Formulation of the Problem⤒🔗

This article is a combination of two lectures that I delivered to theology students, in Oudewater on 19 August 1997. The first lecture had the same title as this article. The second lecture was about the fruits of the administration of reconciliation.

The students had posed specific questions about the topic and I shall discuss them in the article.

Considering the fact that Dr. Noordegraaf had covered the topic of reconciliation from the biblical-theological point of view the day before, I felt that I did not have to give a detailed discussion of the biblical data about reconciliation. But I shall mention a few that form the basis for what follows in this article.

I have combined the two lectures into one article for the sake of economy. Besides, both lectures approached the topic particularly from a homiletic approach.

For the sake of clarity, I shall not describe what I shall discuss in the article. For this purpose, the following questions will serve as a guidepost for the discussion of the topic.

What is the relationship between the preaching and reconciliation? Does the expression, “preaching as administration of reconciliation” say everything that can be said about the preaching? Is preaching not something more than administration of reconciliation? Think for example of sanctification. How does speaking about regeneration and conversion fit in with the idea of “preaching of reconciliation”? Do they actually fall outside of preaching as administration of reconciliation? Or should we acknowledge that the description of preaching as the administration of reconciliation is too narrow a description to characterize the essence of preaching? And that raises the practical question: How is reconciliation administered in the preaching? What does a sermon that does justice to the administration of reconciliation look like?

Further, what is the place of the fruits of the administration of reconciliation in the preaching and in pastoral work? Do they belong to the administration of reconciliation, or are they by-products? As a practical matter, should the fruits be part of the sermon? Should they be mentioned? Or should the preacher do more by discussing how they come about and how they are processed? Should the fruits be regarded as a test case, as a hallmark of the experience of reconciliation?

The foregoing formulates the problem that I want to address particularly from a homiletic point of view.

Two Words for Reconciliation←⤒🔗

In the first endnote I list a number of publications that discuss reconciliation in greater or lesser detail.¹ At this point I refer you to the following texts: Matthew 20:28 and its parallel, Mark 5:18; Romans 3:25; Hebrews 2:17; 1 Corinthians 15:3; 2 Corinthians 5:18; 1 John 4:10; Revelation 1:5. I also refer you to the Old Testament background of the sacrificial ministry and the prophecy about the suffering servant of the Lord (Isa. 53). And I refer you to the detailed discussion of these passages and others in Dr. Noordegraaf’s article.

Reconciliation removes our guilt and is thus the restoration of the judicial relationship with God. Essential components of reconciliation are: the love of God, the wrath of God, God’s righteousness, and restoration of the relationship through forgiveness because of Christ’s sacrifice. In consequence of that, there is also a restoration of the relationship between people and the ability to live in peace. That is a benefit of grace and a learning process in the school of faith.

For the preaching and for the experience of reconciliation, it is important to remember that the New Testament uses two words for reconciliation. They refer to the same matter, but denote distinct aspects of it. Hilaskomai has to do with worship. The verb points to the sacrifice that must be made to achieve restoration of the violated and broken relationship, the German Sühne. Katallasso denotes the restoration of the broken relationship, the German versöhnen.

Versteeg says that both words interact with each other to express the one reality of reconciliation. Reconciliation consists of bringing opposing parties together. It comes about by the sacrifice that serves to cover the guilt. Both words originate in different spheres. Hilaskomai (and its corresponding group of words) derives from worship; katallasso derives from the social sphere² It is striking that two words with such a different background are used. We shall have to do justice to both. Reconciliation is the restoration of the relationship through the atoning sacrifice of Christ (Rom. 5:10, 11).³ For that reason, the reality of reconciliation has a double aspect. This is apparent from the fact that two verbs are being used. Preaching as administration of reconciliation must address both aspects. If you limit the administration of reconciliation to hilasmos and hilaskomai, you do not do justice to the biblical message of reconciliation.

