Repentance

"Repent, for the kingdom of Heaven is near."

Those were the words that Jesus taught. But what do they mean?

For some of you they may be the words that you heard shouted at you angrily from a bullhorn or the words you mostly ignore as you d rive past a billboard. For me growing up they meant something like "apologize and ask for forgiveness for your sins so that one day you can go to heaven."

But that's not what Jesus says it.

First of all when Jesus speaks of the kingdom of heaven he is not talking about somewhere far away up in the sky. The kingdom of Heaven or the kingdom of God is not primarily about where you go when you die. It's here and now according to Jesus. It's a reality to be lived into today.

It's urgent!

And not just because you never know when you will die and you need to have your ticket to heaven because it could be tonight. It's urgent because it's for today. It's urgent because its radically good news. It's urgent because God is doing something right here and right now. The kingdom of Heaven is an invitation to be a part of that.

It's why we repent.

But repentance is not primarily about apologizing, although it may very well involve that. It's about changing. Repentance is turning around and living a different way. It's about the starting of a transformation in your life. Repentance is realizing that the kingdom of Heaven offers a better way to live in God's world and then living that way.

The reason this message that Jesus taught was considered good news was not because it offered an escape clause from a doomed world. It was and still is good news because its a better way of engaging the world. It means being good news. It means being like Christ to the poor, marginalized, widowed and oppressed. And that is something that the world urgently needs.

It's a message of hope...

For all of creation.

Grace & Peace