2 Corinthians, 5:18-21

Okay. I thought it would be good for us this morning to just read through this quote. I've been reading this book called Designed to be Like Him by Pentecost. Maybe some of you have heard of him. So it just goes like this. The question arises, how can we glorify God?

And by fellowship with God, we are created in order that we might have fellowship with God and we were made a new creation in Christ Jesus in order that we might have fellowship with God so that through our fellowship with Him we might bring glory to God. And so last week we were talking about how we are a new creation in Christ, how old things have passed away, behold all things have become new, and much of the passages that we've been looking at in the past several chapters, chapter 3, 4, on into 5, is dealing with the glory of God. You know, I don't want, and I know none of us want for this idea of the glory of God and fellowship with God and being new creations with Christ and all things pass away. We don't want it to be just an intellectual knowledge that we're gaining, but we want it to be something that is intimate, affecting our relationship with the Lord on a daily basis. And so as I came across this, just the idea of having fellowship with the Lord and that fellowship with the Lord bringing glory to God. was just something that kind of struck me this past week as I was reading it.

I have good fellowship with my wife, and for that I'm very grateful. And I'm getting to know more people here since we've been here, and there's growing fellowship with people here. Back in Virginia, I had great fellowship with friends of long standing that I had. So just the idea of fellowship, you know, all of us have people that we have that close fellowship with on a daily or weekly basis.

And just the idea that that is God's intent for us with Him. It's for us to have that fellowship with Him. So we get up in the morning and we go through our daily routines, our daily activities. I go to work and my wife isn't there. My friends aren't there. So who is the person that I can intimately fellowship with while I'm alone at work, it's the Lord. And so I just thought about that a good bit this past week, that He's the one that I can go to, He's the one that I can draw from, He's the one that I can have that security with, that intimacy with during the day, no matter what it is that we are going through.

And I just thought that was pretty important for us to to consider. We don't want to just be filled with facts as we go through the book of 2 Corinthians. We want it to be impacting and affecting our walk with the Lord. Any thoughts about that? On those lines? All right. Well, what we're going to do this morning is we're going to look at verses 18-21. Okay? 2 Corinthians chapter 5, and we're going to go 18-21. We'll finish up chapter 5 this morning. Let's just read down through these verses.

Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them. And he has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us. We beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. He made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him." Alright.

What a kind of climax to a chapter that we've been, I mean, it's been some awesome verses that we've been looking at. here for the past number of weeks. So as we've read through those verses, what jumped out at you? What was kind of the repeated theme in those four verses, or especially the first three verses? What kept coming out?

Reconciliation. Exactly. That's exactly right. So if we were to look at it, you know, we see it there. Verse 18, all these things are from God, and He has reconciled us to Himself, how? Through Christ. And He gave us this ministry of reconciliation, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, and He has committed unto us this word, or this ministry of reconciliation. And then down in verse 20, we beg you on behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God.

So clearly this is the theme. for those three verses, 18, 19, and 20. And I have a mistake up here. This should be 18 through 21. So you're going to take your pen and scratch through that. I didn't get that changed on the first three slides, I think. Or four. First three slides, I didn't get that changed. So if you want to make that correction, that would be helpful.

So verse 18 and verse 19 are real similar if we look at them. All these things are from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ and has given us the ministry, gave us the ministry of reconciliation. Now, 19 is very similar. But I think what happens in 19 is that he explains and gives a little more detail about what was happening, what he said in verse 18.

Namely, This is what was happening, clearly that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, not counting the trespasses against him. Now look at verse 18. All these things are from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ. Now, what really happened? What really happened was that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, not counting the trespasses against him.

Kind of gives a little further explanation there in verse 19 of verse 18. And then at the end of verse 18, And he gave us the ministry of reconciliation. And in verse 19, he has committed to us the word of reconciliation. And then we go down into verse 20, he talks about how Paul is now an ambassador. He is the one who is to go out and share this message of reconciliation for all mankind.

So that's kind of the way that I see it working out there. 19 gives a little further explanation and detail of verse 18. So what I would like for us to do is to take a look at this idea here of reconciliation, as I think that's a big theme of these verses that we have before us this morning. So verse 18 says, Now all these things are from God. So the kind of double negative that I've put before you here, nothing is not from God.

And I think that's just important. That's a thought that we could ponder. We won't take a lot of time this morning to talk about that, but now all these things are from God. Now the word all is an inclusive word. Nothing is left out. Now all these things are from God.

