Has the kingdom become the unobtainable Timbuktu for believers.
I’ve heard of treasures within your walls, The quality of your citizenship speaks volumes, Many have journeyed but not discovered. We’ve heard, read and sang of a city veiled to many. But I am an explorer who will reach the forgotten kingdom.
Read Daniel 2:44, Matthew 16:16, Heb 12:22
The town of Timbuktu is located in northern Mali; it has come to represent a place far away. The Oxford English dictionary defines Timbuktu as “the most distant place imaginable”. Timbuktu was an immensely wealthy city, at the heart of important trading routes for salt and gold.
Writers like Leo Africanus, told of the immense riches of the city, this gave European explorers an acute curiosity for it. The inaccessibility of the city caused many expeditions to be abandoned by explorers, leaving it a place to be desired, but out of reach.
Before the rediscovery of the city of Timbuktu, all documents referencing to it were about the efforts it has taken to reach there. Some people said “It took 60 days from Tripoli” and others compared it to “El Dorado and Atlantis”, which solidified the mystical tale about the city.
The Kingdom of God is experiencing even more mysterious and outlandish references, much like the city of Timbuktu. The people has received two thousand years of outright lies and misguided messages presented to them about the Kingdom.Our ideologies and presuppositions have caused us to be alienated from concepts related to the kingdom. Statements like “I hope I can make it to heaven one day” highlights the deficiency in our understanding of the kingdom and its makeup. Believers have become mystical in basic facts relating to the kingdom.
Daniel spoke of the kingdom of God in this manner “...in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever”.The Father has established His kingdom through His Son, Christ Jesus, who was born King, lived, died, resurrected and ascended unto the throne.
Religion has made us depict the King of kings in our own image, as a mere figurehead of a religion. We have turned the throne of grace and the fortified city of Zion into steeples and bells, similar to the Israelites reducing Him into a four-footed animal and building high places in the land of Canaan.Our ideologies and presuppositions have caused us to be alienated from concepts related to the kingdom. Statements like “I hope I can make it to heaven one day” highlights the deficiency in our understanding of the kingdom and its makeup. Believers have become mystical in basic facts relating to the kingdom.
Daniel spoke of the kingdom of God in this manner “...in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever”. The Father has established His kingdom through His Son, Christ Jesus, who was born King, lived, died, resurrected and ascended unto the throne.
Religion has made us depict the King of kings in our own image, as a mere figurehead of a religion. We have turned the throne of grace and the fortified city of Zion into steeples and bells, similar to the Israelites reducing Him into a four-footed animal and building high places in the land of Canaan.The Father has established His kingdom through His Son, Christ Jesus, who was born King, lived, died, resurrected and ascended unto the throne.
Religion has made us depict the King of kings in our own image, as a mere figurehead of a religion. We have turned the throne of grace and the fortified city of Zion into steeples and bells, similar to the Israelites reducing Him into a four-footed animal and building high places in the land of Canaan.Our ideologies and presuppositions have caused us to be alienated from concepts related to the kingdom. Statements like “I hope I can make it to heaven one day” highlights the deficiency in our understanding of the kingdom and its makeup. Believers have become mystical in basic facts relating to the kingdom.
Daniel spoke of the kingdom of God in this manner “...in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever”. The Father has established His kingdom through His Son, Christ Jesus, who was born King, lived, died, resurrected and ascended unto the throne.
Religion has made us depict the King of kings in our own image, as a mere figurehead of a religion. We have turned the throne of grace and the fortified city of Zion into steeples and bells, similar to the Israelites reducing Him into a four-footed animal and building high places in the land of Canaan.
The Father has established His kingdom through His Son, Christ Jesus, who was born King, lived, died, resurrected and ascended unto the throne. Religion has made us depict the King of kings in our own image, as a mere figurehead of a religion. We have turned the throne of grace and the fortified city of Zion into steeples and bells, similar to the Israelites reducing Him into a four-footed animal and building high places in the land of Canaan.Our ideologies and presuppositions have caused us to be alienated from concepts related to the kingdom.
