Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is near

Matthew 4:17, "From that time on Jesus began to preach, "Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is near."

Repent does not mean to feel bad or guilty.  Repent means to change direction.  Those are very different things.  Repent has very little to do with feelings and much more to do with action.  Now action and feelings are generally tied together by the human psyche but, in this case, it is a call to action not a call to "feeling."

Jesus is telling people that they need to stop and change direction because something new is coming.  There is a new Kingdom and we are invited to change our direction and join into this kingdom instead of the kingdom's that we are under now.  In their case, they were under Roman rule.  They were a province of the kingdom of Rome.  As the Israelite people were awaiting their Messiah - they were hoping for a king and kingdom that would overthrow the present kingdom in power.  In the United States we put a lot of hope into elected officials.  We hope that certain parties will overtake other parties every few years so that we can be a part of the ruling party.

Jesus' kingdom simply isn't a military or political kingdom.  It is much, much bigger than that.  From what we can see so far - it is coming and we are supposed to change our direction.  Let's see how this plays out.

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