Vision 1: Embody the Gospel (2 Corinthians 5.17-6.13)
Every Christian church has essentially the same mission; it is the mission Christ gave his disciples at the end of his ministry: to go into all nations and make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything he has commanded.
But every church finds itself in a different context and is filled with different people, so it is important to spell out how we, as the church that we are in the center of Paris, must do this.
So as we have done in the past, today we are going to begin a three-week mini-series on the vision of our church. This is an important reminder for those of you who have been with us for a long time, and a little introduction to the church for those of you who are new.
Here then is the vision of our church: we will take one week for each point.
Église Connexion exists to:
Embody the gospel for the people of Paris;
Train disciples who make disciples;
Send Christians equipped to serve the Church of Christ in France and beyond.
Today, we are going to look at the first point—our desire to embody the Gospel for the people of Paris. And to talk about this point, we will be in Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians.
Ambassadors for the Gospel (5:17–6:2)
To understand where Paul is going in this passage, we need a bit of context.
The church in the city of Corinth was deeply troubled. Paul had planted it with Priscilla and Aquila; they spent eighteen months there, then went on to Ephesus (we see this in Acts 18). At some point, Paul learned that the church in Corinth had completely gone off track—false teachings, blatant and open sins… it was a disaster.
So he wrote them a letter. We don’t have that letter—it has been lost—but Paul mentions it in 1 Corinthians 5. Apparently, the church in Corinth didn’t understand his letter at all, and their problems only got worse. So he wrote another letter, which we have in our Bible under the title of 1 Corinthians. In this letter, Paul corrected many doctrinal errors and rebuked them quite harshly for their sin.
Good news, though: many in the church were convicted of their sin. They repented, they accepted the gospel Paul was preaching to them, and they got back on track.
But some members of the church still resisted Paul, refused to accept his exhortation, and refused to repent. So Paul wrote another letter, 2 Corinthians, both to encourage those who had repented and to defend his apostolic ministry against his opponents.
Yet he does not speak only for himself; he speaks on behalf of all those who served the church in Corinth with him—people like Priscilla and Aquila. It’s very important to see that he is not giving an isolated example of what he alone did, but is describing how “we,” those who served the church in Corinth, lived.
In other words: he is describing a collective model of behavior, not just the example of one man. And he speaks of himself and his companions as ambassadors for the gospel.
Up until now, Paul has spoken of the sufferings he and his companions endured for the Gospel, and especially of the reason they do it. In chapter 4, he says that because they know where they are going—because they know that their life with Christ is not temporary—they can be in the midst of the most brutal circumstances without losing hope.
And it is on this note that he begins to speak of what motivates him and his co-workers. Chapter 5, verse 17:
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Paul tells us two essential things here.
First, he speaks about us. He says, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.” Sometimes it can be hard to believe that, or to understand what Paul means. But he says it in the verses we just read. If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation—that is: a person who is now reconciled to God. We see this several times: in v. 18, in v. 19, and in v. 20. The goal of Christ’s work was to reconcile us to God. The old has passed away: formerly, we were not reconciled to God; now we are.
Second, Paul tells us how Christ did this; he tells us the Gospel. The essence of the Gospel is summed up in v. 21: “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, came to earth as a human being, fully God and fully man, and he is the only human being in history who “knew no sin.” We have all sinned and are naturally separated from God; Jesus, though he shared our human nature, never sinned. Though he was tempted as we are, he never gave in to temptation. He was and still is perfectly innocent, perfectly righteous, perfectly holy.
And yet, God made him who knew no sin to be sin. Christ took all the rebellion of all his people throughout human history and placed that sin on himself, to such a degree that it was as if Christ himself were the sin that made us guilty before God. Christ went to the cross, carrying that sin on his shoulders, and was punished—not only, or even primarily, by men, but by God. God poured out every drop of his wrath against our sin, and he poured it out on Christ.
That is half of the equation. The other half is found in these words: “so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” Just as Christ took our sin to the point of becoming our sin, he gives us his perfect life to the point that we become his righteousness.
This is how Christ has made us new creations; this is how he has reconciled us to God.
God cannot reconcile with sin. It’s like oil and water: sin and holiness cannot coexist. So how can God reconcile with sinful men and women? He did it by killing their sin in the person of Christ, and by giving them the sinless life Christ lived.
Think about what that means. I am a sinner—I feel, like Paul, that I am the worst of sinners. But God saved me, brought me to faith, and I placed my faith in Christ. I repented of my sin. So God killed my sin in advance when he poured his wrath out on Christ. In other words, two thousand years ago, God killed all the sins I have committed over the last forty-four years, and all the sins I will commit for the rest of my life. Two thousand years ago, God killed the sin I will commit tomorrow.
In the same way, God gave us in advance the righteousness of Christ, so that we might grow in righteousness. Two thousand years ago, Christ lived the perfect life that I will show to God at my death. I will stand before him, he will examine me, he will see the perfect life of Christ that has been given to me, and he will declare me innocent and righteous—innocent because my sin is erased, and righteous because Christ has given me his righteousness.
