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. 

For anyone who has eyes to see, there is clearly something wrong with the world – very wrong indeed. The Bible diagnoses the root of our problem in terms of estrangement from God. This alienation, which is deeply felt, if not always understood, lies behind the need for ”reconciliation”. We live in a dislocated world; on which is ‘out of joint’ with its Maker, and therefore in pain.

One year, just before Christmas, some of the lads at my High school were playing football on the outside hard courts in a lunch break. My friend, Leslie, was shoulder charged by a hunk of a guy, who had fairly recently moved over from Australia. Les was immediately in great pain. I can’t remember ever seeing someone turn so white, and he was sickly. I accompanied him in the ambulance to Wigan General Infirmary, and for a time I didn’t see him while the staff attended to him. When I did see him again, it was a different Leslie. The pain had gone; the bone had been reset, and relief was written all across his smiling features.

God has made a way for a dislocated, out of joint, in pain world, to know the relief of healing. It is possible – and it is only possible – through Christ and His Cross.