Spring 2026 · Vol. 55 No. 1 · pp. 64–74
Even Here! The Church as God’s Reconciling Presence in a Fractured World
In his 2004 convocation address to the theological graduates at Knox College in Toronto, Ontario, journalist Brian Stewart reflected on his experience of encountering Christians as a member of the media. Known for his work on Canada’s national public network, Stewart revealed his personal journey from religious cynic to one who appreciated and then embraced the active faith of the myriads of Christians he witnessed around the globe as he “broke” the news of tragedies and triumphs. Reflecting on touching down in what was assumed to be a deserted part of central Africa, Stewart said, “We stepped out into the middle of absolutely nowhere . . . only to be greeted by a cheerful Dutch Reform Minister offering tea. My veteran cameraman . . . sighed in exasperation, ‘Do you think you could p. 65 ever get us to a story, somewhere, anywhere where those Christians aren’t there first!!!’ I was never able to.” 1
As the church embraces ministries of reconciliation into its fractured context, it should be clear in its message, indiscriminate in love, and courageous across the soft or hard lines that have been drawn.
Stewart’s anecdote, not to mention his high praise for the presence and impact of the church in the most dire situations, points us to the thesis of this paper, namely, that the church—by God’s design, the building of Jesus who is head of the church, and the breath and leading of the Holy Spirit—is to be God’s reconciling presence in a fractured world. Christianity is the world’s largest religious community, numbering around 2.5 billion adherents. 2 Christian denominations and communities identifying as evangelical (including Anabaptist denominations) number approximately 650 million, largely in the Global South, with the World Evangelical Alliance comprising 143 national alliances globally. 3 In both theory and practice, this means that amidst the current realities of a fractured, warring, and polarized world Christians are quite literally present everywhere. As Brian Stewart further noted of his experience in the remotest places and seemingly most hopeless realities as a journalist, “ ‘Even Here,’ churches seemed to say ‘Even Here’ . . . however remote or wretched or dangerous . . . ‘Even Here’ we will be by your side, even to the end.” 4
In what follows, I will sketch a theological outline of the identity and mission of the church as God’s reconciling presence. Then, building upon that foundation, I will identify two imperatives for the church as God’s reconciling presence: the embodying of reconciliation and the embrace of the message and ministry of reconciliation. Finally, I will propose practical implications for the church in its localized expressions.
The Church as God’s Reconciling Presence: A Theological Outline
Jesus said, “. . . I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it” (Matt 16:18 NRSVue passim). The church, the ecclesia (Lat.; Gk. ekklēsia), Johannes Reimer points out, “is only a church when it conforms to the community designed by Jesus.” And, Reimer continues, “ecclesia is called out of the world to become light for the world, accepting responsibility for the world and transforming the world into a place according to the teaching of Jesus on the kingdom of God.” 5 The church is sourced in God, belongs to God, and exists to serve God’s kingdom purposes. This is what Jesus is building as head of the church, his body (Col 1:18). From the very beginning this implies that the reconciling of all things in heaven and on earth are sourced in Jesus’ person, teachings, and work and by extension the body he is forming for “through him God was pleased to reconcile to p. 66 himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross” (Col 1:20). This reconciling work continues every day and everywhere and requires expression and evidence.
The incarnation of God in Christ is the good news by which humanity and the cosmos are reconciled to God and come to experience the fullness of his presence, a presence that is tangible and localized: “And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). Like Jesus who was born in a particular historical moment, a particular place, and among a particular people, “The Christian experience today is always rooted in time and space. To be ‘in Christ’ is to be with him here and now and this, at the same time, is a community experience.” 6 “Even here!” is what the incarnation and the gospel of the kingdom of God declare and demonstrate. Jesus is God’s presence and reconciling power and purpose in fullness, and the church is the reconciling presence of God wherever Jesus continues to build it, involving reconciled human beings in his ongoing ministry. As John Paul Lederach observes, “Jesus’ ministry had roots in grace expressed primarily through the quality of presence.” 7
Jesus, of course, is the fulfilment of the Old Testament promises of Yahweh given to all creation; to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; and to the nations through the people of Israel. In the beginning God is not distant but present in the garden of his creating (Gen 3:8). God’s essence and presence is observed even in the evil acts of Cain (Gen 4:15) and Babel, where Yahweh “comes down to see the city” (Gen 11:5). God’s promises to the patriarchs were marked by faithful presence as heard in Yahweh’s words to Isaac, “I am the God of your father Abraham; do not be afraid, for I am with you and will bless you and make your offspring numerous for my servant Abraham’s sake” (Gen 26:24).
