How the Kingdom of God Comes, Part 3
Livestream: youtu.be/gDDELOVd7Jw
2026-07-05 | Sunday Service
Opening Prayer
So that our praise, our songs, and our words can come out from our hearts – and the way you love us. Thank you. Thank you for the people whom you have purchased with your blood.
Let us reflect here. Thank you for this Sunday. We have gathered together before you. You are the center of everything. Help us to keep you in the center – in the center of everything we do, in the center of everything we are thinking about and talking about. You are the center of our fellowship. We thank you.
Be glorified among us, in our lives, in this place – in this country, on this place. Thank you, Lord, the great King; we love you a lot. Help us to love you more and more. Help us to become perfect in our love for you. Glory to you, Lord.
Father, thank you for your word. Let our hearts be open, our ears open to receive the word that brings salvation – the word that frees us from slavery. Let your word come in power. We ask you to anoint every heart. Thank you. Your word will never return empty; it will fulfill its mission instead. We thank you in the name of Christ. And everybody say amen.
Welcome and Opening Exhortation
Please turn to somebody next to you and tell them that the Lord is here. God loves you. Everything will happen according to His plan because His power is near. He is near.
I am glad to see you all here. When you are at church, you are not always aware of what God is doing. When I say we are at church, understand that being a church is not just about a group of people gathering in one place.
Scripture Reading: Hebrews 10:23-25
Before I start preaching, I want you to read together a passage from Hebrews, chapter 10, verses 23 through 25.
Hebrews 10:23 Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. (NIV)
Hebrews 10:24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. (NIV)
Hebrews 10:25 Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another – and all the more as you see the day approaching. (NIV)
Unpacking the Instructions of Hebrews 10
Three Calls to Action
These are interesting instructions. I want you to pay attention to the context: “let us do something” and “let us not do something.” In other words, here we read a slogan that calls us to a certain way of living. And there is a reason why the Word of God is telling us about these things.
It does not matter what we are doing. It does not matter what missions we have or what plans we have. The Word of God says clearly: there are many plans in the heart of a man, but only those which are according to the plan of God will be fulfilled. In other words, you are to contribute to all that God has predetermined for you – all that God has set apart for you as important. All other things are just a waste of time.
That is why the first thing God tells us is to live in faith and rely upon the Lord. This is one of the things you cannot do for somebody else. You cannot do it for me, and I in turn cannot do it for you.
Holding Firmly to the Promise
“Let us encourage one another.” In other words, God has promised something for us, and we are waiting upon it patiently. There is a period of time when we cannot see what God has promised to us, and a tendency to decline from this course arises in your mind. You might become weak in your hope. That is why God wants us to speak firmly to our promise.
The reason is the trustworthiness of the person whom you have come to know. He is trustworthy. Let us say it together: God is trustworthy. Say it again – God is trustworthy.
If you believe this and accept the revelation about it, if you are sure of this, then you will not be oppressed by the facts in your life, nor by circumstances. We are people who have feelings. Sometimes we feel pain and displeasure. We feel bitterness. We are human, and we have feelings. But these feelings should not determine what we believe in.
Confessing Your Faith Daily
Stick firmly to the declaration of your faith. In other words, just speak it out. Confess what you believe in, not what you see – not what you feel, not what the circumstances insist on, not the imagination. Speak of what you believe instead.
Believers are those who are able to testify. Every day you should stick to your faith. If you think you are going to visit church on Sunday and change the way you speak, but every day you bring a different testimony, then you are a hypocrite. A hypocrite. And later you blame God for it.
But what have you promised?
I constantly notice when you are happy, when you are inspired. What happens when the days are evil – as God says – and it seems everything and everybody is against you, and your world has collapsed?
Would you speak on this day?
Do you wish to stick to your belief or not?
That is why: “Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, because He who promised is faithful.”
Is God Faithful Even When Things Go Wrong?
If you can say undoubtedly that God is faithful – if your hope can see that God is faithful, if your experience says God is faithful – what about the things you have asked for but that did not happen?
If He is faithful, what about your prayers for the healing of a close relative that did not happen, and the person died?
What about something important you had lost? You asked God for help to find it, and you did not find it after all.
What about those things?
Is He faithful or not?
You have to determine it in your heart without anybody making this revelation for you. You are to come to this point: God is faithful. He changes everything.
