Today, then, we are going back to the letter that Paul wrote to the Colossians. As the Lord has continued to drive us there, we want to be obedient to that and continue to work through these scriptures. This great, wonderful letter from Paul, really from the Lord we know, The church is in Kolos and also Laodicea. The letter is labeled the Epistle to the Colossians. That's who it's addressed to. But again, we remind you at the end of this letter, Paul said, please make sure that this letter is also read in the church Laodicea. So there were multiple congregations that Paul was writing to in writing this letter. And we remember that the context is that these churches were being confronted by false doctrine. false teaching and today that doesn't sound like much of a worry as much I think as it ought to. False doctrine is a very dangerous thing for any church. Many churches have ceased to be through history. Many churches have had the candlestick removed. The Spirit of God left them because of false doctrine. that was allowed to set up in the church and allowed to set up in the minds and the hearts of those that were part of that church. So false doctrine is nothing to be trifled with. It's nothing to take simply or it's nothing to take lightly. It is something to be addressed and Paul is writing to them and we just marvel once again at the way in which the Spirit of God attacks the problem. He attacks the problem by painting a glorious picture of Christ. We want to back up as we read today and then make a little progress. Beginning in verse 12, we remember that Paul said, giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints and light, who hath delivered us from the power of darkness and hath translated us or transferred us into the kingdom of his dear son. in whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins, who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature, for by him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things were created by him and for him. And he is before all things, and by him all things consist or are held together, and he is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he might have the preeminence. He goes on and says, for it pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell. And having made peace through the blood of his cross by him to reconcile all things unto himself, by him I say, whether they be things on earth or things in heaven. And you, that were sometime alienated, and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled, in the body of his flesh, through death, to present you holy, and unblameable, and unreprovable in his sight. If you continue in the faith, grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which you have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven, whereof I, Paul, am made minister. We'll stop our reading there today. The verses that will be in view for our remarks today will be verses 21 through 23. Paul, having now spoken of Christ in such a remarkable way, spoken of him just now as the creator of all things, the one for whom all things were created, the one who holds everything together, the one who is to have preeminence in all things. We just left there last week, and we just examined that. And then the next verses, I think, are striking to me as he turns his thoughts to the Colossians themselves, the Colossian people. Our minds have been held captive, or at least I believe they should have been, at the awe-inspiring description of the Son of God. The one, again, who has to be preeminent. The one that is the light of the city of the new heaven. The one who is to receive preeminence in absolutely everything. And then Paul says, and you, When I first read that, as I was beginning to study this passage, as God directed my heart in this direction, those words just jumped off the page. It is almost like this in my mind as I thought about that scripture. It's as if we were standing on the beach and looking out at the ocean and seeing an amazing sunset and the colors as they painted the sky and colors and shades that no human painter could ever Mimic could ever copy and the water is the the light Reflected off of it and it's just the most beautiful scene that we could ever imagine and we're standing on the beach Watching this and looking at this sunset and seeing the power that is reflected in that calmness even of the waters and and this person next to us is describing this scene and talking about how beautiful it is and just how Amazing it is and then they stop and they turn and they look at you and say and you and It's almost shocking. It's abrupt to me. It's just this abrupt shift all of a sudden. And you can imagine, it's almost again like the apostles as Jesus was ascending. Nobody's eyes were on any of them. They were on Christ as He disappeared out of their sight. They were looking at Christ. And when we look at Christ correctly, we see an incredible, beautiful picture that is beyond really our full description. But then Paul says, And you. It's almost like we would question Paul's sense in taking our eyes off of Christ, even though he is not doing that, but he is bringing us into the conversation. And you. And our title, our thought today is, And you. Who we were and who we are in the reconciliation of Christ. and you. It is inarguable that Christ's beauty surpasses all others, his worth, his majesty, his glory swallows up anything that we might possess. But in seeing Christ and the light that he shows, it does give us a vision and