“I will be with you” is a repeated refrain in the Hebrew Scriptures and is the promise Jesus echoes as he commissions his disciples to make disciples of all nations (Matt 28:20). The “I will be with you” presence of God is promised to Moses at the outset of his call to deliver the Hebrew slaves (Exod 3:12). God states to an unsure Moses during the exodus, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest” (Exod 33:14). The presence of God was eventually institutionalized in tabernacle and temple—though even Solomon knew Yahweh was never contained in bricks and mortar (1 Kings 8:27)—and enshrined not only in the theology of Israel, but in their spirituality and worship with many psalms reposing on the hopeful, comforting, and even confronting presence of Yahweh: p. 67 “Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence?” (Ps 139:7).
Even in the discipline of exile, and then post-exile, presence is what Yahweh promises Israel into the future:
I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them; and I will bless them and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary among them forevermore. My dwelling place shall be over them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Then the nations shall know that I the Lord sanctify Israel, when my sanctuary is among them forevermore. (Ezek 37:26-28)
This restating and reaffirming of the original promise of Exodus 6:7 is a prophetic, post-exilic promise for the sake of the revelation of God’s presence among Israel and ultimately the nations—fulfilling the word to Abraham of blessing for all the families of the earth (Gen 12:1-3). The great hope reiterated and expressed after the return from exile is that God’s Kingly presence and rule is to be for and among all the earth: “Many nations shall join themselves to the Lord on that day and shall be my people; and I will dwell in your midst . . .” (Zech 2:11) and “. . . the Lord will become king over all the earth . . .” (Zech 14:9).
The presence of God declared to and experienced by patriarchs, matriarchs, and Israel in exodus, national expansion under kings, and then in exile and post-exile was never just for them. The presence and glory of God and his reign was for all peoples, of which those to whom God’s presence was revealed were to become ambassadors. Neither was God’s presence merely spiritual, religious, or ethereal, but tangible and realized in the personal and community ethics of the people of Yahweh in space and time. “Even here” it should transform, we might say.
In the Old Testament, the prophetic promise of presence is not a detached spirituality or private religious observance, but a living revelation of God’s holiness seen in the way of life of a covenantal people. To know God’s presence is always to be transformed and reconciled in practice; to be made righteous is not only positional, but practical. On a personal level, the prophet Isaiah’s encounter of God’s presence produced not only awe, but the devastating awareness of the hypocrisy of “unclean lips.” Isaiah became unsettlingly aware of the disconnect between what was said about God and how that was lived at both at an individual and a national level (Isa 6:5). On both personal and corporate levels, to know Yahweh’s presence was to be governed by a Law that produced righteousness and justice, right relationships and shalom: “Wash yourselves; make yourselves p. 68 clean; remove your evil deeds from before my eyes; cease to do evil; learn to do good; seek justice; rescue the oppressed; defend the orphan; plead for the widow” (Isa 1:16-17). To enter God’s presence is to become his ways and will; to not be like God in practice when you claim to adore his presence is to trample the courts of the King Eternal and despise his presence (Lev 20:26).
When, therefore, Jesus Christ comes with the announcement, “Glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth peace” (Luke 2:14), it is the stunning combination of the glory of God and the shalom of earth kissing. The fullness of the presence of God is revealed and will dwell with us. Jesus—far from diminishing the prophetic, righteous, and reconciling unity inherent in the presence of God—reaffirms and even elevates it. The beatitudes describe a people poor in spirit, meek, mourning, and peacemaking who will be persecuted like the prophets (Matt 5:12). It would be their good deeds “even here” that are urged to shine (Matt 5:16). The presence of Jesus fulfilled the Law and the Prophets with emphasis on not mere believing, but practicing the righteous, reconciling ways of God among and for the nations (Matt 5:17-20).
In short, from the beginning of his ministry Jesus equates his presence with a far more robust vision than private spirituality or even “saving souls.” In fact, to “seek and save the lost,” as Jesus does with Zacchaeus, is to reconcile the tax collector with God, with the righteous acts revealed in the Law, and with his own people whom he has been exploiting (Luke 19:1-10). Zacchaeus, it might be said, is saved by Jesus to become fully alive in his own context as a reconciling presence.