The reverse is also true. If you make katallasso the sole point of the sermon and do not mention hilasmos, you fail to get to the heart of the administration of reconciliation. From the point of view of hilasmos, reconciliation happened in the bringing of the sacrifice. From the point of view of katallasso, reconciliation is not complete with the bringing of the sacrifice. Preaching the reconciliation is not an announcement of a particular state of affairs. The preaching calls on people to be drawn into what happened in the sacrifice. This being drawn into the atoning sacrifice — by faith — belongs to reconciliation just as much as the sacrifice that was brought. I shall explore this more fully later when I describe the connection between the Christological and the pneumatological aspects. To apply a well-known expression of Van Ruler, we can say: it revolves around hilaskomai, but it is about katallasso.

An Inadequate Characterization of the Preaching?←⤒🔗

We are now able to answer the question whether the characterization of the preaching as administration of reconciliation is inadequate. Does this perhaps fail to do justice to the preaching and limit the breadth of the biblical message of salvation? The answer is that when you mention only hilaskomai when speaking about reconciliation and allow that to be the focus of the sermon, you limit the message of salvation. But hilaskomai does not stand on its own. It is a component of the larger concept that is identified by katallasso.

You cannot proclaim katallasso when you neutralize hilaskomai. On this point we oppose the view of Den Heijer and all his predecessors.⁴ You rob the biblical message of reconciliation of its essence if you ignore hilaskomai, or neutralize it hermeneutically.⁵

Having said this, we also have to address the opposite. When you only recognize hilaskomai and restrict the preaching of reconciliation to it, you ignore the experience of the restoration of the relationship with God, of the renewal that is included in the reconciliation, and of the sanctification without which you do not fully experience the reconciliation.

We repeat the question: can you characterize the preaching as the administration of reconciliation? The answer is: indeed you can, provided that you treat both aspects, hilaskomai and katallasso, as belonging to the essence of reconciliation.

Katallasso is not a consequence, not an effect, not an addition to hilaskomai. There is no katallasso without hilaskomai. Hilaskomai takes its rightful place only in the whole of katallasso.

Therefore, the preaching of reconciliation has two main points. It is the guilt that must be recognized and acknowledged. God himself has to remove it. You must proceed from the punishing righteousness of God when speaking about sin. In the past it was said, rightly, that the sinner has to undergo the justice of God. In what follows I shall address the relationship between law and gospel in the preaching.

Van Ruler would say that a person must come to agree with the justice of God. At the same time, the preaching of reconciliation is also a preaching of the restoration of the right relationship with God, between people, and therefore of the new life.

You can ask whether reconciliation from the point of view of katallasso is not understood too broadly. Is the new life fruit of reconciliation, or does it belong to reconciliation itself?

Let me give a strict definition of the matter. I shall use a few words that played a role already in the background, although I did not use all of them. They are: faith and conversion, sanctification and new life, love and hope.⁶You cannot be reconciled to God outside of faith and conversion. Those two are characteristic of life in and from reconciliation. The same is true of sanctification and new life.⁷ They belong to kallasso. When a person separates sanctification from reconciliation, he remains unreconciled to God. He may speak highly of the atoning sacrifice, but he has no part in it. It is the same with love and hope.⁸ For the reconciled life is characterized precisely by faith, love, and hope. Those three are an expression of the right relationship with God. That is what it is all about in reconciliation. The new life truly belongs to being reconciled to God.

But there is another danger. It lies in such a broad definition of reconciliation that the entire Christian ethos is included in it, namely the ethos in personal, social, ecological, cosmic, and political relationships. I have listed them in an arbitrary way.

When you include all these aspects of reconciliation to reconciliation itself, you can no longer call them its fruits. How do they belong to reconciliation? We have to draw clear distinctions and boundaries. We shall now examine what I have just said in greater detail.

Reconciliation as a Bilateral Event←⤒🔗

Dr. Noordegraaf has pointed out that reconciliation in the Old Testament functioned in the framework of the covenant relationship between God and his people. God binds himself in love and faithfulness to his people and calls on them to live before his face. Psalm 103 is a clear example of it. The way of restoration of the broken covenant is the way of reconciliation. Worship plays a real role in Psalm 103. You may not separate what God says about forgiveness from the sacrifice in the temple. And that shows that reconciliation is a bilateral event. God is first. He takes the initiative. People come to him in repentance and confess their guilt. They bring their prayers and sacrifices to God.⁹ And thus we see that in the Old Testament the reaction of people is part of reconciliation. God begins it; people react. This reaction is not just fruit of reconciliation, it is part of it.

