Thirst
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. Where can I go and meet with God? (Ps. 42:2)Sunday, January 27, 2002
More from The Divine Conspiracy-- Life-changing stuff, beware! hahaha....
"In the course of human events there are always plenty of things that are on the horizon of possibility but do not come about or that come about later. And there certainly is a dimension of still future realization of God's rule. But the term eggiken-- usually translated as 'is at hand' or 'has drawn nigh' in such passages as Matt. 3:2;4:17;10:7;Mark 1:15; and Luke 10:9,11-- is a verb form indicating a past and completed action. It is best translated simply 'has come.'
The reality of God's rule, and of all the instrumentalities it involves, is present in action and available with and through the person of Jesus. That is Jesus' gospel... New Testament passages make plain that this kingdom is not something to be 'accepted' now and enjoyed later, but something to be entered now (Matt 5:20; 18:3; John 3:3,5). It is something that already has flesh-and-blood citizens (John 18:36; Phil. 3:20) who have been transformed into it (Col. 1:13) and are fellow workers in it (Col. 4:11).
...As a child I lived in an area of southern Missouri where electricity was available only in the form of lightning. We had more of that than we could use. But in my senior year of high school the REA (Rural Electrification Administration) extended its lines into the area where we lived, and electrical power became available to households and farms.
When those lines came by our farm, a very different way of living presented itself. Our relationships to fundamental aspects of life-- daylight and dark, hot and cold, clean and dirty, work and leisure, preparing food and preserving it-- could then be vastly changed for the better. But we still had to believe in the electricity and its arrangements, understand them, and take the practical steps involved in relying on it.
You may think the comparison rather crude, and in some respects it is. But it will help us to understand Jesus' basic message about the kingdom of the heavens if we pause to reflect on those farmers who, in effect, heard the message: 'Repent, for electricity is at hand.' Repent, or turn from their kerosene lamps and lanterns, their iceboxes and cellars, their scrubboards and rug beaters, their woman-powered sewing machines and their radios with dry-cell batteries.
The power that could make their lives far better was right there near them where, by making relatively simple arrangements, they could utilize it. Strangely, a few did not accept it. They did not 'enter the kingdom of electricity.' Some just didn't want to change. Others could not afford it, or so they thought.
Another image may help us understand this 'available' aspect of the kingdom, which is so easily overlooked. Think of visiting in a home where you have not been before. It is a fairly large house, and you sit for a while with your host in a living room or on the veranda. Dinner is announced, and he ushers you down a hall, saying at a certain point, 'Turn, for the dining room is at hand,' or more likely, 'Here's the dining room.' Similarly Jesus directs us to his kingdom.
In these images something absolutely crucial to Jesus' message is emphasized. There is no suggestion that electricity or the dining room hasn't happened yet but is about to happen or about to be there-- possibly if someone welcomes it or lets it come. Rather, they have now become available. And, similarly, the kingdom of God is also right beside us. It is indeed The Kingdom Among Us. You can reach it from your heart with your mouth-- through even a shaky and stumbling confidence and confession that Jesus is the death-conquering Master of all (Rom. 10:9).
To be sure, that kingdom has been here as long as we humans have been here, and longer. But it has been available to us through simple confidence in Jesus, the Anointed, only from the time he became a public figure. It is a kingdom that, in the person of Jesus, welcomes us just as we are, just where we are, and makes it possible for us to translate our 'ordinary' life into an eternal one. It is so available that everyone who from the center of his or her being calls upon Jesus as Master of the Universe and Prince of Life will be heard and will be delivered into the eternal kind of life."
"In the course of human events there are always plenty of things that are on the horizon of possibility but do not come about or that come about later. And there certainly is a dimension of still future realization of God's rule. But the term eggiken-- usually translated as 'is at hand' or 'has drawn nigh' in such passages as Matt. 3:2;4:17;10:7;Mark 1:15; and Luke 10:9,11-- is a verb form indicating a past and completed action. It is best translated simply 'has come.'
The reality of God's rule, and of all the instrumentalities it involves, is present in action and available with and through the person of Jesus. That is Jesus' gospel... New Testament passages make plain that this kingdom is not something to be 'accepted' now and enjoyed later, but something to be entered now (Matt 5:20; 18:3; John 3:3,5). It is something that already has flesh-and-blood citizens (John 18:36; Phil. 3:20) who have been transformed into it (Col. 1:13) and are fellow workers in it (Col. 4:11).
...As a child I lived in an area of southern Missouri where electricity was available only in the form of lightning. We had more of that than we could use. But in my senior year of high school the REA (Rural Electrification Administration) extended its lines into the area where we lived, and electrical power became available to households and farms.
When those lines came by our farm, a very different way of living presented itself. Our relationships to fundamental aspects of life-- daylight and dark, hot and cold, clean and dirty, work and leisure, preparing food and preserving it-- could then be vastly changed for the better. But we still had to believe in the electricity and its arrangements, understand them, and take the practical steps involved in relying on it.
You may think the comparison rather crude, and in some respects it is. But it will help us to understand Jesus' basic message about the kingdom of the heavens if we pause to reflect on those farmers who, in effect, heard the message: 'Repent, for electricity is at hand.' Repent, or turn from their kerosene lamps and lanterns, their iceboxes and cellars, their scrubboards and rug beaters, their woman-powered sewing machines and their radios with dry-cell batteries.
The power that could make their lives far better was right there near them where, by making relatively simple arrangements, they could utilize it. Strangely, a few did not accept it. They did not 'enter the kingdom of electricity.' Some just didn't want to change. Others could not afford it, or so they thought.
Another image may help us understand this 'available' aspect of the kingdom, which is so easily overlooked. Think of visiting in a home where you have not been before. It is a fairly large house, and you sit for a while with your host in a living room or on the veranda. Dinner is announced, and he ushers you down a hall, saying at a certain point, 'Turn, for the dining room is at hand,' or more likely, 'Here's the dining room.' Similarly Jesus directs us to his kingdom.
In these images something absolutely crucial to Jesus' message is emphasized. There is no suggestion that electricity or the dining room hasn't happened yet but is about to happen or about to be there-- possibly if someone welcomes it or lets it come. Rather, they have now become available. And, similarly, the kingdom of God is also right beside us. It is indeed The Kingdom Among Us. You can reach it from your heart with your mouth-- through even a shaky and stumbling confidence and confession that Jesus is the death-conquering Master of all (Rom. 10:9).
To be sure, that kingdom has been here as long as we humans have been here, and longer. But it has been available to us through simple confidence in Jesus, the Anointed, only from the time he became a public figure. It is a kingdom that, in the person of Jesus, welcomes us just as we are, just where we are, and makes it possible for us to translate our 'ordinary' life into an eternal one. It is so available that everyone who from the center of his or her being calls upon Jesus as Master of the Universe and Prince of Life will be heard and will be delivered into the eternal kind of life."
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