Please take your Bible now and turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 5. We're making our way through this book. It's a powerful book. i've been blessed by my study in preparation for preaching and have enjoyed and delighted in preaching some of the verses that are in second corinthians that have been lifelong precious to me the heart of the gospel is resonating here and misconceptions that people have in our day that they even preach about about life it seems like so many people have it in their heads that if they're a christian they're not going to suffer or if they have enough faith they're not going to have a hard time and second corinthians just shows you if there's anybody In the history of the followers of Christ that suffered, it was the Apostle Paul. And certainly what he did and what we see in his life displays faith for sure. So that is definitely poured out to us. And then this morning as we open in 2 Corinthians 5 and continue where we've been going, we see just the heartbeat of the gospel coming out to us. I was talking to a man this week as we were both waiting in an office, and just a few words being exchanged between us, he began sharing with me how his daughter no longer spoke to him. A daughter who has a daughter. And clearly this was a pain to him. It was cutting very deeply. There was an absence of peace in this family. There was a need for reconciliation. His daughter dropped all contact and just won't even talk to him anymore. And I was sharing with them that, you know, you're not alone. We live in a world of people who are just at odds with each other. And in there, being at odds, unwilling to talk, and people's hearts are breaking today. Sadly, heartache is rampant everywhere, and suffering the pain and heartache of broken relationships is something that is not uncommon whatsoever. If there ever was a generation that should appreciate the need of reconciliation, it's the generation in which you and I live. And as we think about reconciliation, we should think about the most important relationship that needs reconciliation, and that is the relationship between man and God. And that's exactly what Paul is talking about this morning. Would you please stand with me? for the reading of God's Word, 2 Corinthians 5, 18, through verse 2, verse 2 of chapter 6. Paul writes, All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. That is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and has entrusted to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making His appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. Working together with Him then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For He says, In a favorable time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you. Behold, now is the favorable time. Behold, now is the day of salvation. Let's pray together. Father, as we come to your word today, we come hungry. Lord, we come desiring to be fed. We come thirsty. We come desiring for our thirst to be quenched with truth. We come desiring, Lord, that you would pour out your word upon our Our very being in such a way that we will be enlightened, we will be strengthened, we will be brought closer to you, that the truth will ring out to us and our response will be before you today to submit, to repent, to worship, to serve, to be reconciled. with you. Thank you and we commit this time to you and pray that your glory would be revealed and we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated. So the theme of these verses seems to me to be crystallized in this word, reconciliation. And as I read the text, I see five aspects of reconciliation that stand out and what we're going to do this morning is go through each of these five. I want you to see what Paul wants the Corinthians and wants us to know and understand about this important matter of reconciliation. We start then with the meaning of reconciliation. What does it mean and what does this text tell us is the meaning of reconciliation? Well, the fact that reconciliation is the main idea in the text is fairly obvious because you can begin to count how many times we see the word in one of its forms appear. I see five times between verses 18 and 20 that Paul uses a form of the word reconcile or reconciliation. He says God reconciled us. He says God gave us the ministry of reconciliation. He says in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself. Paul writes that God entrusted us with the message of reconciliation. And Paul appeals, be reconciled to God. So this word is here, there, and everywhere in these verses. We need to explore the meaning of this idea. When we say reconcile, be reconciled, when we talk about reconciliation, of what are we speaking, of what is Paul speaking? Well, in its basic sense, reconciliation refers to the restoration of a relationship, a broken relationship that is put back together. