Week 21 - Sharing the Kingdom GospelGroup+PDFs/Week... · 2019-08-21 · 1 Week 21: Sharing the Kingdom Gospel Big Idea: An abundant, significant life, full of love, joy, and peace,

1

Week 21: Sharing the Kingdom Gospel

Big Idea: An abundant, significant life, full of love, joy, and peace, is available here and now in the Kingdom of God by placing your confidence in Jesus as your forgiver and leader.

Welcome back to Northway’s D Group Podcast. I’m your host, Rodney Mills. For months, we’ve been apprenticing our lives to Jesus. We’ve been learning to love, live, and lead like Him. In particular over the last few weeks, we’ve been looking at the ways we can lead like Him. We’ve joined the Sacred Order of the Towel, understanding that first and foremost, our role is that of a servant. That’s the way we lead.

We talked how we become people of influence by being salt and light. “I am here to make a difference for the Kingdom.” That’s our mantra as we walk through our homes and pull into the parking lot at work and sit at our desks in school.

We started getting more specific about our role as Trail Guides last week as we talked about Fishing Like Jesus. We discussed discovering Persons of Peace and about using Hospitality as a tool to begin leading people down the Disciple’s Trail. You’ll remember we talked about getting clear about three things: Clear about what you’ve received and what you’ve experienced, clear about what we have to offer, and clear about your assignment.

Well in this session, we want to go even further with this idea of getting clear. What is it we have to offer? What does Jesus have to offer? If our unchurched friends were to ask us to summarize in a nutshell what this Jesus Way is really all about, we want to always be ready to give a response. So let’s get real clear about it. Let’s talk about Sharing the Kingdom Gospel.

You do know that Gospel means “good news,” don’t you? It comes from the Greek word euangelion where the prefix eu- means “good” and angelion refers to a communicated message. Euangelion refers to glad tidings or a happy message being publicly announced and proclaimed. You might even visualize it as you hear the Christmas angels declaring to lowly shepherds, “Behold! I bring you glad tidings of great joy!” Euangelion on display. The angel - the messenger - proclaiming the good news. You can see how we get the word evangelist from it as well.

And that’s exactly what we find in the first four books of the New Testament. We see what came to be known as the Gospels. Four evangelists telling the good news in slightly different perspectives. They represent the whole story of Jesus - not just the death on the Cross for sins story - not just the Easter morning story - though those are certainly part of the Gospel as we will clearly see. We have to be careful not to truncate the Gospel to just one, albeit very important part of the story.

What I want you to see is that Gospel is much bigger than that. The good news - the full Gospel about Jesus - The Victory of Jesus - can be told in the shape of a V1. “V is for Victory!” as the Brits used to say during World War II! To see it more clearly in Scripture, we’ll first of all look not to one of the four primary gospels, but rather to Philippians chapter 2, where we take a few moments to review one of Paul’s many summary statements of the Good News. I’m starting in verse 5:

Philippians 2:5-11 CSB 5 Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus, 6 who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited. 7 Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when he had come as a man, 8 he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death— even to death on a cross.

2

9 For this reason God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow— in heaven and on earth and under the earth— 11 and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

V is for Victory. Even this short passage shows the V-shaped story of the Gospel.

We see first of all that Jesus preexisted before he walked the earth. In verse 6, Paul says that Jesus was “…existing in the form of God,” he preexisted his own humanity in an exalted state - equal status with God the Father. But from there we see a downward movement. Verse 7 says,”he emptied himself…taking on the likeness of man.” In churchy terms, this is called the incarnation. God the Son takes on flesh. And then we can see that he continued that downward pattern as his life is a journey toward the cross, and Paul says he “humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death…on a cross.” Buried in a borrowed tomb for three days, we reach the bottom of the V. On Easter Sunday, we celebrate the beginning of his upward movement as he was resurrected, appearing to hundreds of witnesses over the next 40 days. Jesus then ascended into the heavens before the disciples very eyes - his upward motion accelerating. But even that is not the end of the story either, friends.

For the climax of the full Gospel about Jesus is found in Paul’s words, “9 For this reason God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow— in heaven and on earth and under the earth— 11 and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” The real victory in Jesus is his coronation, that he is now enthroned at the right hand of the father, appointed as the Son-of-God-in-power, reigning as King of kings.

That, ladies and gentlemen is the full gospel about Jesus the Christ. Jesus Reigns! V is for Victory! The Lord Reigns. Long Live the King!

Now, this V-shaped Gospel ABOUT Jesus as King helps to clarify the Gospel OF Jesus - The Gospel that Jesus himself preached. So while we’ve talked about the whole Gospel - the big picture story about Jesus, let’s zoom in here for a few moments and discuss what we might call the Gospel within the Gospel. In fact, we can say this was distinctly part of his earthly mission:

As we’ve talked about from our earliest sessions together, Jesus came to preach the Gospel of The Kingdom. In Luke 4, Jesus says…

Luke 4:33 NLT “I must preach the Good News of the Kingdom of God in other towns, too, because that is why I was sent.”

