Bridge Builders

ME

The I-35W Mississippi River Bridge (2007)

In August 2007, the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis, Minnesota suddenly collapsed during rush hour. It wasn’t just a roadway—it was a major artery for the city.

When the bridge fell:

• 140,000 vehicles a day were instantly displaced

— lives were lost

Commutes that took 15 minutes now took over an hour. Now time with family was being effected

Emergency vehicles had to reroute

Businesses lost customers

Neighborhoods were effectively cut off from one another

Even people who never thought about the bridge before suddenly felt its absence.

The bridge wasn’t flashy.

It wasn’t famous.

But it quietly did its job—until it was gone.

And when the bridge failed, everyday life became difficult.

WE

“Most people don’t notice bridges when they’re working—but everyone notices when they’re broken.”

Think about it spiritually When bridges are broken between God and people, confusion and distance grow.

When bridges are broken in families, churches, and communities, life becomes harder than it has to be.

God repaired the greatest broken bridge through Christ—and now He calls us to help keep bridges intact.

God reconciled us through Christ and now calls us to be bridge builders—ambassadors who help others cross back to Him.

GOD

2 Corinthians 5:20 ESV

Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.

Text breakdown: READ THE VERSE

CONTEXT — “THEREFORE” - Lets understand the context.

I want you to go to 2 Corinthians 4:17–18 “For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.”

We have this perspective shift happening. Paul and his companions have moved on from focusing on physical things. Especially their physical bodies and started focusing more on their inner selves.

Now look at 2 Corinthians 5:1–5 “For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For indeed in this house we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven, inasmuch as we, having put it on, will not be found naked. For indeed while we are in this tent, we groan, being burdened, because we do not want to be unclothed but to be clothed, so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life. Now He who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the Spirit as a pledge.”

Summed up: This earthly life is temporary and God is preparing us an eternal home.

In 2 Corinthians 5:6–10 “Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord— for we walk by faith, not by sight— we are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord. Therefore we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.”

We learn that Paul says this perspective shift has to do with walking by Faith not by sight. He has matured to the point where he is now able to see past the temporal and focus on the eternal.

He is not worried about pleasing mankind but pleasing God — verse 9

He understands that the judgement of Christ the true measuring stick not the judgement of mankind — Verse 10

Now we see the practical side of this new perspective shift. Because of this new faith vision here is what Paul is now doing.

2 Corinthians 5:11–15 “Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade men, but we are made manifest to God; and I hope that we are made manifest also in your consciences. We are not again commending ourselves to you but are giving you an occasion to be proud of us, so that you will have an answer for those who take pride in appearance and not in heart. For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are of sound mind, it is for you. For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.”

This faith vision now drives Paul to want to persuade men. To encourage mankind to change their eternal destination while he still can.

I love also if you look down a little bit how he says that the love of Christ controls them!!

Fear of the Lord’s judgement and the love of Christ’s sacrifice is what motivates them. Does it motivate us?

ILLUSTRATION: Think about a time you were deeply moved by something—a song, a movie, or a book. You couldn't help but share it with everyone! Paul had that same motivation for Christ. Just as we can’t stop talking about what moves us, Paul couldn't contain his passion for spreading the gospel. Can we take a page from his book and allow our enthusiasm for Christ to shine in our daily conversations? This enthusiasm will be vital to accomplishing our theme for this year about bridge building.

2 Corinthians 5:16–19 “Therefore from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer. Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.”

AGAIN — This perspective shift / this faith vision is now causing Paul to stop looking at the physical attributes of someone but rather to see their soul.

Are they lost? How can I help them find God? This is what Paul was thinking. This is what helped drive this Ministry of Reconciliation.

2 Corinthians 5:20 ESV

Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.

CALLING - “WE ARE AMBASSADORS FOR CHRIST”

Paul’s calling was that he was an ambassadors for Christ. What is an ambassador you may ask?

“Ambassador” - it actually comes from the same greek root that makes up the Prebueteros which is another name for elder.

This word in the Greek describes someoen who is an authorized representative or messenger.

Now in the letter of 2 Corinthians Paul was appealing to this group of Christians about the false teachers or the super so called apostles that had come into the midst of these Christians and started turning some of them away and were burdening them with financial gain.

SO Paul is saying hey we are actually the real deal. We are the ones that authorized by God to bring you this message of Reconciliation.

Notice what seems to be a requirement or tell for someone who is an ambassador…

God is able to make HIS appeal through them.

