SO CLOSE, YET SO FAR AWAY

DAY 159

Mark 12:34 And when Jesus saw that he answered discreetly, he said unto him, Thou  not far from the kingdom of God. And no man after that durst ask him any question.

The words of Jesus today sound like those of a hard taskmaster. We could paraphrase it as such ‘Your answer is indeed full of wisdom and shows great understanding. However, you have not arrived in the kingdom of God yet.’ Therefore, there was still some way to go or something else that had to be in place.

The scribe in today’s Gospel was missing something ‘a revelation of the person of Jesus, the son of God, and becoming a recipient of His life through His finished work on the cross’. That was the only currency capable of translating any man into that Kingdom.

Whereever the Kingdom of God is preached, the name of Jesus is exulted. His name is the anchor of that message. As unusual as this sounds, it is true because ‘any person can have a wealth of information, even a deep understanding about the word of God, and yet remain outside the kingdom of God.

The foundation of the kingdom is the message of Christ: Christ incarnated, Christ crucified, Christ resurrected and Christ glorified. Your belief in this is what grants you admittance into the Kingdom of God. Else, you could be so close, yet so far away.

#sly