New Creation
2 Corinthians 5:16-21
Rev. Dr. Mary Alice Mulligan
We listened to passages from 2 Corinthians for several weeks and will hear them several more weeks. Here’s the shorthand for what I think Paul wants us to get from these passages we hear from his second letter to Christians in Corinth. All around, people live normal lives completely oblivious to Jesus Christ. Many of them even completely disregard the possibility that God could matter in day-to-day choices. People seem to live generally happy lives, focusing on their own security and future. Typical lives.
However, those who have come in contact with the truth taught by Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit, live out of a different reality. They experience the immersive love of God which alters their perspective. They know they are divinely accepted, forgiven for whatever terrible things they committed, and set loose to spread the radical, unconditional love of Jesus Christ, which means living from compassion and kindness and generosity, always considering the shared well-being of all people. Paul’s letters are written to help us know how to live once we believe that Jesus is the Chosen One who shows us God. From the 5th chapter of the second letter to the people of Corinth, listen for the word of God.
From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Last week’s section of the letter talked about life and death. Even as our physical selves are deteriorating, as everything on Earth is bound to do, Paul tells us God is re-creating our inner being, building within us our new selves, prepared to live into God’s coming fullness. Today, Paul wants us to look more closely at the new creation within each of us, which promises we are already able to live into God’s future. Although we don’t have the fullness of life in God’s completed future, we have a start because God is already acting in us.
God reconciles us. People get right with God because of God’s work. The cross of Jesus Christ shows us God allows anything and still forgives, no matter what. The divine rule of love has been established, shown through the cross of Jesus Christ. We are forgiven. “All this is from God,” Paul says. Our trespasses no longer count against us. Dawn has broken through our sin. The “tit for tat” way of the world has been deposed. God seeks us, reconciles us home, and forgives us, now. Paul practically shouts the power of the present moment. “From now on!” he says. Now! God has already done everything through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is great because humans are about as far from righteousness on our own as anyone can imagine. So, thank God we don’t have to reconcile ourselves. A modern writer puts it: “Do you finally recognize that all that is required of you is to do exactly what Lazarus did which is exactly and only nothing?”[1]
Even when we are still alive, we do nothing, no matter what sin is hanging around us. Then there is Jesus, calling us. And when the Savior calls, nothing in all creation can refuse. Everything old, like our sin, is wiped away, rises up clean. In Christ, God has taken care of everything. This is Cosmic Good News! No sin, anywhere, matters.
Some moralist in the back of the room is probably shouting, “That isn’t fair! God should keep track of those who deserve punishment, especially those who don’t even try to be good.” We know the voice. We often agree with the voice, but we also know none of us can fully live right. None of us. So, everyone must depend on God, who calls us all home as unconditionally forgiven people. Any tally sheet God might have is torn out and the ledger is thrown away. Infinite love embraces us, no matter what. We are forgiven; reconciled back to God.
So then, let’s choose life in Christ. Everything has become new. Every thing; every person. All creation is new, as if through Jesus Christ, God said again for the first time, “Let there be light.” We can choose to see through Jesus’ eyes which reveal we are living in a new reality, governed by God’s Rule of Love. It’s not just that each of us is a new being, although that is pretty terrific; we can see all creation in a new light. We now exist in a new reality. Each of us could be Dorothy, noticing, “We are not in Kansas anymore,” except we are not over the rainbow. We are living “in Christ,” a phrase Paul uses often. “In Christ” means living in the presence, connected to the being of Christ, so there is no place for us to judge each other by society’s categories – of who’s valuable and who’s not. There’s no place for squeezing someone out of what they need or stepping on someone trying to survive. Paul encourages us to live, not according to the flesh (the ways of our old life), but according to the cross (the way of absolute, self-giving, loving, weakness) which means everyone is worthy. Christ has inaugurated a new age, where the rule of God’s love is established, causing a radical transformation of our whole situation.[2] Everything exists in light of the self-giving love of Jesus’ cross, if we just look.
Truthfully, however, we can easily ignore the new reality around us. A scene in a tv show some years ago showed a man turning to another saying, “I hear a cricket.” And his friend asked, “How could you possibly hear a cricket in all the crowd noise of this street?” The first man took out a small coin and dropped it on the ground. Everyone stopped and turned to the sound of the coin. “It depends on what your ears are tuned to hear.” Which do we hear: coin or cricket? Our experience of reality can be tuned to the ways of society’s world or we can be tuned toward the way of Christ. Everything is new in Jesus Christ; we just have to learn to see it. Each of us already lives in a new creation, if we choose it.
So then, if we choose the perspective of Jesus, we are sent out. We know the Greek word for being sent out. Apostolos. Apostles are sent in the joyous name of Jesus, to carry on his ministry in the new reality. Out we go into the new creation to live as Jesus taught us. But what does that mean? Think of what Jesus taught. He told a parable of someone’s being beaten up and left for dead. Soon two good religious leaders walked by; they saw something suspicious. Perhaps it was a trick to get them to stop so someone could jump out and rob them, so they walked on. But another person, someone of questionable character himself, a Samaritan, walked by. He saw a wounded person, someone in trouble. So he stopped to help. The two religious leaders were so wrapped up living in the old world; they didn’t hear Jesus’ call to live out his teachings in the new creation. The Samaritan, however, understood the responsibility to attend to someone in trouble, in spite of possible cost. Our behavior shows whether or not we are living in the new creation.
Part of living in a new way requires sharing the word of reconciliation with others. Paul tells us, God entrusts the message of reconciliation to us, as a community of faith. Together we are not just followers; we are ambassadors for Christ. God made our grace communal, so together we are shaped into a reconciled community, witnessing to Jesus Christ as we serve. But what does living together in reconciling ministry look like? In one Florida UCC congregation, to be part of the church family, a person does 5 things: pray for the church regularly; attend worship regularly; support the church financially; participate in at least one mission or ministry each year; invite at least one person to worship each year. Pray, worship, give, serve, and invite – these marks indicate a person has committed to that particular church family and to Jesus Christ.
The story is told of Jesus’ return to heaven and angels asked him if he changed the world. Had he brought everyone to God’s way? Jesus said “No.” He had entrusted only a small group of people with the message of God’s will, “But,” he said, “I trust them.” I trust them. And now, Jesus trusts us, St. Andrew. We are sent out.
So we need to think about where and how we might share the message of reconciliation. The self-sacrificing love of Jesus Christ witnesses to the love of God, which gives everything for us. People all around us desperately need to hear words of God’s acceptance and forgiveness and love. We are Christ’s ambassadors. We speak for Jesus Christ. The message we have is the exact message people need to hear. Jesus trusts us.
[1] Capon, 132
[2]See Victor Paul Furnish, Second Corinthians, 332.