Reconciling

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW

RECONCILING

Matt 5:23-26

23 "Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, 24 leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift. 25 "Settle matters quickly with your adversary who is taking you to court. Do it while you are still with him on the way, or he may hand you over to the judge, and the judge may hand you over to the officer, and you may be thrown into prison. 26 I tell you the truth, you will not get out until you have paid the last penny.  

NIV

Here is where the rubber meets the road. How can we come to church and engage in any form of worship, either bringing our tithe and offerings, or for that matter even standing singing praises to the Lord when we have the littlest bit of discord in our heart. This discord is not just limited to our heart, but to the heart of those who know us. If our neighbor, our family member, co-worker, anyone has any ill feelings toward us and we have not done everything to adjust it, to resolve it, to remove the least bit of it, our worship, our tithe and offerings are not acceptable to God. If we are, as far as it depends on us, to make every effort to live in peace with all men, then how can we accept any discord to exist? We just cannot go about living our Christian life with our head in the sand. This would mean not being aware if we have offended someone in some way that causes them to harbor ill feelings toward us. Then on the other hand this would also mean that if we in any way caused our fellow believer any reason to have any ill feelings toward us, then their offerings, worship would be unacceptable to God. How could we live with that? This is why we are admonished to not to let the sun go down on our anger.

Eph 4:25-27

25 Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body. 26 "In your anger do not sin": Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, 27 and do not give the devil a foothold.

NIV

This passage continues with much about the interactions of believers both in our behaviors as well as our attitudes. We are also admonished to forgive.

Eph 4:31-32

31 Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

NIV

The whole idea, which is threaded throughout the scriptures is the main point Jesus is making here. We cannot allow any problems, any unresolved issues to fester and think we can just come to worship God, doing the right motions in church, but our heart is not truly right before God. We cannot say, “Well that is just the way it is” “We can’t help it if someone feels that way about us”. Jesus says, settle the matter before you offer your gifts to God. That may mean going to that person and asking them to forgive us for anything we have done to cause them to harbor any ill feelings toward us. We cannot just say we are sorry, but we must ask them to forgive us. This is especially true if they are fellow believers because this then allows them to make right their hearts before God so their worship is acceptable as well as ours. Jesus continues to include the idea about adversaries taking us to court. Legal matters should also be resolved in a hurry, in an equitable way without judicial intervention. This might seem more difficult in our social setting of today as our culture is so embedded in using judicial actions for so many areas of life. Divorce being one that seems to have become a part of Christian life which needs the law to make decisions regarding all matters which were in common. Yet does there exist enmity in the hearts of the divorced? This is a difficult matter. It is difficult not to be judgmental, but the fact exists within Christianity in which separation of contacts but legal and of the heart exist and how we deal with them matters greatly. Partnerships in business are another one of those issues which could arise to ill feelings and thus a break up which again could result in ill feelings, if we allow that to happen. Even in our investments, we could enter into a situation when whomever we have invested with loses our assets. We could feel ill will. There is so much we could include as to how our actions, our behaviors, our attitudes with others can bring us or them to some form of unfriendly, ill-tempered positions, all of which we are to resolve before coming to God with any offerings. That is just the way it is. We must reconcile. We must do the reconciling.