MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION
The Lord Jesus, before His ascension, gave a very important submission to His disciples. This submission was “…Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature” (Mark 16:15).This request of the Master is still very important and must be executed by every Christian today. What will you have done for your relatives and others assuming that you one day discovered a 1000 tons gold in a cave in a village where everybody is ‘poor’? We can guess several responses that my come up. Your main aim would have been to improve the standard of living for yourself, your relatives and others. The selfish ones, of course, would have consumed all the proceeds alone without any consideration to residents in the village.
Receiving Jesus Christ as Lord and personal saviour is the greatest gift that God has given to mankind. Receiving Jesus is treasure deposited in our spirit. This treasure should compel us to always propagate the word of God to the unsaved so that these persons can also receive this treasure of hope. You should not necessarily be an experienced teacher of the bible before you propagate the word of God to the world around you. Sometimes, a simple phrase like “God loves you” is all somebody needs to be born again and experience the God-life. Some people are going through extreme hardships. They have tried all that they can in their power to make things work but nothing has improved. A positive change only comes through Jesus.
Over the years, some Christians have condemned unbelievers to the extent that, these unbelievers have purposed in their hearts not to get close to church or anything about the gospel. This act of repelling unbelievers through condemnation is not the ministry of reconciliation. No matter the gravity of sin of any person, Jesus still loves these persons. If Jesus could not condemn sinners, then as believers, we equally are not allowed to condemn sinners. We are God’s co-labourers today in the ministry of reconciliation (1 Corinthians 3:9). What an unbeliever needs initially is the saving gospel of Jesus. From here, the word of God will start the process of transformation and naturally, acts of sin begin to depart from saved souls.
In conclusion, our responsibility is to let people know the ministry of reconciliation which kick-starts a transformation that brings about prosperity and a life of meaning. The prosperity life in Christ is everlasting life.
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