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2 Corinthians | Chapter 5

2 Corinthians 5:1-5

“In Immanuel’s Land”

I. Intro.

After speaking of afflictions in chapter 4, it’s no wonder that Paul takes up the topic of heaven in chapter 5. When Spain had ended its conquests to the ends of the known world, they printed coins that reflected this, minted with the Greek fabled “Pillars of Hercules,” better known as the Straits of Gibraltar— the 9-mile narrow passage between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. Next to the Pillars were these words “Ne Plus Ultra,” or “No More Beyond.” These coins stayed in circulation until after 1492, when Columbus sailed the ocean blue, discovering the New World. Spain no longer could claim that she was the end of the earth, so she took the coins and put an X over the word “Ne,” and the coins now read “More Beyond.” Spain went from the “ends of the earth” to the “gateway to the new world.” Or, in the words of “Looney Tunes’ Porky Pig,” it went from “That’s all Folks” to “There’s Much More.” In this passage of scripture, Paul puts his X over the “No” as he tells his readers that there is “more beyond.”

II. Vs. 1 The Truth About Tents

Vs. 1: The use of the metaphor of a “tent” representing our earthly bodies is a natural one for Paul, seeing that his vocation supporting his missionary endeavors was that of a tentmaker. I’m amazed that at the start of this topic on life after death, Paul begins by saying “we know” and not “we guess, we hope, or we think”! When you read 1 Corinthians 15:51-54 and compare it with the words recorded here, it is easy to see that Paul is comparing the earthly body we now have with the future resurrection body we will have. Paraphrasing, Paul says that we who are in this present body shall enter in a “twinkling of an eye” a change whereby this “corruptible will put on incorruption,” this “mortal body will put on immortality,” and in this, “death shall be forever swallowed up in victory.” In 2 Corinthians, Paul is describing and contrasting these two bodies by saying:

  • The present body is like a tent (verse 1 and 4): By this, Paul is saying that our earthly existence is a temporary and uncomfortable one. Tent camping can be fun for a few days, but not if living in a tent is your permanent home. Consider your earthly body as a tent. It used to be new, sturdy, and taut. It was able to withstand the harsh environment, but lately, it’s not nearly as attractive as it was 30 years ago. It seems that my tent stakes have become loose as the canvas sags in spots. My tent poles have some bends in them, which allows the weather and cold to penetrate inside. Remember what Jesus said in John 14:2-3, “In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.”
  • The future body is a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens: Look at the three contrasts between these two bodies:
    1. Construction Material: The first contrast is of the material used. According to Webster’s dictionary, a tent is a “collapsible shelter of fabric stretched and sustained by poles and used for camping outdoors or as a temporary building.” Even if you use the highest quality tent fabric and take great care of your tent—mending it when it gets a tear in it, cleaning it after every use—the fact remains that nothing you can do will prevent it from aging and wearing out. It is made of inferior materials. According to the sites I looked up, the average tent can withstand only around 16-20 weeks of constant U.V. exposure, which could be in actual usage anywhere from 2 years to 15 years, depending upon the amount of use. Ah, but a house’s material is designed to be permanent, larger, and more comfortable to live in.
    2. Craftsmanship: One can use the best materials, but the house is only as good as the builder, and here we find that the designer and builder is God, who didn’t allow earthly hands to mess up His design as is the case with our temporary tent. Did you notice the way Paul worded this? He wrote, “We HAVE a building from God!” That is, our house is awaiting us; it’s already finished. Paul could have used a future verb tense that would have said “we will have a building from God,” but he didn’t write that. God won’t allow us any “changes to the design.” All our present earthly activity produces nothing to our home that awaits us. Man, am I happy about that because if it were based upon my works, then there might be a lot of unfinished rooms in my house.
    3. Location: Finally, the contrast switches to “location.” You can have a home of superior materials built by the best Craftsman but still be in a bad neighborhood or in a place you just don’t want to spend any time living in. Real estate experts will tell you that the driving force that raises the cost of a home has everything to do with location. And here Paul tells you two things about the future location:
      • Eternal: This speaks of the fact that the home that awaits me is in a place that will never change. I won’t have moved into it one day and down the road find that they want to put a freeway next door. Our view from the home that awaits us will never have its view blocked, and there’s no worry about annoying neighbors moving next door. It will be pristine the day we arrive and will remain that way for eternity.
      • In the Heavens: Finally, Paul says it’s in the heavens, which tells me that it will have the perfect environment, incorruptible beauty, and breathtaking vistas. Ann Cousins took Samuel Rutherford’s writings (who lived in the 17th century) and made a hymn that became D.L. Moody’s favorite song. It goes like this: “There to an ocean fullness, His mercy does expand and glory, glory dwelleth In Immanuel’s land.”