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gave, of course, tons of instruction. But one of the things that he talked about was reconciliation. He said this, he said, if you are at the altar and you there remember that your brother has something against you, then leave your gift there, go and be reconciled to your brother and then come back and present your gift at the altar. Jesus is addressing a relationship that has been broken by the offense of the one at the altar. There at the altar, this person remembers that I have done wrong to a brother. They have something against me because I have done wrong to them. And so the instruction is of the importance of reconciliation and of the responsibility of this one who's before the altar to go and reconcile with the one that he's offended. To be again on good and peaceful terms. Well, reconciliation touches our relationship with God as well. Every sin that we commit against God violates our relationship with Him. Every human act of disobedience is an act of hostility against the Creator and Lawgiver of the world. Every sin against God is an offense to Him and brings destruction to our relationship with God. And the reason this is true is not because God is touchy. or that God is unreasonably sensitive. I mean, you offend people today and it's like, well, they are just so sensitive. And so you think about God and offending God, but sin against God is such a huge matter. It's not because God is unreasonable and it's not because God is touchy that sin creates such a barrier between us and Him. It's because He is holy, perfect, pure, and spotless. And God cannot approve of that which is a violation of His law. And He won't approve. And to act against Him is to commit treason against God. It's not just a, oh, I'm sorry, I forgot, I wasn't thinking. But it is an act of violence against God. So for reconciliation to occur, something must be done with the sin that is committed against him. These violations against God. And Paul points to this very fact when he says in verse 19 of our passage that reconciliation involves not counting trespasses against the guilty. Reconciliation involves a removal of the trespasses. Trespasses are the reason that God must punish people. So reconciliation looks squarely at the violations of the relationship, squarely at the trespasses in the relationship. Reconciliation says something must be done for the two parties to come together. The days that we live in are dark indeed. I'm just hearing stuff all the time. You say, problems abound. Well, yeah, you know problems abound, right? Think about our city. I heard this week, I believe it was, that Milwaukee is setting a record for homicides this year. I mean, it just pales other years. The killings that are going on in this city are just astronomical in their number. In fact, the rate per capita is greater than Chicago. And this is a problem! Are you happy about that? This is unacceptable! Right? We can say that all day, it's not going to make it not happen, but we cannot look and consider this problem and think, well, it's just the way it is. But what can be done to stop something so terrible as this? Well, what about other problems in our nation? It seems like our nation is being led by people, and I'm not just talking about one person in particular, I'm talking about people who are making the predominant laws that prevail in our day and enforcing predominant laws in our day. It seems that people that are leading our nation today have no regard for morality whatsoever. take all of the boundaries away, push all of the borders down. If someone feels that they want to do something, they ought to be able to do it. And nobody should say, that's wrong. That's a problem. And corresponding to that, it seems the one thing that this group of people that are leading the way in our day want to get rid of is religious liberty or liberty of conscience. The thing that if God has convicted you that this is wrong, that you should have a protection even from our government to say, you know what, you'll be protected for what you're convinced of because we don't want you to violate your conscience. And those freedoms seem to be disappearing in our day and it's terrible and we feel like something must be done. Think about those problems and then just ask yourself for a moment, what do you think is the greatest problem we face today? What's the greatest of the problems that we face? What do you think? Clearly, there's one problem that supersedes all the others. It's the problem of reconciliation, or the lack thereof. And I'm not talking about reconciliation of the races, although that would be great. I'm not talking about reconciliation of estranged families, although that's a tragedy that they are. These are problems. But the greatest problem facing the human race is this. How can sinful people be reconciled with a holy God? That's the problem. That's the issue. And this is precisely what this text is talking about this morning. The restoration of a broken relationship between people and their Creator. People that must answer to their Creator. People who violate their Creator every day. People who receive life, and breath, and health, and strength, and every ounce of happiness they ever experience, they experience because He's patient, and because He's gracious, and because He created this world, and because He grants that to them. And so the biggest question is how can we be reconciled with God? And so let's look at what Paul says in our text about the author of reconciliation. He paints a picture for us about this important idea, but he also shows us who has brought about the reality of reconciliation. The author of reconciliation. And the verses