The Kingdom Of God

[0:00] Good morning, everybody. Everyone good? Cool. If you have a Bible, go ahead and turn to Mark 1. We'll be working out of that today. We're gonna start in verse 14. Those of you who are new, I just wanna say how pleased we are that you are with us.

[0:13] We're still kind of the front end of the gospel of Mark, so it's a great time you join in with us. Everybody that has to listen to this online, man, thank you. Glad you're tracking. But let's go ahead and jump into it.

[0:24] Ready? Let's do it. Verse 14. Now, after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God and saying, the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand.

[0:40] Repent and believe in the gospel. This is God's word. Now, I know that was a short bit of verses. Don't worry, the sermon's not gonna be short.

[0:52] I know you all were really concerned about that. But let me start with kind of backing up and saying like, okay, we're at a specific moment here where Jesus comes in, and actually these are his first words.

[1:04] But before then, we kind of see what's been going on. Like Mark introduces his gospel with this guy named John the Baptist out in the wilderness proclaiming forgiveness of sins through water baptism.

[1:16] This new message that, man, the people of Israel were hearing about and coming out and receiving this grace, this new grace of God and this message that they hadn't heard before. And so there's a bit of excitement because it seems like God is visiting his people again.

[1:30] It's been over 400 years since there's been a prophet in Israel. And suddenly people are like, they don't know what to make of John. They're like, man, is this it? Is this God coming and visiting us? Could John be a prophet?

[1:40] And so they're taking advantage of that. And John actually says like, hey guys, don't get too enamored with me because there's another guy coming. I'm gonna get out of the way of, he is much greater than me and he's gonna baptize you not just with water.

[1:52] He's gonna baptize you with the Holy Spirit, which is even better. And then suddenly Jesus shows up on the scene, gets baptized. And then we see last week, we saw that he went right into the wilderness. And kind of what we were considering up to this point is like, or especially last week, is that this was God doing a not so obvious redemption reset for humanity.

[2:12] Okay, we talked last week about Jesus being this new and better Adam. That came up out of the waters of baptism as this new creation. He received the spirit as it descended on him as a dove.

[2:23] And then we see this blessing of God the Father over him. He said, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. Jesus hadn't done anything at that moment. So Jesus comes out of nowhere and all this happens.

[2:34] And guess what? All those things point back to what happened to Adam. He came up from the dust of the ground, a new creation, right? And then it says like, he's this molded form, but he is inanimate.

[2:46] Like he doesn't have life yet. And God breathes his spirit into him to give him life, it says, and then God blesses him, right? And so we see this amazing connection between the old Adam and the new Adam, which is Jesus.

[2:59] And just like Adam, we had to now face temptation. Guess what? The first Adam, he did that and he failed. We know that. And henceforth, we know life as we know it, right? It's full of sin and it's broken.

[3:10] And there's a lot of pain and suffering because of that. But Jesus, he went into the desert for 40 days to face temptation too. But where Adam failed, Jesus prevailed. And so this is this amazing reset.

[3:24] There's this new Adam that has come by which we can be born again, not by flesh as in natural birth, but by the spirit and in spiritual rebirth, spiritual renewal. And it's beautiful.

[3:35] It's this beautiful new promise, but you know what? Nobody knows about it. Nobody knows about it except for Jesus, God the Father, and the Holy Spirit. There's like big, big secret that's happening.

[3:46] And so Jesus is coming and part of his messages and proclamation and demonstration is going around and saying like, is explaining some of these things.

[3:57] And now we see that that's what he does. He comes back and he comes back to Galilee. He doesn't go to the important, well-populated place, Jerusalem. He goes into the country, not a lot of people, not a lot of important people especially.

[4:10] And he's there and he comes in and he's gonna let everyone in on this secret. Now, if you had this kind of big news, like when we get big news in our lives, we love to share. Like if you become a grandma and grandpa for the first time, you're just like, who can I tell as much, right?

[4:25] You wanna share that good news and you wanna talk all about it and you wanna show everybody the pictures of your grandbaby. And you think it's the most beautiful thing you've ever seen, right? And that's what we're like.

