Kingdom Encounters

Hello listeners, this is Dave Scherrerrer from 100 Fold Ministries. I was going to say today that it's my firm conviction that every encounter with another human being has the potential to not merely be a human conversation, but that it could potentially be an eternal kingdom building interaction. Let me say that again real quick just to see if it makes sense here. It's my firm conviction that every encounter with another human being has the potential to not only be a human conversation or interaction, but even an eternal kingdom building interaction. We're just going to let that sit for a minute and we're going to talk about it. This is Kingdom Offerings and you've reached the podcast environment of 100 Fold Ministries and I'm Dave Scherrerrer. And here we like to talk a lot about the kingdom of God and his gospel, the gospel that Jesus lived and taught about the kingdom of God. So I want to go back to that sentence and I said that has the potential to not merely be a human conversation and potential is a big part of that sentence. I say potential for being a kingdom conversation because at least in my circumstances, some good many conversations between me and a thousand other people in a given day seem to be quite finite and are fleeting encounters and I will never again see this person. I won't be remembered by them. I won't remember them. And it's just one of those things that happens during the course of a day. And I suspect that most of my conversations throughout my life, some great, great percent have been just like that. But I also dare say that increasingly, even chance and very brief encounters that I'm finding have an increasingly kingdom nature to them. Usually when I don't think anything particularly eternal happens is because I've not intended anything eternal to happen. It doesn't happen because I'm not intending it to. I'm not expecting the kingdom of God to break out. I'm just expecting to go about my momentary agenda that I have for my life in this day, right here, right now. Just trying to get some groceries and then I'm going to get on to my next chore. And so you grocery clerk guy out there, you're not on my agenda. I am only on my agenda right now and I'm just trying to buy groceries. You're not part of it. So if that's the frame of mind that I'm carrying, then I can virtually guarantee that nothing spiritual will happen because I'm not expecting to and I'm not expecting them to speak in such a manner to me. So let me counter that. If on the other hand, I enter the grocery store with a kingdom mindset, I most always have some kind of encounter that includes a God-inspired small, brief conversation or interaction of encouragement. And every once in a while, even a prayer kind of breaks out in the cereal aisle because I have come in with a kingdom-minded attitude before I even start. And I don't think it's particularly my perky personality, although I am a flaming extrovert, so that probably helps sometimes. But by far and away, the increase in my kingdom encounters isn't due to me, I'm quite sure. It's more about my attitude of readiness for the spirit to move and to inspire me into an other-centered conversation. My mind is filled with Christ and I expect someone to enter into that conversation with me. If I am not willing for it to be so, it's not going to happen. If I am, I'm allowing it to be so, it just very well might. I want to give us an example of how a chance conversation with Jesus, one of these grocery store kind of events. Jesus is walking down the road, trying to mind his own business, get from here to there, and in Mark chapter 10, we read a chance encounter between Jesus and a man that wants to pepper him with questions. You might be familiar with the encounter. It's the encounter that some editors of your Bible might call the rich young ruler. And so I'm going to read this story, but I'm going to interrupt myself as the story goes, because I think as we look at this story, we might read it and say, well, okay, that's Jesus, but I feel like the kingdom is breaking out all over the place in this relatively chance encounter between this seeker and Jesus. So this is in Mark chapter 10, and I want to start in verse 17. It starts a little bit in the middle of a story, but it says, as Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees. Okay, now that's different right there, right? A man ran up to him and fell on his knees. Now, I'm going to say that has never happened to me. Nobody has greeted me in the grocery store and said, Dave, tell me how to get eternal life. That just hasn't happened. Now, Jesus has a reputation, and people know that he often speaks of eternal life and is a teacher of some renown. So we can see why this might happen more often to Jesus than it happens to me for sure. So a man ran up to him, fell on his knees before him and said, good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? So clearly this guy's got something in his mind. He knows that Jesus is a good teacher, and he knows that he wants to inherit the eternal life. So already we know a little bit about this guy. He's curious about Jesus. He