Ministry of Reconciliation

[00:00:02] Our Heavenly Father. You know better than any of us here how great the trials are of this life. [00:00:10] In the Lord Jesus Christ, whom you sent, we have reassurance and confidence that he felt these things in his own body, as have his apostles and many others who have come after and served in your name. [00:00:29] Lord, we ask that obstacles and trials and temptations would become non obstacles and non trials and non temptations to us. We ask that as we face difficulties in this world, that you would build us up and strengthen us according to the word of Christ, even as you did so for the apostle Paul. Lord, we ask that this word would be made certain in us today and that you would give us strength for the work of ministry that we do together as a body and that is assigned to individuals in special callings as well. Bless us, Lord, as we come now to your word. Illuminate to our minds, strengthen our wills in obedience to it, warm our hearts that our feelings might match the truth. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen. [00:01:24] Well, let's turn to God's word now. In two Corinthians chapter five, verses eleven through 15, Corinthians 511 through 15, let's hear the word of the Lord. [00:01:49] Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others. But what we are is known to God, and I hope it is known also to your conscience. We are not commending ourselves to you again, but giving you cause to boast about us so that you may be able to answer those who boast about outward appearance and not what is in the heart. [00:02:11] For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God. If we are in our right mind, it is for you. For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this, that one has died for all, therefore all have died, and he died for all, that those who might live might no longer live for themselves, but for him, who for their sake died and was raised. Amen. Please be seated. [00:03:00] So it's helpful, I think, as we begin to try to understand this passage, to remember just some simple context that helps us understand how Paul is speaking, why he's speaking, why he's addressing these concerns. At the bottom of it, he's telling us his motivations. He's telling us what it is that motivates him to be the kind of minister of the Gospel that he is, and not him only, but others as well. [00:03:33] We remember that two Corinthians begins this way. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, and Timothy, our brother, these two brothers, co workers in the Lord, writing to the Church in Corinth. And they say this together along with all others who name the name of Jesus Christ. [00:03:54] Well, what is the situation that Paul and Timothy find themselves in from a broad perspective? One way to describe it is difficult. If you turn to chapter six and look at verse four. Paul says this as servants of God, we commend ourselves in every way by great endurance in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger. [00:04:29] That's tough. [00:04:32] Pick any one of those things and you have a whole bunch of great dinner stories to tell about how your life was so difficult at a particular time. But Paul's not interested in telling stories or entertaining or just connecting. Paul is on a mission. He is living this way, a way that is surprising to many, a way that is shocking to many. And he is enduring so much. [00:05:00] Why? He gives us answers to that in our passage today. And if I could read on a little bit further. In chapter six, he tells us some of the ways in which that happens, how he endures. He goes on to say in verse six, by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love, by truthful speech and the power of God with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left, through dishonor and dishonor, through slander and praise, we are treated as imposters and yet are true, as unknown and yet well known as dying. And behold, we live as punished and yet not killed, as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing, as poor, yet making many rich, as having nothing, yet possessing everything, he's enduring these very difficult, very intense hardships. Timothy as well, others as well. And he's enduring them by the power of God, by the gifts of the Spirit, by a sense, knowledge and hope in the things that God is doing now and promises to do in the future. [00:06:15] So though it's very difficult and very hard, and he understands that very well, this is a man who is not discouraged. This is a man who has his eyes set on the Lord. And it is the Lord who motivates him in his work. [00:06:31] In our passage, Paul addresses two of those things, two things that give him a motivation and confidence in his work that I'd like to think about with you this morning. [00:06:44] The first is a sense of a coming judgment and accountability that he has. The second is the love of Christ. Let's consider each of those. [00:06:58] Paul begins in verse eleven, and he says, therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others. [00:07:07] Paul has just said in verse ten, which we considered last time, that all must appear before the judgment seat of Christ. Each 1 may receive what is his due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil. Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others. [00:07:25] Paul knows that he is one who will have to give an account. [00:07:30] We read of this kind of accounting in other places in Scripture. Let me mention, too, in chapter 13 of Hebrews. We read this in verse 17. Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls. As those who will have to give an account. [00:07:53] As those who will have to give an account. This is the job, or this is one of the things that is going to be required of leaders, and Paul knows it. We have something similar in James. This is the last verse I read. But there are others in the Scriptures. In James three, one. James says, not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness. [00:08:19] Paul understands this. He does his work, in other words, for men alone, although certainly for their benefit. But he has in mind that he is a servant, a slave of God, and God cares what he does. God doesn't ignore what he does. He's not doing it in vain. There's all kinds of implications of doing your work for the Lord, but one of them is he understands that he will have to give an account, and so he gets to work. He doesn't make excuses. He doesn't stand back. He doesn't say, well, I don't know. It's hard. These things are tough. I'm hungry. He does his job, and in the fear of the Lord, he goes to persuade others. [00:09:04] What is persuasion? Let's take a few moments to think about this. [00:09:09] Persuasion is God's common gift to mankind that he then calls men like Paul and Timothy to use for holy purposes. So it's a common gift. People persuade each other all the time. But he uses it here in particular for persuasion to certain things. Persuasion to the Word of God and the truths about it. Throughout various passages in acts, we read about Paul entering into the Synagogue to Persuade, to persuade those to reason and persuade about the kingdom of God. [00:09:47] He reasons and he persuades. In acts eight four, both to the Jews and the Greeks, in Acts 28, we read that he was seeking to convince them about Jesus, both from the law of Moses and the prophets. We read that some were convinced by what he said, but others disbelieved. [00:10:08] So from that, we're reminded that persuasion is not always effective in the way that we would measure it. Sometimes. [00:10:18] Sometimes we seek to change a mind and the mind doesn't change. King Agrippa famously says, would you persuade me in so little time and make me a Christian? And Paul says, I'll paraphrase, yeah, I'd like to, and others as well. [00:10:36] Persuasion is a part of his work, and it's a really, really important part. [00:10:43] Persuasion is not coercion. To do a little disambiguation, as Wikipedia says sometimes, right? What's the difference between things? Persuasion is not coercion. It's not forcing people to take an opinion. Persuasion is also not manipulation. Manipulation is tricking people into something. [00:11:07] Persuasion is also not. This will sound kind of obvious, but giving up on even trying, right. Persuasion is the AcT of Trying to change a mind. [00:11:19] I think there's a temptation in, an increasing temptation in our particular time right now, when it's so polarized and so many People disagree and degree disagree so strongly that we kind of say, is it even worth it? Is it even worth trying to persuade my neighbor? Sometimes we assume too quickly that people are locked in to their views, that there is no hope of changing their minds. And sometimes, admittedly, it doesn't happen. And we never move to tricking or coercion or force. That's not persuasion. But persuasion does seek to change a mind. And I think in my own life I've needed to Plant the flag a Little deeper into the ground and say, I am committed to persuasion. I do think this is possible. The Lord calls me to it, and I'm going to try. [00:12:19] But the fear of the Lord gives us some boundaries on that that are very helpful. [00:12:26] What does it mean to persuade in the fear of the Lord? Well, one of them is the sense that we are going to have to give an account when we go about teaching. Another does have to deal with coercion. When we trust the Lord for the outcome of these things, the need to control someone, the need to make them think what I want to think, evaporates a little. The pressure gets released. If we know that ultimately this is up to God, that only God can change minds and change hearts, he uses the means of persuasion and other tools. [00:13:03] But to do so in the fear of the Lord means I'm not ultimately trusting in the power of my eloquence or the clarity of my arguments, as good as those might be, but I'm trusting in him. [00:13:17] Now, Paul understands this very well, because he was not as eloquent as some People wanted. He was not as good looking as some people wanted. He was not as important, invaluable to society. [00:13:32] And they often judge things, as he says in our passage, by outward appearance. [00:13:38] People boasted in outward appearance, and they looked at PauL and they say, we can't boast in this Guy. We can't follow this guy. This guy's a mess. His knees shake. He gets nervous. And look at him. He's hungry. He's disheveled. Last time we heard, he was beaten in the last town. This is someone you want to follow. [00:13:59] He wasn't like the rhetoricians of the day, who had big followings and were often wealthy and lots of people around them and fawning after them. He wasn't like that. [00:14:12] But he appeals to them. He appeals to his hears and before God himself, who he ultimately stands before. And he says, I hope it is known to your conscience what I'm doing and who I am. [00:14:27] Paul stands before them and says, he says, we are not commending ourselves to you again, but giving you cause to boast about us. Here's why you can trust us. Here's why. You don't have to judge us based on the opinions of others. [00:14:47] Why? [00:14:48] Because I do my work in the fear of the Lord. [00:14:52] That's what Paul says here in this first part, to keep going on this sidebar of persuasion and what it means to do it in the fear of the Lord. We can add a few other things. One thing we can say is that it means that relationships are involved. When we persuade other people's people in the fear of the Lord, we are looking at someone who is made in the image of God. They're not a math problem. They're not a project to be worked on. They are a person with dignity that deserves to be treated well and listened to, to meet them where they're at, to understand where they're at. And so persuasion often involves a lot of listening, even more than talking, sometimes a lot of paying attention and getting to know