Spurring One Another Toward Love and Good Deeds
Stop Focusing on Yourself
The next verse – verse 24 – says: “Let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.” If you want to live a life full of godly meaning, if you want to be filled with the godly life, then just stop focusing on yourself. Stop focusing on your pain.
Let us be attuned toward each other. Here the Bible is talking about the necessity of taking part in another person’s life, so that not everything is spinning around your own comfort.
The Danger of a Self-Centered Faith
Some believers think that God’s purpose is to make you happy and make you satisfied with your life – that God is needed only for solving your own issues. And when they have no issues, they believe that God is not necessary and should not interfere in things. Such people think: “God, when I have not asked you to come into my life, do not disturb me. Let me live my life. If I need you, I will ask you. But as long as everything is going fine, do not disturb me. Do not tell me where to go. Do not tell me how to live my life.”
This is not the kind of life God is inviting us to. That is why Jesus warned us that the great commandment is to love God and to love your neighbor.
Seeing the Good in Others
If everything you do is just an expression of your displeasure toward people – if you can only complain about the imperfections of other people – then you will be an unhappy person. When you look at people and you only see what they do the wrong way, you will never find anything in them to praise them for or to cheer them up.
You ought to look for what is good in people. This is the essence of a compliment. A compliment is not about flattering people. You are not to tell them they are this and that when in fact they are different. But if you are just attentive toward each other, you will always find something to say: “Thank you, Lord, for my brother, for my sister, for that person.”
But when you are filled with yourself, you have no time to pay attention to others. You have your own goals. You may trample over people on your way because they prevent you from reaching your goals. But God is inviting us to do something different.
Being Careful in the House of God
We are to be careful in the house of God. We are to multiply the good deeds and the good examples to follow. Do you accept this challenge from God?
“Let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.”
Not Giving Up Meeting Together
The True Meaning of “Meeting Together”
The next thought – verse 25 – is what prompted me to open this passage: “Let us not give up meeting together.” This is related to the topic I have been discussing for weeks: how does the Kingdom of God come?
We have been talking about the church and the kingdom, and we mentioned that the church is like a training base – a training camp where God is training His people and preparing them for participation in His kingdom.
When we read “let us not give up meeting together,” I want you to pay attention to the word meeting in a different way.
Right now you have gathered together. We are just gathered together like this, and later we simply leave. Next Sunday, people gather together again. And again there is no contact among people between the Sundays. But this is not what meeting is all about.
The Building Site Analogy
A meeting is a place where people come together and something is built. The easiest example is a building site. You have purchased a piece of land and you want to build a house on it. You have bought all the building materials and the tools. But bringing everything to the building site does not make the house get built.
What do you need in order to build a house?
Usually in the process of building a house, a certain process takes place in which all the parts of the house are put together. What do you need in order to put a nice construction together?
You need to put everything in its place.
The Lego Illustration
Consider the example of Lego. You can see a nice house pictured on the Lego box, but in order to make that house you have to use the building blocks provided in the box and put them together to make the desired structure.
That is why God warns you: “Let us not give up meeting together.” It is not just about attending meetings. Because some people can attend meetings their whole life but never let others know God – never allow themselves to be placed together into a house. This is similar to baking a pancake on one side but never flipping it over, so the other side never becomes edible.
God is changing something in order to enable you to be together and become the house of God where the glory of God can appear.
Allowing God to Gather Us Together
So if I only think about what I am interested in, and you come to the meeting but you are thinking about what you are interested in – not what God is interested in – then nothing changes. But God wants to change you, to transform you. God wants to teach you to work together, and God wants to destroy everything that prevents you from working together – things in your thinking and in my thinking.
That is why you are not to give up meeting together, but instead allow God to gather us together, inspire one another, and encourage one another.
The Urgency of the Day Approaching
“Because the day is approaching.” This basically tells you that time is not always on your side. I probably think I still have time, and so do you. But life proves that you have to keep time precious.
The day is coming – the day when you will not be able to change anything anymore. You will not even be able to listen, because your heart will be so accustomed to different things. Your heart will be so stony that it will not be able to respond to the truth. May God help us not to come to that point.
So in other words, when you come to church, expect God to do something in you. Let Him show you yourself through God’s eyes. “Help me to look at myself – the way I react to other people and how I perceive them. Help me to see what I need to change and transform in my reactions.”
Very often people like to keep a distance. But God wants to make us so close to each other that all inconsistencies become visible – so that you are not able to put a mask on yourself.
