“In other words, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting people’s trespasses against them, and he has given us the message of reconciliation. Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making His plea through us. We plead with you on Christ’s behalf, “Be reconciled to God!”” (2 Corinthians 5:19–20, NET)
They are expressions of the one great heresy, which is as old as fallen mankind: Man refuses to accept the external word and the external means of grace and develops his own religion, which places man where God alone has the right to stand: “Ye shall be as gods!”
I have met Christians who were so intent upon winning souls to Christ that they would not talk to you about anything but God and His goodness!
Such a man was the Canadian, Robert Jaffray, one of our early pioneer missionaries. His family owned the Toronto Globe and Mail and as a young Christian he was disinherited because he chose to follow God’s call to China rather than join the family business.
That good godly man spent his lifetime in China and the south Pacific, searching for the lost—and winning them! He was always reading maps and daring to go to the most difficult places, in spite of physical weaknesses and diabetic handicap. He sought out and lived among the poor and miserable, always praying to God, “Let my people go!”
On my bookshelves I have numerous books about church growth, about having a missional spirit. Others talk about forensic apologetics and evangelism. Many of these approach the topic with a clinical approach, looking at statistics, looking for patterns that can be replicated, looking for logical presentations of the gospel that give overwhelming proof – which we hope will covert the heathen.
We know, for we ourselves our guilty, of the great sin of self-idolatry, of narcissism. Even in thinking “we” can prove the gospel, we are take up a burden that is rightfully the Holy Spirit. Far too often in the church, we create our own religion, putting ourselves in charge of saving the world.
Yet there are those, who in humility simply follow the Spirit, as they are compelled to not shut up about Jesus. Jaffray was one, Eric Liddell comes to mind, as does Barton Stone, and Wyneken and Luther. Each spent their lives, or a great deal of their lives not arguing, but pleading that people would be reconciled to God – a work already accomplished by Jesus.
I think that word pleading is important – it has the emphasis of desire built into the request. It doesn’t come from a place of power, or even authority, but of someone is so worried about the person they beg them to let God in, to receive the love and mercy. It comes from seeing people living without hope, without peace, assaulted by the world, and by their own guilt and shame.
And we have the antidote to that which poisons their life.
How can we get them to receive it? How can we get them to trust in a God they do not yet know of, that they have yet to experience, that they haven’t allowed to bring them to life, remove the guilt and shame of sin, and restore them?
This is the passion Paul had, this is why some cannot shut up about the love of God.
We can beg them, the Spirit opens their hearts, Christ has reconciled them to the Father.
This is our call… we simple beggers on a this journey called life…
Sasse, H. (2001). This Is My Body: Luther’s Contention for the Real Presence in the Sacrament of the Altar (p. 191). Wipf and Stock Publishers.
Tozer, A. W., & Smith, G. B. (2008). Mornings with Tozer: Daily Devotional Readings. Moody Publishers.