And if we were to start in verse 17, or even go up further than that, we talked about for the love of Christ is controlling us a couple of weeks ago. He died for all, therefore all die, so that we would not live for ourselves, but that we would live for God. who died and rose again on our behalf. 17, therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature. Old things have passed away, all things have become new. Now all these things are from God. You can see how he is building this crescendo here. All these things are from God. Then he continues on into this section about how we have been reconciled to God. Look at Colossians chapter 1. Just go over to Colossians chapter 1. And let's look at verse 16. Colossians 1 and verse 16. Someone would just read that out for us when you find it.

For by Him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created by Him and for Him. Okay. There's the idea there of all things coming from God.

And I think he's wanting to communicate that the context of what he's talking about here with old things having been passed away, new things coming, this reconciliation, it didn't originate with man. Man didn't think it up. Man isn't the energizing force behind what he's talking about here. All these things have come from God, and Paul wanted to make that very clear to his readers and to his audience. These things have come from God.

Romans 8.28 we know says that all things work together for good to them that love God and those who are called according to his purpose. So all things are coming from God. We just need to keep that in mind. Who? Let's see how it reads here. Who has, let's see, go back to the verse.

All things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. So who is the who talking about there? It's God. Who all things have come from, He's reconciled us to Himself and through Christ. So now all these things are from God who reconciled us to himself. So God is the one who is doing the reconciling. We're not reconciling ourselves. God is the one who is doing the reconciling. And we're going to talk about that in detail as we continue on here with the idea of reconciliation. So the basic words as we look at this word reconciliation in the Greek are katalaso and Dialasso and they are both formed from the word Alasso.

There's point number one. And they are drawn from a Greco-Roman political arena where it referred to the removal of enmity between two agreed parties. It's kind of the background of the word here. And enmity, because we are going to use the word enmity a lot this morning, it's the bitter feeling of hatred. It's kind of the historical background there. It's referred to the removal of a bitter feeling of hatred between two agreed parties.

That's all we have. A couple other ideas of the word reconciliation is simply to affect a change. It's going to cause a change. It's going to happen. It's going to reestablish proper, friendly, interpersonal relations after these have been disrupted or broken. And I like that word. Right there, friendly interpersonal relations.

Because we know we're talking about reconciliation between man and God. So it's happened that we have been brought back to a friendly interpersonal relationship with God. That to me speaks a very intimate personal between God and myself and God and mankind. And for that I'm very grateful and I think this idea here has great significance as we think about it in our walk with the Lord that we've been brought back into this friendly, personal, intimate relationship with God. Second, or on down here, change a person from enmity to friendship.

And let's look at this verse, Matthew, which kind of helps us get an idea as to what we are talking about here. Matthew chapter 5, and verse 23. Matthew 5. verse 23 and 24, and if someone would just read that out for us as you find it. Matthew 5, 23 and 24. Therefore, if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and may rememberest that thy brothers have anything against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way. First be reconciled to thy brothers, and then come and walk with them.

Okay, so the change of a of a relationship of one where there was some hatred or some enmity or strife between two people, go and have that relationship mended. Go and have that relationship fixed to where there's no longer this enmity or hatred or division or anything standing between these two parties. That's what we're kind of getting at there.

So lastly, enmity is overcome and peaceful resolution is restored on the basis of the work of Christ. We're going to talk about how it's all centered in what Christ did in making this reconciliation possible. And this concept refers to an objective state of peace, not simply a feeling of peacefulness. I think that's important for us to grasp and understand. It is a true fact, a real fact, because of what God has done for us through Christ, there is peace. It's not based on some warm fuzzy feeling of peacefulness that reconciliation is based on.

Do we always have that? No. Are there times when I might be in the flesh and I might think because I'm walking in the flesh from man's point of view that God is unhappy with me and that I'm no longer at peace with God? Yeah, that happens. So we can come back to this positional truth of reconciliation. See, reconciliation is really a positional truth. So it's based on the objective that we have been made at peace with God, not just a warm, fuzzy feeling. Because our faith must be based on facts, not based on feelings.

I think we've probably read and heard that before. Isn't that what the world wants, though, the warm, fuzzy feeling? Absolutely. And yet they're seeking for what they call, you know, inner peace. But they never find that inner peace. Because so much of it, they're trying to find that warm fuzzy piece. Right. That's right. That's all they understand. That's right. Yeah.

The world's in a tough spot, because they are abandoning the absolutes of our postmodern culture, yet they're wanting that warm fuzzy feeling, yet they are not in a position where they can base it on absolute truth, where they can find it. So they're in a tough spot.

