Church – WakeupWatchman

Jesus talked about the Kingdom of God not being from this world. He began to reveal the nature of this Kingdom, that it actually would come from amongst the people who put their faith and trust in him. Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.”John 18:36 Being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them, “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed, nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There!’ for behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you.”Luke 17:20-21 The religious leaders of Jesus day where looking for a spectacular arrival of the Messiah and his pending Kingdom. The prophets of the Old Testament rightly prophesied that the King would come and set up his kingdom to rule and reign in power. Well Jesus certainly did that! God was ruling in the hearts of some people, and the King Himself was standing among them, although the Pharisees were oblivious to that fact.https://www.gotquestions.org/kingdom-of-God-within-you.html The Gospel of Matthew shows us that Jesus preached that we should repent because the kingdom of heaven is at hand (Matthew 4:17). If that was 2000 years ago, how much closer must we be to seeing this as a reality. As the Church continues to grow, even under severe persecution in many countries we see the Kingdom of God growing each day. We cannot know the complete makeup or size of the coming Kingdom of God as it is something Jesus himself will reveal at his second coming into the world. Jesus reveals a wonderful promise to his kingdom members in that at the end of this age in the world we will see the Kingdom of God as he gives it. Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.Matthew 25:34 What will this Kingdom of God look like? We are given some insight into what it will be like after this age. The amazing panorama will be more than we can imagine or know at this time. John the revelator, an apostle who walked and spoke with Jesus himself was shown what it will be, a glimpse into the future for those who believe and hold their faith and trust in Jesus Christ. Let's look at the account he wrote down after a vision given to him by God. Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.”Revelation 11:15 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”Revelation 21:1-4 This hope is for everyone as Jesus the Christ died for everyone on the cross 2000 years ago. Salvation is found in no one else but Jesus, he is the way the truth and the life, no one can come to the Father, please God or enter the Kingdom of God without the righteousness found in Jesus alone. Our own works are like filthy and torn clothes, imagine presenting yourself before a court room after you crawled through a sewer on the way there. That is the best we can do though, but Jesus gives us clean and pure clothing (metaphor) from his own back and puts on our sewer clothing and appeared in the court room for us, and was punished on our behalf, and we go free. That is the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. John Macarthur talks about the invisible Kingdom of God in this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCFRWb2DRiY The Invisible Kingdom of God, Part 1 (Luke 17:20-21) Come into the Kingdom of God, know Jesus Christ. Jesus once said that he was the door to the Kingdom, you have to go through the door to be a valid guest and join in the celebrations. There is a great article about Knowing Jesus & Knowing about Jesus written by the folks over at gotquestions.org/knowing-Jesus which talks about the thousands of people who claim to be Christians and they may even know significant details about him, go to Church and do good works. The difference is that when you know Jesus, with the aid of the Holy Spirit within you, who is given as a gift from God, you do know Jesus because your life is changing, you are repentant when you sin, you are grateful in the forgiveness and grace found at the cross because you are beginning to know him as a person who gave everything to be with you in his coming Kingdom. Jesus has revealed to us that the Kingdom of God is by the works of God, through his Holy Spirit within each of us as believers. We believe because he has given faith to each of us as a gift, Jesus is building a Kingdom for God of which he will rule as King and the entire earth will come under the rule of this same Kingdom. This is one of the reasons why the Church, Christians are so thoroughly persecuted throughout history. The Kingdom of God belongs to Jesus Christ and we are part of that Kingdom if we belong to Jesus Christ by faith and trust in him.