KINGDOM OF GOD SERIES
“How do you enter the Kingdom”
REVIEW
- What priority does the Kingdom have? First Matt 6:33
- When is the Kingdom? Now
- Where is the Kingdom? Go to John 17:20-21
- Wherever God’s people dwell, where they come together…whether it be in China, Europe, Russia, in America…Kingdom is there within the believers
Question for today? How do you enter the Kingdom of God?
- Pray
TRANS: We have looked at what priority the Kingdom has, when and where the kingdom is, but now…
1. How Do You Enter?
- Who has the best chance to enter? A child…A rich man…A religious man
A prostitute…
- Who would you say had the best shot? You may be surprised by the answer
- Today I want to begin to talk about “How do you enter the Kingdom of God?”
- Go to Acts 16:14 “How do you enter the Kingdom of God?”
- I hope you will begin to ask yourself, “Am I in the kingdom today?”
- Jesus once said this, “accept a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom
- Then a couple of verses later, He said it again a little different, “accept a man be born again he cannot enter the Kingdom”
- Nicodemus, “How can I be born again? Do I have to enter my mother’s womb a second time?
- Jesus told him that’s not what he’s talking about, “Accept a man be born of water and of the Spirit”
- We say, What in the world does that mean? Well, He tells us
- Jesus is saying you must be born of the flesh and of the Spirit
- When you are born, you are protected by a cocoon of water and that’s the physical birth
- But to enter the Kingdom…you have to have a Spiritual birth
- What I am trying to tell you is you don’t choose to be born of God
- Listen, you to didn’t choose God first… for you to enter the Kingdom, God’s Spirit has to start working on you
- Look at Acts 16:13 – 14 (Read)
- She went and was listening…then she has this divine appointment
- God opens her heart to respond…God’s at work…God’s making a difference
- Go with me to John 6…there is a mystery…Jesus said “You must be born again.”
- He said the wind is out there…it is like the Spirit and it blows where it wants to
- And the Spirit of God when He wants a man, He begins to blow…
- It’s a supernatural deal
- See I believe in universal opportunity 1 John 2:2 says, Jesus was the payment for our sins, not only ours but for the whole world.”
- I believe in universal opportunity but I also believe that no man can come to God unless God first begins to draw him
- God has to be working on a man’s heart, working the ground, laying the ground work
- If someone is not coming to the Father, it is because the Father is not drawing them
- The Jews were grumbling because they did not understand what Jesus was saying
- Jesus is telling them don’t worry about it…these things are spiritually discerned
- If you can’t understand em I’m not worried about it because it is about God and not about me, not about you
- But if you do start to understand these things, then God is starting to quicken you to life
- Look at verse 41
- Don’t grumble, don’t fret…if a man comes to me…God’s gonna open their heart to understand
- You can’t come into the Kingdom any other way
- One day as God begins to draw you…your eyes are opened and you begin to see
- Say, What does the Spirit of God begin to say to you or reveal to you?
- I want to share with you what the Spirit of God begins to reveal
A. My condition – Jesus tells the Pharisees, tax-collectors and prostitutes will rush into the Kingdom long before you will
- Here is a religious man that fasts twice a week
- Stands on the corner and quotes loud prayers
- Tithes everything he owns including what he grows in garden
- And Jesus tells him, “good luck”, these prostitutes are going into the Kingdom
- These tax collectors are going into the Kingdom but you…EEEHHHH!
- WHY? Because you can’t get into the Kingdom unless you first are lost
- Then, can you get saved…I think many isle walkers, many been dunked, and signed a card
- But they never got saved…you know why? Because they never quit depending on themselves
- Honestly, religious people are not going into the Kingdom
- Jesus says, “You want to know who is going into the Kingdom, those who are poor in spirit, theirs is the Kingdom of God” (Matt 5:3)
- The bible says “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God”
- There is none that is good, none are righteous…not even one
- All my righteous is as dirty, soiled, nasty, filthy rags
- Paul says “O retched man that I am” Isaiah says, “I am a man of unclean lips”
- The people that come into the Kingdom are those that realize they are HOPELESS, HELPLESS, UNDONE, and they are done for
- But Jesus said, “The poor in spirit…those who realize they are undone, hopeless…theirs is the Kingdom of God”
- Ask yourself this morning, Has God ever shown you your unworthiness? You hopelessness? The real you without Him? How dirty and stained you are?
- If He has, then it causes me to mourn, and to throw everything on Him and trust in Him and not in me
- God comes and He says, “You’re undone, you’re a wreck and there is nothing you can do to make yourself worthy to me”
- Then at that point, we cast ourselves on the mercy seat of God and then He makes us clean, He makes us right with Him.
- When you go on the street, most of the people that we would consider down and out will take a gospel tract
- But the guy with the three piece suit and the chairman of board job…he won’t take a tract
- Why? Because he don’t see his need for God…he is counting on his righteous…his riches…his position
- But the bible says, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom”
- But the good news is…a few verses down from that passage in Matt 19, Jesus says that what seems impossible with man is possible with me.
- A rich man can enter the Kingdom of God but he must be willing to first give up his riches
- What I am trying to say is the Spirit reveals my condition…that’s why tax collectors and prostitutes can enter the Kingdom
- They knew they had a need they could not meet…not good enough
- He paid a debt He did not owe…
- Jesus became the payment for my sins…I couldn’t pay it…so He did
- 1 John 1:9 says, If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to FORGIVE us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness”
- Next week we will continue as we look at 2 aspects of forgiveness in the Kingdom of God
CONCLUSION
- What priority does the Kingdom have? First Matt 6:33
- When is the Kingdom? Now
- Where is the Kingdom? Go to John 17:20-21
- Who can Enter the Kingdom?
- So far we have seen…God’s salvation is universal
- But God has to draw you…quicken you
- Hard for a rich man to enter
- But prostitutes, tax-collectors, those who are poor in spirit there is the Kingdom
- When God does begin to work, He shows me my condition
- Helpless, hopeless, undone
- Next week we will continue as we see two aspects of God’s forgiveness
- Invitation……………pray