They're always at this... There's always this tension of trying to get there. They never truly will arrive at it until they can come to grips with the scripture and with God as their Heavenly Father. Let's go to slide number four. So let's just talk about the problem here for a minute. Making a need for reconciliation. Why was there a need? What was the problem? that made this reconciliation, or being brought to this place of friendship with God, what made that necessary? So we know that in Genesis 3, and we won't take the time to read through all that, but let's go back there and read through some of it. Genesis 3 makes this need, shows us why reconciliation was needed. Genesis 3, in verse 6, When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit, and she ate. She gave also to her husband with her, and he ate.

And the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed big leaves together, and made themselves loin coverings. So then they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of God, from the Lord God among the trees of the garden and the Lord God called to the man and he said, where are you? And he said, I heard your sound in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself.

That there begins to show us the problem. Of all the previous days that the Lord God had walked into the garden, they had met him with that intimate fellowship and friendship. And now we have on this day, because of what they had done, the Lord God walks into the garden and they go and they hide. and there begins this division, the intimate, the friendship, the relationship now is broken. So, go down to verse 23 of the same chapter, and therefore the Lord God sent him out of the garden of Eden to cultivate the ground from which he was taken and he drove the man out. In the east of the garden he stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life.

So ultimately, there was spiritual death, there was physical death, and they were kicked out of the garden. Therein lies the problem, because of the sinfulness of man. That's what brings alienation. They were alienated when God walked into the garden. They were hiding. They were alienated from God. There was enmity, and there was there was hostility, so there was a huge relational change because of sin there.

Go to Isaiah chapter 59 verses 1 and 2. Behold, the Lord's hand is not so short that it cannot save, nor is His ear so dull that it cannot hear. But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear you. Verse 2 there says, But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God. That's what we're talking about. There's a separation between man and God. In Colossians chapter 1, Colossians in chapter 1 and verse 21. says, although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds. They used the word alienated and hostile in mind. That was the problem because of the sin of Adam. Adam's sin was imputed to all of mankind. As our federal head, the first Adam, we were all born into sin. We were alienated and hostile in our mind.

Verse 22 says, and yet he has now reconciled you in his flesh, in his fleshly body, through death, in order to present you before him holy and blameless and beyond reproach. So there is the idea there of reconciliation that we're going to be talking about as the solution to the problem. So it's important that we understand that the enemy is us, not God. Adam and Eve are the ones that messed up. That was imputed to us. In our hostility, it is our hostility that is the problem.

God did not walk away from man, but man walked away from God. So you take two people sitting out here together in their chairs, who got up and walked away? Was it God or was it man? Man. Man got up and walked away. So there's this separation, there's this alienation, there's this hostility in this relationship. So sin had created a barrier between God and man and had rendered man hostile toward God. therein lies the problem.

We can probably talk about more of the problem, but that's I think maybe a basic overview of what the problem and making the need for reconciliation. Okay, let's talk about the solution. The solution is that now we're reconciled. It's always God that reconciles us. It's not vice versa. We need to be just real clear on that. God reconciles us to himself.

Let's look at Romans in chapter 5. This is extremely clear and you know it's humbling to read these verses and think about what it is that God did for us. I mean it's extremely, extremely humbling to me to read these verses and think about it. Romans 5 verses 6 through 10. While we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Do you see us in that verse there? We were helpless Christ died for the ungodly.

God was reconciling us to himself. We were not trying to make things right. We were helpless, could do nothing to save ourselves, and God did that. Verse 7, And one will hardly die for a righteous man, though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die. Verse 8, But God demonstrates his own love towards us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. What were we doing there? We were, yes, sinners. We were still sinning and Christ died for us. God is the one that was pursuing us.

It's extremely humbling to me. Verse 9, Much more than having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. Verse 10, For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. Incredible. Incredible what it is that God has done for us.

We were enemies, we were helpless, in verse 6. We were sinners, in verse 8. And we were enemies, in verse 10. And God says, you know, I'm going to pursue you guys. Because I love you, I'm going to pursue, I'm going to reconcile this relationship between us. I was broken in the garden. God is reconciling us, not vice versa.

