Entering the Kingdom of God

On the second session here, and we'll... You know, the first section we talked about the Kingdom of God, and talked about how that was, or is, a very misunderstood concept in the world today. Many, many churches don't have an idea of what the Kingdom of God that Jesus Christ really preached is. And what we're going to talk about in the second session here is building off of what we ended with in the first section. And it's another very, very misunderstood subject if you go to many churches today. Let's pick up where we left off in Luke 12, verse 32. And there, of course, we're reminded that what God wants is to give everyone his Kingdom. He would like everyone to be able to receive, return a life, and be in his Kingdom. But, you know, as the people in the New Testament in Acts 2, when they were learning, and they were being preached to there by the apostles as they received the Holy Spirit, when they heard the message, and when they understood the message that they were being given, they had a question that they asked. They said, "'Ment and brethren, what shall we do? Now that we know this, now that we have had this, told us, what do we do with it?'" And you probably know exactly what Peter's response was at that time, Peter's and John's. But let's answer that question for us today.

Again, in Matthew 7, verse 21, Christ, in his own words, said, "'Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the Kingdom of Heaven.'" It's not enough just to call on his name. Not enough just to say, we follow God, or we believe in him. But he who does the will of my Father in heaven.

God will live by that way of life and show God you want that way of life if you're going to be in his Kingdom. What is God's will? Well, there's a few places in the Bible that says what his will is. We know his will is for everyone to be in the Kingdom. In 2 Peter 3, speaking of the end time, the time before Jesus Christ returns because he went to heaven a couple thousand years ago, hasn't returned to set up his Kingdom yet. And some people can think, well, he's delaying his coming. The Lord is not, slack Peter says, concerning his promise, as some count slackness. But he's long suffering. He's patient with us. He gives us the time to make the choices that we need to make to show him that we will follow him. He's long suffering. He's patient with us. He's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

God doesn't want to see anyone fail. So sometimes, you know, it seems like years can go by and we wonder what is God waiting for. He's not willing that any should perish. He's giving us all the time to respond to him in the way that we should to show him we want his Kingdom. He's not willing that anyone should perish, but that all should come to repentance, it says. When Jesus was talking in the very first verses that we used to begin this an hour ago, says Jesus came to Galilee preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom of God and saying, the time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is at hand. And he said, repent. The first thing he said, repent and believe the Gospel.

The common theme throughout Scripture in Matthew 3 verse 1, John the Baptist came. He led the way, prepared the way for Jesus Christ. He was preaching the Kingdom of God. He was preparing the people for Jesus Christ in the message that he would be bringing. And John the Baptist said to the people that he was working with in that day, repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. It's here. He knew who that coming King was. Repent. What does it mean to repent?

Christ in another place in Luke 13 says, and you, and remember the audience that he was speaking to, people that saw, thought that they were doing what God wanted to do. They thought they were living by the words of the law. But Christ said to them, and you will perish too, unless you repent of your sins and turn to God. A message he gave in person that day, and in the whole three and a half years he ministered, and the message he gives to all of us today and everyone who reads, everyone who hears, and everyone who understands, and wants to respond to his call, or chooses to respond to his call and wants his kingdom. You too will perish, unless you repent of your sins and turn to God. And in Acts 17 verse 30 says, truly these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all men everywhere to repent. There's a time we live in life, and we just don't know that we're doing wrong. We think we may be doing things exactly the way God wanted us to. And God understands that we're doing that, but when our minds are opened, when he calls, when he is, when we come to the knowledge of his truth and understand what Jesus Christ preached, when we understand that he is the way to salvation, and we understand that he will be the king of that kingdom that will be established on all the earth, he commands all men everywhere to repent. Repentance is a misunderstood concept from the world today. You know, I can flip my TV on on Sunday mornings, and I can hear someone talk about it at the end of their message, that if you'll just pray a simple prayer, God, I repent of my sins, and I come to you. And then they say, if you pray the simple little prayer, that's all you need to do. Is that all you need to do when Jesus Christ said repent? Is that all you needed to do? Pray a simple little prayer? Or was he talking about something much more? Because, again, throughout the theme, when John the Baptist spoke and when Jesus Christ spoke, he spoke about repentance. Whenever he spoke about the kingdom of God, he spoke about repentance, turning from your way and turning to God's way if you want to be in that kingdom. It was the first thing that he said we had to do. Do you really know what it means to repent?

