Untitled

God is Love. He is not vindictive, but He does have guidelines to work within that have been designed for our best because of His Love for us. For Him not to follow these guidelines would be hypocrisy.

God must judge and punish in accordance with these guidelines. His Mercy is shown by His delaying this punishment as long as He can and tries to help us to see the error of our ways so we will repent and avoid His judgment.

His Mercy was also in Jesus removing all our eternal punishment through the cross, for all those that accept this Mercy as well as removing through the sacrifice of Jesus all that stopped us relating to God in a personal, intimate way.

Rewards in heaven are also according to His rule. These rewards rely on how we have kept His Rule of Love.

Those knowingly refusing God’s guidelines end up in hell. They are the rules! God has shown Love and Mercy to them and they have rejected it! God is not vindictive in sending them to hell, He is just following His rules as He expects everyone else too! Those going to hell have chosen the reward of their master, Satan through rejecting Jesus as Lord and Master so Jesus is giving them what they have chosen.

Gal. 6:7-10 Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith.

They have followed the king of darkness and belonged to his kingdom so share in his reward and have rejected King Jesus, so do not belong to His kingdom so they do not have eternal life,

Jesus went around preaching The Gospel of The Kingdom and doing good works (Mat 4:23,24) so these two things are central to any ministry that states they follow Jesus. If they are not preaching, teaching and demonstrating the values of The Kingdom of God they are not doing the ministry of Jesus.

Central to Salvation is the Lordship of Jesus in the life of His follower and the resultant state of being a citizen of The Kingdom of God. Any follower of Jesus not representing and expressing The Kingdom of God and its values are not really following Jesus and may not be saved.

Central to deliverance from the kingdom of darkness is the Lordship of Jesus and the placing all things you are steward of (including yourself) under His authority and control for Him to protect. There is no complete deliverance from the kingdom of darkness if Jesus is not Lord of every area of your life.

The word ‘gospel literally means "good news" so the Gospel of the Kingdom is the good news of The Kingdom. It is our acceptance by God as citizens of His Kingdom because of our faith in who Jesus is and what He has done and includes all the benefits that result from this relationship.

Salvation from the kingdom of darkness,

Healing and deliverance from the effects the kingdom of darkness had on us,

A personal relationship with The Holy Spirit as well as His personal guidance,

A personal relationship with Jesus and The Father as a citizen of His Kingdom.

And eternal life resulting from the relationship with Jesus and The Father (John 17:3).

If we preach only the Gospel of Salvation then we do not preach all of the above. We preach about salvation only and not all that Jesus preached. It is preaching teaching and demonstrating The Kingdom of God as Jesus did which marks people as belonging to The Kingdom of God and which attracted people to the Christian faith of the early church.

It is demonstrating the power and authority of The kingdom of God over the works of Satan (sickness, demonic oppression, spiritual death etc.) that draws people to Jesus and his kingdom and demonstrates how superior it is to Satan’s kingdom.

Healing (the body), is replaced by Medicine,

Deliverance (the soul), is replaced by counselling and psychiatry/ psychology,

The relationship of salvation through Jesus as your Lord (the spirit), is replaced by inviting Jesus into your heart without the need to make Him Lord,

The Kingdom, is replaced by the denomination/church/parachurch organisation,

The leading of The Spirit, is replaced by the guidance of denominational rules, reason (sight), theology, church policy and worldly ways of doing things.

Teaching about what the Bible says is replaced by discussing what words say so that the overall principle to apply is often lost and the meaning of words becomes more important than their application.

Satan realizes that The Gospel of The Kingdom of God restores the whole person as it deals with the person as a whole being. New Age people are taught the importance of the holistic approach to life by their demon guides. You must deal with the total person: body, soul and mind - the physical, spiritual and mental, not just the spiritual side of a person. These different parts of a person are so interrelated that all parts suffers if one part suffers.

The ultimate deception of Satan was and is to get people to concentrate on the Gospel of Salvation so that only the spiritual consequences of sin are dealt with. He hid the Gospel of The Kingdom, which deals with the total freedom of the person from the ravages of sin and the effects of the kingdom of Satan on people.

