Kingdom Concepts (part 1)
KINGDOM CONCEPTS
AS UNDERSTOOD BY GRANT ALFORD
[An unfinished series of messages prepared for and delivered to the Prairie High School Chapel]
We know from 2 Peter 3:9 that God does not desire that anyone should miss out on salvation, but rather that they should repent and be saved. We also know that reality is that many will fail to take the offer. It is stated categorically that the gate is wide and the highway broad that leads to destruction, and that there are actually only a few (relatively speaking) who will choose to come in by the narrow gate and follow on the footpath that leads to Life. (Matthew 7:13,14).
Contrary to popular opinion among Christians, I want to suggest to you that not only are there few who stumble upon the doorway, but that God Himself built a maze as it were, and disguised the doorway with landscaping that would keep all but the most sincere or determined from finding it.
No! It can’t be. The God of Love so wants everyone to be saved that He would do anything to bring them in. No. He won’t! He won’t compromise His character, and He won’t cheapen the sacrifice of Christ, and He won’t force His creation to accept His Reign. That is why Jesus talked about the kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Heaven and about “Entering” it, rather than automatically being in it by virtue of natural birth.
I want to ask a series of questions, and not necessarily give answers, although I may suggest some references that may lead to the answers.
The first consideration of course about Salvation is the place of God’s Soveriegnty and Man’s Freewill. I heard it said of one theologian or teacher that he taught God’s Soveriegnty on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and Man’s Free Will on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.
What if the solution is a conditional Soveriegnty or a conditioanl freewill? What if God dangled a bit of spiritual bait in front of us and if we took a nibble He would give us a little more? What if we instead turned away, showing no interest at all? Would He give up? Or would He try again with a different flavour or served on a different platter? Is that what the passage in 2 Peter speaks of regarding God’s longsuffering?
Do we determine how far and how quickly we advance?
I would offer for your consideration here, various verses that may come to your mind, or that you may wish to look up, verses that imply “If” in them. The term “whomsoever” also implies the exercise of choice. Sometimes the word “if” should be translated “since” but apart from those instances consider these:
Matthew 16: 24 “If any will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.”
John 8: 18 “ Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what he thinks he has will be taken from him.”
John 7:37 “If anyone is thirsty , let him come to me and drink.”
I believe, not only is there room to teach that to some extent the choice is our, but that the results, whether or not we “make it” into the kingdom may depend on the intensity of our searching.
From Jeremiah 29: 13 we see this principal as it applied to Israel as a nation. When put alongside other passages, you will see it must be true of individuals also:
Jeremiah 29:13 “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found of you…”
If we recall the parables that Jesus said were describing the Kingdom, he told of one who sold everything he had to buy a field that had a single treasure in it, or to purchase a pearl of great value.
We already meantioned the need to die and take up the cross, and when Jesus tells us to Seek First the Kingdom of God and His Righteousness, the word for seek suggests a coveting earnestly or striving after. In another passage he speaks of hungering and thirsting. Again with the idea of an intesity that makes one driven.
It may be the idea behind an obscure or strange passage in Matthew 11:12 and Luke 16:16 that the NIV gives as “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the KINGDOM of GOD has been forcefully advancing and forceful men lay hold of it.”
This idea that the degree of our desire, or the intensity of the pursuit may determine the success of the search, and ultimately our salvation might suggest that it is based on works. Let me suggest the difference is that when speaking of works we speak of external accomplishments in which we take pride and think we have done something to deserve the heavenly reward. But combining my premise that our Salvation may have something to do with a conditional response to the Spirit’s prompting, brings us more to the idea of motive and heart or spirit responding. God looks on the heart. Because of that God saw beyond David’s sin and said of him that he had a heart after God’s own heart. So a question we ask now is: Where is your heart? Are you seeking Him intensely?
And now to come back to the idea that maybe God isn’t as ready to have people sign up for the God Squad as you have been led to believe. Meditate for awhile on passages like Mark 4:11 when Jesus explained why he spoke in parables and plainly the message went right over most of his hearers heads. To the closest desciples, the most sincere followers, he said “You are permitted to understand the secret about the Kingdom of God. But I am using these stories to conceal everything about it from outsiders.”
In other words only those who will put in an effort to understand, who will come back to the puzzle, who will pay the price, who will persist, will be counted worthy to enter.