We've read in 2 Corinthians 5, 18-19, Go back to Colossians. A couple verses prior to where we were earlier. Go back to Colossians. Chapter 1 and look in verse 19 through 20. For it was the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross. Through Him, I say, were the things on earth or things in heaven. So, it was through Christ to reconcile all things to himself. And one more, let's look at Ephesians chapter 2. Ephesians 2, and let's look at verses 14 through 16. Burns covered a good number of these verses in Ephesians and Colossians in the past couple of months. So verses 14 through 16 of Ephesians 2.

For he himself is our peace, who made both groups into one, and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall, by abolishing in his flesh the enmity which is the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so that in himself he might make the two into one new man, thus establishing peace. He might and might reconcile them in one body to God through the cross, having by it having put to death the enmity.

Extremely clear. Just laying it out for us. Absolutely clear for us. So God's goal is to bring man back to himself. That's incredible. I mean, that's an incredible thought, isn't that? We read in the Garden what happened. We read the hostility between God and man.

And God's goal is to bring man back into a relationship with himself. Incredible. So God is the one who initiated this change and reconciliation. He moved to reconcile sinful man to himself. So here's, say God and man are sitting down. I get up and I walk away. God gets up and comes after me in order to reconcile me back to him and all mankind back to himself. Incredible. So reconciliation is man's word. It's from God to man. Man was the one who had moved out of fellowship with God.

Therefore, man needed to be restored. Any thoughts or questions, Bob? Jim, the opposite is an experience I just had this week. I was with a Jewish woman who was giving a very important talk at the meeting I was at. Her mother had died six months ago, and her mother was planning on being there. And she is now trying to return to the synagogue at 7 a.m. each day, that she can get there.

And it makes me turn to Romans 8, 7 and 8, just in line with what you were saying, because the carnal mind is enmity. please God, but is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. I mean, this process of reconciliation isn't the carnal mind, which is enmity, trying to please God by a performance or abiding by a law, because it can't, right?

But reconciliation. And I tried to assure her that her attendance was not being recorded by him, that there was a greater principle, and that was the end of the conversation. But nevertheless, I mean, the idea here is that there's no human response that can match reconciliation.

That's right. That's right. Yeah. It's entirely of Him. And the fleshly mind is in the tea. The fleshly mind just continues to make, continues, and down the road is bad. Continues to make the problem, in a sense, worse. The fleshly mind is in the tea.

When we're trying to, in a sense, reconcile ourselves to God, it's just going to stay bad. Yeah, absolutely. So we pray that God would work in that lady's heart and show her that, boy, what I'm doing is not going to... the help matters. I need to turn to the one that is pursuing me. You can't buff up Adam to make Adam presentable.

Well, no, it is the same. Well, no, it's as different as Greek is from Hebrew. I mean, different languages, but... Oh, yeah. Sure. The Jew is not open to that concept. Right, that's right. Might not be open, but God is God and He can open our mind and that might happen. Okay, let's look at slide number five. Any other thoughts? Okay.

The method was one of exchange. The Greek term here for reconciliation is derived from words for exchange in which by extension the enmity is exchanged for peaceful relations. And to reconcile is to end a relationship of enmity and to substitute or to make a relationship of peace. So through Christ's substitutionary death on the cross, God was satisfied making peace with God possible. That's what happened. That's the method of reconciliation, how it is possible.

And this exchange is described to a degree in verse 17. We talked about last week that old things have passed away and behold, all things have become new. The old enmity has passed away and the new relationship of peace has come. We've read verses, all these verses that we've been looking at have been describing this to us in detail. So at the cross, the payment for sin was paid by Christ and we were placed into Christ and now had a relationship of peace, thus being reconciled to God.

So man's part, reconciliation provided is not the same as reconciliation accomplished. Christ died for all mankind. But all men are not saved because all men do not believe. So is reconciliation provided there for everybody? Absolutely. Is it accomplished? Not until they believe. That's the main part, the main responsibility is faith. So this reconciliation has been provided for the whole world but it is effective only when it is received by personal faith on the part of the individual. It requires personal belief I'm a part of people, I'm a part of mankind. Any thoughts? There? Okay. Okay, verse 19.

So basically it looked at The whole idea there of reconciliation, that was a theme that was coming out of verses 18, 19, and 20. As we see verse 19 here, the ministry of reconciliation has a threefold nature. Let me read the verses again so we can refresh ourselves and not get too far away from our text. Let me read the verses again for us. 2 Corinthians 5, 18 and 19.

Now all these things are from God. who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, not counting the trespasses against them, and he has committed to us the word of reconciliation. So verse 19, the ministry of reconciliation really has a three-fold nature. First of all, God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself.