The Gospel of The Kingdom and its holistic approach mean we need to look after our mind and body as well as our spirit and look to Jesus for total healing and no one else.

At the very beginning of His public ministry, Jesus read the following from the book of Isaiah (Ch 61:1-2) in Luke 4:17-19:

And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Esaias. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written,

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable year of the Lord."

He then went out and taught The Kingdom of God, demonstrated it, preached it and trained people to follow in His steps. The Gospel of the Kingdom was so much a part of His teaching that He did not need to tell His disciples to proclaim it when He ascended into heaven. Jesus gave what we call The Great Commission, and in this, the Gospel of the Kingdom is not mentioned, as it was not needed to, it was so fundamental to all He did, and indeed, is the basis for the Great Commission.

Mat 28: 18-20 And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.

Mark 16:16-19 And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned. And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.

Luke 24: 46-47 And said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.

As you can see each of the writers gives a different twist to the Commission, which if summarized would look like this:

"All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in My name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned. And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world."

Acts 8: 3-4 As for Saul, he made havock of the church, entering into every house, and haling men and women committed them to prison. Therefore they that were scattered abroad went every where preaching the word.

The church had been told to go to all nations but stayed in Jerusalem. God organised it so that they obeyed Him and were scattered abroad.

Most Christians do not go into their neighbourhood and proclaim the Gospel let alone other nations. God will have to scatter them through persecution so that they go into their neighbourhood, if only by the example of their lives as well as into all nations

Jesus used parables to teach important matters and in two of them spoke of the ‘lost sheep’ and the ‘lost talent’ (coin). People are the most important things to Jesus as well as their maturing and development, which He nurtures as they let Him do so.

Many of them are lost to Him and under the control of His enemy with the subsequent result of their ending up in hell, the prison of his enemy. This is because many of the churches seems to be a social clubs ignoring the lost and the last order Jesus gave to His followers.

This order is a result of His ‘Law of Love’ as anyone who loves Jesus will love these people as He does and will desire to set them free as He does and so will willingly carry out His final commission, not from fear or obedience but from Love for Him and His lost people.

Paul said that the Kingdom did not come in empty words but in demonstration of its Power!

The Christian life is mainly doing everyday activities with some great moments of ministry. If God’s Power was only demonstrated in great moments of ministry it would have little demonstration on this earth. His power is shown in everyday activities by the way He does things for us out of Love and over rides the forces of darkness in doing so.

Love is the vehicle through which God shows His power! Unless we Love as He does we will not show His power and any ministry not based on God’ Love will fail.

This is why seeking wisdom or power for its own sake will never succeed as it is done in our own strength and not that of God! It is the Power of God working in us and through us as His Love works through us demonstrating the Kingdom of God in all its fullness!

It is this demonstration of The Kingdom that attracts people to it and Jesus! So while the church does not demonstrate the Love of Jesus and the Authority of Jesus it can never successfully complete the ‘Great Commission’

I was walking to the toilet a 12-30 am and looked out the window at the moonlit landscape. 1 noticed the stark edges of the landscape at which point The Holy Spirit said we are like the moonlight!"

We have no power or light but reflect this as the moon does (authority and wisdom. NB delegated authority = power)

We are not as powerful as the source and like the moon cannot give off light ourselves

It reflects only when the light source shines and gives it light to reflect

There are no shades of grey - only light and sharp shadows. (I am not to impose my weak light on the true light and pollute or diffuse or muddy it)

The shadows are dark as the reflected light does not scatter after its reflection --- it only directly lights things unlike scattered sunlight

The shadows are darker and more defined than when the source of the light lights the moon directly ... This is why revival is so powerful, the source of the light is present and not reflected light!

On the day of judgment there will he no shadows only light or darkness

He proclaimed the Kingdom and demonstrated it in power and might. His message was

(Mat 3:2) And saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

(Mar 1:15) And saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel.

(Act 2:38) Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.

(Act 3:19) Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord;

(Act 8:22) Repent therefore of this thy wickedness, and pray God, if perhaps the thought of thine heart may be forgiven thee.

(Act 26:20) But shewed first unto them of Damascus, and at Jerusalem, and throughout all the coasts of Judaea, and then to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, and do works meet for repentance.