We must understand that this is done. It is finished. In your life, you will experience many sufferings and trials. But if you have placed your faith in Christ, you will never again have to fear being punished by God for your sin. He has already done it, when he punished Christ.
And he has placed Christ’s perfect life on you, so that God sees you as perfect, and not as guilty. You are guilty before God, and so am I. But Christ is not, and it is his life that we now wear.
That is the Gospel. That is the first thing Paul tells us.
The second thing is as surprising as the first (at least to me).
If God has created a way to reconcile people to himself, then people need to know about it.
Of course, God is God. He could easily make himself known to people in a vision, or simply cause the truth to appear miraculously in our minds. Sometimes he does that: he can proclaim the message of the Gospel himself.
But most of the time, that is not how he does it. Most of the time, he entrusts this responsibility to other people. That’s what Paul says in v. 18–20: God gave us the ministry of reconciliation; he entrusted to us the message of reconciliation; he made us ambassadors for Christ; it is through us that he makes his appeal.
This is crazy. It’s so risky. I know myself, and I know that 90% of the time, I don’t speak very well. I’ve prepared this message in advance, there’s no one else talking at the same time; that I can do. But if you’ve ever had a conversation with me, you know that’s not how I normally speak; in conversation, I don’t speak well. I go in circles, I stutter, I have trouble speaking spontaneously.
And apparently (we discover later in this letter, in chapter 11, verse 6), Paul had the same problem. He says that he is “unskilled in speaking.” He was a great writer, but not a great speaker.
Yet God chooses to make people like that—people like you and me—ambassadors of the Gospel, to entrust to us all the ministry of reconciliation. Why? Because it is when we minister in our weakness that the strength of Christ is displayed. It is always amazing when an awkward and imperfect conversation about the Gospel brings faith to someone else, because we can never say that this person came to Christ because I did such a great job. No, it is clearly God’s work.
So, as imperfect as we are, we make our appeal; we beg people on behalf of Christ, “Be reconciled to God.”
And that is what we see Paul doing at the beginning of chapter 6:
Working together with him, then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. 2 For he says,
“In a favorable time I listened to you,
and in a day of salvation I have helped you.”
Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.
We’ll come back to this appeal later, but this is Paul’s work as an apostle, it is Priscilla and Aquila’s work as servants of the gospel, and it is our work too. This is the mission Christ has given us: to call people to repentance and faith in Christ in order to be reconciled to God. To do that, we must share the good news of the Gospel.
Living Examples of the Gospel (6:3–10)
But one thing we constantly see in the Bible is that the proclamation of the good news rarely, if ever, comes by itself; it is accompanied by a living example of what that good news looks like. And that is where Paul moves next: he spends eight verses reminding the Corinthians how he and his companions live their lives. 6:3:
3 We put no obstacle in anyone’s way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, 4 but as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: by great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, 5 beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; 6 by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love; 7 by truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; 8 through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; 9 as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; 10 as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.
In this passage, Paul gives two arguments why his opponents should listen to him. The first is in 5:20–21, which we saw before. He says: “Listen to what I say because this is what Christ says: God makes his appeal through us, and that appeal is to believe in what Christ has done for you. Listen to what I say because it is the truth.”
That should be enough. But Paul doesn’t stop there. The second argument Paul gives is the example he and his companions give in their lives. Their way of living, of serving, of suffering. His second argument is completely objective, empirical, and visible.
The Gospel of Jesus Christ changes us. He just said so. If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.
These are not just words. This is not a sentimental statement. It is literally true. If we are in Christ, we are no longer what we were.
I want to be careful here, because some of us might read what Paul says in these verses and think: “I’m not like that; so I must not be a Christian.”
That’s not what Paul is saying. Read Romans 7—Paul acknowledges that some changes in us are immediate and others take a lifetime; we must learn to observe everything Christ has commanded. It is not automatic. If you have not yet reached the level of maturity Paul describes here, don’t worry, neither have I.
But if we are in Christ, by definition, as new creations, there will be changes. And we will grow in those changes. Paul gives here the example of what mature and experienced Christians look like—or, to put it another way, what living examples of the Gospel look like.
He gives positive examples—endurance (v. 4), purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit, love (v. 6), truthful speech, the power of God, and righteousness (v. 7), in all circumstances (v. 8). This is the part of the Christian life that others will look at and say: “I want to be like that.”
I don’t know if you’ve thought about this. Many people will find problems with Christian doctrine and ethics if they want to; those are the areas where people debate, where they try to find a flaw in what we believe in order to challenge it. That’s what Paul’s opponents in Corinth were doing.
But no one can credibly speak against Christian character. No one says: “I hate patient people. I hate kind people. I hate loving people. I hate honest people.” These are traits that are almost universally admired.
And that’s normal, because every human being is made in the image of God, and we are created to respond positively to his character.
But some people will stubbornly resist having such character in themselves, because even though it is attractive, it is also costly. That’s why Paul gives negative examples—or rather examples that most of us would consider negative.
It’s easy to be patient, kind, loving, and honest when everything is going well. But the true nature of our character is revealed when the world turns against us. And that’s what Paul says—not only is their character exemplary, but it is so in the most difficult situations: in suffering, hardship, calamities (v. 4), beatings, imprisonments, riots, hard work, sleepless nights, hunger (v. 5), dishonor and slander (v. 8).