leading up to the ones we're looking at this morning, Paul was speaking of the dramatic transformation that occurs in the life of those believers, those who believe in Christ, those who are in Christ. They are changed. The new things come. Behold, the old things are passed away. There is a reorientation and a recreation. And then look what Paul says at the outset of verse 18. He says, all this is from God. Transformation doesn't just happen. Transformation, and if you're here this morning, you've come to Christ, you've experienced a life transformation. It is something that just doesn't occur in a vacuum. It is something brought about by God. Paul says, all this is from God. And not only does God bring about transformation, God also brings about reconciliation. See, Paul says, all this is from God. who through Christ reconciled us to himself. Verse 19 repeats the concept. God was reconciling the world to himself. The author of reconciliation is God. Salvation from sins involves reconciliation in our relationship with God and it's God who is the one who accomplishes this. That's a really big deal. Especially when you think about where the responsibility should lie for being reconciled. The normal course of reconciliation is that it is brought about by the one who's done the wrong. Like, if someone wrongs you, let's say, like happened a couple years ago in our neighborhood, a guy came along and beat up on Ariel's car. He made a mess of it. I get this call on a Wednesday night. We were just, it was the first, it was almost exactly now, it was on the Wednesday night that we were just getting started in the course of our normal church year and life. And I was getting ready to teach and I get this call from Ariel in tears. Somebody just beat my car up basically. So I get in the car and go running. To make a long story short, they caught the guy that did it. And we're reconciled with him because he paid restitution. You know, normally that's the way it is. If you're going to get reconciled with somebody after you've done them a wrong, you go to them and you repair the damage. That's the normal course in our human situation. Even that's what Jesus is talking about in Matthew 5 when he says, if you're offering your gift at the altar, you there remember your brother has something against you, you've done wrong to them, then leave your gift before the altar and go first be reconciled to your brother. Who is supposed to go and be reconciled? It's supposed to be the one who committed the offense. You remember your brother has something against you, you go to him and set things right. And so under the circumstances of our sins against God, we who committed the sins are the ones who by all rights should be going to God to seek reconciliation. But there's a couple of problems here. One is just the fact of our sinful nature. What has happened to us as a result of the sin of Adam in the garden? What has happened here is that we would never seek reconciliation of ourselves. We don't have a heart that disposes us to want to be reconciled. Romans 3 verse 10 quotes the Old Testament saying, none is righteous, no, not one. No one understands, no one seeks for God. And this is illustrated in the garden. Right after Adam and Eve had sinned against God and God comes into the garden and He calls Adam and Eve to account after they had sinned. And what do the man and woman do? Do they run out to greet God with tears and sorrow saying, please forgive us? No, they go behind the bush and try to hide to escape God and get away from Him. And then when God confronts them, they don't say, oh God, we're sorry, they say, No, it was their fault. In fact, they often say, God, it's your fault, because the man says, the woman, she got me to do it, so you gave me this woman, it's your fault. And the woman, she says, this serpent that you put in the garden, he's the one that convinced me to eat. So what you see, this is human nature at its best, and it's terrible. It defies and runs from the idea of reconciliation. So that's one problem by nature, No human goes to God saying, I'm sinned and I'm sorry. That's the first problem. And the second problem with us is our sins themselves. Even if we did seek reconciliation, we could not bring it about because we are incapable of satisfying the requirement for reconciliation. How can sins against God, who is holy, be set aside? Well, the world just thinks, well, let's figure this thing out. I'll just try harder. I'll just stop doing sins so much. Maybe I can start doing some religious practices and that will take care of all the wrongs I've done. It doesn't erase those things. It's not a work that we can accomplish. And so for these reasons, it puts us in quite a fix of understanding to see that we should be the ones to be going to God and begging to be reconciled. But this is not going to happen. Number one, because we don't have it in our hearts naturally to do it. And number two, even if we did, we don't have in our lives what is required. And so we can all breathe this morning because of what Paul tells us in this passage, we can all breathe a collective sigh of relief. This thing is no small matter that Paul declares that it is God who does the reconciling. It is God, God who is the one who has been offended, but God is the one who comes