The church does not preach this. It preaches The Cross and the need to invite Jesus into your heart.

Jesus preached that salvation was a continuing relationship with God not a once only invitation of Him into your heart (which is wrong as The Holy Spirit lives in our spirit anyway and not Jesus and we do not have to invite The Holy Spirit in anyway as He is a gift from God and cannot be received any other way). He also preached we are citizens of heaven as a result of salvation and not of a local church or denomination.

Evangelism must thus preach forgiveness of sins and that because of what Jesus did we can now enter a relationship with Jesus and The Father that makes us citizens of The Kingdom Of God and results in eternal life and that our life must show this has happened by a change in direction from the things of the world to the things of God as well as our lifestyle reflecting the Character of God as led by The Holy Spirit.

The Kingdom of heaven has come to you and

Because of what Jesus did at Calvary the barriers between God and you were removed and you can now enter into a personal relationship with the Father and Jesus with The Holy Spirit in us to guide us.

We must repent, in otherwords, turn our back on what Satan offers us in his kingdom of darkness and turn towards that which Jesus offers us in His Kingdom. We are also to be baptized to identify ourselves with the Kingdom of God.

Our lives should then be one of obedience to Him, showing forth the Kingdom of God in all the things we do and by the way we do them.

If Jesus is not Lord of our life we can lose our salvation so we need to work at obedience to Him in all we do (Rev 3:5).

1 Jn 1: 3-4 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.

So others can have fellowship with us in now and later in heaven and that their Joy will be complete in the next life.

Most churches preach the Gospel of Salvation only and not the Gospel of The Kingdom, so that the power and authority of Christ are not demonstrated and seen on earth. Instead of The Power and Authority of Jesus we see a confessing of faith intellectually and following a set of rules or the learning of theology, rather than seeing a demonstration of this Kingdom life. This results in the casual observer of Christianity seeing it as being no different from any cult or religion.

Where the Gospel of The Kingdom is preached the churches are growing. Where only the Gospel of Salvation alone is preached they are dying.

It is the power of Jesus working through the life of a Christian that sets them apart from other religions and cults and attracts people to Jesus in such a way that they will consider and accept what He taught. The authority of The kingdom is not visible in the lives of most Christians and so people do not consider Christianity as being any different to other religions. This makes it very easy to drop in and out of Christianity, as happens so often these days. It also makes it easier to join other faiths such as Mormonism, Jehovah Witnesses and Hindus etc. in common worship services. It also makes it easier for Satan to build his one world religious system of all belief systems with liberal Christians in preparation for Anti-Christ and his government. Then Satan will have a government system and associated religious system to go with it.

It is the responsibility of every mature Christian in whom Jesus is Lord and Saviour to preach this Gospel of the Kingdom and to show the authority of Jesus over Satan through the demonstration of the authority and power of The Kingdom of God. If you are not doing this, then it is your responsibility to learn how to do this. You should still be able to give every person a reason for your faith and hope in Jesus. If you cannot do this then perhaps you do not understand what salvation is and may not be saved.

A lot of the evangelism principles and what is preached when evangelising was developed in a time when people knew who Jesus was and knew their Bibles and may not be appropriate for today in a society where Jesus is no longer relevant to or even known about and the Bible is no longer a family book. I read with interest that Paul preached differently to the Gentiles who did not know of the coming Messiah and of God than when he preached to the Jews who did and that what convinced people to follow Jesus was the miracles that the apostles and disciples did and not just words (1 Cor 2:4).

Perhaps this is the only way to reach people in an age that is as godless as the time of Paul. Having said that, I add that anyone who hears the spirit of God as they preach or evangelize will meet the needs of the listeners. But then, how many talk to the spirit and listen to him as they preach.

The Business of God on earth is saving people from hell and maintaining them once they are saved. By this He expands His kingdom. He uses people to do teach those who prepared to hear the things of God how to accept Jesus as Lord and Saviour. He uses mature Christians who have been prepared by The Holy Spirit and who are willing to teach others about The kingdom as well as demonstrate it as they teach and preach. He then has these new followers trained to go out and do His work so they will reach and train others for Him. It is the pattern Jesus used and which Paul also used (2 Tim 2:2).