[4:37] So Jesus has this amazing news, right? That's like, it's as lovely as your grandbabies are, like this news is even bigger than that, okay? What does Jesus say? Mark 15, 115.

[4:50] The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand. Apparently, Jesus is not a big talker, right? But you would think like, hey, Jesus, can we get a bit more detail here besides just that?

[5:04] What does all that mean? But again, we need to step back and see like, man, Jesus is speaking into a specific context, right? First century Jews who understand the scriptures, they're understanding like all of God's promises and kind of where they're at and looking forward to this coming Messiah.

[5:19] And so they're hearing something, maybe different to how we might receive and hear these very words. But Jesus is saying this to them and to us that the good news, right?

[5:30] He talks about this good news, this gospel of God is about a king and his kingdom. And so for modern Western mindsets like ours, we don't easily relate to this because we've never lived under that kind of government.

[5:43] Like that doesn't register for us very easily. But back then they got it. And what they would have rightly assumed, we need to hear clearly and understand more clearly, which is a kingdom doesn't belong to the people, it belongs to the king, okay?

[6:02] And I studied this word kingdom in preparation for the sermon. And I looked at it in some instance throughout the whole of the Bible. And except for a couple of times or a few times where the kingdom is referred to as the kingdom of Israel, almost always it's referred to in connection to the king that is currently reigning.

[6:20] So when David is king over Israel, it is called David's kingdom, right? Not the kingdom of Israel, it's David's kingdom. He's on the throne. And then when David left and Solomon came, it's called Solomon's kingdom.

[6:31] He's on the throne. He's ruling and reigning over that kingdom. And now in Psalms especially, and also in some places in the prophets, there is reference to another kingdom, which is God's kingdom, which is the word Jesus uses here.

[6:46] So it's not like a new idea, but God's kingdom, as they would have understood it, it was always like up there in the heavens where God is ruling and reigning in a way that is complete.

[6:58] His rule is unchallenged. Everybody in that kingdom submits to his rule and exalts his throne and kingship with absolute pure joy, no problems.

[7:09] Like everybody's, yeah, God, we're in this. We love that you're ruling and reigning. We're following all your rules. We're submitted to you fully. There's no sin up there, right? And so that's how they understood that. Now let's step back because, you know, Israel was meant to be God's reflection of that heavenly kingdom here on earth, but it was never meant to be its reality.

[7:32] And so when Jesus says God's kingdom is at hand, he is saying that the kingdom of heaven, and that's a term Matthew's gospel uses more than the kingdom of God, but it's the same thing, the kingdom of heaven has broken into earth in a way that has yet to happen, okay?

[7:48] We need to realize that. The kingdom of heaven has now broken into earth in a way that has yet to happen in all of history. But how does it come? Where was this kingdom Jesus was talking about?

[8:00] How could we see it? How could we tell where it is and where it's taking place, and what are the boundaries of this kingdom? But here's the thing. This new kingdom, this kingdom of heaven, and it's breaking in, it was Jesus.

[8:14] See, the king had brought his kingdom, and that's what Jesus is saying here. And there is no separating the two. You can't have the kingdom and all its blessings without the rule of the king over you, okay?

[8:26] Now we'd like for it not to be that way. We'd rather that, man, it would be nice to have all the kingdom goodies, but not have to be submitted to the king, but it just doesn't work that way.

[8:38] Up until recently, everyone understood that's how kingdoms and kings worked. That was the nature of the beast, so to speak. But now we've been programmed because we are so separated from that type of government that the prevailing societal narrative is that we actually deserve the benefits just because we are born into this, let's say, America as citizens, right?

[9:01] So because I'm an American citizen, because I am born, I get to receive the rights and the benefits of all these things just because I breathe oxygen. And so to twist JFK's statement a little bit, our mindsets today are more like, do not ask what you can do for your country, but what can your country do for you?

[9:17] And I'm afraid that sentiment colors the way we live out our faith. And Jesus is saying, uh-uh, the kingdom belongs to you, yes, but just as importantly, you belong to the kingdom.

[9:30] Let me say that again. The kingdom belongs to you, and you belong to the kingdom. What do I mean by this? Well, let's look at the first part of that statement, the kingdom belongs to you.

