The kingdom of God has everything to do with hearing faith. It has nothing to do with self-motivation. It has everything to do with being swept up, carried away, transfigured, overtaken, overwhelmed, overshadowed, doused, baptized, anointed, charged, sworn, called, given over. It has nothing to do with resolutions and to-do lists and the habits of successful people.
What happens to you is suddenly you realize the kingdom of God is upon you. You realize that the same Spirit that raised Jesus’ dead body from the grave is now pulsing in your mortal flesh giving you resurrection life. You realize that Jesus Christ has personally come and thrown his mantle over you and said “Come walk exactly as I walk.” And there’s really no time for hesitation. You don’t get to summon up a response. Faith either jumps up inside you like baby John the Baptizer in Elizabeth’s womb…or you find yourself walking away sad, mumbling your excuse.
Really, right now once and for all - let the dead bury their dead - you go preach the kingdom of God. That’s when it gets good.
Yes Lord, I’m ready willing and able to say YES. I’m there. I’m with you Lord. Help me to never give any excuse! May the loads of this life, be it material blessings, job, family, success, or whatever NEVER hinder us from being ready when the Lord calls!
That’s it. God’s word produces immediately when there’s that kind of cooperation. “Let there be light - and there was light.” When he speaks into our lives (and that’s all the time, as much as we’re willing to listen), all that’s needed is that we humbly receive the ingrafted Word as the Word and bathe it in faith. A simple genuine unconditional YES!
There’s such an amazing contrast seeing people’s faith in a 3rd world country. They have very few illusions about their resources or abilities. Either God comes through for them or they lose everything. So when the Word comes to them with all the glory and authority of heaven, they melt. You see that pure YES written all over their faces. There is no “wow, that’s a good insight, i should make more of an effort to put that in practice..” or “i wish i could get around to that..” There is no asleep in the light going on where there’s real abject desperation.
We’ve been given so much. What if all of a sudden we stepped over into a place where we counted all our resources and abilities and opinions and options as absolute garbage for the sake of knowing Christ Jesus fully as our living speaking Master? There really is nothing in all the earth so empowering as that pure totally dependent YES to God.