[Darris McNeely] What does the gospel of the Kingdom of God have to do with prophecy? We've been covering prophecy in these BT Dailies in a series. And the importance of the gospel, which really is the good news of the Kingdom of God, really needs to be connected to the importance of prophecy and the role of prophecy within the Bible and specifically to the gospel in itself. I think a good place to begin with that is where the gospel begins in the gospels in Mark 1:14-15 where it says that, "When John was put in prison, Jesus came to Galilee preaching the gospel of the Kingdom of God and saying, 'The time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel.'" It took a belief in that good news of the coming Kingdom of God for people to grab them and to wrap their minds around and to really understand what it was all about. Jesus said to repent. Now repentance we've already covered in a previous episode in this series on prophecy—really is one of the key aspects and purposes of prophecy as a compelling reason for us to change our life and to get in line with God and His ways, His laws, and His teaching. So repentance right here at the beginning of the gospel really makes that connection.

[Steve Myers] Absolutely, it's something that Christ is encouraging us to say we've got a responsibility. We've got to respond to the gospel message. And of course, that's not some mystery. Jesus Christ says this is the good news of the gospel of the Kingdom of God. Gospel equals good news. And part of our responsibility is to respond to that message and repent. We've got to change our mind. We've got to change our direction. We've got to turn from what we're doing to be sure we're lined up with Jesus Christ and God the Father.

[Darris McNeely] Now repentance is kind of a heavy word today. People don't like to repent. In fact I've found in talking with people that they really don't understand what the word means and the idea that we have to change—change our lifestyle, whatever that might be is rather difficult for people to really wrap their mind around. But what Jesus is talking about when He says to repent—and you look at what the Bible says and it's a large subject and it's really about changing from our lifestyle to God's lifestyle. That is really an important way to understand what repentance is all about. It's getting in line with a godly lifestyle, which when you really examine it, Steve, is different than the way most people want to live today.

[Steve Myers] Yeah, Christ was very specific with that too because He said, you know, the time is fulfilled. The Kingdom of God is at hand. Believe in the gospel. Repent and believe. So once you hear the good news, once you hear what God's plan is, once you hear what His standard is, what's our standard for living? He says our standard better be His standard. And that means I've got to repent from my way of thinking to put on God's way of thinking. That means a change in lifestyle.

[Darris McNeely]  And that's why in so many of the prophecies which do deal with the real consequence of human behavior, human decisions that are contrary to God's way of life, God's style of life lead to the problems that prophecies talk about and the war, the spiritual deception, the famine, the pestilence, and so many other issues that are right at the heart of some of these dire, prophetic warnings. When God gives us that advance understanding and knowledge and tells us to repent, it should be a compelling reason for any of us to begin to change our life in advance to get in line with what God says in order to avoid not only the consequences in our own personal life of those bad decisions, but the larger ones that are prophesied to come upon the world in the time of the end.

[Steve Myers] There's much to this subject. We're going to continue with our series on prophecy later on BT Daily. We'll see you next time.