By Dwight Fuqua — We are all familiar with Matthew 6:33. We’ve heard it. We’re read it. We can quote it. The Master said, “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added to you.” We know that we must put the kingdom “first.”
Strong says that the word “first” (proton) means first “in time, place, order, or importance; before, at the beginning, chiefly, at the first of all.” Continue reading
“I tell you the truth, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.”
Luke 18.17
Jesus taught the true life of subservience to God as the whole objective of divine creation and purpose. In order to enter that life, he also taught certain conditions or requirements apply. Childlike humility is one of them.
Humility that brings us into God’s circle must not presume to know better than the Lord how we must conduct ourselves, how we must worship him, how we must serve him and show others the path to him.
Settling every Bible based question or studying every Bible based topic can hardly be resolved with a single verse every time, but there are times when a single verse is so clear and concise in what is being said, the point cannot be missed by any honest Bible student.
For example, take the question and topic of the arrival of God’s kingdom. Some say it still hasn’t happened! Some still (often times inadvertently through the repeating of Matthew 6:9-10) pray for it to happen! Some have come up with fanciful theories to explain when it will happen (i.e. premillenialism)! And some have completely misunderstood the nature of the church because they don’t know when it happened! Simple fact is, God’s kingdom has arrived … that or Christianity isn’t the only “2,000” year old thing walking around today. To get what I mean all one has to do is read, “And He said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you that there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the kingdom of God present with power.”” (Mark 9:1)
There you have it! If you follow a theology that says the kingdom of God hasn’t yet arrived, then you have one of two choices according to the plain language of the above referenced verse: 1) Admit that Jesus was wrong, or 2) Admit that you are wrong. Read Mark 9:1 again and think about those two choices carefully.
“But when they believed Philip as he was proclaiming the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they began to be baptized, both men and women.”
Acts 8.12
Philip preached to Samaritans. The gospel began to reach more and more people. The proper response to the gospel is faith and baptism. All are welcome in God’s kingdom, men and women.
The gospel about God’s kingdom includes the truth about its present manifestation, the church. “… a proper understanding of the church is required to be saved in the church (Acts 8:12), …” (Webster 2018, 21).
“Earthly people are like the earthly man, and heavenly people are like the heavenly man. Just as we are now like the earthly man, we will someday be like the heavenly man.”
1 Corinthians 15.48-49 NLT
The physical human body and the spiritual human body are different, just as Adam and Christ were different in their origins. God will transform our bodies at the resurrection.
To be like Christ is always a good thing, both now and eternally. In what ways will we be like him in heaven?
A piece of glass, an interesting rock, or maybe even a simple can discarded by a construction worker who built a house … to a young child, anything dug out of the ground is buried treasure!
But from time-to-time stories appear in the news about real buried treasure. And for many of us, such stories recall a time in our life when an “X” on a simple piece of paper created excitement in our heart.
Did you know Jesus told a story about buried treasure? He said,
“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” (Matthew 13:44 NKJV)
When it comes to the value of God’s kingdom, some people do not reap the reward simply because they are not willing to dig a little deeper into what they already have within their grasp. In fact they end up selling it for something of lesser value (Hebrews 11:6; Hebrews 12:15-17). But others rejoice over the treasure they find in the gospel and they are willing to pay the price for the investment that is worth more than everything they own (Matthew 19:29).
What are we looking to find when we set out looking for buried treasure? And what are we willing to do when we find it?
Where is the “X” of our heart located? Jesus wants to know.
“but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:20-21 NKJV)
“This is evidence of God’s righteous judgment, to make you worthy of the kingdom of God, for which in fact you are suffering.”
2 Thessalonians 1.5
The perseverance and faith of Paul’s readers showed that what God was doing in the world was right. His work prepared them for the eternal kingdom.
We are worthy of the kingdom in the sense that we are being sanctified for it. God makes us ever more holy in order to live in his holy presence.
“For the kingdom of God does not consist of food and drink, but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.”
Romans 14.17
God doesn’t make dietary rules. He creates a spiritual feast.
