God did not wait for a change of heart on our part. He made the first move. Indeed, He did more than that. He did all was necessary to secure our reconciliation, including our change of heart. Even though He is the One offended by our sin, He is the One who makes amends to Himself through the death of Christ.
Copied from The Gospel for Real Life by Jerry Bridges, © 2002, p. 94. Used by permission of NavPress – www.navpress.com. All rights reserved. Get this book!
Our reconciliation to God is permanent and eternal. Because Christ accomplished it for us, there is no possibility it can ever be undone. Though we continue, even as believers, to do those things that in themselves deserve God’s displeasure, we can never revert to a state of divine alienation. For the sake of Christ, God will always accept us. And even when God deems it necessary to discipline us for persistent disobedience, He always does so out of love to restore us to the way of obedience (see Hebrews 12:4-11).
Copied from The Gospel for Real Life by Jerry Bridges, © 2002, p. 96. Used by permission of NavPress – www.navpress.com. All rights reserved. Get this book!
Here we see the infinite love of God, that He has been pleased to think of us poor creatures from everlasting and make it His work to reconcile us to Himself. And here is the foundation of the sweetness and comfort of all the mercies of God to those who are reconciled to Him: they are the fruits of the eternal love of God for us.
Gospel Reconciliation, Assured by God, Quoted in: Burk Parsons, Assured by God, P&R, 2006, p. 37. Used by Permission.
Reconciliation…always portrays God as the reconciler and sinners as the ones reconciled, since it was human sin that ruptured the relationship between God and man (cf. Isa. 59:2)… Thus, reconciliation is not something man does but what he receives; it is not what he accomplishes but what he embraces. Reconciliation does not happen when man decides to stop rejecting God but when God decides to stop rejecting man. It is a divine provision by which God’s holy displeasure against alienated sinners is appeased, His hostility against them removed, and a harmonious relationship between Him and them established. Reconciliation occurs because God was graciously willing to design a way to have all the sins of those who are His removed from them “as far as the east is from the west” (Psm. 103:12), “cast all their sins into the depths of the sea” (Mic. 7:19), and “cast all [their] sins behind [His] back” (Isa. 38:17).
2 Corinthians, Moody Publishers, 2003, p. 200.
Sinners cannot be reconciled to Him on their own terms. Unregenerate people have no ability to appease God’s anger against sin, satisfy His holy justice, or conform to His standard of righteousness. They are guilty of fatally violating God’s law and face eternal banishment from His presence. The deadly, deceptive premise of all false religion is that sinners, based on their own moral and religious efforts and achievements, can reconcile themselves to God. But God alone designed the way of reconciliation, and only He can initiate the reconciliation of sinners; that God…reconciled us to Himself is precisely the good news of the gospel.
2 Corinthians, Moody Publishers, 2003, p. 199.
The glorious good news of the gospel is that the sin-devastated relationship between lost sinners and the holy God can be restored. That at first glance seems impossible. God’s perfect, infinite, righteous justice demands the punishment of all who violate His law. Standing before the bar of His justice are helpless, guilty sinners, unable either to satisfy God or to change their condition. But through God’s plan of reconciliation all the hostility, animosity, and alienation separating the Holy One and sinners vanishes, and those who were once His enemies become His friends. The high calling and noble privilege of preaching this message of reconciliation is the most important duty in the world, since it deals with eternal destinations.
2 Corinthians, Moody Publishers, 2003, p. 198.
There is one Gospel, and it is universal and applicable to all cultures. The Gospel is universally applicable because the one great need of all human beings is the same: they all need to be reconciled with the Creator.
Who Will Be Saved? Edited by: House, Paul and Thornbury, Gregory, Crossway, 2000, p. 185.
There can be no peace between you and Christ while there is peace between you and sin.
