Sep 30 2008
now is the time
Here is a link to today’s reading:
Why do today, what you can put off until tomorrow? Is a motto for many people. But God has a different plan in mind for you. God has work for you to do TODAY. Don’t be fooled into thinking you can live your life ‘someday’. This is your only life and the expiration date is unknown. Paul tells the Corinthians that they are called to be ambassadors for Christ. Just so there is no confusion he goes on to tell them when they are expected to do this. The time is NOW!
Today’s Challenge:
What are you putting off until ‘someday’? List three things that you can move from the someday category to the ‘now is the time’ category. Is there a person or a place where God needs an ambassador? Can you do that today?
Textual Reflections:
The truths of this text amaze me. But before I comment on that I want to slide back one verse because the set-up verse for this section is pretty cool too. In 2 Cor 5:16 Paul writes, “So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.” Paul is here acknowledging that when he first saw or heard about Jesus [We can't know exactly when this was but Paul was an important figure in the religious life of Jerusalem during Jesus ministry. It is impossible to imagine that he would have missed the dramatic events of the last week of Jesus life] he just thought Jesus was some guy. In fact we know that Paul was so convinced that the stories Jesus followers began to tell [that Jesus rose from the dead, that he was the Christ, that he was the son of God, etc] were lies that he tried to kill any who were preaching these things. But now Paul has been convinced. He is admitting up front, “I used to believe about Christ the same way everyone else does, but now I am convinced that Jesus was more than just a human.”
He is telling us that just like he was wrong to think that Jesus was just some guy like everybody else, we are wrong if we think that Christians are unchanged by their unity with Christ. In fact contends that being in Christ has an effect so radical that in Christ we are new creatures. We are a whole other species.
Then Paul describes this new species.
My son and I periodically spend some time on the National Geographic website. There are lots of fun things to watch and learn on that site. In my book there isn’t much that is cooler than watching a snake unhinge its jaw to swallow something huge. I bring that site up because when they describe an animal on that site they usually focus on two things: what it is and what it does. They will say things like, “Vampire bats are the only known mammals to survive solely on blood.” You see all wrapped up in one tidy sentence is a word about what the bats are (mammals) and what they do (drink blood). (You can read more here.) In the same way, Paul gives us a few sentences that remind Christians who they are and what they are called to do.
Christians are the people who have received the reconciliation that God has brought through Jesus Christ. Reconciliation is a repaired relationship. God through Christ has offered a repaired relationship to the whole world by offered to no longer count our sins against us. God offers a clean slate and restored connection between us and God through the son Jesus Christ. Christians are those people who have accepted that reconciliation.
But in the same breath Paul talk about what Christians do. Christians are reconciled reconcilers. Christians who are now part of the kingdom of God are all given the task of being ambassadors for that kingdom: to be agents of reconciliation. Christians are called to be relationship menders in the world and to give testimony to the relationship mending that God wants to do with every person. Paul says in verse 20 that this is what he has been trying to do. He has been serving as an ambassador for Christ (which means anointed king and was a title for Jesus) urging others to be reconciled to God.
In chapter 6 he reminds everyone that now is the time. Alll of life is lived in the now. Most especially our relationship to God is lived in the now. Now is the time to be reconciled and now is the time for those who are reconciled to live as a reconciling agent in the world.
on the walk
-Ethan
