Living Out The Kingdom

by Ashish Joy

What does it mean to live out Christ to the world? What does bear­ing the Cross look like? I’ve been think­ing about this for quite some time. Here are some of my thoughts…

To know Christ, the real­ity of Him; to be over­whelmed by the sheer good­ness of God; the glory of God man­i­fest in all of life.1 The won­der of a God who under­stands us in our frailty, and catches us in the rap­ture of His feroc­ity.2 The beauty of God, as seen in the redemp­tion of fallen human­ity, in the life that is caught in the aban­don of Abba’s love. 3

Let the love of Christ rule in us richly, and the peace of God rest in our going and com­ing. May the kingdom’s seed be planted in our hearts as we look to God’s grace upon the earth. Let the pres­ence of Christ sanc­tify us into His image; and may His good­ness speak to the world a mes­sage of the hope and promise of life in Him. May our hearts be so in tune with the pres­ence of God, that our hands and feet fol­low through in response.

For our hearts and minds, lost in the real­ity of God, must fol­low through in holis­tic lifestyle, which flows out in action.4 If we truly believe in the good­ness of God, then that good­ness must be assim­i­lated into our lives. If we actu­ally believe in the love of God, that love must some­how be evi­dent in our words and actions. If we truly believe that God is trust­wor­thy, then some­how His res­i­dence in our hearts must draw out trust­wor­thi­ness from an oth­er­wise untrust­wor­thy soul. If we believe in the holi­ness of God, then that real­ity would cause us to live in such a way that we are set apart.

If we are part of king­dom that is not of this world, how is it that we pledge our alle­giance so eas­ily to other king­doms?5 If God’s king­dom is so much big­ger than any tribe, or peo­ple, or cul­ture, or race, or nation, then why do we asso­ciate His king­dom so read­ily with our way of doing things?6 If God’s king­dom goes against the king­doms of men that have been set up, why do we so quickly fol­low because it requires min­i­mal sac­ri­fice?7 If God truly is the Lord of our lives, why do we live as if the econ­omy or cul­ture or sin­ful­ness lord over us?8 If we are part of a king­dom greater than what is seen or felt or known in the nat­ural, why do we let what is seen or felt or known dic­tate how we oper­ate in God’s king­dom?9

Is our faith just a set of beliefs, phi­los­o­phy, or ideals, which makes it a reli­gion at best?10 Or is our faith a liv­ing, breath­ing, mov­ing, active lifestyle, which makes it a rela­tion­ship with an all-powerful, ever-present, all-knowing God?11 If we actu­ally believe the things we claim to believe about God, would that not change the way we live?

The king­dom of God can­not be cap­tured in a box, or ana­lyzed in a test tube, so as to have a com­plete grip and under­stand­ing of it.12 The king­dom of God is not imper­vi­ous to true prophetic crit­i­ciz­ing and re-energizing.13 The king­dom of God is some­thing else entirely.

The effect of the king­dom can be seen, but its meth­ods are actu­al­ized to con­text; thereby the cause remains in God and His Word, but the real­ity is in the dif­fer­ence it makes in the world it has affected.14 The king­dom of God is truly at work.

  1. When it’s more than just living for Christ or because of Christ, but it’s about living in Christ, and Christ living in you; where the connection has become a inherent, soul, and spirit connection; where Jesus lives and breathes through you… ↩
  2. Jesus emptied Himself and became like us in every way. He was tempted like us. Though He did not sin, He experienced the weight of humanity’s sin upon that Cross. He understands us on our worst days, and joys and sings over us on our best days. At the same God is also a consuming fire, a blazing furious Spirit, who rules the heavens and the earth; a God we on our best days still feel inadequate to worship and consider as ours. ↩
  3. When God saves us from what we were, and makes something out of us. When God’s overwhelming loves picks us out of the muck and mire of depravity, and redeems us. We become sons and daughters of the Most High God; that is beauty at work. ↩
  4. A healthy understanding of God (orthodoxy) is necessary for us to follow through in right response (orthopraxy). Read more about this ↩
  5. We claim to be Americans or Canadians or…and we forget that we are Christians, citizens of Christ’s kingdom first and foremost. ↩
  6. There’s such a close-mindedness when we think of God’s kingdom. It is so much bigger than we can truly understand or even fathom. We must maintain a healthy doubt in thinking that we have a complete handle on kingdom living. ↩
  7. We do what is easy because it keeps us part of the status quo, even if we know we should say something. We do not want to draw attention to ourselves. We are afraid of not bowing down to false images of worship set before us like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego; afraid of going against the rule of the land like Daniel; scared to go before our monolithic religious structures that limit the work of God like Stephen; or in fear of stepping up and defending our faith in front our civil authorities like Paul. Where are the citizens of the kingdom of Heaven that fear God and do not fear man? ↩
  8. Why do we run to and fro, thinking that all is failing? If sin increases, does it change how we raise families, preach the gospel, or run our churches? If America or any nation for that matter collapses, does that somehow affect our Christianity? A resounding NO. We are who we are because God has put us in this situation, and if we are to go through hardship or storm, it is God who will help us through it all. ↩
  9. There is no place for citizen of the kingdom of heaven to lose his/her focus onto a kingdom of this world. Our focus must remain solely on the Christ’s kingdom, and how we can bring more people into that kingdom. ↩
  10. Is our faith just a worldview, or philosophic rubric, merely propositional and dry? Do we follow because traditions calls upon us to do so? Are we somehow caught up in a mental ascent? ↩
  11. Is our faith a divine dance between divinity and humanity? Are we caught up in the wonder of God, and living utterly and completely for Him? ↩
  12. Some would claim to be living according to the kingdom, but who makes that judgment? We have the blueprint in Christ’s life and teaching, but how do we truly know? Maybe it’s in the simple things like how we love our neighbor as ourselves, and how we love God. Maybe its about righteousness, peace, and joy. Maybe it’s about living selflessly. ↩
  13. Our interpretations of the kingdom needs to continually go through the prophetic criticism/re-energizing, where we analyze our present through the lens of history and our energized by the hope and promise of the future. ↩
  14. We only know the kingdom is at work when we see the fruit of the kingdom. We will know the cause by the fruit that is produced. Methods and practices can be taught and administered, but the fruit is what gives the kingdom away. ↩