Category Archives: The Kingdom

Poetry and Prayers, The Kingdom

Truth and passion

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There’s no internet access at Nazim’s place, where I’m staying. And that means I have to dash off these quick updates at La Hacienda, a smoky Mexican restaurant in the old quarter of Sarajevo. With distractions coming and going like television commercials, it’s not exactly the sort of place you’d choose to do some creative writing.

I was thinking the other day how truth gives birth to passion. Any non-musician will quickly tire of plunking around on an untuned piano. But tune the instrument and teach him a few laws of harmony and the passion of music will thrill him for a lifetime.

It’s the same with the Kingdom. For years my heart was dull and two-dimensional. The uninspiring fragments of life left me cold and listless until the curtains of the kingdom parted and Truth began to take root in my soul. From that moment on, nothing has been the same.

Pray that I’ll be able to point these dear people to the truth of the Kingdom. I’m convinced it is the only sure thing that can resurrect God-given passion and hope in the Balkan people.

The Kingdom

Biblical monikers

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In Bible times common names like James, John, and Joshua, were often distinguished by adding the name of their father, their character, or a prominent character trait.

  • Joshua, the “Son of Nun”
  • Barnabas, the “Son of Encouragement.”  (Imagine what a great friend this guy would be!)
  • James and John, the “Sons of Thunder” (Drama, anyone?)
  • Judas, the “Son of Perdition.”  (Damnation)
  • Jesus, the Son of God.  (A definite conversation-starter in first century Jerusalem.)
Matthew 13:38 mentions one I especially like: the “Sons of the Kingdom.” I can’t ever remember anyone being referred to as a “son of the Kingdom,” but I’d wear that moniker with great honor.  Perhaps when people thought about me they’d pause and think, “Ah yes… the Kingdom!  What a glorious thought, and a beautiful King!  Glory!    
The Kingdom

The kingdom is a verb

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The kingdom of God is more like a verb than a noun.  It says “Go!” “Preach!” “Heal!” “Pray!” “Love!”  The kingdom is not about real estate, but real life.   It’s proactive, creative, dynamic, and visionary, and the only way we’ll see it is by engaging in it.  The kingdom isn’t a rest home, but a revolution – a movement of love, heroism, service, and sacrifice.  “… from the days of John the Baptist, the kingdom of heaven has been forcing its way in, and men of force take it.  (Matt. 11:12)   

One of the great noble themes of the kingdom is that our lives DO matter.  While other kingdoms lull the children of Adam into fatalism, nirvana, and welfare wards, the kingdom thrusts us into significance, action and adventure. Nike’s “Just do it” rings true to the human heart because it’s an idea that belongs to the Kingdom.  “If you know these things, you’ll be blessed if you do them.”  (John 14:17) 

The Kingdom

Fear of a kingdom lost…

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Eighteen year old Micah asked to speak with me after lunch. “OK, here’s the thing: I want the kingdom. I don’t want to miss it like most people around me. I want it. But I’m afraid I’ll miss it. I’m afraid the weeds will crowd it out, or the cares of life will smother it. What do I need to do?”

What a great question. And what hope it gives me to see young people passionately seeking the kingdom. But how do we actually do it? Since the Kingdom is at its essence the most practical and real thing in the cosmos, there must be practical and real ways of seeking it.

These suggestions have helped me:

  • Pray for the kingdom. It is, after all, the first priority of the Lord’s prayer. “May Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Faith inevitably becomes sight, and as we pray for the Kingdom we will eventually see it all around.
  • Develop an ear to hear the King’s voice. As Jesus spoke to the twelve, He is still speaking. And if our ears are tuned, we’ll hear him saying, “Look here at this pearl, at this mustard seed, this party, this movie, this football game….” Pictures of the Kingdom are everywhere, and it’s the Father’s delight to point them out to us.
  • Ask for “Kingdom Eyes.” Like fine art, good wine, and beautiful music, it’s a cultivated taste. “This people will listen and listen, but not understand; they will look and look, but not see, because their minds are dull, and they have stopped up their ears and have closed their eyes.” We need the help of the Spirit to see the Kingdom.
  • Take your expectations out of the church building. The kingdom became flesh in Jesus, and it’s been invading the streets and the neighborhoods ever since. You’ll see it in a homeless person, in the widow next door, in the fatherless child across the street. “Sanctuary religion” tends to cloud our vision of a world full of beauty, grace, and human need.
  • Obey the small promptings of the King. Nothing opens the kingdom like walking the streets of human need with the King at our side.