Because it's a crucial thing for us to know. The first step into the kingdom of God is repent, Christ said, John the Baptist said, the Bible says. The first key is to repent. And what does the Bible say about repentance? If that's the key, if that's the first thing we need to do is repent to be in the kingdom of God, we better understand what Jesus Christ said it was, we better understand what the Bible said it was, and we better be ready. And with God's help and spirit, we'd be ready to do it. In Hebrews 6 and verse 1, it talks about repentance being the first of the doctrines. Hebrews 6 verse 1, therefore, leaving the discussion of the principles of the doctrine of Christ. Let's go on to perfection. Let's build from here. When Christ calls us year by year, decade by decade, we become more and more like Him. John says, we will be like Him when He's revealed. We become more and more like Christ, going on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works. Works at one time that we may thought were very good, but they don't lead to life. Only Jesus Christ, and living His way of life, leads to life. Not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God. The first thing we do is repent. The first thing we do, but it's something that we do the rest of our lives. Because when we repent, it's not just a one-time thing. As God works with us and as God perfects us, and He shows us more and more of our imperfections, weaknesses, and sins, we repent to those and we go on, as He says, to perfection. Looking, acting, thinking, being led by the same Spirit that led Jesus Christ, who is the King of that Kingdom.

So let's take some time now to look at biblical repentance, because without it, not one of us will be in that Kingdom of God.

There's four steps I've got here. There are four principles on repentance. First one is, repentance is not just remorse. It's not just being sorry for what you've done.

It can certainly be part of it. When we understand that we've done something wrong, we certainly are sorry for it. Every one of us who have kids, we want our kids to be sorry when they've done something wrong. But we want them to learn something from that sorrow. What we really want is them to learn the right way of acting. We don't want to go back and, every single day, call them on the same thing and just have them say, I'm sorry. We want them to learn a way of life that would say, that's one thing you don't do anymore. Or, this is something you do every day without me telling you every day to do. So, repentance is not just remorse.

Now, when we see the word remorse in the New Testament, it comes from the Greek word metola. Well, whatever. You see it there. I'm not going to even try to pronounce it. I practiced it last night and I still can't get it right. So, anyway, that long word with all those M's in it there. It means it's an emotional remorse, something that we just feel. And feeling is good emotions. God put emotions in us. He wants us to feel, but those emotions can't define everything that we do.

So, there's a emotional remorse, and the Bible will talk about an emotional remorse. But when it talks about remorse, it doesn't involve a course or a change of course in action. What we want with our children when we correct them, and they say, I'm sorry, is we want them to change their behavior. We want them to stop doing something, or we want them to start doing something. What God wants with us when He shows us our sins, when He shows us a weakness, when He shows us the character flaw, He wants us to be sorry we've done that.

We may not have even known we were doing that, or that it was wrong. But He wants us to be sorry, but He also is looking for a course of action. Now, let's look at a couple examples here. A good example is back in Genesis. A man that we're all familiar with, and a family we're all familiar with, is Isaac and Rebecca and their twin sons, Jacob and Esau.

Let's turn with me back to Genesis 27. And you remember the story about Esau. He was the firstborn. He was the first twin to be born. And there were certain advantages that the Nord to a firstborn. They had the right to the birthright, and they had the right to the blessing, which were hugely important. Esau, when he came back hungry one day, was just willing to sell that birthright off for a bowl of soup.

Remember that? He was just hungry, so it was like it meant so little to him. He just sold this to Jacob for the birthright. Then there came time for the blessing. As Isaac was growing old, and he was going to pass the blessing on to Esau. That Esau went out to get game.

Jacob also knew the importance of that blessing, just like he understood the importance of that birthright. Here in Genesis 27, verse 30, it says, It happened as soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob. Because you remember Jacob went in, and he lied to his father and told him he was Esau, made it look like he was Esau to receive that blessing.

As soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob, and Jacob had scarcely gone out from the presence of Isaac, his father, that Esau his brother came in from his hunting. And he had made savory food as well, and brought it to his father and said to his father, Let my father arise, and eat of his son's game, that your soul may bless me. And his father Isaac said to him, Who are you? So he said, I'm your son, your firstborn, Esau.

And Isaac trembled exceedingly. He knew what had happened, and he said, Who? Where's the one who hunted game and brought it to me? I ate all of it before you came, and I blessed him. And indeed, he shall be blessed. He got that very valuable blessing that was passed on from Abraham to Isaac, to Jacob, and then down to his sons.

