Reconciliation - UPDV Updated Bible Version

Reconciliation runs along two axes in scripture: the restoration of a broken bond between persons, and the restoration of relation between God and humanity. Both axes name a real route back from injury — a way out, a route of access, an act done — rather than a wish for the bond to mend on its own. The wisdom-tradition keeps the route specific (a friend after a sword-draw, a slander, an open mouth), and the prophetic and apostolic witness names the larger route as a decreed completion-aim and as a Christ-mediated work tied to the cross.

Between persons

The Esau and Jacob narrative gives reconciliation as a meeting after long estrangement: "And Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck, and kissed him: and they wept" (Gen 33:4). The bond is sealed when the gift is accepted: "Take, I pray you, my gift that is brought to you; because God has dealt graciously with me, and because I have enough. And he urged him, and he took it" (Gen 33:11).

Sirach treats reconciliation as a defined recovery-route built into the friend-bond, not a vague hope. Even at the extreme of drawn weapons the route remains: "Even if you draw the sword against a friend, Do not despair, for there is a way out" (Sir 22:21). The same applies to verbal injury: "If you open your mouth against a friend, Do not fear, for there is a [way of] reconciliation; But reproach, arrogance, betrayal of a secret, and a deceitful blow, In these every friend will depart" (Sir 22:22). The bracketed [way of] is a UPDV editorial supply that names the route explicitly. Sirach pairs the same logic with bodily injury: "For a wound may be bound up, and for slander there is reconciliation, But he who reveals secrets has no hope" (Sir 27:21). Wound and slander each have a route; secret-disclosure does not.

The sacrificial sign

Under the priestly arrangement, reconciliation between God and the people is given as an altar-act done with blood. At the consecration of the altar Moses applies the blood directly: "And he slew it; and Moses took blood, and put it on the horns of the altar round about with his finger, and purified the altar, and poured out the blood at the base of the altar, and sanctified it, to make atonement for it" (Lev 8:15). Ezekiel's restored-temple vision keeps the same logic in the prince's tribute: "and one lamb of the flock, out of two hundred, from the well-watered pastures of Israel; -for a meal-offering, and for a burnt-offering, and for peace-offerings, to make atonement for them, says the Sovereign Yahweh" (Eze 45:15). Meal, burnt, and peace offerings are drawn for the explicit aim of atonement for the house of Israel.

A decreed completion

In Daniel the act of making reconciliation appears as one of the six decreed aims of the seventy weeks: "Seventy weeks are decreed on your people and on your holy city, to finish transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy" (Dan 9:24). The reconciliation-aim is paired with the iniquity that requires it and is set inside the same decree-frame that culminates in the anointing of the most holy.

Reconciliation in Christ

The Pauline statement places God as the subject of the reconciling: "But all things are of God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and gave to us the service of reconciliation" (2Co 5:18). The reconciliation is God's act, the direction is back to God, the mediator is Christ, and the derivative result is an entrusted "service of reconciliation." The next verse repeats and extends the scope: "to wit, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not reckoning to them their trespasses, and having committed to us the word of reconciliation" (2Co 5:19). The paragraph turns to imperative address: "We are ambassadors therefore on behalf of Christ, as though God were entreating by us: we urge [you⁺] on behalf of Christ, be⁺ reconciled to God" (2Co 5:20). The substitutionary content closes the unit: "Him who knew no sin he made [to be] sin on our behalf; that we might become the righteousness of God in him" (2Co 5:21).

Romans gives the same movement under the language of enmity and peace. Justification opens the access: "Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ" (Rom 5:1). The reconciling is then named explicitly across the enemies/reconciled distinction: "For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, shall we be saved by his life" (Rom 5:10). The instrumental phrase is "the death of his Son"; the result-phrase is "shall we be saved by his life."

Colossians states the universal-scope reconciliation as a through-Christ act with the cross as instrument: "and through him to reconcile all things to himself, having made peace through the blood of his cross; through him, whether things on the earth, or things in the heavens" (Col 1:20). The addressed-state before that act is alienation: "And you⁺, being in time past alienated and enemies in your⁺ mind in your⁺ evil works" (Col 1:21). The reconciling answers that state in Christ's body: "yet now he has reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you⁺ holy and without blemish and unreproveable before him" (Col 1:22). The presentation-aim — "holy and without blemish and unreproveable" — is what the reconciliation produces.

Hebrews names the same office under the propitiation-act conducted by a brother-likened high priest: "Therefore it behooved him in all things to be made like his brothers, that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people" (Heb 2:17). The God-ward sphere is "things pertaining to God," and the operative act is propitiation for the people's sins. See Atonement for the wider sacrificial-act vocabulary, and Mediator for the high-priestly office Hebrews draws on.

Two made one

Ephesians works the reconciliation across a second axis — Jew and Gentile reconciled to God in one body. The setup abolishes the dividing structure: "Having abolished the law of commandments [contained] in ordinances; that he might create in himself the two into one new man, [so] making peace" (Eph 2:15). The reconciling itself slays the enmity: "and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, having slain the enmity in himself" (Eph 2:16). The peace is then preached outward: "and he came and preached [the good news of] peace to you⁺ who were far off, and peace to those who were near" (Eph 2:17). The outcome is shared access: "for through him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father" (Eph 2:18). Two parties, one body, one Spirit, one Father — the body-unifying restoration is what the reconciling produces.

The reconciling of the world

Romans 11 widens the frame from the people to the world: "For if the casting away of them [is] the reconciling of the world, what [will] the receiving [of them be], but life from the dead?" (Rom 11:15). The casting-away/receiving contrast names the reconciling of the world as a stage in a larger movement that ends in life from the dead.