Entering the Kingdom of God, Part 1

Welcome to Mark. You can go ahead and turn the lights down. Thank you.

Well, welcome! We'd like to have all of you with us today for the Kingdom of God seminars. Mark mentioned this is the fourth in our series of seminars, and if you missed any of them previously, they are online. We have a local site in which we have the audio of all of our sermons and presentations. That's Cleveland.ucg.org. So if you would like to be able to listen to the fast Kingdom of God seminars, they are available there. We are going to cozy up to a nice book on this Saturday. The book is known as the Bible. We together are going to learn more about the Kingdom of God. So the focus in this particular seminar is entering the Kingdom of God, something that I hope all of us want to do. And to enter the Kingdom of God, it's important to understand the statement that Jesus Christ himself made. He said, the time is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of God is at hand, repent, and believe in the Gospel. They did from Mark chapter 1 and verse 15. So Jesus says there are two primary requirements for being in that Kingdom. The first is repentance, and we'll talk about that in a little more detail. That goes beyond just being sorry for the mistakes we've made. Repentance means we literally turn around and we start heading in another direction. And also believing in the Gospel. That's the good news of God's promises of what he has in store for you as an individual, and also for all of mankind. By the time we get to the book of Matthew, chapter 6, Jesus is in a discussion with his disciples, and his disciples were a lot like you and I are. They were concerned with physical material things. They were concerned with shelter. They were concerned with reliable transportation. They were concerned with good food. You eat all the kinds of clothing, all the kinds of things that you and I are also concerned about. But Jesus said this in Matthew, chapter 6, verse 33, he said, but seek first. Make your first priority this kingdom, the kingdom of God and his righteousness. So seek the kind of righteousness that Jesus Christ has. He said that all these material things that you desire, shelter, nice clothes, all the good things in life, these things will be added to you. Get your priorities straight and understand that your main mission in your life is to seek the kingdom of God. And we'll explain more about how we can seek that throughout this seminar. It's interesting that in the same chapter, Jesus taught his disciples how to pray. And he asked him, teach us how to pray. And this is what he said. He said that this manner therefore pray, our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. Now, it's interesting that he didn't teach them to pray that they would get to go to heaven.

He didn't teach them to pray that they would somehow be translated off of this earth and reside somewhere else. He taught them to pray that the kingdom of God would be established on earth. Your kingdom come. Because here is where God plans to reward the same. We are being trained to be kings and priests for all eternity. To prepare to rule with Jesus Christ, the kingdom of God. So he taught them to pray, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That's also something we need to pray for. Because right now, God's will is not always being done on earth. We know that God's will is being done in heaven, but on this earth, unfortunately, there is an enemy. There is a rebellious spirit. We call him Satan. We call him the adversary. He's known by many names, but he is a spirit who is rebellion against God, God's way of life, and God's values. And for that reason, oftentimes, God's will is not done presently on earth as it is in heaven. But when that kingdom comes, at that time, there will begin a process of complete harmony, where God's will on earth will be exactly as it is in heaven.

So one of the things that Jesus said in giving him that kingdom that was so important is repentance.

So what do we repent of? Well, we should be repenting of sin. And what is sin? Well, Paul taught us to understand that we are all sinners, and we all need to repent of the sins in our lives. Here's what he wrote in the New Century version of this constant struggle that he had between knowing to do right and understanding God's law and God's values, and the pull of his human nature, the pull of his carnal self, that constantly was struggling with doing the things that he knew we should do. Romans chapter 7 and verse 21. Paul said, so I have learned this rule. What I want to do good, evil, is there with me. He says, when I want to do what's right, there's something else there pulling me in another direction. He says, in my mind I'm happy with God's law, but I see another law working in my body, which makes war against the law that my mind accepts. That other law, working in my body, is the law of sin, and it makes me its prisoner. So in his mind, he knew the things that he should do. He knew the life that he should live. He understood the benefits of keeping God's law, but yet because he was still a physical human being like all of us are, he had those poles, that downward pole, that downward direction in our flesh, to take us. He says, what a miserable man I am. Who will save me from this body that brings me back? And then he answers the question. He says, I thank God for saving me from Jesus Christ our Lord. So in my mind, I am a slave to God's law. I want to be obedient. He says, but in my sinful self, I am a slave to the law of sin.

