THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION
[p. 63] THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION
My first thought was to have turned at this time to another subject; but I felt that something more was to be said on the subject of ministry. And what led me to it was this, that we get two distinct parts of ministry spoken of in this epistle. One I referred to last week in connection with chapter 3: the new covenant ministry. In this chapter it is “the ministry of reconciliation”. The apostle evidently presents the two things as distinct the one from the other. Of course they are both parts of one ministry; but they are treated as distinct. I desire now to say a little, as the Lord may enable me, in regard to the ministry of reconciliation, and its object.
I may in passing observe that the ministry of the new covenant connects itself with the eighth chapter of Hebrews, and the ministry of reconciliation with the tenth. I do not want to go largely into that point now, but some may care to follow it up at their leisure. If you read 2 Corinthians 3 in connection with Hebrews 8, you will find that there is a certain correspondence. In Hebrews 8 we read that Christ has obtained a more excellent ministry, by as much as “He is the mediator of a better covenant”; the terms of the new covenant are then given, but to show that the first has grown old. In 2 Corinthians 3 the apostle says that God has “made us competent, as ministers of the new covenant; not of letter, but of spirit”, and he shows its application to Gentiles. Because, as Gentiles, we could not be strictly under the terms of the new covenant, and yet we have the good of it. In Hebrews 8 the point is, that the first covenant having grown old, was ready to vanish away. Christians could not be before God on ground which [p. 64] was ready to vanish away; but we are with God on the ground of the new covenant.
Then in chapter 10, in connection with this, the result of reconciliation is presented to the Hebrews in language to which they had been accustomed, “the holiest”, and so on. They were familiar with the idea of the tabernacle and the holy place, and the priests, and they are now taught that they have “boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus”. I think we get practically the same thing taught in 2 Corinthians 5 in the ministry of reconciliation. The apostle deals with Jews in divine wisdom, according to where they were, and the thoughts with which they were familiar. But in dealing with Gentiles he presents things in a rather different way; but I think he presents practically the same things. I have just indicated the correspondence between these passages, and will leave anyone to follow it out at his leisure.
If anyone were to ask me what the great object of the second epistle to the Corinthians is, I should say that it is to lead the saints into the apprehension that they are a company of priests, a worshipping company. I very much doubt if the Corinthians had yet learnt it. I think in the first epistle saints are taught that they are “a spiritual house”, and in the second epistle that they are “a holy priesthood”, both which thoughts are taken up as regards Jewish Christians in 1 Peter 2, “To whom coming, as unto a living stone ... ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood”. In chapter 3 of the first epistle, the apostle had said, “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” And in chapter 12 he brings forward the truth of the body, but in connection with the manifestations of the Spirit, because all the gifts of the Spirit are set in the assembly, but in the assembly as the body; and I do not think that apart from the truth of the body the presence of the Spirit in the temple can be understood.
[p. 65] I have referred to the temple as being the great point in the first epistle. The saints were a spiritual house, the dwelling-place of the Spirit. I think that Christians up to the time that the apostle laboured at Corinth, had been accustomed in their minds to connect all light with Jerusalem as a centre, not with the temple, but with Jerusalem. When a difficult question arose at Antioch, the matter was referred to the apostles and elders at Jerusalem for decision. And after that, Paul and Silas went about confirming the different assemblies by the decrees of the apostles and elders. And this was doubtless according to divine wisdom. But in 1 Corinthians Paul takes the ground of having laid a foundation as a wise master builder, and presses upon the saints the truth that they were the temple of God, that the Spirit of God dwelt in them; and therefore there was not occasion to refer to Jerusalem, because where the temple of God was, and the Spirit of God in the temple, there was light. That is I judge the great idea connected with the presence of the Spirit of God in the temple — the light of God was there. The epistle to the Hebrews has the same character really, for we there have, “Whose house are we”, that is, Christians. The temple at Jerusalem had ceased to be God’s house, He dwelt not in temples made with hands, but the apostle says We are God’s house.