knows that Jesus may have words of truth. He's a little spiritually discontent. He has some things, but he wants more. He wants to know with assurance that he can have eternal life. So he said, good teacher, what must I do to have eternal life? Well, Jesus kind of flips the narrative right here and says, why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. Okay, that statement is kind of begging the question, are you calling me good? And if you're calling me good and God alone is good, are you calling me God? Because in that case, my friend, you are very, very close. So Jesus then interrupts that sort of brief sidebar, and he says, you know the commandments. You should not murder, you should not commit adultery, don't steal, don't give false testimony, you shall not defraud, and of course, honor your father and mother. So Jesus is going through the litany, he's ticking them off on his fingers. You know the commandments. It's almost as though he's testing the man to see where he wants to go with this. Do you want to have a deeper conversation, or do you just want to entertain a conversation that puts you at ease? Because he answers it curiously. He says to Jesus, teacher, all these things I have kept since I was a boy. Okay, now if I'm Jesus, I'm gonna kind of get a funny smile on my face and say, really? I doubt it. I doubt that you've kept all these commandments since you were a boy. In fact, the whole point is, I think that Jesus was trying to make, is that you can't keep these commandments. You can't perfectly live according to the law. But I love how Jesus responds. I love how the editor captures the drama of this account, because Jesus doesn't build on his suspicion of whether or not he's been true to his word about keeping all the commandments. No, Jesus speaks into his life. Jesus looked at him and loved him. That's amazing. He says to the man, where's one thing you lack? Go, sell everything that you have, give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then, when you've done that, come and follow me. Well, there's a huge kingdom lesson in that conversation that Jesus has with that rich young ruler in that moment. He looks at him with love in his eyes, and he says, go sell everything that you have. I think what he's telling him is, you need to renounce the world. You've invested your life in the things of the world and in the lies of the world, and I'm asking you to renounce the world, and I'm asking you then to give that which you have to the poor. It's interesting that he doesn't just say, hey, just go give it to your next door neighbor or your sister. He says, no, I want you to give it to the poor. I want you to invest in the kingdom priorities that I have set aside for everyone here on earth while we await the fact that Jesus is longing to have his kingdom to come and rule and reign here on earth, just as it does in heaven. I want you to go and sell everything you have. Give it then to the poor, and now I want you to come and follow me instead of the world. I want you to come and follow me instead of the world. Renounce the world and pledge allegiance to me and my kingdom. As we read on, we read that this man's face fell. His countenance fell. He became visibly sad, and he went away because, as the scriptures tell us, he had great wealth. And the story ends there. I guess we don't actually know. He might have decided to himself to go and sell everything, give it to the poor, and come back and follow Jesus. We don't know that. We just know in this moment it's going to be very, very difficult for him to make that choice. So Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, how hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God. And now he begins having a kingdom conversations now with the disciples. He takes this living picture, this living word picture of experience with this dialogue about the kingdom of God with this young man, this rich young man. He turns to the disciples and says, okay, let's talk about this a little bit more. How hard it is to enter the kingdom of God. It's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God. So I don't want to get distracted by that camel and eye of the needle thing. But what he's saying is the world, and especially an abundance of the world, is a profound distraction from setting our eyes and following hard after the kingdom of God. Well, that was kind of a counter-cultural idea for the disciples. For them, if you're rich, that gives you the opportunity to kind of follow the law with a little bit more ease and give a little bit more generously. And so chances are, if you're rich, you've been blessed by God and you're kind of in. And Jesus is saying just the opposite. No, if you're wealthy, it's going to be especially hard for you. If you're wealthy, it's going to be especially hard for you to enter the kingdom of God. So the disciples are even amazed and they say, well, who can be saved? If it's hard for the rich, what about us poor guys? And Jesus looked at them, I'm guessing with love in his eyes, and said, with man, with humankind, this is impossible, but not with God. All things are possible with