And it's only when we completely shut off this physical body, this carnal human nature, that we have, that that conflict will end completely. But what do we need to repent of? We need to repent of a lifestyle of sin, of being a sinner. So what is sin? Well, you may have heard of the seven deadly sins. So they're defined as pride and lust, greed, sloth, envy, wrath, and gluttony. But there's actually a biblical definition of what sin is. And that biblical definition is from 1 John chapter 3 and verse 4. I'll be reading from the contemporary English version. And here's what it says. It says, everyone who sins breaks God's law, because sin is the same as breaking God's law. Now, when you think of God's law, what God's law is, is commandments. And in its most simply form, it starts off with a basic understanding of two things. One is love the Lord your God with all your heart and your soul. So that's God's related and how a relationship should be towards loving God. The second is love your neighbor as yourself. From those two basic great commandments come what we call the Ten Commandments. And the first four of those Ten Commandments relate to our relationship and love towards God. The final six of those Ten Commandments indeed relate to how we should be dealing with our neighbor, loving our neighbor as ourself.

And then, of course, Jesus Christ came to earth and he put a spiritual application on the law of God on those commandments to regulate and to teach us that it's also important how we think what our perception is, what our attitude is towards others. So sin is the breaking of God's law. That's what we need to repent of. A key scripture is Romans chapter 6 verse 23. It says in Romans 23, it reminds us of when we must repent of. It says, the wages of sin is death. But the gift of God is eternal life and Christ Jesus our Lord. How many here have ever worked for anyone and received some wages for us? Let me see your hands quickly. Almost all of you. Why did we receive wages? We received wages for something that we have done. We received wages for something that we have earned. And because we have sinned, the wages of sin is death. And it's not just death in some hellfire. It's not just some death consciously in limbo or somewhere. I mean, when it says, biblically speaking, the wages of sin is death, it means unconscious, non-existence, what we know of as death. Because it's the gift of God. That's eternal life. You see, if we were already immortal souls, we would already have eternal life. And we would be living that life either smoking some fatal ace in hell if we were bad or flittering around in heaven if we were good. But we don't already have eternal life. That is why we need it given to us from God as a gift. And of course, that's possible through Jesus Christ, our Lord. So since the wages of sin is death, and all physical human beings eventually die, we need a Redeemer. Or else we will remain forever unconscious and dead. We need a Redeemer. Thankfully, that Redeemer is Jesus Christ. So as we think about entering the kingdom of God, a key element of that is faith in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Faith in the fact and knowledge that by the shedding of His blood, it became possible for us to once again be forgiven and be reconciled to God and have a meaningful relationship with Him. John chapter 3 and verse 16, I know we're not playing football, but we'll put it on the screen here anyway. This is commonly seen in football games. Usually someone holds a sign up somewhere during most football games, for God so loved of the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. You see, everlasting life isn't something we automatically have again. We are not immortal souls. It's something that we need given to us as a gift from God. And thankfully, God loved the world so much that He was willing to watch His very own beloved Son die, be tortured, and die and have His bloodshed so that you and I can have the opportunity to become the children of God and the lazy forever. Romans chapter 3 and verse 24.

Famous scripture by Paul, and Paul loved to write in very long sentences. He was a highly educated man, so what I'll do is I will stop halfway through this, and we'll take a look at it a little bit. Romans chapter 3 verse 24. He says, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood.

We're going to stop right there. That's half of it, but we'll define what He's saying.