a picture of us. There is no room for pride in the human heart. We speak about that often. But there is a beauty here that is to be seen when Paul says, and you and he begins to talk about you and me. As believers, As those who had come to know the Lord, the Colossians, had become partakers of a transformation that is greater and more beautiful than any in the world and any that anyone could ever imagine. They had been changed by Christ. They were not what they once were. They were something altogether new and different. And that is something that I believe we need to grab a hold of. If you are cold today, if your heart is distant from God, I believe it might be in part because you've forgotten a little bit about who you were before Christ got a hold of you and changed you into who you are now. And seeing Christ and the light that He puts off Himself, there'll be no sun, S-U-N, in heaven because the sun, S-O-N, is the light of that city. He is the light giver. And as he puts off the light, it shines on us and shows us who we are. When I was lost, God showed me who I was as the light of Christ entered into my mind and my heart through preaching and through the spirit of God. As he showed me who he was, I saw who I was. I was lost. But he shows me today that I'm one of his. God's people today need to be close to God, and that goes without saying. But in the world in which we live, it is vital that we walk close to God and we see Him for who He is, so that He then might show us who we are. I am again and again just in these first 20 some verses of this letter struck just with the immense wisdom of God in how to confront false doctrine. How to confront that that is wrong. Show them Christ. And by doing so, you'll show them who they are. And by showing them who they are, they will realize their need of Him. And when we get saved, when God has redeemed us, when we are reconciled as the scripture talks about here. We see the beauty that is tied up into that and we see that that is always the antidote to false doctrine is a view of Christ again and again, more clearly, more directly, more unapologetically, more scripturally and biblically as we look at Christ and we see Him for who He is and we see us for who we are. The view of Christ is always the best place to start. But that's not where the vision stops. Christ will always be the center of our view. He is always the apple of our eye. He is always the center of everything. But that's not where the vision, that's not where the view stops. It extends. It moves around Christ and it shows us that we as believers have been changed, that Christ He's everything Paul said he would be. And one of the results of that truth is that we as believers in Christ have been changed dramatically, fundamentally and completely. It's too many places in the world, there is a preaching of a gospel that is without power, without depth, without any real power to change people. It's this doctrine. It is this false idea that salvation is a decision of the mind. It's a decision that I want to go to heaven. And I would ask again, who in their right mind would not want to go to heaven? It is this thing that doesn't really affect Monday through Saturday. It might affect us for a couple of hours on Sunday. But other than that, this Christianity thing really has no impact on life. That is not the view of Scripture. That is not the view of reconciliation. That's not the view of what Christ does to people when He saves them. He changes them radically. And you, Paul says, what you were, He's going to talk to them about and what they are now at that point, having been reconciled and what that means. I believe that this is a key to us as God's people growing more and more. close to him, desiring that he would live primary and be preeminent in our lives. The way that he has been said that he should be is to see him and then to see what he has done for us. And as we realize what he's done for us, our eyes then go back again to him and his light shines brighter than it did before, which then shines light again on what he has done for us. And it's just this cycle of glory and praise again and again and again, as we see Him for who He is and what He has done for us. And in verses 21 through 23, He tells the Colossians who they were, who they are, and how they have become who they are, and what that is to mean for them then and in the eternal future that was ahead of them. What was their previous state? Their previous state is the same as yours and mine. Their previous state is the same as Paul writes to these Colossians. If you've been saved today, you can say exactly what was happening to the Colossians. What did happen to the Colossians is what happened to you. The verse 21, it tells us you who once were alienated. You As the vision of Christ and our focus 100 percent is upon him. And then we realize as that light shines and it shines upon us, we realize that we once were alienated from him. What does that word mean? It just means stranger, a foreigner. You. God, open up our eyes and our hearts to remember that before you saved us, we were foreigners to your kingdom. Strangers. strangers to your kingdom. We did not know him. And our citizenship was in the kingdom of this world, not the kingdom of God. And as that realization dawns on us, we also realize, and this is the important thing to remember, as the light dawns on us and we remember, those of us that have been saved, we remember we were here. Those of you that are not yet saved, you remain in