III. Vs. 2-4 Does Anybody Know What Time It Is?

Vs. 2-4: Next in these verses, Paul is very careful as he explains, saying, “I don’t want you to misunderstand me. I don’t want you to think that we die and then float off to be with the Lord in a bodiless existence. We aren’t to be disembodied; we aren’t to be ghosts, hanging around waiting to get our bodies.” Clearly, Paul expected a new resurrected body, which he describes as an experience of not being disembodied, but being further embodied. Three times in verses 2-4, he changes the analogy from a building to a body, as he says when we receive our resurrected bodies, it is like being further clothed, so that it is more than we have at the moment. Then he says that such clothing is like being “swallowed up by life.” Paul said the resurrected body swallows in life the earthly body, and by this, he is saying that it is a furthering of experience, fulfillment, and satisfaction.

Many people want to know, “How can this be?” I mean, when our loved ones die, and they or their ashes become interned, you go out to the grave decades later, you can dig it up, and their remains are still there. So “How could those people who died receive a resurrection body when their bodies are still lying unresurrected in the grave?” There have been many explanations, but three that are the most popular:

  1. “We are disembodied”: This view says, “When we die, we go to be with the Lord in spirit, but our bodies are buried in the grave, so we have to wait incomplete until the body is raised. It may take centuries, but we are just waiting around in bodiless existence.” The problem is that in light of this passage, that teaching cannot be accepted. Paul says he will not be disembodied, and God has prepared him for the very opposite.
  2. “We are asleep waiting to be awakened”: This suggests that “When we die, both our soul and our spirit go to sleep within the body, and there is no sense of communication or experience.” In this view, we may be asleep for centuries in the body, and when we are wakened at the resurrection, it is as though nothing has happened in the meantime. But the problem with that suggestion is that it does not align with 2 Corinthians 5:8, where Paul writes that “to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.” And in Philippians 1:23, Paul speaks of departing and “being with Christ; which is far better.” Every scripture speaking upon death of the believer tells us that we will have immediate access to the LORD.
  3. “We are given a temporary robe”: There are some who propose that “God gives us, in the meantime, an intermediate temporary body to use in eternity until our real one gets there. A kind of heavenly bathrobe which we wait around in while our real one is getting back from the cleaners.” But once again, the problem is that there is not one Scripture to support that as there is no reference to an intermediate body.

The simplest interpretation is to take what Paul means and look at it outside of the constraints of our earthly existence. If we do this, then what Paul means is that when we leave this body, WE ALSO LEAVE TIME. Our problem is that we project time into eternity and say it is the same thing going on forever, but it is not. The characteristic of time is that we are all locked into the same rigid sequence of events. We all experience 24-hour days because, on this earth, it takes that long for the earth to rotate on its axis, and nobody can speed it up. This is simply not the case once we step into eternity! In eternity, there is no past or future; there is simply ONE GREAT PRESENT MOMENT. The events we experience in eternity are never anything we have to wait for; they are always what we are ready for. This passage says that God has been spiritually preparing us for something, and that event is the coming of the Lord for his own, the return of Christ for his church, for each individual believer. Therefore, the Scriptures clearly teach that when a believer dies, what he experiences immediately is the coming of the Lord for his own. Paul describes that event in 1 Thessalonians 4:16 when he writes that “the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.” With Jesus will come all those who have been dead in Christ so that it will appear to those left on earth as though they had already been raised first when in actuality we are all raised together, as 1 Thessalonians 4:17 says, “Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord.” This is the experience that awaits us immediately upon our death.

