We are a new creation in Christ

On the resurrection Sunday evening Jesus said to His disciples, "Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you." Just as Jesus was the personal representative of the Father on earth, so before He went back to the Father in heaven, He appointed His disciples to be His personal representatives on earth. They were related to Jesus in the same way that Jesus was related to the Father.

We have seen three things about the relationship of Jesus to the Father. First, that Jesus did not speak His own words; second, He spoke words given by the Father. And third, it was the Father in Jesus who did the works and that those who had seen Jesus had seen the Father. I pointed out that these should all apply to us. We should not speak our own words, but the words of Jesus. It should not be we who do it but Jesus dwelling in us and that anyone who has seen us should in that have seen Jesus.

We are Christ's official representatives here on earth. This same truth is beautifully presented by Paul in 2 Corinthians chapter 5, verses 17 - 21.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him [Jesus] who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (NIV)

First of all, it starts with a new creation. This is passing out of death into a new life. Then in that new creation we become the official representatives of God and of Christ on the earth. God has given to us the ministry of reconciliation. Just as God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, so now Christ is in us reconciling the world to God. We are Christ's ambassadors, Paul says. As though God were making His appeal through us. "We implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God." And the basis of the message is this very theme of these devotions: identification. We cannot become Christ's representatives until we have first been transformed ourselves. It's the new creation that has the message.

Let me emphasize once again our message is based on that divine exchange that took place at the cross, when God made Jesus who had no sin, for us to be sin that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Think of yourself as a reconciled reconciler. First, you have to be reconciled to God through Christ, then you become God's agents and messengers of reconciliation through Christ to the rest of this world.