Drawing Nigh to God....series

Drawing Nigh to God

by

Minnie E. Dauphinee

Working With Christ ...Ambassadors

The apostle Paul said, "Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God" (2 Corinthians 5:20).

 

An ambassador is a minister of high rank sent on a mission by one sovereign or state to another. He speaks with authority in the name of the one he represents. To be an ambassador is a high honor, a sacred trust. The Lord might have chosen holy angels as His ambassadors; instead He chose frail human beings, that His power might be manifest through their weakness.

 

All Christians are to be ambassadors for Christ. A businessman once went to the pastor of a certain church and asked if he might join his church secretly, explaining that he feared that church membership would interfere with his business if it were known. The pastor wisely replied that the Lord accepts no silent partners in His work.

There are many souls who long to be Christians, but their faith is weak; they do not know how to lay hold of the promises of God. Such ones are encouraged when a transformed friend comes to them in Christ's stead, for they feel that the same power that transformed his life can transform theirs. It is of the utmost importance that an ambassador for Christ speak just as He would speak. How weighty a responsibility!

 

" 'Ambassadors for Christ!' O Lord, how can

 it be

That sinful, mortal men of clay dare go

 and speak for thee?  

How can our human hearts that years of

 sin have stained,

From poisons of the serpent's sting be ever

 drained?

How can our tongues that shot the viper's

venom far,

Be used to bless the world and not to mar?

 

" 'Ambassadors for Christ!' O Lord, and can

it be

That eyes so full of sin can ever see but

Thee?

How can minds filled with photographs of

 sin for years,

Erase from mem'ry's hall those imprints with

 mere tears?

How can words, long the vehicle of sinful 

thought,

Now paint the sacred pictures that new

sight has caught?

 

" 'Ambassadors for Christ!' " O Lord, if it can be,

Then do Thy wondrous work, that we may

speak for thee;

Take Thou our mortal minds and wash with

blood, not tears,

The sinful, sad impressions of those care-

less years.

Take though our sinful hears and make

 them, Lord, like Thine,

For only as our hearts are pure can our

 words be divine."

 

_Adlai Albert Esteb