“Don’t be afraid, little flock, for your Father is pleased to give you the Kingdom.” – Luke 12:32

Poetry and Prayers, The Kingdom

Getting wrecked

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Been vaguely aware for some time that when it comes to the Kingdom, I’m a whole lot handier at talking about it than I am at actually living it.  I try to ignore that awkward truth, but it’s becoming more of a burr in my backside while I go on talking. And talking.

This week I’ve been reading Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne, a book that my friend Bryan says is “the most dangerous book I’ve ever read.”  Shane is a young man who’s actually putting feet to his words, living with the homeless, standing up against injustice, and caring for the poor.   He says he’s not interested “in a Christianity that offers these (poor families) only mansions and streets of Gold in heaven, when all they really want is a bed for their kids now.  And many Christians have an extra one.”   That, right there, is the kingdom.   And I really am wanting to find my place in it. But see? There I go with words again.   

“The matter is quite simple.  The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers.  We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know the minute we understand, we’re obliged to act accordingly.  Take any of the words of the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly.  My God, you will say, if I do that, my whole life will be ruined.  How would I ever get on in the world? Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship.  Christian scholarship is the church’s prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to be sure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close … It is dreadful to be alone with the New Testament.” – Soren Kierkegaard             

The Kingdom

The unshakable kingdom

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The kingdom is the only true reality. It is life as God intended it to be. The Kingdom is everything in the cosmos working as it was designed, from brain cells to business calls, from muscles to music. This is why Jesus said his yoke “is easy” and his burden “is light.” (Matt. 11:30) To live by truth is easy. Respect gravity. Expect to reap what you sow. Don’t step in front of a moving vehicle. Don’t spend what you don’t have. Treat others like you’d want to be treated. Pay your bills. But to resist reality is to ask for trouble.

Societies founded on falsehoods crumble and self-destruct. Communism, Materialism, and Postmodernism all fail because they haven’t the glue of truth to hold them together. No need for God to destroy those societies any more than for Him to have to destroy a person who’s trying to live on raw sewerage. The choice is the judgment. But the Kingdom! Ah! It is unshakable (Heb. 12:28). It is the house built upon a rock. Storms may rage against the Truth, but they cannot change it. And the Truth of the universe is the bedrock of the Kingdom.

Poetry and Prayers, The Kingdom

Disciples or converts?

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Jesus told us to go out and make disciples. Instead we’ve made converts.

Scott McKnight, in The Jesus Creed says it’s the difference between a birth certificate and a driver’s license: “If conversion is like a birth certificate, we produce babies who need to be pushed around in strollers. If it’s like a driver’s license, we produce adults who can operate on life’s pathways.” This probably explains why so many here in the Bible belt are endlessly running from church to church seeking some place “we really get fed.” People who carry driver’s licenses generally also know how to go to the fridge, drive to the supermarket, and cook up a meal.

McKnight goes on to ask, “When was Peter actually converted?” Was is:

  • When he left his boat and followed Jesus?
  • When he fell before Jesus and confessed he was a “sinful man”?
  • When he confessed “you are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”?
  • When he confessed Jesus as Lord?
  • When Jesus breathed on the disciples with the Holy Spirit?
  • When the Holy Spirit came on Pentecost?

It’s a tricky question for us because nowhere is it actually recorded that Peter said a “sinner’s prayer.” And that’s what seals it for most of us evangelicals. Undoubtedly this is something we need to wrestle with. What differentiates a disciple from a convert? And could it be that our “how do I get to heaven?” mentality lends itself to conversion over discipleship?