When Esau heard the words of his father, he cried with an exceedingly great and bitter cry, and said to his father, Bless me! Bless me too, father! You can feel the emotion. Esau had been cheated out of it in his mind, and he cried, and he wept bitterly. He wept bitterly.

Who wouldn't in that situation? About in verse 38, it says, Esau said to his father, Don't you have one more blessing for me? Bless me! And Esau lifted up his voice, and he wept. He was doing it. He was doing that great word that's on your screen there. He was very sorry that he wasn't there, and he didn't receive that blessing.

Over in Hebrews, in the New Testament, it talks about this incident here that's there in the Old Testament. Over in Hebrews 12, in verse 14, the author here tells us, in verse 14, Pursue peace with all people and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord. Looking carefully, he says, in verse 15, Lest anyone fall short of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness springing up, cause trouble, and by this many become defiled.

Lest there be any fornicator or profane person like Esau, who for one more so food sold his birthright, counted it so unworthy or so unimportant that he was willing to sell it off for soup. It was a very valuable thing. The kingdom of God is a very valuable thing to us, or it should be if we understand the words of Jesus Christ. What are we willing to sell it for?

What are we willing to sell it for? Christ says, be willing to give everything up for the kingdom. Seek it first. Everything you have, sell, and cling to it. And he'll make sure he takes care of you. Esau was willing to give up his birthright for a bowl of soup. For in verse 17, you know that afterward, when he wanted to inherit the blessing, he was rejected.

He didn't count the birthright important, so why would he count the blessing as important? When it came time for that, he was rejected, for he found no place for repentance. He found no place for repentance, though he sought it diligently with tears. He was remorseful.

He was sorry. But in the accounts that he saw, you never see him get down on his knees before God and repent of the attitude that he had toward that birthright. You never see him admit to God that he counted it as something so worthless. And what God was looking for from him, what he's looking for from us, is that we come before him and, yes, be remorseful for what we've done, but to be absolutely contrite before him and humble before him and to repent. Esau wept bitterly, but Esau found no place for repentance, and he was denied the blessing as well because he didn't do it. Now let's look at another man in the New Testament back in Matthew 27. Matthew 27 in verse 1.

He finds Judas. Judas, a tragic figure in history, betrayed the Son of God. If you can imagine being called to be a disciple of Christ, walking with him three and a half years, and then never recognizing who you were walking with, never realizing who it was that you were in contact with, and he was willing to sell off that for 30 pieces of silver to betray him. Matthew 27, verse 1, this is after he betrayed Christ. It says, when morning came, and the night after they arrested Christ, when morning came, all the chief priests and elders of the people plotted against Jesus to put him to death. Now when they bound him, they led him away and delivered him to Pontius Pilate the governor. And Judas, his betrayer, seeing that he had been condemned, was remorseful. He was that Greek word sitting on your screen there. He was remorseful, and I think in the old King James, I'd even say repentance, but now that they know what that Greek word there means, it means remorseful. There's a different word for repentance. He was remorseful, and he brought back the 30 pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, saying, I've sinned by betraying innocent blood. And they said, what do we care? Just go your way. And he threw down the pieces of silver in the temple, and he departed, and he went, and he hanged himself. Judas was remorseful. When he realized that he had done, he was deeply sorry for what he had done. So sorry that he went out and killed himself. All of a sudden, that 30 pieces of silver meant nothing because he had betrayed the greatest thing that was ever going to happen in his life, and that was understanding Christ and being able to walk with him. And he sold it all for 30 pieces of silver, and he was sorry. Very sorry, so much so, so much so, that he killed himself. But nowhere in the Scripture does it tell us that Judas repented. Nowhere in the Scripture did Judas get down on his knees and tell God not only how sorry he was, but that he recognized his sin and that he would never do that again. Now let me read from a commentary on this concept of remorse and Judas and repentance. It says, a man may hate sin just as a murderer hates the gallows, but this doesn't prove repentance. If I hate sin because of the punishment, I haven't repented of sin. I merely regret that God is just. But if I can see sin as an offense against Jesus Christ, and if I loathe myself because I have wounded him, then I have true brokenness of heart. Do you see the difference between remorse and repentance? Esau never repented, even though he was deeply sorry. Judas never experienced repentance, even though he was deeply sorry, even to the extent that he killed himself.

