George Mendonsa and Greta Friedman made news on August 14, 1945. President Truman had announced victory in Japan and the end of World War 2 and the crowd of 750,000 filling Times Square in New York City roared in jubilation for twenty minutes. Sailor George grabbed the closest nurse, Greta, and planted a kiss of celebration on her lips. The war was over. Peace had come. But you and I know that peace really hadn’t come. The United States immediately entered a cold war with Russia and many wars were to follow.
Something is dreadfully wrong with the world. In Genesis 2 God said all He had created was very good, but a short time later you see Cain murdering his own brother. Ever since Genesis 3, world history has been full of hostilities between nations, families, and even in marriages. Fathers and sons are estranged from each other. Couples married in romantic bliss end up in courtrooms fighting over who gets what. No question, sin destroyed the original harmony. Romans 8:22 says all creation is groaning under the curse of sin. Tsunamis and tornadoes and hurricanes sweep hundreds of thousands into eternity in a matter of minutes. The Black Plague in the 1300s killed untold millions in Europe and beyond. Mobs today are looting and shooting with a perverted sense of justice. Something is dreadfully wrong with the world and no amount of education, therapy, or government intervention is going to fix it. The world is at war with God. Sin is the problem.
But thank God, sin and death and war and hatred will not have the last word. We have a book that tells us what God is doing about it. The Bible is the story of God reconciling sinners to himself and ultimately bringing true and final justice to this evil world. Paul takes us into the great doctrine of reconciliation in Colossians 1:18-23. He has exalted Christ as the supreme God-Man, the supreme Creator of all things, and the supreme Head of the Church. Now God wants you and me to see how He brought reconciliation to this sin-cursed world.
The Father’s good pleasure was to reconcile the world to Himself through His Son.
Colossians 1:18-19, He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything. 19 For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him 20 and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.
Verse 18 tells us Christ is uniquely qualified to bring reconciliation to this world. He’s the head of the church. He’s the beginning of the church. He’s also the firstborn from the grave, defeating death once for all. God’s plan for Christ is to have first place in everything. Notice in verses 19-20 that God the Father found great pleasure and delight in two things.
First, God found delight for all the fullness of deity to dwell in His Son (vs 19). God was excited about the incarnation. It pleased Him. God found pleasure as He saw Jesus lying as a baby in that feeding trough. He looked on Jesus’ baptism and spoke from the heavens, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” When Jesus was on the Mount of Transfiguration, the same voice said, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to Him.” God Almighty expressed His good pleasure in His Son.
Second, it was the Father’s good pleasure to reconcile all things to Himself through His Son (vs 20). Reconciliation means a complete and total change from war to peace, from enmity to friendship, from wrath to loving acceptance. This was God’s great plan. We were going our own way, but God took the initiative to change everything. Friends of mine started their marriage by placing two lovely clay Mallard ducks, male and female, on the mantle of the fireplace. These ducks were to represent their feelings in a non-accusatory way. They started out facing each other. All was good. Delightful. But eventually one duck turned. And at times they both turned. So there they were, once facing each other in harmony, now turned away showing a need for peacemaking, for reconciliation.
When God first created Adam, they faced each other in a harmonious, peaceful relationship. God provided Adam a beautiful wife. All was wonderful. It was paradise. But then sin entered and shattered that harmony. Sin affected them in every way. They became totally depraved of any righteousness. They were guilty. God is holy and cannot fellowship with sin, so God turned in wrath from man. God became man’s enemy. God’s sentence of death, of judgment, and of wrath was on every man born, on each of us.
Here comes the beautiful part. God took the initiative to bring about reconciliation. We could do nothing in our sin; God did it. God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. It was through Christ’s shed blood and His awful death on the cross that God turned back to man. Romans 5 describes this perfectly.
Romans 5:8-10,But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. 10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.
You as a human being are born a sinner and God’s enemy. You can’t reconcile yourself to God. The problem is not so much that you are angry at God, although you are in your rebellion of rejecting Him. The real problem is that God is angry at you in your sin. Before coming to Christ, everyone is a sinner in the hands of an angry God!
Don’t minimize God’s wrath and God’s coming judgment. Don’t be duped by the world around you that completely rejects a God of wrath. R. C. Sproul in his little book When Worlds Collide (page 63) says the postmodern God is “a deity without sovereignty, a god without wrath, a judge without judgment.” But the Bible says in Romans 1:18 that God’s wrath is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness. Ephesians 2:3 says we were children of wrath. Ephesians 5:6 says God’s wrath is coming on the sons of disobedience. 1 Thessalonians 1:10 says we believers are waiting for Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come. Revelation 6:16 says sinners will cry, “Hide us from Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb.” And Revelation 19:15 says when Christ returns He will tread the winepress of God the Almighty’s fierce wrath!
These verses teach us two things. First, God’s wrath is real and truly placed on every person outside of Christ. And second, God’s wrath is no longer on those who believe in Christ.
Reconciliation required propitiation and justification.
Now how does God reconcile His enemies who deserve His wrath? Here we are at the heart of the gospel. This is the message that everyone needs to hear. It is not a message of free health care for all, all college debts paid, a guaranteed monthly income, some pipe dream of a socialistic utopian. The gospel message people need to hear is the message of reconciliation to God.