God. Now, Peter starts to take this in a fresh direction one more time. He tries to dogpile on the idea that Jesus has just been talking about, about giving things up, selling things and following. And Peter says, hey, we've left everything to follow you. Okay, I'm a little suspicious about that as well, because we know that the disciples all returned to fishing when they were done following Jesus, after Jesus had been in the tomb, so before the resurrection. So we know that they didn't completely lose track of their fishing trade. But they, of course, had given up a lot to follow Jesus, given up three years of their life, given up their time and their heart. They'd given up, as Peter said, everything. One other curious thought here, the rich young man in giving up everything was giving up great wealth. I wonder if these fishermen were giving up great wealth, or if they were just kind of giving up their job, which is no small thing, of course. And then Jesus begins to make an even more profound kingdom promise. He says, truly, I tell you, no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mothers or father, children or fields for me and the gospel, and this gospel of the kingdom we talk about so much here at 100 Fold, no one who has left their home and their family for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred fold times as much in this present age of homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children, fields. And then he says this, along with persecutions. If you will renounce the world and all of those who are attached to the world, I will repay you. I will replenish. I will recompense you 100 fold. And friends, that is the church. For every one father that I leave who refuses to let me go into the ministry, there will be a hundred more that will embrace me and pray for me. And this is the promise of Jesus, this kingdom promise of a hundred fold blessing as we invest in his kingdom gospel. And then he goes on to say that you'll get all these brothers and sisters, but with persecutions, as though that's a throw in line. And I want to say here that when we renounce the world, the world will now hate me and persecute me. So Jesus is adding this to the equation so that we can understand that when we indeed do fully turn our back on the world, the world will seek its revenge. The world will seek to persecute me and hurt me because the world hates me, because I have denied the world and turned myself towards Jesus. And Jesus says, many who are first will be last and the last will be first. All right, there's a lot to think about there. I want to kind of wrap up, but I want to get back to our topic of the day. And that's that every encounter with another person has the potential to not merely be a human encounter, but a kingdom encounter as well. It fleshed out in this story. Jesus could have just passed this guy off. He was busy doing something else. But clearly this man's interest in Jesus and his passion caught Jesus' eye and he turned toward him and had this conversation. But what we are discovering in this day and age, in very brief encounters, when my mind is set on the kingdom of God, is that there can be very deep spiritual, emotional, relational conversations that are just under the surface. All we have to do is ask the second question. The first question is, how are you doing? The second question is, no, no, really, how are you doing? You look tired. You look discouraged. You look sad. You look excited. What's going on in your life? And people want to talk. They want to be understood. They want to be heard. They want to know that their life matters. And when we invest even in a brief conversation, I believe that kingdom begins to break out all around us. So this means that we need to be connected to the Spirit because while most every conversation has a potential for being a kingdom conversation, not every conversation will indeed become kingdom. Just because I can doesn't think I should. We've all met some of those presumptuous Bible beaters, they sometimes call them, who bring Jesus presumptively into every conversation in every sentence, and that doesn't usually go over great. But there are times when in the spirit of the conversation, an openness is there, and then we ought to be ready to talk about Jesus. I kind of feel that for most of us, our sense of regret isn't that we talk too much about Jesus, but that we failed to talk about Jesus at all when there was a chance. So let's pledge together. Let's pledge to give God a chance now in these days. Here in 2024, when I'm recording this, we're approaching Holy Week and Jesus' death and resurrection. So with this sense of anticipation of the kingdom of God coming in such power, what if we listen and see if God can enter into our daily lives, that we might bring the kingdom into our conversations as well. All right, so this is Dave Scherrerrer on 100 Fold Ministries. You can find us at 100 Fold Ministries, so that's 1-0-0-F-O-L-D-Ministries.org, and you'll also find our blog environment there and some other things that might be helpful. So peace to you. Go out there and have a great kingdom conversation.