Purpose of Reconciliation

Households of Faith
Today’s Focus: Purpose of Reconciliation
Scripture: John 14:17,18; 8:40-56; James 1:27

Greetings Kingdom Citizens
Now if we do not know, one of the purposes of reconciliation is to restore the lost sons of promise back to the House of God. However today I want to show you another purpose and one that is kind-of covered in our minds that needs to be unveiled. The unveiling of this purpose will help us to understand the state that we are in and why we need to be reconciled back to God. Jesus as He was teaching His disciples in John 14 He reassures them of something very important. In John 14:16 Jesus said He will pray the Father that He shall send another Comforter that He will abide with us forever. Now we know the Comforter is the Holy Spirit. But I would like for us to pay attention to verse 17 and 18:

John 14:17,18: Even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth Him: but ye know Him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless; I will come to you.

Now let’s break this down. First, Jesus tells the disciples that they know Him for He dwelleth with them. How is the Holy Spirit dwelling with the disciples? Because the Holy Spirit was in Jesus. Jesus was dwelling amongst the disciples. This is why He told them, the disciples, that you know Him because He has dwelt amongst them. But look at the next sentence, “And shall be in you”. So the Holy Spirit will not just dwell amongst them but a time is coming that the Holy Spirit will dwell IN YOU!. Ok, let’s tackle this last verse now that we know this.

The scripture says that He will not leave us comfortless. Now we have heard and read this a thousand times and we understand it to be in the context of not leaving us lonely which on the surface has some merit. But what does the word comfortless mean and when you know that, then you have the context for the scripture.

The word comfortless in the Greek is “orphanos”. The word orphanos means: orphan, bereaved parentless, fatherless

Do we see this! Jesus is telling us clearly before the abiding of the Holy Spirit, you were an orphan. But the coming of the Holy Spirit and you being reconciled back to the House of God solves all of that. No longer are you parentless or fatherless but you have a Father, in Heaven who abides in your spirit and makes His dwelling place within you.

With that said, the apostle James defines for us true religion and sums up all of this in one scripture:

James 1:27: “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

Case closed! So religion is for us to visit or provide relief to the widows and the fatherless. James is NOT talking about a ministry of compassion where we visit orphanages and widows even though that is good in intent. He is speaking of the spiritual widows who are uncovered and the spiritual orphans and by dwelling amongst them JUST LIKE JESUS DID WITH THE DISCIPLES, they will come to know the Father and see Him in us and be drawn by His Spirit into the House of God and relief their condition of being a widow and orphan. Now let me show you a picture of two churches:

In Luke 8:40-56 we see two widows, The woman with the issue of blood and Jairus’ daughter at 12 years of age. Now the woman with the issue of blood represents a church that is bleeding to death. She could not recognize the ruler of the synagogue, who is Jairus, as her spiritual covering or the one whom her soul has been given to watch over. Without proper oversight and covering the church is hemorrhaging and bleeding to death. Through faith, the woman believes in Jesus Christ and by her faith she is made whole. It is only by faith and trust in Jesus Christ that the church will stop hemorrhaging because He is the lifeline of the church and the Great Physician. The second girl represents the emerging church. It represents a church at puberty and being mentored. The church is family structured with fathers and mothers caring for children. Now the significance of Jesus coming in when He did represents that fact that the natural must die before the spiritual comes in and all who do not believe are cast out (John 8:53,54) from receive the spiritual.

Peace, Love and Grace from the Father,
Calvin Calhoun, Jr.