IV. Vs. 5 On Tiptoe

Vs. 5: A nine-year-old girl wrote her pastor one day a little note that read, “Dear Pastor, I hope to go to heaven someday, but later than sooner.” Paul’s view was different as he would say that he knew he would go to heaven one day, and he hoped it was sooner rather than later. Paul writes in Romans 8:19, “For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God.” J.B. Phillips interprets this as “The whole of creation is on tiptoe to see the wonderful sight of the sons of God coming into their own.” Paul’s groaning was like a child waiting for his birthday or Christmas. He wasn’t longing for death; he was longing for LIFE as he was already in death.

2 Corinthians 5:6-10

“Earth’s Last Picture”

I. Intro.

These are times of crisis in the world, and reading Ray Stedman’s commentary, I came across a quote from nearly 30 years ago by Malcolm Muggeridge, the English journalist and author. He was speaking at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University in what he called the end of Western civilization, saying: “The final conclusion would seem to be that whereas other civilizations have been brought down by attacks of barbarians from without, ours had the unique distinction of training its own destroyers at its own educational institutions and providing them with facilities for propagating their destructive ideology far and wide, all at the public expense. Thus did Western man decide to abolish himself, creating:

  • His own boredom out of his own affluence
  • His own vulnerability out of his own strength
  • His own impotence out of his own erotic mania

Blowing the trumpet that brought the walls of his own city tumbling. And, having convinced himself that he was too numerous, labored with pill, scalpel, and syringe to make himself fewer, until at last, having educated himself into imbecility, he polluted himself by drugging himself into stupefaction, keeled over, a weary, battered old brontosaurus, and became extinct.”

After speaking about the believer’s future home in heaven, Paul anticipates a question about our present condition based upon our permanent home, and that is, “What is there to live for now?” Something that Malcolm Muggeridge would have apparently agreed with! But Paul’s “More Beyond” wasn’t limited to his future in heaven. Amazingly, when you read the pages of the New Testament, you never see that reaction. Instead, there is a cry of victory running throughout, even though their circumstances did not look any more hopeful than ours.

II. Vs. 6-8 What a Difference Jesus Makes

Vs. 6-8: Paul would write in Philippians 1:23, “For I am hard-pressed between the two, having a desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better.” The “More Beyond” reality changed Paul’s values and desires for the present. It is clear that Paul viewed this life as a race with the prize being eternity in the fellowship of God. But such a prize didn’t cause him to stop and sit on the sidelines of life. No, it caused him to run harder than ever to win his race. The harder he ran in this life, the quicker he would complete the course God had set before him, which meant the sooner he would collect his prize.

Paul says in this passage, “So we are always confident,” and again in verse 8, “We are confident.” The key to understanding this is found in interpreting the little word “SO” found in verse 6. That little word tells us that Paul’s encouragement was based upon what he has been saying about the power, activity, and availability of God. The basis for Christian hope is found in the fact that God is going to act both in the future beyond death and in the present. In this passage, Paul sees two very practical present effects of the “More Beyond” principle of our relationship with God:

  1. Vs. 6-8 Our Position Never Changes: “We are always confident,” and Paul sees two reasons for it:
    1. Vs. 6: The first reason is that no matter where we are (on earth or in heaven), we are always at home with the Lord. The word is used both for our life in the body and our coming presence with the Lord. They are both said to be an experience of being “at home.” Can there be any finer description of life than being “Home with the Lord”? Home is the place with no restraint; we can relax, take our shoes off, and be who we are in peace and ease. We are like children who are looking ahead to Christmas. At home, the hustle and bustle of life lived in the fast lane slows down as if time ceases. That is an encouragement to us that what we are headed toward in heaven is not something dreadful or even different but rather more fulfilling. We will be at home with the Lord, in his very presence, seeing him no longer only with the Spirit (through a glass dimly) within, but face to face.
    2. Vs. 7-8: The second reason is that we are in touch with the Lord by faith, not by sight. We have His presence with us! No circumstance can ever leave us abandoned to ourselves. John 14:1, 14:18, and Matthew 28:20 all speak to this fact that we are not alone, and better yet, that Jesus is with us. As such, we choose to walk by faith and not by sight, having the full supply of love, peace, and joy to keep us in the midst of anything. So despite our position changing outwardly, it never changes inwardly, and one day it will no longer change outwardly!

