Intro to Kingdom | A Kingdom at Work Film

[00:00:00] You hear the phrase, the kingdom of God a lot in scripture. You do. Jesus talked about it constantly. Before we talk about entering it, advancing it, or even building our lives and businesses around it, maybe we should pause and ask, what was Jesus actually talking about right when he said the kingdom of God?

What did he mean? Okay, so let’s start simple. What is a kingdom? At its most basic level, a kingdom is where a king rules exactly, and every kingdom has three things. A king. A people and a territory. The king has authority. The people live under that authority, and the territory is where the king’s will is carried out.

So then how does that apply to the kingdom of God? Well, wherever God’s authority is welcomed, his will is embraced and his nature is expressed, that’s his kingdom. Okay. So in the simplest terms, it’s where. God rules, right? An earthly kingdom can be shown on a map, but can we do that with the kingdom of God?

Well, no, because God’s kingdom isn’t confined [00:01:00] to a physical location. It’s not limited by borders or governments, it’s transcendent. Okay, so when is God’s kingdom? Can we actually put it on a timeline? Yes and no. It exists above history, above our now and above the future, but it intersects with it. So the kingdom of God is eternal.

So if it’s transcendent and eternal, then those in it can find stability. Even when everything fills unstable, like when leadership is shifting, economies are shaking, and culture is changing. Yes, the kingdom of God remains unshaken, unmoved, and unstoppable.

When Jesus began his public ministry, do you remember his first message? Yes. The Kingdom of God is at hand. That wasn’t just an opening line. It was a heartbeat of everything he said. When you think of it, so many of his parables began the same way. The kingdom of Heaven is alike. That’s right. Seeds, soil, treasure, vineyards, [00:02:00] weddings.

The kingdom is mentioned in scripture over 100 times, and interestingly, Jesus only uses the word often translated church twice, right? He didn’t primarily preach church attendance, behavior modification, or even salvation as a standalone idea. He preached the king and his kingdom. What about after his resurrection, before he ascended to heaven, during those critical final days of his time on Earth?

Did Jesus mention the kingdom of God? Then? Yes. It wasn’t just one topic among many. The kingdom was the message. In fact, he spoke about the kingdom more than any other subject in the gospels. Well, if the kingdom was central to Jesus, then it must become central to us. Then how do I begin making the kingdom of God central to my life?

Each of us begins by following the first instructions Jesus gave. Repent for the kingdom of God is at hand. The word repent in Greek met doesn’t simply mean feeling sorry. It means changing the way you think, the way you see, [00:03:00] the way you respond. I understood repentance as feeling bad and asking for forgiveness.

You’re saying it’s more than that. Turns out repentance isn’t shame and it’s not behavior modification. Repentance is proper alignment with reality. As God designed it from the very beginning, it’s learning to see and seek the kingdom. That kind of alignment requires relationship with God the Father, Jesus the Son, and Holy Spirit, right?

It takes humility, choosing submission to God, agreeing with God about who he is and who we truly. Are who we truly are. Sounds like an identity statement. So then repentance is directly connected to our identity, right? It is. And repentance is not a one time moment. It’s a constant posture. Repentance goes well beyond forgiveness then this sounds transformational.

It 100% is Romans 12 says, be transformed by the renewing of your mind. That word renewing literally means renovation, and it’s not a command as much as it [00:04:00] is an invitation. Not to just be renewed once, but to continuously be transformed by a renovation of the mind. When I hear renovation, I think of demolition and rebuilding.

Correct. God and his mercy will even allow holy brokenness not to destroy us, but to rebuild us, to remake us. So then repentance is the doorway to the kingdom.

Even though we belong to the kingdom, we still perceive through minds limited by a clock. That makes it hard to understand a kingdom that’s not bound by time. Think of it like this. The kingdom of God is eternal. It exists above history, above our now and above the future. Yet the kingdom is present and active even as we are experiencing it now.

The kingdom of God is steadily revealing more of itself, and it always will be. Yes, the kingdom also has. Unlimited resources. Jesus said in Luke [00:05:00] 1232, fear not little flock for it. Is the father’s good pleasure to bestow unto you? The Kingdom God generously offers the endless eternal treasures of the kingdom to us, his children.

