The Kingdom of Eternal Happiness
There seems to be no end of televangelists, church pastors and roadside billboards preaching a "cheap grace" happy-clappy message of "Just say - 'Ah bleevin Jeezuz,' and you'll be guaranteed a home in the Kingdom of Eternal Happiness!" It doesn't matter, they say, which Jeezuz you bleevin: merely a great moral teacher, or a good man that God used, or a god-like being that appeared to be a human, just bleev! That's the magic formula to get free salvation and the secularized version of it: free homes, free food, free clothes, free TV, free phones, free education, free medical care, etc. ...until the money-printing presses burn out, the world heats up, and the hurricanes and floods take away the east, west and gulf coasts, leaving just the heartland of hard-working people who were taxed to pay for all the free stuff being handed out.
My point here is that a so-called gospel of "cheap grace" that whips up people into a state of euphoria by promising health and wealth on earth and eternal happiness in heaven is way out of sync with reality and with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, Who said: "If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever will lose his life for My sake, the same will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits his own soul? For whoever will be ashamed of Me and of My words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed, when He comes in His glory, and the glory of the Father, and of the holy angels" (Luke 9:23-26). And about those televangelists, church pastors and roadside billboards, Christ said:
"Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravening wolves. By their fruits you will know them. Do you gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree produces good fruit; but the corrupt tree produces evil fruit. A good tree can't produce evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree produce good fruit. Every tree that doesn't grow good fruit is cut down, and thrown into the fire. Therefore, by their fruits you will know them. Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven; but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 7:15-21).
These wolves in sheep's clothing are like the "coyotes" who promise to guide illegal immigrants across the U.S. border in exchange for a hefty fee that the wolves/coyotes keep, even if the illegals die in the desert or are arrested and deported. Those poor people believed the lie of an eternal paradise of "free stuff" just across the river, but in fact were sold down the river. The false prophets stroke the "sheeple" with soft, sweet words and gentle music as the offering plates are passed and their bank accounts are filled. But preachers who tell it like it is, who preach the pure Gospel of Christ, are like the prophet Jeremiah, who said to Hananiah the false prophet:
"Listen, Hananiah: the Lord has not sent you; but you are making this people to believe in a lie. Therefore thus says the Lord, Behold, I will wipe you off the face of the earth: this year you shall die, because you have spoken rebellion against the Lord. So Hananiah the prophet died the same year in the seventh month." (Jeremiah 28:15-17)
But Jeremiah, for his inveighing against the false prophets who foretold lies that the Jewish people wouldn't be conquered and taken away as slaves, eventually was arrested, thrown into a well, and later sawn in two. He complained to the Lord:
"Cursed be the day in which I was born: don't let the day in which my mother bore me be blessed. Cursed be the man who brought news to my father, saying, A manchild is born to you; making him very glad. Let that man be as the cities which the Lord overthrew, and didn't repent: and let him hear a cry in the morning, and shouting at noontime; because he didn't kill me from the womb; and so my mother would have been my grave, and her womb always great. Why did I come forth out of the womb to see labor and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame?" (Jeremiah 20:14-18)
The glory of the coming Kingdom as described in the New Testament is not the happy-clappy glory-halleluiah of the smiley-face "Ah bleevin Jeezuz" crowd. The Apostle John wrote about Christ's glory this way: "The time has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Most assuredly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains by itself alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit. He who loves his life will lose it. He who hates his life in this world will keep it to eternal life. If anyone serves Me, let him follow Me. Where I am, there will My servant also be. If anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him. Now My soul is troubled. What shall I say? 'Father, save Me from this time?' But for this cause I came to this time. Father, glorify Your name! Then there came a voice out of heaven, saying, 'I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again." (John 11:23-28).
How was Christ glorified? By dying and being buried, falling into the ground like a grain of wheat. The Apostle Paul stated that "through many afflictions we must enter into the Kingdom of God" (Acts 14:22b). And Paul wrote to the Church in Philippi that Christ "emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient to death, yes, the death of the cross. Therefore God also highly exalted Him, and gave to Him the name which is above every name; that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, those on earth, and those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father" (Philippians 2:7-11).
So the true glory isn't free, it costs us our whole life, becoming a "living sacrifice" in order to be transformed into Christ's image and likeness: "Therefore I urge you, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service. Don't be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God" (Romans 12:1-2). Also, "But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord, the Spirit" (2 Corinthians 3:18). The word "transformed" is the same Greek word as "transfigured" like when Jesus was transfigured and shone in His glory. This is our goal as Christians: it isn't cheap or easy, but it's worth it!
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