Lent
March 4, 2016

Scripture Reading: 2 Corinthians 5:16-21

All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, 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.
–2 Corinthians 5:18-21

Merriam-Webster gives us three basic definitions of the word “Reconcile”*:
1.  to restore to friendship, compatibility, or harmony
2.  to make consistent or congruous; to obtain agreement between (two financial records) by accounting for all outstanding item
3.  to cause to submit to or accept

The last stage of the grief process is acceptance, to be reconciled to something one cannot change. We experience grief in the death of loved ones. We daily experience grief in our self-disappointments or our sense of real loss when we become reconciled to giving up a bad habit or implementing a much needed new one. God is with us in the reconciliation that is acceptance of something we have previously denied.

My first thoughts on the word reconciliation related to my checkbook. I do not like to reconcile it but I know it is important to keep up with it. Our oneness in Christ is a constant attempt to reconcile, to make consistent, our life in this world with our life in Christ. It requires us to not only bring into sync our personal lives with Christ, but also for us to work at being in sync with those who journey on a path to God as well as those who do not.

In the final analysis reconciliation is about harmony, a beautiful recognition that life is best played like music when all the notes culminate to perfection even as some dissonance was present throughout the playing. The final harmonious result is more glorious than one could have imaged when the players tuned their instruments in preparation for the concert. The fine tuning is necessary as is the reconciliation of the dissonance.

Prayer: Lord, help us to tune ourselves to your guiding note so that we all can play your theme in love and harmony. Amen.

*http://unabridged.merriam-webster.com/unabridged/reconcile

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized 
Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council 
of Churches of Christ in the United States of American. Used by permission. All rights 
reserved.