Thy Kingdom Come!

The fight for power, building an empire or kingdom, a political party, establishing a city on one’s name are top priorities of today. The global unrest due to war, infiltrating spaces, are killing people in numbers. Even worse scenarios are fights for cities for gods adding people’s misery and creating disharmony in a country. It’s either motivated through power or convinced in the name of gods and religion.

Political leaders encourage exclusivity in the name of religion and use it as a weapon to sway the votes of people who end up worshiping them as gods. However, these leaders fail to understand that whatever kingdom they are relentlessly building is temporary and they will cease to be part of it at some point in their life. Only the kingdom is left standing. Sadly, people live for the present and are influenced by irrational beliefs.

I keep repeating in my blogs that Jesus in entire human history emphasized right from the beginning on a kingdom that is not part of the earth. He started his discourse by inviting people to repent from all wrongdoings and sins stating that the kingdom of God is near. Receiving forgiveness of sins through believing in Jesus makes one worthy and qualifies the person to live eternally with Him. The Bible states, “He who has the Son (Jesus) has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.". You have life in Him.

While Jesus was standing before Pilate for trial, He had to clarify what Pilate asked, “Your own nation and the chief priest handed you over to me. What have you done?” To this Jesus responded, “My kingdom is not of this world,” “If my kingdoms were of this world, my servants would fight, so that I wouldn’t be handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” So true, He never wanted His followers; the disciples to fight and protect religion at all costs. It is all about relationship with the Savior. We are looking for the kingdom to come. Jesus promised He is going to prepare a mansion for us not with depraved moral standing as some claim that they would get women and wine, but to live with Him with all purity.

What are we trying to establish here on this earth is ultimately not prepared to have us being part of its kingdom permanently. There is nothing permanent in this life on this earth. Why aren’t we trying to find out the true saviour who has conquered over death and has the power to keep us alive after our death? You have a hope! You are not destined for eternal perdition, however your decision of knowing the truth will determine whether you will spend eternity in heaven or hell. Are we prepared to know the Savior?

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Life – An Empty Pursuit or Meaningful Fulfilment

Purposeful life is to restore things to its original intention. Many goals end up empty after many years of pursuit.  People pursue business, success, wealth, good relationships, sex, entertainment, and good works assuming they will find meaning. However, those who have pursued these have testified the deep void and emptiness they feel once having achieved them. They feel cheated of fulfilment.

Solomon in his book Ecclesiastes found in the Bible states, "He (God) has set eternity in the hearts of men...". Deep down we are aware there is no 'here-and-now'. The Bible narrates that God made man a social creature, gave him work, the power to rule the earth and have constant fellowship with the creator. God intended for each of these to add fulfilment in life. Instead, all of these were adversely affected by man's fall into sin, especially man's fellowship with God. The result was curse upon the earth as narrated in the first book of the Bible, Genesis. The Bible does not say that every difficulty is the result of sin, but it does teach that the result of sin is difficulty.

Jesus while narrating an incident cautions the people this way, “No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as well.”. We cannot treat our bodies indifferently and expect to have good health. We cannot treat people indifferently and expect to maintain their friendship. We cannot all put selfish interests ahead of the common good and have a well-functioning society. If we violate the design and purpose of things created by God - if we sin against our bodies, our relationships, or society - they blow back on our face in the form of consequences. If we violate the laws of God, we are violating our design, since God built us to know, serve, and love Him.

Real meaning in life, both now and in eternity is found in our restoration of relationship with God that we lost when Adam and Eve fell into sin. That relationship is only possible through His son Jesus Christ. The Bible states this strongly, "Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”. To receive Him as Savior we require faith, as the Bible states, " But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name." He is the only one who claimed “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me."

Real meaning in life is not found only in accepting Jesus as Savior, as wonderful as that is. Rather, real meaning in life is when one begins to follow Christ as His disciple, learning of Him in prayer, in walking with Him and living in obedience to His commands.

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Chasing hastiness dwelling on superficialities!

