MattGlover.com

If the message I spoke on the Good Samaritan wasn’t convicting enough, then this week must have been designed to finish me right off.

Read the summary of my Good Samaritan message to get some of the background to the story with my Uncle.

The passage for this week was Romans 5:1-11, a turning point in Romans. Up until this point, Paul has been laying a theological foundation for living the Christian life and before heading down the track of some of the more practical outworking of this, he pauses to talk about peace and reconciliation.

Both of these terms are familiar to us to some extent. Peace is something we all want, particularly on a worldwide scale. But it is more than just an absence of hostility. It is a state of being tranquil or serene; a quiet confident contentment; stillness, serenity calmness. Peace comes when we’re in the state in which we were created to be - in relationship with God.

Reconciliation is the bringing of conflicted parties back together. Sometimes we think this is making things as they were before the conflict happened, but this is rarely the case. Sometimes it is impossible. Instead it is bringing people together to a point where they can move on in a new way. Reconciliation is one way to describe the whole mission of Jesus - bringing people back together with God

While there is no denying that we need peace and reconciliation on all sorts of levels, where we need it most is in the area of life that is most important to us - our relationships. These were the things that I focussed on for the remainder of my message.

1. Relationship with God

As I’ve mentioned already, we were created for relationship with God. Sin meant that the relationship wasn’t as it should be, but Jesus death and new life reconciled us to god in a way that meant we could share in that new life too. This brings peace.

But it doesn’t necessarily bring good times. Paul quite rightly says that suffering is part of the human experience. Perhaps even more so in some areas when the message of the New Testament is embraced. But when reconciled to God, suffering produces perseverance, which produces character and hope in turn. It means that we can say, “these hard times will pass”, and we can look forward to better times in the future. Sometimes it is the only thing that keeps us going.

Being reconciled to God brings a peace that passes all explanation and understanding. I can’t say anymore than that.

2. Relationships with Family.

This is the most important of all our relationships. Whether we like to acknowledge it or not, our families have the biggest impact on how we turn out. Whether they’ve been a good or bad influence doesn’t change the fact that they are still the biggest influence. Sadly, family conflict is everywhere and one of the hardest things for any person to deal with.

Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:16-20 that we have the ministry of reconciliation. We are called to tell, show and model how people can be reconciled with God. Part of this is doing what we can to be reconciled to others, family included. To me this means making the first move in the reconciliation process, regardless of whether we expect the outcome to be good or bad.

Two days before giving this message, I met with the Uncle that I had spoken about the week before. I was shaking as I drove there. I had no idea how it would go.

When he opened the door, he greeted me with a big hug and we spent the next two hours catching up with all that had happened over the last two years. It was a great time and an opportunity to not start the process of reconciliation not just between my Uncle and I but the rest of our family as well. As I left, the only regret I had was that I had left it so long to get in touch.

Peace and reconciliation is needed in our family relationships. Perhaps now more than ever.

3. Relationships with Friends.

I shared the story of watching two girls argue at Uni and then watching in amazement as they apologize and moved on arm in arm. It’s not something I have seen happen very often, but something I wish would. The fact that so many people feel isolated and lonely might be due to the fact that we’ve forgotten how to seek reconciliation with each other after a big fight.

Paul says later in Romans that we should try and live at peace with everybody if we can (12:18). Seeking peace and reconciliation thus becomes part of living the Christian life. It’s not an optional extra or just something that the ‘heavyweights’ have to do, but something we all should be seeking at every opportunity we can. It’s part of our discipleship.

It gives us, and others, a glimpse of what God is like

It gives us a little glimpse of heaven.

I don’t think it is any accident that Paul talks about these two things before going on to talk about some more practical stuff. If we can’t get this right, or at least give it our best shot, then we deserve the ‘hypocrite’ tag that so many Christians wear and everything else becomes a waste of time. But if we get it right, we can make the world a much better place.

The time of silence that followed was confronting. We prayed for those that we know we have to reconcile with. We prayed for the strength and courage to make the first step. We prayed for peace.

If you were there and feel game, share a bit of what was going through your mind in the comments section.