The Kingdom of God (Part 3)

The Kingdom of God (Part 3): “Beloved, grace and peace be unto you, from God our Father, and from the LORD Jesus Christ. Let’s continue the discussion we started about the Kingdom o God as taught to us by Jesus Christ. Verse 1 told us the Kingdom is a group of people who have a purpose, and go after it. Verses 2 thru 4 define these citizens. Let’s look at the text.
 
Matt. 25:2 And five of them were wise, and five were foolish.
Matt. 25:3 They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them:
Matt. 25:4 But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.
 
Of the ten that serve as examples for us, Jesus gives us some details about them. Jesus tells us five were wise, and five were foolish. The first thing this tells me is that it is possible to be in the Kingdom and be foolish. I can be a member of a church in good standing and be a fool. I can also be a part of the kingdom and be wise. Now to benefit from this text, first we should define the term wise. The word wise in the Greek has a few meanings, let’s highlight a few. The word wise here means, intelligent, mindful of one’s interests, thoughtful, i.e. sagacious or discreet (implying a cautious character; while 4680 denotes practical skill or acumen; and 4908 indicates rather intelligence or mental acquirement). The best definition I heard one give of this word is, one who operates with the end in mind.
So the wise believer knows what his or her purpose is, and operates, functions in such a way as to achieve that afore mentioned purpose. For example, if my purpose is to be near the sea, it is unwise, foolish to travel further inland. Once you have read the word of God, sought God through prayer and fasting for direction, and he has answered you concerning your request, it would be foolish to engage in activity, (whatever it is) that does not bring you closer to your goal. Being wise means I must be a thinker. You determine your destination; plot the course, then with malice and aforethought go toward that goal. How you achieve this goal is as important as achieving it.
Those who were wise were wise because they prepared for the journey. The foolish knew what their purpose was but did not prepare. Beloved prepare for your purpose. How do I prepare? In the scripture there is a method of reading scripture called typology. Many things in scripture gives us deeper insight my knowing the symbolism of a thing. Oil in scripture is a type of anointing. Meaning they go hand in hand. Whenever we see anyone being anointed for a task, usually we see oil being applied. So we can read this text this way. Of the ten virgins we see here, the foolish were understood to be foolish because the attempted to achieve their purpose without their anointing. We need God’s anointing to be wise Christians. To often we try to approach the purpose of God like non-Christians. We should not try living this life like Oprah, or thinking the way to achieve the purpose of God is by following Dr. Phil’s advice. Beloved the way to achieve our purpose is to do it God’s way. This is what God requires because God when he appeared, in verse 10, only the wise were allowed in, and Jesus (the bridegroom) shut the door. The best way for us to be shut out of the will, and purpose of God is to try to live out God’s purpose our way.

Yours Because I’m His
Leo Colon
pastor@ihpfwc.org
http://www.ihpfwc.org
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(Via .)