  

Hastiness and superficiality are both related with human Character. Hastiness is the result of the high expectation and work pressure that has spilled on to the daily life of humans. Man is constantly on the run trying to achieve goals whose posts are ever moving further. Hastiness is pal to busyness. And it is usually connoted that busyness is the state of a disordered heart. Are you able to see the connection? All these are so much connected to each other and identifies with the state of human heart. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn pointed this out way back stating, “Hastiness and superficiality are the psychic diseases of the twentieth century.”. You can imagine how true it is and how much it has intensified in the 21^st century.

We have merely stopped waiting anymore. We are used to getting things so quick that hastiness has become our lifestyle. Dietrich Bonhoeffer states a truth, “Waiting is an art that our impatient age has forgotten.”. What is your heart longing for and what are the pressures that keeps you in constant hastiness? We are forced to be hasty connecting so many odd dots for our existence.

The next psychic disease is the superficiality of the age. People are not who they present themselves to the wider world. We are constantly pretending to be someone who we are not, to create a reputable impression. We lie to ourselves and to others, brazenly. In the end we are always wearing a mask based on what we want and are hiding behind it. People have learned to cheat and be cheated to co-exist. The survival of the fittest theory uses any means irrespective of good and bad, to make its living. If this reflects your current status in life, then you need your heart to be formatted. 

The hardware problem is physiological that needs a medical diagnosis. But the software problem is a spiritual problem that needs a God who is bigger than your heart and who can cleanse your heart and make it new. Jesus is in the business of transforming hearts because He indwells human heart. Hastiness and superficiality are going to cost you more than you can expect. You will be in a constant restlessness state that will make your life miserable. We pay a huge price if our lives are hasty and superficial. The Bible talks about the Saviour, “if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” You can make a choice today.

  

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Higher up!

 

If we have a keen desire to make our laws more stringent to reduce atrocities and crime rate, we are on the right track. Unfortunately, we humans are smart enough to use the loopholes in the law to our advantage and escape the consequences of our actions. Moral laws are becoming more subjective which finds their own way to operate. We on one hand want a stricter framework for a better life and on the other we hide behind religious philosophies and commit extremely vile acts without accountability.

To explain the case in point, we see terrorists proudly chanting slogans of religious texts and their god, after brutal murders of innocent people including babies. It is an audacious act in the part of man to believe that he has the authority to eliminate god's masterpiece the creation of humans, and by doing so he assumes he is doing god a favour. Most of such tyrannists and bigots assume they are protecting their gods from being forgotten. Religious sects forcefully impose their personal view of god to create a majority. In the process man has become foolish, insane and brutal. Religious scripture has impacted us with the ideology of love and hatred. They openly promote killing, atrocities over women and children, violation towards the dignity of women, influencing division on the basis of caste and races. We are shameless enough to practice these in reality, in the pretext of religious ideology.   

John Joclebs Bassey stated this, “A majority of people follow the herd because they find it difficult to veer into the lane that would require their mind to get to work.”. The unfortunate truth is people reject the truth without knowing it in the first place. Jesus is the only one in history whose teaching contradicted every other teaching of the world.  Some later used His teaching partly, to find recognition and to be known as the kind person who has concern for the people.  Let me quote few responses when people wanted answer a tough question. One of His disciples asked, "Lord how many times must I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? As many as seven times? But Jesus answered not seven time but seventy times seven.”. This shows there is no end to stop forgiving someone who has hurt you. A Pharisee who is the expert of law tested Jesus by asking, "Is it lawful to divorce his wife on any grounds? And Jesus replied, Haven’t you read, that he who created^] them in the beginning made them male and female, and he also said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no one separate.”. 

Once we know the true God who is all loving and merciful, we move to a higher ground of knowledge. He does not instruct to kill to expand His name and boundary. If we have to do the unthinkable inhumane acts to protect the rights of our god then we will have to question the fundamental need for the existence of such a god. Its worth making an effort to know Jesus Christ to find salvation and live with a transformed ideology of love.

 

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