someone. That happens because we fear the Lord, and we understand how he's made people and how they are made in his image. We understand them not just in relation to ourselves and our needs and our wants, but we understand one another in the world in relation to him. [00:16:01] Fearing the Lord in persuasion also means knowing the Lord, right? Trusting the Lord, and knowing who he is and what he said. That means understanding the word. And when we speak the word of God, when we seek to persuade people about Jesus from the prophets, or Jesus from the law of Moses, or Jesus from other parts of scripture, we better know the law of Moses, we better know the prophets. We better know the Scriptures, right? And not just be guessing or speculating about things as those who are persuading on behalf of the Lord. And in the fear of the Lord, we should represent his words and him well, which means, of course, knowing them. [00:16:46] And ultimately we can end with this. Though there are other things to say, that we trust him for the results, we trust him for the confidence. We place our confidence in him, not in outward appearance, not in the little things that happen in this or that circumstance, but in him and in his promises and in his love. [00:17:09] This is how Paul is motivated. He's motivated to persuade others in the fear of the Lord. [00:17:18] In verse 13, he says, if we are beside ourselves or if we're not in our right minds, or you could paraphrase and say, if we're crazy, or if people reckon us as crazy or call us crazy, it's for God. [00:17:33] If we are in our right mind, it's for you. [00:17:37] Paul is saying that the accusations that are coming against him, he basically just doesn't care about them. He says, I do it for the Lord, I do what I do for the Lord. I do it for you. [00:17:51] So that's Paul's first motivation, the fear of the Lord. And this is why he aims to persuade. His second is the love of Christ. [00:18:03] Now, this could mean either loving Christ or Christ's love for us. I think it's the latter. Excuse me? [00:18:16] I think it's the latter. [00:18:19] And this is an amazing way Paul speaks. Right. I've been using the language of Paul's motivations, but he actually uses a stronger word here, doesn't he? For the love of Christ controls us. [00:18:32] It's bound him. It's pushing him in a particular direction. The love of Christ controls us. Why? Because we have concluded, we know, we are persuaded, we are sure of something. [00:18:48] And here's the something that he is persuaded of, the conclusion that he has drawn based on what Christ has done in the world. It's this that one has died for all, therefore all have died. And he died for all for a reason, that those who might live might no longer live for themselves, but for him, who for their sake, died and was raised. [00:19:16] Paul is saying to work backwards. We could say it this way if we move through the logic backwards. [00:19:25] He does what he does because Christ was raised for him, and he now lives in Christ. And he lives in Christ because he died in Christ, and he died in Christ because Christ died for him. [00:19:40] That's why he's controlled in this way. Controlled not in the sense of like, stop controlling me. Right? But controlled in the sense of this is the animating principle that is inside of him. The thing that forms his decisions, forms his heart, makes him do the things that he does. That's why this is what he's explaining. What is it? It's this principle of life that Christ has put into him. [00:20:10] I once was lost, but now I'm found. I once was blind, but now I see. I once was dead, but now I'm alive. [00:20:19] He's alive. He's alive because of the love of Christ. [00:20:25] How did Christ demonstrate his love for him? He died for him. He died for Paul. And let's remember, Paul was not always this great, persevering hero on behalf of the Lord. Paul was once an enemy of God. Jesus said to him, Paul, why are you persecuting me? [00:20:47] Paul was persecuting the Church. He was persecuting Christ. He was an enemy of God. [00:20:55] How do we get here? [00:20:57] We get to this point, we get to this kind of change because of something Christ has done, because of the love of Christ. [00:21:09] Some people look at just a few words here. This one has died for all in verse 14 and wrongly conclude that this teaches a kind of universal atonement. They take just these few words and they say, well, Christ therefore died for every single person, even though we know not every single person is saved. [00:21:34] But is that what Paul says here? [00:21:36] It's not. How do we know? Because we read his logic. Paul doesn't just say one has died for all, but he gives us a very important point here. He says, one has died for all, therefore all have died. [00:21:55] In other words, all that have died are those that all that he has died for. There's a connection between those two, and there's yet another Connection, which is all that those who have died are those who now live not for themselves, but for the sake of the one who died for them and was raised. [00:22:18] Well, Jesus tells us in MaTTHew 25 that as the Resurrection, there will be a separation of the sheep and the goats, the just from the unjust, the righteous from the wicked. He tells us that there are some who Remain his Enemies and will be Judged on the basis of their sinful works. [00:22:39] We know that his atonement was not for all people because not all have died in him and not all live in him. Right. There's this Connection that Paul makes between these Three Groups, and as he says this here. So then we have to ask, well, what does he mean then, when he says, one has died for all? Well, he means for those who have died and those who live. He means for believers. He means that those for whom Christ died. Christ's atonement was effectual. [00:23:11] Jesus didn't die and create a possibility of salvation. Paul says here, Jesus Christ, when he died, he makes something happen, something