Transformed 1

2 Corinthians 5:17-19

Preparing to sell my mother’s condo, my sister has been sorting through stacks of old photographs. She makes a pile for each family member and then we are invited to take home all the pictures in which we appear. Looking at all the old pictures stirs up many memories – most good, some not so good.

With family and friends, and with old photographs, we are stuck with our past. We must carry with us what we have done all the days of our lives. But it is not so with God.

What happens with the one who is “in Christ?” What has God given us? What does God NOT count against us? What message should we have?

Paul is able to sum up the work and ministry of Christians in just a few sentences. We are to be about and involved in a ministry of reconciliation. Reconciling who to whom? We are to work at restoring or reconciling human beings with God.

Born as mortals into a fallen world we are a people of sin. Our relationship with the Almighty is fractured and broken. To be with God we must have that relationship mended, and we do that by taking on Jesus Christ as our Savior. We must be “in” Christ – that is, we must believe Jesus is the Son of God, that he died to take our sins away, and that we are to act like Jesus did.

In our human relationships we may have a past that we drag along behind us for years (“Remember when you wet the bed?” “Remember when you stuck peas up your nose?”). But with God all the bad things in our past are taken away, forgotten, shed like old skin.

When we accept Jesus as Savior and attempt to live as he did, then we are a new creation. The old is gone and God no longer holds our sins against us. We are transformed, in short. We are new and must live as people who have been given a new life – not taking this gift for granted, but living with deep appreciation for the mercy and forgiveness God gives.

And then, with this new attitude and appreciation, we become part of the ministry to reconcile others to God, to bring other people into a new relationship with their loving Father.

DAILY CHALLENGE: What can remind you that you are a new creation in the eyes of God?