this place, a stranger, a foreigner, an alien to the kingdom of Christ. You are outside of the protection of the God of heaven and earth. And the problem with being a child or a citizen of the kingdom of this world is that this world is going to pass away. In fact, according to Paul, it is in the process of passing away. It is a continual process that this world is passing away again every day. It is getting closer to the time in which Jesus will return. declare time to be no more. He will gather his people to himself and he will destroy that that is not his and that is sinful, and he will deal with it for all of eternity. Second Peter 3 10. The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise and the element shall melt with fervent heat. The earth also in the works that are therein shall be burned up. You remember when you were lost? Those of you that are believers here today, do you remember that moment that the light of the gospel shone in your heart and showed you that you were a child of this world? A citizen of this world? The kingdom of this temporary world? That's who you were. Paul, as he looks at Christ and paints this glorious picture, and then he says, and you, remember you, you were a kingdom of this world that is passing away. You're not a child of mine. You are not a citizen of my kingdom. You were a citizen of the kingdom of this world. There are somewhere around, it depends on how you count them, about 196 countries that populate the earth, according to the UN. Which of those countries you're born into has a dramatic, obvious, dramatic indication and an impact upon the life that you're going to live. If you are one of the lucky one out of every 23 people on this planet, you've been born and you are a citizen of this country, the United States, that has known more prosperity and comfort and ease and peace than any people on the face of the earth have ever enjoyed. And you right now are one in 23 people that are living on the planet. You've won the competition. You've won the lottery. 1 in 23. Many of those other 22 people in that group are citizens of kingdoms that have known, citizens of nations that have known nothing but poverty and famine and war for year after year after year. And what makes us worthy of it? Nothing. This is just God's plan. But what do they all have in common? Every citizen of the kingdoms of this world, every citizen of every nation on this planet, what do they all have in common? Whether they are a nation of prosperity like the United States, or a nation of utter poverty like Sierra Leone, or Liberia, or other countries that populate this earth that have so little, what is it that they all have in common? They are all citizens of a kingdom. that is coming to an end. They're all citizens of a world that is coming to an end. It's coming to a close. There's not going to be any difference. It's not going to matter whether you met the end of this life with riches or with poverty. The end is going to be the same. Every last one of you will let go of your riches or you will let go of your desire for more in this world because this world will be declared no more. And God is going to bring it to an end according to the authority of His Word. According to Peter as he told us, I am bringing it to an end. Back to Paul in the Colossians, and he says, And you who once were foreigners, you were citizens of a kingdom that had nothing promised to it except destruction. I'll share that one reality, that one thing, no matter how blessed. There's men today that are so rich, they own islands. And there are men today so poor, they have absolutely nothing but the clothes on their back and no idea where the next meal is going to come from. And health has been taken from them. And they're on the streets of countries right now without limbs, begging for their next meal. They're all the same in this regard. They are going. They are members of a country, of a nation. If they're not gods, they are members of a nation in a world and a kingdom that is going to be destroyed. Completely and utterly destroyed. When we see Christ, we realize that his kingdom, his kingdom. Is not of this world. All that we would understand this, when we are a child of God, we are now no longer a stranger and a foreigner to Christ's kingdom. We are a stranger and a foreigner now to the kingdom of this world. We are. We're supposed to be. And in reality, we are. Christ's kingdom is not of this world. That's what he said in John 18. Jesus said, My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not of this world. This is what the Pharisees struggled and stumbled that. Looking for Christ to establish a kingdom in a world that actually has already been sentenced to destruction. It was sentenced to destruction the moment sin entered it. All the way back in Genesis chapter 3. This world was sentenced to destruction when sin entered into it. Because the new heaven and the new earth that the citizens of Christ's kingdom are going to enjoy and inherit is a kingdom that will never see sin, will never see tears, will never see disease, We'll never see separation. We'll never see destruction. We'll never see darkness. We'll never see the thief come in. We'll never see burden, and toil, and worry, and uncertainty, and all of these things. This kingdom that we've been transferred into, as Paul said earlier, is one that is a perfect, and is perfect. This world, once sin entered into it, the clock began to tick to its utter and end destruction. And you, Paul reminds these