How is that possible?
Actually, it’s very simple. What we do is always determined by what we desire. If what you desire is comfort, ease, and superficial happiness, then you will lose patience at the slightest obstacle to those goals. You will not love people who are unlovable. We can really judge the value of our character when it continues in the midst of difficult circumstances.
And the reason why the Christian’s character can continue to manifest and grow in the midst of trials is that for his people, Christ transforms every circumstance into an occasion for grace.
Paul says (at the end of v. 8):
We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; 9 as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; 10 as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.
So in part, these things are literally true—Paul and his co-workers were often condemned (Paul himself was later executed in Rome), but they knew what awaited them at their death. They were poor, but their poverty was not an obstacle to enriching others spiritually. They were often sorrowful, but they had a joy in their Lord that did not disappear in their sadness, since it did not depend on their circumstances.
They really had very little, almost nothing—they left everything to follow Christ. But in reality, they possessed everything. Everything they needed, everything that truly matters, was theirs.
If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.
If anyone is in Christ, a trial becomes a grace.
If anyone is in Christ, a failure becomes a ladder.
The Call of the Gospel (6:11–13)
And when Christ does this—when the grace of Christ allows their character to persist in every circumstance, and that can be seen—the call God gives us to make as ambassadors for Christ cannot be easily rejected. Paul says in v. 11:
11 We have spoken freely to you, Corinthians; our heart is wide open. 12 You are not restricted by us, but you are restricted in your own affections. 13 In return (I speak as to children) widen your hearts also.
Here is what he says to the unbelieving Corinthians who are listening to this letter. No matter what you may have heard from other sources, we are not weighing you down and we are not living in lies. Our heart is wide open. We are not holding you back, and the Gospel is not holding you back; what is holding you back is you.
So, just as we have opened our hearts to the Gospel and to you, open your hearts to us as well. We are the living proof that it is possible to live for Christ, in good times and bad—to be called liars and yet tell the truth, to be sorrowful and yet always rejoice, to have nothing and yet possess everything.
And if we can do it, you can do it, because it is not us who have done it—it is God who did it in us. And he can do it in you too.
At this point, the Corinthians have no credible arguments left against Paul and his companions. They can debate theology if they want, but they cannot credibly speak against Christians who are faithful.
And if what Paul says about his own character is true, is it not possible that what he says about the gospel is also true?
You see, God uses the Gospel to bring us to faith, but he does it in more than one way. Sometimes, people hear the Gospel and are entirely convinced by the Holy Spirit, right away. That happens, and it is wonderful.
Other times, though, people hear the Gospel and say: “Okaaaaaaay…” And they remain in doubt.
But over time, they see what their Christian friends’ lives look like, they see the practical application of the Gospel, and they begin to believe that what they once considered foolishness might actually be true. That too is the work of the Holy Spirit.
We cannot know which means the Holy Spirit will use. That’s why we must always have all our tools at hand.
Conclusion
And here are the tools Paul gives us here.
The first is the Gospel. We must do everything we can to know it as well as possible, we must learn to “speak Gospel fluently,” like our mother tongue. We must learn to be able to say, without even thinking: 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.
The second tool he gives us is our life. Paul’s life and that of his companions legitimized the Gospel for the Corinthians. If the Gospel produces such a change in them, in the midst of all they are suffering, isn’t that something worth digging into, worth taking seriously?
But watch out: this example of the Gospel manifesting in our lives means something that will make many of us uncomfortable. It means that we must open ourselves up to people, give them access to ourselves and to our community, in such a way that they can see the Gospel lived out in various circumstances among us. When we do things together—going to church, participating in a community group, playing football, whatever—unbelievers should be included as much as possible. Because they need not only to hear the Gospel, but also to see what it looks like.
That takes a lot of time, it’s not easy, and it’s risky, because it means being vulnerable, being able to say what Paul says to the Corinthians: our heart is wide open. We don’t always want to open our hearts to others, because that would mean letting them have access to aspects of our lives that we prefer to keep to ourselves.
But that is what an ambassador of Christ looks like. It’s risky, but it’s incredibly freeing. There is nothing more freeing than having nothing to hide. People need to see the Gospel.
And when we do that, the last tool Paul gives us here becomes really striking: of course, it is the appeal. Paul says: “We have spoken freely to you… open your hearts also.”
We must not be afraid not only to announce the gospel, but also to say afterward: “I beg you on behalf of Christ: be reconciled to God! Please, believe in him. Accept him. Put your trust in him.” No appeal you will ever make will be more important than this one.
If we live this way, if we use all the tools God gives us, will it be effective every time? No, at least not in the sense we usually mean.
But every time God saves one of his own, every time someone comes to Christ in faith and then lives a life of discipleship, that visible presence of the Gospel, manifested in the lives of his people, will be there.
We want to be a church that embodies the Gospel for the people of our city. We want the people of Paris to hear the Gospel, see the Gospel, and accept the Gospel. This is our prayer, and God is faithful.