Propitiation is just a word that means covering up atoning, covering up by the blood of Christ. So what Paul is saying so far that we've read here is it's by the blood of Jesus Christ whom God sent to this world that redemption is possible for you and for me. And that redemption isn't because we've earned it. It isn't because we're superior or we're smarter or anyone else. That redemption is possible because of God's grace. His undeserved love, our, we don't deserve it, His love towards us who are not deserving of His forgiveness and of His compassion. Let's continue. Let's pick it up here. Through faith, that is the faith that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, that He was able to shed His blood, that He lived and changed blood and died so that you and I could have the opportunity to have eternal life. Through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness because in His forbearance God had previously passed over the sins that were previously committed. So it's by that shed blood of Jesus Christ that God accepted that and said, I will forgive all human sin because of what my son did. Let's talk about grace for two minutes.

Grace is undeserved forgiveness. It means God's acceptance. It means God's love, love received from God. But here's the key with grace that we have to understand. And I'm always fearful that there are far too many people, including those who do possess God's Holy Spirit, who don't understand grace. First of all, we don't deserve it. We don't receive grace because we're of a certain lineage. We don't receive grace because we're better than anyone else, or because we're righteous of good. We don't deserve God's grace. Number two, we cannot earn it by what we do. Number three, like any gift, you must be willing to accept it and open it in order to enjoy it. And if you meet with my wife and I, we'll have a wedding anniversary and I will be giving her a gift. And if she were to take that gift and not open it, just put it on the closet, was put it on a shelf in the closet, she wouldn't enjoy that gift very much, would she? If she doesn't accept it and open it, that gift would have very little meaning towards her. And that's the way grace is. You may have heard the story of a group of individuals who went on a cruise together to the Caribbean. And they first met each other when the beginning of the cruise started, and they were all hanging out and associating with one another, and they were doing a lot of things, a quick friendship, they immediately became quick friends, but they noticed one member of the group didn't show up for any of the meals. Just disappear. It was never there for any of the scrumptious meals that you always find on a cruise ship. And after a few days, one of the individuals said to this man, I've noticed that you haven't come to any of the meals. And the individual said, well, he said it cost me a lot. It cost me an awful lot to take this cruise, and I can't afford the meals. So I go back into my room, and I eat crackers. And his friend said, you just don't get it. You see, the cost of the meals was included in the price that you paid. The price has already been paid. And my friends, don't continue to live with guilt and shame after you were content of your sins, and you've received God's Holy Spirit. The price, the total price for all of your sins, have already been paid by Jesus Christ. So there's no reason to continue to live in shame or guilt because of the past mistakes that you made. To draw another analogy, another parallel to that. God, on the Sabbath day, gives people an opportunity to come and enjoy a feast together. To share in spiritual food. To share in fellowship. So rather than just staying home and eating crackers on the Sabbath day, and denying yourself the opportunity to enjoy a splendid feast, come with people of life month and join them. And stop eating crackers and start enjoying the abundant life that God wants us all to have because Jesus Christ paid the price for all.

Let's talk about two essential requirements for entering the Kingdom of God. One we've talked about a little bit already, and that is repentance. That is the desire to change the lifestyle that we've been living, turn around, and head in another direction. The direction of God's law, of God's values, and way of life. The second is faith in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And when we understand what these mean, we understand what repentance is, and we've made that commitment. And when we have faith in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we say, yes, he is my Savior. Yes, he did shed his blood so that my sins could be forgiven. It leads us to make a life-changing decision. And that decision eventually is baptized. And baptism pictures a watery grave. It pictures as we go in and plunge into that water. It pictures being buried in that water. And as we come out of the water, it pictures the goodness of life. It pictures our commitment to be a new creature of Jesus Christ, to live a new way of life, to have a new attitude, a spring in our step, a purpose for living. So it should change us, and we should begin a process of developing the lying of Christ. Paul said in Romans chapter 8 and verse 14, for as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. Now, no one can come to God unless the Father calls them.

And if you were not being called, and what I'm saying is, I'll look up with you to you, it just won't have any meaning. It just won't make sense to you, because that's the way that the Father works.