Colossian people, as they're dealing with this false doctrine of the Gnostics, the Judaizers, all of these different errors that began to creep into the church, does Paul begin to knock them off and take aim at those individual false doctrines? No, he points them to Christ, and then in pointing them to Christ, he then says, and then you remember, don't you, Colossians, that you were once foreigners. aliens to this kingdom of God. You were strangers to this kingdom of God. As the light of the gospel dawns in our hearts, we come to realize that we are as sinners, foreigners to Christ's kingdom and are bound to this earthly kingdom. And further, we are unable to change it. You remember that you've been saved. You remember God bringing the reality of your lost condition to your mind and to your heart and you realized it and it dawned on you. Maybe you'd heard sermon after sermon after sermon all your life long been brought to church. Maybe if you could remember you heard sermons in your mother's womb and yet one day it changed. God lets you know you are a stranger to me. You are a foreigner to me. You are not my child. You are not a citizen of my kingdom. And when you realize that, you then realized I can't change my citizenship. I can't go down to this, to the to the court of God and sign some document that says I want to be a member of God's kingdom. There had to be something happen. Because not only were you a foreigner, a stranger to God's kingdom, Paul said as well in verse 21, not only that you were alienated, but that you were an enemy. We don't like to think of ourselves that way. We don't like to think of ourselves, even in our lost state, that we were enemies of God, but that is precisely how the scripture labels us. We were enemies. Paul says to the Colossians, you remember how you were foreigners and strangers to this kingdom, but not only that, you also remember that you were an enemy. Many don't appreciate the truth of this teaching of this reality. Before we were reconciled to Christ, though, we were his enemy. We were not neutral. There is no such thing as spiritual Switzerland. We were enemies of Christ. Enemies to Him. And you might say, I'm not an enemy. It does not matter what you say. God has labeled you that if you're lost. You are an enemy to God. We were not neutral. There's no such thing as neutral. Jesus says it as pointedly as He can in Matthew 12. He that is not with me is against me. In our politically correct world, it's not acceptable to most to make such a claim as this. It's uncomfortable. We people are made to feel uncomfortable when they are told that they're an enemy of God. We don't want to hurt their feelings. It seems, again, as though the worst thing you can do to somebody today is hurt their feelings. And it has shackled God's people. It has allowed us to pull back. from telling them the truth because we're worried about hurting their feelings. I'm going to tell you this right now. You are not going to lament that your feelings were hurt for eternity. You are going to lament that you did not admit the truth of what was being said and come in repentance towards God in faith in Christ. That's what you will regret. But in our politically clerical world, we're not supposed to make people feel uncomfortable. We're supposed to pass over this truth. But you were an enemy to God when you were lost. And if you remain lost today, you are an enemy to Christ by the word of God. If you're not saved, you're not neutral. You're not neutral. You are in open rebellion to the king of kings and the Lord of Lords. Open rebellion. You stand today as an enemy of the cross, an enemy of the one who holds your life in his hands, the one who created all things, remember? The one for whom all things were created, the one who holds all things together, the one who is to be preeminent in all things. This is your enemy. This is the one before whom you are rebelling. There was a senator, a U.S. senator, one time he went to examine one of our nuclear weapons facilities. He found out and he was told that the hydrogen bombs that they had could blow the earth off its axis by 16 degrees. That was the claim. Scientists in examining that claim actually have said, no, that's not true. We've all heard that though, right? Nuclear weapons, if they all exploded at the same time, it literally knocked the Earth off its axis. Science is now telling us that that's not true. There is no known power in all of nature that could do such a thing to upset the Earth. A strong earthquake involves as much energy as would be supplied by a million atomic bombs and a thousand hydrogen bombs. And it would not knock us off the orbit that God has set us in. But God can. God is holder of this world by his very breath, he could blow this earth out of its orbit. His very thought could do the same. Is there any greater description of our fallen nature than this? We as unbelievers stood and as unbelievers yet today stand in opposition to this God of unimaginable power and might, benevolence and glory and love and mercy and grace and righteousness and justice. We stand with weapons in hand against him. One of the first steps towards salvation is to surrender. Surrender absolutely and without qualification. I surrender all, as the song says, all to Him. All to Him I give, all to Him I owe. I surrender and without reservation, I lay my weapons down at His feet. I surrender. World War II would have been over long before it ultimately ended if Eisenhower and the other leaders of the