happen in Paul's own life that he says he's now controlled by the love of Christ, and he's really, really happy about it, isn't he? This control that, as it's translated here, is not a fretful, disagreeable, begrudging thing that he just has to deal with in his life. No, it's getting him through the hard times. It's allowing him to serve the Lord and not himself. It's allowing him to do things that, quite frankly, are changing the world. [00:23:55] And he'd do it all day, and he will do it all day. [00:24:00] And we've talked about this before, right? He addresses this question about dying and being with the Lord or staying in his body and being here and serving those who are here. And he says, I just want to serve. [00:24:14] I want to serve the Lord. Of course, I'd be rather away from the body and at home with the Lord, but if he would have me here, that's fine, too. [00:24:23] Paul's heart, his mind, his desire is for this church and for all of God's people, which is why it's so wrong and so evil. We can say when People are accusing him of doing this for his own advantage, or of doing this for some other ungodly purpose, or of not really caring or of not really loving. [00:24:52] Paul is saying, I am who I am because of what Christ has done. [00:24:57] His atonement was effectual for forgiving my sins. [00:25:03] His ministry of Reconciliation was effectual for changing my life. And now he's on a mission to persuade everyone who would hear him that anyone who puts their faith in Jesus will be saved. [00:25:19] And this is the Gospel, the good news, that the love of Christ changes us and compels us and takes us from turning inward on ourselves and aggressive towards other people. And it makes us people that are willing to give up even our own bodies and our own lives for the sake of others. [00:25:40] To love as we have been loved, to give as we have been given to, to welcome as we have been welcomed. [00:25:52] This is what motivates the Apostle Paul. And when we understand the principle of the motivation, that it's Christ's love at work in his life and the fear of the Lord that is connected with that love. A heart that is changed from enmity against God to being a friend of God and a servant of God. [00:26:15] We have someone, then, who's not just a kind of wow example of wouldn't it be nice to be like that? But we have someone who shares with us the same things. [00:26:30] This is not just Paul's super secret superpower. [00:26:35] The love of Christ is what we all have who put our faith in him. [00:26:41] The love of Christ is that which God sent Jesus into the world for. [00:26:47] This love of Christ for us in the way that he gave himself up for us, is something that we share with Paul and Peter and Timothy and those who preach the Gospel in our own lives and the brothers and sisters who are around us reminding us of the Gospel from day to day. [00:27:06] And it's from this same place, then, that we can go out into the world and share the Gospel with others individually and together as a church. And we should be motivated by these same things, not by our own quest for glory, not by our own self preservation, not by any evil or wicked thing or prideful thing, but by the love of Christ, knowing what he has done for us and what he calls us now to do for others. [00:27:38] Let's pray. [00:27:41] Our Heavenly Father, we thank you for the work of Christ in the world and in our lives. [00:27:46] We thank you that because of his death, we are set free from sin, truly set free from its power, its bondage, as well as the consequences of it. You tell us that the wages of sin is death, and yet when we die in Christ, we do not die forever, but we enter into eternal life. [00:28:07] This is possible because of what you have done. You deserve all praise and glory and honor. You deserve our thanksgiving, our singing, our confessions. You deserve every action of eating and breathing, of speaking, of living, of loving. [00:28:29] Lord, we ask that this gospel would be firm in our hearts and in our minds so that we might truly fear you as we ought, love you as we ought, serve you as we ought. We ask, Lord, that you would help us not to walk by outward appearance, to not judge things as the world judges them. Help us to judge things according to your will, according to your word. [00:29:00] Help us to see the love of Christ for what it truly is and to share that message of hope with all those who would listen. [00:29:08] And in the act of persuasion, Lord, let us learn to trust you, neither giving up on persuasion altogether or tricking or manipulating people into belief or forcing and coercing people. [00:29:24] Instead, Lord, let us persuade and convince and urge trusting in you and the power of your word to be effective in changing minds and hearts. [00:29:38] We pray, Lord, for our missionaries as we pray for ourselves. We pray for those who are around the world and around our country that preaching this word, serving and making yourself known. [00:29:54] We ask that you would bless them in their work. They'll help them in their trials and difficulties, not to lose heart, but to have a courage and to boast in the strength of God, of you, our great confidence. [00:30:11] We also ask, Lord, that you would be with those who are currently suffering for your name's sake, for those who are being pressured and coerced and tempted to give up on you and your word for the sake of momentary relief of less trials in this life. [00:30:32] Lord, we ask that you would both rescue them from their trials and give them perseverance in them. [00:30:40] Let these difficulties be refining for them, sanctifying for them. May you use them for their good and for the glory of your name. [00:30:52] Lord, we thank you for the work of those who have gone before us, those that you have used in persuading us and changing our minds and our hearts, that we might fall in love more and more with you. We praise you for all of these things. We ask them in Jesus name, amen.