In this light it is understandable that reconciliation has everything to do with bringing peace. Ephesians 2:15 and 16 call the reconciliation to God of Jew and Gentile (into one body) peace. This peace is not something added to reconciliation. It is truly part of it. The same is true of Romans 5:1. In Colossians 1:20 reconciliation even has cosmic dimensions: “all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven”.

We may conclude that the reconciliation to God has many aspects. The question that faces us now is whether the details of all those aspects belong to reconciliation. My preference is to say that the restoration of the relationship happens before reconciliation. Characterizing that restoration with terms such as peace, love, and faith means that restoration truly happens before reconciliation and is really part of it. I call the manner in which reconciliation operates in all those relationships the fruit of reconciliation. We find those fruits for example in Romans 15:13 and Galatians 5:22. The word peace appears in both texts. The peace in Romans 5:1 is the experience of reconciliation. The peace mentioned in the other two texts is the effect of reconciliation in the life with Christ and with each other.

I believe that it is correct to speak about the fruits of reconciliation. By that I mean the effect of reconciliation in the relationship between God and people. At the same time I realize that the personal involvement in and the believing experience of reconciliation are part of reconciliation as such.

Ridderbos combines these two aspects beautifully in the ultimate sentence of his first paragraph about reconciliation. He says: “In this way reconciliation flows into the whole of the Christian life and is its foundation and summary, just as ‘the administration of reconciliation’ coincides on the one hand with ‘the administration of righteousness’ and on the other hand with ‘the administration of the Spirit”’.¹⁰

Christology and Pneumatology←⤒🔗

We see this too when we read Paul’s message about reconciliation in 2 Corinthians 5:11-21 from the point of view of Christology and pneumatology. In this passage Paul speaks about God, who reconciles the world with himself in Christ. That is the sole focus in the biblical message of reconciliation. Paul looks at reconciliation by reference to the work of the Father and of the Son.

There is another focus in the same passage. That is the ministry of reconciliation (v. 18) and the word of reconciliation (v. 19). The ministry of reconciliation is the ministry of the Word (Acts 6:4). The word of reconciliation has to do with the pneumatological aspect of reconciliation.

The ministry of Jesus lies at the heart of reconciliation. He came to give his life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:45). That is the Christological content of reconciliation. I am inclined to write, the Christological substance, although I realize that that sounds a bit strange in this context.

It is evident from 2 Corinthians 5 that there is a second ministry in the reality of reconciliation. That is bringing the word of reconciliation.

This ministry — called diakonia, just as that of Christ — is pneumatological in nature. We share in reconciliation through the preaching. The Spirit takes it out of Christ and proclaims it to us (John 16:15). By the preaching we appropriate the reconciliation through the work of the Spirit.

The pneumatological aspect in particular shows us clearly that the believing acceptance by people also belongs to reconciliation.

From the point of view of the distinction between Christology and pneumatology — which form a unity — we can say that reconciliation encompasses its believing acquisition.

In light of 2 Corinthians 5, we cannot maintain that reconciliation happened in the past and there is nothing more to be said about it. Reconciliation must be preached and experienced. Christologically, reconciliation is a one-time fact; pneumatologically, reconciliation is a dynamic reality.¹¹ The preaching has to take both aspects into account. Only then can we characterize preaching as the administration of reconciliation.

How is Reconciliation Administered in the Preaching?←⤒🔗

When you preach Jesus, you preach reconciliation with God through him. This is clear from what Paul says: “For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2).

There are texts in which reconciliation is mentioned explicitly. The biblical-theological contribution has discussed these extensively. There are also texts in which the words renewal and reconciliation are not mentioned explicitly. But it is nonetheless clear that whenever Christ, his person and his work, are mentioned in the preaching, reconciliation is being discussed. No preaching about Christ can fail to mention reconciliation.

When you preach a text which mentions reconciliation, you must therefore discuss it thoroughly. If that word is not mentioned in the text, Christ’s work of reconciliation ought still to be the foundation of the proclamation of the gospel. Christ came to reconcile us for our sins. You cannot speak about his coming and his actions (words and works) without speaking of his sacrifice as the foundation of reconciliation.