It was also the theme of his cousin, John the baptist and Jesus picked up right where John left off. Mark tells us:

Mark 1:14-15 NLT 14 …after John was arrested, Jesus went into Galilee, where he preached God’s Good News. 15 “The time promised by God has come at last!” he announced. “The Kingdom of God is near! Repent of your sins and believe the Good News!”

3

Repent and Believe became the keys to Citizenship in the Kingdom. And Everywhere he went, Jesus talked about The Gospel of the Kingdom. What is that you might ask? What is the Kingdom of God? Jesus clues us in as he taught us to pray. You know this line from what we call the Lord’s Prayer.

Matthew 6:10 KJV Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth, as it is in heaven.

You see, The kingdom of God is where what God wants done is being done. Where the will of God - the loving action of God on behalf of His people, is made manifest in the world. He described it best in what I’ve come to think of as His primary text for his gospel of the Kingdom, a quote in one of his earliest sermons from the Gospel Isaiah,

Luke 4:18-19 CSB 18 The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

And Jesus is preaching this Good News of the Kingdom, inviting all his listeners to step out of the darkness, to leave behind their disoriented lives and to experience a New Life now under the complete rule and reign of God. Listen to how he clarifies it:

Luke 19:10 CSB For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost.

Put another way, Jesus came to rescue and restore the disoriented. If you are lost or disoriented, you need to find The Way and Jesus says that He is That Way. “Come follow me - I’ll show you The Way.” He says,

John 12:46 CSB “I have come as light into the world, so that everyone who believes in me would not remain in darkness.”

This is the Gospel OF Jesus - “Stop fumbling around in the dark, stop trying to find your own way. Come follow me into the Kingdom of God - this is the life you were meant to live!” In fact, he even famously says,

John 10:10 ESV “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” Look friends, this is not just life after death - but Jesus’s real invitation is abundant life - a life of great significance, a life of love, joy, and peace available now in the Kingdom of God - on earth as in heaven. He didn’t beat around the bush with his invitation either. In Luke 5 he says,

Luke 5:31 NLT I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners and need to repent.

Repent and believe. He just kept using these terms over and over.

Now remember, to repent means to experience a radical and fundamental change in how you think about the world - to experience a reorientation to the life you were meant to live. It means admitting you’ve been loving the wrong things. It means rethinking your life in light of Jesus’ teachings and commands.

4

And when Jesus said to believe the Good News of the Kingdom, he didn’t just mean believe that it’s true, like you believe 2+2=4 is true. He meant to place your confidence in His authority and His teachings. To make Him the ruler, the king, the leader of your life. You’re no longer King of your life - He is.

In the Gospel of the Kingdom terms, to repent is to put to death your sinful and selfish thoughts and actions and habits and to believe is to give your allegiance to Christ the King, being raised to new life in the Kingdom. In a sense, responding to Jesus’ call is like participating in that V-shaped Story of the Gospel. Dying to sin - buried with Christ - raised to new life in Him. Listen to how Paul describes this cosmic transaction:

2 Corinthians 5:15, 17 NLT 15 He died for everyone so that those who receive his new life will no longer live for themselves. Instead, they will live for Christ, who died and was raised for them. 17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!

So to repent and believe are those initial steps, but the full call of Jesus includes a bit more. He makes it clear in Luke chapter 9:

Luke 9:23 CSB Then he said to them all, “If anyone wants to follow after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me.

This is really important to grasp. Jesus expects us to follow. It’s not just a one time decision in our heads. Our lives have to increasingly align more and more closely to His life. And Jesus says we do that by obeying His commands. He says in John 14…

John 14:21 NLT Those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them. And I will love them and reveal myself to each of them.

His disciple John says this as well…

1 John 2:3 NLT And we can be sure that we know him if we obey his commandments.

So if you put all of that together, here is how we respond to Jesus’ offer: Repent and Believe, Follow and Obey. It all goes together. That’s the life of a true disciple of Jesus - those who have accepted His invitation Repent and Believe, Follow and Obey.

And so now, our new life gets redefined. I think of it in four terms: The new believer receives Citizenship in the Kingdom, a Personal Relationship with the Father, an Apprenticeship to Jesus to teach us how to live His Way, and Holy Spirit Power and Partnership in the Mission to announce and enact the Kingdom Gospel, making disciples of all people.

Remember, Jesus calls us to be His disciples so that we in turn will lead others to be His disciples.

And the final act of this whole Kingdom drama is that In God’s timing, King Jesus will one day return, reconciling all things back to Himself, where his followers will rule and reign with Him in his forever Kingdom.

