Reconciliation - notes and questions

Listening to: Caitlin Rose: Own Side Now

"God... through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God." (2 Corinthians 5:18-20)

This passage has been going round my head a lot lately.

Notes:

• Relationship to the Father as sons is the goal achieved by reconciliation.
• Paul does not say, "God is reconciled to you, now please be reconciled to him"... Paul never says that in his letters, although that is usually how we present the Gospel ('God has moved toward you, now move toward him' is poor). Instead Paul says that in Christ, the representative man, the new humanity has been reconciled to God! As Torrance says, the covenant has been fulfilled from both sides already.
• Nevertheless, there is a note of urgency as out of "fear of the Lord" Paul seeks to "persuade", "appeal" and "implore" his hearers to be reconciled.

Questions (a big plea for help!):

• How does verse 19 differ from verse 18? "reconciled" v. "reconciling", "us" v. "world", "through Christ" v. "in Christ", "giving" v. "entrusting", "ministry" v. "message"... what's the significance?
• How does this passage compare with Romans 5:10, "we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son.... now that we are reconciled [past, linked to death], shall we be saved by his life [future, linked to life]"? ... cf. also 2 Timothy 2:11: "If we have died with him [past, death], we will also live with him [future, life]" (also Romans 6:8)