I shall summarize my ideas in a number of points:

1. Administration of reconciliation takes place via the preaching of God’s promises in Jesus Christ. Administration of reconciliation is only possible and only becomes a reality when you preach God’s promises in Jesus Christ.
2. The work of Jesus Christ is being obedient in love to the God of the law and to the law of God. That obedience has a dual aspect, namely, actively fulfilling the law and undergoing the judgment of the law over sin. Thus, you have to speak about sin and punishment, about judgment and satisfaction through Jesus Christ.
3. There are two ways to preach about God’s judgment. One is that you begin in paradise, where everything was good and where everything went radically wrong because of disobedience. That is a sermon that begins with Adam (the first and oldest), in order that you end up with Christ. In other words, the sermon moves from Sinai to Zion.¹²The other is to begin with Christ. He is the second, the new Adam. When you preach his work and his love for the sinner, you cannot ignore the reason why the Father sent him. And then you go back from Golgotha to Paradise. This second method seems to me to conform to the manner in which the Bible speaks about sin and guilt, namely, in the framework of the gospel.
4. This raises a question about the relationship between the law and the gospel. In my book on this topic I discussed in detail the place of the law in the preaching of the gospel. The fundamental principle of my book is that when you preach the gospel, you cannot ignore the law or, consequently, sin, guilt, and judgment. But I rejected the structure according to which you must first experience condemnation by the law, after which you can then speak about acquittal by the gospel. This structure introduces a chronologically phased experience of law and gospel. One of my objections to it is that being broken only by the law is then a work of the law. The law has a relatively independent place in the gospel. God now gives it in the framework of the gospel. We cannot preach the law apart from the gospel.¹³
5. You may preach Christ as the Guarantor, the Mediator, the Reconciler, who bore the punishment. You must point to him, so that the listener can take refuge in him in faith. You must describe and promote that progression.
6. Its fruit is the forgiveness of sins and life with God in peace and joy. Christ promises us these riches in his grace. We may accept them in faith.
7. You must also point to the functioning of faith and the experience of forgiveness. And you must draw attention to things that impede the functioning of faith.
   This means that you must address knowledge of sins and the believing acceptance of the promise of forgiveness. In a previous article I have written about the “so that” structure of preaching: “and that by believing you may have life in his name”.¹⁴We may regard the spiritual reality of having life in Jesus’ name through faith as a description of experience and of reconciliation.
   In this way you have all the opportunity you need to speak pastorally, personally, and practically of the experience of reconciliation in the preaching. In the process, you will address the questions: How do we achieve it? How do we live it and how do we hold on to it? What are the threats to this experience and how do we resist the devil’s opposition to it? In this way the sermon about reconciliation becomes practical, or if you will, experiential. In any event, it becomes existential-personal.¹⁵

The Hermeneutical Question←⤒🔗

In the above discussion I have discussed what the Bible says about reconciliation. Now I want to examine the question whether today’s human beings are still attuned to it. Are modern persons so far estranged from biblical terminology that these expressions are foreign to them? The question about meaning is more relevant and urgent for many than the question about guilt. And so for them the meaning of existence becomes central, rather than reconciliation. In this context I ask the following hermeneutical question: What should be our point of origin, the person, the reader, or the text?¹⁶

It seems to me that the nub of the question is whether hilasmos belongs to the essence of the biblical message. Or can we perhaps cut the substitutionary sacrifice out of reconciliation, while still retaining a biblical doctrine of reconciliation, but one that is now packaged into a different terminology and conveyed in other metaphors?¹⁷

Having posed the question, we must also answer it. When we consider the ministry of sacrifice in the Old Testament, the substitution in that ministry is so real, that we would lose the heart of the message of reconciliation if we replaced the idea of substitution with something that makes more sense to us today, such as, for example, solidarity.¹⁸

In my booklet, Zullen we lezen? I drew attention to the key position the newer hermeneutics has arrogated to itself. It determines what portion of the biblical message is still transmissible and acceptable.¹⁹ In opposition to modern hermeneutics I pleaded for a hermeneutic of the Holy Spirit. It enables us to understand the essence and intention of biblical concepts.

