GOD’S WORD FOR JANUARY 27 ~ ~ Luke 12:29-30 ~ ~ “And do not seek what you should eat or what you should drink, nor have an anxious mind. For all these things the nations of the world seek after, and your Father knows that you need these things.”
Michael Youssef’s book, “How to Read the Bible”
“THE KINGDOM OF GOD, TODAY AND TOMORROW”
What is the Kingdom of God like?
The Kingdom of God has no measurable boundaries. It is not a region of so many square miles of real estate. It is PEOPLE. Specifically, it’s the people who are called by God and who have submitted to His sovereign rule.
God invites every member of the human race to make a radical decision for the Kingdom of Christ – or against it. Those who heed the call have not merely “entered” the Kingdom; they ARE the Kingdom.
What are Kingdom citizens called to do? The most important task of the Church is to proclaim the Gospel, which is the Good News of salvation.
The modern world is in thrall to demonic powers. Everywhere we look, evil and injustice seem to triumph. But there is good news! The power of the cross has broken the power of Satan. The resurrection of Jesus Christ has launched the age of the New Covenant and the ascendancy of the Kingdom of God. Let men and women renounce their old allegiances to sin and self and begin a new life as citizens of the Kingdom.
This is the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and we have no other.
The preaching of the Gospel often seems to fall on deaf ears. Yet it is good news that fulfills humanity’s deepest longings. Even when people are not aware that they need the saving message of the Kingdom, they still grope in the darkness for it.
Human beings can no more escape the longing for the Kingdom than they can escape themselves. It lies at the heart of human nature. People peer into the window of the Kingdom of God but do not know how to enter, because Satan’s agents of deception lure them away from the promise of salvation.
People are idolaters by nature. Though they long for God, they will settle for false idols. Though they long for the extasy of heaven, they will settle for cheap earthly thrills. Though they long for eternity with God, they will settle for the temporary gratification of wealth, power, or fame. The false gods of the twenty-first century are as deceptive and deadly as the demon-god Baal in ancient Palestine.
Into this global morass of demonic deception, the Church of Jesus Christ proclaims the gospel of the Kingdom. The Church places its hope squarely on the truth of the Bible because it knows no other truth. It announces the Kingdom of God as the goal of history and the only hope for man’s redemption.
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Matthew 6:33
But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.
Matthew 19:24 (AMP)
Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man [who places his faith in wealth and status] to enter the kingdom of God.
Mark 10:15
Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it at all.
(Meaning, truly submitting and trusting Christ with our sins and our lives, as a child to his parents)