Beginning on the Sabbath of September 10, the United Church of God will hold Kingdom of God Bible Seminars at more than 150 locations in North America, South America, Australia, Europe, New Zealand, the Philippines and Africa.

Since the Kingdom of God is what the Church is all about, participation from every member is absolutely critical. God wants every human to enter His family, and this is what these seminars will explain. These seminars are an extremely valuable part of our overall gospel-preaching efforts, standing beside The Good News and our other printed publications, Beyond Today television and our UCG.org website.

And all our members are in a unique position to be able to participate directly in a personal way with this set of seminars. Let’s examine how individual members can most effectively participate, who our target audience is, why we are conducting these seminars and what the seminar content will be.

Believe, Pray and Support the Big Picture

We all have to believe in what we are doing. How? Believing prayer is the first and foremost duty of the members of the church for the success of the seminars. The believing prayers of congregations and the ministry are vital. Christ said we should pray, “And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in My name, I will do it” (John 14:13-14). When we pray for the success of these seminars according to Scripture, asked in Christ’s name, God will give what we request.

When people attend the seminars, we as members are to be
ready to talk to those who ask about the Kingdom of God. Financial services operations manager Aaron Dean said, “Each member should have faith to be ready to give an answer. Don’t be afraid to meet those coming to the seminars and engage them in conversation. But also be willing to let them lead the conversation if they aren’t ready to talk about certain subjects.”

Target Audience

Those attending will be subscribers to The Good News and our other magazines, UCG.org website users, and/or watchers of Beyond Today. This is United’s opportunity to give some of its most devoted mass media followers the message of the Kingdom of God. In doing research to prepare the seminar outlines, it became clear that the Christian world of 2.3 billion people knows little or nothing about the Kingdom of God the way Jesus Christ taught it.

According to Wikipedia’s entry on the Kingdom of God, scholars now broadly conclude that the Kingdom of God was Jesus Christ’s central message. But there are myriad false ideas of what that message is and means from the points of view of all types of scholars, philosophers and thinkers. In contrast, UCG has designed its seminars to proclaim and explain the true Kingdom of God message of Jesus Christ: that through God’s calling, faith, obedience and true conversion to Christ, mankind has the opportunity to be part of the family of God.  

Preaching the Gospel in Several Ways

By examining the history of religious thought throughout the world, it is apparent that in the centuries since the Gutenberg invention of printing in circa 1440 up until the 1930s, few if any other churches anywhere published or proclaimed this same purely biblical Kingdom of God message in its fullness. Further, we know that not since the time of the apostles has the specific content of this original biblical gospel been proclaimed globally.

However, Christ stressed how important proclaiming our specific message is to the history of the world. He said, “This gospel of the Kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all nations, and then the end will come” (Matthew 24:14). This is part of UCG’s work in fulfilling Jesus’s words.

Seminar Content Formula

In Mark 1:14-15, we see the account of the major outline of topics that Christ proclaimed throughout His ministry: “Now after 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.’”

Those who have constructed the seminar content analyzed this message and designed four seminars using four main themes as a comprehensive formula to guide our content. Each seminar will contain two presentations. Seminar 1 will be held in September of this year. The remaining seminars will be held in the subsequent 12 months—one every four months. So seminar 2 will be held in January 2012, seminar 3 in May 2012, and seminar 4 in September 2012.

Seminar 1—The Time Is Fulfilled.When Christ said this 2,000 years ago, it was time in history for the first coming of Christ. In a world of suffering dominated by the oppressive Roman Empire, it was time for humanity to hear God’s message of good news of the Kingdom of God, which will bring a perfect government to Israel and the world. It was time for a host of major prophecies of the first coming of the Word of God to be fulfilled.

Today, it is time for a host of prophecies about the second coming of Jesus Christ to be fulfilled—for Christ to return to save a world when civilization and the survival of the human race is at stake. It is time for man to understand the noble purpose of God in creating man to live forever in His divine family and how God, not man, will solve mankind’s greatest problems when the Kingdom of God will rule the earth.

Seminar 2—The Kingdom of God Is at Hand. When Christ said this, He was immediately at hand representing the power, grace, mercy, laws and justice of the Kingdom of God. He counteracted the wrong ideas of the world at the time. He demonstrated what the Father and Son are personally like in their character of love, virtue and purpose.

The second seminar, scheduled to take place in January 2012, will demonstrate that these truths of the Kingdom of God represent the greatest opportunity for each person alive and for the entire human race. It will teach in greater depth about the specific nature of the Kingdom of God.

Seminar 3—Repent! Christ taught that everybody needs to rethink reality in light of the Kingdom of God and change so as to enter that Kingdom. Jesus taught God’s law and magnified it. He said that His disciples must reconstruct their lives around God’s truths—in the same way that little children respond to their parents—under God’s direction through the Word of God.

The message of repentance today is the same as in Christ’s time. This seminar will focus on what real repentance is, how to respond to God so as to come under His grace and how to be transformed now through true conversion to Christ .

Seminar 4—Believe the Gospel!Mankind needs meaning for everything in life and the Kingdom of God gives meaning to every element of existence if we believe it. Belief is a choice. It is not just a matter of knowing what the Bible says about the Kingdom of God. Jesus said that true disciples are to respond to His message of the Kingdom by building a life of believing faith. This seminar will make an appeal to people to build their lives on living faith in the reality of the Kingdom of God as outlined above.

Seminars Held On Sabbath

Some may wonder why the church is giving these seminars on the Sabbath.

It’s simple—the Sabbath day is God’s ordained day to teach and celebrate the Kingdom of God to humanity. Christ taught and healed the unconverted on the Sabbaths as well as at the annual Festivals. The apostles taught the unconverted on the Sabbath. As a church, every four months, we will follow in our spiritual Leader’s footsteps in presenting the Kingdom of God, which the Sabbath celebrates!

Multiple Installments, Continuous Program

The reason they will be held every four months is because we continuously have new people watching our media on television, reading our literature and downloading and interacting with our expanding, global Web presence. When given a repeat offer, the number of people responding increases. You can view our Kingdom of God Bible Seminar website at www.kogbibleseminars.org.

Let’s understand Christ’s principle of the mustard seed. His work in planting the seed of His Kingdom starts very small, in the hearts of people individually around the world. It takes time to prepare those hearts, plant those seeds, water, fertilize and harvest the crop.

Also, most people who may have some interest will need to be invited multiple times before they will take action on an opportunity. In the pilot program, which was held in Columbus and Cambridge, Ohio, many people came to multiple seminars, but there was also a mix of new people each time. Eventually, one third of the attendees became regular Sabbath observers attending with us. But even if someone attends for the first time during the second or third seminar, the material covered will still sufficiently stand alone from the previous seminars for our attendees to receive a positive, cohesive message about God’s Kingdom.

People will bring relatives, friends and members of other churches to these seminars. This program will grow. And we will grow as a loving family in the Church. After all, we know God, who is love, is the planter. God our Father and Christ are opening this great door of opportunity for us to serve Him in presenting His Kingdom through UCG’s Kingdom of God Bible Seminar series. Let’s be ready, willing and gracious instruments in His hand. For in this opportunity given to the world, the Kingdom of God is at hand!