This same theme is picked up by the apostles as the Spirit blows the church beyond Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). Where Jesus builds his church—planting his incarnational presence through reconciled human beings united and filled with the Spirit of God—a glorious mystery is revealed. To the Ephesians Paul writes of the epochal moment that has arrived: when Jesus was crucified at the behest of Jews and Gentiles together, he broke down the dividing wall of hostility that seemed irreconcilable between the two groups. Christ has become the peace (Eph 2:14), and those who awake to God in Christ reconciling all things in heaven and on earth (Col 1:20) become a new humanity (Eph 2:15), fellow citizens in a new political reality and family (Eph 2:19), and a new holy temple in the Lord (Eph 2:21).
The old temple, like the previous tabernacle the symbolic sign of God among his people, 8 is rendered obsolete for a new dwelling of the reconciling presence of God among the nations has emerged—the ecclesia (church) Jesus is building. And, says Paul, this has been God’s plan all p. 69 along, “. . . so that through the church the wisdom of God in its rich variety might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places” (Eph 3:10).
God’s declaration of his past, present, and future reign has finally, fully, mysteriously, and covertly burst upon the powers that seek to kill, steal, and destroy. This has been accomplished through Christ and the presence of the church Jesus is building that has been—as Mary became in bearing the mystery that reconciled heaven and earth—overshadowed by the Spirit (Luke 1:35). In Christ God, who is present and with his creation despite its sin and fracturing (Rom 5:8), has reconciled the world to himself and given to the ecclesia the ministry of reconciliation (2 Cor 5:18), which can now be present and contextualized everywhere.
Peter emphasizes this practically: “Conduct yourselves honorably among the gentiles, so that, though they malign you as evildoers, they may see your honorable deeds and glorify God when he comes to judge” (1 Pet 2:12). The reconciled reality, fellowship, and life in the world of those “in Christ” is God’s reconciling presence and the vocation of the church, even here and even now until Jesus comes again and the earth knows the full glory of the Lord (Hab 2:14). One day God will fully dwell among us and tears and death will be no more (Rev 21:3-4), but until then, the church filled and empowered by the Spirit is to become God’s reconciling presence and to embrace the purpose for which Jesus is building it. As Al Tizon states, “The church as evangelist, peacemaker and steward: these describe the whole and reconciled church engaged in the Whole Commission.” 9 Or, as John W. de Gruchy describes, “The Church is God’s reconciled and reconciling community, God’s new humanity, a sign and witness of God’s purpose for the whole inhabited universe or oikoumenē.” 10
The Church as God’s Reconciling Presence: Two Imperatives
This leads to two imperatives placed upon the church as we join Peter in practically and contextually applying the theological foundation outlined above.
First, the church must embody reconciliation. The church, rightly understood, becomes the crucible for the presence of God revealed and realized in human relationship and purpose. Lederach writes, “The people who make up the church and its very structure are living testimonies of working out the mission of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:18-19). The church is a place of encounter.” 11 The church’s encounter of the glory of God in worship, word, and sacrament is not separate from the encounter of the glory of God in practicing God’s will with one another in the reconciled p. 70 community. To worship in God’s presence is to make present the law of love (Rom 13:8-10; Gal 5:13-14; James 2:8), a call consistent with the prophetic call of Isaiah to Israel to never divorce ritual from the holy practice of the reconciling and shalom-centered will of Yahweh.
The Scriptures place a clear imperative on the church as God’s reconciling presence: the embodiment, enfleshing, “tabernacling” of reconciliation and peace among the members of the body of Christ. Numerous New Testament passages instruct Christ’s disciples in this regard. We are to rectify relationships before worship (Matt 5:23-24), forgive one another (Eph 4:32), speak the truth to one another (Eph 4:25), identify factions and division as sin (Gal 5:20), and reject xenophobia—as Paul did in confronting Peter’s hypocrisy by not eating with Gentiles (Gal 2:11-13). Furthermore, we are not to excuse culturally accepted identities that do not embody the revelation of God’s presence within that culture (Col 3:5-10; Titus 1:12-13). And we are to reject the cultural and societal inequalities and injustices that do not reflect God’s reconciling gospel of the kingdom, as seen in Paul’s commendation to Philemon regarding his relationship with his runaway slave, Onesimus (Philem 15-16; cf. Col 3:11).
All of these instructions—and very practical case studies—urge the church toward the embodiment of a reconciling presence, “even here.” This is not simply about “getting along” for the sake of a common cause, church growth, or perceived ministry success. But this is because of the nature of God, because Jesus is building his church that he prayed would know oneness (John 17:21), because a new humanity in Christ is evidence of the presence of God in a fractured world, and because peace and reconciliation embodied in the life of the church is central to the mission of God.
