Skip to main content

Reconciled


 Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.  But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation— (Colossians 1:21-22)

The focus for this week’s prayer time is reconciliation. In general, to reconcile to things is to bring them into agreement. You should reconcile your bank account at least once per month. This morning as I thought about the idea, however, was deep sighs and slumped shoulders as we reconcile ourselves to our miserable fates, whatever they may be. Part of that is human nature, and part of human nature involves reconciliation often meaning “Be reasonable. Do it my way” or “Be reasonable. Give me my way.” There is no meeting in the middle. We’re expected to lay down our arms and be enslaved. And even with God, this seems to be the case. Reconciliation isn’t on our terms. It’s on His. He provides all we need, but we still don’t get to be in control.
What this means is that for there to be reconciliation, there must be trust and goodwill on both sides. This is why sometimes reconciliation isn’t possible. It is still to be our goal when possible, from what Scripture teaches, we are to seek it even if it will cost us. The well-being of the other is to take precedence even over our own.
This means that if what the person with whom you are seeking reconciliation is doing something that is harmful to them, we must love them by standing against that thing. So, for example, reconciliation with an alcoholic doesn’t involve remaining silent about or “accepting” their alcoholism.
Today’s passage says that God has reconciled us to Himself. I struggle with this because again, it goes back to control. I must submit to the adequacy of His actions. I must submit to His being in control. When I think about it, that’s not a problem. But as I go about my life… I struggle. This is why we need to be praying WDA. They are so easy to lose.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The List

              Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,   through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance;   perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. (Romans 5:1-5)           Think about it. We have been justified. At least, we could be justified if we stopped insisting that our justification be based on our merits. We have peace with God, or could have peace if we stopped throwing temper tantrums. We have gained access into grace i...
Post a Comment
Read more

Meditations of the Heart

  May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. (Psalm19:14)           As I started writing this post, I noted that the meditations of my heart are all over the mental landscape, from a hub where eight superhighways come together to a lunar or nuclear landscape. Do you see my error? The moment I read the word meditation , I think about thoughts. But what’s described here is the meditations of our hearts ; our wills.           While the meditations of our minds may be all over the place, the meditations of our wills tend to be a little more stable by the time we are adults. We no longer tend to want to pursue the ten separate careers we did in any given day as children. Part of this is humble acceptance of reality. We come to understand that we can’t do it all. I think another part of it is disappointmen...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Way, The Truth, and The Life

              Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me . (John 14:6)           If “I am the gate of the sheep…I am the good shepherd” from chapter 10 is a double whammy, this verse is a triple whammy. And its first victim is the notion that any other so-called god was acceptable or the same as Jesus. He, and He alone is the way, the truth, and the life, and the only way to get to the Father. There is no other Savior, or Redeemer, according to Jesus. Now, to be fair, other religions will claim that their religion or god(s) are the only way. That is the nature of gods and of religions. If this and that are equally good and agree on what’s necessary, then this and that are the same thing, so there’s no need to from the other to one. If that’s the case, then why speak against the other or promote the one? There’s a song I’ve been listening to i...
Post a Comment
Read more