III. Vs. 9-10 Motive for Now and Eternity

Vs. 9-10: Paul’s “absent from the Lord” in verse 6 is to be understood by the sense that his mortality had not yet been swallowed up by life. How this played out was that life was interpreted by faith, not by sight! His goal did not waver because it didn’t matter if he was in mortality or immortality; the aim was always to live well-pleasing to the Lord. The longing to be with Christ, which was far better, further solidified his resolve to live to “Please Him” now. Paul is saying, “I’m sure of heaven, and because I’m sure of what Jesus has done for me, I’m going to live with a greater resolve in the Holy Spirit’s power and dependence to live like it now.”

  1. Vs. 9-10 Our Purpose Never Changes: Notice that it says in verse 6: Whether “at home” in either place, the purpose and aim of our lives is to please God. That is not something that is going to change when we leave this earth. The one real reason we have to be here on earth is to please God, to be a delight to him. Rudyard Kipling wrote a poem titled “When Earth’s Last Picture is Painted,” in which he spoke of all the great things that people would be able to do in heaven. One of the stanzas goes like this: “And only The Master shall praise us, and only the Master shall blame; and no one shall work for money, and no one shall work for fame, but each for the joy of the working, and each, in his separate star, shall draw the Thing as he sees it, for the God of things as they are.” There are three ways by which that is manifested:
    1. Vs. 10a Motives: This is where he brings in this whole matter of the “judgment seat of Christ.” Many people mistakenly think that Paul is referring to the 20th chapter of Revelation, where all the dead, small and great, are standing before the “great white throne” of God, where we are told that “the books are opened,” and lives are reviewed, and eternal destinies are settled. But this is not a judgment to settle destiny; it is a personal evaluation given to each believer by the Lord himself of what his life has really been like. It is as though you and the Lord walked together back through all the scenes of your life, and he pointed out to you the real nature of what you did and what you said. It is a time of disclosure to us of what has been hidden in the silent, inner reaches of our own hearts. I believe that this is what Jesus spoke of in Luke 12:3 when He said, “Whatever you have spoken in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have spoken in the ear in inner rooms will be proclaimed on the housetops.” In 1 Corinthians 4:5, Paul said, “Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the counsels of the hearts. Then each one’s praise will come from God.” God’s concern is not just what we do but why we do it. The judgment was to be exercised by us now to sort out the motive behind our actions to see if what lay behind them was to be seen as well-pleasing to the Lord or well-pleasing to men who watched us!
    2. Vs. 10b Evaluation: It is a helpful time of seeing the truth about ourselves. If that frightens you, there is something you can do about it, as 1 Corinthians 11:31 says, “If we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged.” The judgment seat of Christ has already started. The Holy Spirit is pointing out to us our wrong attitudes and motives. If we face the truth now, we do not have to face it at the judgment seat of Christ, as it has already been dealt with.
    3. Vs. 10c Rewards: The judgment seat of Christ is not only there for a time of honest evaluation and proper understanding of our motives. It will also be a time of encouragement, as we are told here in verse 10, “that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.” In 1 Corinthians 9:25, Paul wrote that “everyone who competes for the prize is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable crown.” If you cross-reference this with “Crowns” that will be given to us in heaven, there are four mentioned:
      • 1 Thessalonians 2:19: Crown of Rejoicing
      • 2 Timothy 4:8: Crown of Righteousness
      • 1 Peter 5:4: Crown of Glory
      • James 1:12: Crown of Life
      The analogy of a crown is only a symbol of the gift of God to us, which is eternal life. You never earn these crowns; they are only symbols! So what you win or lose at the Bema judgment seat of Christ is the opportunity to display the nature of these gifts that have been given to you. The degree to which you have manifested that life now in this life will be what you display in heaven: rejoicing, righteousness, glory, and the life of God in this earthly life will be given to you to manifest in heaven. It is what he wrote of in 1 Corinthians 3:13, “each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is.” Paul goes on to say in 1 Corinthians 3:14-15 that if a man succeeds, “he shall be given a reward,” a great opportunity to display that life, or, “he shall suffer loss,” as he will not have that opportunity. Friends, the Holy Spirit hasn’t been given to us as a guarantee of a life of ease so we can take a nap. He has been given to us to empower us in our race to the finish line. Heaven, therefore, changes our ambition in life, which is to be found in every way as “well pleasing” to God. Heaven and the Holy Spirit have refocused us, simplified our lives to one goal that asks one question, “Will this action, attitude, etc., be well pleasing to Jesus?” And to make sure that we understand this in the present, Paul reminds us that this aim today will be the sole aim in eternity!

2 Corinthians 5:11-17

“The Radicalized Christian”

I. Intro.

Since September 11, 2001, the word “Radicalized” has become mainstream as it is used to describe a person who takes their belief system to the extreme. Unfortunately, the term has been associated with violence, terror, and death. I’m reminded of a story of the Communist revolutionary Mikhail Borodin who sat in a hotel room in Canton, China, with a reporter and his personal Vietnamese secretary, the infamous Ho Chi Minh, in 1926. The discussion was about all the missionaries in China. After a long silence, Borodin said, “I used to read the New Testament. Again and again, I read it. It is the most wonderful story ever told. That man Paul, he was a real revolutionary. I take my hat off to him.” In reading the New Testament, you can’t dispute Borodin’s assessment of Paul, and for that matter, the early church. Seeing how they lived their life, my prayer is that all of Christ’s Church would become “radicalized” as He and they were. The radicalized Christian is not engaged in acts of terror but rather motivated by the terror of seeing people perish apart from knowing the love of Christ. As such, we aren’t into killing others but dying to self-centeredness! The world needs us to become “Radicalized Christians”!

II. Vs. 11-13 The Fear Factor

Vs. 11-13: The question is, what motivated Paul to live such a radical Christian life? Here Paul tells us two paradoxical truths: “fear and love.” The old way of defining the terror or fear of the Lord was that we were afraid that God would hurt us. But now, our terror or fear is that our actions or attitudes would grieve Him. The thought of coming before the Lord caused him to want to persuade others of the benefits of living a radicalized Christian life. Looking at his own life in light of this, Paul says, “I find a tremendous motivation from this awareness that all the hidden motives of my actions are going to come out in the open before everybody.” As humans, we are used to “subjective truth” and interpreting our actions and motives to others in a way that places us in a better light. But before the Lord, none of us will be able to water down the truth about us; none of our reasoning or excuses will change the truth. In Acts 10:34, Peter said, “that God is no respecter of persons.” Because of this truth, Paul didn’t want to waste any of his time “pretending to be someone he wasn’t.” Imagine what life would be like if we didn’t waste so much time trying to convince people we were better than they know we are! Paul didn’t want to spend any time having to defend his actions or motives before people, and to do this, he made certain that he did so before the Lord who alone, according to Hebrews 4:12, “is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” So his interest in answering his critics was not to defend himself but rather that they might ease their conscience.

