God is increasingly bringing His government upon the earth to quicken mankind toward His image and intentions. It is time to assess and discuss the complex aspect of human behavior from a Kingdom perspective.
I pray we ask the Lord often to reveal to us what needs to be known—that which may be hidden—and help us to receive it and implement it in our lives for His glory. He desires us to be free and empowers us to act against the very nature of self.
The Gospel of the Kingdom is the redemptive manner in which God intends for His will to be accomplished in the earth. This, in itself, should alert us to the misappropriation of prevailing messages of the “preparing us for Heaven” Gospel. Yes, thankfully, Heaven is in the mix, but the place called Heaven is for later, while the work of spreading Heaven on earth is present and ongoing.
This Kingdom is more than the redemptive act accomplished in the Person of Christ resulting in our going to Heaven. We are thankful for redemption, but we cannot remain stuck there waiting on Him or Heaven while all the while He is waiting on us. He has empowered us with His Spirit, and therefore the power of Heaven is within us. No more hanging on for Jesus to return when He is hanging out with us to occupy until He comes.
The sheer weight of the word Kingdom carries governmental connotation, which lovingly demands a behavioral response from us. Christ presented and demonstrated a “Father-pleasing” life that is beyond doctrine and rituals. There must be a response to the declarations of, “The Kingdom of God is at hand,” and “The Kingdom of God is within you”; I hear the echoes of Apostle Paul’s cry of laboring until Christ becomes fully formed in us.
New Birth is a Journey
Most of us have read the Bible or have been taught that Heaven is the main focus of our new birth in Christ. Being born of the Spirit is the entrance into the Kingdom of God and the beginning of an amazing Kingdom-journey as the manifest sons and daughters of Almighty God.
Our destination is secured, but our calling and journey is to be living in the realm of the Spirit while being the glory of His heavenly essence upon the earth. Heaven can wait, but while we are here, the family business of “Almighty and Sons” brings the power and presence of God into every sphere of society. As we shed our religious ways and allow God to expose the darkness and distractions in our lives, His light and nature will supernaturally come forth in power through each of us.
The new birth represents the coming out of darkness and being reborn into the Kingdom sphere of Agape and Light. When this occurs, we are empowered with Kingdom understanding and are free to act against ourselves or the nature of self. We become human as God intended, we can love as God intended, and we are free to become His intention of love for the world around us. Christ was the firstborn among many, the first of humanity to be empowered by the Spirit of the Living God.
The new birth is God’s insemination of His eternal seed to each person who receives and embraces Christ. (John 1:12) But to all who believed Him and accepted Him, He gave the right to become children of God.
It communicates the essence of the new creation by restoring to us eternal Life, and being raised up in the form of His Agape Love. This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
This is indeed that which was taken from us in the transgression of Man and now restored to us in the last “Son of Man.” As His children, we once again have the “God in us” potential to be human as God intended. His Life, given to me, is that which enables me to act against myself, since my life is not my own, and since now I have chosen to live as a Father-pleaser.
God is Love, and Christ appeared as Love Incarnate for the sole purpose, or rather, the specific purpose, of being the one that could and did act against Himself. This He did for the single purpose of bringing in a new creation, one that is capable of acting against self in order to live as Him for the world. His life showed the way, and His death and resurrection secured the way for all of us.
(John 5:19) So Jesus explained Himself at length. “I’m telling you this straight. The Son can’t independently do a thing, only what He sees the Father doing. What the Father does, the Son does. The Father loves the Son and includes Him in everything He is doing.”
We Carry the Hope for Humanity
Again, that purpose is stated in Hebrews 10:7: “I come to do Thy will, O God.” This, of course, is restated in the encounter at Gethsemane: “Not My will, but Yours be done.” We can now see the manner in which Father intends for His will to be accomplished on the earth through us who also say, “Father, not my will, but Yours be done in my life.” Becoming incarnate ambassadors of God’s nature, which is Agape love, is His will for us.
The activated ingredients of His nature are present and revealed through His children. Many have said a prayer without revelation and the actuality of becoming an empowered follower of Jesus and His ways. As Christ is becoming fully formed in us through becoming disciples of His way, His truth, and His life, His nature will increasingly and supernaturally be revealed.
Living a life that God intends for each of us is the evidence of the power of God within us. This is not works based on anything but an outward flow of His agape nature in us. Religion has rules to follow that create a form of godliness, but it falls far short of His power, His glory, and cannot be sustained.
So we live under His governance, and His Kingdom government has no end. Nations will continue to rise and fall, but His Kingdom will continue to come while His people rise up as Kingdomized servants who carry the hope for humanity.
These are exciting times, as the opportunity to present everlasting hope has never been better. We have the freedom through Christ to put down our nature and live in His nature. There is no greater measurement to our daily living than how much we love our Father and love others. We each have come a long way, but we continue to grow from glory to glory in His wisdom, stature, and favor. He is with us, He will never leave us, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against us, or His Eternal Kingdom.
Robert Ricciardelli is a writer, speaker, talk show host, and a transformational life and business coach. You can find out more at www.convergingzone.com.
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