Allies would have been accepting of a Hitler forced or compromised treaty. They said, no, there must be complete and total surrender. Many people today fail to get truly saved because they're not willing to surrender all. They come to some kind of confused idea in their minds that they've bought off God by going to church on Sunday, giving their tithes, living a good moral life. None of these things changes the fact that you're an enemy to God until you've been changed by Him. We are enemies. And it goes on in verse 21 to say, in our mind. As you do some study of that phrase in the Greek, the idea is that it's literally a particular manner or way of thinking. We are enemies to God. We were enemies. Those of us that are saved, the Colossians, as Paul says, and you who are strangers, who were alienated, who were enemies and enemies in your mind, your very way of thinking was adversarial to God. Your very way of thinking made you an enemy of God. Our willful standing as an enemy to Christ is one of the most imaginable truths of life. Why would anyone rebel against this King, as we said a moment ago? Why? What kind of thought process does it take for us to say, I am going to stand as an enemy to God? A child with a stick would have a greater chance of overcoming a grown man's army with weapons of mass destruction than you have of successfully standing against the God of heaven and earth. And yet you do. And you say, no, I don't. And I would simply tell you that that is exactly what he's talking about, your way of thinking. God's truth in this and our response to that truth. Men often they speak in their arrogance against God. We've seen them. You've seen them. Maybe young people, you hear them in the hallways. We speak against God in our arrogance. We mock him. We claim that we don't believe in him. These are all children throwing rocks at a cement wall, expecting it to fall down. Our very way of thinking, according to the scripture, makes us an enemy of God before he changes us, who we were, what we were. How can it be that we would stand as an enemy to God? The answer, again, is our very way of thinking as unregenerated sinners is contrary to the truth. We're set here to be enemies in our mind. in our very thought process, in the very way we think, an unbeliever thinks they're okay. an unbeliever who is a foreigner to God, who is alienated from Him, who is distanced from Him, who is an enemy of His. They think they're okay. In fact, many of them think it is the Christian who has lost his mind and is living his life based upon a lie. But it is their very way of thinking that makes them an enemy to God. And it is God that then shines the light of truth into our hearts, so that we then see the truth and understand the truth. and see Him for who He is, see the world for what it is, as passing away. But an unbeliever in their very way of thinking thinks they're okay, and they could not be further from that. Their thoughts don't change a thing about who God is. It does not affect one moment, one part of their standing before Him. This, again, by the way, is why as God's people, Paul instructs us in Romans chapter 12 to renew our minds, our way of thinking by the scripture, by prayer. by fellowship with other believers, other church members. We are to think more and more like a child of God and less and less like the world. There is really little that is more alarming to me personally than the apparent evidence that's all around us of just how unlike God, even His people are thinking today. Don't think like He's told us to think. We measure ourselves by this fallen culture that is diving deeper and deeper into sin. And as that culture dives deeper and deeper into sin, we don't go down and meet them, but it's pulling us down the way that we think, too, instead of holding the line of Scripture in our life. No, God does own me and all that I have. The least I am to do is to offer my life a living sacrifice to him. The most reasonable, rational thing for me to do is that. Paul says that I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable unto God, which is your rational, your reasonable service. and be not conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Renew your mind. As an unbeliever, your mind, the way you think, makes you an enemy of God. And outside of being reconciled to Christ, your thoughts will simply take you further and further down the road of being an enemy. Not only were you a foreigner, a stranger, not only were you an enemy in your mind, but according to the scripture, Paul says, and you who sometime were alienated and enemies and worked evil. Doing evil deeds is verse 21 in the ESV. doing evil deeds, working evil as foreigners to God's kingdom, as enemies of His in your mind, unsaved people ultimately work evil. And I remind you again, there's no neutral in this warfare. There's no neutral ground. There's no middle ground. There's no gray area. There's no third choice. There's no third option. There is no heaven, hell, or something else. It's one or the two. Jesus says, you're with me, or you are against me. And you, he says, the Colossians, who were once alienated and foreigners, to me, who were my enemies, not only were you enemies in the way you thought, but because you were enemies in the way you thought, your actions and your deeds followed, and you weren't evil. doing evil deeds. We are not neutral. One of the striking and even controversial truths of Scripture is this, that we are talking about now, that anything we do that is not