In this next section I would like to look at the necessity of faith for God says without faith it is impossible to please Him. If that is what God says then we need to understand exactly what faith is and how it applies to our relationship with Him. These next episodes will give you some practical ways to apply faith to all you have learned so far.

• Luke 17:20, 21(1)
• Hebrews 11:6 (2)
• Romans 6:16 (3)
• Romans 6:18, 19 (4)
• James 1:25 (5)
• Matthew 5:6 (6)
• Luke 19:14 (7)

Good morning, and welcome to another Lesson From The Tent. I am sitting at my desk in the tent, and as I do quite often, I have rolled up one side of my tent to allow a soft, cool breeze to blow inside.

Just outside the bug netting about six feet away is a small flock of grouse meandering by. They are unaware of me, so they are in no hurry. Watching the goofy way grouse walk adds some great entertainment to my morning. God definitely has a sense of humor.

This week we will review lesson #4 about the Invisible Kingdom and apply faith and believing to this mysterious wonder. I will be concentrating on the main thought of that lesson where Jesus said:

“The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed; nor will anyone say, ‘Look, here it is! Or, There it is!’ Then Jesus said, ‘pay attention to what I am about to tell you next; the kingdom of God is in your midst.’”(1)

What Jesus taught here is a great challenge to faith, for He revealed the kingdom of God cannot be seen by our human eyes. Yet, it is real, and it is powerful, and it resides inside God’s favored ones. Remember that faith is the assurance of things hoped for, and the conviction of things not seen,(2) which certainly applies to the invisible kingdom.

If you remember, the original word for kingdom refers to the reign of a king. It has nothing to do with land or a castle. So, if we are talking about faith in the invisible kingdom, then the actions of faith must first, be willing to acknowledge and surrender to God’s invisible reign, and second, any actions of believing must be in harmony with God’s visible word the Bible, just as if God was standing next to you asking you to do something for Him.

When God created us humans, He designed us to become slaves of doing what is right. But when the first two people disobeyed Him, that slavery to righteousness suddenly reversed and all humans from that time on became enslaved to doing wrong. Listen to what God says about this in the Bible.

“Don’t you realize that you become the slave of whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to sin, which leads to a change in the way you experience life for the worse, or you can choose to obey God, which leads to righteous living.”(3)

And then God follows this up by saying:

“I am using the illustration of slavery to help you understand this. Previously, you let yourselves be slaves to doing wrong, which led you deeper into sin. Now you must give yourselves to doing what is right so that you become slaves to righteousness.”(4)

And God calls being enslaved to doing right as the type of freedom that leads to a life of rich happiness.(5)

Like everything about God there is great benefit in obeying Him. But it all comes down to a willing attitude of surrendering to the invisible kingdom reign of God living inside of you. Faith must have the assurance and conviction that the invisible kingdom does live inside God’s favored ones, and that He wants us to willingly surrender in obedience to His will. The believing actions of this will then be seen in a person’s desire for a righteous lifestyle.(6)

One day Jesus taught a parable that illustrates what this type of willing surrender to the invisible kingdom looks like. If you remember, a parable is a story that may not be true in all its details but is absolutely true in the lesson it teaches.

In this parable, Jesus revealed what the correct attitude of surrender to His invisible reign is like, and He teaches this through a group of people who actually have the wrong attitude. We see this in what they say about the nobleman, who in this parable represents Jesus, and I quote them, “We don’t want this man to reign over us.”(7)

The word want used here actually reveals the correct attitude Jesus is looking for from those in His kingdom. The original word means to love to or take great pleasure in doing something. And these people strongly admit they do not want Jesus to reign over them. That is a clear revelation they are not God’s favored ones.

This parable reveals everything we need to know about the correct actions of believing. The followers of Jesus should take great pleasure in surrendering to His reign, and they willingly do this because they love being under His rule.

This is the right attitude a person with faith in the invisible kingdom should have, and you can see how this attitude of believing would affect a person’s relationship with God.

With God’s power, He can make even His enemies surrender to Him. But God does not use His power to make someone love to obey Him. But, because the Spirit of God resides inside His favored ones their desire to do righteousness is something that God’s Spirit naturally produces. And that’s why surrendering to His reign is so important to His favored ones. We simply surrender to doing what is right.

One thing that stands out loud and clear throughout the Bible is attitude is everything to God. Therefore, following Jesus comes down to willingly letting the invisible Spirit of God lead us. This is why we need to get to know the Bible so we can learn how God wants us to act while living in His invisible kingdom. The Spirit of God will move a person to do what the Bible says with an attitude that loves doing it.

Remember, the result of obedience to God’s word is becoming a slave of righteousness. Whereas disobeying His word results in enslavement to sin. This is the choice God’s favored ones have every day, while those who are not His favored ones have no choice but to live enslaved to sin.

Well, that’s it for today and once again, there’s just one thing ─ The kingdom of God may be invisible, but real faith responds with an attitude that loves doing what the Bible says.

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