The kingdom is key! It is key to living a truly successful life. Now, when we say living a successful life, one should not automatically think of big houses, nice cars, lots of money, or the like. Although, there is nothing wrong with these things in and of themselves, it is just as Jesus said in Luke 12:15 that, "...one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions." But when we speak of living a truly successful life, we are speaking of living a life that is in line with the kingdom of God, which is the rule, reign, and will of God. In other words, successful living is kingdom living.
Now, if successful living is kingdom living, then we need to know what is involved in this kingdom living. Or we might say, what is required and what are the results of kingdom living. Well, we believe there are at least three things that can be identified among the requirements and results of kingdom living:
1) Living a Spirit filled life (Ephesians 5:18)
2) Living a Surrendered life (Luke 9:57-62)
3) Living a Satisfied life (Philippians 4:10-13; Hebrews 13:5-6)
In living a Spirit filled life, we are living a life that is under the influence and control of the Holy Spirit vs. living a life that is under the control of substance, worries, emotions, and the like. Also, in living a Spirit filled life, we are living a Word filled life. For the Spirit of God always agrees with the Word of God. Thus a life that is full of the Spirit, is a life that is full of the Word.
In living a Surrendered life, we are living a life that has forsaken and left all for sake of our Lord Jesus. Of course this takes walking by faith and not by sight, for in the natural it can be quite scary to forsake our own will and desire for the sake of Jesus because in doing this, we lose control of our lives. However, we must understand that if we lose control of our lives for the sake of Jesus, then we actually gain our lives; for Jesus said in Mark 8:35, "For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it."
In living a Satisfied life, we are living a life that is satisfied and content with God. In living such a life, we are not looking for things to satisfy us, but we are looking to God and God alone; for He is our help and that is why we do not need to fear what man can do to us. Now, in living this satisfied/content life, we need to implement gratitude, because it is very difficult, if not totally impossible, to live a satisfied/content life while being ungrateful. Therefore, we need to exercise gratitude in a major way.
These three things of being Spirit filled; Surrendered; and Satisfied are some requirements and results in successful living and thus in kingdom living.
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