Saturday, May 25, 2013 - 3:15 pm

I read 2 Corinthians 5 & 6 today, and as I was reading chapter 5 it got me thinking about the way we're supposed to respond to those who aren't living a godly life. How do we act, and what do we say, to people who are in the position that all of us were in when we weren't following Christ? Well, from what I see in this chapter, we're not to encourage sin, but we're not to write off and condemn the sinner either. That used to be you and I, but thank God that He redeemed us from the self-focused, destructive lifestyle that results from living by our sinful flesh. I think the most straightforward way to put it is to read 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 who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." The challenge is, as usual, to speak the truth in love, not to misrepresent God by shying away from either His truth or His love.