to the one who has offended and He does what is necessary to bring reconciliation between Himself and them. He is a wondrous God. He is merciful. He is gracious. He abounds in loving kindness. He is worthy to come to, to bow down before, to serve, and He is worthy to be reconciled to. He is the author of reconciliation. Now there's a third thing in this text I want you to see about reconciliation. Not only do we see the meaning, we see the author, but we also see this morning, we see the means. How is it that God could bring about reconciliation? The means of reconciliation is front and center in the message of reconciliation. The means of God's reconciliation of sinners is the person of Christ. I mean, again, this is something Paul doesn't say once, but he says over and over in this text. Notice verse 18, God through Christ. reconciled us to himself. And again notice verse 19, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself. And then verse 21 explains how God through Christ brought about reconciliation. Here's what he did. Look at that verse. To sum it up, you could say it this way. God made the sinless Savior sinful, so the sinners might be made righteous. That's what He did. That's how He brought reconciliation about. Jesus Christ is the sinless Savior. In living His life on earth, His mission in every day and in every moment was to fulfill all righteousness. It was to fully submit to the law of God and completely fulfill all righteousness. It was to make sure that every detail of the demands of God and the standard of God were fulfilled. He knew no sin. He never once did Christ fail to embody and fulfill the demands of righteousness before God. He always did everything exactly the way the Father requires. To say he knew no sin is to say that he did not experience sin by committing it. Certainly he knows what sin is, but he never knew it in his heart. He never had a heart to disobey and he never did anything in the act of disobedience to God. Not even in the slightest way did Jesus fail perfectly to perfectly obey God. Hebrews 4 says that He was tempted in every respect as we are, yet without sin. God gave the ceremonial law in the Old Testament to the Israelites. in part so that we would have a picture of the true heaven. And God showed that to be right with God requires something. It requires a payment. It requires sacrifice. The temple was a place of sacrifice. The Holy of Holies, the presence of God being manifest in that place. Then the offerings were brought to the altar and presented to God for God to cleanse uncleanness, and make people acceptable to Him. And the sacrifices that were brought to be offered were always characterized by this requirement that they had to be perfect. No blemish. No spot, no irregularities. Don't bring your leftovers. Don't bring the worst of your lambs to sacrifice to God. Bring the best. Bring that which is perfect. And so God established priests to minister before Him in the temple, bringing these sacrifices to Him for sins. No sacrifice would be accepted that wasn't perfect and without blemish. And in the fullness of time, God wants us to see that when He sent Jesus, He sent forth His own Son who had no blemish or spot or He had no failure whatsoever, not one defect, because this is the requirement. for reconciliation, a sacrificial offering without defect. And in the fullness of time, God made his sinless son to be sin in the place of sinners. Their sin is transferred to him in the law. People would put their hands on the sacrifice to confess their sins over this sacrifice. And this this this animal was then actively sacrificed as bearing the penalty that was due the one who put their hands on the head. And so Christ came and was in the place of human beings. God's provided perfect sacrifice that was demanded for reconciliation. He was punished for the sins of others. He suffered for our sake. As we read in Isaiah this morning, Isaiah put it like this. All we like sheep have gone astray. Each one of us has turned to his own way. And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all he was pierced for our transgressions he was crushed for our iniquities upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace and by his wounds we are healed he bore the penalty of the sinners so that the sinners might bear the reward of his pure and holy life That's good news. We have nothing pure to offer to God. We cannot pay the penalty unless we're paying it eternally and never able to pay it fully. This is the essence of the gospel. This is how God solved the greatest problem in the history of mankind. If you think about it, religions, and I don't look at Christ's command to follow Him and trust in Him and live for Him. I don't look at it. It's not a religion. But there are all kinds of things which vie for the call of Christ to follow Him, which are religions. Man invented ways to try to solve what man perceives to be the biggest problem in the universe. I mean, some religions see the suffering of humanity as the biggest problem in the universe. And they create a religion to deal with the question and issue of overcoming suffering. And some religions look at it more like, well, I've got to find my place in this universe. And my place in it is somewhere out in nothingness. And so that's where we're