Ambassadors with a Plea
2 Cor 5:18-21
18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
ESV
Ambassadors with a Plea
(2 Cor. 5:11-21)
Intro:
A. I want you to think about your greatest fear. For some that is a fear of spiders, others it is heights, or small spaces or large crowds. The point is, many people have fears.
B. The Bible talks about “the fear of the Lord.” That can be respect and terror wrapped together. A person may have a healthy fear of fire. They enjoy the heat from it on a cold day, but they also understand the consequences of getting to close to the fire and what it could do to them.
C. Last week I shared with you how Paul teaches us this great desire, this longing to be at home with the Lord, but the last verse of that thought sets up the reason Paul teaches us Christians that we need to have a plea with those who are unbelievers. So look at the connection from 2 Cor. 5:10-11a.
D. I will one day stand before the judgement seat of Christ. I will have to give an account of me in the flesh. Knowing that I am saved by the grace of Jesus, not my works, Paul wants everyone to have the same joy of that day. But knowing that not everyone will be saved motivates Paul to get out there and share Jesus. And, catch this, Paul expects that EVERY Christian will have the same desire to see people outside of God’s salvation to be reconciled to God through Jesus. So from Paul’s point of you, we are all ambassadors for Christ with a plea to the world around.
E. So what is it that motivates us to become this ambassador with a plea? Paul gives us three reasons:
I. Fear
A. We get started with most basic reason people make changes in their life – fear. I asked you to think about what you fear the most. During this year, many of us have had fears. The fear of sickness or death is a real fear. But Paul speaks of a bigger fear – the fear of standing before God. Knowing that fear (that hell is real), Paul says, “We persuade others.”
B. What brought many of us to Jesus was first a realization that if we died we would be in hell and not heaven. That wasn’t bad. Paul uses that as a motivator to preach and uses it as a motivator for people to realize they need to be saved. You can’t be saved from something you don’t believe in. Unless I fear hell and believe God has the power and right to condemn me, I won’t appreciate what it means to be saved. I need to grasp what I am saved from.
C. While fear is often the first motivator for us to be saved and to encourage us to share Jesus with those we fear are not saved, it is not a lasting motivator. Paul speaks of another reason we are ambassadors with a plea.
II. Love
A. READ 2 Cor. 5:14-15, 21. Fear might bring me to knowledge of needing a savior, but Paul wants us to remember that the love of Jesus was seen at the cross. You can guilt me into doing a good work, but Paul reminds me that Jesus died so I wouldn’t have to spend eternity in hell.
B. Sin came with a price – separation from God. We call that death. Sin cut me off from my union with the creator and in His justice left me to be eternally condemned. But the love of God, as seen in Jesus, paid the price for my sin. Paul would tell the church that Rome that, “maybe for a good man someone might dare to die, but Christ died for us while we were yet sinners.” (Rom. 5:7-8)
C. You want motivation, look at what a person loves and you will find them motivated to keep it. For Paul, the love of Christ “compels,” “controls,” or “urges him forward.” The only way we can be reconciled back to God is for Jesus to deal with our sin. The death, burial and resurrection of Jesus made the way for you and me to be back in relationship the God. I don’t reconcile God to me, God reconciles me to Him. Why would God do that? Love.
D. I can follow a God who dies so I might live. And when that God not only died for me, but conquered death through resurrection never to die again, a door just opened up for me to follow him home to heaven. He reconciled me.
III. I’m Changed
A. Paul gives us a third reason why we want to be ambassadors for Christ, which is we are changed people. READ 2 Cor. 5:17. Paul wants us to feel good about who we are. Yes, sin separated us from God, but Jesus reconciled us back to God and in the old me is gone and the new me is alive.
B. I want you to take hold of that idea that you are a new creation. You are not just a changed you, you are a new you. You are born again. You start a new life. The old person was separated because of sin. But Jesus, who had no sin, took my sin and nailed it to the cross. As that new creation, I have been given a purpose and a passion. There are people who need to know the same joy of salvation that I know.
C. As the new creation, I become God’s ambassador. Just listen as Paul gives the Christians in Corinth and us, the ministry assignment. READ 2 Cor. 5:18-20.
D. While Paul took that ministry personally, the appeal that he makes is the same appeal that every Christian wants every unsaved person to hear – be reconciled to God.
Conclusion:
A. She was a known as a sinful woman. She entered into the home of a religious man who had a nice dinner party. She came in to that room, looked and found the reason for putting herself in that situation. She wanted Jesus. Falling at his feet she weeps. She knows she is a sinful person, everyone there knows she is a sinful person. The host is outraged that Jesus is allowing this woman to touch him. Yet, at the feet of Jesus she weeps, pour perfume on those feet, but unprepared for what she has done, with no towel in her hand, she simply wipes his feet with her hair.
B. What does that woman want? The Bible doesn’t say. But here is what Jesus says to his host Simon, “her sins, which are many, are forgiven – for she loved much” (Lk 7:47). Then Jesus turns to the woman and tells her the same, “You sins are forgiven.” With those words ringing in her ears, Jesus tells her, “your faith has saved you; go in peace.”
C. Do you know what reconciliation does? It brings peace to the one whose life is out of line with the creator. Jesus recreated that woman that day. Now, Paul says, we can tell the same story, except her story becomes our story. We are the sinner saved by faith. With that ringing in our ears we become ambassadors with a plea – be reconciled to God.
D. Most of us in this room have taken hold of that joy and received that peace. Let’s be the ambassadors that tell the story. Let’s share this good news with one more person who needs to hear it and pray that God will send forth reapers into His harvest.
Because of Jesus,
Jeffrey Dillinger, minister