[9:41] The kingdom is yours. The kingdom is yours, which is all its benefits and its blessings. We receive it and are brought into it by faith through grace, more on that later.

[9:53] But what that means is that we don't deserve any of those blessings because we didn't earn them. Jesus earned them for us. So they are ours, but we receive them with gratitude and gratefulness.

[10:07] We receive the kingdom. Daniel 7, 18. Daniel is a guy back in the Old Testament days, and he was there hundreds and hundreds of years before Jesus. He actually prophesied about this coming kingdom one day.

[10:19] He says this, But the saints of the Most High shall receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever, forever and ever. And that is the great news about the kingdom, right?

[10:32] For the Christian, we understand that to mean that we are forgiven of sin, we're made righteous, we're justified before God, we're adopted as his children, we are made citizens of heaven, we've received every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms to include union with Christ, as well as the abiding presence and power of the Holy Spirit.

[10:52] Those are all things we get right now. We live in, those are our reality. Those are kingdom realities that we receive. And again, not because we're trying to earn it and we have to perform our way into those things.

[11:04] We receive them because Jesus made a way through his life, death, and resurrection for us. And because we have believed on that through faith, they come to us by grace. We get that default right from the gate, right?

[11:16] Now, that is beautiful. And that is wonderful. And we need to live in that reality confidently as citizens of the kingdom that we have received this. But as true as that is, we have to reckon with the other truth, the other side of this, is that you also belong to the kingdom.

[11:32] As much as the kingdom belongs to you, you also belong to the kingdom. So as much claim you have to the kingdom and its benefits because of the promises of God, also the kingdom and its king has claim over you.

[11:47] And that statement sounds like the opposite of liberty and freedom, right? But that's the other part of the good news. Nevertheless, that's the gospel of Jesus. That's the good news of the kingdom being near and now.

[11:59] You are not your own. You don't belong to yourself. And actually, this is stated somewhere else by the apostle Paul. In 1 Corinthians chapter six, verses 19 and 20, it says, Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?

[12:16] Therefore, because of that reality, you are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So what do we do? Glorify God in your body.

[12:29] This reality of king and kingdom and how we are not our own, that is probably one of the biggest hurdles and one of the most offensive parts of scripture for today, right?

[12:39] Because it stands against the modern gospel of radical individualism that promotes these principles that my truth is truth and my body, my choice, I get to do what I want with it.

[12:53] Which means, and what it's saying here is all my opinions, all my feelings that I feel are to be honored and affirmed and go unchallenged. And the other part is that I get to do whatever I want with my body that I live in.

[13:07] It is mine. It belongs to me and no one else. Which is worked out in everything from reproductive rights to sexual libertinism. That's what we see today. And in a world where the individual is exalted above God and where they say God is dead, it only makes sense to believe that.

[13:25] But for the Christian, this scripture is saying the exact opposite to be true. If you're in God's kingdom, your truth isn't your own and neither is your body. That is the clear fact of the gospel message.

[13:38] It is. It all belongs to God. So I don't get to believe whatever I want. I don't get to act on every urge and desire that I have. I'm responsible and accountable in this body to the king in every single way.

[13:53] And I'm accountable for what I believe. I'm accountable for what I do. And this sounds terribly restrictive and boring, but I just wanna say Jesus isn't a killjoy that is trying to keep us from having any type of fun.

[14:05] Like he just knows what is best for us. And he's the designer of our mind and our body and our soul. And he created them for truth and honor. And you know what? He is a king that has rules, but you know what those rules are for?

[14:19] It's they are there to promote honor and truth for you. And when we step outside those rules, there is damaging effects on our mind and our body and our soul.

[14:31] Louise Perry, she's a British journalist, thinker, feminist, author, and she's wrote an interesting book that is getting a ton of attention. All like the big podcasts out there are having her around to discuss this, but this is what her book is titled and the premise of her book.

[14:45] It's the case against the sexual revolution. And I wanna say this, she is not a Christian at all. But her research has shown and proven the negative effects that the sexual revolution has had and how it's been negative particularly on women.

[15:03] And the sexual revolution, what it did in the 60s, it stripped away the sacredness from sex, the sacredness of your body. Where God says sex is a powerful union of two peoples, where bodies and souls are united and intertwined and it's a place of high vulnerability and high trust, the sexual revolution to base sex into just, hey, it's this just fun pastime that people can engage in casually without any consequence for their own pleasure.