going with this thing. But the great problem in the universe actually, as we've said before, is this. How can sinful man be made right with holy God? And the answer is what we find in Scripture. Not something, not an answer that any human being came up with. No, this is God's answer to that question. And His answer is that He has taken care of the problem. He sent His own Son as a sinless human being to bear the punishment, do human sin, to provide satisfaction, what He requires in order that human beings might be acceptable to Him. God has done this in Jesus Christ. That is the gospel. That's good news. That's what we mean when we say that's the gospel. That's good news. That's the good news. You know what? And this helps me so much when I'm sitting there thinking about all the problems we got in our land and in our city and our state today. And I'm going, you know what? I'm just depressed. But let's look at things in their greatest sense of reality. And the reality is this. There may be a lot of stuff going on that just disheartens and disturbs me and you too. But ultimately, the most important matter has been taken care of by God. So I can get all disturbed and all worked up and all agitated about things today, but I can always, in the midst of all of that, be comforted. At least I know. By Christ, I've been reconciled. God has reconciled me to himself through Christ. I will stand before God one day, but I will stand before Him as clothed not with my sin, but with the righteousness of Christ, because I have come to Christ and been reconciled with God through Him. Now this means of reconciliation that we see in Jesus leads to what Paul emphasizes in this passage also, which is a plea for reconciliation based on God's work. The plea to the world is God's plea. God uses human voices, but the appeal comes from God. And God's appeal to the human race is to be reconciled to God. It comes out very clearly in verse 20. Look there. Paul says, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us, we implore you on behalf of Christ. Be reconciled to God. There remains something that must be done. Christ has come, Christ has died, God has come, God is calling out, but something must be done. The appeal must be heard and it must be submitted to. What must we do? be reconciled. We must be reconciled based on what God has done. An ambassador, obviously, is an important person who represents one nation to another. And it was no less true in the days in which Paul was writing. The ambassadors represented kings and rulers to other nations, and what they said was taken as being the very words that the king or the ruler of the nation that they represented would be saying. That is the essence of being an ambassador. So if an ambassador is in a foreign country, he speaks for his king, and the king that he's talking to there hears the words of this ambassador as though they are coming from the king. Because that is the authority that's been granted to this ambassador. Now what they said was taken in this way. And the purpose of an ambassador was to secure and maintain good and friendly relations between the nations. It was not, however, the custom of the great and mightier nations to send out ambassadors to the smaller, more insignificant nations. Because, I mean, for example, take it for Rome. What would it matter to Rome if a little insignificant nation out here didn't want to have peaceful relations with Rome? No big deal. We're the big guy on the block. You mess with us, we'll mow you down. But it did behoove the smaller nations to send ambassadors to the bigger ones because the bigger ones were a threat to them. And so they sent those ambassadors. Many of them came to Rome. And they would try to meet with the Roman government leaders constantly in order to bear out and keep good, peaceful relations because Rome was a threat. If there's anybody you wanted to be friends with in that day, it was Rome. This is striking. Because again, we look at this picture. Who is it in God's creation? that goes as, who sends ambassadors? Is it the big guy? Is it the big man or the little? You see, in this case, it's not the little country that sends an ambassador to the big one seeking help and relations. In this case, in reality, God, the owner and ruler of the universe, dispatches ambassadors to go with His word to the people out there who are under the threat of his punishment under the threat of cosmic justice. And he calls and he says to them through these ambassadors, he speaks and he says, be reconciled to me. They call out saying, be reconciled to God. God, the owner of the universe, is sending out ambassadors to make a plea. And see how powerful it is that Paul expresses this plea the way he does. He says, God is making his appeal through us. We implore you. on behalf of Christ. Be reconciled to God. Now there's a number of reasons for him to implore people. You implore somebody, you are asking them in the strongest possible, emotionally charged request. This is the most, there is not, I don't know of a word in human language that expresses the urgency of a request like this word implore. Maybe it's beseech in past days. A question asked, the request made with all the urgency and with all the emotion, with everything is on the line when you come to implore someone