Participation in the Kingdom of God

You have problems and I have problems. Everyone with a mind is aware that anything from minor to major problems beset us on a daily basis. That's life. We look around at the state of our world and wonder how all the wickedness and problems can ever be remedied.

One solution

There is only one sure solution to turning evil to good and that is to expand the Kingdom of God. Are you a participant or a bystander? Oh, you study the word of God? Fantastic. But don't merely study, we who call upon the name of the Lord Jesus must participate.

Three components of participation

The three components of participating in the Kingdom of God are change, listening and seeing. Keep in mind that the Kingdom of God is already here in part but has not been totally fulfilled yet. That time is coming.

When the jealous Jewish leaders brought Jesus before Pilate, the Scripture reads:

"Then Pilate went back into his headquarters and called for Jesus to be brought to him. “Are you the king of the Jews?” he asked him.

Jesus replied, “Is this your own question, or did others tell you about me?”

“Am I a Jew?” Pilate retorted. “Your own people and their leading priests brought you to me for trial. Why? What have you done?”

Jesus answered, “My Kingdom is not an earthly kingdom. If it were, my followers would fight to keep me from being handed over to the Jewish leaders. But my Kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:33-36, NLT).

Above image: The route Jesus took from the trial to His execution at Golgotha (the Via Dolorosa — “the Way of Sorrows”).

Change

The new birth or conversion is not the end of our Christian journey. If you believe it is, you might want to examine yourself. We cannot simply receive a "get out of hell card" as if this life were a Monopoly game.

True change is required. Pastor Allen Jackson recently said: "If your only goal of your faith is to go to heaven after you have lived your life, I don't think you should imagine you're going to go to heaven."

That's a powerful truth. You see, our walk of faith requires us who believe to live for the purposes of God. We have to be willing to change. Now if God is not prompting you to change your life, that is not a good sign.

Look what Jesus said: "And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 18:3, NIV).

And: "You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds" (Ephesians 4:22-23, NIV).

That is change. Change leads to repentance. Repentance is turning from your old sinful ways and taking a new direction in life.

Listening

We must listen to the Lord. Repentance is aligning with God. Think of a car out of alignment. The car pulls you to the left or right and the steering has to be controlled to move in a straight position. Our life without repentance pulls us out of alignment with Jesus. We veer towards the sinful desires and out of His will.

We must practice repentance to stay aligned with God. Repentance is not just what we stop doing bit also what we are willing to do!

We also meditate on God's word rather than simply reading it like a novel. "Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful" (Joshua 1:8, NIV)

"They made their hearts as hard as flint and would not listen to the law or to the words that the Lord Almighty had sent by his Spirit through the earlier prophets. So the Lord Almighty was very angry" (Zechariah 7:12, NIV).

We must listen to God. We need to hear what God is saying to us in His word and in prayer.

Seeing

We see with our eyes. But we also listen with our eyes! We consistently live in a panic mode because we don't listen with our eyes. The disciples saw all the miracles Christ did but they constantly did not see with their eyes and understand.

"Listen carefully to what I am about to tell you: The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men.” But they did not understand what this meant. It was hidden from them, so that they did not grasp it, and they were afraid to ask him about it" (Luke 9:44-45, NIV).

The outcome of listening and seeing with spiritual eyes leads to understanding. Understanding leads us to make a choice. The choice we have is either to be obedient or not.

Look at Isaiah the prophet. He listened and obeyed:

"Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”

And I said, “Here am I. Send me!” (Isaiah 6:8, NIV).

Application

Unless we change (repent), listen and see things spiritually, we will stumble about in life. Maybe one of you can identify with this right now. Are you willing to repent and change? Are you willing to listen to the Lord through His word and through prayer by meditating on the Scriptures? Will you open your spiritual eyes to really see?

I tell you the truth, unless we do, we will stumble in the streets.

"So justice is driven back, and righteousness stands at a distance; truth has stumbled in the streets, honesty cannot enter" (Isaiah 59:14, NIV).