geared to glorifying God is sin. That's deep, hard things for us to hear. But when you spend one minute, one hour, one day consumed with your own wants and your own desires, you are spending time that is not yours. It's not yours. Anything that we then do, anything that we do, every lost person as a lost person, every second that ticks off the clock is a second that you spend in open rebellion to God. And every second that ticks off the clock, that a child of God forgets who he was, who he is, is a second that is lost. To honor and glorify God. Outside of being reconciled to Christ, you can work nothing but iniquity. It's not my opinion. Job says it this way. How much more abominable and filthy is man which drinketh down iniquity like water? Just drink it down like water. And boy, we can look at our culture and we can watch them take gulp after gulp after gulp of iniquity. Just drink it down like water. Matthew 7, 23, Jesus says it. I will profess unto them, I never knew you depart from me, you neutral people. No, you workers of iniquity, enemies. It's perhaps one of the greatest dangers of this entitlement culture that we are seeped in, that we are dipped in daily. People actually believe that their lives are theirs. Let me challenge you. Do you actually believe that your life is yours? Maybe you would never admit that out loud, maybe you'd say just the opposite, but is it really what you believe deep down? My life is not mine. You're going to have a hard time tempting somebody with entitlement when they grab a hold of this truth that even my life isn't mine. My days are not mine, my time is not mine, nothing is mine, it is his. But it is one of the greatest dangers of the entitlement culture and age in which we live. People think their lives are actually theirs. They fail to realize they owe everything that they are and everything that they have to God. A life which is consumed in the never-ending pursuit of personal gratification is a life that can only be described as one that has lived as an enemy of God. It's the only way you can describe it. Even the good things that we do turn out to be nothing more than the claims of our own to attempt to take credit for something that God alone deserves the credit for. Our righteousness is as filthy rags. In our natural condition, who we were were sinners, foreigners, enemies, workers of nothing but evil. That's the material God had to work with when he saved you. That's the material he had to work with when he saved you. An enemy whose very thoughts run counter to himself. There's surely no room to boast in there. There's surely not room to slide in any credit to a preacher To ourselves, to a song, to grandma, to mom, to dad, to a deacon, to a teacher. None of this. There's no room. There's no room for anything but Christ being glorified and the fact that he saves lost sinners. And Paul reminds the Colossians again of just who they were. Wretched, alone, rebellious, afraid, uncertain, lost and undone, as David put it, in a horrible pit, miry clay. That's who you were when God saved you. That's who you are if you're not yet saved. I need to have some. Who are they now? Verse 21, yet now hath he reconciled. Reconciled means to bring together two parties that once were in hostility to one another. That's what the word, the idea of reconciliation means. It is to be reconciled to someone where there was once hostility, now there is fellowship. There is friendship. But we must ask ourselves this question. How is it that a man who is an enemy of God can be made to be his friend? How is this even possible? How does this happen? How do we go from being God's enemy? literally in the way that we think, to being one who willingly, joyfully, and unashamedly bows at His feet, and offers Him praise, and gives Him our life. How does this happen? How can this happen? If we are the enemy that Paul described, in such a way as he described, wholly given to drinking down iniquity like water, and rebellious to God, how can we ever become His friend? How can reconciliation ever be accomplished? The answer is we've been reconciled to God by Christ. The hostility has been set aside. Friendly relations have been established. We've been brought together with Christ, but we realize here that it was God who initiated the reconciliation. It was Him who came to us to reconcile. We didn't go to Him. We didn't go to Him. We must now ask, how can we be reconciled to God if we are His enemy? How does reconciliation between a God and man take place? There are many who misunderstand this process and they are left with an empty religion, empty promises that says, you can go to God and you can reconcile on your own by making a decision, by doing a good deed, by living a good life. Think about it for a minute. If man is an enemy of God in the very way that he thinks, How can a man ever become the friend of God alone, apart from the working of God in his heart? It would be impossible. Impossible. Were it not for God's desire to reconcile, you and I would have no hope in eternity. Because we were his enemy. In the ancient world, it's actually opposite of what we see in scripture, the ancient world, The obligation for reconciliation was on the part of the one who had done the offending. The one who had offended somebody else, who had harmed someone else. It was their obligation to go to them, accept fault, tell them their fault, and ask for forgiveness. It was the offender's obligation to go and to make reconciliation. But I thank God that's not how