Blog

I have come to realize through interactions and deliberations that most Christians do not understand the meaning of the Kingdom of God or as used in other versions of the bible – the Kingdom of Heaven. I realize that this basic foundational error can be found with 95% of Christians and it makes me realize that there is work to be done amongst people who are suppose to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. If the foundation is not fortified, there is nothing the righteous can do even if he hears God on a consistent basis. The foundation is the key to further access to greater light and I have come to understand why there are so many quibbling and argument amongst Christians concerning this or that. Let me start by exposing one of the greatest error made by Christians in connection to the Kingdom.

When Nichodemus came to meet Jesus at night in the book of John 3, his emphasis was not being born again as most Christians believe; his basic emphasis was in the Kingdom. Jesus gospel was about the Kingdom not about being born again. The word born again was only used once in the bible to explain the parameters to be achieved in order to see the Kingdom; this means an experiential knowledge of the Kingdom requires a re-birth. This is all there is about born again but I realized that it has been institutionalized to be the destination that must be attained. No wonder I hear words like “I would make heaven because I am born again”. Wow! A great error……..

Now, let me bring the concept of born again versus the kingdom to our every day experience. Kingdom simply means King’s Domain therefore Kingdom of God means God’s Domain; any where God is the King is the Kingdom of God whether in heaven or in your heart as long as he is the King of that particular place but there are certain elements that assures his rule in a particular place. Let me use our everyday parlance to expatiate; being born again is like having a VISA to UK. I am sure you know that VISA (no matter the length of time) does not make you a citizen of UK, it only gives you access to experience UK; you can see the Thames, London Bridge, Trafalgar Square, etc but you are not a citizen of UK. This is what it means when Christians who are suppose to be citizen of the Kingdom say they are “born again”, what they are simply saying is that I have access to experience the Kingdom of God. When they say this, I wonder if they are certain of what they are saying or they picked it up through osmosis. Jesus expatiated to Nichodemus on what it would mean to enter the Kingdom; being born of the spirit and water – a totally different experience which means to be a citizen of UK, it is a different ball game than obtaining a VISA.

Now the Kingdom is the most important aspect of the Christian gospel and in fact the major goal. Jesus talked about it in almost all his speech explaining it using different parables and stories to hit the point home. When Jesus says “Seek first the Kingdom”, he did not say pray and fast like most people assume, it simply means align yourself to the Kingdom values, encourage its vision and walk its mission. When you do that every other thing shall follow you but do we even understand the vision, mission and value of the Kingdom. Let’s take a peek into the scripture by analyzing Mathew 25 where Jesus compared the Kingdom to a group of virgins; he differentiated them into the wise and the foolish ones. The wise ones knew how to plan, fore-think and produce while the foolish ones had contrary elements. At the end of the day, the words the bridegroom used for the foolish ones show what Jesus is looking for in a Kingdom material. Kindly note that all of the ladies were virgin that means they lived right but the foolish ones lacked purpose, productivity and planning. These disparities between the wise and foolish should be carefully studied by the church because it is what counts in proclaiming your Kingdom status.

Another misconception that I find unbearable is always depicted in Nigerian Films; African Magic is always a delight to watch but when the spiritual angle is displayed, I find the mindset of the creator of the movie appalling; I feel like grabbing him and talking some sense to him about his depiction of the Almighty God but on second thought I can not blame him, because he is reflecting the feel of the people. This is what always happens in the movie; whenever an evil wants to happen to an individual; it does not take more than two seconds for the evil to substantiate but when good deeds is about to happen, the pastor would sweat and pray for 10 minutes before he finally gets the evil out. This is a wrong depiction of the kingdom and should be stopped. Jesus was so angry in the book of Mark 9 when his disciples were sweating to cast an unclean spirit from a man. He called them unbelieving generation because they did not have solutions to the deed. Whenever, I want to know what displeases God, I look at what infuriates Jesus in the bible. The greatest misconception of the church is to believe living right is all it takes to please God……………………….