Statements like “I hope I can make it to heaven one day” highlights the deficiency in our understanding of the kingdom and its makeup. Believers have become mystical in basic facts relating to the kingdom. Daniel spoke of the kingdom of God in this manner “...in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever”.
The Father has established His kingdom through His Son, Christ Jesus, who was born King, lived, died, resurrected and ascended unto the throne. Religion has made us depict the King of kings in our own image, as a mere figurehead of a religion. We have turned the throne of grace and the fortified city of Zion into steeples and bells, similar to the Israelites reducing Him into a four-footed animal and building high places in the land of Canaan.
Our ideologies and presuppositions have caused us to be alienated from concepts related to the kingdom. Statements like “I hope I can make it to heaven one day” highlights the deficiency in our understanding of the kingdom and its makeup. Believers have become mystical in basic facts relating to the kingdom. Daniel spoke of the kingdom of God in this manner “...in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever”. The Father has established His kingdom through His Son, Christ Jesus, who was born King, lived, died, resurrected and ascended unto the throne. Religion has made us depict the King of kings in our own image, as a mere figurehead of a religion. We have turned the throne of grace and the fortified city of Zion into steeples and bells, similar to the Israelites reducing Him into a four-footed animal and building high places in the land of Canaan.
Our ideologies and presuppositions have caused us to be alienated from concepts related to the kingdom. Statements like “I hope I can make it to heaven one day” highlights the deficiency in our understanding of the kingdom and its makeup. Believers have become mystical in basic facts relating to the kingdom. Daniel spoke of the kingdom of God in this manner “...in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever”. The Father has established His kingdom through His Son, Christ Jesus, who was born King, lived, died, resurrected and ascended unto the throne. Religion has made us depict the King of kings in our own image, as a mere figurehead of a religion. We have turned the throne of grace and the fortified city of Zion into steeples and bells, similar to the Israelites reducing Him into a four-footed animal and building high places in the land of Canaan.
The impact of the Kingdom in Acts turned the nations upside down, they proclaimed that the King was and still is on the throne. This was evident by His citizens (Apostles) willingness to die for their King. Centuries has passed since Peter said “...You are the Christ (King), the Son of the living God.” The deterioration in our declaration of the King and His kingdom has become immense. We now proclaim a saviour whose kingship has been cheapened to a church service and serving him is equal to serving in a local church building.
Believers have embraced a mentality that is in keeping with the Timbuktu perception, meaning we never journey to the city of Zion as explorers, but instead remain poets and writers of a city we have never been to. Some believers will admit that the Kingdom is real, but it is spiritual (abstract). Although, the impact of it can still be felt in our Sunday services or seen in our evangelical crusades through the souls we convert.
Over the centuries the city of Zion has had many expeditions to it, however many explorers have not gone all the way; they came back with tales of their journeys but have discouraged others from seeking the Kingdom for themselves. They inform us about their journeys, sacrifices and adventures. They have written books about their expeditions, but many of their voyages result in building churches commemorating their own achievements. Many of our seminaries are teaching pastors that desire to explore and express the City of Zion to just preach and write about it in an abstract form to their congregations.
The pathway that John Wesley and many others have created for us to follow has had a great impact and will be renowned for all eternity. However, they did not go all the way and in this generation we have the opportunity to surpass them and journey farther than they ever did. This generation is in need of a rediscovery of the King in His domain. Our national identity must not be formed by religious ideology, instead it must be in accordance with the Kingdom of God. There is a need for a theocratic government in our community and the restoration of the laws that protected our forefathers which produced the culture the King commanded.
I was shocked when I discovered that Timbuktu was a real place and was reachable. I was reminded that we “...have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering.” The Kingdom of God is not abstract ideas, but is real and must be expressed practically on the earth. We cannot just preach, write and sing about our journeys to the city of the living God, but we must truly discover it by expressing the five components within our community.
'The Kingdom is not unreachable and inexpressible, but it is tangible and attainable'
Adewale
He who has an ear, let him hear.