Let me read from another commentary. It says, the Greek word which is used to describe Judas' change of mind, the Greek word on your screen there, is quite different from the other Greek verb translated repent. And that word we'll see in a minute is metaneo, which is used to describe repentance unto salvation. Metaneo basically means to change one's mind. So it is properly translated repent in most instances. It involves the intellect and the will. This word for remorse has to do more with emotions, and so does not indicate true biblical repentance. Judas had a change of mind in that he was sorry after reflecting on the results of what he had done.

He was filled with grief, anguish, and perhaps even indignation for the consequences of his act, but his high degree of remorse did not involve a true understanding of the nature of sin or a commitment to return to Christ and seek forgiveness from God.

Repentance involves remorse. We're sorry for what we've done when we come to realize that we haven't been following God or Jesus Christ the way that we thought we might have, and when he opens our minds to what we do. When we do that, when our minds are opened, Christ says the very first step we have to make if we want to be in his kingdom. If we want that thing that should be more important than to us than any other thing on earth, we have to repent. That's the Greek word metanayo, and as I just read, it involves the change of one's mind and involves will and intellect. We choose. We choose to follow God. Life is all about choices. In Deuteronomy 30 verse 19, the God of the Old Testament, who is Jesus Christ, said, I said before you this day life and death, blessing and cursing.

Therefore, choose life that you and your seed may live. Choose it. Adam and Eve made the wrong choice. Many people down through the ages have made the wrong choice. Christ cautions us in the examples that it gives in the Bible. Don't make the wrong choice. Choose life. Choose the kingdom. Choose Jesus Christ and to follow his way and to let him lead you. And he says in Luke 13 verse 3, you will perish. He told the people then, and he tells us now, you will perish too, unless you repent.

In 2 Corinthians 7, Paul talks about this concept as well. He says in 2 Corinthians 7 verse 10, for godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation.

And that's underscored for a reason. True repentance leads to salvation. Remorse doesn't.

Godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation not to be regretted, but the sorrow of the world produces death. Esau had the sorrow of the world. Judas had the sorrow of the world. We can't have the sorrow of the world. If we want the kingdom, if we want what Christ has to offer, if we want eternity, if we want to live, walk, and reign with him, as it says in Revelations, Revelation, we repent. And it's the repentance that leads to salvation. What we do is repent of being a sinner. At the core of repentance is understanding who we are apart from God. And that's a harrowing thing when we come to see ourselves as God sees us. In Jeremiah 17 verse 9, it says, the heart is deceitful above all things. Deceitful. Always playing games, always doing things, whatever. The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? That's the natural heart. That's who we are apart from God and his Spirit. In Romans 8 verse 7, it says, the carnal mind, the natural mind, is enmity against God. It hates the things of God. It wants the things that it wants rather than the things that God wants. God says, repent of being a sinner. We have to realize who we are apart from God and realize that without his Holy Spirit, without him leading and guiding us, we are simply sinners and we won't please him and he won't have sinners in his kingdom. Paul recognized this in Romans 7 verse 21. He says, I find a law that evil is present within me. That's who I am. And even after we have God's Holy Spirit, we spend the rest of our lives putting out that evil as God reveals it to us. I find a law that evil is present within me, the one who wills to do good. Because I want to do good. I want to do what God says. I delight in the law of God according to the inward man, but I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. I want to break free from these old ways of things that I've done. I want to break free from the way I naturally react to things, but it just keeps pulling me back. It's a hard thing to do. We can't overcome it. We can't do it without God's Holy Spirit. Verse 24, look what he says of himself, O wretched man that I am, Paul, who was converted on the road to Damascus, Paul, who spent his life sacrificing for the people of God, preaching the word of God, being in chains and all those things that he suffered during the life to do that, he says, O wretched man that I am, he saw himself for who he was. And it's a painful experience to see that, but when you do, it's easy to repent before God and then know that it's only through him salvation and eternity comes. O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord, the only way to salvation, the only way to the kingdom, the only way to eternal life. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.