In the second epistle to the Corinthians, as I have said, the object of the apostle is to lead the Corinthians into the apprehension of the truth that they were a holy priesthood, and he would bring their souls thus into contact with God, and it is for that purpose he brings in, in the way he does, “the ministry of reconciliation” as leading to new creation, where all things are of God.
As far as I can understand it, he could not unfold to them properly the ministry of reconciliation unless he first unfolded to them the ministry of the new [p. 66] covenant. I do not think anybody can really understand reconciliation if he does not know something about the new covenant. I was bringing out last week how the end of the fourth and the beginning of the fifth of Romans unfold to us all the good that we get from God through our Lord Jesus Christ, that is, that the Lord is the spirit. He is the spirit of Scripture, the spirit and (if I may use the expression) the principle of God’s ways towards men. Nobody will get a right thought of the new covenant if he does not see that all the good which is in the heart of God towards man is administered in power by the Lord Jesus Christ, and there is no other way by which anyone can get it; it is God’s way of administration. The first introduction of Christ as Lord is at the close of Romans 4, where it says, “If we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification”; that is, that when every effect of sin had been annulled in Christ by His resurrection from the dead, for the last effect of sin in that way was death, then you find He is Lord as risen: I do not say He was not Lord before, but it is in resurrection that He is thus presented to us. The first covenant was one of requirement on God’s part; the new covenant does not speak of requirement, but of what God has effected for men and ministers to them through the Lord, who is the spirit of Scripture — I do not say the spirit of the new covenant, that is hardly the thought, but the spirit of Scripture.
I come now to what completes the ministry, that is the ministry of reconciliation. And this connects itself in my thought very intimately with “boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus”.
The last item of blessing referred to in Romans 5 is that “we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement”, i.e., reconciliation. The effect of receiving the reconciliation [p. 67] is that we joy in God. I will try and give you the idea presently if the Lord enable me, of what reconciliation means. In 2 Corinthians 5: 17, 18, we read, “If any one be in Christ, there is a new creation; the old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new; and all things are of the God who has reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and given to us the ministry of that reconciliation”. It is a strong expression that is used there, new things have come to pass; the word employed for “new” is the same word as that in new covenant; and it is “new” in the sense of different, not only new things, but different things have come to pass, things that have a completely different character. One thing is very evident in the passage, that there is a most intimate connection between reconciliation and new creation, because in new creation “all things are of the God, who has reconciled us to himself” — that is what new creation means.
What the apostle referred to as the old things was, I think, the things connected with the responsible man. The apostle had done with the old man, and all the system of things with which the first man was identified. The first man was man on the footing of responsibility before God, and in that sense Christ came after the flesh, He came on to that ground “made of a woman, made under the law”. Now the apostle says, “Though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more”. With the apostle it was practically true that he had put off the old man and put on the new, and the new man was created after God, was a new creation, in righteousness and holiness of truth. When you get on to that ground you apprehend that new things have come to pass, that God has begun completely anew, and that the starting-point with God is Himself; God has begun from Himself by Christ in all these new things. God did not begin in that way at the first; man was made out of the earth, earthy, and God breathed into his nostrils the breath [p. 68] of life. Now, in new creation, God has begun from Himself; “all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation” — that is the starting-point, I have no doubt it will be carried out to the utmost limits. We read that there are to be new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells; everything will be from God. And so the new man is created after God in righteousness and holiness of truth; there is a new creation. But the point is that we are to reach the knowledge of God who is acting in this way; and the way by which we come practically into that knowledge of God is by reconciliation — that is what I want to bring before you.
I will tell you the great idea of reconciliation — reconciliation means the removal of moral distance. God has by the judgment of sin removed the distance that existed between Himself and man by reason of sin. He was the only One who knew the distance or could measure it, and He has removed it. When Adam and Eve were turned out of Paradise, although God clothed them in coats of skin, yet the distance was immeasurable, and so far as man was concerned, irremediable. Man had fallen under the power of sin, and the distance between God and man was infinite. When I come to the ministry of reconciliation, I find that all that is gone. It is not that man has bridged the distance, nor has God bridged the distance, but God in grace has removed it. If you want to know the great proof that the distance is gone, it is that He has raised Christ, who was made sin, from the dead. There could be no resurrection to life if sin had not been put away — that is perfectly certain, because resurrection is the annulling of the sentence of death, and the sentence of death could not have been annulled if sin, which brought death in, had not first been put away.
