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Dear Friend,
Have you ever moved house and been given a bunch of keys with no labels on so that you don’t know which key unlocks which door? Very frustrating and you can guarantee that half the keys on the bunch fit no door at all!
Sometimes in the life of our church family and in our daily Christian lives it can seem that faith faces a locked door and, if we are honest, many of us have often struggled to find the right key to use...sometimes it can seem that there is no key that will ever fit and we are faced with standing still and admiring the woodwork, rather than moving forward into the next room as we thought we should!
This term we will be tackling some of the doors in the life of our church to which we believe God has provided keys. Keys that represent spiritual truths that will help unlock spiritual growth both in the life of our church family and in our own personal walks of faith. Keys that will help the Kingdom of God grow here in Dorking, in our church family and across the world.>
‘Keys to the Kingdom’ is the title for this term’s teaching and focuses on:
~ the embracing of suffering, sacrifice and servanthood,
~ the importance of ‘good soil,’
~ the welcome of children
~ the Kingship of Christ both now and in the future.
Mark’s Gospel gives us a clear and concise context from which to explore these particular Keys to the Kingdom, vividly bringing alive for us the dynamic way in which Jesus - through His life, teaching, miracles, suffering, death and resurrection - ushered in the Kingdom of God.
As we study some of Mark’s teaching on these key Kingdom truths, please pray that God’s Holy Spirit will guide and help us unlock all that Jesus would show us for His Kingdom to grow here.
Every Blessing
Paul and Amanda
Keys to the Kingdom
Mark’s gospel is a very condensed Gospel, the shortest of all four gospels. Like a film, Mark rushes from one dynamic scene to the next using the words "immediately" and "straightaway" about 40 times to help the action flow.
So Mark traces Jesus literally travelling throughout Galilee, announcing the Good News of the coming of the Kingdom of God much as a proclamation of the Emperor's birthday might have been made in those days. In Mark 1:15 Jesus says two things about this Kingdom of God:
That the time has come for it to be preached and for a response to be given by the people - it is the right season.
It is near, or at hand, i.e. very close by!
It is clear from this reference that the Kingdom comes in two senses:
It comes specially wherever Christ is present physically because Jesus is the Kingdom Himself. Thus Jesus not only announces or proclaims the Kingdom but brings it in his person.
It comes to individuals in a spiritual sense. This spiritual quality is emphasises when Jesus equates child-like innocence and love as pre-requisites to entry to the Kingdom.
But the Kingdom is still more than this! A tension between the present and future aspects of the Kingdom is often referred to as "the now and the not yet" of the Kingdom of God. In other words a full vision or understanding of the Kingdom is yet to be fulfilled.
For Mark, the Kingdom of God calls for an acceptance of Jesus as Saviour for faith and repentance; for a call to witnesses to the suffering of Christ and for his disciples to take up their crosses and be willing to suffer too. The Kingdom of God is a testimony of the sovereignty of God, for the seed of the Kingdom grows by God's sovereignty and not man's. It grows ‘in secret’ and, like the mustard seed, produces growth and fruit that far outweighs the seed that was planted.
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