Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you. (Hebrews 13:5)
When Jesus first proclaimed the gospel (Mark 1:14-15) he simply declared the proximity of the kingdom of God (it is here and now), and then invited his hearers to believe his words to be true (“repent and believe . . .”).
In this proclamation Jesus established the paradigm for understanding the flow of the kingdom of God: it is here and now. If you are dealing with something that is not here, its not yet the kingdom. And if you are dealing with something that is not now, its not yet the kingdom.
It’s here . . . there’s no distance.
It’s now . . . there’s no delay.
Distance and delay are the enemy’s primary mechanisms for resisting the flow of the kindgom of God. If he can put just a little bit of distance between you and others, he can hinder the flow of the kingdom between you. If he can assert just a little bit of delay in your mind concerning the coming of God’s breakthrough into your life, he can hinder the flow of the kingdom in your circumstances.
We must be proclaimers of the gospel . . . the gospel that Jesus preached. The kingdom of God is here and now!
The enemy would have you to believe that your breakthrough is so far away that you can only view it through a telescope.
Satan doesn’t mind you believing that God will break through in your life, as long as you believe that he’ll break through later. Satan doesn’t mind you believing that God will make his presence known in your life, as long as you believe that he will show up some place else. But the moment you begin to believe that God is with you right now, that he is working right now to overthrow the enemy’s work in your circumstances, and that you don’t have to be anywhere else but where you are right now to receive God’s breakthrough, you and the enemy will have some problems, because your faith has just overcome him!
Repentance is not a spiritual apology; it is the act of renouncing all doubts about the proximity of the kingdom. Whenever you find yourself thinking thoughts like, I’m all alone . . . No one is here to help me . . . This situation is never going to change . . . I’m going to struggle with this for the rest of my life . . . you can be sure that your need to repent is acute.
We tend to repent of our malfunctions, and not our mal-beliefs. But the true sin is in the failure to believe that God is with me, and that his kindgom is here and now. That fundamental failure to believe is the foundation for all sinful behavior.
Today’s meditation is a faith builder because it confronts us with a promise that we all struggle to believe at times. To meditate on this verse of Scripture – allowing it to sink deeply into our hearts and minds where it may confront and overthrow our unbelief – is in and of itself an act of repentance and a coming to faith.
Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.
Share your thoughts
In what area of your life has the enemy sought to put distance and delay between you and the kingdom?
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