Evangellion

I am a man who deeply loves the gospel. I do not consider myself alone in this, but perhaps sometimes it might be a lonely proposition. I consider this the case because there are many who do not know or have forgotten what the gospel is. In greek the word evangellion was used, and to roughly translate the meaning, the gospel is 'good news'.

But what, exactly, is the good news? To many people who consider themselves Christians, the good news is that God's only begotten Son was born of the Virgin Mary, suffered, died, and was buried in the remittance of the sins of mankind and that faith in Him will lead to eternal salvation. To a vocal and powerful few, many might think that the gospel is 1 Cor 6:9 "Don't you know that those who do wrong will have no share in the Kingdom of God? Do not fool yourselves. Those who engage in sexual sin, who are idol worshipers, adulterers, male prostitutes, homosexuals..."

While both of these things may have their share in truth, when I consider the gospel, it draws to mind a complex recursion. A thing inside itself. Sort of like the bag you keep under your sink or in your utility closet, what is that bag full of? More bags. Bags inside of bags inside of bags. To a person with no faith at all, the Bible is good news, to a person approaching faith, Christ is good news, to a person of faith, self control is good news. And the topic that personally interests me in this essay is the good news that Christ spoke himself.

In Matthew 4:17 "From then on, Jesus began to preach, "turn from your sins and turn to God, because the Kingdom of God has come.""
When he sent out His disciples He told them to share the same message that the Kingdom is at hand.
 Luke 17:20-21 "And when he was demanded of the Pharisees, when the Kingdom of God should come, he answered them and said, "The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation: Neither shall they say, 'Lo here!' or 'Lo there!' for, behold, the Kingdom of God is within you.""

In us lies the Kingdom of God. We are the ground into which the seed of faith is planted. In order for that tiny morsel of faith to develop in us so that we may develop as brothers and sisters in Christ, we must tend our field.

We must stand guard that the fowls of fear do not come and rob us of our faith. We must remove the stones of our past pains and self doubt so that we can make loose soil for roots to grow, so that affliction and persecution cannot shake our faith loose.

Daily we must strive to pull the thorny wees of worldly care, concerns of wealth, lusts and desires for things not pertaining to God or the kingdom which might choke out the fruit growing from the Truth.

By being the good fertile ground that hears the word, we can produce much greatness for God and the glory of all his work.

It is with this constant mindfulness that the Kingdom of God is ever present in our lives and our endeavor to keep our feild in order that we become disciples.

Then we begin to focus on the commandment Love. Love one another as brothers and friends. And forgive. If your brother trespasses against you seven times in a day, and seven times turns and says, "I repent". Forgive him.

For every moment is new and every moment is an opportunity for pure love. This is the gospel I read.

listening

In the Era of Christ's lifetime there were quite a few luminaries, none quite so brilliant perhaps, but still deeply profound and well worth learning from. One such is the slave-philosopher Epictetus. Like Jesus, he did not write his own wisdom but it was recorded by those around him.I highly recommend you take the time to look up "The Golden Sayings of Epictetus" one of them is as follows: "God gave you two ears and one mouth, so that you might listen more than you speak."
In Luke 6:31, and several other places in the Gospels, Jesus is found extolling a simple principle. "Do for others as you would like them to do for you." Currently, in the social media society, we find that we have a countless number of prompts to share our opinions. So much so that it's quite possible that a lot of people are mindlessly making noise. Obviously, even if we don't know what we are trying to say, we want to be heard.
I've come to the opinion over the years that one of the very few things we can do to help and heal the many groups of displaced and disenfranchised people in the world is to give them a voice. Not necessarily to fix their problems for them, but to let them know that they are esteemed, their story is worth hearing, and someone wants to understand and empathize.
We're all making a lot of noise, and we make more and more because no one is listening. If we break the cycle and listen, then we will truly be doing for others as we want done for us.