Both John the Baptist and Jesus were announcing a new age of the Kingdom of God. John the Baptist dressed like Elijah to indicate that Israel was as much in need of a complete turnaround as they were in the time of Ahab and Elijah. He also lived in the desert to symbolise the state of his people. Jesus was always stressing that to enter the Kingdom was to make a radical shift of life; that is clear in the Sermon on the Mount and it is highlighted here in 7:28b when he says that the least person in the new Kingdom of God is greater than John, who was the last old covenant prophet. It is important to understand that between normal worldly lifestyle and Kingdom lifestyle there is a radical discontinuity. To go from one to the other is a radical shift into an entirely new order of things. It is not a smooth transition in which you can take all your previous expectations, goals, desires, mindsets, priorities etc and just put a different label on it all. When the disciples stepped into this new life they left everything behind. When people joined the early church they sold their properties and invested the money into the movement. They understood that to be a part of the Kingdom of God is a completely different kind of life. It is a radical shift. It may not always require us to do what they did, but if it isn’t that, what is the radical difference? What is the radical difference between your life and the lives of others around you?
Reflect on these questions and ask God to shape and change you as he sees fit.
Read Luke 7:18-35
