And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people.
From that time Jesus began to preach and to say, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."
Repeatedly we discover the crux of Jesus' message in scripture. He came spreading the good news about the kingdom (the realm) of God coming to earth. Quite literally, the I AM was interacting with the affairs of man in a way that transformed people.
Perhaps the most revealing thing about Jesus' message was what He did not preach. He did not attempt to persuade people to join a church. He did not challenge them to embrace the synagogue and be more faithful in their attendance. He did not invite people (other than a very few) to join his ministry.
Someone recently referred me to an online article in a newspaper's religious section. A number of pastors spoke candidly about the "unchurched", about being saddened by the amount of people not attending church services on Sunday morning.
As I reflected on the article, my mind turned to the message of Jesus, a message of the kingdom of God, a message of good news, a message of power. I wonder if we have not replaced the message of the kingdom with the message of the church. Has our focus turned from the kingdom of God to an attempt to persuade people to attend our church services?
Incidentally "attending church" is not a biblical concept. The church is the outward manifestation of the inward transformational power of the kingdom of God. If we focus on the attendance of Sunday morning services, are we missing the point?
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