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Kingdom Of Heaven | Kingdom Of God

Daily Bible For Advent | Parables Of Jesus Recalled | The Lost Sheep | Children In Christian Faith | Jesus And A Child

In these verses of the Bible, Christ expresses the love of God for all people. Christ’s is not an exclusive calling, nor especially a calling to those who most clearly, visibly, seem to adhere to the requirements of the Old Law; he has come to bring home to God those who have wandered, sinners who have fallen far from the Law. When a sinner comes home to God, there is incredible rejoicing in heaven. So we, though we may sin, should never be afraid to return to the Church, to say sorry, confess our sins, and find forgiveness [ … ]

Daily Bible For Advent | Jesus’ Prayer And Healing | The Sermon On The Mount Concludes | Sin And Faith | The House Built On A Rock

Matthew’s account of the Sermon on the Mount has been related through the whole of chapters five, six and seven of his Gospel. Jesus concludes his teachings with today’s Bible verses, which carry both a promise and a warning. Commencing with the Beatitudes, Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount has presented to the people, toward the start of his ministry, a most beautiful, transformative understanding of God’s call to us to be with Him and to live according to the real, inner truth of the law [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | Prayer And Vigilance | Watch For The Son Of Man | End Times | Kingdom Of God | Jesus Is Coming Soon

Most of the signs Christ describes to his listeners in the eschatological discourse had already been realized by the time Luke’s first audience would have heard his Gospel. There had been, and were, wars, persecutions, family conflict, and Jerusalem with the Temple had been destroyed. The Christians of Luke’s time listening to these Gospel verses, of today and since Tuesday, could then have been encouraged to know that they were very close to Christ’s full revelation, his apocalypse, and so have courage to bear persecutions and other great challenges of the early Church [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | The Lesson Of The Fig Tree | Kingdom Of Heaven | Kingdom Of God | Jesus Christ Is Coming Soon

Just as Jesus’ listeners know how to interpret signs in nature, the trees beginning to bud and shoot new leaves as they come to life in spring, so Jesus tells them that, when they see and experience the upheavals described by Jesus in our Gospel verses of the past few days, they will know that the Kingdom of God is near [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | The Eschatological Discourse | Destruction Of The Temple | Kingdom Of Heaven | Kingdom Of God

In Luke’s account of the eschatological discourse, the apocalypse – from the Greek for revelation – is clearly envisaged as beginning in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in AD 70. The natural world is portrayed as being in a state of turmoil, and this reinforces for the listener the impact of what will be – has been by the time of Luke’s writing – a political event.  The Jewish rebellion and the sacking of Jerusalem will be brutal and bloody [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | The Day Of Christ’s Coming | King James Audio Bible KJV | Love Revealed By Jesus Christ

Jesus continues to speak to his listeners about the apocalyptic coming of the Son of Man. Using a highly elevated, figurative language, laden with symbol and metaphor, Jesus describes the second coming, or Parousia, which marks the end of this period of history and the inauguration of the new age, the days of the Son of man; it is a scene of sudden, violent destruction and transformation, and a scene of judgement [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | The Coming Of The Kingdom of God | King James Audio Bible | Love Revealed By Jesus Christ

The Kingdom of God has come in the person of Jesus. This is Jesus’ message, and it is this that will lead to his being crucified. It is this toward which the language of apocalypse directs us: our old way of being fractures with the coming of Jesus; the new reality of which we are a part is as lightning flashing across the sky – across the whole sky, the whole of our world, from one side to the other. And still we are told there is to be no visible sign of the coming of the Kingdom. It is within us, in the midst of us, when we walk as disciples with Jesus [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | Faith As A Grain Of Mustard Seed | Forgiving Offences | King James Audio Bible KJV | Parables

To cause scandal is to drive other people away from the path of faith, to cause another person to sin, to withdraw from a life of grace, to cease to believe in redemption in Jesus Christ. This is a terrible sin, and we know that it does not stop there. The evil spreads, and soon it is common practice to denigrate Christianity. We think of the millions upon millions of little ones – and this in ‘Christian countries’ – who have never been introduced to Jesus, and of all the attendant troubles they experience because their spiritual lives have not been fostered. The signs of this spiritual neglect are endemic, while when many people speak against Christianity they do not even know what it is that they are objecting to; they have become in so little time so far removed from what could have been their inheritance, the living faith [ … ]

Parable Of The Unjust Steward | Parables Of Jesus | King James Audio Bible KJV | Love Revealed By Jesus Christ