of something. So Paul says this is the plea that God is making. God makes this plea through his ambassadors to people who are under his judgment. And his plea is this. I sent my own son. To bear the penalty of your sin. I have brought about the work of reconciliation. Now I appeal to you to be reconciled to me. In other words, God is saying, you don't have to do anything. You can't contribute anything, but you just need to accept it and come. You just need to put down your weapons. You just need to put down your life. And you need to come to me and accept from me what I've done for you. And we'll be reconciled. The almighty, invincible ruler of the universe sends out ambassadors among the people of the world. Not because he's threatened by them, but because they will be threatened by him if they are not reconciled. God is merciful. God is patient. He is kind and benevolent. He deserves worship and he deserves. Reconciliation. And he appeals to you today. And there are some in this room who have not responded to his appeals to your life in previous days, this morning, God is appealing to you and I am imploring you Be reconciled to God. There is no greater matter in your life than being reconciled with God. There is no grander offer in all of your life and in all of the universe than the offer that comes from God of reconciliation. And there would be no greater act of... It would be, what is it then to refuse such a grand offer? Well, it's not smart, is it? It is detrimental. It is dangerous. and it is an act of continued treason against God when He has come to you and He appeals to you and says to you, come and be reconciled to me. And you say, ah, I'm too busy. Or you say, I've got other things to do in my life. You've got pressure and stress and you've got to work tomorrow. One day you're going to stand before Him. What are you going to say then? Paul implores people, the stakes could not be greater. And he does this because the time is now. Look what he says in verses 1 and 2 of chapter 6. The grace of God here, I think, is seen as the gospel coming. God's grace has come. The gospel has come. Do not, he says, do not receive the grace of God in vain. Do not hear the gospel in vain. Do not hear it and turn away. For now is the favorable time. Now is the day when God is offering this to you. God is calling now. When God visits you with an offer of peace, you better take it. Seize the offer while it's still on the table. The urgency is for everyone in this room who has yet to take the offer to do it now. Now, there's one more message in this text, one more aspect of reconciliation that I see, which I need to point out in this case to those who have accepted the offer of peace, those who have been reconciled with God. And this last point is to look at the ministry of reconciliation. Verse 18 says, God gave us the reconciled, the ministry of reconciliation. Verse 19 says he entrusted to us the message of reconciliation. And verse 20 says that we are ambassadors for Christ. God appeals through us. We implore you to be reconciled to God. And then in verse one, Paul says this, and it's striking, working together with God, we appeal to you. The ministry of reconciliation is a glorious ministry. Every reconciled person is called to the ministry of reconciliation. And the ministry of reconciliation is to preach the message of reconciliation to those who need to be reconciled. And it is to implore them to be reconciled to God. And it is to preach the message of Christ, who is the sinless one who became sin. He was made sin by God so that we who are united with him become. the righteousness of God and stand reconciled to God. We've been given this message to preach and proclaim and we have been given the urgency to say to others, be reconciled to God. I can tell you this morning, on the basis of this passage, that you don't need necessarily to go through a whole course of study in order to be able to be equipped to preach the gospel to people. You can turn to 2 Corinthians 5 and you can say, look what verse 21 says, and you can say, God is appealing through me to you, be reconciled. What do you say to a lost person? What do they need? They need to be reconciled to God. And God has come to them in the point of a person to ask them, to request, to draw upon them, to come. And it is a glorious truth that Paul brings out when he goes back to this ambassadorship. And he talks about how the fact it is that when you share, and when you preach, when you proclaim, when you tell someone this truth of the gospel, that it is God who's the one that's actually doing it. You and I are His ambassadors. We speak with His authority. And that really brings up the seriousness of those who refuse. But I want to give you another, hopefully a dose of encouragement here in your going and in your speaking. Do you see what Paul says in chapter 6, verses 1 and 2? Being then fellow workers with God. I don't know about you, but that helps me because sometimes I don't think I'm a very good witness. I think I should have said that and I should have said this and you know, I just didn't do this. Well, what I fail to see when I think like that is that I'm not the only one working. There is a reason why God has given me the message. That's because I'm weak and frail, and the display of the