Practicing The Presence Of God: Following The Beat Of The Kingdom

I recall a few weeks back I was trying to get into the mindset of Christmas, so I was watching old Christmas cartoons from the mid 1900s. A fair amount of it was oddly poisonous to my spirit. It was not edifying or encouraging to my inner man. It was a lot of self focused desire for stuff, a lot of santa claus in the red suit giving people toys. So be it. One after another was pretty bad, pretty boring, but then I came along the little drummer boy. It was made in 1968, a stop motion film about the little drummer boy meeting the baby Jesus.

In any case I watched this cartoon and found myself, laughing and kinda thinking to myself man this is stupid. But when I got to the end, something caught my attention that has stuck with me ever since. It’s something where I left feeling that I had been edified by the film, and that God had been in it after all.

The drummer boy comes to the baby Jesus and plays his drum. And everyone starts nodding along to the beat, the people around, the animals, everyone nods along to the beat.

And I realized that’s really what happened when Jesus was born into the world. The kingdom of God came with power, and with that, people became different, something fundamental changed. And a new beat took over, and spread to millions, the beat of the kingdom of God, and it’s so different from the messed up beat of the world. There is a new beat.

The ”beat” of God is what true Christians have, they walk in the mindset of Jesus Christ. They see the world around them through that lens.

There is a competing system, and that is the world system, which is under the control of the evil one. More and more it nearly forms itself into an opposing religion, another all encompassing way of seeing reality.

It vys for the hearts and minds of lost humanity, and claims to be a way out for humanity. Just as Christianity claims to be a way out for humanity.

Like any radio station, we can only tune in to the station if we’re on the right channel. If I want to listen to K-Love and I’m on 107.9 it’s not going to work. I need to turn over to 89.1.

Similarly, you will follow the beat of that which you’re tuned into. If you’re tuned into the world system, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, PBS, NPR, Ny times, Washington post, major academic institutions, political groups, television, Hollywood, celebrity gossip, then you will be in fact tuned into the world system, and you’ll walk in step with the world system. It will dictate how you think, what you think about, and what causes and effort you focus on in the world.

Similarly, if you tune in to the Bible, prayer, daily devotionals, sermons on Youtube, biblical Christian speakers, Christian books, Christian media, Christian newspapers and websites, then you’ll be tuned into God’s system. If you listen to the prophets you’ll be aware of prophecy. If you listen to biblical teachings, you’ll have biblical knowledge. If you study end times, you’ll have knowledge on such things. That’s a good vein to be in. But you can be tuned into the body of Christ, and still not find yourself in step with God’s plan and purpose for your life.

There is a lot of false doctrine out there in the body of Christ, from once saved always saved to cessationism, to Calvinism itself, so we do really have to be careful what teachers we’re listening to in the body of Christ. Because we may just be led astray, if we’re not careful.

To really be in alignment with God’s purposes and plans you need to do something mentioned in scripture, from Romans 12:2, “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

You need to learn to test and approve what God’s will is. This is done through prayer, asking God for help on a particular, specific topic, and then studying the word for clues about God’s wisdom on the topic you’re questioning about. This also takes time. Give yourself time as you seek an answer from God.

That’s all well and good, but, I’ll tell you this, you will naturally lean toward God’s will in your life if you have something very basic, which is our theme for today: The Presence of God.

If you have cultivated a lifestyle in Christ in which Christ is the center of your life, and you’re in constant communion with God throughout the day, you will walk in the cloud of the presence of God at all times, and you will naturally incline toward God’s will, God’s heart on a particular topic, and God’s purposes for your life, for your state, your nation, and the world.