But God begins calling us, sometimes decades before He literally helps us discover through circumstances in life that we need to have a relationship with our God. It may be an event that occurs when we meet with small children. He had a process when we were in high school. We may have gone through a tragedy in life many years ago when God began to lead us by His Spirit, understanding that part of His plan was to later on call us so that we could make a decision and become a disciple of Jesus Christ. So again, for as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. Also, as in Galatians chapter 3 and verse 27, for as many as you were baptized in the Christ, you have put on Christ. That sounds like a straight word. What does He mean? You would put on Christ. It means that you have decided to become a disciple. You have said, that's the kind of values I want to live my life by. I want to develop the mind and attitude of Jesus Christ Himself. I want to go through a process of conversion to minimize that carnal human nature that I have and to be able to dominate it with the Spirit, to be able to dominate and overwhelm it with the fruits of God's Holy Spirit. That's what it means to put on Christ. Verse 28, there is neither Jew nor Greek. There is neither slave nor free. There is neither male or female, or you are all one in Christ Jesus. Now obviously, Paul is talking spiritually here.

When my wife got out of the shower this morning, I was delighted to see that she is still female.

You see, just because we are called into God's way of life, that doesn't mean we stop being the nationalities that we are, or we stop being male or female. We maintain the physical identity that we have. But what Paul is saying spiritually is that we are all one in Christ. He loves us as His children. He offers us salvation. He gives us equal as brothers and sisters in Christ, all sharing the same goings together. 2 Corinthians 5 and verse 17. Again, Paul says to the congregation, therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. As I mentioned before, coming out of that bath-pismal tank, coming out of that water, we come out of there with a newness of life.

Paul says old things have passed away, and that includes our sins, and it should include the shame, the guilt that we have from the mistakes that we've made in the past. He says, Behold, all things have become new. And God, in His great mercy, understanding that we would continue to accumulate sorrows and griefs, we would continue to need to process the mistakes that we've made. Also, what He has done is He instituted something every year to remind us that we can do this again, called the Passover. And by observing the Passover, it reminds us annually every year, once again, that Jesus Christ is the ultimate Passover lamb, and that we should be growing and have an opportunity to become new all over again. So what it means to believe the gospel? I think this is a very important subject that we want to talk about in a little bit. Again, Mark chapter 1, verse 15, is scripture that we saw lower in earth. Jesus said, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand to repent and believe the gospel. The gospel means good news. Now, I have to be frank with you, and tell you that in the events leading up to the return of Jesus Christ, this world is going to go through a lot of terror. It's going to go through thermal nuclear war. It's going to go through massive world wars that are going to decimate a large number of people who live in this world. It's going to be a terrible time, more terrible than the earth has ever experienced. But God looks at the long term, and those are necessary events in order to try to encourage mankind to repent of its sins, to try to draw mankind to see what has been brought upon itself through sin, and to try to draw mankind closer to God. But beyond those events, which frankly are short term, especially when you look at them in the length of eternity, when you look beyond those events, you see that the ultimate part of God's plan is good news. It's God returning to this earth in the form of his son Jesus Christ and establishing the kingdom of God on earth, and literally reforming and refashioning the world to make it more uncapital, to make it a beautiful paradise, to restore the garden paradise that was lost at Eden, to once again cover the entire earth. The gospel message itself also contains the very keys of the kingdom of God if we look at it closely. Some of the keys of the kingdom of God, some of the encouraging keys, are first of all liberty. Liberty from this dark being that I spoke of earlier called Satan the Devil, liberty from him, and being able to have the victory that is in Christ because we receive his Holy Spirit. Liberty from the fear of death, liberty from sorrow and an uncertain future. Another part of that gospel message, it's a message of hope. It's encouraging.

It says, look into the future because God has a wonderful promises plan for all of mankind.

Another key of that kingdom is healing. When Jesus Christ came, he healed people of their service. A very horrendous sin that mankind in his day had committed, but he also healed people physically. Blind people had their sight restored. Lean people were able to walk once again. So it's a time to look forward to healing when all the diseases that mankind has will be healed and become only a memory. The prophet Isaiah, hundreds of years before Jesus Christ, walked from the service, wrote a prophecy about Christ himself, and here's what he said in Isaiah chapter 16, 1, again in verse 1.

