The longer I walk with Jesus, the more I realize how much “culture” hinders us from obeying the voice of God. Amplified voices in the church love to invite us to repent of identifiable sins like sexual immorality, drunkenness, abortion, thievery, murder, and identifiable list goes on and on. But Jesus never told us to repent of those things, not because they were not sins we needed to repent of, but because they were all fruit, that had a root He was after. Jesus never plucked bad fruit, but He always went after the root.

Here is an example of this in Jesus’ very own words, “After Jesus called the crowd to Him, He said to them, Hear and understand. It is not what enters into the mouth that defiles the man, but what proceeds out of the mouth, this defiles the man.” (Matthew 15:10-11). The Pharisees were fruit inspectors, not realizing they had rotten roots. Fruit is the food they put in their mouth, Jesus was not worried about what they ate, He wanted them to hear what they say. Paul even says in Romans 14:17, “The kingdom of God is not a matter of food and drink, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.”

Jewish “culture” was very focused on obeying the law. Any law breakers were considered, not of God. Henceforth, why they struggled with Jesus, because He was not submitting to what their “culture” demanded. The same is true with all “cultures”, in America independence is a value in this “culture” therefore, to let someone tell you what to do is not an option. Everyone of us must repent of obeying our culture if we are going to walk with Jesus into His kingdom, for the kingdom of God is not American culture, African culture, European culture, Asian culture, Australian culture, the kingdom of God is its own culture.

Jesus said, Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand! I believe many of us need to repent of disobeying God, because it doesn’t align with our culture. Our culture is keeping many from blessings God has for us individually and corporately. It is subtle, because we are born into a culture, but it is just another reason why we must be born again, for the kingdom is its own culture. Once you can die to your culture and live for His kingdom, everything changes and your life will truly never be the same again.