86. When do
I as a Christian enter into the Kingdom of God and when I sin am I still
part of it? Daniel O.
You enter the
Kingdom of God when you receive Christ as your Lord and saviour by believing
in your heart and confessing with your mouth the Gospel message of His
resurrection from the dead as stated in Rom 10:9 "That
if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe
in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved".
In John 3:5 "Jesus answered Nicodemus who was an officer in the temple and said, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God". And unless someone has his mind renewed by the work of the Holy Spirit, he will never understand divine and spiritual things appertaining to the Kingdom His dear Son.
Being born-again of water and of the spirit is entirely a spiritual experience as the water speaks of the Word of God. There is nothing natural implied, as in water, for the baptism into Christ takes place the instant one believes and confesses Christ as their Lord and Saviour.
At the moment of physical death the spirit and soul of the believer can he be thought to have similarly entered into an open state of grace, and the Kingdom of God. Unless a person is regenerated, he is not born heir apparent to the Kingdom and without internal holiness, shall not enter into it, enjoy it, or see God.
All will live eternally with the God they contain at the time of their physical death. The God of the Christian now dwells in temples made without hands, and we as believers will be where He is, because the Bible says that Christ has gone to prepare a place for us. John 14:2 "In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you".
Sin then to a Holy God is to still have the old god in the temple or container of our body. Being born-again takes out the old man (Satan) and replaces it with the new man (Christ). If we sin, as in bad behaviour, we have an advocate with the Father through our High Priest - Jesus Christ whose intercessory work and shed blood cleanses us of every sin we confess. 1 John 1:9.
