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This week, at Anchor, we considered how the Vineyard-owner from the parable of Matthew 20 might be hinting at something like the following:
“Isn’t it wonderful,” Jesus asks, “that just as I was wonderful to you, I’m always choosing to be wonderful… to everyone?! Look around,” He says. “Look at all the people I’ve got you rubbing shoulders with, every single day: these are the highest work of your work in my fields.” He smiles even more broadly. “Or were you starting to think that the moral-of-this story was only your personal morality, your self-righteous hardwork, or, even worse than that, promise of eventual reward. Oh, my friend—it is so much more than that! Back when I called you—back when you and I understood together where all this was going—did you misinterpret what we were doing? Yes, I sent you into the world; yes, I sent you into my vineyard—but what did you think we were doing there together? We were in the vineyard—you and I, together; shoulder to shoulder—not to talk about its fruit, not to be knowledgable about its potential eventual crops; even to constantly point to the fruit as if the fruit was the thing. The fruit is a part of the thing, yes. But the fruit, my dear friend… is not the thing. “The thing… is my calling you… your coming along with me… our going-together into the fields of this vineyard. The thing… is us… together. Just you and me, as we’re walking out every single moment of the moments that are making up your life: the thing… is our life together… together. “And do you wanna know what’s especially wonderful? “That the more you come to terms with just how wonderful what we’re doing together is…the more you’re celebrating being part of this glorious work-with-me… well… in the midst of enjoying the work, delighting in me, doing this together… that’s the moment when others start to wonder--these people doing their lives around you--why YOUR life is so full of wonder. As you’re walking around with me… learning to see the world like me… you’ll start to look, to others, like me. “And, you see,” He smiles now with the greatest affection it is possible to conceive of, “that is the thing. That’s why I called you in the first place. That’s the whole of the Kingdom of Heaven. My friend, that’s what we’re doing, here, together: living our whole lives together, so that everyone may have life in me.”
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We ask: How many times does Jesus call us to repent: to return to Him?
He answers: One more time than the number of times you’ve walked away! “The kingdom of God never comes by watching for it. Men cannot say, ‘Look, here it is,’ or ‘there it is.’ For the kingdom of God is inside you.” (Luke 17:20,21)
Over this last week, I had the pleasure of going through all four Gospels and then simplifying, then collating, every single thing that Jesus ever said about the Kingdom of God. So, by way of reminder, everything you're about to read is, according to Jesus, now, permanently, today-tomorrow-forever, temporally and eternally, IN YOU. WITHIN YOU is a Kingdom that Has arrived; is the Good News; is still, and always will be, arriving; is a perpetual feasting; is pure power; and pure potential kinetic energy. INSIDE YOU is a Kingdom that is subtle and yet always growing; small but destined to become mighty; proven out by its final outcomes: a Kingdom of goodness, immeasurable value, the intensive seeking of which is also its joyous finding. THE KINGDOM WITHIN YOU is after every single person upon the earth; is the best of all that’s been—currently is—and all that’s to come; is utterly gracious; wide-WIDE-open; extremely intense; but also generous—like a living-breathing invitation. (An invitation to what, you might ask? Oh, I’m so glad you did!) Because WITHIN YOU is a Kingdom—a Kingdom of Heaven, don’t forget!—that is the wildest, most joyous, sort of PARTY! This KINGDOM INSIDE YOU is a perpetual call to attention; the pointing-to and arrival upon God’s secret; pure growth and pure growing, at one and the same time: it is right here, right now; a message entirely its own; requiring of your all; a worthy place to set one’s heart and closest focus. And, almost best of all, this KINGDOM WITHIN YOU has been given-to-you for your real-time experience—that is given to you; never, ever earned!—it is Paradise RIGHT NOW; it operates from the freshness of a twice-born spirit; brought to bear, in fact, by the Holy Spirit; meaning you yourself are holy, otherworldly, even as you live within this world! My friends, today, and all week along, and every moment until you draw your final breath, the Kingdom of God is inside you! |
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July 2026
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Colorado Springs, Colorado, U.S.A.
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