Isaiah said, the Spirit is before God is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor. That's the good news. An encouraging message of hope that God loves you, and even if you're struggling at this very time, there is a purpose for that. There is a reason. It's because God is trying to help us and mold us to develop godly character. To preach the good tidings to the poor, he has set me to heal the broken heart.

Again, it is a message of encouragement. It is a message of healing that offers hope to people who are despondent, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound. Most of mankind is captive to Satan the devil. They are in prison to the God of this world of course, as the adversary. They are bound in their own carnality, and bound in their own passions, and in their own weaknesses, and literally slaves of the devil.

The message of the gospel is that Jesus Christ has come to provide hope, to provide healing, and to provide the evil. You know, belief and faith are inextricably linked to obedience. I'm going to talk to you something right now that is contrary to a lot of religious philosophies that you will hear, because many people sincerely believe that obedience is not required of a Christian. That obedience is unimportant. That obedience they teach is actually in conflict with having faith, and that is a serious mistake.

So I want to talk about this subject for a while, because belief and faith and obedience are not contrary to each other. Let me give you a little definition of each. Belief is when you accept something. Someone says Jesus Christ is the Lord and Savior, and you say, I accept that. I believe that. Faith is a little bit deeper. Faith is when you accept something is true, even though there is no way that you can prove it. None of your senses can prove what you believe, but you accept it on faith.

If one of your senses could tell you that that indeed was true, if one of your senses could prove that something was true, then you wouldn't leave faith. Faith means God says it, God promised it, I believed it, done, even if there's no evidence of it at all. And obedience is when we say to ourselves that we want to follow the example of Jesus Christ, when we want to change our lives and become servants of Christ, disciples. That means learners, and to develop the mind of Jesus Christ within us.

And belief and faith and obedience are not contrary to each other. They actually strengthen each other, much like a dovetail. They dovetail together to create a stronger person, a stronger Christian, one who is more dedicated, one who is more committed to their walk as a disciple of Jesus Christ. So obedience is not in conflict with having faith. Doing good works, doing good things is not a conflict to having faith.

They actually go hand in glove, and they should be working together. James says in James chapter 2 verse 19, he says, you believe that there is one God. He says you do well. Even the demons believe and tremble. Yes, you see, demons believe in God, but the demons aren't saved, are they? Demons aren't justified in God's sight, are they? But they believe in God, but belief alone is not enough, saying, yeah, I believe in God, and I have relatives who say, well, you know, all I think is, I believe in God, and I think that all I have to do is be a good person, and that's all that God wants for me.

Well, first of all, it depends on how you define the word good. If you define the word good as God defines the word good, then you are in serious trouble. We need a believer. We need a Savior. But simply believing that Jesus Christ has came to this earth, simply believing that He's the Son of God isn't enough. The demons believe that. They often had conversations with Jesus Christ.

They often acknowledged to Him that He came from God. What is it that the demons lack? Who would like to tell me what it is that the demons lack? Obedience! That's what they lack. James says here in James chapter 2 and verse 17, remember they are rebelling against God.

James chapter 2 and verse 17, He says, Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is death.

Faith is an essential property of a Christian life. Faith is what gives us sin. Faith is what gives us justification in God's eyes. But, He says, if your faith isn't demonstrated by the good things that you do, then it's a dead faith. It's a hollow shell. It's a mockery. It's not even a living act of faith. Continuing, He says, but someone will say, you have faith and I have works. And James says, show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. So you see here that James is emphasizing the point that works alone aren't enough. Faith alone isn't enough. That they don't care and work together to help us to grow and become the kind of disciples that Jesus Christ wants us to be.

After this verse, he draws a unique analogy. Here James talks about Abraham, whom is known as the father of the faith, soul. And James uses Abraham as an example in the book of James to show how his works reflected his faith when he was willing to offer his son Isaac as a sacrifice. And he follows up that statement with this scripture, James chapter 2 and verse 24. He says, you see then that a man is justified by works and not by faith only.