Let God transform your thinking as it says in Romans 12, verses 1 and 2. Let's look back in the Old Testament because there's a theme throughout the Bible of repentance and the same things that Jesus Christ talked about. Let's go back to Job 42. While the Old Testament, the bulk of the people there didn't have the Holy Spirit. Some did, and we see here as Job is talking to God after he goes through his trials and after he has all the discourse with his friends back and forth. And finally God gets involved and shows him just how powerful God is. And Job begins to see himself for who he is and what God needed to reveal in him that Job with God's spirit would put out. Job 42, verse 2 says, I know this is Job speaking, I know you can do everything and that no purpose of yours can be withheld from you. You asked, who is this who hides knowledge or who hides counsel without knowledge? Therefore, Job says, I've uttered what I didn't understand. Things too wonderful for me, which I didn't know. Listen, please, and let me speak. You said, I will question you and you will answer me. I have heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eyes see you. Therefore, I abhor myself and I repent in dust and ashes. I abhor myself. I abhor who I am without your Holy Spirit and without you in my life. Was Job sorry for the things he did? Yes, he was. Did he repent and see himself as someone who wasn't going to live or had no hope without God? Yes, he did. Over in Luke 18, we find a simple little story. In Luke 18, verse 13, of someone who was praying to God. A man who the society of that time didn't respect at all. They looked down on him as one of the lower rungs of society. Luke 18, verse 13, the tax collector, standing afar off, wouldn't so much as raise his eyes to heaven when he was praying, but he beat his breast and saying, God, be merciful to me, a sinner. That's who I am, he said. And Christ said in verse 14, I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other. He saw himself for who he was and it was a humbling experience. When we repent, we're humble before God. Without repentance, we will never enter the kingdom of God.

What is sin? Let's just do, you know, just so everyone is on the same page, 1 John 3, 4. Whoever commits sin transgresses the law. Sin is the transgression of the law. And in James, it says, whoever will keep the whole law and yet stumble in even one point, he's guilty of all. What God is looking for is to perfect us and to do that through the process of our lives. And even during our lives, we will never be that. It won't be until we're resurrected as spirit beings.

And I know that in many of the churches in the world today or in society, they will say that Christ did away with the law. Didn't he nail the Ten Commandments to the cross when he died? No, not at all. In his own words, he said, don't think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I didn't come to destroy the Old Testament. I didn't come to do away with it. I didn't come to destroy, but I came to fulfill. And if you look at the Greek word, it would be better translated, complete. I didn't come to fulfill it, or I didn't come to destroy it. I came to complete it. For surely I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, and last time I looked, earth was still here, the heavens were still above us. Until heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all be completed. Until God's purpose for this earth is completed, and then he burns up the physical earth and replaces it with the new heaven and the new earth. The written law of the Old Testament, God intended to be a guide to the way we live today, just as Jesus Christ lived. And we follow His example, as we read before, in 1 John 2 and verse 6. Walk as He walked. Do as He did. Romans 3 verse 23 says, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

Romans 6, 23 says, the wages of sin is death. We've all earned it. We've all broken God's law. We've all earned death. And if it wasn't for Jesus Christ, we would all be doomed. But the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord. It's a gift He gives us. He didn't have to, but He so loved every man, woman, and child that was going to be born that He was willing to come to earth, live, set the perfect example for us to follow, to die that our sins may be forgiven and then resurrected that we might have the hope of eternal life. A gift from Him to us. How important do we count that gift?

Repent means to change. Acts 3, 19, we read this verse earlier when we were talking about that from the foundation of the world and all the prophets spoke of the kingdom of God. In Acts 3, 19, it says, Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out. Be converted.

Isaiah 55. Well, let's turn to Romans 12 before we go to Isaiah 55. Romans 12, verse 1. Romans 12, verse 1, Paul says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. Make the choices to do things the way God says. Give your life to Him. Don't follow your own will. Don't follow your own preferences. Don't follow the way you want to live. Be willing to sacrifice and choose God's way, is what he's saying. Give your bodies as a living sacrifice to Him, which is your reasonable service, because after all, Christ came to earth and He died and gave Himself that we might have life. And don't be conformed to this world. Don't be conformed to this way of life you see around you, but be transformed. Let God change the way you think, transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Isaiah 55, verse 7, says, let the wicked leave their way of life. Let them leave their way of life. Don't count it so important that you would sacrifice the most important thing that you've been given, that you would stick with that. Let the wicked leave their way of life and change their way of thinking. We can only do that with God's Holy Spirit, only as we accept the call, only as we repent, and we let God change the way we think. Let them turn to the Lord our God. He is merciful and quick to forgive. Remember, it's God's will that all would come to repentance. All! Every single one of us. Because before God calls us, none of us were living the way God wants us to. Before Jesus Christ came to earth and started His church, people weren't living the way of life that God had intended. He came and showed the way to live.

Mark 12. Man must love God with all his heart, with all his mind, and with all his strength, and he must love his neighbor as he loves himself.

