The Promise of Peace – Reconciliation (His Perfect Peace 2)
As I said in the first instalment in this series, we are thinking about peace in terms of our relationship with God, our relationship with one another and our relationship with ourselves. In this post we are considering the first of those which arguably is our greatest need of peace. In this blog we will try and unpack the meaning of the word reconciliation and think about how Jesus achieves peace for us through His death in our place.
The story of the Bible is that God made us for relationship with Him, but then sin entered the world and created a wedge between us and Him. That was the story of Genesis 1-3 and its been the repeating story of history. In Genesis 3 we see the contrast between the beauty of God’s relationship with Adam & Eve and the devastating impact of sin on that relationship. There is a fascinating normality about how God walked in the garden in the cool of the day (3:8). But there was something different on this particular day as we are told that Adam & Eve hid from the Lord. Why? Earlier in this chapter they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, breaking the one prohibition that God had specifically laid down.
As a result they realised they were naked and so they hid from God. I think the nakedness mentioned here was more than the absence of clothes. Suddenly there was an acute vulnerability in their relationship with God. Their sin had driven a wedge between them and God and the consequences were significant. Work would now be toilsome, childbirth would be painful, the relationship between the man and the woman would be difficult and they were soon banished from the garden. Things would never be the same again this side of Jesus’ return and the inauguration of the New Creation.
1. By nature we are enemies of God (Ephesians 2:1-3):
Paul often describes our need of peace in our relationship with God. If we are to understand the wonder of this peace, then we first need to understand the desperate situation we find ourselves in because of sin. In Romans 3:23 he says: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God while in Colossians 1:23 he writes Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behaviour. These are strong words and express our natural situation as enemies of God.
1 As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. Ephesians 2:1-3
Paul tells the Ephesians that they were dead in transgressions and sins. Paul goes on in those verses to explain how they have been taken captive by the cravings of our flesh (specifically our desires and thoughts), the world (following its ways) and the evil one (who is at work in all who are disobedient). His conclusion is that they, and indeed we for that matter, are by nature deserving of wrath. We often like to play down our sin or compare ourselves to others, but repeatedly the Bible demonstrates that God takes our sin seriously. It is describes as wickedness & rebellion (Leviticus 16:21), doing what is evil in God’s sight (Psalm 51:4-5), despising God & His Word (2 Samuel 12:9-10), going astray like sheep (Isaiah 53:6) and being covered in filthy rags (Zechariah 3:1-4). All these passages together present us with a strong message about our sin. However, as we will soon see this is only half the story because Jesus’ death on the cross provides the solution for all our sin. Paul in Romans 5 says:
20 …But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, 21 so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 5:20-21
2. Peace with God through Christ (Romans 5:1-11):
When Paul is instructing the Ephesians about putting on the armour of God, he says their feet should be fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace (6:15). That the gospel should be described this way should be no surprise at all given what we have already said. The gospel is described through a whole number of paradigms, but in terms of peace it is very much a relational paradigm. In Romans 5:1 Paul describes how we can have peace with God through the blood of Christ.
1 Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. Romans 5:1-2a
Earlier in Romans, Paul makes a clear case for why we need God’s grace and why we cannot earn it of our own merit. We need be justified through faith in Jesus Christ. Now in chapter 5 Paul begins to spell out some of the benefits. Because of what Jesus has achieved at the Cross, we can now enjoy peace with God through Christ. This is not the peace of God, but rather peace with God. This doesn’t mean we have peace with the world, peace with the flesh or peace with the evil one. No our battles with these things will continue until Jesus returns. Through Christ Paul says we’ve gained access into grace and we now enjoy a new standing within the grace of God. This peace with God changes everything!
A few verses later Paul is wrestling with why anyone would die for someone else. He says that for a good person someone might dare to die, but then he declares: But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us (5:8). The peace we now have with God came through Jesus’ demonstration of love for us…while we were still sinners!
9 Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! 10 For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! 11 Not only is this so, but we also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. Romans 5:9-11
Paul finishes the section by saying that those who were God’s enemies have now been reconciled to God through Christ. Reconciliation in this context is about the restoration of peaceful relations with God. It means being transformed from being enemies of God to becoming friends of God. Wow this is amazing and is true of all who trusts in Christ.
Nearly 33 years ago God called me to Himself. I don’t know how much I was aware of it, but up until that point, I too had been an enemy of Christ. My every inclination was towards living with myself as king of my life. But after meeting Jesus things began to change as a result of the peace with God that I was now experiencing. I wasn’t going around living in open defiance like the younger son in Jesus’ parable of the Lost Son, but there was a clear self-righteousness like the older son in the parable. I came to realise that I too needed to know God’s peace.
3. The Impact of Peace with God (Ephesians 2:11-12):
The final passage fleshes out the impact of the gospel for Paul’s predominantly Gentile readers. They were regarded as separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship and foreigners to the covenants of the promise (v12). But now he says that in Christ they who were once far away, had now been brought near by the blood of Christ (v13). This is simply incredible that both Jew and Gentile can experience peace with God and play a part in His great promises:
14 For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, 15 by setting aside in his flesh the law with its commands and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, 16 and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. 17 He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit. Ephesians 2:14-18
Paul poignantly asserts in these verses that Jesus is our peace. Furthermore, he claims that the dividing wall / barrier between Jew and Gentile has been destroyed. Why? To create one new humanity out of the two and make peace. Through Christ Paul says that everyone has access to the Father by one Spirit. The Gentiles are no longer outsiders, but citizens, and members of God’s household. Paul likens God’s people to a building in which Christ is the chief cornerstone. In Him, we are being built together to become a holy temple in the Lord, in which God dwells by His Spirit.
19 Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. 21 In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. 22 And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit. Ephesians 2:19-22
For most who are reading this blog, this will likely also be true of us, because we too are Gentiles. We too, were nothing, without hope and without God in the world (2:12b). We too were enemies and alienated from God. But now in Christ, everything changes, because we now enjoy peace with God and equal status as the people of God.
The first thing that robs us of this peace is when we fail to understand and appreciate our new identity in Christ, through which we enjoy peace and reconciliation with God. I know for myself how often I can regress to trying to earn God’s grace in my daily life. Living as if I were still an enemy of God by trying to earn God’s favour. But the reality is that if we are in Christ, we already enjoy peace with God and He gives us His grace freely and lavishly. Let me finish with the words of John Newton: “My memory is nearly gone; but I remember two things: That I am a great sinner, and that Christ is a great Saviour.” Amen!
See other posts in this series: