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God has been consistent with his message to
humanity: As his children, human beings are to inherit his kingdom
on earth. Belief in this promise, from a God with the father-heart
of grace to make it happen for an incomplete yet growing human being, is the core of a right relationship with him
and the key to a healthy life.
This belief is therefore, and always has been, God’s standard of righteousness for men…the
righteousness of faith. This was his message to the first Adam, to Abraham,
Isaac, Jacob, the prophets, and finally to the rest of humanity through
Jesus the Messiah and his apostles. God continues to pass this
message along to any who will listen through his church, and believe
this good news.
This is not primarily a message about a kingdom of
the heart, or a kingdom of a church organization, but about the future
coming kingdom of God on earth to be established at the return of Jesus
the Christ. That kingdom has not yet been established as a reality
on earth for all humanity, but Jesus currently sits at the right hand of
God in that kingdom. He is preparing it for those who believe in
this specific promise of the Father as he did, and who attempt to
redirect their hearts, minds, and lives, according to that belief.
The good news is the single most powerful hope of a life worth living
for the person who realizes he or she has not lived the life he/she was
meant to live.
This righteousness of faith that is based on a human being's belief in the Kingdom of God
message, is the foundation of a
trusting Father/son relationship. From within this message and relationship, the
Father is perfect…the children are not. It is of paramount
importance that the children in this relationship start out with this
right and healthy understanding. There was never intended to be any shame in this
for the children, and no condemnation of this by the Father. Grace
of the greater toward the lesser, out of a desire for a reciprocating
love relationship, sustains the relationship as the children move
toward greater and greater maturity over the course of time. It is
about a forward momentum that begins with understanding one's potential,
and trusting in God's grace and love to see that potential realized. As
Saint Irenaeus said, “the glory of God is man fully alive.” This was (and continues) to be the
basis of life in the kingdom of God. This trust in the Father
and belief in His promise lay at the foundation of the system in force
at the very beginning. If followed, it would sustain a healthy
environment where God’s human children could become all that they were
created to be within this kingdom on earth. This system is simply but profoundly called "rest"
in Hebrews 4:1-10 and Genesis 2:2-3, and is the righteousness of
faith the apostle Paul speaks about. Saying it yet another way,
the righteousness of faith is a rest-based system where the incomplete
and imperfect human creation perceives it's value through the grace of
the Father alone, and therefore trusts in the Father to faithfully and
successfully deliver what He has promised...their inheritance of His
Kingdom on earth.
But when the first Adam ate of the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, it was symbolic of his “agreement” with the adversary that being human was not good enough, and
therefore he should not trust the father-heart of God to accept and love him
in his imperfect, immature condition simply on the basis of
grace alone. Instead, Adam and Eve now perceived the relationship
to be
based on perfect knowledge of right and wrong, and the
appropriate implementation of that knowledge. In other words, it
became a relationship based on performance, where righteousness and
self-justification were perceived to be based on the keeping of
moral codes. The children saw (wrongly) that their core value and
worth in the eyes of their Father was dependent upon perfect
law-keeping. Thus the righteousness of faith, based on trust in
God's promise of a worldwide kingdom ruled by His human children, was
over-ruled and displaced by a false system of "works" right from the
beginning. False religions and even a false Christian gospel have
been the result, holding mankind in bondage to sin and death.
We are in bondage because the human mind and heart were not created to
function optimally and to mature successfully under the false
righteousness of works system described immediately above. This system has fear at
its base, and there is no fear in love. Fear leads to the bondage
of sin (sin is actually not accounted where there is no law…no one is perfect
anyway. But once law is the basis for life, that is, once
works becomes the justification of one's core value and lovability, sin
will overcome a person and hold him in bondage to it). Envy, jealousy, covetousness,
adultery, hatred, murder, wars, are all the destructive patterns of life
that develop when one is in bondage to sin. The power of sin is
the law as a system of righteousness and justification of one’s core
value. According to Hebrews 4:1-11, we are to strive to leave
this false system and enter back into the system of "rest" which is the
basis for healthy and productive life in the kingdom of God.
Throughout the world today, there is a scattering
of those who accept God’s standard of righteousness through faith, and
have thus retained the true gospel of the coming kingdom of God to this
earth. They still believe in the one God of Abraham and Jesus,
which allows them to
embrace their humanity just as Jesus did his; trusting in the one true God
to accomplish his purposes in us. These are the brethren of the
Church of God, Abrahamic Faith. “For if you are Christ’s, you are
Abraham’s seed according to the promise.” We would love to have
you as a part of our family of faith.
If you would like to know more about the one true
God and his miraculously conceived human son, Jesus the Messiah who was
raised from the dead by his Father and ours, contact a congregation or
group of believers near you. We are those who also preach the
gospel of the kingdom of God as a witness unto all nations prior to
the end of this present age. If you would like a
brief introduction regarding what the Abrahamic Faith is about,
click here. You can also click on
the tab for the Church of God, Abrahamic Faith at the top of the
page. For even more information about biblical unitarianism, our Related Links section will guide you to many more
helpful sources (biblical unitarian is not to be confused with
the non-christian unitarian universalist beliefs). God
is only one person
Jesus is the Son of
God, not God
The monotheism of
Jesus
Two hour video, Jesus is Human |