I believe this might well be one of the reasons we’ve lost sight of the Kingdom.

The Kingdom, The Love of God

The Jesus Creed

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I’ve been reading The Jesus Creed by Scott McKnight. Essentially the “Jesus Creed” says “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Luke 10:27)

McKnight says that when the Creed is translated into prayer, it becomes the Lord’s Prayer. When it’s translated into a story it becomes the good Samaritan, and when it’s translated into a society it becomes the table of hospitality, which includes tax collectors, prostitutes, notorious sinners, and people we normally wouldn’t invite into our homes.

Years ago God put it in my heart to invite the residents of a neighborhood “boarding house” over for a proper meal. The across-the-street residents of the home were well known cast-offs, drug users, handicapped, and loners who had no place else to go. So they lived in these cheap quarters, paying weekly rates for a roof over their head.

It turned into a rich evening of friendship which remains in my memory as one of those sweet moments of Jesus’ presence.   I had no agenda, I didn’t present the Four Spiritual Laws to them, nor even try to manipulate the conversation around to giving a gospel presentation.  Still… not long afterwards, one of the guys called me over to talk about his need for Christ. He was an addict, and he suspected he may have been HIV infected. But he knew Jesus loved him, and he wanted to make his peace.

I miss doing radical things like that. Now I stay in an upscale neighborhood, (compliments of my generous friends who’ve welcomed me into their pool house), and spend almost all my time with my church family, who are positively amazing people!  But I’m longing to re-engage with people on the outside of the church circle again.  I’m not doing a very good job of that since leaving Sarajevo.   And I miss the way I invariably meet Jesus in those settings.

The Kingdom

An alternative story

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Ivan Illich, (the social philosopher, not to be confused with Tolstoy’s tragic figure), was asked one time about the best way to change the world:

“Neither revolution nor reformation can ultimately change a society, rather you must tell a new powerful tale, one so persuasive that it sweeps away the old myths and becomes the preferred story, one so inclusive that it gathers all the bits of our past and our present into a coherent whole, one that even shines some light into the future so that we can take the next step forward. If you want to change a society, then you have to tell an alternative story.”

Of course we know that the Kingdom is that fresh, alternative story waiting to be told. Jesus’ invitation to, “repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand” was simply an offer to step into the adventure of His story.

The old, threadbare script about alienated humans trying to reach God through religion, sacrifice and ritual (blah, blah, blah), was shut down, canceled, and should have been run out of town for good by the dazzling news that God himself had taken on flesh, moved into the neighborhood, and embraced humanity right where it was. God’s new story was a comprehensive plan to redeem not only the human race, but to overhaul the whole of life and culture from gardens to garbage dumps, from prisons to palaces. Even nature itself waits for us to take our place in the action. (Romans 8:19)

I’m praying today that my soul will be saturated with the script, and that I will become a master storyteller of the Kingdom Tale.

The Kingdom

The kingdom generation

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Boredom happens when we miss the story of God, the epic battle that began in the garden. My generation medicated the boredom with drugs and traded adventure for success. Or – if we happened to be evangelicals – we scurried from meeting to meeting in a frantic search for signs and wonders, prosperity and rapturous emotions until we ourselves became addicts of another sort.

Then the King sat us all down, (those who would listen), and said, “Let me give you a story to live.” It’s a tale of a good and glorious King, and a poisonous spell that darkened the minds of his people. It’s an epic of heroes and romance, of breathless battles and nail-biting suspense. And it’s a story with my name in it. (And yours too!)

This generation – the young people I just left in Budapest, the Attention Deficit Generation – are cashing it in for a part in the story. It’s a swelling movement of grace and power, of justice and mercy. This, I believe, is the Kingdom generation. And the action is about to begin. It’s time to fasten our seat belts, study our part, and enter into history. “May Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven.”

buda-castle.JPG

Always a sucker for a castle, this one is in Budapest.