{"id":12987,"date":"2013-09-20T08:35:06","date_gmt":"2013-09-20T13:35:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/?p=12987"},"modified":"2013-09-23T07:25:21","modified_gmt":"2013-09-23T12:25:21","slug":"what-the-kingdom-of-heaven-is-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/what-the-kingdom-of-heaven-is-not\/","title":{"rendered":"What the Kingdom of Heaven is NOT"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Light<\/a> <\/small><\/p>\n

Theophilos Papadopoulos<\/a> via Compfight<\/a><\/small><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Who inherits<\/em> the Kingdom of Heaven?<\/p>\n

A lot of people say “Christians”. I doubt it; not across the board.<\/p>\n

That’s because there are some things this kingdom is not<\/span>:<\/strong><\/p>\n

1. Abstract. (It’s not an “idea” to which we ascribe. It often stops there, but that’s not it. It is the dominion<\/em> of God.)<\/p>\n

2. In the “sky”. (Nope. Heaven is not “up there” or “in the sky”. That’s silly talk. The Kingdom of Heaven is here and we can be citizens of it. It is not of this world, not in the sense that it’s elsewhere, or in the sky, or a place we live in after we die. It’s not of this world because it operates outside those bounds. It does not inhabit selfishness which we are rife with.)<\/p>\n

3. Later. (The Kingdom of Heaven is the Kingdom of God and it happens now<\/strong>\u00a0for you when and if you<\/span> act like a citizen of it.)<\/p>\n

4. It not<\/strong> about mere right belief. (It’s about right action<\/em> that comes from a core conviction.)<\/p>\n

5. It is inherited<\/em><\/strong>, not taken. There is no ascension to it either. God’s grace grants they we may be like him and see him as he is. The kingdom is his and we\u2013in being as he<\/em> truly is\u2013may have a part in it.<\/p>\n

Don’t grow callous to the pain and struggle of others. When you do, you pick your own hell because you pick the slow death of your soul. (To be clear, “soul” is not a ghosty thing, like Casper the friendly ghost. “Soul” is the core of you, the whole<\/em><\/strong> you, the unique piece of you joined with Divine Spirit…breath of Yahweh.)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Verses for reflection:<\/em><\/p>\n

Luke 17:20\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

20<\/a>\u00a0<\/b>Once Jesus\u00a0was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come. He answered them,\u00a0\u201cThe kingdom of God is not coming with a visible display.<\/strong>\u00a021<\/b><\/a>Peoplei<\/a>\u00a0won\u2019t be saying, \u2018Look! Here it is!\u2019 or \u2018There it is!\u2019 because now the kingdom of God is among\u00a0you.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0Matthew 5:3\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cHow blessed are those who are destitute in spirit,\u00a0because the kingdom from\u00a0heaven belongs to them!<\/p>\n

(Sometimes I can’t help but do some theology on this blog.)<\/p>\n

This is the way of Jesus. You might not be doing that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There are some thing this kingdom is not: 1. Abstract. (It’s not an “idea”. It is the dominion of God.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76],"tags":[4376,5354,927,1001,4377,1026,1445,1472,1524,1608,1614,1616,4716,1763,41,1930,1932,6329,56,2521,2545,4079,3022,3272,85,3421],"class_list":["post-12987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spirituality","tag-act","tag-blessed","tag-death","tag-divine","tag-do","tag-doubt","tag-ghosty","tag-god","tag-grace","tag-heaven","tag-hell","tag-help","tag-if","tag-in","tag-jesus","tag-kingdom","tag-kingdom-of-god","tag-kingdom-of-heaven","tag-pain","tag-people","tag-pharisees","tag-right","tag-selfishness","tag-struggle","tag-theology","tag-things"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12987"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12992,"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12987\/revisions\/12992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lisadelay.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}