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15 entries for this category: | Bringing the Kingdom of God into the World |
There have been big questions about how the kingdom was going to come. Big fights over this. One group called the Zealots said the kingdom was going to come when we finally have enough courage to take up arms and throw off the power of Rome ourselves. And another group called the Essenes said: No, it`s not going to happen that way, not violence, it`ll happen when a group of us withdraws because we live in such a polluted and messed up world, when a group of us just withdraws, into a little cloister and we get so pure, God sees and God has to act. And another group, the Pharisees, basically said: It`ll happen when we reform our nation and we start doing Torah, when every man is like the priest of his household, and Torah gets obeyed to the absolute letter of the law, then the kingdom will come. Another group, called the Sadducees said: No, they really took the kingdom talk as kind of a metaphor, and they said, we ought to go after all we can get right here, right now, and they collaborated with Rome. So there were these big debates about how the kingdom was going to come. But one thing everybody agreed on Jesus followers as well everybody agreed on who the kingdom was going to be good news for, it was going to be good news for Israel, for the sons and daughters of Avram. That`s who the kingdom was coming for. Then in the fullness of time came this Rabbi with authority, Jesus, and His message is: Hey, the kingdom is right here, in Me, this is it, My body, My life, My way of being with people, My understanding of the Father, what I teach, My death on the cross for your sins, and My resurrection that`s going to take care of the death problem. The kingdom of God is coming through Me. By: John Ortberg
Category: I Come from Outside this World - Jesus |
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