Reconciliation required propitiation. God’s wrath was on us. But when Christ hung on that cross, God made Him to be sin for us (2 Cor. 5:21). God’s wrath that we deserved was diverted from us onto His Son on that cross. All our sins and our hostilities were judged in Christ. God’s wrath was completely satisfied or propitiated on the cross for all those who would come to Christ in faith.
Reconciliation required justification. Christ’s perfect righteousness is imputed to the believers’ account before God. God declared us righteous in Christ and therefore at peace or reconciled with Him. Romans 5:1 is so good, “Therefore, having been justified or declared righteous by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” That’s reconciliation! God’s wrath was propitiated or satisfied in full and Christ’s righteousness was imputed to our account, giving us peace with God, perfectly and forever reconciled to Him.
Reconciling things on earth and in heaven.
Colossians 1:20b through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.
But what about the “things on earth and things in heaven” in verse 20? The Bible certainly does not teach universal reconciliation, as Rob Bell tried to tell us in his book Love Wins. This phrase is not saying everyone ends up in heaven. When Adam sinned, the entire created universe came under the curse of sin. This may be when all those craters you see on the moon and almost all the celestial bodies were formed. Boom, bam, crunch! Thank God He created the earth with a protective shield around it so the atmosphere burns up most of the meteors flying toward us.
“”Things on earth and things in heaven” means that God has done all that is required to bring about righteousness and peace in the new heaven and earth through Christ’s work on that cross. The time is coming when everything will be where God in His justice and righteousness requires it to be. No one gets away with murder. There will be no loose sinful ends flying around. All sin not paid for by Christ on the cross will finally be punished in the lake of fire; and all God’s reconciled people will be completely glorified and free from sin. The curse of sin will be removed from the universe; righteousness will fill the heavens and the earth (2 Peter 3:13).
Peace will reign in the heavens and earth under the Prince of Peace. But it will happen in stages. You’ll see it in the millennial reign of Christ. Nature itself will be reconciled to God.
Isaiah 11:6, And the wolf will dwell with the lamb, And the leopard will lie down with the young goat, And the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; And a little boy will lead them. 9 They will not hurt or destroy in all My holy mountain, For the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD As the waters cover the sea.
No need for cages at the zoo. Grizzlies will not rip the scalps off hikers. Snakes will not pump their venom into victims. After the 1000-years reign of Christ in Revelation 20 will come the Great White Throne Judgment, the lake of fire, and then the new heavens and new earth where righteousness dwells. When it is all said and done, everything will be reconciled to God, every knee shall bow to Christ, and every tongue will confess He is Lord. He will be the Lamb shining forth like the sun! The Bible is the grand story of God reconciling sinners and the entire universe to Himself! We will forever and ever praise the Lamb who was slain.
What you were; what you are.
Colossians 1:21-22, And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, 22 yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach–
Paul doesn’t want us ever to forget the pit of darkness and sin from which Christ reconciled us. Paul describes us three ways. You were alienated from God. You didn’t know God. In fact you were separated from God. You were hostile toward God in your thoughts. You really didn’t want God telling you what to do. You resented people telling you that you needed to be saved. You were full of yourself. You were proud and self-righteous. Your thoughts weren’t full of love and submission to God. You engaged in evil deeds. You thought, did, and said things that were offensive to God’s law. You didn’t wake up and give thanks to God; you woke up to pursue your own agenda. You had a self-serving attitude. Anger, bitterness, lust, sex, greed, you name it, filled your thoughts. You were glad people couldn’t read your mind.
That’s the dark, black background to highlight God’s glorious grace in your life. But then God dealt with you and drew you to faith. You confessed your sinful heart, trusted God and bowed your heart to Him. God reconciled you to Himself. He turned your heart around to embrace His loving grace and receive His gift of peace with Him through the cross. The thief cried, “Remember me.” The jailor cried, “What must I do to be saved, to be reconciled to God?” This is the answer: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.”
Paul details your new reconciled status in verse 22. Because Christ reconciled you in His physical body and died that violent, bloody death on that cross, He now brings you before the Father with your new status or position. God sees you holy, blameless, beyond reproach. This work of reconciliation brings you out of the pit of sin, guilt, hostility into this position before God as perfectly righteous in Christ. You are reconciled to God. The Father receives you as His child and Jesus receives you as His friend.
Don’t move away.
Colossians 1:23, if indeed you continue in the faith firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the gospel that you have heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, was made a minister.
But how do you know God has reconciled you? How can you be sure? Do you believe in Christ? Does He hold the preeminence in your life? Is He ruling your heart? Don’t let any false teaching move you away from the gospel. God always urges us to continue in the faith. True faith isn’t a flimsy thing. It isn’t just a prayer, “Jesus, come into my heart.” Or “Yeah, I was baptized when I was a kid.” Faith works in your heart to believe God’s Word, keep you firm, established, steadfast, filled with the hope of the gospel that you are heaven bound to be with your Lord forever. God will keep you by His power through faith. Paul isn’t suggesting that we keep ourselves reconciled. No, he means if we are reconciled we will continue in the faith. We may wander for a time, but God will keep us by drawing us back to Him and finally restore us.
George and Greta kissing in Times Square in 1945 were celebrating a temporary cessation of war. Plenty of wars followed. But when God reconciles you to Himself, the war between you and God is over forever. Peace now rules in your relationship with God and will continue all the way into the new heavens and earth. Our hearts will forever overflow with eternal jubilation, praise, and thanksgiving.