Embodying reconciliation is, ultimately, to join God in his mission to reconcile the world. Embodying this great and uncommon hope of love embodied (1 Cor 13) and contending for the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace (Eph 4:3) not only serves the wellbeing of a local fellowship, denomination, or national alliance, but, as David Bosch states, “stands in the service of humankind and seek(s) to manifest the cosmic rule of Christ . . . . The church is ‘the sign of the coming unity of mankind.’ ” 12 To embody reconciliation is mission and witness of Jesus Christ as Lord. Every local Christian fellowship, no matter how small or large its context, is “mirroring in microcosm ’the hope of the world and the universe, at present divided and at odds with its creator.’ ” 13
Second, the church must embrace the message and ministry of reconciliation. Building upon embodiment as mission, the church must decidedly identify, employ, and activate reconciliation in word and deed. p. 71 Paul tells the Corinthians that they have been given a ministry or service (diakonia, 2 Cor 5:18) of reconciliation and the message or word (logos, 2 Cor 5:19) of reconciliation. Both message and ministry comprise a whole. To divorce message and ministry, word and deed, declaration and demonstration is to divorce the gospel from its source and very nature. Message and ministry are like two arms of God’s reconciling embrace of the world in Christ, who came declaring the kingdom of God and seeking the lost, embracing the stranger, touching the outcast, loving the enemy, setting free the oppressed, and restoring the rejected (Luke 4:18-21).
Toward this unified embrace, the church should clearly and unapologetically declare the good news revealed in Jesus Christ, the only name under heaven by which people can be saved (John 14:6; Acts 4:12; Rom 1:16). The cross of Christ may be foolishness and a stumbling block in a fractured and opinionated world (1 Cor 1:18), but it is the reconciling and resurrecting work of the cross that has power to save and bring life. The church—so far as it remains Jesus’ church burning bright and not capitulating to cultural pressure and accommodation, whether overtly or subtly, as was the temptation even in the early Christian fellowships (Rev 2–3)—must embrace the prophetic proclamation of Jesus Christ as “God with us,” crucified and risen again, ascended to the Father, inviting any and all to follow him as Lord until he comes again to consummate his reign. This is, ultimately, the declaration of the reconciling love and presence of God for all people and creation, “even here.”
In holy tension with this embrace of the message declared must be ministry demonstrating and delivering the message practically, “even here.” The clues for what this looks like are seen in the Law Jesus said he came to fulfill and that he himself embraced in the first century context of Palestine under Roman occupation. The Old Testament Law called Israel to love the orphan, widow, and stranger, something James reiterates as “true religion” (James 1:27). Jesus responded to the cries of hated Roman centurions and treasonous tax collectors (Matt 8:5-13; Luke 19:1-10). He even used the faith of hated foreigners (Luke 4:24-27) and the active love of “heretical” Samaritans as scandalous examples worthy of embrace and emulation (Luke 10:25-37).
As the church embraces ministries of reconciliation into its fractured context, it should be clear in its message, indiscriminate in love, and courageous across the soft or hard lines that have been drawn. It must speak and act for justice for those who cannot and who are oppressed, embracing the risk of being despised as both the prophets (Matt 5:11-12) and its Lord was (John 15:18-25) when they too acted and spoke the way p. 72 of righteousness, justice and peace. The church must be equipped to bring the ministry of reconciliation into the inter-religious, inter-political, and inter-ethnic contexts in which it finds itself. As the presidential envoy of an Islamic nation has said, “Religious leaders should lead the way in peace and prosperity.” 14
These cries of the world should remind the church of the prophetic declaration that there will be a day when the nations say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths” (Mic 4:2). The church should creatively and with faithfulness to God revealed in Jesus Christ design and deliver ministries of reconciliation that respond to the cry of their context to build peace and prosperity (i.e. shalom) wherever the yearning arises. This can be done with confidence and compassion because believers are learning to embody the way of peace found only in Jesus Christ (Eph 2:14), seeking to “beat their swords into plowshares” (Mic 4:3), and have the Spirit of God empowering and equipping all God’s people for this work of service. In short, the “royal priesthood“ of all believers (1 Pet 2:9-10) is essentially the mediation of the reconciling presence of God by those with direct access to the presence of God through a Great High Priest (Heb 10:19-22), and gifted by the indwelling presence of God (1 Cor 12:7). This lays upon the church everywhere, “even here,” a marvelous task for the sake of a fractured world because of the rule and reign of God revealed in Jesus Christ: the church’s mandate to articulate “a social vision and . . . foster the kinds of social agents capable of living it out; including creating just, truthful, and peaceful societies.” 15 It is this great responsibility of articulation and equipping (i.e., discipleship) that the embodiment of reconciliation and the embrace of the message and ministry of reconciliation make possible.
