Jesus Christ: Central in Salvation

It was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross.

–Colossians 1:19–20

Jesus Christ is sufficient for every need you have. Perhaps the greatest demonstration of His sufficiency is that He did for us what we could not do for ourselves: He paid the penalty for our sins so that we could have peace with God. Jesus Christ is central in salvation. As Colossians 1:19–20 says, “It was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross.”

That word “reconcile” means to change a relationship from hostility to harmony. Paul was not talking about two people who amicably part company and then agree to come back together. Instead, the picture here is of a relationship in which one person leaves and the other party tries to repair the relationship.

Imagine that a wife decides she no longer loves her husband, so she moves in with another man. She has broken her marriage vows. According to the Bible, her husband has the option to divorce her and start over with someone new. Yet he is so in love with his wife that he can’t imagine letting her go. Instead, he tries to win back her affection. He makes the first move in reconciling that relationship. After the way he was treated, that would take a great deal of humility.

But that’s exactly what God has done for us. Isaiah 53:6 says, “All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way.” God didn’t break off His relationship with us; we wandered away from Him and chased after other things and other people. God would be justified in ending His relationship with us and letting us spend eternity separated from Him. Instead, God loved us so much that He took the first step toward reconciliation with us: sending Christ to die for us. Romans 5:8 says, “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

God reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ. But God doesn’t drag anyone back to Himself kicking and screaming. The Bible says we have to agree that we want to be reconciled to God by individually trusting in Christ as our Savior.

Jesus Christ is the central issue in this universe He has created. And what you do with Him is the central issue in your life–and in your eternity.

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Today’s devotion is adapted from “Jesus Christ: Creator, Originator, and Reconciler” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2011.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.lockman.org.