in,
and would enjoy blessedness and dominion. Yet he declared that even now,
every individual who is called into the kingdom may call on God as his
Father, and be sure of the gracious will of God, the hearing of his
prayers, the forgiveness of sin, and the protection of God even in this
present life.[58] But everything in this proclamation is directed to the
life beyond: the certainty of that life is the power and earnestness of
the Gospel.

2. The conditions of entrance to the kingdom are, in the first place, a
complete change of mind, in which a man renounces the pleasures of this
world, denies himself, and is ready to surrender all that he has in
order to save his soul; then, a believing trust in God's grace which he
grants to the humble and the poor, and therefore hearty confidence in
Jesus as the Messiah chosen and called by God to realise his kingdom on
the earth. The announcement is therefore directed to the poor, the
suffering, those hungering and thirsting for righteousness, not to those
who live, but to those who wish to be healed and redeemed, and finds
them prepared for entrance into, and reception of the blessings of the
kingdom of God,[59] while it brings down upon the self-satisfied, the
rich and those proud of their righteousness, the judgment of obduracy
and the damnation of Hell.

3. The commandment of undivided love to God and the brethren, as the
main commandment, in the observance of which righteousness is realised,
and forming the antithesis to the selfish mind, the lust of the world,
and every arbitrary impulse,[60] corresponds to the blessings of the
Kingdom of God, viz., forgiveness of sin, righteousness, dominion and
blessedness. The standard of personal worth for the members of the King
is self-sacrificing labour for others, not any technical mode of worship
or legal preciseness. Renunciation of the world together with its goods,
even of life itself in certain circumstances, is the proof of a man's
sincerity and earnest in seeking the Kingdom of God; and the meekness
which renounces every right, bears wrong patiently, requiting it with
kindness, is the practical proof of love to God, the conduct that
answers to God's perfection.

4. In the proclamation and founding of this kingdom, Jesus summoned men
to attach themselves to him, because he had recognised himself to be the
helper called by God, and therefore also the Messiah who was
promised.[61] He gradually declared himself to the people a