We must explain and clarify the terminology of sacrifice and redemption, and also the juridical framework (God’s righteousness) in our preaching. The message of reconciliation cannot do without this language, nor without its explanation.

First we must listen to what is written in the text, what it says and means. From there we must switch over to today and explain the breadth and depth of reconciliation in the life of the Christian. The newer hermeneutic takes the opposite route. It begins with today’s persons and fills their way of thinking with biblical terminology.

Our task is not easy, but it is essential for him who makes the words of Paul his own and pleads with the congregation to be reconciled to God.

Fruits of Reconciliation←⤒🔗

The second part of this article does not address homiletics alone. We began with homiletics, but now we need to discuss the fruits of the administration of reconciliation in the life of the believers. Those fruits are closely connected to the preaching. The preaching raises them. They have their place in daily life. Therefore, in this context you can speak of an ethical and a spiritual care aspect, in addition to a homiletic aspect.

In Matthew 5:23 the Lord Jesus describes reconciliation as something that happens between people. Before you bring a sacrifice, you must first be reconciled to your brother. An act of thankfulness toward God can never serve as an alibi for living in an unreconciled relationship with your brother.²⁰ The relationship with God in thankfulness at the altar can take place only once you have reconciled with your brother, or alternatively, once you have given him the opportunity to reconcile himself to you.

In other words, you cannot experience reconciliation with God if you reject reconciliation with your neighbour. In the words used by the Lord Jesus, the demand to reconcile is much more urgent than the completion of a pending sacrifice. Van Bruggen says: In God’s eyes, remaining unreconciled to a brother is a greater desecration of a sacrifice than the interruption of the sacrifice, which the Jews regarded as a desecration.²¹

Being reconciled to the brother is not a condition precedent to, nor a ground for reconciliation from God’s side with us. But it is certainly a demonstration of our inclination toward God and the neighbour.

This is very clear from the parable Jesus told about the unmerciful servant (Matt. 18:21ff.). The king cancelled his debt, but the servant was not prepared to cancel a much smaller debt owed him by another servant. The absence of that readiness demonstrates that the unmerciful servant failed to understand the miracle of forgiveness and his precarious position as debtor.

We see the same relationship between receiving forgiveness and forgiving in the fifth petition of the Lord’s Prayer (Luke 11:4; Matt. 6:12). The “as” (Matt.) and “for” (Luke) is not the same thing as “because”. Otherwise our attitude would form a meritorious basis for God’s forgiveness. Those who ask God, with a broken heart (Ps. 51:17), to forgive, cannot continue to grouse, or harbour a grudge against a fellow man. He must be ready to forgive the other person too.

Thus, our readiness to forgive is fruit of the forgiveness that we ask of God. At the same time, it is a sign of God’s forgiving grace in our life. You can recognize that grace in our life. It is efficacious.

I identify reconciliation with the neighbour as the first distinguishing mark for ethos, pastoral work, and preaching. It is experiencing peace, becoming whole from what was broken. That is true reconciliation and restoration.

We are moved when we read of this in Ephesians 2:16, also referred to above. There Paul speaks about reconciliation between Jews and Gentiles, from the point of view that they are reconciled to God by the cross, by which enmity was put to death. It is not easy to determine what exactly the “wall of hostility” (2:14) is. It is also called enmity. For now I believe that the Jews appealed to the Old Testament ritualistic commandments and thereby raised a wall of hostility.²² Perhaps those on the other side of the wall not only experienced the enmity, but were also fed by it, so that it, despite the wall, was two-sided. This demonstrates the hardness of sin.

God has made those two into one new person, and thereby has reconciled both to himself. The enmity was put to death on the cross. The means whereby the enmity was fed and kept in place was taken away. For the law of the commandments was rendered inoperative.

Here we see reconciliation explicitly connected to the relationship between Israel and the nations. Here we come into contact with the peace that is part of reconciliation.