Today’s parable may seem to us to be very strange. Fired for corruption, for being wasteful with the rich man’s property, the dishonest steward goes on to compound the error with outright criminality, marking down the debts of the rich man’s debtors in order to secure future favours. And Jesus praises him! [ … ]

Parables Of God’s Mercy | The Lost Sheep And The Lost Coin | King James Audio Bible KJV | Parables Of Jesus

The publicans (tax collectors) and other sinners are drawn to hear Jesus’ teaching. Perhaps they feel Jesus offers hope to them especially. While the scribes and Pharisees, despising sinners, find Jesus behaviour as he mixes with such people to be utterly objectionable, Jesus receives all humanity with love, understanding and, where there is faith and repentance, forgiveness. It is as if the people know that they are not condemned but can be accepted by Jesus. He offers them hope [ … ]

Parable Of The Invited Guests | What Do Jesus’ Parables Mean? | Audio KJV | Vocation | Kingdom Of Heaven | Prayer

The Jews of Christ’s time thought of the coming of the Messiah and the restoration of Israel in terms of a great banquet, where poverty would give way to plenty and conflict to fellowship. Jesus has told two parables, while he dines at the house of the leader of the Pharisees, one of the choice of places at a feast and one of inviting the sick and the poor. In the light of the parables, a guest at the meal is moved to express the hope of the coming of the Messiah [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses For Lent | The Greatest Commandment | Love Revealed By Jesus Christ | Love Your Neighbour As You Love Yourself | Kingdom Of God

Jesus has discussed the resurrection of the dead with those who question him. He has spoken truly and in accordance with the Old Testament teachings of the Bible. The scribe who now asks Jesus his question is clearly a just man; he is not seeking to test Jesus but rather to learn from him and discover the truth. Jesus sees this and makes time to speak to the scribe quite plainly. The scribe accepts what Jesus has to say and we hear of Jesus’ message sinking into his heart [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | O Jerusalem, Jerusalem | Herod Threatens Jesus | King James Audio Bible KJV | Kingdom Of God

Some few of the Pharisees now show solidarity with Jesus, warning him that Herod Antipas means to kill him. Herod has previously expressed a wish to meet Jesus (Luke 9: 9), about whom he was perplexed, wondering if John the Baptist had risen again. We do not know whether the Pharisees simply want to get Jesus to go away or if there is danger [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | The Narrow Gate | Christ’s Judgement | King James Audio Bible KJV | Love Revealed By Jesus

Christ’s journey from Galilee to Jerusalem is an ascent, literally, that occupies the central third of Luke’s Gospel. When the journey begins, it is made explicit that this is a journey toward the cross: ‘And it came to pass, when the time was come that he should be received up, he stedfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem…’ (Luke 9: 51) Christ’s teachings as he and his disciples travel are cued to the sense of steady, deliberate movement toward the Passion [ … ]

Parables Of The Mustard Seed And Of The Leaven | King James Audio Bible KJV | Love Revealed By Jesus Christ

The two parables make it clear that Christ intended the newly inaugurated phase of the history of our salvation to be the work of ages. His second coming was not to be an apocalyptic end of the world as we know it in weeks, months or just a few years after that first Easter. The world’s faith would grow with time. Christ’s Church would grow, to encompass the whole world. Christ intended the Gospel be preached to everyone the world over and through all subsequent history [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | A Life of Humility and Service | Is It Lawful For A Man To Put Away His Wife? | Jesus’ Teachings On Love

Jesus has told his disciples about the Passion to come for the third time, as they journey to Jerusalem, and still this grizzly series of events, of mockery, scourging and death, is quite beyond the disciples’ comprehension. It is a great testimony to the apostles’ honesty and humility that, in recounting the Gospel, they do not seek to conceal their early weaknesses; these men chosen by Jesus have yet to be transformed through grace, to become the great pillars of the Church. Now further weakness is recalled, as the disciples reveal their ambition to have a powerful and prestigious position when the Kingdom comes [ … ]

Daily Bible Verses | Follow Jesus | Kingdom Of God | King James Audio Bible | Old Testament Prophecies Of The Kingdom

It is not for us to adapt Jesus to our lives; it is for us to conform our lives to Jesus. This is a lesson of these Gospel verses. Once we have heard the call of God through Jesus, there must be no umming and ahhing, no by now secondary considerations interfering in our new relationship with Jesus. Our life should now be his. As and when it is proper, all else will follow. If it isn’t appropriate, then it won’t [ … ]

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