Jesus’s first public proclamation in the Gospel of Matthew is, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near” (Matthew 4:17). Through the person and work of Jesus, God’s effective power arrived on planet Earth.
A solid theological understanding of God’s kingdom is that it has come (through Jesus’s historical ministry), is coming (through the work of the Holy Spirit today), and will come (when God reigns supreme on earth as He does in heaven).
While it is God’s role to bring the kingdom, it is humanity’s responsibility to respond to it. The proper response is repentance—a change of mind that results in changed behavior.
The Sermon on the Mount provides the most comprehensive description of what happens when people recognize God’s right to rule and change how they behave accordingly. In this sermon, Jesus places special importance on both attitudes and actions.
“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.
On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’
Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; go away from me, you who behave lawlessly'” (Matthew 7:21-23).
The first thing we notice in Jesus’s message is that words alone are not enough. Our thoughts and words must be accompanied by action.
This makes perfect sense. Suppose you work in the court of a king. You might say all the right words, but if your actions reveal loyalty to the king’s enemy, you would be recognized as a traitor, not a loyal subject.
We may claim to be members of God’s kingdom, but the true test of that claim is whether God’s power actively controls our lives.
Traitors in earthly governments often appear to serve the king. They may even be high-ranking officials, but if their actions align with the nation’s enemies, they are traitors, not patriots.
Verse 23 points to two revealing factors. First, Jesus says, “I never knew you.” There is a vast difference between knowing Jesus and merely knowing about Him. Throughout Jesus’s ministry, demons frequently declared their knowledge of Him. However, they did not truly know Him, or they would have fallen down in worship and faithful service.
When we know Jesus for who He is, we will also respond with worship and service. To not know Jesus is to lack a personal relationship with Him in our daily lives.
Second, lawlessness is a defining characteristic of people who do not know Jesus. The effective reach of God’s power has not transformed their lives, and this is revealed in their attitudes and actions.
Your Inventory
Jesus didn’t teach us this so we could “take the inventory of another person,” as cautioned against in the literature of Alcoholics Anonymous. The best thing we can do is take our own inventory. Here are a few questions to ask ourselves:
- What is our relationship with Jesus like?
- Is what we say about Jesus matched by behavior that aligns with His teachings in the Gospels?
- Has God’s kingdom—the effective reach of His power—become the controlling factor in our lives?
- If we have negative answers to these questions, what changes need to take place?
YouTube Discussion
Rudy Ross, Bruce Kirby, and I discussed this passage on YouTube today.
Real Voices 