The Habits of Jesus | The Kingdom of God

At the heart of it all is the King­dom of God as a mes­sa­ge of hope, invi­ting peo­p­le to live under the rule of Jesus. This hope trans­forms the dai­ly lives of Jesus’ fol­lo­wers and offers a new per­spec­ti­ve on guilt, suf­fe­ring, jus­ti­ce and the future. That is why they are invi­ted to share the good news with others in a cre­di­ble, rela­ti­onship-ori­en­ted and wel­co­ming way, and to accom­pa­ny them on their jour­ney of faith.

This mor­ning I’m going to talk to you about Jesus’ habit of spre­a­ding the King­dom of God. I must admit that I found this ser­mon incre­di­bly dif­fi­cult to prepa­re. It’s actual­ly quite sur­pri­sing, given that it is the very essence of fol­lo­wing Jesus.

I think many of you feel exact­ly the same way about this. Fun­da­men­tal­ly, we share the same desi­re to pro­cla­im the King­dom of God. We reco­g­ni­se the need. We long for chan­ge. But we don’t know whe­re to start. My hope is that this ser­mon can help you with that. But first things first: we must start with Jesus. Any­thing else falls short.

Jesus and the Kingdom of God

Pro­clai­ming the King­dom of God was sure­ly Jesus’ most important prac­ti­ce! Ever­y­thing else he did and car­ri­ed out has its ori­gin here. Accor­ding to the Gos­pel of Mark, he began his minis­try as fol­lows: «‚The time has come,‘ he pro­clai­med. ‚The King­dom of God is near! Rep­ent of your sins and belie­ve in this good news!‘»(Mark 1:15 NLB). Sin means tur­ning some­thing good into some­thing for the best. The mes­sa­ge of the King­dom of God is not pri­ma­ri­ly about the ques­ti­on: «How do I get into hea­ven?», but about the fact that God is King – in hea­ven as on earth. The King­dom of God is not a place, but refers to God’s reign. In Jesus, the King­dom of God beg­ins in an exem­pla­ry way and beco­mes visi­ble. This is evi­dent in the fact that Jesus over­co­mes death, heals the sick and even com­mands crea­ti­on to obey him.

This king­dom is also evi­dent today – in the ten­si­on bet­ween «alre­a­dy» and «not yet». Some things are alre­a­dy visi­ble, others are not yet. As child­ren of God, fol­lo­wers of Jesus no lon­ger need to fear con­dem­na­ti­on. «So the­re is now no con­dem­na­ti­on for tho­se who belong to Christ Jesus» (Romans 8:1 NLB). The King­dom of God mani­fests its­elf in many dif­fe­rent ways. The Angli­can Church’s so-cal­led «Five Marks of Mis­si­on» illus­tra­te the diver­se ways in which the spread of the King­dom of God is expres­sed in prac­ti­ce and in the life of Jesus:

• Fin­ding and sha­ring faith (Pro­cla­ma­ti­on)
• Lear­ning and tea­ching discipleship
• See­ing and hel­ping peo­p­le (Dia­ko­nie)
• Pro­mo­ting and deman­ding jus­ti­ce (fair­ness)
• Pre­ser­ving and Sha­ping Crea­ti­on (Envi­ron­ment)

Today, the focus is on the first part: fin­ding faith and sha­ring faith. It is about evan­ge­lism – that is, sha­ring the good news. But why should this be pas­sed on at all? The King­dom of God is a mes­sa­ge of hope becau­se it is based on the vic­to­ry of Jesus Christ and strips death, evil and suf­fe­ring of their ulti­ma­te power. If death has the last word, all hope remains limi­t­ed. Fol­lo­wers of Jesus are cal­led to be signs of the King­dom of God. In doing so, it is important to walk the midd­le path – neither fal­ling into lega­lism nor into arbi­trar­i­ne­ss. This is achie­ved through the power of grace. «For the grace of God, which brings sal­va­ti­on to all peo­p­le, has been reve­a­led. It leads us to turn our backs on a life wit­hout God and on all sin­ful pas­si­ons. Now, in this world, we are to live sen­si­bly, righ­teous­ly and with com­ple­te devo­ti­on to God» (Titus 2:11–12 NLB). For me, the mes­sa­ge of the King­dom of God means: «I am more sin­ful and wicked than I ever thought pos­si­ble. And yet, at the same time, I am more accept­ed and loved than I ever dared to hope» (Timo­thy Keller). 

