October 2 -- Part 5 -- Hrubieszów

When I was young, some preacher or another doing a Bible study quipped a line to us, "When you read the Bible and come upon the word 'therefore' find out what it is there for.  The word therefore always connects a cause and an effect.  So if we desire the effect, we must pursue the cause.  Second Corinthians chapter 5 contains a profound series of 'therefore' clauses.  Sadly, we have often heard exhortations to act out the effects without ever allowing ourselves to be transformed by the causes.  Consider:

the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, 

therefore all died; and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.  

Therefore from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer. 

Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. 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.

To help us understand this complex of cause and effect relationships I want to restate this passage as a series of Causes and Effects.  So that the meanings are clear I will sometimes substitute the antecedent noun for the pronoun used in the passage:

Cause:  God made Jesus, who knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf.

Effect:  We became the righteousness of God in Jesus.

Cause:  Jesus died for all.

Effect:  All are deemed to have died.

Cause:  We believe the above things are true.

Effect:  The love of Jesus the Anointed One controls us.

Cause:  Some recognize that Jesus died and rose again for their benefit.

Effect:  They stop living for their own benefit and start living for the benefit of Jesus who died and rose again for them.

Cause:  We live in the Truth of the above.

Effect:  We stop looking at people (including Jesus) by the power of our own reason and logic.

Cause:  We stop looking at people (including Jesus) by the power of our own reason and logic.

Effect:  We see that everyone who is in Christ is a completely different person than he was before he received Jesus.

Cause:  We recognize these changes in people (including ourselves) are gifts of God not the person's accomplishments .

Effect:  We realize if God is willing to do this for us He is willing to do it for everyone who accepts it.

Cause:  Being controlled by love we want to help everyone we have a relationship with to accept this transformation from God.

Effect:  Father God commissions us to be His ambassadors; Our function being to make disciples as Jesus commissioned us to do.

Cause:  We have been forgiven so very much.

Effect:  We, as ambassadors of the King, dispense forgiveness of sin assuring people that God is not keeping track of their sins. 

Notice:  If you eliminate the cause you also eliminate the effect.  

We have often heard people exhorted to be ambassadors without ever having believed that because one died for all therefore all have died.  It just will not work.

We have often seen people who believed themselves to be ambassadors but they never believed that old things have passed away and all things have become new.  It just will not work.

We have often seen people who believed themselves to be ambassadors who refuse to allow the love of Christ to control them.  It simply will not work.

We deceive ourselves and allow others to deceive us because we want to be deceived.  But God is never deceived.

My prayer is:  "Jesus, please, help me to remain continuously aware that everything in my life depends on my belief that you died for all and rose again for our benefit.  Help me to let your powerful love guide and control every word I speak and every action of my life.  Please, Lord, grant me grace that I would never misrepresent you as I serve as your ambassador.  Lord, please, allow me to see that old things have passed away and all things have become new both in my life and in the lives of others that you entrust to my ambassadorship."

What is yours ?

His, thus Yours,

  Stuart

Matthew 16:17 (NASB)

 . . . flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.

John 4:24 (NASB)

God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.

John 20: 19 - 23 (NASB)

So when it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and when the doors were shut where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and *said to them, “ Peace be with you.” And when He had said this, He showed them both His hands and His side. The disciples then rejoiced when they saw the Lord. So Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you; as the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” And when He had said this, He breathed on them and *said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained.”

I Corinthians  1: 22 - 2:13 (NASB)

For indeed Jews ask for signs and Greeks search for wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block and to Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.  For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God. But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption, so that, just as it is written, “Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord.”  And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.  Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; but we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory; the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory; but just as it is written,

“Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard,

And which have not entered the heart of man,

All that God has prepared for those who love Him.”

For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.  But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one. For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he will instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ.

II Corinthians. 5: 13 - 21. (NASB) 

For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are of sound mind, it is for you. For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, 

therefore all died; and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.  

Therefore from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer. 

Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. 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.