All men can return to God. because Christ died for all men. That's clear. That's what we have been talking about. So God does not hold the sins of the sinner against him. He has removed the sin barrier and it is up to the sinner to return to God. Now, the individual benefits from that. How? By belief. That's exactly right. God has done the work. It's finished. God has completely done his part. As long as man believes it, there's no work involved, simply faith. And faith is not a work. As long as he believes in that, he can benefit from what it is that God has done on his part.

So now, to move on to the next phase here, these verses, Paul saw himself as one who should take the word of reconciliation to others. fix that mistake there. It should be the, not to, word of reconciliation to others. Sinners need to be told that they can return to God if they want. God has given to Paul and to us this ministry of reconciliation.

God uses people to bring the unreconciled to himself. So, God draws people to himself. They believe they're reconciled. He uses them to communicate this message. I mean, there's co-workers that I have at work. I have this ministry of reconciliation. That's what he talks about in the next verse in detail. So let's look at this verse here. This is slide number 7. So Paul saw himself as an ambassador. He says, we are ambassadors for Christ. It's really a representative and the present active indicative. So the point being, we are ambassadors. We are right now, present tense, ambassadors. You might say, well, you know, I didn't sign up for that. I didn't fill out my job application and sign on the dotted line that I want this ministry to be an ambassador, this ministry of reconciliation. Well, you know, we got it anyways. There's nothing that we can do to not have it. What do we do with that?

Here we sit as a group of 20 people that God has given this to us. I think, number one, we trust the Lord. I say, God, you've given this ministry to me, and who are the people in my path that you're going to put in front of me that you might have me share this ministry of reconciliation with? That's it. And trust the Lord that he's going to live his life in and through us, and we'll take advantage of the opportunities and open doors that God puts before us. But that's important. Do we think of ourselves that way?

Often times it's easy for believers to become this little holy huddle. We don't think too much of those people outside around us. I'm not sure, I forget what the statistics are, but it is the short period of time that once an unbeliever becomes a believer, that their circle of unbelieving friends dwindles away.

That's an incredible thing, and being on staff at a church for a number of years, we had an outreach to homeless and the down-and-outers of our community in Virginia, and I was thankful for that, because that forced me as being employed at a church, which is so easy to become just engaged with believers when you're on staff at a church, to have that be your focus. I was very thankful for this avenue. to keep rubbing shoulders with believers. That was very helpful. I was at a conference one time, and somebody was sharing, and he was in a similar position in his mind, kind of a young adult pastor type deal, and he said that he found himself so surrounded with believers and his his proximity to and rubbing shoulders with unbelievers was nil. He went out and he got a part-time job at a Starbucks coffee just so that he could have some interaction and exposures with unbelievers.

And so it's easy for us to fall into that. It's comfortable, it becomes our mindset. But I think this is kind of a reminder to us that we have it. Every one of us have. Right now, we are ambassadors. Whether we like it or not, whether we signed up for it or not, We are ambassadors for Christ. So what does this mean? Well, an ambassador does not speak in his own name, act on his own authority, or declare his own opinions. So, as we think about ourselves as being ambassadors, whose name are we speaking in? Christ. Whose authority? What opinion are we speaking from? We're speaking from the truth of God's Word. There's no opinions stated. It's truth. in God's Word and He is the authority.

So what do we have to offer as ambassadors? Christ. That's it. That's all that there is. Somebody comes up to us and lays on us their woes of life and all those kinds of things. What do we have to offer? Christ. Just lay it out simply, simply to them and trust the results to the Lord.

The ambassador, he is a representative of the country that has sent him and Paul was and we are representatives for Christ, who is our Father, God, who is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and our citizenship is in Heaven. So that is what we are representing. We are representing our Father, our Heavenly Father, and the citizenship that we have that is in Heaven. So it says that we beg you because of what Christ has done to be reconciled to God. Let's read verse 20 there again. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ.

As though God were making an appeal through us, we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. So see, God in a sense is appealing to the world, to the lost world through us. That's what's going on here. He's saying, be reconciled, we beg you, God's making an appeal. We beg you on our behalf, on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. So, we communicate that to people that God puts in our path. On behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. We can share that with folks that He puts in our path. Okay. Let's look at the last verse here. Verse 21. Okay. Any thoughts about being an ambassador there?