[15:29] Well, Louise Perry is showing how poorly that has worked out for the physical and emotional health of women today. And she has a lot of statistics to back up her research.

[15:42] But that is the delusion of sin. After all, in the beginning, it offers us all kinds of liberty, all kinds of freedom, all kinds of fun. It's telling us like, man, you will be fulfilled and come to your full self if you just follow it.

[15:55] But in the end, it always leads to destruction. It damages us in ways we cannot even imagine. And Jesus, he said this statement that I love, wisdom is known by their children.

[16:08] Wisdom is known by her children. What he was trying to get us to see is that, you know what? time will reveal the true value and worth of the truth and choices that we make today.

[16:21] The way that you live, the principles that you live by and adopt, time will tell and reveal whether those were good or whether those were worthless. And for me, man, I'm gonna put myself in Jesus' truth all the time because, one, it doesn't change.

[16:39] And when I look back, it has an awesome track record. The world's standards, not so much. It's always changing. It's ever changing. You can look back through history.

[16:50] Constantly, the principles and its values and what is right and what is wrong is ever fluid. It's always. You can't stand on it. It's unsure.

[17:00] And you know what? The outcomes speak for themselves. Jesus, as king, has good rules for his kingdom and for the people in his kingdom because he loves them and he knows what brings honor and flourishing to their lives.

[17:16] And to come into his kingdom, we have to accept the fact that, you know what? Jesus, our king, he's always right even when it means we're wrong which takes humility and it also takes a massive change in our mind and hearts which is why Jesus' declaration about the good news of his kingdom and the coming of his kingdom ends with this in verse 15.

[17:37] Repent repent and believe in the gospel. And let's look at each of those in turn. How do we enter the kingdom? How do we receive the kingdom? We do it by repentance.

[17:50] And that word repentance in the Greek means to think differently but it means to think differently after having been with someone. And so this change of mind, it just doesn't come because we decide like, you know what?

[18:02] I'm a little bit smarter today. I think I know what's going on. Literally repentance is like, you have been dead set on this being the right way and you've been walking in it your whole life and nobody could tell you otherwise and then suddenly, boom, you encounter Jesus and then you are woken up to the fact that like everything that I thought was right was wrong and now you're pivoting and you're saying like, oh my goodness, this actually is the right way and you're walking in that direction.

[18:30] That is repentance and that's what this tells us. Repentance is a response to revelation. It always is and it always will be and where does that revelation come from?

[18:41] Not inside yourself, friends. It comes from him. The king's got to interrupt your life and make that known, okay? But repentance is a response to revelation. Let me explain how this works out even in history.

[18:53] Up until the time of Galileo in 1610, everyone thought the sun revolved around the earth including the church. In fact, because Galileo started saying, actually, you know what guys? The earth might be revolving around the sun.

[19:05] The church said like, no, the Bible doesn't say that which was a bad interpretation of the Bible and they jailed him for it, right? Bad move. We fixed it. Don't worry about it. We got it right after a while but anyways, so Galileo is seeing something that no one else is seeing.

[19:20] He's stepping, he's like having this revelation. Is it because it came to him in a dream? No, he had a telescope. He saw what nobody else could see. He was looking at the phases of Venus.

[19:32] He was looking at moons orbiting around Jupiter and he was saying, wait, some of this stuff I'm seeing further into the galaxy no one else has saw before, right? I'm seeing revelations here and this is showing me something different to what I thought was right.

[19:48] And now, we're like that morally. We don't see fully or clearly. We don't have a telescope for our hearts. God does. And so, he has to come to reveal that to us.

[19:59] And in light of Jesus' truth, when we understand that and he wakes us up to the fact, it's like we have that Galileo moment. Oh my goodness. The sun doesn't revolve around the earth.

[20:11] It's the opposite way, right? We have that same moment. Oh my goodness. Like, Jesus is the king. I have been wrong. I need to change the way I've been. That's the essential part of repenting, right?

