Audio: iTunes | Spotify
God was, in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and placing among us the Word of Reconciliation.
᛭ INI ᛭
(5. Oops!: Humanity writ large, including each of us, is in open rebellion against God.)
Adam rebelled. He listened to the serpent’s words through his wife rather than the Word of the LORD. Adam warred himself and all humanity with him out of God’s Kingdom into Satan’s domain. Ever since then, mankind has taken up its rebellion against God. Each sinful human attempting to live out the lie, “You’ll be like God.”
But it was a lie. Adam and His children no longer had full and free “dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” There was only one lord and master on the earth now. Mankind handed the keys over to Satan, and he is a cruel master, using a powerful weapon against us: death.
“Just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned.” Death also reigns “over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam.” We didn’t eat the forbidden fruit, but we engage in all sorts of other sinful behavior. We’re alsosubject to death: “The wages of sin is death.”
(4. Ugh!: Reconciliation with God is impossible for sinful man.)
There was no way Adam could fix what he’d done. There’s no way to fix what you do either. Anything you do to try and make up for how you’ve messed up is just digging the hole deeper, adding sin on top of sin. For if anyone were to keep a commandment of God, that’s just what God says to do. Doing what you’re supposed to do doesn’t make up for a previous time you didn’t. Adam or you can’t balance the scales by what you do.
There’s no way to break down the dividing wall between mankind and God. There’s no amount of negotiations that will bring about a resolution or peace settlement. There’s no way to give God a little to receive back from Him blessing. “Who has given a gift to [God] that he might be repaid?” For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen. (Rom 11) There’s no way to calm the animus, hatred God has for mankind’s sin. There’s no offer man can give to God to call off the war mankind started when Adam rebelled against God, especially when we continue to rebel daily and much through our own sin.
(3. Aha!: GOD RECONCILES IN CHRIST AND KEEPS THAT RECONCILIATION A-ROLLIN’!)
The old things must pass away. All things must be made new. We “who are alienated” in our flesh must be restored and brought back. We “who are enemies [of God] in our minds by wicked works” (Col 1) must be made friends and children of God. There must be reconciliation—bringing the two parties back together. But God’s reconciliation in Christ is altogether different that human reconciliation. There’s no negotiations, no compromise, no negotiated settlement. It’s a complete and total reconciliation and restoration. God Himself does it and gives it as a free gift to mankind—“God was, in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself.”
“It pleased God the Father…by Christ to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross.” (Col 1) For Christ “is our peace, who has made both [Jew and Gentile] one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, and that He might reconcile [Jew and Gentile] to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity.” (Eph 2)
He reconciled all mankind to God the Father. “For the love of Christ compels us, because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died; and He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again.” (2-Cor 5) “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Rom 5) “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1-Jn 4), “and not for ours only but also for the whole world.” (1-Jn 2)
Yes, all are reconciled in Christ, but not all receive the benefits of Christ’s reconciling death, not all receive the propitiation that Christ accomplished—propitiation means that God’s anger toward sin and sinners is satisfied. “For there is no difference; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, [which is received] through faith.” (Rom 4)
Clearly, God has reconciled in Christ, in His blood, His death, but God must deliver the word, the message, the good news of this reconciliation, that sin no longer separates God and man, so that mankind might hear about, believe it, and thus be saved. As Paul says, “God…has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.” Or to put it another way:
GOD RECONCILES IN CHRIST AND KEEPS THAT RECONCILIATION A-ROLLIN’!
(2. Whee!: God keeps Christ’s reconciliation a-rollin’ in the ministry of reconciliation.)
GOD RECONCILES IN CHRIST AND KEEPS THAT RECONCILIATION A-ROLLIN’! He keeps Christ’s reconciliation a-rollin’, delivers it, through the ministry of reconciliation. The ministry of reconciliation is the ministry that delivers God’s reconciliation in Christ, the ministry that announces Christ’s reconciliation.
I’m engaged in that ministry at this very moment! I’m announcing to you that you are truly reconciled with God in Christ. Christ has paid what He did not owe for your sake. He became sin that you would be God’s righteousness in Christ. He had all your sins, and the sins of the whole world, credited to His account, “He bore them in His own body on the tree, that you would die to sin and live for righteousness, by His wounds you have been healed,” forgiven and set free.
The ministry of reconciliation cleans the slate, gives you a fresh start. When the eternal scales of God’s judgment were tipped against you from your birth, even your conception, that debt was wiped clean in Holy Baptism. Christ’s reconciling death, His payment for your sins, was made personally yours at Holy Baptism. Baptism places you into Christ, and so you are Christ’s, and “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away, behold, the new has come.” You are in Christ IHS by Baptism through faith.
But since the flesh still remains, and still is in constant rebellion against God, His holy will, and does whatever it wants, not matter what God’s Word says about what’s wrong and sinful, there is yet more reconcilation to be announced and delivered your whole life through. Christ’s reconciling death is constantly made yours, you are restored into Christ’s reconciliation by Holy Absolution, by Sermons, just like this one, and by using the Holy Scriptures in daily reading, devotion, meditation, and prayer.
And the clearest example of God’s reconciliation is Holy Communion. The Lord invites you to His Supper, seats you at His table, and gives you the very means of His reconciliation: “His body given for you; His blood shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” Through Communion there is no longer no separation between you and Christ, we are renewed and restored as one flesh, one body, one blood with Him.
(1. Yeah!: God keeps that reconcilation a-rollin’ in the word of reconcilation.)
Yes, GOD RECONCILES IN CHRIST, through is blood and death, AND He KEEPS THAT RECONCILIATION A-ROLLIN’ in all those ways. Yet, the Lord keeps His reconciliation a-rollin’ all the more. Paul says, “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us,” or “placed among us,” “the word of reconciliation.” This, of course, is another way of expressing the same thing that I just said about the Office of the Ministry. That is one way that God has placed among us “the Word” or “Message” “of Reconciliation. ANd yet Christ our Lord also says, “Therefore if you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled [διαλλάγηθι] to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.” (Mt 5)
So it is that Paul also says, “Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, as even God in Christ forgave you.” (Eph 4) Throw the grudge in the garbage, as it were. Hanging on to it is the opposite of the reconciliation that God worked in and through the death of Christ IHS your Lord.
Forgive them before they’re even sorry or know that they wronged you! “God demonstrated His love in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.” “For the love of Christ compels us, because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died; and He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again.” (2-Cor 5) Hanging on to a grudge, withholding reconciliation, is to live for yourself. Whose score are you trying to settle? Your own. The sin you’re hanging on to, the wrong you suffered, was paid for by the blood of Christ, wasn’t it? Christ died for that sin; He died for that person and you!
Now, if they’d rather live in their sin, reject reconciliation, abuse forgiveness to continue the wrong, that’s not on you. “If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men.” (Rom 12) Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. (Rom 12) And He’s already paid for you and for all, “if One died for all, then all died.” God’s already reconciled the whole world to Himself in Christ.
GOD RECONCILES IN CHRIST AND KEEPS THAT RECONCILIATION A-ROLLIN’!
For you and for all! To you, through you, to all. “It is finished!”
Gracious Mercy Blog 