When Gideon was chosing an army, at one point he didn’t ask for those who wanted to join him to step forward, he asked all those who were afraid, to leave. Perhaps in our evangelism we have been too afraid to spell it out clearly. Maybe today istead of asking how many of you want to declare your intesity and longing to be into the Kingdom of God we should give opportunity for those who know they are not ready to pay the price to declare their disinterest. Of course there would be no point in their continuing in a community whose stated purpose is to train (true) believers to think and act christianly. [editorial note: this was a motto or mission statement of Prairie High School]
This really is the bottom line of my thinking or charge today.
As the first Kingdom Concept, it is to sketch out the Treasure the Kingdom is and the Cost required to Enter it. My next look at Kingdom Concepts will start where Jesus started when he declared he had come to announce the Good News of the Kingdom of God.
Traditionally, if you have said that you have “asked Jesus into your heart” the evangelical community has assured you he has come in.
But if you said you didn’t feel anything, we told you you couldn’t depend on your feelings, then we would show passages of assurance that said God would be true to his promises. But you know I can’t think of one passage that assures the non-christian that all he has to do is say “Come into my heart Jesus”
I want to suggest that for some of you, the reason you have no assurance of salvation is simply because you aren’t saved. The reason some of you know nothing of the Joy of living in the Kingdom is because you have never entered it. The reason you don’t feel the fellowship of the King is because you haven’t let Him reign in you. In other words I believe we have betrayed both the work and word of God when we in our enthusiasm have usurped the work of the Holy Spirit. It is His work to convict. It is His work to convert. And it is His work to give witness and assurance that the Godhead has taken up residence. Only He knows your heart. Only He knows the intensity of the longing you have to Know Him. And you can not fool Him. Nor do you have to impress Him with external show or comparisons to others. He honours the most childlikefaith, or if you will, the most childlike desire to please the Father.
This surely is what this passage declares:
“…Those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of Sonship . And by Him we cry “Abba, Father.” The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.”
Have you or are you ready today to make a choice?
Have you or are you ready today to Seek with the whole heart?Have you or are you ready today to Pay the price to Enter the Kingdom of God?
AS UNDERSTOOD BY GRANT ALFORD
[An unfinished series of messages prepared for and delivered to the Prairie High School Chapel]
We know from 2 Peter 3:9 that God does not desire that anyone should miss out on salvation, but rather that they should repent and be saved. We also know that reality is that many will fail to take the offer. It is stated categorically that the gate is wide and the highway broad that leads to destruction, and that there are actually only a few (relatively speaking) who will choose to come in by the narrow gate and follow on the footpath that leads to Life. (Matthew 7:13,14).
Contrary to popular opinion among Christians, I want to suggest to you that not only are there few who stumble upon the doorway, but that God Himself built a maze as it were, and disguised the doorway with landscaping that would keep all but the most sincere or determined from finding it.
No! It can’t be. The God of Love so wants everyone to be saved that He would do anything to bring them in. No. He won’t! He won’t compromise His character, and He won’t cheapen the sacrifice of Christ, and He won’t force His creation to accept His Reign. That is why Jesus talked about the kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Heaven and about “Entering” it, rather than automatically being in it by virtue of natural birth.
I want to ask a series of questions, and not necessarily give answers, although I may suggest some references that may lead to the answers.
The first consideration of course about Salvation is the place of God’s Soveriegnty and Man’s Freewill. I heard it said of one theologian or teacher that he taught God’s Soveriegnty on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and Man’s Free Will on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.
What if the solution is a conditional Soveriegnty or a conditioanl freewill? What if God dangled a bit of spiritual bait in front of us and if we took a nibble He would give us a little more? What if we instead turned away, showing no interest at all? Would He give up? Or would He try again with a different flavour or served on a different platter? Is that what the passage in 2 Peter speaks of regarding God’s longsuffering?
Do we determine how far and how quickly we advance?
I would offer for your consideration here, various verses that may come to your mind, or that you may wish to look up, verses that imply “If” in them. The term “whomsoever” also implies the exercise of choice. Sometimes the word “if” should be translated “since” but apart from those instances consider these:
Matthew 16: 24 “If any will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.”
John 8: 18 “ Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what he thinks he has will be taken from him.”