And that’s the whole gospel right there, friends. It is so important to understand this whole picture of the Gospel. Now, chances are, if you were to share the Gospel with someone, you won’t have to go into all of those details, but for the apprentice of Jesus, this is some of the most important information you can master. So let’s talk about how you too can share this incredible Gospel for yourself.

5

It may seem like I’ve just shared a lot, but I think there are some simple ways to remember it. Over the next couple of weeks, your D Group is going to be working on mastering the retelling of this full Gospel of Jesus’ life and message. There are essentially two versions to master—a simple version and an advanced version. So let’s start with the simple version. It’s a single sentence and it goes something like this:

The Gospel of the Kingdom | Simple Version: An abundant, significant life, full of love, joy, and peace, is available here and now in the Kingdom of God by placing your confidence in Jesus as your forgiver and leader.

That covers the primary offer, which is an abundant, significant life, full of love, joy, and peace, and it also covers what a person must do in order to have that life: placing confidence in Jesus to not only forgive the wrongness of our past, but to also be in charge of his or her life from now on.

So here it is again, the simple version of the Gospel of the Kingdom: An abundant, significant life, full of love, joy, and peace, is available here and now in the Kingdom of God by placing your confidence in Jesus as your forgiver and leader.

If you’re really short on time, an even simpler version would be, “Life now in the Kingdom of God by placing your confidence in Jesus as Leader of your life.” But I think the first version adds just enough embellishment to describe the kind of life that Jesus is offering: it’s abundant, a life of significance, a life of love, joy, and peace.

Now again, that’s the simple version. But to really tell the whole Gospel takes a few more moments. And again, you might not ever share all of this, but it’s critical for the apprentice of Jesus to have it in your heart, especially as you go about discipling other followers of Christ. This may take you some time to master, but have confidence. You can do this.

Again, you’ll want to print the manuscript so you can see the Kingdom Gospel diagram. As you’ll see, it’s a circle divided into four colors. Each of those colors represent a different act in this unfolding drama of the Kingdom of God. There’s also a grand finale as well.

You’ll see represented on the right side of the circle that which Christ has done for us, divided into two acts. The first act is about his life and teachings, while the second act is about his victory and authority. These two acts summarize the elements of the V-shaped gospel story of Jesus we talked about earlier. The left side of the circle is about us, also divided into two acts. The third act is our response to his offer and the fourth act is related to our new life. The grand finale has to do with our future hope when Jesus reconciles all things and we as His followers rule and reign with Him in His forever Kingdom. Here it is in outline form, and I’ll just read through it. Remember, you’re going to want to do your best to get very comfortable sharing this as well.

6

The Gospel of The Kingdom | Advanced Version

Act One: The Kingdom Of God has come through Jesus. He is Christ, God’s one and only son. He came to earth to announce the truth of the Kingdom, showing us the way to an abundant and significant life in the here and now. (Love, Joy, and Peace. This is the Jesus Way, the life you were meant to live!)

Act Two: He died on the cross for our sins, was buried and resurrected on the third day according to Scriptures and now reigns as King at the right hand of the Father.

Act Three: In his great love and by his amazing grace, God our Father is saving everyone who repents and believes, follows and obeys. • Repent: Rethink your life in

light of Jesus’ teachings/standards.

• Believe: Have full confidence in the authority and teachings of Jesus. • Follow and Obey: Abandon your old ways of thinking and increasingly align your life to the Jesus Way.

*By the way, that’s faith!

Act Four: The new believer receives Citizenship in the Kingdom, a Personal Relationship with the Father, an Apprenticeship to Jesus to teach us how to live His Way, and Holy Spirit Power and Partnership in the Mission to announce and enact the Kingdom Gospel, making disciples of all people.

The Finale: In God’s timing, King Jesus will one day return, reconciling all things back to Himself, where his followers will rule and reign with Him in his forever Kingdom. *That’s Hope!

And there you have it! Even this advanced version is only about 250 words but still covers all the essential elements of the whole Gospel about Jesus and the Kingdom Gospel of Jesus. Each little word and phrase has been carefully crafted to succinctly tell the whole story, so do your best to master it all. As you tell the story, you could draw or write out each element as you talk it through. Or maybe you’ve got this diagram saved to your smartphone or tablet and use it help you remember.

So that’s it. The Whole Gospel. Your assignment for the next couple of weeks is to master it - both the Simple version and the Advanced version. I know you can do this. This is not just some theological exercise. This is YOUR story, too. So let the words burn into your heart and mind. Own it, get comfortable sharing it. There is no greater news in the entire world and Jesus himself has entrusted it to us. Let’s make it known, friends. Let’s shout it from the rooftops. Our God Saves!

1 Matthew bates. Salvation by allegiance alone. 34 (First introduced by Ben Witherington III, Paul’s Narrative Thought World, 95)