[20:22] And a part of that is confessing that those things are true. It's confessing what is true. And when we've received that revelation, it changes our minds. Like, Galileo couldn't go back to what he believed before.

[20:35] When you experience the truth, you don't say like, well, that's not convenient, so I'm just gonna live in denial. No, you gotta accept this as true, right? You're just like, oh my gosh, I have no choice here. And that's what happens to us.

[20:45] Our minds get radically changed. And God, part of what God does is call us to confess that. It's actually why God pulls out a confession from Adam after he had sinned.

[20:58] Right? Adam sinned. What does he do? He goes and hides in the bushes. God comes and he says, Adam, where are you? Now, it's not because God had lost Adam, didn't know where he was at.

[21:10] God was up to something here. He knew it was going on, but that's the step one in repentance. God calls us out of hiding and part of that is just hiding from the truth because Romans 1 says we suppress the truth.

[21:24] Right? Our hearts are hardened. Our minds are warped. We suppress the truth that God is creator and God is good and he has ways and we say, no, thank you. We want our own. God calls us out of hiding.

[21:35] He called Adam out of hiding and he says to Adam, or Adam says back to him, I heard the sound of you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself and so, you know, Adam is kind of confessing a little bit of the truth but he's not being fully honest yet and God knows that and God, you know, he hears God, he's afraid for the first time because he's naked and hides.

[21:58] He doesn't say why that is so. He doesn't fully understand why that was his natural reaction but it's because he's now stained with sin and he has no way to cover that up and they tried to by making fig leaf suits, right?

[22:14] And they're saying like, man, God can't see me like this. This isn't good. Got to cover it up. And so, we hide from ourselves. We cover our sins. We bury our head in the sand. We do all kinds of things rather than face our sin and God's not okay with that and God knows this and he says, hey, who told you you were naked?

[22:30] God's getting to the heart of the matter. Have you eaten of the tree I commanded you not to eat? And where Adam is unwilling to go and what he is unwilling to face, God is not and he does that with us.

[22:43] God goes right to our hearts. He goes right to the heart of the matter which is step two in repentance. God reveals the full truth of our sin and we desperately need this, right?

[22:58] We desperately need this because we are like Adam. Man, we are blind to our sin. We tend to minimize sin. We tend to cover it up. We do all kinds of stuff. We explain it away like classic victim mentality.

[23:11] What did Adam say when God confronted him? He said, it was the woman you gave me. Right? Let me pass the buck. I'm not gonna take ownership but God doesn't let him get away with that.

[23:22] He hears that pathetic excuse and he's not letting Eve off the hook because he does deal with Eve. She sinned too and Satan sinned as well and he led them to temptation and God deals with him as well but he gets to Adam and he says, hey, you listened to the voice of your wife.

[23:38] He's saying, you didn't have to do that, buddy. I know what you just said but you had a choice here. You have eaten of the tree which I commanded you. You shall not eat of it. God brings Adam right back to the thing like, hey, you're trying to let yourself off the hook.

[23:51] I'm not letting you off the hook. There's stuff in here, buddy, that I need to deal with in your heart and that needs to get fixed and you know, another kind of interesting point in this is that God doesn't like just go after Adam and Eve.

[24:04] He gets at the serpent as well. He says, man, he had a part to play in this as well, right? Which is actually, I find that very comforting because, you know, everybody involved here has to take ownership of the sin.

[24:17] Satan's involved, he's involved, Adam's involved. There is no innocent party in all of this which is good for us to know. So in one sense, God understands that Satan, he is like bent on tempting us to sin and sometimes he succeeds but God goes on to say that you don't get the excuse of the devil made me do it.

[24:37] You don't get to do that but there is some sympathy and I think some kindness in this that God doesn't, like he acknowledges that was a real thing that they were being tempted and what that means is that there, man, for people around us that like are maybe burdened because of sin or fall into sin or whatever it may be, it gives us compassion and empathy and understanding like how, man, Satan can get it right with them and also how they could be the victim of being sinned against that, but we have to realize that like sometimes because of that, just because you're sinned against you don't get a hall pass to respond sinfully, right?

[25:15] But we get to see that man, there can be compassion and empathy towards that and those past hurts or betrayals or abuses that lead us into pathologies that really dishonor the king and his rules for us and I would say this, trauma from abuse is a very real thing.

