Think Again
From Bob Hamp.
“Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.” So simple, yet so many ways we can misunderstand. I think the key to understanding this phrase, is understanding who it is is that spoke it and how He might be thinking.
Men and women who have spent a lifetime, (or even a day) in church are so bent towards connecting Scripture with behavior control, otherwise known as “The Knowledge of Good and Evil”, that almost all our experience and perception comes through that lens.
Repentance is much more about the blind seeing, than it is about bad people trying to be good.
Jesus never really met a man who was not blind. At least not in light of His way of seeing. Jesus could see all things, including the hearts and minds of men, and the swirling activity of the spiritual realm around us. Because He saw clearly, He could look at every man in every situation and see every aspect of both. Motives, hidden thoughts, fear, and even the spiritual forces lurking within each exchange, all were as visible to him, as traffic signs are to us. Such was the vista in the Kingdom to which He was accustomed.
Crippled as we are, we try to perceive reality through a singular set of “senses”. Sight, sound, touch, taste, fragrance. All these are senses which apprehend a single realm; the physical. Perhaps within this arena we could perceive clues, signs and symptoms of other arenas, but we could not see them. Like seeing tree branches move, while not seeing the wind that moved them.
Walking through a dark room, we would trip over furniture and obstacles we could not see. Turn on the light, the natural result is a different set of responses. Step around the table, stop and turn when solid objects are in our path.
Repentance is about changing the way we see. The natural result is a different set of responses. Repentance is about using a set of senses beyond the physical. Intuition, wisdom, revelation, faith (yeah, you remeber, the assurance of things NOT SEEN!) Operating by these senses, behavior change is a natural result of seeing clearly, as opposed to the application of will power. When we try to produce behavior change without repentance (Seeing Differently; with different senses) this is called, “The Knowledge of Good and Evil”
Repent for the Kingdom of the Heavens is at arms reach.
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