When you are masking yourself, you are actually living in a prison. You are covered with a mystery. You are hiding from people. But God wants you to be open.
Do you hear?
Do you agree?
Do you accept it?
But this is a long journey. It is not going to happen in one moment. But when you love God and allow Him to enter your heart, you will go closer and closer toward it. We will no longer live like a closed book, but we will be able to help each other.
The Challenge of Helping Each Other Grow
Of course there is an issue: sometimes people, when they see a deficiency in another person, instead of helping him or her, slander each other.
Do you think we can help each other to grow?
Do you need to help each other?
What practical steps do you really make in order to help at least one person to grow? At least one person.
Do you pay attention to something that helps a person to change and transform? Not by force, not by the mind, not by power, not by pressure. The kingdom of God is established in different ways.
Summary: Two Things to Do, One to Avoid
So there are two things we are to do and one we are not to do. Let us see them again.
Which thing are you to do?
First: “Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful.” This is God’s instruction for each of you today.
Second: “Let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds” – so that we can lift each other up.
And what shall we not do?
“Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing.” This is much more than just attending a meeting. It basically means that you allow the processes that take place in the house of God to make us closer to each other and develop us as a church.
Amen.
God’s Ultimate Purpose: A Kingdom of Mature Sons and Daughters
The Conclusion: What Is the Kingdom of God and How Does It Come?
And today I would like to address what is happening and draw a conclusion about what the Kingdom of God is and how it comes.
The purpose of God is not just about salvation and creating a church. He wants to create a mature family of sons and daughters who fully reflect God’s nature and through whom He can strengthen His kingdom.
Let me repeat it again – this is the purpose of God. God has a purpose. God has a goal. And unfortunately, the goal of God does not always match the human’s goal. That is why we are to discover His goal and submit ourselves to it, so that we can move along with Him.
It is not just about saving people or building a church. These two things are very important – saving people and building up a church. But that is not just His desire. He wants to raise, through salvation and through the church, mature daughters and sons who reflect His nature, so that through them He could establish His kingdom.
In this case, the final goal of God on earth is God’s kingdom. Because everything we have been talking about – saving people, building a church, raising up mature sons and daughters – all these things are needed together in order to establish His kingdom. That is why God’s kingdom is the most important thing.
Jesus Always Talked About the Kingdom
No wonder that all the talks of Jesus were about the kingdom. All His parables were about the kingdom. All the instructions He provided to His disciples were about the kingdom. And in the last days of Paul, when he was under house arrest and people were coming to see him, Paul was talking with people about the kingdom. You can see it throughout the Scriptures.
That is why it is so important for us to understand that there is a kingdom.
The Kingdom Is Not About Territory or Outward Order
The Kingdom Begins Within You
We also mentioned that the Kingdom of God is about spiritual conditions within you. The idea of the kingdom is not talking about a territory, nor about any outward order established by power or by the law. I have nothing against the law, but we have heard that the Kingdom of God begins within you.
When Jesus came, He could have imposed His kingdom outwardly. He had all the heavenly angels at His disposal. He had the most powerful army. So if this were something to be imposed by power, Jesus could have done it. Just read the Bible: one angel destroyed 80,000 people. One angel. But God has thousands of angels. He could easily, by the flick of a wrist, destroy all sinners – all those who do not love God. They could all have been either destroyed or put in prison in the blink of an eye.
He could do it. But why did He not do it?
Because the Kingdom of God is not established by power or by force.
Peter’s Sword and the Power of Love
When Jesus was arrested, do you remember what Peter did – one of His disciples?
He pulled out a sword, claiming: “Why are you trying to arrest my teacher?” And he cut off the ear of a soldier. And what did Jesus do?
He healed the ear and ordered Peter to put his sword away.
Imagine – you heal the person who hates you. You heal the person who is trying to seize you and capture you by force. Look here: Jesus manifests the most powerful, the highest power – namely, the power of love. But there is no such power in the heart of a human.
Turning Enemies into Friends
Humans are rather inclined to destroy their enemies, while God wants to turn enemies into friends. This is what Jesus did. That is why we say that the Kingdom of God does not come in a visible, outward way.
Looking at church history, there were attempts to impose order and transform the behavior of humans. A person comes to a church, behaves well, but nothing has changed within him – in his heart.