[25:32] It is not like, you know, cover over your past and don't deal with it and suck it up, buttercup. That is not, that is not God's road of redemption. Like he offers us a full salvation, a full healing and there's some like deep wounds in our hearts that exist from like the past that we haven't reckoned with.

[25:51] I think a lot of us in this room that we need to reckon with because what comes out of those things are sinful responses now and here's the thing, if you and I, let's say, let's say that, okay, your father when you were a child would say hurtful, mean things to you like you are a waste of space, how could you be so stupid, what is wrong with you, a myriad of things, okay?

[26:19] As a child, you do not know how to cope with that well, okay? And so, as you get older, it's like, okay, my mom and dad, you know, you can look back on those things and say, you know what, my mom and dad, they just did the best they could with what they have.

[26:32] What you're doing is you're minimizing that sin against you because that sin was really bad and evil if that was said over you. That is a curse and not a blessing. That is not from God, that is from Satan and if you minimize those things, what you're doing is you're taking ownership that you should not be taking ownership of because of those moments and then you're gonna look back on that and say, man, why was I so hurt by that?

[26:57] Why am I so agitated by that as I'm thinking about it right now? Oh, it just must be my problem. You're taking ownership of stuff that you're not supposed to be taking ownership of because you are not being honest and truthful with those past hurts but when we step into those past hurts and face them truthfully for what they are, we get to let God's grace come in to that place where we are hurting and then healing can begin to happen, right?

[27:23] And we can be restored and then we get to be set free from those things because those things have power over us if we do not do that. They have power over our lives in this day and the way we act and believe and behave and we need to realize that that is a very true thing.

[27:38] Here's the other danger if we don't do that. When you look at those things and minimize like, oh, you know, it's okay. My dad was just trying to make me stronger. He meant well. He meant, you know what you're gonna do?

[27:49] You're gonna repeat that same sin because you've minimized that sin. You said, oh, well, that wasn't that bad. You're gonna be doomed to repeat that. And I'm saying this as a pastor who's counseled a lot, a lot of people and I see this work out all the time.

[28:03] I've seen it in my own life. Okay? And we have to realize that that is part of what is going on and part of the repentance package is going in and confessing and facing things and saying things truthfully, whether it's things in our past that we have done, committed sin, or things that have been done to us because all those things make up who we are today and all those things work out and we need to let the fullness of God's love and grace flood into our hearts in those places, every single one of them as we face them truthfully and then true healing can come, then true redemption can come and we can get set free from the power of those things over our lives.

[28:43] That is what God offers us in this beautiful repentance. And that's step three in that repentance is when we do that, we receive God's grace to forgive our sins and to heal us from sin's effects.

[28:59] I wanna say this, forgiveness from God as you step into that, if you're saying, man, Lord, I committed this sin, I'm sorry, forgiveness from him is immediate.

[29:11] You don't have to work out. It's not like, well, I'm gonna forgive you this much and then you gotta work off the rest of that. Now, Jesus paid it all. You paid for all that sin on the cross.

[29:22] You step into that, the blood of Jesus covers that sin, it is immediate. Now, there's another part of this is if you've been sinned against, right, that forgiveness can be immediate for people around you but the healing from that, it may take time and that is okay.

[29:43] And there's, we have to realize there's a difference between the forgiveness of sin and maybe the healing of that, right? And so, we, here's an example, okay, a spouse cheats on their spouse and so now they've come and they've confessed that, they've repented, okay, that spouse may have been living with that guilt for some time and now they're like down the road of redemption and forgiveness, they're way here, their spouse just found out way back here, well, they're playing catch up.

[30:10] That's spouse that has sinned against and so we can't come and say like, you just need to repent, lady or man and move on and forget because God says that, we can say like, yeah, forgiveness is a real thing, grace is a real thing but we have to honor that there may be a time of healing that needs to go on for them and be gracious with that and honor that and say, yeah, that is a good, righteous, just thing that must happen and God will bring them along gently and those things are good and they happen that way and we've seen that and we've seen marriages restored because of that but you don't want to short circuit, you don't want to short circuit those things.