The moral settlement of the question of sin was upon the cross, where Christ was made sin, and death [p. 69] did not come in till sin had been completely put away as before God. Christ now once “in the end of the world hath ... appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself”. Therefore, when Christ died, the first thing that came to pass was that the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom. It was not that man went into God, but the wonderful thought is that the distance between God and man was so completely gone that God could come out to man. It was not man getting back to the garden of Eden; man never could get back that way; God placed Cherubim and a flaming sword that kept the way of the tree of life. But in the cross God comes out in grace to man, because He has annulled by Christ the distance that existed between Himself and man. That is what was done by the cross; that was the effect of Christ being made sin.
Having spoken about reconciliation, I want now to convey a general idea of the purpose of it, what the great end of reconciliation as to persons is; and you will see how it connects itself with the thought of man going into the holiest. The first thought in reconciliation is that God may have His pleasure in man; the other is that man may joy in God. The apostle says in Romans 5, “We joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement”, i.e., reconciliation. The reception of the reconciliation, the knowledge that God has annulled the distance that stood between Himself and man, enables us to joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
I will give you just one illustration of it which is so perfectly simple and familiar that no one can miss the idea; that is, the case of the prodigal son. He was reconciled outside the house, but he was brought into the house in order that the father might have his delight in him, that he might be there to the father’s entire pleasure and satisfaction, and that he might joy in the father. That is the good and gain of [p. 70] reconciliation, and really that is the great thought of the holiest of all. The prodigal must have been delighted at the thought of what his father was to him, but his delight was not greater than the father’s delight; the father was delighted to have the prodigal at his table. I cannot press it too strongly that reconciliation means that distance is gone, and the good and gain of reconciliation is first on God’s side, that He may have His pleasure in man, and then on our side, that we may joy in God. You will understand, I think, why I connect it with the thought of the holiest of all. Where reconciliation is apprehended you get a worshipping company. You could not worship God acceptably unless you first knew that God has His pleasure in you, and your delight is in God. The Lord lightens up the subject of worship in John 4. He says, “The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh such to worship him”. When I know that it has been the Father’s pleasure to call me into the place of a child which I occupy before Him, and my joy is thus in the Father, then it is I can understand worship; but I cannot understand worship apart from the holiest. The holiest is where the glory of God is, where His perfect satisfaction rests. Heaven is a place, but you cannot talk of the holiest as being a place, it is a moral thought.
There are two expressions to be noticed in this passage, first, “the ministry of reconciliation”, and then “the word of reconciliation”; and as I understand it, the ministry is the larger thought of the two. The apostle says, “All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation”. Then in verse 19 you see what the ministry is, “to wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath [p. 71] committed unto us the word of reconciliation”. Mark those two parts. There is first that “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them”. As I understand it, the coming of Christ into the world put everything for the moment on a completely new footing. Previously the Jew had been on the footing, so to say, of law, but the presence of the Son of God without abolishing law, put things on a new ground. When He was born into the world, the angels sang, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good pleasure in men”. God was not pressing home the claims of law and prophets, but “was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them”. I believe we little understand how the very fact of Christ being born as man into this world altered for the moment the whole aspect of things before God. I believe that in the coming of Christ God overlooked in His people the broken law and the persecution of the prophets, and everything else. He gave them Christ, and if they had accepted Christ they would have come into the promises. But they rejected Him, and the rejection of Christ served to increase the responsibility they had previously been under; God exacts from them the ten thousand talents, the whole debt. We can understand this from the parable of the king that would take account of his servants in Matthew 18. The Jew did not act as he had been acted to. But then the fact that the world rejected Christ, and that things therefore go back in a sense to the old ground does not alter the great truth that “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses”; that is, that in the presence of Christ here upon earth there was a way of reconciliation; that had it been possible for the world to have accepted Christ, the world might have been reconciled; but God knew that it was not so to be. That is the first part.