this reconciliation comes about between God and man. It is the one who was offended who comes to us. He says, you have offended me. You are a sinner. According to this process in the ancient world, it would be our obligation to go to God in the first place, but that's not how Scripture reveals it. It just isn't from the very first to the last. From Genesis, when God goes to Adam and Eve, to the end when He simply says, again, come to drink of the fountain of the waters of life. I am coming to you to give you an opportunity to be reconciled to Me. In regard to being reconciled to Christ, it's not how things work. It is God who comes to us and seeks reconciliation. We should be done. We need nothing more to praise God for the unending age of eternity than to realize that He came to me. And He had no obligation to do so. No obligation to do so. We would never truly even see our offensiveness to God if He didn't show it to us. Romans 3.11, no one understands, no one seeks for God. It's the emphatic negative in the Greek. It means no one, no exceptions, no one seeks God. Includes you. Scripture teaches plainly and repeatedly that apart from God's willing approach to us, we would simply remain His enemy. There's no one in heaven right now, by the way, no one in heaven that you would tap on the shoulder and none of them would say, I am here because what I did first. Every one of them says, I am here because God came to me. God came to me. Incredible. Unspeakable grace. Second Corinthians 519. to wit that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their sin unto them, and hath committed unto them the word of reconciliation God added in mind all the while. Every child of God sings for joy in their hearts and minds, no doubt as they think on this unthinkable truth. God came to me. God came to me. I was the offender and yet he came to me. Adam was the offender, yet God came and said, Adam, where are you? Not because he didn't know where he was, because Adam needed to think about where he was. I was the offender. I was the one that picked up arms and took up arms against this God of heaven and earth. I did that, and He came to me to reconcile. In fact, He sent Christ apart from my knowledge and even will, and He sent Him to reconcile. How? In verse 20, to reconcile all things unto Himself. And let me tell you, there's another reality of the word reconciliation that talks about putting things in balance, putting things in their right place, and all of creation one day will be put in its right place before God, saint and sinner. Saints, their joy in heaven forever at the mercy of God and sinner in their eternal destruction in hell, it will all be reconciled. The accounting is coming. And it's going to be reconciled in accounting. We have that practice of reconciling bank statements, reconciling financial statements, making sure it's right and it balances. There's going to be a eternal Reckoning and reconciling. But God reconciled those that have come to him in belief and faith. And we are now reconciled with Christ. What is the means that this happened? How did this happen? And I'll just speak briefly on this in verse 22, in the body of his flesh through death. That's how the reconciliation was made possible. That's how reconciliation with God was made possible. Paul begins here to attack. and to address one of the doctrines that were false, that were beginning to seep into the church, which was the Gnostic idea that Jesus did not have a physical body, that he was not really man, he was something different, he wasn't real. And Paul puts that to rest here and says, look, reconciliation is impossible without the physical death of our physical Savior, Jesus Christ. He did die for you. He died for you. You know what I thought about as I looked at this and considered it again, I wonder, I wonder how often, if ever, we have really stopped and just sat in quiet solitude before God and thought about those last few moments of the life of our Lord on the cross. Yes, he died. But as he did so, he experienced death. He felt the last breath go out of his lungs. He saw the last scene of the mockery and the soldiers and the apathy of those unbelievers, and he saw it all. And then his eyes closed and he felt death. As he gave up the ghost and laid his life down. And he died. That is the means of reconciliation. Christ's death on the cross. As I often say, we could plant our tent there and remain, but we'll move on the reason why. Why? This is marvelous. God has reconciled us. You who once were aliens and enemies of God in your mind, working evil, now hath he reconciled. Why? Why would he do such a thing? What is in it for him? There are a lot of people today who have a very unbiblical idea of why, but what was the ultimate purpose? Why were you saved? Why did God choose to reconcile you? The scriptures tell us exactly why, but sadly many miss it. Many claim God sought reconciliation because somehow there was something missing in Him when man sinned, and He needed to reconcile it for He Himself to be whole. This isn't true. It's not biblical. God is independent. He was whole and in fellowship with Himself in the Trinity before He created the world, and He is whole and in fellowship forever, independent of this creation. Job 4.11 Who has first given to me, God says, that I should repay him. Whatever is under the whole heaven is mine. I don't need anything, he says. I don't need anything that you have to give me. Paul said in Acts, as he was speaking to those in Athens, he