were enemies friendly again to God. God gives us that minis-try of reconciliation.
In Colossians we are told that definition of how we are made friendly to God: "But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation" (Colossians 1:22). We are going to use one of the verses as our theme this morning, which goes along with the word "reconciliation." We are told that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ. We are told I. that this is God’s message to the world and II. and that this is our ministry unto the world.
I. This is God?s message to the world
In our text Paul tries to describe to these believers the importance of humanity. He looks at hu-manity, not just as a collection of people or mankind; but he looks at humanity as people who are God’s creation. So in our text he tells us: "So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer." Today, we will be using Paul as our example as he writes these words of our text under inspiration. Paul had looked at people in a worldly way; even Christ, when considering Him just as Jesus of Nazareth, a criminal who had been put to death. That was until God made him a believer. After that, he looked at people as people who had a soul, as people who were destined for eternity, either in heaven or in hell away from God.
So his life was changed. His perception of mankind was changed. He realized that God had cho-sen him for a very specific purpose. God had chosen every believer and their lives were changed. He says, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!" He talks about the fact that the new man is given birth in the believer by faith. He says that the new man, the Christian, lives a life following Christ, not always giving in to sinful desires, sinful thoughts, words and actions, but wanting to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Himself.
It sounds like a great accomplishment for any person; and yet, Paul puts this all into perspective when he says: "All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ." When Paul became a believer, he was not looking for Christ. When Paul became a believer, he was looking for Christians to put to death, to punish. Paul realized that because he now believed and looked to heaven and eternity, it was because of God. All of this he says is because of God, all because through Christ he was reconciled and made friendly in the eyes of God.
So now let’s look at those definitions that Scripture gives for us. (As a reminder as we read the Bible, when we come to the big, long words, we should look in the verses before and after and even in the same verse. In this way God gives us a definition for just about every hard word that we find.) He talks about reconciliation and he says, "God was reconciling the world to Himself to Christ;" and in the next phrase he says, "not counting men’s sins against them." This is one definition for reconciliation--"doesn’t count men’s sins against them." Paul was ever thankful. Paul, who consented to Stephen’s death--who was put to death because of his faith--now realized that God did not count that sin against him. Paul, who put Christians in prison, now realized that God did not count those sins against him. He was reconciled to God.
How did this happen? He says at the end of our text, which gives us another definition or recon-ciliation: "God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the right-eousness of God." This is a twofold definition--that Christ who was sinless became the sin of the world. Christ did this by His sacrifice so that people are reconciled and made friendly to God. Now rather than be clothed by sin, believers are clothed by the righteousness of God or made friendly to God, once again reconciled to Him. Then the lives of people have changed. This is God’s message to the world. It is sim-ply a message that Christ died for the sins of the world, a simple message as described in our text--the word reconciliation. It is a message that we in our day and age need to hear. It seems as if we live in a time and age when people look all over the place for all kinds of answers to all kinds of problems. Yet, they forget that the root of all problems is sin itself. But because people have been raised to think that the experts have the answers, we have all kinds of experts in this world too. People go out in all kinds of di-rections rather than back to the Word of God.
Now, we live in a time we hear about terror everyday, and it can become almost unsettling won-dering what is going to happen next and when. So the world sometimes takes our focus away from focus-ing on the message of reconciliation, focusing on the fact that God through His Son has made us friendly once again with Him. The Lord describes it. He says that is the way the world is going to be. He says: "For, as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ." (We are enemies of the cross of Christ by our birth into this sinful world, but God has recon-ciled us. He has made us friendly again.) "Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things" (PHILIPPIANS 3:18,19). Now, we can’t just look at the world and say, "Well, the people of the world always have their minds on earthly things." We, too, know that our mind is on earthly things more often than we realize. We come to this time of year when it is hot and dry, but it doesn’t stop us from wondering if it is ever going to stop being hot and dry and windy. We wonder if it is worth the time and effort to harvest the crops or not. So our mind is on earthly things. We forget sometimes that message of reconciliation--that God has made us right with Him.
The Lord wants us to focus on that message which is to the world. We can rejoice because we know that message is meant for the world; and as believers, we know that message brings us great com-fort and joy. We know that this message is meant for those who need to hear it, and it was a message that Jesus proclaimed: "But go and learn what this means: `I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners"(MATTHEW 9:13). Jesus had the message to proclaim to the world--the message of reconciliation; and it is the message that we are all sinners.
It is a message that certainly says, "We don’t deserve to be in heaven, and yet God provides us with a heavenly home." It is a message that we can proclaim by our lives, by our actions, and especially by our words, telling those who need to hear it, "Yes, your sins condemn you, but there is help and Christ is the answer." From 1 John 3 we read: "Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin"(1 JOHN 3:4,5). So we are all sinners, but Christ takes away our sin. The Lord says we were all lost and con-demned, but Christ has saved us for eternity.
So Paul says in the middle of our text: "God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ." This is God’s message to the world and Paul continues to say, "This is our ministry unto the world."
II. This is God?s message into the world
When Paul became a believer, he realized that there was only one thing he had left to do in life--to proclaim the message of salvation to the ends of the earth. So our text began with that powerful statement of his motivation. He says, "For Christ’s love compels us." He was driven on by no longer love for him-self, no longer by love of carrying out this ministry of persecuting Christians; but because Christ had loved him with an everlasting love. Now, he was driven on by that love to show Christ’s love to others. He explains: "because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And 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." Paul realized before this time, before he was a believer, his life was worthless; but after this now he had a purpose to live for Christ, Christ who came and lived for him and even died for him and was raised again.
Paul, who had never met Jesus, now by God’s grace, understood that Jesus gave up His life for him. That was his message of reconciliation for the world, again realizing not on his own. Paul didn’t go out of his way to find Christ. He didn’t pay to learn about Jesus. He says, "This is all from God who rec-onciled us to Himself to Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation." Paul says God gave us the ministry for the purpose of proclaiming God’s Word. He describes what that means: "We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making His appeal through us. Paul realized that after Christ was born on earth and the angels announced His birth, they went back to heaven. They didn’t come and make announcements of the Gospel anymore, but that was left to His first Apostles and His disciples who came later, such as the Apostle Paul. Now Paul realized he was to represent Christ and the preaching and teaching of His Word. So in prayer, he says, "We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God." Be made friendly to God, repent and turn to the Lord.
We might look at that task that God gives us as an awesome responsibility, and it is. It is one of the privileges of being a believer; because you and I are able to come here on a Sunday, are able to come to special worship services and celebrate the fact that we know the message of reconciliation. For most of us if not all, we have known it from very little on. As day-by-day goes by in this life filled with tears and sorrow and problems and terror, we learn to enjoy God’s message of reconciliation, that He has paid the price for our sins. With that, our privilege and responsibility is to let others know, either by the words of our mouth or by the actions of our lives that we lead. Certainly, we are reminded of God’s great commis-sion from Matthew and Mark: "He said to them, ’Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be con-demned’"(MARK 16:15,16). This is the simple message of reconciliation to let others know that Christ has died for their sin.
Sometimes we don’t feel so motivated to do such an awesome task, but the Lord reminds us though like Paul to look back at what He has done for us, to look back at the very beginning of our text where it says: "Christ’s love compels us." We look back and see that God has done everything for us, sent His Son to die in our place to make sure that salvation is a certainty for each one of us through the suffering, the sacrifice and the death of Christ our Savior. So our lives are changed. It is a little harder for us, because we are not like the Apostle Paul. The Apostle Paul was past his teens and twenties, probably in his thirties when the Lord changed his life. Our lives were changed at our baptism, so some-times we have to remind ourselves of just what that means. We could be living in darkness, in the dark-ness of not knowing what the future holds, in the darkness of being scared of every news story that comes out nowadays; but we aren’t. We live in the light of the knowledge of salvation and in the glory of God’s forgiveness. Thus, our lives are changed.
Paul writes in Galatians: "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me"(GALATIANS 2:20). Each one of us lives our lives in the love of God. We may not stop and think of it everyday, but we do. When we take care of our property and possessions and when we help our neighbors and friends, that is because we love God. We don’t stop to think to ourselves, "Well, I am go-ing to do this because God loves me. He gave Himself for me." But that is our motivation in everything that we say, think and do that gives glory to God. It is because God sent His Son to die for our sins. So Christ’s love really does compel us.
During this time of year, it is a special time because June and July and sometimes into August, new men are assigned to their places as pastors for the first time, and experienced men go to different places. We read of these events in the bulletin. These men go to proclaim God’s message of reconcilia-tion to God’s people. Sometimes we might think to ourselves, "Well, that is the pastor’s job and those who have been trained to be called to do that." As believers, you too have been called to share this mes-sage of reconciliation. The fact that you have gone to Sunday school, that you have been baptized; you also have been trained in the knowledge of salvation. You know that Christ has died for your sins. Yet, we might think that we are not so well equipped to proclaim what God wants us to proclaim. Well, really your pastors feel that way from time to time, too; because as we study God’s Word, we realize that there is more and more to learn every day, more and more to learn every year. We never completely learn every-thing God wants us to know about salvation, do we? But we know it enough that we are able to share it with others. We know it enough that we can always continually prepare ourselves. The Lord encourages us. He says: "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth"(2 TIMOTHY 2:15). As you study God’s Word for yourselves and as you hear it preached to you and as you read it day by day, you become trained to correctly handle the Word of Truth. In the day and age we live, I would venture to say that many of you are far more trained than some who are called pastors in other denominations, because God has given you His Word. He has given to you the message of reconciliation. He has given to you the love that you know in your hearts that God has reconciled you to Himself through Christ.
Yes, as Paul says, "God was reconciling the world to Himself through Christ,? but the important thing is that we as individual believers know that God is reconciling us to Himself one by one. God was and is reconciling the world to Himself in Christ. This is God’s message for the world, and this is our ministry into the world. We turn to that familiar passage from 1 Peter 2:9 and he gives that list that says, "You are a holy nation, a royal priesthood, a people belonging to God that you may declare the praises of Him who had called you out of darkness into His marvelous light." He tells us why: "Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have re-ceived mercy"(1 PETER 2:10). We would all agree--God has shown us great mercy that we might show that same, divine mercy to others. Amen. Pastor Timm O. Meyer