III. Vs. 14-15 The Love Quotient

Vs. 14-15: Fear had motivated Paul, but love compelled him. I find it interesting that what compelled Paul to live well-pleasing to the Lord was:

  • Vs. 11: The terror of the Lord
  • Vs. 14: The Love of Christ

These two things seem contradictory, don’t they? In September of 2007, the then-Senator Obama was asked how he expected to be able to defeat Senator Hillary Clinton to win the Democratic nomination. He brashly said, “To know me is to love me.” I hate to disagree with now President Obama, but from an earthly perspective, to truly know any of us is not to love us. Much of our self-deception and protection is based upon fear that if people really knew the truth about us, they not only wouldn’t love us, they wouldn’t even like us. What Paul is saying is that Jesus’ unconditional love for him drove him to set limits on what he would and would not do. The word “compels” is difficult to translate: Jamieson, Fawcett, and Brown translate this verse by saying, “There is an irresistible object which has so controlled the life of a Christian that he lives with one objective in view to the elimination of any other possible consideration; LOVE.” The love of Jesus refreshed him and made him want to do the right things for the right reasons. There is nothing that can give us a sense of security, self-worth, and a good self-image more than the unconditional love of God.

That truth caused Paul to realize that to experience this love that Jesus has for him, “if One died for all, then all died.” The death to his self-centered, self-protective former life was the key to experiencing the love that Jesus has for him more. People are obsessed with the “what about me” attitude that says, “What about my needs?” or “I’m just not happy anymore.” Here, the revelation Paul is giving us is: The reason people aren’t happy isn’t because they aren’t having their needs met; they aren’t happy because they are looking to have someone or something make them happy, and their concern is their happiness instead of others’ happiness! Friend, Jesus Christ died to set you free from that syndrome. You do not need your needs met because He has already met them. So if you are seeking to lay this upon people, you will find yourself suffering rejection because no one can meet your needs but Jesus. Paul says, “Christ died for all,” and that means “all have died.” This enables us to live no longer for ourselves. After having our needs met by Christ, we turn and try to meet the needs of others.

IV. Vs. 16-17 The Big Bang

Vs. 16: At one time, Paul had judged Jesus as nothing more than a messianic pretender who pushed too far and ended up getting what was coming to Him. The irony is that Paul was now viewed as a traitor and was hated and persecuted just as he had done to others for their belief in Jesus. There are two things that fear and love will produce in us:

  1. Vs. 16: First, it will make you see everybody else differently: We don’t look at them the way we once did. We were once impressed with people who had power, money, or fame. We followed them around, imitated them, and wanted to be near them. We would even drop their names around to be associated with them. Then there were other people we thought were of no value, and we treated them like dirt. We wanted nothing to do with them. Paul once thought of Jesus as being nothing more than a low-class, uneducated street preacher. He thought because Jesus had no political standing, no family position, no training, and no education that he was worthless. But now Paul says, “I see Christ for who he is, the Lord of Glory, the King of the Ages, the Prince of Life, God himself become a man.” And because Paul didn’t see Jesus that way anymore, He could no longer treat other people that way anymore. Instead, Paul saw people for who they are, men and women who were made in the image of God but have fallen from that view. They are victims of the lies of the devil, but they are important, significant people because God’s image is in them, and it can be awakened to life again. Everybody, even the most obscure, the lowliest, and the weakest among us, is a possible child of God, made in the image of God, and is significant enough that God sent His only Son to die on their behalf.
  2. Vs. 17: This verse ought to be the opening line of the biography of every Christian. The term “In Christ” sums up the significance of our redemption as it speaks of our security in Christ. It speaks of our acceptance in the only ONE who is and always has been well-pleasing to the Father. It speaks of our assurance for the future; it speaks of our inheritance as Christ is the sole heir. It describes the explosion of new creation, the true and only “Big Bang,” as in “If anyone is in Christ “BANG” he is a new creation!” And what does this new creation look like? Well, as the NIV renders this, “the old has gone, the new has come!” The New Man has not merely changed a few practices or habits; Paul says that if he is in Christ, he is a totally different kind of person. And this leads us to the 2nd thing fear and love have produced in us:
    1. Vs. 17: Secondly, it will make you treat them differently: Therefore, no matter who it is, it is possible that they may be born again. No matter how violent they are in opposition to the gospel, they can be changed. God can reach the most hopeless, the darkest, the lowliest, the worst, and the farthest away. And, when they are reached, we never need to give up hope for them because they are part of a new creation. God has started a work that He is going to finish. We are prone to writing people off, but what He has begun as a good work in them will not fail until the day of Christ. So there is always hope, even for me and you. This is the hour to become a “Radicalized Christian” above all other hours in history.

