Break up or Make up ? Dr . Mrs . Lilian Stanley passage from the Bible that highlights the efforts taken by Christ to bring about these two parties , widely separated by centuries of enmity , to embrace one another .
“ For He Himself is our peace , who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier , the dividing wall of hostility , by abolishing in His flesh the law with its commandments and regulations . His purpose was to create in Himself one new man out of the two , thus making peace and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross , by which He put to death their hostility . He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near . For through Him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit ,” ( Eph 2:14-18 ).
“ I am sorry ,” is probably the hardest sentence to pronounce . There are two dimensions in reconciliation one towards God and the other towards man . To get reconciled with God is very easy because we don ' t see God and we know He is too loving not to forgive us . But reconciliation with another person churns our stomach because he is not God , he is a human being with human nature .
There are many lessons for us in this passage . When two people are not able to make up , Christ is hurt at the lack of peace because He Himself is our peace . When we stubbornly refuse reconciliation we are wounding Him . He is Jehovah-Shalom , the God of peace ( Jdg 6:24 ). “ Seek peace and pursue it ,” says the Bible ( Psa 34:14 ).
Jesus taught us that if we come to church and suddenly remember a grudge that a friend has against us , we must leave our offering right there at the altar , leave immediately , get right with the friend and then , and only then come to offer to God whatever we had brought for Him .
In other words , Jesus said that our relationship with man should come first before we ever try to get closer to God . This is exactly what the apostle John taught us too : “ If anyone says , ' I love God ,' yet hates his brother , he is a liar . For anyone who does not love his brother , whom he has seen , cannot love God whom he has not seen . And He has given us this command : Whoever loves God must also love his brother ” ( 1Jn 4:20-21 ). There is no glossing over the truth .
If there were two people in the world for whom it was impossible to love one another , it was the Gentiles and the Jews . But the Bible says , Christ made them shake hands . It was not a fake reconciliation but a genuine oneness . Let ' s see a
When the Prince of Peace was born on earth , peace on earth was proclaimed ( Isa 9:6 ; Lk 2:14 ). But today we hardly see peace anywhere on earth . It is not because God has failed but because man has failed to play his role . There is no peace between countries ; countries are torn apart by civil wars ; there is hatred between States in India ; community clashes are an everyday affair ; the number of estranged couples has reached sky-rocketing proportions . In other words , man hates man . Sadly , the same state exists among believers too .
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