The «why» behind sha­ring the Good News lies in a chan­ge of rule: from «I am king» to «Jesus is king».

What distin­gu­is­hes fol­lo­wers of Jesus from peo­p­le who do not have this hope? Fol­lo­wers of Jesus can be gene­rous becau­se their secu­ri­ty does not depend on their pos­ses­si­ons. They can for­gi­ve becau­se God has for­gi­ven them. They can suf­fer wit­hout losing hope. They can stand up for jus­ti­ce wit­hout belie­ving they have to save the world on their own. They can face death wit­hout being domi­na­ted by it. Fol­lo­wers of Jesus speak of Jesus – not out of fear or a sen­se of duty, but out of the hope that they may share the best mes­sa­ge the­re is. «The­r­e­fo­re, stri­ve for clear, sober thin­king and self-con­trol. Place all your hope in the grace that awaits you at the return of Jesus Christ. Obey God, becau­se you are his child­ren. Do not fall back into your old, bad habits. Back then, you did not know any bet­ter. But now you must be holy in ever­y­thing you do, just as God, who has cal­led you, is holy.» (1 Peter 1:13–15 NLB).

When I’m enthu­si­a­stic about some­thing, I want that enthu­si­asm to rub off on others. But the­re are dif­fe­rent ways of doing this. I can approach peo­p­le in a mili­tant, know-it-all or patro­ni­s­ing way. Accor­ding to a recent US stu­dy, 62 % of peo­p­le who do not belong to a church but are inte­res­ted in reli­gi­on say that reli­gi­on was impo­sed on them rather than offe­red to them as a free choice. That is why we should invi­te peo­p­le to fol­low Jesus in a wel­co­ming, joyful and exem­pla­ry way.

Invi­ting peo­p­le to a life with Jesus is not a sprint, but a mara­thon. Yet the poten­ti­al of the Good News is immense. It chan­ges lives, for God makes all things new! But what does this Good News actual­ly look like? This is whe­re we need to learn to put it into words. The four points are very well known: First­ly: God loves me. Second­ly: I am sepa­ra­ted from God. Third­ly: Jesus gave ever­y­thing for me. Fourth­ly: Do I want to live with Jesus? Howe­ver, this frame­work is not always effec­ti­ve, becau­se many peo­p­le are at a com­ple­te­ly dif­fe­rent stage on their jour­ney of faith.

During my stu­dies, I lear­nt about what is known as the Engel Sca­le. It was deve­lo­ped by James Engel and shows that peo­p­le are at very dif­fe­rent stages on their spi­ri­tu­al jour­ney. It focu­ses on the enti­re jour­ney of faith, rather than just the decis­i­on for or against Jesus. The­re was a time when the Chris­ti­an «water table» was signi­fi­cant­ly hig­her. That meant con­ver­sa­ti­ons could start from a dif­fe­rent point. Today, many peo­p­le are fur­ther remo­ved from the fun­da­men­tals of the Chris­ti­an faith. That is why more time, more rela­ti­onships and more acces­si­ble encoun­ters are nee­ded. Depen­ding on whe­re a per­son is on their jour­ney, dif­fe­rent steps can be hel­pful. That is why we are orga­ni­s­ing an Alpha­Li­ve cour­se this autumn. This intro­duc­to­ry cour­se on faith is aimed at peo­p­le who have alre­a­dy had some initi­al expo­sure to the Chris­ti­an faith and are on a spi­ri­tu­al quest.

The «how» of evan­ge­lism springs from hope born of experience.

It’s all about the rela­ti­onship. In the vast majo­ri­ty of cases, that’s the be-all and end-all. Becau­se the cru­cial ques­ti­on isn’t: «How do I explain the­se four points as accu­ra­te­ly as pos­si­ble?», but rather: «What does the good news actual­ly look like for this per­son?» What does the good news look like for the col­le­ague who’s shun­ned by ever­yo­ne? For the neigh­bours who are con­stant­ly arguing? For the class­ma­te who always thinks she knows bet­ter? For the sin­gle mum in your cir­cle of fri­ends? For the pen­sio­ner from the neigh­bour­hood whom you bump into every time you go shop­ping? Or for … – insert a name here.