2 Corinthians 5:18-6:2

“Serving those separated”

I. Intro.

Paul has been describing what a believer ought to look like amidst a dying world:

  • They are to be someone whose life is filled with great hope both now and for eternity.
  • They are aware that life’s difficulties are not without purpose and plan, albeit we may not fully comprehend this until we see Jesus face to face.
  • They are to be a people with only one aim and purpose: to be living to please God, motivated by the terror of the Lord or the love of Christ.
  • They are to be people who don’t see or treat people the way the world sees and treats them.

Now in this section, after having given his readers an accurate description of who they are, Paul now tells them what they ought to be doing. He describes the ministry that God has given all of us as the “ministry of reconciliation.” The words “reconcile” and “reconciliation” appear five times in this section. The “ministry of reconciliation” is not telling people to make peace with God; it is telling them that God has made peace with them. Notice that Paul uses the words “we” and “us” throughout this passage. This is what God has called each one of us to do; it is why He has left us here in the world. There are five things about this ministry in this passage that we illustrated last week:

II. Vs. 18-19 Tell them what they have won

  1. Vs. 18 First, the ministry comes from God Himself: That means that we are responsible to Him to do this. The Church, (the original disciples) didn’t give Paul this commission; God did. And as such, he didn’t have to check with others to get permission or send in monthly reports on how he was doing. There is no “board authority” over the “ministry of reconciliation” as it is a calling from God to His people. That’s true today; you don’t need permission from me to exercise the “ministry of reconciliation” you have received from the Lord. So go ahead and invite folks over to your house, do a VBS for your neighborhood, start a ministry to reach out to your co-workers, etc. If you want help, let me know; I’ll see what I can do to help you. When Carl and Jennifer wanted to start a ministry to reach out to those who have lost loved ones, they told me about it, and now they host it each week. The great thing about this is that God places these visions and passions uniquely within each individual. Because God first reconciled us to Himself, our experiences can be useful in reaching others, as some will be able to relate to our experiences. Others won’t, but those who may not be able to relate to me may be able to relate to you.
  2. Vs. 19 Second, I realize that this ministry is all-inclusive: When we see the word “reconcile,” it immediately suggests to us that someone is separated or apart. There is no need to reconcile that which is still together. The “ministry of reconciliation” is the service of reuniting that which has become separated. What has become separated is people from their Creator. People are stumbling around trying to find themselves and have no sense of purpose, no identity. It’s amazing that people can live in a home with a bunch of other people, live and work amongst people all day long, go to entertainment events, and look you in the face and say, “I feel all alone”! People feel estranged because they are estranged from God! God takes care of this separation by sending those reconciled out with a twofold message to those who need to be reconciled:
    1. First, the message will not start out trying to scare people to become Christians: To make them believe they are going to hell, with flames burning beneath them, so they will repent of their evil ways is not the ministry of reconciliation. Paul tells us that the message starts out NOT with what we have done wrong but with what God has done right! “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.” Obviously, it is alluded to as you have no need to reconcile someone who isn’t apart, but the message of reconciliation starts with what God has done to fix that separation, as there is nothing mankind can do to fix it. God desired to “no longer count people’s sins against them.” He wasn’t “making a list and counting it twice, so that He could see who had been naughty or nice”! God is NOT pointing out all of my mistakes and faults; instead, the message of reconciliation presupposes that I already know that I’m a mess. Instead of starting out trying to scare them into the kingdom, God would have us speak of how He wants to love them into His arms from the brink of disaster. In Isaiah 1:18, God says, “Come now, and let us reason together; though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool.”
    2. Second, we read that, “This is the wonderful message he has given us to tell others.” God has entrusted those who have been the very recipients of His goodness to tell others who have been weighed down by their own sin and failure about how good and willing He is to do the same for them. Have you gone shopping on the internet yet? I’ve noticed that not only can you get the specs about what you are looking to purchase, you can read what others thought about the model or brand and even write in what you thought about it if you’d like. Folks, we don’t have to go to each person and convince them of how messed up and horrible their old life is. No, what we need to tell them is how God has provided a brand-new life for FREE and how superior it is.