So he’s inviting us to take an active role in reestablishing his kingdom order. He is, we have the honor of stewarding those treasures of the kingdom we cultivate. We. Govern. We reflect God’s glory on the earth and we never have to do it alone. Jesus said in Matthew 28, verse 20, and surely I am with you always to the very end of the age.

Our king never leaves us. He continues to give and give and give, and his revelation never ceases.

We humans have a tendency to reduce concepts into something small enough to explain. But if we can contain it and explain it, it’s not the kingdom, it’s religion. Hmm. And religion is a man [00:06:00] made system of rules and behavior that replaces relationship with God. But repentance, which requires relationship is the entrance to the kingdom, not religion.

Right, but that repentance also called salvation is just the entry point. It’s not the whole message. The modern church has often replaced the message of the kingdom with the message of salvation. But the kingdom is more than the doorway. Yes, the kingdom includes so much more. Notice that the church fits within the kingdom, not the other way around.

Meaning God’s rule extends beyond the church walls to what? Well, everything, and that means that church is no better than or less than work. It’s all part of the kingdom of God. Because the kingdom of God is different from the world. Everything about it can seem upside down and backwards. That’s so true, like how you can’t enter the kingdom through effort, performance, or control.

Instead, it requires humility and surrender. Romans chapter nine talks about how [00:07:00] Gentiles. Nonis. Israelites came into relationship with God by having faith in Jesus. Meanwhile, Israel, God’s chosen people tried to obey the law to make themselves right with God. It didn’t work because they tried to do it without faith, which is an example of an upside down kingdom.

Experience. Workspace effort leads to stumbling in the kingdom, offends human self. Sufficiency. You know, it’s actually easy to enter the kingdom. The hard part is avoiding the religious spirit that wants to earn its way in. According to Matthew 6 33, when we seek the kingdom and God’s righteousness, first, we’ll be given everything we need.

Everyone is seeking something first, the question is, are we seeking God’s kingdom first? And that’s an important question because what we seek is what we’ll see. Seeking the kingdom first. Walking in relationship with God and receiving kingdom revelation is an ongoing journey. It’s not something anyone masters.

Kingdom life is [00:08:00] counterintuitive to our human logic. But what it first seems upside down and backwards is actually God’s proper design. And as we continue on our kingdom journey, we’ll discover that it’s actually right side up.

When we enter the kingdom of Heaven, we come to know Jesus is Savior, but he’s even more than that. We come to know him as Lord, as we learn to submit everything to him. Even Jesus had to practice submitting everything to his. Father, like when he was tempted in the desert, and because God loves us, he will dismantle anything that rules over us.

Submission is actually freedom, not restriction. It protects us from wasting our efforts and it activates spiritual power. In fact, submission is how we step into dominion. In Genesis 1 26, God said, let us make man in our image. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the cattle, all the earth, and [00:09:00] every creeping thing.

So this is another kingdom principle that can seem upside down. Dominion flows from submission, and when we understand lordship, we embrace that we bear Christ image. We operate according to God’s original design, and we bring his right order to every part of life. He gives us the power to properly steward all the treasures of the kingdom, including business, education, politics, family, and more.

And what we steward under God’s rule will last because it’s part of the unshakeable kingdom. Hebrews 12 describes a holy shaking of the earth that will remove everything temporal so that only the kingdom remains, and God invites us to spend our lives on things that will survive that shaking. And he empowers us to do exactly that When we release control, lay down religious practices and preconceived expectations and ask God what he desires, and that’s how we welcome his authority, embrace his will and [00:10:00] partner in expressing his nature.

It’s what seeking first the kingdom looks like. Since we know the kingdom is at hand, we seek it with confidence that it’s already here and therefore can be found. Plus we know it’s constantly revealing more of itself and will last for eternity. And the role each of us plays in the kingdom flows from relationship with the Lord, right?

We walk in humility and proper alignment with reality as God designed it and he continuously renovates our minds. That submission puts us in a place to operate in dominion over all God gives us. Which means the kingdom isn’t another thing to add to a business plan. The kingdom is God’s rule over every plan, including how and why we work.