Sermon Tone Analysis

*Primary Passage:  2 Corinthian 5.16-21*

 

*Homiletical Proposition:  We are a new creation through Christ’s reconciliation*

 

*Attention:   New Glasses  I found out I needed glasses.

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*Read Passage*

*By being reconciled to Christ he now was able to look at things differently.*

*Paul was reconciled.

make compatible with or to reestablish a close relationship with.

Before – incompatible   Now  - compatible *

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*Main Point #*1   Being reconciled to Christ Allows us to look at people differently

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*Supporting Points & Cross References*

·       Paul looked at Christ differently   v16            outward flesh

o      Looked at the outward.

education,  where you were from, Jew or not.

Paul was looking for a Savior, a king, who would rule and lead Israel.

He saw Jesus simply as a man and could not see how Jesus could have been who he said he was.

When we know Christ personally, when we have been made right with him, He allows us to look through His eyes and see things as he does.

Jesus          rich, poor     handsome~/ugly    powerful~/weak    Jew~/Gentile 

None of that mattered    saved~/or not savedb

Paul shows us this in 

Gal 3.28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Paul was looking with the eyes of Jesus  

 

·       We need to look at others through His eyes

o      What do we see when we look at others?

Well dressed, popular, wealthy, well educated, race?

James 2 warns us not to look at these things.

We need to be able to see as Jesus saw.

We have to look past the material things that catch our attention and focus on the spiritual things.

*Look at people differently*

*Main Point #2*   Allows us look at our past differently

 

*Supporting Points & Cross References*

·       Because we have been made right with Christ we are changed..  V17  “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, /he is/ a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”,

We are different, we may look the same but we are different.

·       The old is gone forever    Because of this we can look at our past differently.

Who we were in the past is gone.

What we did in the past is gone.

Consequences still there.

Because we are reconciled to Christ, God no longer condemns us for our past.

If God can look at our past differently

·       We have to move on with the new     Phil 3.13-14 forgetting what /lies /behind and reaching forward to what /lies /ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus  Sometimes new is uncomfortable and we want to slip back into how it used to be.

I couldn’t get used to my new glasses.

But eventually…..

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*Main Point #3   *Allows us to look at our position differently

 

*          Supporting Points & Cross References*

·       God fixed the relationship with us              v18-19       broken because of Adam

o      Sees us as reconciled because of Jesus, the New Adam

o      Before this we based who we were on what we had, who we knew, or what we knew.

But we are given a new position in Christ  With that new position comes a new job.

And the nice thing is that God doesn’t look at our past, he doesn’t check our references.

He doesn’t count our past against us.

·       God has appointed us ambassadors of His Word          v20  

o      We are to help people be reconciled to God.

o      We have to make sure that our relationships with others is right

 

 

Summary and Challenge:     Because we are a new creation, we cannot go back to being what we were before.

That person is gone.

My doctor created a new pair of glasses for me.

Bifocals  They are better than the old ones.

I am not used to them and sometimes I think that it would be easier to go back to the old ones, but I can’t do that.

Even though my old glasses were comfortable, that would not be the best thing for me.

I need to see using my new eyes 

How do you see people?

What do you see when you look at them?

When we see with the eyes of Christ we will not see what the world sees.

We will not see status, or wealth or power, we will only see people who know Jesus or people that need Jesus Christ.

When we see people that need Jesus Christ we need to remember that we have been appointed as an ambassador.

It is our job to take the good news to them.

God will work through us.

In order to do this we have to make sure that our relationship with God is right, and we have to make sure that our relationships with others are in order.

We can’t be a good ambassador if we are fighting with our countrymen.

United together we can take God’s message of reconciliation to our community.

Is there a relationship that is not right.

You need to fix it tonight.

Do you need to ask forgiveness or give forgiveness?

Don’t wait.

Is there something that has come between you and God?

If so, how are you going to remove it?