God used Paul and others to Appeal to (urge) others to reconcile to them.

Paul will mention something similar in Ephesians.

Ephesians 3:20 “Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us,”

ILLUSTRATION: Consider the role of a diplomat representing their country at an international summit. Their words can create alliances or escalate conflict. Similarly, Paul saw himself as an ambassador for Christ, entrusted with the powerful message of reconciliation.

APPLICATION: As Christians, those who have been called by God to be reconciled to him through Christ, have a great responsibility. We are God’s ambassadors / bridge builders while we have breath on this earth.

When we embrace our role as representatives of Christ, we carry the responsibility of sharing hope and healing in a fragmented world, just as Paul did in his time.

What does that look like? Maybe you are asking how can I live out this responsibility?

YOU

MAIN APPLICATION:

Through our theme this year as becoming Bridge Builders we will focus on:

Building bridges with God – deeper faith, spiritual renewal

START HERE - This year we will strive as a individuals to develop a deeper connection with God.

This is one of my main goals for myself this year. I want to deepen my understanding of Christ’s love for me and the Grace God has provided me through His Son. This will then help me become the ambassadors who sees souls and wants to bring others to God.

Now can you imagine if we are all striving to accomplish this same thing.

So how am I going to help us to accomplish this first step?

Right now we are have 3 days into our daily text devotionals for our men. Aside from that we will also have weekly devotionals put out on our youtube and Facebook pages. I would encourage you to watch those and be encouraged.

We will spend our Sunday night service focused on worship and study. Dealing with texts like Revelation or answering big questions that we have.

But i would like to encourage you…if you are someone who is not usually attending on Sunday nights or Wednesday nights come and be with us. To be honest I am not sure what else could more important than coming and getting to study Gods word again with brothers and sisters.

I learned early on in Ministry that disciples were made through learning not through events and so I want to focus on providing as much learning opportunities that I can this year

Building bridges in our families – grace, forgiveness, intentional leadership

We will have periodic encouragements this year for families to have time of growth together.

Whether it be a time of serving together or a time study together. I hope to encourage us to have those times around the table as a family to grow those spiritual connections.

But not only that i would love to encourage us to reach out to those family members we have had bad relationships with and be able to reconcile with them while also pleading with them to be reconciled to God.

Building bridges in our church family – unity, service, belonging

The best relationships I have developed in my life were started with Christ being the topic of conversation.

I can talk hunting, football, weather, Disney, current events in our country until I am blue in the face but for some reason when I leave those conversations I don’t feel like I have made any headway in deepening that relationship.

But if we start talking about God and Scriptures and maybe get into some struggles that we have. Now Im building a bridge with my brother or sister that will stand the test of time.

We will have opporunities this year to do that very thing. But I also want to encourage you to take some ownership of this to.

Maybe this year you find a different pew every Sunday to sit in and try to meet the people who are on that pew.

Sometimes the greatest divide in a church family is the aisles that separate our pews. I have been here a little over a year and I can tell you most everyone’s name.

Exercise: look around this room for a second. Now everyone raise one hand in the air. I am going to ask some questions and if you can answer yes leave your hand up if can’t answer yes put it down.

I have talked with some in this congregation and mentioned other people who are in this church and they had no idea who I am talking about.

Can we truly be a strong church family if we don’t know each other?

This year with yall’s help I strive to change that.

Building bridges in our community – presence, love, invitation

This will be fun opportunity for us. I love sharing the gospel. I love learning about Christ. I love watching others finally get it. So our last bridge builders opportunity will be to build connections with our community.

That will be done through serving our community in various ways this year. That will be done through showing our appreciation to those in our community who have served to keep us safe and protected.

Lord willing this will also be an opportunity for us to shine our light and bring people to GOD!

WE

As I close this sermon out this morning I want to say I am so excited for this year. Let’s be bridge builders together. Let’s be God’s workers who are in the saving folks occupation.

My charge for you today is simple…after you have your meal i want you to go home and as a family / by yourself i want you to write out 2 Corinthians 5:20. Then below i want you to make the commitment to being a bridge builder this year with me.

NOW THE LAST THING I PROMISE…

— Paul ended 2 Corinthians 5:20 with - we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.”

If you are here this morning and you are ready to become a child of God by having your sins washed away in baptism what a great way to start this year.

Or if you are ready to fix the relationship you have fractured with God. You are a Christian who has walked away from faith and this morning you want to fix that? Let us help you and let us pray with you.

If you have a need come while we stand and sing together.