Reconciliation and Transformation←⤒🔗

A number of publications have explored the fruits, or, if you prefer, the effects and consequences, of reconciliation. Herman Wiersinga did that in his book, Verzoening als verandering: a given for human action. After the topic, effective reconciliation,²³ he addresses reconciliation of neighbours, reconciliation and criminal law and reconciliation in society.²⁴ See also the chapter, “Verzoening tussen volken en mensen”, in Lekkerkerker’s book.²⁵ I do not share Wiersinga’s view of reconciliation. He lets reconciliation be absorbed into what I described above as the fruits of reconciliation. And he disregards hilasmos as the core of reconciliation. Nonetheless, we cannot ignore what he writes about the practice, although his practice lacks the biblical foundation.

Reconciliation means wanting to do away with what caused division. It means confession one’s guilt, forgiving another’s guilt, and living in peace with each other. Love’s aim is restoration, harmony, and wholeness. We receive this positive disposition when we experience reconciliation. Think, for example, of the fifth petition, “as we also have forgiven our debtors”.

Reconciliation is possible only if you want to change. The willingness to change and the belief that it is possible are indispensable for achieving interpersonal reconciliation.

Reconciliation comes about by breaking through the hostile relationship. Wiersinga writes that when you are motivated by a positive attitude, you bring the relationship to another level.²⁶ For that purpose you do not have to remain silent about the guilt, or diminish it. On the contrary. You pierce the relationship of enmity when you want to receive and welcome the other, by forgiving him. In this context I should prefer to speak of a change in the relationship, rather than bringing it to another level. That is how God took the initiative to reconciliation. And that is how change came about.

We saw that there are two sides to reconciliation. Two persons or parties are involved. But that raises the question: What happens to reconciliation when one party wants to reconcile, but the other does not? The unilateral initiative to reconciliation then runs aground on the blunt unwillingness of the other person. It is clear that reconciliation does not happen in that case. As a result you are in an interpersonal situation in which one invites the other to reconciliation, but the other does not want to reconcile. Remember the closing verses of 2 Corinthians 5.

The person who would love to be reconciled, has to wait. He must not lose his patience and he should not let his willingness to reconcile lessen, even when the other person rejects reconciliation.

Within the Framework of the Christian Life←⤒🔗

The theme of interpersonal reconciliation derives from Christian life. Sanctification must really take shape in that life. You must draw the basic outlines in the preaching and you will be able to develop this further in pastoral discussions.²⁷

The core of the fruit of reconciliation is Christian love, which does not seek itself. The Holy Spirit pours this love into our hearts (Rom. 5:5). The preaching about the fruits of reconciliation is therefore a preaching in which the Spirit is active. He brings about the love by putting to death our old nature. The Spirit breaks down and builds up. When you preach about reconciliation as transformation, you cannot ignore that work about breaking down our old nature. But the main point is always positive. The fruits grow despite the oppression. You must also speak about the opposition.

The fruits exist in the service of Christ, for the glorification of his grace, and for the benefit of our fellow man. Thus, they do not exist for your own self-aggrandizement or something to boast about. The fruits are a sign of the efficaciousness of the Spirit and of the pneumatological activity of faith. They underline the reality of the reconciliation to God as it is being experienced in faith. They fill our hearts with joy. They leave a sweet flavour in the heart of a person and in the faith community.

The absence of this fruit should fill us with concern, and motivate us to self-examination. You need to ask yourself why they are missing.

These are pastoral problems that must be discussed in the preaching and developed in pastoral visits.

In conclusion I point to the necessity of personal knowledge of sin and of equipping oneself to fight against sin. I also draw attention to the social and even cosmic (Col. 1:20) implications of preaching reconciliation.

In the preaching we must discuss both the Christological and the pneumatological aspects. But we should not deal with the latter at the cost of what Christ has done for us. Nor should we deal with the Christological aspect without taking into account what the Spirit does with the Christological aspect in and for us. There needs to be pneumatic balance between the two. The experience of reconciliation encompasses forgiveness and renewal. The consequence is fruits of forgiveness. In that way reconciliation displays its pneumatic effectual power.

Preach about reconciliation as the unfolding of the gospel of the kingdom (Matt. 4:23). In that way we find the royal way between activism and being pietistically focused inwardly! The royal way bears the name: preaching as administration of reconciliation. That is how the kingdom comes in its breadth and depth.