kingdom

“Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity” (Joel 2:13). When John showed up at the cross, Jesus did not say to him, “John, where were you? I was looking for you. I thought that, of all the disciples, you would be the one who would have stood by me during the trial. Where were you, John?” There was no rebuke. There was no “I told you so.” Rather, He looked at him, and He gave him the highest responsibility that our dying Savior could give anyone. He said, “Son, here is your mother.” The Lord was saying that He wanted John to substitute for Him. He wanted John to stand in His place to speak for Him—to care for His mother. Some of us have made promises to the Lord, promises that we are going […]

“Jesus answered him, ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise'” (Luke 23:43). As we continue looking at the statements of Jesus on the cross, today we look at His second: “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). In one of His final interactions before His death, Jesus compassionately extended eternal life. As He openly prayed for the forgiveness of His killers, Jesus sparked an internal transformation in the criminal next to Him. In humility, the criminal said to Jesus, “[R]emember me when you come into your kingdom” (v. 42). In the midst of great suffering and torment, our Savior did not allow His own pain and circumstances to distract Him from the cries of faith from a repentant sinner. Jesus knew that this was the very reason He was hanging on that cross. Just as He was not too preoccupied to minister to this criminal, He is never […]

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” (2 Corinthians 5:17). Read 1 Corinthians 15:3-8, 20-26. Think about what it must have been like to arrive at Jesus’ tomb Easter morning, full of sorrow, only to discover the large stone in front of the tomb had been rolled away. Imagine being greeted by an angel with the incredible news that your Lord was no longer dead but alive! To witness the resurrection and experience it as a close friend of Jesus must have been something. But here’s the amazing thing: The Bible says we haven’t missed out. Though we are two thousand years late to the party, we can still experience the resurrection of Jesus Christ and bear witness to its power. How? you might ask. In his letter to the Ephesians, the apostle Paul says that when Christ comes into your life, when you truly surrender to Him, […]

“He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” (Romans 8:32). When God wanted to show us His love, He gave. And He gave everything. Only in heaven will we come close to grasping the unity of the Godhead and what it means that the Father “did not spare his own Son” (Romans 8:32). But because God desires a relationship with us, because He wants us to know Him, He graciously helps us understand the wonder of the Gospel by communicating to our limited, finite minds with a relationship familiar to us. He chose to communicate the depth of His love for us through the image of the father-son relationship. In the Hebrew culture into which Christ was born, the father-son relationship was precious—the two persons were inseparable. So when God revealed Jesus to the world, He revealed Him as Son, and […]

“We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:6). Throughout the Old Testament, we see God as our caring, protective shepherd: The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters. (Psalm 23:1-2) He tends his flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently leads those that have young. (Isaiah 40:11) As God’s sheep, we can take comfort in knowing that our Good Shepherd loves us enough to go after the one lost sheep (see Matthew 18:12-14). He shows His love for us through His vigilance, faithfulness, and commitment to pursue that one wandering sheep; and when He finds the sheep, He joyfully carries him all the way home. We may think that […]

“‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found'” (Luke 15:31-32). Read Luke 15:11-32. Too often we see men and women who are living like the older brother in this story, and we can’t even tell there’s a problem. These people are in church. Some of them may even teach Sunday school, volunteer to help run vacation Bible school, or host a small group. The older son is really not that different from his younger brother. Both sons wanted what their father could give them, but neither was truly invested in his relationship with him. The younger son chose the more direct approach. He essentially told the father to drop dead so he could have his inheritance ahead of schedule. The older brother was more patient. He chose […]

“For the Lord Most High is awesome, the great King over all the earth. He subdued nations under us, peoples under our feet” (Psalm 47:2-3). Psalm 47:1 says: “Clap your hands, all you nations; shout to God with cries of joy.” Most people have no problem clapping and shouting for their favorite sports team, but when it comes to church, they become tongue-tied, merely mouthing the words. Some don’t even do that. They come to praise God, but they never do. They keep their mouths shut. Today, in every corner of the globe, God’s people are suffering at the hands of persecutors who falsely accuse them simply because they believe in Jesus. The police chase them like criminals. In every corner of the globe, Christians are being muzzled and intimidated, even in the West. Psalm 47 reminds us that the day is coming when we are going to reign and rule with Christ in the universe. The day is coming […]