The Church as God’s Reconciling Presence: Practical Implications for “Even Here”
In conclusion, and to move the imperatives of embodiment and embrace toward even greater application, let us name a few practical implications for the church seeking to become God’s reconciling presence wherever our “here” is.
First, let us normalize and celebrate the opportunity to engage local church differences and conflict and equip disciples to practice—even with difficulty and lathered in much grace—peace and reconciliation. God has gifted the church with many experiences and experts in this work, and these strengths should be pulled to the center from the p. 73 margins, given how polarized and fractured both church and world are today. This ought to be seen as core missional training.
Second, in our training of church leaders and pastors, let us equip them with theology and skills related to peacebuilding and reconciliation. Lack of capacity in his area has often led to division, unhealthy church life and mission, and the multiplying of the ways of the flesh in Christian leadership that, unsurprisingly, ends up mirroring the brokenness of the world, undermining God’s reconciling mission. When this training occurs, it does more than provide skills but often leads to addressing and healing a leader’s own unreconciled story and even destructive tendencies that will be multiplied—often unknowingly—in the community they are forming.
Third, in our church life, let us centralize prayer regarding the fracturing of our households, fellowships, municipalities, nations, and the world. The work of reconciliation and becoming God’s reconciling presence is a spiritual battle and a work of the Spirit and must be sourced in the power of God. We must pray persistently for justice (Luke 18:1-8) and for the Father’s will to be done on earth as it is in heaven (Matt 6:10).
Fourth, let us more carefully attend to the cry of our place. Every “here” has a heart cry. The question is often whether the church is listening and discerning its context. Jesus saw Zacchaeus and Bartimaeus. Jesus felt the touch of the hemorrhaging woman. Jesus saw the widow make her offering. Jesus brought little children to himself. Jesus saw the Samaritan woman at the well and “how the fields are ripe for harvesting” (John 4:35). The truth is that the disciples missed the cry in all of these instances. What are we missing that may be the opportunity to become God’s reconciling presence, “even here”?
Notes
- Brian Stewart, “On the Frontlines,” typescript of address to the 160th Convocation of Knox College, Toronto, Ontario, May 12, 2004, 4, https://waynenorthey.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/On-The-Front-Lines.pdf.
- “List of religious populations,” Britannica.com, https://www.britannica.com/topic/List-of-religious-populations.
- “WEA panel highlights Africa’s pivotal role in global evangelical growth, underscores need for training,” Christian Daily International, p. 74 https://www.christiandaily.com/news/wea-panel-highlights-africas-pivotal-role-in-global-evangelical-growth-underscores-need-for-training.
- Stewart, 3.
- Johannes Reimer, Missio Politica: The Mission of Church and Politics (Carlisle, Cumbria: Langham, 2017), 47–48.
- Munther Isaac, “Ecclesiology and the Theology of the Land: A Palestinian Christian Perspective,” in The Church from Every Tribe and Tongue: Ecclesiology in the Majority World, ed. Gene L. Green, Stephen T. Pardue, and K. K. Yao (Carlisle, Cumbria: Langham, 2018), 161.
- John Paul Lederach, Reconcile: Conflict Transformation for Ordinary Christians (Harrisonburg, VA: Herald, 2014), 45. See also Lederach’s The Little Book of Conflict Transformation (New York: Good, 2003).
- The verb shakan (pronounced shaw-kan) means “to settle, dwell.” It is the root of what in post-biblical Hebrew is called the shekinah, God’s presence. In Exodus 40:35, shakan indicates the resting, dwelling, settling, or habitation of God: “Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled upon it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.” Bible Hub, “shakan,” https://biblehub.com/hebrew/7931.htm.
- Al Tizon, Whole and Reconciled: Gospel, Church, and Mission in a Fractured World (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2018), 174.
- John W. de Gruchy, Reconciliation: Restoring Justice (London: SCM, 2002), 55.
- Lederach, Reconcile, 105.
- David Bosch, Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1991), 466–67.
- de Gruchy, 55.
- As heard by the author during a conference on religious tolerance in a Central Asian country in 2025.
- Miroslav Volf, Exclusion and Embrace: A Theological Exploration of Identity, Otherness, and Reconciliation, rev. and updated (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 2019), 315.