I’d like to take the pres­su­re off you. Sto­ries about how peo­p­le come to faith almost always invol­ve seve­ral peo­p­le. Ten years ago, I was at a wed­ding. I was sit­ting at a table and struck up a con­ver­sa­ti­on with someone. It tur­ned out that at least four peo­p­le had play­ed a part in his jour­ney of faith: a school fri­end from his child­hood, the bri­de hers­elf, a col­le­ague from tea­cher trai­ning col­lege and, final­ly, the bride’s cir­cle of fri­ends and fami­ly. God rare­ly wri­tes his sto­ries with just one person.

So what can we do to help peo­p­le encoun­ter Jesus? And what is it worth cos­ting us? Jesus gave his life to spread the King­dom of God. What is it worth cos­ting me? Time? Rela­ti­onships? Com­fort? Repu­ta­ti­on? Com­mit­ment? Per­se­ver­ance? Money? Com­pas­si­on? Lei­su­re time?

But per­haps you’re sit­ting here today and rea­li­sing: actual­ly, it doesn’t real­ly mat­ter much to me whe­ther other peo­p­le get to know Jesus. This isn’t a cri­ti­cism, but an invi­ta­ti­on. Ask yours­elf once again why you cho­se Jesus Christ. Becau­se the foun­da­ti­on for invi­ting others is the hope that you yours­elf have expe­ri­en­ced. If you’ve lost that hope, or if you’ve never real­ly come to know it, then the Alpha­li­ve Basic Cour­se on Faith might be just the thing for you.

Ano­ther important point: when we share the good news with others, it is not we who are the acti­ve agents – but God hims­elf. That is why pray­er is cru­cial. I would like to warm­ly invi­te you to pray regu­lar­ly for peo­p­le for whom you hope to see an encoun­ter with God. For what the Good News means to a per­son at any given time depends on whe­re that per­son is on their jour­ney with God.

The «who» behind evan­ge­lism is God hims­elf. We are allo­wed to play our part, but it is God who acts.

To con­clude this ser­mon, I would like to invi­te you to embrace this chan­ge of rule: away from the king­dom of «I am king» and towards the king­dom of «Jesus is King». At see­tal chi­le, it is a tra­di­ti­on for tho­se being bap­ti­sed to shout out loud as they emer­ge from the water: «Jesus is Lord!» This is a visi­ble expres­si­on of this chan­ge of rule. This chan­ge of rule means no lon­ger making some­thing good the most important thing. I would like to invi­te you to make God the most important thing in your life – and sim­ply to let the good things be good.

I invi­te you to pray this pray­er with me:
Dear God, thank you for making me won­derful, for loving me and for wan­ting the very best for my life. I’m sor­ry that I’ve lived wit­hout you. Jesus, plea­se for­gi­ve me for all the times I’ve put some­thing good befo­re you. I trust in you and ask you: Come into my life. Be the King of my life! Be my Saviour and my best fri­end. Fill me with your Holy Spi­rit and help me to fol­low you and to live in a way that plea­ses you. Amen.

Possible questions for the small group

Read the Bible pas­sa­ge: Mark 1:15 & Titus 2:11–12

1. What does the shift in aut­ho­ri­ty from «I am king» to «Jesus is king» actual­ly mean for you in your day-to-day life?
2. Which state­ment about the King­dom of God or the Good News par­ti­cu­lar­ly reso­na­ted with you or pre­sen­ted you with a new chall­enge? Why?
3. Can you think of any situa­tions whe­re you – con­scious­ly or uncon­scious­ly – have deci­ded that someone will pro­ba­b­ly never be open to Jesus? What prompt­ed you to adopt that attitude?
4. How can hope, rather than fear or a sen­se of duty, beco­me the dri­ving force behind tal­king to others about faith?
5. Who springs to mind when you think about how God often rea­ches peo­p­le through rela­ti­onships and through seve­ral peo­p­le? How could you be the next step for that person?
6. What might it cost you to accom­pa­ny peo­p­le on their jour­ney to Jesus (time, com­fort, repu­ta­ti­on, pati­ence, pray­er or some­thing else)? What do you find most dif­fi­cult about this?
7. Pray­er: Which one or two peo­p­le would you like to pray for spe­ci­fi­cal­ly over the coming weeks, that they might expe­ri­ence an encoun­ter with Jesus? How can the group sup­port you in this?