The Fullness of the Kingdom of God…“but Christ is all and in all.”
To See God’s New Creation before You. To Glimpse the Kingdom of Heaven living and breathing right before Your Own Eyes. How might this happen?...
The Fullness of the Kingdom of God…“but Christ is all and in all.”
To See God’s New Creation before You. To Glimpse the Kingdom of Heaven living and breathing right before Your Own Eyes. How might this happen?...
Colossians 3:1-11
3 If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. 2 Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. 3 For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.
5 Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience, 7 in which you yourselves once walked when you lived in them.
8 But now you yourselves are to put off all these: anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language out of your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his deeds, 10 and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him, 11 where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcised nor uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave nor free, but Christ is all and in all.
“All Glory Be to Christ” song lyrics set to the tune of ‘Auld Lang Sygne’
Should nothing of our efforts stand
No legacy survive
Unless the Lord does raise the house
In vain its builders strive
To you who boast tomorrow's gain
Tell me what is your life
A mist that vanishes at dawn
All glory be to Christ
All glory be to Christ our King
All glory be to Christ
His rule and reign will ever sing
All glory be to Christ
His will be done
His kingdom come
On earth as is above
Who is Himself our daily bread
Praise Him the Lord of love
Let living water satisfy
The thirsty without price
We'll take a cup of kindness yet
All glory be to Christ
All glory be to Christ our King
All glory be to Christ
His rule and reign will ever sing
All glory be to Christ
When on the day the great I Am
The faithful and the true
The Lamb who was for sinners slain
Is making all things new
Behold our God shall live with us
And be our steadfast light
And we shall ere his people be
All glory be to Christ
All glory be to Christ our King
All glory be to Christ
His rule and reign will ever sing
All glory be to Christ
All glory be to Christ our King
All glory be to Christ
His rule and reign will ever sing
All glory be to Christ
What does the Perspective of the Kingdom of God look like to God. We may never know unless it is revealed to Us by the Grace of Our Creator after Our Resurrection. But We can do three things to begin seeing the Kingdom in Our Lives here on Earth: 1. Get Glimpses of the Kingdom from Our Own perspective in moments of clarity and humility, in natural Human discourses/scenes/imagery where the Kingdom is living and breathing right in front of Us, as well as; 2. Imagine What it looks like from that Birds Eye View of God the Father; and 3. Read, Reflect and Understand Scripture.
I Do think that too many attempt the second of these two methods without perceiving the first or the third. Clearly When We read Scripture We are getting the straight and tried words of God, presented to Us as He intended. And if We are perspicacious enough to undertake the first method…We can actually see the Kingdom With Our Own Eye in the Flesh Here and Now.
I think Hegel was trying to imagine the Kingdom from God’s Eyes and then equating His extended meditation [through writing] to the exactness of God. This is the mistake of traditional pantheism. The ‘World Spirit’ is not God, it is Hegel’s words on God, which are not final. I’m much more impressed by St. Thomas Aquinas Who admitted that all of His Writings were like so much straw: “In the Thurston and Attwater revision of Alban Butler’s Lives of the Saints, the episode is described this way—
On the feast of St. Nicholas [in 1273, Aquinas] was celebrating Mass when he received a revelation that so affected him that he wrote and dictated no more, leaving his great work the Summa Theologiae unfinished. To Brother Reginald’s (his secretary and friend) expostulations he replied, “The end of my labors has come. All that I have written appears to be as so much straw after the things that have been revealed to me.” When later asked by Reginald to return to writing, Aquinas said, “I can write no more. I have seen things that make my writings like straw.”
—
Kind of in Line with the adage “I Know that I Know Nothing” Aquinas admitting that His Prolific Works here on earth are straw compared to the Full Divine Mystery is much wiser than Hegel claiming to know and speak for the Kingdom of God. Besides We know that God does not live through Human Beings, He Created Human Beings as separate from Himself out of an act of Love.
It is much more becoming and I have come through personal experience to believe that it is much more comforting and rewarding and awe-inspiring in the fullness of Faith, to see God’s New Creation before You. To Glimpse the Kingdom of Heaven living and breathing right before Your Own Eyes. How might this happen?
I have had the privilege to say Grace before Four separate Gatherings over the past Year. 3 of which I was saying it in front of almost all atheists at behest of the Host. And My 85 Year Old Uncle asked for Me to add longevity into the prayer for Him as well I prayed the same thing for another 80 Year old at the other gathering. In this I witnessed in Myself that I was carrying out the Kingdom of God in the Flesh and on the word of My prayer to People Who were yet to answer the Gospel. I felt blessed and chosen by the Spirit of My Fathers and the Spirit of Christ. When I go places, Old Men and Young Men give Me looks of Reverence [I wear a Crucifix everywhere]. Here I have glimpsed what it feels like to embody the Kingdom of God, Giving thanks to the Triune God I worship in the Name of Jesus Christ and by the Holy Spirit, given by God the Father.
I feel like the Greybeard Wise Old Man even though I am not yet Thirty. The point being that the Christian Patriarchy already speaks through Me.
In this I have Glimpsed the Kingdom of God. And Out of All the Graces, the one that My Believing Aunt invited Me to give Grace On this past Christmas (2023) in front of My Intimate Family Gathering. Here I felt most fully to live, abide in the Glory of God as I praised Jesus’ name on behalf of My family.
Being too philosophical does not give the same enduring life tableau as of living-in faith, one which engenders in You the abiding Feeling of Belonging as being in the Kingdom of God.
I cannot say what it looks like from God’s Vantage, and I cannot see what My Imagination provides in the way of a World-Picture. But I can Feel Christ All-in-All as I bless a Meal on a Holy Day in the Name of the Lord, sanctifying My Whole close and loving family. This is what it feels to Be living in the Kingdom of Heaven, but more importantly to live side by side with My Creator and the Christ Jesus being in My Heart. I have seen this Newness of Creation, one that sublimes against all Idolatry or Hate, the Love that Conquers and Knowing Him Who Loved Us First.
In the Name of Jesus Christ I pray that all of You My Brothers and Sisters get to feel this feeling in Christ Jesus by the Holy Spirit in the Gift of Our Father in Heaven, Amen. – Gregory Mathew Wilford.