Inside St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin, Ireland, there’s a door that tells a five-century-old tale. In 1492 two families, the Butlers and the FitzGeralds, started fighting over a high-level position in the region. The fight escalated, and the Butlers, afraid they would be killed, took refuge in the cathedral. When the FitzGeralds came to ask for a truce, the Butlers were afraid to open the door. So the FitzGeralds cut a hole in it, and their leader offered his hand in peace to prove their desire was genuine. The two families then reconciled, and from adversaries they became friends.
God has a door of reconciliation that the apostle Paul wrote passionately about in his letter to the church in Corinth. At His initiative and because of His infinite love, God exchanged the broken relationship with humans for a restored relationship through Jesus’s death on the cross. We humans were far away from God, but in His mercy He didn’t leave us there. He offers us restoration with Himself [“not counting people’s sins against them]” (2 Corinthians 5:19). Justice was fulfilled when “God made [Jesus] who had no sin to be sin for us,” so that in Him we could be at peace with God (v. 21).
Once we accept God’s hand in peace, we are given the important task of bringing that message to others. We represent the amazing, loving God who offers complete forgiveness and restoration to everyone who believes.