[p. 72] Then the second part is that he had given to the apostles the word of reconciliation. I understand that to be the testimony that reconciliation has been effected. You could not talk about reconciliation if reconciliation had not been effected. “The word of reconciliation” is the testimony that it exists, because things are much in advance of what they were when “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses”. What marks the present moment is that reconciliation has been effected, and that the great distance that existed between God and man, as the result of sin, has been annulled by the Lord Jesus Christ, and in order that God may have in Christ His pleasure in man, and that man may find his joy in God. If you do not understand the new covenant, as the footing on which you are before God, that Christ has ministered to you every benefit from God, I do not think you can enter into the great truth of reconciliation. I may be asked, Did not the apostle preach reconciliation to unconverted people? I admit it; but no unconverted person could enter into it. Many people take up the idea of reconciliation as though it meant a change of feeling in them. I do not believe that is the thought. You must reach the ground of the new covenant, and learn the great good which God has brought to you in the Lord Jesus Christ before you can understand that reconciliation has been effected, that God has annulled the infinite distance that stood between Himself and man, in order that He may have pleasure in man, and that man may joy in God. That is what I understand the apostle to mean in beseeching people, on the part of the Lord Jesus Christ, to be reconciled to God. If you want to know either the measure of God’s delight in man, or to understand anything about joying in God, you must look at the Lord Jesus Christ. It is there you learn the whole truth of it. To enter the father’s house, the best robe had to be put on the prodigal. And it is [p. 73] that into which you are to enter. The apostle says, “We are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us”; we want you to enter into all that greatness which is displayed in the Lord Jesus Christ, and the reconciliation which God has effected through Him. “For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him”. That is what the apostle brought to people, and he brought it to them as an ambassador for Christ.
I believe the great climax of it is that God will display saints as the expression of His righteousness. If we want to understand what the righteousness of God is, we must learn it in Christ; there only can we see an adequate expression of the righteousness of God. I do not speak of righteousness being shown when Christ was a substitute for us, when He bore our sins. It was holiness in God that led to His being forsaken, but righteousness comes out, to my mind, in the resurrection and glory of Christ. And therefore the Lord says the Spirit will convict the world concerning righteousness, “because I go to my Father and ye see me no more”. But the point here is He was made sin for us, and we get all the results that flow from His having been made sin for us, and it is in the church that the righteousness of God will be perfectly displayed and vindicated; that is, that when the universe sees the church in glory with Christ then it will understand the righteousness of God, in the great answer which He has given to the work that Christ accomplished for us when He was “made sin”.
I know what people will say, You put it off to the future. No; I say everything that will be displayed in the future is true to faith now. The great principle of the present moment is that God gives us now as heavenly light what soon will be our part. Therefore it is good to faith, although as to the actual display of it I do not doubt at all it refers to the time when Christ [p. 74] is manifested; then everything will come out. But the practical bearing of it in our souls is this, that there is nothing inconsistent with our being in the holiest; because if we are the righteousness of God, we cannot be more. It is not here the thought of Romans, that you are justified as men living on earth, but you are become the righteousness of God, and if you are that, surely you are entitled to be in the holiest, where everything is the display of the glory of God. But then, it is not only that you are there as the righteousness of God, but you are there in Christ, as reconciled, there as in the One in whom God has His delight, and there too as privileged to “joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now” — mark that word ‘now’ — received the reconciliation, that is, you have received the word of reconciliation.
May God give to us to see the greatness of the apostle’s ministry, that the great end and aim of it was not simply that the saints might know that they were a forgiven people here in the world, but that they might know how God had annulled the distance which existed between Himself and man, that everything might be put on an absolutely new footing, “All things are become new. And all things are of God”. That is what I want you to understand. It is a new starting point from God Himself; the whole thing originated in the thought of God, and God has brought it into effect. I would to God every one of us might enter into the thought. It is the knowledge of reconciliation which really constitutes us a holy priesthood. May God give to us to understand it better in His great grace, and to see the great purpose and end of the apostle’s ministry in the gospel, which I think comes before us in this second epistle.