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When Jesus talked about the gospel, He meant good news for you. He invites you to not only enjoy the world's best news yourself, but to help spread it!
God has sent you an incredible invitation. Did you get it? Have you replied?
When you read to the end of God’s Book, you are given a sneak preview of some amazing and awesome aspects of the event you are invited to. The descriptions are almost beyond human comprehension:
What do you call all these fantastic things? The Bible describes all this and much more as the Kingdom of God.
And you are invited!
God says, "I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts. He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son" (Revelation 21:6-7).
God offers you eternal life, the universe and to be His children!
Jesus then adds, "'And behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to give to every one according to his work …’ Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city" (Revelation 22:12,14).
The book of Revelation gives the end of this story, but we have to go to the Gospel of Mark to find Jesus Christ’s first announcement of this invitation.
After defeating Satan’s temptations, Jesus began His ministry by going to Galilee to preach the gospel of the Kingdom of God. "'At last the time has come!’ he announced. 'The Kingdom of God is near! Turn from your sins and believe this Good News!’" (Mark 1:14-15, New Living Translation).
Along with the good news (or "gospel" in older translations), Jesus told us how to respond to His personal invitation.
Sin is breaking God’s laws (1 John 3:4). God created His good and perfect laws for our benefit. And if we repent of sins and strive to follow His laws of love, we will be blessed.
Repentance involves both asking for forgiveness (through means of Jesus Christ’s sacrificial suffering and death in our place) and seeking to turn away from sin and live the right way like Jesus did. The good news motivates us to "seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness" (Matthew 6:33).
The gospel, or good news, was on the apostle Paul’s mind in his first letter to the Christians of Thessalonica. He mentioned it four times in the second chapter alone! In that context, he reminded them: "We pleaded with you, encouraged you, and urged you to live your lives in a way that God would consider worthy. For he called you into his Kingdom to share his glory" (1 Thessalonians 2:12, NLT).
By following Jesus Christ’s example of obeying God’s law of love, we will be living by the rules of God’s Kingdom now, and will be proclaiming the good news silently by our example (Matthew 5:16).
The second thing Jesus asked us to do to respond to His invitation is to believe the gospel. The Bible also calls this belief faith.
"What is faith? It is the confident assurance that what we hope for is going to happen. It is the evidence of things we cannot yet see …
"So, you see, it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that there is a God and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him" (Hebrews 11:1,6, NLT).
By studying the invitation (the Bible) and communicating with God through prayer, we can grow in our belief in these seemingly unbelievable promises.
We can come to know that the unsolvable problems of today’s world really can be solved. We can know that the hopelessness of humanity can be replaced with solid hope from God. We can believe that our loving God has truly invited us to be His children in His Kingdom forever!
Belief leads to action. Take time to study some of the actions God wants from us in response to His invitation: Mark 16:15; Acts 2:37-42; James 2:14-17. Helping to spread the good news, committing our lives to God and living the way of give are all part of our RSVP to God’s invitation.
To understand more about this wonderful good news of the Kingdom of God, read our inspiring free booklet The Gospel of the Kingdom.
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Keywords: gospel calling invitation kingdom of God seeking God belief faith
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