Paul said, give your bodies as a living sacrifice to God. Love him with all your heart, mind, and soul. The same thing Moses said in Deuteronomy, love him with all your heart, all your might, all your soul. And when you do that, you follow what he and how he says to love. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments, and his commandments are not burdensome. They don't weigh us down. They free us. They let us live a life we could only live as we know and are led by Christ. Now, an example of step three would be King David. In Psalm 51, he prayed a prayer of repentance. He let God change the way he thought. When he saw himself or who he was, and who he was naturally, was an adulterer and a murderer. He committed to sin with Bathsheba, and he murdered her husband. And he saw himself or who he was, and he repented before God, and he let God change his mind and his heart. And before and after that, he became a totally different person. It was the man after repentance that God said, David is a man after my own heart. But you know what God also saw? He saw in David someone who was willing to change his way of life, willing to acknowledge his sins and who he was, and to follow what God said. And not just to hold on to who he was, but to be willing to follow God from there on out. It's the same thing that God is looking for us. Repentance is also a change of direction, meaning, and purpose. And I've already read Romans 12, verse 2. I'll read it again. Don't be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

In 2 Corinthians 5, Paul tells us what happens when we repent, when we are baptized, when we receive the Holy Spirit. 2 Corinthians 5, verse 7, he says, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, and remember, he's the only way to salvation, if anyone is in Christ, he's a new creation. He's a new person. Brand new, sins washed away, comes up out of the waters of baptism, clean. In God's eyes, when hands are laid on him or her, and he receives the Holy Spirit, letting God write his way of life on their minds, hearts, and souls. Old things have passed away.

What we were before, gone. Put behind us. We may have loved the customs of the land around us. We might have loved those holidays that come around once a year that seemed so good, but we learn God's way. Old things have passed away. All things have become new.

All things have become new.

You know, an example of that is the Apostle Paul.

You remember in Acts 9, where Paul was stopped on the road to Damascus?

And Christ opened his eyes, and he began then to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Before that, you read in Galatians 6, and you know in Acts, prior to that, Paul was against Jesus Christ. He fought against the teaching that would lead to the Kingdom. He hated it. He was willing to put people to death that believed it.

His old way of life didn't lead him to see Jesus Christ. It excluded him. But then God stopped him in his tracks, blinded him for three days, and opened his eyes. And Paul, to his credit, responded to God and gave his life to them. And then he went out and began preaching the gospel of the Kingdom of God, the gospel of Jesus Christ. A total change in direction, a total change in his life. And he became the apostles of the Gentiles. He says in Galatians 1, what he was taught, he was taught by revelation of Jesus Christ. And he went out and he did it. That even people, when they saw him, were like, who is this Paul? He used to fight against this way. But now, you follow it and you preach it. If you want to be in the Kingdom of God, you have to be willing to give up your way of life, or as it conflicts with the way of Jesus Christ. When the people in Acts 2 heard the things and they heard the gospel preached to them, they said, men and brethren, what shall we do? What are we going to do with this now that we've been confronted with it? Another choice. Because we all have choices in life, it's just a matter of making the right choice along the way. Men and brethren, what shall we do? And Peter said to them, repent. Repent.

And then let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins. If you want the future that Jesus Christ promised, if you want the Kingdom of God that is coming to earth, God says it will happen and it will surely happen. If you want everything He has to offer, the first step is repenting. Christ said, as He talked about, the Kingdom of God. And now you understand exactly what the Kingdom of God that He preached is. And He said, if you want it, repent. And now you understand what repentance is. And He said, believe. Repent and believe. Have faith and know that the words you see and that this is the Word of God. And if you don't know that, prove it to yourself.

Well, that concludes. I'll be happy to take any questions here from anyone that might have any. But as you leave, I'll remind you there's some booklets on the back table there that you're welcome to peruse through. There's many more booklets that are back there at the website www.ucg.org slash booklets, including one in there about proving that the Bible is the Word of God.

I want to thank all of you for coming today. Those of you who are here for the first time, we have Sabbath services right here in this building. Every Sabbath at 1030, you're more than welcome to join us whenever you want to. After this, we will, you know, you're invited to stay around where there is a lunch that we'll set out. You're free to stay with us as long as you want. Many of us will be here to fellowship with you, and we hope you do stay around, and we will enjoy talking with all of you this afternoon. So, let me ask Devin if he'll come up and lead us in another song, and then we will close the service.