gospel coming through me is to point out that the power is not mine, it's God's. It's kind of glorious when you can think of everything you didn't do right when you were sharing. You look at the textbook case of here's how you should share the gospel. You go through, I was talking to so and so, and I didn't do that, and I didn't do that, and I didn't do that, and guess what? They heard. And they believed. And they were reconciled. Because it's not you who's doing it, it's God. And so one of the things that can encourage you, do you ever feel like, you know, I'm just weak and incapable, I'm a horrible witness? Well, maybe it's because you don't open your mouth. But if you open your mouth, that is good. As long as you don't speak untruth. But if you just say, God wants you to be reconciled with Him, you're a sinner. The Bible says, I love you. And I'm appealing to you on the basis of the blood of Christ. God is a co-worker, and God will do the work. Here is why you just keep on doing it. You don't stop, but sometimes maybe you want, why do I even try? Nobody ever seems to respond. Why do you keep on doing it? Why should you keep on doing it? When you speak to others, you speak as God's authorized ambassador. God himself is speaking through you. You have this treasure in a jar of clay for the glory of his power. Take seriously, therefore, the ministry of reconciliation, but do not be overwhelmed by it. You know, I guess one thing came to my mind as I was thinking, illustration, illustration. You know, the University of Wisconsin, since it's kickoff Sunday, I'm going to put one football illustration out here, okay? So the University of Wisconsin football team has a reputation. If there's any team in the nation that has this reputation, they have a reputation for having a great offensive line. They have such a good offensive line that I think I could win the Heisman Trophy if I was a tailback as Wisconsin. Not because I'm a great runner, but because I'm on a great team. An offensive line that opens up holes so I can run right through them. You could drive a train through some of those holes. God is that kind of co-worker when it comes to the Gospel. You see, things that you cannot do in sharing the Gospel are the very things He does. You see, one of the things we've seen about Paul in 2 Corinthians is that for those who are lost, there is a veil that lies upon their hearts and they are incapable of appraising that which is spiritual. God is the one who takes the veil off. God is the one who replaces an old heart of stone with a heart of flesh. God is the one who brings sinners to himself. But he uses you and me to get the joy of speaking the gospel. Those who believe are reconciled. And how, therefore, can we keep silent? That's our guilt. That's our wrong is our silence. We need not to worry so much about what we say as worrying that we don't say anything at all. We're His ambassadors. The King has sent us to go tell the world that this world is going to meet this King one day. And judgment is going to ensue. And they must seek reconciliation now! while the offer is on the table before the day comes and it's withdrawn and the judgment takes place. It's terribly sad the amount of hostility and dissension that destroys human relationships all around us. People refuse to swallow their pride and seek reconciliation with other people. But the great tragedy of the day is that people refuse to swallow their pride and repent of their sins and be reconciled to God, who is reaching out and demonstrating that he is willing to put our trespasses behind him. The message of reconciliation is a glorious one. And there's not a sinner who has a good reason to reject that offer. We have every reason who are who are reconciled to proclaim that offer. And so, you know, if there's anything that we should be responding to this morning as we close, look, if you're not. a believer in Jesus Christ there I hope that you won't be able to leave this place without having said today that there's one thing that was brought to your attention above all others you need to be reconciled and I implore you on behalf of God himself be reconciled and then I speak to those of us who are reconciled by faith in Jesus that we take from this passage the urgency of the calling of we who are reconciled to be ambassadors and to make the appeal of God in the world in which we live. There is no hope for this world in the things it's seeking and the things it's finding and the things it's doing. The only hope for the world in which we live is Jesus and we need to proclaim his gospel to it. Let's pray. Lord God, I pray that you just help us to take from this passage this morning The message that clearly applies to us, and I have no doubt that there are some in this room today and their great need is right here, right now, to bend their knee before you and say, God, I want you. God, I'm a sinner, broken, and I've done everything in the world to destroy our relationship, but I see that you've done everything to rectify it, and I accept it, and I trust in Christ that you sent to restore that relationship. And Father, for those of us who need to be more faithful in preaching, more faithful in sharing, Lord, impel us today to implore the world on behalf of you to be reconciled. We pray it in Jesus' name.