God’s kingdom deals with inner qualities produced by the Holy Spirit rather than the destruction of one’s brother through the imposition of personal preferences.
Jesus said: “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking beautiful pearls, who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had and bought it” (Matthew 13:45-46 NKJV). The “kingdom of heaven” is that “one pearl of great price. Jesus shows that, if we sought “the kingdom of heaven” like “a merchant seeking beautiful pearls,” when we found that precious “kingdom,” it would be worth “all that” we have. Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world ” (John 18:36 NKJV), so Paul wrote, “do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2 NKJV). But when the Samaritans “believed Philip as he preached the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, both men and women were baptized” (Acts 8:12 NKJV). What’s this worth to you?
This is Johnny Polk, with “Words of Wisdom” brought to you by the Oneida church of Christ.
Jesus physical resurrection has “infallible proofs.” He also spoke “of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God” (Acts 1:2-3 NKJV). What did Jesus say about “the kingdom of God?” 1) He said, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17 NKJV). “At hand,” meant “close, near by.” 2) He said, “there are some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom” (Matthew 16:28 NKJV). Either He lied, or else the kingdom came while people who heard Him were alive! 3) He said, “I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes” (Luke 22:18 NKJV). Either the kingdom came in the 1st Century, or there is no Lord’s Supper. Kingdom people observe it every 1st day of the week in the church of Christ (Acts 20:7)! The kingdom has come!
This is Johnny Polk, with “Words of Wisdom” brought to you by the Oneida church of Christ.
Luke tells of Jesus Christ, until “He was taken up” (Acts 1: 2 NKJV). “So then, after the Lord had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God” (Mark 16:19 NKJV). On Pentecost, the Apostles preached David was still dead, but had prophesied “that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his body, according to the flesh, He would raise up the Christ to sit on his throne” (Acts 2:29-30 NKJV). Everyone who preaches that Jesus is not yet on David’s throne is denying Jesus’s resurrection! If Jesus is not now on David’s throne, He could not have “delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins” (Colossians 1:13-14 NKJV). “Millennial-ism” denies the faith!
This is Johnny Polk, with “Words of Wisdom” brought to you by the Oneida church of Christ.
THE KINGDOM OF GOD
There is certainly a sense in which the omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent Creator-God of heaven and earth rules over the entire universe. In his benediction, Jude wrote: “To God our Savior, who alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen” (Jude 25). On the other hand, nothing is more obvious than the fact that since the fall of mankind in the garden of Eden (Genesis 3), the majority of God’s creation has been in rebellion to Him. The apostle John, writing to Christians near the end of the first century A.D., said, “We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies in the power of the wicked one” (I John 5:19). The apostle Paul showed that there are two spiritual realms when he affirmed that Christians have been delivered “from the power of darkness and translated into the kingdom of the Son of His love” (Colossians 1:13). Everybody is in one or the other of these domains: the power of darkness (the kingdom of Satan) or the realm of spiritual light (the kingdom of God’s dear Son) (Cf. Ephesians 5:8). Continue reading
In God’s true kingdom, an individual is not turned away from being served, or from serving, based on his or her ethnicity, birthplace, race, spoken language or nationality.
In God’s true kingdom, the only individual that need not apply (which is different from not being wanted) is the self-righteous; for the self-righteous will never realize how bad he or she needs Jesus…who just so happens to be the only way one can find his or her self in God’s kingdom to begin with (Colossians 1:12-14).
“If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” (1 John 1:6-8)
In the preface to his book Bring Out the Best in People, Alan Loy McGinnis wrote,
… virtually everyone is a motivator in one situation or another—when we’re persuading a friend to lose weight, or giving a pep talk to our kids, or trying to help a batter out of a slump, we’re motivators. Either we are doing it poorly or we are doing it well.
Christians are motivators, in a real way. They are not mere educators. They want people to do something, obey the gospel. They not only tell people what God has done in Christ and what each person must do to be saved — information —, but they also encourage and exhort so that people will be moved to act — motivation. Continue reading