ByReconcile, in the Biblical lexicon, is “katallassō,” which means to bring a mutual change. Each party involved in reconciliation must perform one’s role to make it successful and complete. In our case, it’s between us (man) and God.
When God created man (both male and female), He had a personal relationship with him. That relationship was so good until man sinned and developed sin-consciousness in Genesis 3. Eventually, this created enmity between God and man. Even though God was unhappy about it; He forgave man after this happened. Although He punished Adam and
Eve, the consequences of the fall are still in effect on some people today, especially the unbelievers (the unsaved).
The Word of God says in Romans 5:12 NKJV that
Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men because all sinned:
Man lost the life of God breathed into him when he got formed in Genesis 2:7 after the fall. He then took the nature of sin and corruption. Furthermore, man also lost the ability to reproduce in God’s likeness.
Since no child was born before the fall, Adam and Eve started having children in the likeness of themselves [which was already corrupted by sin (Genesis 5:3)]. And that explains why death (separation of the God-life from man’s spiritual make-up) was passed upon all men just as it’s written in Romans 5:12.
Before man can commune with God, he must have eternal life in him
God saw that the main problem that hindered the continuity of His fellowship with man was sin (Isaiah 59:2) and death. He knew that before any man could commune with Him, he must have eternal life, and it was lacking.
Therefore, to solve this issue of a broken relationship, God knew there had to be reconciliation.
Laws were given for the Israelites to obey, but that couldn’t reconcile them back to God. They were just slaves to sin, no matter how hard they tried to be righteous.
They sacrificed once a year to purify their sins, but they just kept falling back. The blood of bulls and the ashes of a heifer that got used for the sin offering couldn’t reconcile the Israelites back to God because animals also got affected by sin since the Bible says in Romans 5:12 that “…sin entered the world…” not just in man.
There was no person or animal’s blood holy enough to purge the sin of all people. So, God decided to love us; and that led Him to send Jesus Christ (John 3:16) into this rebellious world to come and take away the sin of the world (John 1:29) through death.
God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself when Jesus was physically in the world (2 Corinthians 5:19). However, when Jesus died on the cross and said, “…It is finished…” (John 19:30), everything God had to do on His part to ensure the reconciliation between Him and humanity was fulfilled (Colossians 1:21-22).
Currently, the sin obstacle that prevailed between man and God has been taken away by God Himself through Jesus Christ.
Despite this effort, another problem arose, which was (and still is) the ignorance that people now have the opportunity to return to God without any hindrance since the world’s sin had been taken away by the blood of Jesus. That led Jesus to establish the ministry of reconciliation before leaving the earth (Matthew 28:18-20).
The ministry of reconciliation
The ministry of reconciliation is a ministry set up by Jesus to tell people about the gospel (the word of reconciliation — 2 Corinthians 5:19) that their sin has been paid through the shedding of His blood on the cross. Thus, when they believe in Him and get saved, they’ll be reconciled to God for intimate divine fellowship to ensue just like it was from the beginning.
God brought Jesus to die for the whole world; but if people don’t accept Christ’s message, they’ll not be born again.
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Suppose I buy a car for a friend, package it well and hand it over to him; he has to accept it. If he doesn’t, it doesn’t matter how beautiful that gift is, it remains unaccepted, right?
In the same way, God brought Jesus to die for the whole world, but if people don’t accept Christ’s message, they’ll not be born again. Very simple.
Christians, our preaching of Christ unto the lost serves as a channel God uses to tell them that they must reconcile back with Him. When the word of reconciliation (the message of Christ) reaches the lost for them to believe, they don’t only get saved but also gain the confidence to go before God without any sin consciousness.
Romans 8:1 (NKJV) says,
There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
When a person gets saved, the sin nature inherited during physical birth is put to death by God (Colossians 3:3, Romans 6:2). Furthermore, God gives him eternal life and begins to have a relationship with him.
God doesn’t need to reconcile the world to Himself anymore. He has already done that through Jesus. We must (and also tell others) be reconciled back to God. All that man has to do is to get born again and decide to follow Christ with all his heart. Are you doing this?
Read more on “How to be saved” here
