Reconciliation With God: The Heart Of The Gospel

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the story of a merciful God who provides the sole means of grace, pardon, and forgiveness to a fallen, rebellious, and wicked creation who hates Him (Ezekiel 18: 23, 32). Even when He could have let us remain in our wretched condition and condemned us to hell for rebelling against Him, He sent His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ to this world to carry out the mission of rescuing us in spite of ourselves (Isaiah 53:5-6; John 3:16; Romans 5:6-11, 6:23). The term for this undeserved act of grace is called reconciliation. Through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross in His sacred role as the perfect, sinless, and final sacrifice for our sins, we are no longer bound by the wretchedness we brought upon ourselves for our rebellion against God at the start of history.

This is the supreme demonstration of God's love towards us. The Bible says that we are dead in sin from the first moment of our conception (Psalm 51:5). How is this related to the issue of God's love towards us? Real love for someone doesn't remain silent or passive when that individual is walking down a path that will obviously lead to their ruination or death. The love of God also includes His just nature that must render a perfect verdict against our rebellion against Him. He is not passive concerning our wickedness and will overlook nothing regarding our life. Should we refuse to reject His offer of reconciliation through the Lord Jesus Christ (John 14:6), we then cut ourselves off from being forgiven from sin, provided with eternal life and peace with God, and the joy of becoming a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). All opportunity of reconciliation ends when the sinner takes his last breath and enters an eternal hell that they brought upon themselves (Luke 16:19-31; Hebrews 9:27; Revelation20:11-15).

This truth from Scripture is another example of an "expostulation" or the use of reasoning in the presentation of the Gospel. Expostulation is the presentation of ideas and facts that results in a person changing their mind or conception about a subject or opinion, especially when it comes to the things of God (Isaiah 1:18). Explaining to someone that they are in rebellion against God because of their sins and deviant condition is one of the steps to helping them understand the Gospel (Romans 3:23). None of this is possible without the guidance of the Holy Spirit, who convicts the hearts of those who are tired of their sins and desire life, peace, and forgiveness available only through Jesus Christ (Matthew 11:28-30; John 16:5-15).

Reconciliation is a large word that describes the heart of the Good News. It is a grand term that describes the wondrous love of God towards us, and sums up the entirety of the great hymn, "Amazing Grace". It is the portrait of the Father who ran to the stinking Prodigal Son and embraced him in love and forgiveness (Luke 15: 11-32). Reconciliation also showed the son who stayed home in a state of bitterness that the Father's love extended to him as well. Those of us who have come to Christ for salvation and reconciliation with God need to keep on the alert and compel all to come to Him in these closing days. How great is our God. Please run to His open arms today.

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