says, God's not worshipped by men's hands with temples that we create. He doesn't need anything. Why did God then reconcile us? Why? It's not because he needed us. Psalm 50, 10 through 12. Every beast of the forest is mine. The cattle on a thousand hills. I know all the birds of the hills and all the moves in the field is mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell you. God says for the world and its fullness are mine. So he didn't need us. Why then did he do it? He tells us. Verse 22. Read it again. Reconciled us in the body of his flesh through death. Here's why. In order to present you holy and unblameable and unreprovable in his sight. That's why he did it. not because he needed us not because he wanted us not because he looked well not because he looked down and saw something in us that was worth saving, not because he desired to fulfill something in himself that was missing after the fall, not because of any of that, and also not so that our lives can be filled with the three car garage and the financial security and the great relationships and the wonderful jobs and the wonderful life and the wonderful house and all of these roses that the televangelist and the prosperity preacher of the day will tell you. Not any of that. That is not why God saved you. He saved you to present you in His sight, holy and unblameable and unreprovable. That's why He did it. To present you in this. Now, all of these things bring blessings to our life that are untold and unimaginable. And we just language, human language cannot express it adequately enough. But He reconciled you. from who you were to who you are. The reason he did it was because one day he's going to present you this way. And if I want to encourage you with anything today, if you are saved here today, you are going to be presented that way to God. You're going to be. Ezekiel tells us, God says, I will sprinkle clean water upon you and you shall be clean from all your filthiness and from all your idols. And I will cleanse you. What God cleans, He cleans entirely. We're going to be presented that way to God one day. If you've been reconciled to God, this is your final destination and final state. This is what we ought to be striving for in our life, to just be moving even a little bit in that direction. To be presented that way to Him. Now, how can we have assurance as I close? How do we know this has happened? Well, the scripture tells us it's just as plain as it can be. If you continue in verse 23 in the faith. Grounded and settled and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel. We're very nervous when it comes to this kind of idea that the assurance of our salvation is if we continue, because oftentimes people will go to a place of, well, then if you ever sin again, you're clearly not one of his children. You clearly weren't reconciled. And that's not at all what this is talking about. Example after example, after example, in scripture of believers, true believers in God who fell from their place, David, Peter, Solomon, others, Samson, so many examples. But the point is this, if you do continue grounded, which is to be to have a foundation Let me ask you this, is your faith in Christ the grounding, the foundation of your life? Is He still the fundamental truth in your life? Settled means not subject to change. The trials of life don't unsettle your faith. They serve rather to strengthen it. Because you see God in the midst. not moved away. That means to cause a state to cease, to be shaken from one place and moved to another. The moment of conversion is obviously necessary. There is a moment of conversion of salvation whereby God changes you, He reconciles you, He justifies you, He then begins the process of sanctification in your life, and you then are not moved away from that reality, though you will stumble and you will fall and you will deal with sin while you are in this tabernacle of flesh. There is something within you that is grounded and settled and will not and cannot move you away from trust in God, even in you strip everything away that's there. Take everything away from you that remains. If there's something else that is in that place, Something else that you go to that is your fundamental place of certainty and assurance outside of Christ and a faith in Him. I fear you've not been reconciled. Because this is how we can know, according to Scripture. A couple of concluding thoughts. There is no room for human pride. We've said that. Not room for one drop of it. not one whisper of pride. Yet, we must not forget what Christ has done through reconciling us to Himself. As the light of Christ grows in our life, and then it casts its light upon us, and then we read in Scripture where Paul turns our eyes and says, And you, in light of who He is, you, who once were foreigners, enemies in your minds doing evil works. Now have he reconciled. He has brought you together. There's no longer animosity there. There is love and worship and praise and honor of God. There's no room for pride, but there is room for glorying in what Christ has made us. Changed us. From a foreigner to a citizen, from an enemy to a friend. We have been reconciled if you've been saved. This will, if we just grab a hold of this, just a little piece of it, it will encourage our hearts to meet the ungodliness of this world and face every false doctrine and false idea that threatens to overwhelm the godliness that yet remains in our life. seeing this. Reconciled. We are that have been saved. Reconciled to God.