John 7:37 “If anyone is thirsty , let him come to me and drink.”
I believe, not only is there room to teach that to some extent the choice is our, but that the results, whether or not we “make it” into the kingdom may depend on the intensity of our searching.
From Jeremiah 29: 13 we see this principal as it applied to Israel as a nation. When put alongside other passages, you will see it must be true of individuals also:
Jeremiah 29:13 “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found of you…”
If we recall the parables that Jesus said were describing the Kingdom, he told of one who sold everything he had to buy a field that had a single treasure in it, or to purchase a pearl of great value.
We already meantioned the need to die and take up the cross, and when Jesus tells us to Seek First the Kingdom of God and His Righteousness, the word for seek suggests a coveting earnestly or striving after. In another passage he speaks of hungering and thirsting. Again with the idea of an intesity that makes one driven.
It may be the idea behind an obscure or strange passage in Matthew 11:12 and Luke 16:16 that the NIV gives as “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the KINGDOM of GOD has been forcefully advancing and forceful men lay hold of it.”
This idea that the degree of our desire, or the intensity of the pursuit may determine the success of the search, and ultimately our salvation might suggest that it is based on works. Let me suggest the difference is that when speaking of works we speak of external accomplishments in which we take pride and think we have done something to deserve the heavenly reward. But combining my premise that our Salvation may have something to do with a conditional response to the Spirit’s prompting, brings us more to the idea of motive and heart or spirit responding. God looks on the heart. Because of that God saw beyond David’s sin and said of him that he had a heart after God’s own heart. So a question we ask now is: Where is your heart? Are you seeking Him intensely?
And now to come back to the idea that maybe God isn’t as ready to have people sign up for the God Squad as you have been led to believe. Meditate for awhile on passages like Mark 4:11 when Jesus explained why he spoke in parables and plainly the message went right over most of his hearers heads. To the closest desciples, the most sincere followers, he said “You are permitted to understand the secret about the Kingdom of God. But I am using these stories to conceal everything about it from outsiders.”
In other words only those who will put in an effort to understand, who will come back to the puzzle, who will pay the price, who will persist, will be counted worthy to enter.
When Gideon was chosing an army, at one point he didn’t ask for those who wanted to join him to step forward, he asked all those who were afraid, to leave. Perhaps in our evangelism we have been too afraid to spell it out clearly. Maybe today istead of asking how many of you want to declare your intesity and longing to be into the Kingdom of God we should give opportunity for those who know they are not ready to pay the price to declare their disinterest. Of course there would be no point in their continuing in a community whose stated purpose is to train (true) believers to think and act christianly. [editorial note: this was a motto or mission statement of Prairie High School]
This really is the bottom line of my thinking or charge today.
As the first Kingdom Concept, it is to sketch out the Treasure the Kingdom is and the Cost required to Enter it. My next look at Kingdom Concepts will start where Jesus started when he declared he had come to announce the Good News of the Kingdom of God.
Traditionally, if you have said that you have “asked Jesus into your heart” the evangelical community has assured you he has come in.
But if you said you didn’t feel anything, we told you you couldn’t depend on your feelings, then we would show passages of assurance that said God would be true to his promises. But you know I can’t think of one passage that assures the non-christian that all he has to do is say “Come into my heart Jesus”
I want to suggest that for some of you, the reason you have no assurance of salvation is simply because you aren’t saved. The reason some of you know nothing of the Joy of living in the Kingdom is because you have never entered it. The reason you don’t feel the fellowship of the King is because you haven’t let Him reign in you. In other words I believe we have betrayed both the work and word of God when we in our enthusiasm have usurped the work of the Holy Spirit. It is His work to convict. It is His work to convert. And it is His work to give witness and assurance that the Godhead has taken up residence. Only He knows your heart. Only He knows the intensity of the longing you have to Know Him. And you can not fool Him. Nor do you have to impress Him with external show or comparisons to others. He honours the most childlikefaith, or if you will, the most childlike desire to please the Father.
This surely is what this passage declares:
“…Those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of Sonship . And by Him we cry “Abba, Father.” The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.”
Have you or are you ready today to make a choice?
Have you or are you ready today to Seek with the whole heart?Have you or are you ready today to Pay the price to Enter the Kingdom of God?
posted by Mister A Muses | 3:26 PM
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