Once again, on the way to church this morning, I managed to catch the Sunday morning talk by guest speaker Andrew Hambilton on FM 96.5. Summary is below (I had the benefit of hearing the talk a second time on the internet); any mistakes/ambiguities are mine.
The talk is about heavenly citizenship & what is it like to be part of God’s kingdom. Andrew had gone along to his friend’s Australian citizenship ceremony a few months ago. As he reflected on the ceremony, Andrew realised how he takes his own citizenship for granted. For him, he is citizen by birth, but for his friend Dean, it was a matter of a transfer of allegiance/loyalty from his country of birth to his newly adopted country. Andrew talked about how having citizenship mean celebrating the unique values of the nation, actively live those values, demonstrate them & share with others.
Andrew then moved from talking about earthly citizenship to heavenly citizenship. He said just as there are some values which make us uniquely Australian, there are also some values which are heaven’s values, i.e. values which characterize citizens of heaven. He implores his listeners to consider what these heavenly values are & make a commitment to them – that is, a commitment to actively live by those values & demonstrate them to others. Those who become Christian become a citizen of heaven. They become adopted to God’s Kingdom. They transfer their allegiances/loyalties to that Kingdom, & embrace that Kingdom’s values. That should mean Christians should think & act in a different way. Jesus’ words in the gospel of Mark invite people to become citizens of God’s heavenly Kingdom, & enjoy the benefits of that citizenship now (Mark 1:14). The gospel of Mark does talk about what the Kingdom is like – it is different from earthly kingdom. Citizens of heavenly kingdom should think, act, speak & behave in a way that reflects the values of heaven.
Andrew then outlined 3 qualities/characteristics of a citizen of heaven. First characteristic is passion. Heavenly citizens are passionate. Passionate about God, about people, & about life. Jesus said in Mark 12:30: Love the Lord your God with all your heart & with all your soul & with all your mind & with all your strength. Jesus also said love your neighbours as yourself. All your heart, all your mind, all your strength – that is passion. Be passionate about God, & passionate about others, including ourselves. Jesus calls us to be truly passionate about God, because we believers are ruled by ruled by a God who is passionate about us.
Second characteristic is generosity. Heaven’s citizens are generous with their time, talents & treasures/belongings. Mark 12 has the story of a widow who gave a few coins to her church offering. It wasn’t much, but she gave everything she had. Jesus recognized this over others who apparently gave more than the widow, but what they gave was only a fraction of their wealth. We can at times be stingy with what we have. But being a heavenly citizen involves changing our thinking, & recognise that everything we have really belongs to God. He made everything, so He owns everything (see Psalm 24:1). Be generous with what we have.
Third characteristic is being wise investors. Heavenly citizens invest their life into something that lasts & leave a legacy. They value what God has done for them, & try to please God by investing their life. In Mark 15, we read that Jesus gave His life so that we can live & have a great future. The gift of Jesus’ life is a valuable gift & that requires appropriate response from us. Gifts that we value, we cherish & handle it wisely – the way we do this reflects the value we place on the gift & also the giver. So it is with God’s gift – how we use our life shows how much we cherish or value God’s gift. Heavenly citizens value that particular gift, & invest their lives in a way that show their appreciation of the gift.
Andrew said that earthly citizenship test often involves testing how much people know about their new country. Heavenly citizenship test is different – it has a lot more to do with who you know, rather than how much you know. Andrew referred to Revelation 21:27 – only those whose names appear in the Lamb’s Book of Life can be citizens of heaven. It is entirely up to us whether we choose to become a citizen of heaven. Will we choose God’s invitation to heavenly citizenship? If we do, then being a heavenly citizen has great privileges, much much better than the privilege of being citizen of any earthly nation. One such privilege is freedom. Freedom from all the things that enslave us & hold us back (fear, trouble, drugs, pressures of life, etc). We find freedom in Christ. Another privilege is forgiveness. Because of forgiveness, there is no longer a need to be ashamed of all the bad things which happened in the past. Another privilege of heavenly citizens is a future. Where we go in the future (heaven or hell) depends on who we give our allegiance to now. If our allegiance is with God & His Kingdom, then we will have a great & secure future.
Andrew implored listeners to embrace the gift of heavenly citizenship & commit to live out its values, to demonstrate them & share them with others. He encouraged us to be passionate, be generous & invest our lives wisely – so that when others look at us, they will know that we are citizens of heaven.
Reflection:
Hmmmm......let's run through the 3 characteristics.
Generosity - I think I'm ok with that. I do what I can to help people out, in terms of giving of my resources, time, etc.
Passion - yeah well, certain things I'm pretty passionate about. I wish I could honestly say I have passion about my faith. Sad, but it's true, I lack the zest that other Christians have about God, the Bible, etc. I hope God can help me out in that regard.
Wise investor - well, based on the description above, I can't say I qualify as one. I'm not very good at spending my time wisely, on the things that matter in eternity.
Thus, my score is 1 out of 3. Thank goodness God doesn't impose exam scores on His people. And thank God for His Son, that we believers have our citizenship in heaven.
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