[30:42] You have to allow God's way of bringing healing and the fullness of forgiveness and redemption, you have to allow that room to work, okay? All right, so all of these things, actually what they mean is forgiveness, healing, all this stuff, what it takes, man, it takes trust in God because Adam didn't trust God, that's why he hid from him but it takes trust in God, it just, you know, it takes understanding like repentance, getting that truth but all this means we have to believe and that's the next part of what Jesus says, we enter the kingdom by belief, through belief and so we have to unpack this a little bit more because belief isn't just like, oh, I know God's real, I know who he is, I can answer facts about him, I can get like an 80% on a test of his attributes and characteristics and some of the Bible, you know, the Bible stories about him, it is more than the knowledge of who he is, like that word belief, right, and that word belief that Jesus used in that time that had a lot more to do with trust than just mental assent or acknowledgement of something, it had to do with trust and that helps us understand something that man, it's not just knowing about God, we have to believe that he is who he says he is and what he says is true and it's more true than everything else, right, and he's the one and solely than the one that we can trust, right, and we get this,

[32:12] I mean, we've been through COVID and there was a lot of opinions floating around and we were trying to figure out what experts should we trust and we all kind of landed on who our experts would be and the research we would believe in but man, what made them more right than everyone else's experts because we didn't really come to a consensus when we look back at that as a nation, what made your experts more right than somebody else's experts and I just want to say I really don't want to know, please don't send me emails about why your experts are more right than everyone else's, what I'm doing is I'm making a point is that ultimately in that moment we had to decide what were the research and experts that we were really willing to put our trust in and who we were willing then to follow, right, because it affected our behavior, it affected our response in that moment and the point is that trust is essential to belief because you won't follow God and you won't live according to his kingdom or step into the fullness of the grace that accompanies repentance if you do not trust him, you just won't do that and here's the thing, there is no real relationship without trust, there isn't but that is the nature of the king and his kingdom and that is the nature of the good news of the gospel, it starts with, man, it starts with revelation to see that, to see what we couldn't do on our own, what Jesus had to do for us, it starts with seeing that God is right and we are wrong, it's trusting in him and submitting to him and surrendering to him but man, as we step into those things in greater and greater measure, you know what happens?

[33:54] we receive more of the kingdom in beautiful measure and that's what Jesus is holding, that's his message, that is what he is holding out to you and me. Friends, there is no kingdom without the king.

[34:08] My question for us in the room today is will you submit to him today? Can I have the band come up as we respond? I wanna say for those of us in the room or hearing this online, if you are not yet a Christian, I am so glad that you stuck with me, that you listened to this and I hope you heard the good news of this king and his kingdom and my prayer for you right now is God is revealing truth, his truth to you, the truth that changes minds and hearts and I wanna say this, if that is you, the response for that is confessing Jesus as your Lord and Savior, that is it, you don't have to earn it, you have to come in and say, man, you know what?

[34:51] This God, I trust you, Jesus, I believe in you, I believe in all your promises, I believe that you have died for my sin, you have covered my sin, you can heal me from my sin and forgive my sin and it's really stepping in and believing that and making him Lord of your life.

[35:07] There's gonna be a prayer we're gonna have up on the screen in a moment if that is you, you can pray that prayer and I encourage you today, man, God always holds out, he says today is the day of salvation, don't put it off.

[35:18] If you're here and you're already a Christian, I trust that through this sermon God has been showing things for how you can respond. To be honest, between services, God and during our worship time in this 11 a.m., God was working on my heart, he was showing me some ways that I need to go repent to one of my sons because of some stuff, I just wasn't at my best as a dad.

[35:40] I said some hurtful things towards him with my voice, I said it in anger and I said it to punish him in a punitive way. I'm like, oof, I can't, I don't want him to live thinking I'm minimizing that.

[35:53] Maybe he's minimizing it so I'm gonna go and I'm gonna be honest with him. I'm gonna say, man, what I did in that moment was terrible. I was not a good father in that moment to you and I'm gonna have to ask his forgiveness and I have to say, I have to turn the lights on for that sin and be honest so that healing for him can come and for me can come.

[36:20] That's a reality. I wanna say, man, how is God leading you to respond today? What are some things that you need to do? for this