What Are We As Ambassadors for Christ?
As an American living in China, I keep an eye on what the ambassador to China and the one for the US say? Why do I do this? The ambassador has no real power. The Apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthian 5:18-20 that we are Ambassadors for Christ. See below. What does he mean by this?
18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 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.
Who is reconciling men to God? God is. It is not us! Did we not already say God Gave us Important Work? Are we not reconciling men and women to God? Actually no, So, Paul gives us a remarkable metaphor in saying we are God’s Ambassadors.
An ambassador represents his nation, and we, therefore, represent the Kingdom of God.
Ambassadors do not send armies to war, set trade policy, or bring down inflation. Ambassadors raise the flag as it were. We raise the Cross.
For example, we tell someone that God’s love helped us turn our lives around, or share the bridge illustration shown above. We cannot make them believe or be moved by what we said. It is not our job to make them believe.
What do Ambassadors for Christ Do?
What does a good ambassador do? He or she accurately represents his home country before the foreign country. We also are responsive to represent God as he really is as found in the Bible.
We must not use conjecture to tell people about God. Let’s tell what we have personally experienced and what the Bible says about that experience.
On another point, an Ambassador would not force the other country to listen to him. He would respectfully ask for tine to talk. We must also do this. We should seek to be great ambassadors, but first we should let people we know know we are Christian in a respectful way. That is a first step.
Yes, let’s be the Ambassador the Bible asks us to be. It is a great honor to take this position that God offers. Let’s be all we can be for the love of God.