Last verse there, He made him who knew no sin, sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Many of your versions might have the word to be sin there and that's not in the original Greek. So the verse would read, He made him who knew no sin, sin on our behalf, so that, kind of cause and effect there, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. So let's talk about God made Christ, made Him, who knew no sin. Just kind of go through these, we won't take the time to read through them all, but it's important for us to understand that Christ was sinless. It's a pretty simple principle, and I'm sure all of us all of us are pretty solid on. But we talk about He made him sin. It's important in fact that God and Christ in His nature was sinless.

So in John 8, verse 46, Jesus asked the question, which of you convicts me of sin? Because He was sinless. Who is there that's going to convict me of sin? Hebrews 4, verse 15, says He was without sin. And chapter 7, verse 26, says that he was separate from sinners.

In 1 Peter 2.22 he did no sin and in 1 John 3.5 in him there was no sin. So God made Christ who knew no sin, sin on our behalf.

So what does that mean? It means that God reckoned or imputed to Christ human sin, making him, Christ, the representative for sin, dying and sacrificial death, So that the penalty could be paid and man could enjoy a relationship with God. That's kind of the nuts and bolts of the whole idea of reconciliation. So that man could be reconciled, brought into this right relationship with God. A couple of verses there. There's tons of verses that talk about Christ's substitutionary death. Lots of them. I just pulled a couple of them out.

1 Timothy 2.6, Christ gave himself as a ransom for all.

Hebrews 2.9, Christ tasted death for everyone.

1 Peter 3.18, Christ suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust.

So, important there, He became sin on our behalf. God reckoned or imputed to Christ human sin. Just as, the same, is that the sin of Adam was reckoned or imputed to us. But our sin was reckoned or imputed to Christ, making Him the representative of sin. became sin on our behalf, dying that sacrificial death penalty, so that we could be reconciled and enjoy this relationship with God.

Last phrase, powerful phrase, so that we might become the righteousness of God and Him. Let me read the verse again, kind of catch it all in context. He made Him, Christ, who knew no sin, sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God and Him." A humbling thought to me, that we have become the righteousness of God and Him. Do we deserve that? No. What have we done to earn it? Nothing. God in His love and His care and His pursuit of us has made that possible. Incredible.

The sinless one became, by imputation, a sin for the sinner. that the sinner might become, by imputation, righteous in the sinless one. That's really what's happening, the transfer there. When a person believes in Christ, he is made the righteousness of God in him. Let's look at 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 30. 1 Corinthians 1 and verse 30. Someone just read that out, if you would, when you find it.

1 Corinthians 1.30.

But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness, and sanctification and redemption. by we've been placed into Christ, by God's doing, you are in Christ Jesus, who came unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification.

There's what we're talking about. We've been made the righteousness of God in Him. So because we believed in Christ, we were placed into Christ, therefore we have been made righteous before Him. Now God God now sees the person in Christ and declares him to be righteous, that we have been made the righteousness of God and Him. Is that a fact that can be changed? No. Is that a position or truth? Sure. Yeah. Absolutely. Okay. I just wanted to end this morning with a quote here by a guy named Robert Lightner. I thought he summarized this whole thing real well, this whole section real well.

The fact is that the Bible teaches very clearly that Adam's sin was imputed to the human race, that the sin of the human race was imputed or reckoned over to Christ, and that the righteousness of Christ is imputed to the believing sinner. And therefore we are declared the righteousness of God and Him. So that's kind of a closing thought there. for us with this chapter. This section was kind of a doctrinal section. When you got the word reconciliation coming up five times in three verses, it's clearly going to be a doctrinal kind of feel to the class, and I know it was. But my hope, as I've gone through this this week and as I opened it up this class this morning, is that reconciliation is a positional truth.

And let's not come away, oh that was cool to hear, a lot of information about this doctrine of reconciliation, but let's have it be one that's personal and let it bring forth the heart of thanksgiving to God, because he pursued us. We had gotten up out of the chair and walked away, and he came to us and he pursued us so that he can make that relationship right again.

And not only did He do that, but He declared us righteous. So there's no better relationship that we can have with Him than what is already made possible. Let's not let it be this doctrinal thing, let's let it be practical and personal and intimate with us in the Lord. Let's pray.

Father, we thank You for this morning. We thank You because You have pursued us when we did not want to be pursued. You've loved us when we did not love you. And Lord, you've done a work in our relationship here between us and you that is really unfathomable and undescribable. So God, we just thank you for that. And let it, through your Holy Spirit, be something that really impacts our lives, that you bring to remembrance this week, as we go through our week, that you've done this work for us. And so thank you, Father. be with the service that's upcoming, that you would speak through him to us. In your name we pray. Amen.