It reminds me of the time when I was a teenager. I could not understand it. I looked at older people who entered the church and took their seats. They would put out their cigarettes at the entrance to the church because it was not allowed to smoke inside. But once they left the church, they smoked again. And day by day, year after year, they had been doing the same thing. After they left the church, they continued to smoke, to drink, and to swear and do all kinds of evil things. But at the same time, they visited church on Sundays.
God is not looking for such ways to establish His kingdom.
The Kingdom Comes Through the Spirit
Two Weapons: The Word and the Holy Spirit
That is why we say that the kingdom is coming – it is being established from within, with the power of the Holy Spirit. That is why you have only two kinds of weapons: the Word of God and the Holy Spirit. The Word of God is the sword of the Spirit. This is the kind of sword Peter was supposed to pull out. But instead he pulled a physical sword. That is why he failed.
Let us use the stronger sword. God is transforming us through His word. And that is why the Kingdom of God is living in us.
Not by might, not by power, but by the Spirit of the Lord.
Let me name three tools: prayer, the Word, and the Holy Spirit. Prayer unites people. We pray according to the Word and in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Spiritual Weapons – Ephesians 6
When we read the book of Ephesians, chapter 6, where it speaks about all kinds of weapons, Paul says that our war is not physical. We are living in the body, but we are not making war in the flesh. Our armor is not physical, but it is stronger.
The Kingdom of God is a spiritual kingdom, and that is why the weapons of this kingdom are spiritual too. His power, His laws, and His priests are spiritual. That is why the Kingdom of God is about a spiritual condition within you.
Saving people is the main objective – and the creation of a spiritual condition within the person that can reflect God in his life. Thus he will become a tool in God’s hands.
Life in Christ: The Only Source of True Change
The Word of Life
Let me put it a different way. This thought came to my mind this morning, and I have mentioned it many times during recent weeks.
When Jesus says to the Pharisees: “You search the Scriptures, because you think that through them you will have everlasting life. But the Scriptures are testifying about me. Yet you refuse to come to me in order to have life” – the word life in this context is key.
God wants to give you life. Without His life, we can do nothing. Surely we can try. But nothing will change within you without God’s life – spiritually and eternally, nothing will change in you.
So the reason why Jesus came, He says, is so that you can have life. And nothing can replace it. If I have no life in Christ, instead I will have a religion. I will have human traditions. You will try to improve yourself, but you will fail, because it is impossible to improve without life in Christ. That is why He says: “I have come so that you can have life, and have it in abundance.”
Coming to Jesus for Life, Not Just Knowledge
That is why Jesus, when He was speaking to the Pharisees, said: “You are not coming to me.” The reason why we read the Bible, the reason why we stay in fellowship and in prayer – the reason is the purpose of staying together with God. And this will change your life.
Now imagine a person who has no life, and he is trying to give life to others.
Do you think he will succeed?
Can I share what I do not possess?
You cannot. He can only share His life through mature sons and daughters. Only such people can represent God. That is why the first part is the establishment of the Kingdom of God: God saves you, He brings you to church if you allow, He helps you to grow if you allow Him to do all these things.
It may also happen that you do not allow Him to do so. As I keep saying, God is not going to push you. He can push you, but He has decided not to. He wants you to love Him because of who He is. He wants you to see that all His laws are just. All His demands toward you are lawful and for your sake. That is why it is necessary to grow.
The Internal Battle: Why the Kingdom Begins Within
Why Does the Kingdom of God Begin Within You?
Because all the fight of a human is an internal fight. All the battles you face are within you.
Let us open James 1:14.
James 1:14-15 But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death. (NKJV)
Your main enemy is not visible on the outside. Your main enemy is within you. That is why God starts with the process within you. Once you celebrate victory over your internal enemy, all the external enemies will be defeated one by one in the blink of an eye.
This is similar to David and Goliath. The visible external enemy was Goliath. Amen. But the main enemy is within you – you are fighting your thinking: fleshy thinking, arrogance, greed, ambitions, selfish desires, and so on.
Those are the baggage you carry from the beginning. And God wants to handle all this baggage in the process of making you a mature son or daughter. You are not to avoid the process that leads to it. And this has to do with “let us not give up meeting together.”
Three Powers That Lead Us Away from God
When we read the Word of God, we can notice three main powers that lead us away from God’s power.
1 John 2:16 For everything in the world – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life – comes not from the Father but from the world. (NIV)
The desire. The craving. The possession of what you see. The desire to be above others. Self-establishment and self-confirmation in comparison with others. All those things are enemies of the kingdom, and God wants to remove them from your life.
