The Plumbline

For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!” (2 Corinthians 5:19-20 NLT) Come back to God... The message is clear. One cannot escape the truth - God's message is one of reconciliation, not condemnation. His desire goes beyond judgment of sin to the means by which one can actually be forgiven of that sin and find the grace to dwell in his presence.  Reconciling the world to himself... There is no other pursuit worthy of our attention right now than to be ambassadors for Christ. The message the world needs to hear clearly is that God wants for all to know Christ. To come into that close, bonded relationship with him. Sins no longer counted against us... We cannot imagine a life free of sin until we say yes to Jesus. We might try to live according ...

Jesus spoke to the people once more and said, “I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life.” (John 8:12) If you were in a dark room and someone offered to turn on a light for you, would you just continue to stumble along, feeling your way around obstacles, risking bumping into things as you did? It is likely that you'd accept the invitation to have light brought into the room because you don't like stumbling aimlessly! Obstacles abound in life - many of them of our own making. Why would we choose to just stumble around in the dark, running into those obstacles repeatedly, when we are offered light to help us avoid them completely? Jesus offers us light - light that dispels all manner of evil in our lives, pointing out obstacles and stumbling points so we don't run into them needlessly. Yet so many refuse to allow the light in. It seems to me that we get a little too used to this idea o...