Is James saying that a man is justified by works only without faith? He's not saying that.

Is he saying that a man is justified by faith alone without having any works? He's not saying that either. What he is saying is that faith and works work together. They dovetail together.

And that's the point that James is emphasizing here. I don't want anyone to mistake what I'm saying.

Perfect obedience after being convicted of your sins will not make you righteous. Keeping all the laws of God, doing all the good work, succeeding what Mother Teresa did in her lifetime, will not give you salvation. Will not earn you salvation in God's eyes. It's impossible.

Can't happen. We have to repent of breaking God's law and be willing to be led by God's Spirit and live the life of faith. But works, obedience, and faith are not in conflict with each other. They are not opposing forces. They work together hand in hand, or produce the kind of fruits that God desires that we have. It's important to understand that Jesus came to save us out of our sins. You see, he wanted us to leave that baptismal ceremony coming out to live a new life. Out of our sins is the new creation, as a new creature in Christ. He came to save us out of our sins, not save us in our sins. He wants us to change and to grow and to develop God-like character and attributes and qualities just like Jesus Christ himself has. So where James was confronting those who lacked obedience in the fruits of the Holy Spirit, Paul was confronting another type of carnal attitude. That's why, to some people, it appears, as if James and Paul are contradicting one another in their writings, but they're really not. Paul was often in conflict with self-righteous individuals who were teaching works, or obedience is what justifies or saves us. And all the good works, keeping all the laws in the room, all the perfect obedience you could muster will not save you. In context here, Paul usually was talking about, as in the book Relations, he was talking about some sort of concision. He was talking about people who would show up and say, in order to be saved, you had to have this little piece of flesh cut off your body. Well, how did that help the female part of the congregation, understanding that great spiritual knowledge these people were preaching? And Paul was saying, no, that has nothing to do with salvation. That doesn't provide you salvation. It's the faith in the saved blood, in the shed blood of Jesus Christ that provides salvation. So they're not in conflict with each other. Here's what he said, very strong words in Relations, chapter 2, verse 16. Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, and again I want to emphasize that you can keep all of God's commandments perfectly. You can be in perfect obedience. You can do great works for the rest of your life. You can feed the poor. You can travel the world in middle homes and do all kinds of wonderful things, and none of those things will make you justified in God's sight or save you.

You're not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. Even we have believed in Christ Jesus that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law, or not just by doing good things, not by obedience. For by the works of the law, no flesh shall be justified. But if, while we seem to be justified by Christ, we ourselves are also found sinners, is Christ therefore a minister of sin? You say, look, I know all your people, you're like me, and you keep telling me that your righteousness is what saved you. He says, if you just have one sin, if you keep 999 things perfectly, but you sin once out of those 1000 acts, he says you are a sinner, and Jesus Christ is not a minister of sin. He says, certainly not for it. We build again those things which I destroyed, I made myself a transcript. Paul says, I am not going backward. Remember, one time he had been a Pharisee, and he believed in salvation by works.

So, I'd like to seal this up a little bit so that we understand it. First of all, belief and faith are what result in justification. That is being just in the eyes of God. That is God looking down on us and saying, yes, I love you, yes, I forgive you, yes, I'm willing to have a relationship with you. So, that's what belief and faith in the shed blood of Jesus Christ and understanding that he is our Savior results in. Obedience, or the works that we do, result in spiritual growth, because we root out that carnal self that we have. We allow the Spirit of God to begin to dominate our thoughts and our actions and our attitudes, and that develops spiritual growth. And God gives us his Holy Spirit so that we can develop the fruits of God's Holy Spirit. That's what obedience and works do. Now, when you put together, when you don't look at them as contrary to one another, and you put together faith and obedience, the result of that is sanctification. That's simply a big word that means the process of becoming holy. That's all the word sanctification means. So, when we have a living faith, and we have an active obedience, and want to follow God's law and live God's way of life, the result is that we slowly develop the mind of Jesus Christ, and day by day, we become more like which is exactly what he is like. Well, that's it for our first session.