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Topic: Kingdom of God

Doing the Teachings of Jesus

Sound, wise teaching has no real effect in our lives if the teaching is not put into active, continuous practice. As we have seen throughout the “Sermon on the Plain” in Luke 6, Jesus lays out the demands and blessings of living as a disciple in the Kingdom of God. Jesus concludes his teaching with a challenge to his followers to embody his teachings and put them into living action. Read More 


Blessings to the Messy

This weekend, we started our 6 week church-wide adventure entitled “The Beautiful Mess.” The title may seem a little different, but it’s very representative of how the Kingdom of God interacts with our lives. When a new way of living begins to reveal itself, it can bring beauty into our “normal” messes of life by actually “messing up” our so-called … Read More 


A Different Kind of New

To say that Jesus was a radical, “thinking-outside-of-the-box” person may well be the understatement of understatements! In living out his call as God’s Messiah, he went against a lot of the expectations and categories of his Jewish contemporaries, especially the religious leaders. It appeared that everywhere he went he was turning social convention on its head with his Holy Spirit-empowered deep wisdom and amazing love. Jesus’ incredibly loving, accepting behavior towards social outcasts and “sinners” made him the constant target of attention, scorn, and many questions from people. Read More 


The Kingdom is a Really Messy Party

Messiness often bothers people. Life is messy, and many things are ambiguous or undefined. There are no clear categories into which certain events can be placed. It can be too chaotic, and unsettling for some to endure. Because of this dislike of messiness, it is pretty understandable how we would like to make things clean and unambiguous as we can…including our relationship with God and His Kingdom. We learn from Jesus’ ministry, however, that God’s Kingdom is not as clean-and-nice as we might like for it to be. Read More 


Kingdom Healing

The Good News Jesus came to proclaim to humanity was for all people and for all areas of our lives. He came to heal and set free the poor, the oppressed, the blind, the captives and prisoners of judgment. Jesus applied Kingdom liberation to every form of oppression. Jesus sets a pattern of speaking the truth in love and then following through with action. He does not just talk about the Kingdom. He acts upon it. Read More 


The Crown of Beauty

This weekend, we started our “Beautiful Life” series! Sometimes, the state of the world can make life look so ugly, but God is a beautiful God that wants us to understand that life was meant to be enjoyed as beautiful. God wants to give us “beauty” in exchange for the “ashes” of our everyday existence and give us crowns that let us know who we were created to be in God. Read More 


Being Beautiful

There are various opinions about what it means to be a Christian. One thing that does not get mentioned often is the idea of being “beautiful.” The truth is that the Kingdom of God is a reality of beauty. And Jesus, who is the King of that Kingdom, is also beautiful. When Kingdom reality is lived out by people who … Read More 


The Spirit, the Kingdom and Politics

Following a recent article in the New York Times, Scott revisited some of the questions raised by Greg in his sermon series, “The Cross and the Sword.” As a new pastor at Woodland Hills, he told about how he first learned of the sermon series and the responses people had to it. Discussing the differences between the kingdom of this world and the Kingdom of God, Scott pointed out that as Christians, we are to belong first and foremost to God’s Kingdom, while still being engaged with what is happening in the world, but laying aside political differences when it comes to the body of Christ. Read More 


Bear Hug from a Manger

In an age when rulers were given titles like “savior” and “lord”, the true Savior of the world was born. The birth of Christ brought about a Kingdom that looks very different from the way the kingdoms of this world operate. In a lowly manger, God declared that his Kingdom was not of this world and that his love and salvation would embrace all of human kind. Read More 


Making His-Story

Zachariah’s Song alludes to over 35 different Old Testament scriptures. With the use of phrases like “God of Israel,” “to his people,” “from our enemies,” “his servant David,” and “our father Abraham” the reader of this song should recognize how Zachariah is looking back. But he is not just looking back. He is looking back to look forward. He is using the actions of God recorded in the Old Testament as a backdrop for the even greater things God will do through Jesus Christ. With these allusions we can see how God makes His-Story, how the story of God’s dealings with Israel becomes the story of God redeeming the entire world. Read More 


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