III. Vs. 20-21 Other people’s treasures

  1. Vs. 20 The third thing about the ministry of reconciliation is that it requires a voluntary acceptance: Nobody is automatically saved, as verse 20 says literally, “We beseech on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.” There is no universal salvation; that is why God sends us as ambassadors. Ambassadors go to countries because countries don’t always relate very well to each other. Things need to be explained and approached with diplomacy. An ambassador lives in a foreign land as a representative of another government, conveying the message that his government seeks to give. The message that we are to be conveying as “ambassadors for Christ” is “be reconciled to God.” Look at the way our King wants us to convey His message: By pleading and imploring the citizens of our host country. Paul said that God didn’t want him to communicate reconciliation as an “act of war” but as a response to LOVE. There can be no better picture of this than Jesus Himself who, according to Matthew 23:37, wept over the city of Jerusalem and said, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!”
  2. Vs. 21 The fourth thing about this ministry is that it achieves the “righteousness of God”: Deep down, people want to be right, and if you accuse them of not being right, you will start to hear all the excuses. Our ministry is to tell people that they can be right with God, and they don’t have to justify why they aren’t. God isn’t interested in the reason you aren’t right with Him; He is into providing the only way you can be right with Him. The declaration is that Jesus took our place, the only truly innocent man that there has ever been, choosing to take our sentence of death. This “rightness” before God didn’t come about because God takes sin and rebellion lightly; in fact, the death of Jesus in our place proves this truth. God hasn’t compromised His holy nature to establish His loving nature; Jesus’ death established the one while demonstrating the other. Furthermore, this “rightness” is not future; it’s not something I’m going to become; it is something that I am the moment I receive Jesus!!! Dear ones, we start our Christian life “right with God,” and because of this truth, we don’t have to earn it or try to keep it because then it would be based upon our works instead of Jesus’ sacrifice. Ray Stedman rightly says, “It’s no ‘good news’ to come to somebody and say, ‘Christ forgave all your sins up to now, but from now on, you’d better watch it. You are going to have to pay for all those.’ The ‘good news’ is we are forgiven of our sins the moment we received Jesus, and that includes the sins I haven’t even done yet.”

IV. Vs. 1-2 Don’t put it off until tomorrow

  1. Vs. 1-2 The fifth and final aspect of the ministry of reconciliation is when people should respond: The term “the grace of God” is a general term that covers all that God has done for us in Christ. So Paul is saying this to people who are already reconciled, “Now, don’t let that be in vain, empty, worthless, in your life.” Paul is saying that when you received Christ, He came in to live within you to do two basic things:
    • To show you the difference between right and wrong
    • To give you the power to do the right and to reject the wrong

    Furthermore, Jesus intends to have us use that in every area of our life. So if there are some areas where we haven’t listened to Him, not drawn our strength from the Holy Spirit, then though we have Jesus, we aren’t living in that area as if we are. In that area of our life, we have received “the grace of God in vain.” God is at work to change that, but until we agree with God in that area, according to Galatians 5:2, “Christ has profited you nothing” in that area. The timing to act, both for us as well as those who have never met Jesus, is NOW, Paul says. The face of God’s watch dial is blank except for one word on it with regards to our need to get right with God: NOW! Satan also has a watch, and his dial is also blank except for one word: TOMORROW! Satan wants you to put it off, hoping that you will never make it to “tomorrow.” Saints, when we are administering the “ministry of reconciliation,” make sure your watch is set to the right time. The Christian’s privilege and responsibility is the honor of their King Jesus and of His kingdom, the Church, and both are in our hands. By every action and word, we can make others think more or less of both!