Kingdom Living
How God Changes the World
Category: General
Tags: Enemy Love, Jesus, Kingdom Living, Love, Unity
Verse: John 17
God’s hopes for us began before the creation of the world. And what God intended from the beginning gives us insight into how God works to bring about what he intends. In the first chapter…
Kingdom Reconciliation is Not About Politics (But it is Political)
Category: General
Tags: Kingdom Living, Kingdom of God, Politics, Racial Reconciliation, Revolt
Topics: Ethical, Cultural and Political Issues
In the broader culture, the social and political discussions about racial reconciliation are usually focused on people’s rights and privileges as a means of making the world a fairer place. The criteria such efforts at…
The Coming Kingdom & Racial Conflict
Category: General
Tags: Kingdom Living, Kingdom of God, Love, Racial Reconciliation, Unity
Topics: Ethical, Cultural and Political Issues
In the book of Revelation, we see a glimpse into the future. John says he saw, …a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne…
Why Racial Reconciliation Matters
Category: General
Tags: Good News, Jesus, Kingdom Living, Kingdom of God, Racial Reconciliation, Unity
Topics: Ethical, Cultural and Political Issues
In Psalm 72, the author prays for a day when “all kings” would “bow down” to God’s anointed and when “all nations” would “serve him” (vs. 11). At this time, the Psalmist continues, God’s king…
Lies, Truth, and the Holy Spirit
Category: General
Tags: Jesus, Kingdom Living, Lies, The Holy Spirit, Truth
The root of the flesh is a lie about who God is and who we are. Satan brings us into bondage of the flesh by convincing us that God is not the loving God he…
Revolting Against Classism
Category: General
Tags: Jesus, Kingdom Living, Kingdom Revolution, Love
Topics: Ethical, Cultural and Political Issues
All fallen societies and religions have a tendency to rank people according to class. All have ways of separating the insiders from the outsiders, the holy from the unholy and the more important people from…
Dancing with the Triune God
Category: Sermons and Video Clips
Tags: Judgment, Kingdom Living, Practicing the Presence of God, The Work of the People
Topics: Hearing God, Prayer
What does it mean to live in the presence of God now? How do we do this? What does it mean to be in the presence of God for eternity? In this video produced by…
Friday Lights: Living the Best Day Ever
Category: Lighten Up
Tags: Being Present, Friday Lights, Gratitude, Kingdom Living
Each Friday we post content sent to us by our readers that is inspiring, funny, lighthearted or just generally fun. If you’d like more information on submitting content for this feature you can get more information here….
Voluntary Suffering and the Kingdom
Category: General
Tags: Kingdom Living, Power, Self-Sacrificial Love, Suffering
Topics: Following Jesus
In a post from two days ago, I wrote about the call to voluntary suffering for others as it is laid out in the New Testament. For the first three centuries of the church, Christians…
The Call to Suffer
Category: General
Tags: Judgment, Justice, Kingdom Living, Self-Sacrificial Love, Suffering
Topics: Following Jesus
Paul tells us that in all our relations, we are to “have the same attitude of mind Christ Jesus had” (Phil 2:5). Though he was “in very nature God,” he didn’t cling to this status….
5 Distinctions of God’s Kingdom
Category: General
Tags: Kingdom Living, Kingdom of God, Kingdom of this World, Nationalism
Topics: Following Jesus
Jesus said that his kingdom was “not from this world,” for it contrasts with the kingdom of the world in every possible way. This is not a simple contrast between good and evil. The contrast…
The Kingdom of God ≠ Political Activism
Category: General
Tags: Kingdom Living, Kingdom Revolution, Politics
Topics: Ethical, Cultural and Political Issues
Given the centrality of following Jesus’ example, it is vitally important we not only notice that Jesus was a revolutionary (see post) along with some ways that we can join his revolution (see that post…
7 Ways to Join the Kingdom Revolution
Category: General
Tags: Kingdom Living, Kingdom Revolution
Topics: Following Jesus
In the previous post, I introduced in short form the call to participate in the kingdom revolution that Jesus began. What does this mean for us today? Let me offer seven ways we are called…
The Purpose of the Church
Category: General
Tags: Church, Kingdom Living
Topics: The Church
Unlike most social groups, the relationships forged in the body of Christ are not ends in and of themselves. Rather, Christ calls us to unite with other believers for a unique purpose: to grow in,…
As We Remember MLK
Category: General
Tags: Kingdom Living, Martin Luther King, Racial Reconciliation
Topics: Ethical, Cultural and Political Issues
If you’ve never read Martin Luther King Jr’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail, you should take the time to do so. He wrote the letter to leaders of of the white churches in Birmingham in response to…
Did Jesus Instruct Us to Arm Ourselves?
Category: General
Tags: Jesus, Kingdom Living, Non-Violence
Topics: Enemy-Loving Non-Violence
Verse: Luke 22
Over the past few posts, I’ve been dealing with the passages that are frequently used to argue how Jesus condoned violence. One of these takes place just after the last supper and just before Jesus and…
Reflecting on the Lord’s Prayer
Category: General
Tags: Eschatology, Jesus, Kingdom Living, Prayer, Spiritual Warfare
Jesus begins the instruction on prayer (Matthew 6:9-13) by telling his disciples to pray for the Father’s name to be “hallowed,” for his kingdom to come, and for his will to be established on earth…
Does the Old Testament Justify “Just War”?
Category: Q&A
Tags: Augustine, Cruciform Theology, Just War, Kingdom Living, Non-Violence, Old Testament, OT Violence, Violence
Topics: Enemy-Loving Non-Violence
Since the time of Augustine, Christians have consistently appealed to the violent strand of the Old Testament to justify waging wars when they believed their cause was “just.” (This is Augustine’s famous “just war” theory.)…
How To Fix The Church: The Kingdom of God (Part 4)
Category: General
Tags: Church, Jesus, Kingdom, Kingdom Living
Topics: Following Jesus
God has leveraged everything on the Church loving like Jesus loved, as outlined in our previous posts in this series. “By this the world will know you are my disciples,” Jesus said, “by your love”…
The Only Thing That Matters Is Love: The Kingdom of God (Part 3)
Category: General
Tags: Jesus, Kingdom, Kingdom Living, Living in Love, Love
Topics: Following Jesus
To say that living in Calvary-quality love is the most important thing in our life is to grossly understate its importance. This stands in distinction from how we typically define the Kingdom of God. But…