Tag: entering the kingdom
Entering the kingdom through hardship!
Scripture reading for June 22nd: Acts 14:8-28
Today’s prosperity gospel promises health, wealth and good times to those who will believe. Those who preach this false gospel take the promises of God out of context or pick the ones that sound good and ignore the rest for their own gain and to draw a crowd. They know how to use the Scriptures to their own advantage and tickle people’s ears! The record of the ministry of Jesus and the church in Acts tells the true Gospel!
Jesus preached a message of the Kingdom of God that commanded people to repent! He told his disciples that they would be blessed when they suffered hatred, insults and rejection because of Him. They would be blessed if they were poor, hungry and weeping for His sake. In fact if all men were speaking well of you, you probably were a false prophet! (Luke 6:20-26)
At Lystra, Paul was used by God to heal a crippled man who was lame from birth. Paul and Barnabas had a time with the crowd that gathered and tried to worship them. They preached to them until some Jews from Antioch and Iconium came and dragged Paul out of the city and stoned him. The disciples prayed over him and God raised him up and he went back into the city. (Acts 14:8-20)
“Then they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith. “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God,” they said. Paul and Barnabas appointed elders for them in each church and, with prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord, in whom they put their trust.” (Acts 14:21b-23) These disciples were fearless, realizing that God would take care of them. They gave their lives to help God’s church and do what Jesus had commanded them. They did not experience or preach a ‘prosperity’ gospel, but lived in the power and joy of the Holy Spirit accepting hardship and persecution as part of the package.
As you read these accounts of the early church and the preaching of these first apostles and missionaries, do you think the church today is preaching the same Gospel? Are you living by the Gospel that Jesus and Paul preached? Today is a good day to repent and be filled with the Holy Spirit!
God pays well!
Scripture reading for April 17th: Luke 18:18-43
It takes faith to give away your resources to help the poor and needy. Jesus was asked by a certain ruler what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus told him that keeping the commandments was a good place to start. (Luke 18:19-20) This man felt that he had been keeping them since he was a boy. “When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow Me.” When he heard this, he became very sad because he was a man of great wealth. Jesus looked at him and said, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God.” (Luke 18:22-24)
This rich ruler knew that Jesus was a great teacher and he must have respected Him enough to ask about his eternal soul. Possibly he had been listening to some of Jesus’ prior teaching about the rich man and Lazarus and was pondering his chances of ending up in heaven or hell. (Luke 16:19-31) At any rate, Jesus answered his question by pointing him to the ten commandments. This man felt that he had kept them all since boyhood! Jesus, knowing the true state of his soul, pointed out one more thing that he lacked. This one thing, selling all his many goods and giving them to the poor proved to be too much.
This man had placed money ahead of following Jesus. He had an idol in his life that he was unaware of until Jesus showed him what he lacked. He foolishly held onto that which he could not keep and lost the precious gift of eternal life! Truth is not easy to receive when we have to let go of something dear to us. We will be tested for our willing obedience and faith when we seek eternal life and a relationship with the Lord.
The disciples who followed Jesus were promised great returns for leaving their businesses and wealth behind. “I tell you the truth,” Jesus said to them, “no one has left home or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God will fail to receive many times as much in this age and in the age to come eternal life.” (Luke 18:29-30) God pays well!