Too many times a scatter gun approach is used for evangelism and much effort is wasted. Rather than asking The Holy Spirit where to go and look for those He has prepared, people just go out and evangelise in the hope of finding someone willing to listen.

God is your partner in ministry and you have to listen to Him to be effective. City wide crusades may be wonderful things but if the churches are not individually going out and seeking the lost they are a hypocrisy as are week long revival meetings if the church does not normally evangelise. Evangelism should be a result of our Love for Jesus and His people going to hell and not a chore to satisfy a church or denomination and should also be a natural part of our life, and not an exercise or duty.

It is much more fun to have a big crusade than to go door knocking than on the streets after waiting on The Holy Spirit and asking Him when and where to go. It seems much more effective to plan a door knock to every house on a suburb than to pray and ask who is ready to be reached. Our prayer should be;

By this ‘scatter–gun’ approach Satan Wastes the efforts of many in futile work and reduces the effectiveness of evangelistic outreach.

If you evangelize without God’s guidance and direction you are putting on a good show but you are not doing God’s business as He will tell you where He wants you and who to go to. It may look good but is not God’s business. God’s business is done as we listen to His Spirit tell us what He wants done and where He wants it done.

Happy will be the servant who is found doing what God wants and not what is traditional or looks good and has the appearances of being fruitful.

Revival occurs when the church is doing the work of Jesus and not just a few people only are doing it.

The work of Jesus was: teaching, preaching and demonstrating the Kingdom of God, reconciling people to God and delivering them from the effects of Satan and his kingdom on them.

How do you prepare for revival? You obey Jesus in the daily things He asks you to do, (Malt 61. 33) and He will prepare you for it.

Redemption allows salvation by faith through grace unto righteousness that results in sanctification and worship but requires holiness and Lordship. Now to translate this churchspeak which means nothing to the average person ‘on the street’.

All are redeemed (our punishment removed by Calvary) as Christ died once for all not just those that would accept Him as Lord and Saviour. Salvation, however, is a result of faith in whom Jesus is and results in our being transferred from Satan’s Kingdom to God’s Kingdom and also being in a position to have a relationship with God. This is a result of God’s Grace (Love) as we did not know we needed salvation and redemption and were not able to do this anyway. As a result of this salvation we are set apart by God as His (Sanctified) and given The Holy Spirit to mark us as being His property. We worship Him out of Love and Gratitude and separate ourselves from the things of Satan’s kingdom to those of Jesus (holiness). Jesus must be Lord if we belong to His kingdom otherwise He cannot be our Saviour.

The Christian Life is the expression of our relationship with God. It is the expression of love and obedience based on love of and thanksgiving to God for what He has done for us and who He is and is not of compulsion or fear of God’s punishment. It is a life of voluntary obedience and service to God as the Christian realises that God’s nature is Love and that all God does for a Christian is a result of this love and is best for the Christian.

I cannot offer God anything except my Will for Him to use as He wills and it is as I obey His desire for me that I bring Him Glory and Honour.

Evangelism is a form of worship that brings Glory and Honour to Jesus and not an exercise to boost church numbers ot ‘win people for Jesus’. THe sooner the church changes its attitude to evangelism the sooner it wil be restored as a force in the world. This will happen in the revivals of the last days that are coming soon.

The wonder of it all is that knowing what was going to happen He still made us! He did not made us for His sake, but for ours so we could relate to Him and experience His Love and Grace.

The Christian life is a continual expression of God’s Love and Grace to us and through us to others and this is how it should be approached. To approach it any other way is to doubt God’s Love and thus His salvation, Grace and Mercy.

Al the members of the Trinity are equally God but have divided up responsibilities for ease of our understanding their roles and being able to relate to them.

The Father is like a father to us and provides all we need. Everything that is good or worthwhile is from The Father

The Lord Jesus rules The Kingdom of God and protects all its citizens in it. He expands and defends it using His Citizens (us).The Holy Spirit empowers and guides us. He fills our spirit and marks us belonging to The Kingdom of God (The Lord Jesus), he replaces demons in our soul and h e covers us as a cloud when we are baptised into Him showing our authority and role in The Kingdom of God.