Lord, help me to grow.
The Cross: God’s Way of Dealing with the Flesh
How Does God Settle the Matters?
Through the cross. Through the cross.
Instead of anything else, Jesus chose the cross. The cross represents your denial of yourself. It represents your willingness to capitulate before God and to allow God to govern in your life.
And when Jesus found the first disciples, He warned them: “Do you want to follow me?
Do you want to be my disciple?
Then every day, take up your cross.”
The cross shows that you are dead. The cross used to be a weapon of death. And the cross shows that you are dead to your own desires.
The Broken Vessel
God can only use a broken vessel, a broken jar.
How can God fill a vessel which is already full?
You can keep praying as much as you want. When you are filled with yourself, God cannot fill you, because He can only fill you when you are empty. Those who are praying to God and asking Him to fill them with His power – make yourself empty first. Make yourself empty. Then God will fill you with His power, and you will begin to see what God is able to do when a human steps aside and allows God to manifest Himself.
And these things are not easy. If it were easy, God would have never told us so much about it.
That is why: be sincere with yourself. This is the main goal of every Christian – namely, spiritual maturity in God and becoming like Jesus.
The Teaching That Says It Is Impossible
Do you know what frightens me?
You will hear a teaching that tells you such a thing is impossible as long as you live in this body.
Is God talking about something that is impossible?
And your feeling of guilt is growing?
Can we or can we not do what God wants us to do?
Not by might, not by power, but by the Spirit.
Look – this is where God wants us to concentrate our efforts. “Transform my mind with your word and transform it through your Spirit.”
The Disciples Were Imperfect Too
When Jesus left, His disciples were imperfect. On the day Jesus had resurrected, the Bible says that His disciples refused to believe. But once He had shown up before them, He did not reproach them. He simply told them to go, and He promised to be with them. This is the essence of the matter. They had to believe in it.
Jesus Prayed for You
You Are Not Going to Do It on Your Own
You are not going to do it on your own. “I will do it with my power in you.” That is why on the day He left, He said: “I have prayed” – not only for His disciples, but for all those who will ever believe in Jesus, in Christ, through them.
This was powerful. He was actually praying for Peter, but He saw you and me, because He knew that through Peter’s testimony and the testimony of his disciples, and the disciples of their disciples, and so on – He was praying for you. This is the power that transforms brothers and sisters.
God’s Hope for Believers
God has a hope – that we will not only be believers who consider only their own benefits, but that we will be believers who allow God to transform us. Not used as a slogan only, but eager to fulfill it and use all opportunities in order to grow.
Amen.
God Relies on Disciples, Not Crowds
The child is growing. God’s power is on his shoulders. That is why God is more interested in having such sons than in gathering huge crowds. Thank God for the crowds. But God relies on the disciples.
Each time we are praying for the growth of the church, I want you to understand my heart. God is not looking for a crowd of people who are not transformed – simply emotionally stirred. God is looking for mature people.
Amen.
Closing Exhortation: Allow God to Work in You
You Are Not the Same
Shall we allow Him to do such a thing with us?
Thank God that you are not the same as you were. I hope you are still not perfect – not yet the way you are supposed to be – but this is not an issue for you, as long as you have this goal set for yourself.
The purpose of my faith is to become a mature son or daughter and to fill the Kingdom of God wherever I find myself, in order to glorify God. This is the way God’s kingdom comes, and it starts today.
That is why let us choose to obey God in every little thing. When we learn to deny ourselves, when we learn to overcome hardships and pain and never concentrate on them, but instead see something better through the hardships – help us, O Lord.
Closing Prayer
Let us stand up. Lift up your voice and say:
Lord, thank you for being a loving God. With your love, you have conquered our hearts. Help us to see your love – the price of this love. Help us to believe that we are in your hands. Help us to believe that nothing will happen to us as long as we are in your hands, as long as we are standing on this road which leads to life everlasting.
You say that you are the way and the truth, and it leads to life everlasting. Thank you, Lord.
We thank you for your people, for your church, for the revelation about your kingdom. Help us to get deeper into it – not because of knowledge alone, but help us, in the name of Christ, to understand it for the sake of life. And to come to you for the sake of life.
Help us to move from acquaintance to relationship, from relationship to fellowship, and from fellowship to intimacy. We want to have those close relationships with you and with one another in fellowship.
End of Sermon – 2026-07-05 | How the Kingdom of God Comes, Part 3
