“...From Now On...”

“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. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We 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. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

II Corinthians 5:16-22

  

Read slowly and deliberately through the passage above.

As you do, consider carefully what our attitude toward the world ought to be.

We are not called to judge and condemn but to bring others to Christ through the ministry of reconciliation.

How easy and how tempting it is to step away from that role to tell others what miserable sinners they are.

If we do this we are forgetting ourselves the grace of God given in our own lives.

We begin to believe the lie that somehow we are now where we are because of our own goodness and our own behavior.

That is a dangerous place to be.

Remember that the Good News of John 3:16 is followed by more Good News in John 3:17:

“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.”

The message and the ministry we carry is one of salvation and not condemnation; one of hope and not despair, one of mercy and not judgment.

Let that ‘triple play’ of salvation, hope and mercy make the difference in someone’s life today as you minister in reconciliation and not judgment!