@sonship saidMan can unit but with a totally godless purpose and for a dystopian idolatrous monument of self glory. It can be secular or religious. It can be capitalistic or communistic. It can be be well intended in the eyes of the architects. The kingdom and the power and the glory are of God forever. It can never be for the fallen mankind withdraw from fellowship with God as thier life. Eventually the confusion will errupt. The misunderstanding, the scattering, the incompletion because this is not what man was made for by his Creator. But this love of God is for the salvation of the world and the eternal kingdom of God under His administration of righteousness.
Man can unit but with a totally godless purpose and for a dystopian idolatrous monument of self glory. It can be secular or religious. It can be capitalistic or communistic. It can be be well intended in the eyes of the architects.
The kingdom and the power and the glory are of God forever. It can never be for the fallen mankind withdraw from fellowship with God as t ...[text shortened]... the salvation of the world and the eternal kingdom of God under His administration of righteousness.
Gosh. Does all this answer the question: "How does the Sermon on the Mount, for example, equip a follower of Jesus, in practical terms, to face the challenges of the modern world that you are alluding to?"
If your answer is that Christians should do nothing, just come out and say it.
@sonship saidWhat do they do? Do they go out and tackle the "godless dystopia" around them in any way. If so, how? Or are they some kind of 'gated communities' populated by people with your mentality, being effusive about fellowship and deification, and telling themselves that the Sermon on the Mount is not about walking the Christian walk in this world?
We have models around the world.
We have workable, testable communities on every continent.
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@FMF
Read it first. I think you are only posed to pushback on any replies.
First Jesus said the kingdom of the heavens people are poor in spirit.
"And opening His mouth, He taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for thiers is the kingdom of the heavens."
Do you know what it is to be poor in spirit?
I can't be poor in spirit without realizing God exists.
No one who thinks God is a imaginary figure CARES to be governed by God or be a part of a kingdom of God. The hope and aspiration of this one is totally with what we can do WITHOUT regard to any God.
To be self sufficiently independent from any divine Father is the opposite of being poor in spirit. That is being rich within one's own resources in not NEEDING God, not wanting God, and certainly not wanting any administration of God - any "kingdom of the heavens" .
The first preperation for the end of the age repeat of the Tower of Babel like idol is to feel poor in spirit as needing God in their spirit and in their spiritual life.
We start here in our preparation, says Jesus. You are blessed if you are in need of spiritual wealth,. if you are poor in spirit and not haughty, self gloryingly indendent from your "heavenly Father".
This is somewhat mirrored in the life of Enosh in the fourth generation of mankind in Genesis. His name Enosh means frail mortal man. And in his day men began to call upon the name of the Lord.
Men having fallen away from the presence of God realized their fraility when Enosh was born.
"And to Seth also a son was born, and he called his name Enosh. At that time men began to call upon the name of Jehovah." (Gen. 4:26)
SOME people became aware that they were not so rich in themselves. They needed Jehovah God. They realized "You know, we may be very capable. But actually we are rather poor towards God and towards one another. We are frail. We better start to call out to God for our help."
This is like Jesus teaching first and foremost in His Sermon on the Mount -
"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs in ther kingdom of the heavens."
@sonship saidI am reading it. I think the rhetorical technique you are using is called spamming.
Read it first. I think you are only posed to pushback on any replies.
What are a few examples of the teachings in the Sermon on the Mount that you think Christians really ought to be turning into actual action in their daily lives, weekly, monthly, annually, in view of Jesus's commandments and in view of the fact he is believed to have laid down his life for them?
Give me ten dot points.
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In the Sermon on the mount in Matthew the term the kingdom of the heavens does not mean Heaven. It is not about going to the third heavens and there in Heaven being in God's kingdom.
The kingdom of the heavens means the kingdom whose Source and Origin is for heaven. The capital, so to speak, is in heaven where God the Most High reigns.
The kingdom is to COME rather that we GO to some place -
"Your kingdom COME. Your will be done ON EARTH . . . even as it is in heaven."
In the Sermon the repeated phrase "the kingdom of the heavens" involves God's adminstration arising in the hearts of some people on heart and consummating with it evenually coming TO the earth.
@sonship saidDo you think that Christians building schools, operating food kitchens, laying down water and sanitation, and working to prevent diseases in remote areas, and other similar things, whilst claiming to be inspired by Jesus to do so, are doing this in the wrong "kingdom"?
This is like Jesus teaching first and foremost in His Sermon on the Mount -
"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs in ther kingdom of the heavens."
@sonship saidWho are you talking to?
In the Sermon on the mount in Matthew the term the kingdom of the heavens does not mean Heaven. It is not about going to the third heavens and there in Heaven being in God's kingdom.
The kingdom of the heavens means the kingdom whose Source and Origin is for heaven. The capital, so to speak, is in heaven where God the Most High reigns.
The kingdom ...[text shortened]... rising in the hearts of some people on heart and consummating with it evenually coming TO the earth.
Are you blogging?
@fmf saidNO.. thats called good works done by people trying to save themselves, and it is condemned in Christianity. Their work without faith is the work of Satan.
Do you think that Christians building schools, operating food kitchens, laying down water and sanitation, and working to prevent diseases in remote areas, and other similar things, whilst claiming to be inspired by Jesus to do so, are doing this in the wrong "kingdom"?