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And he sent them to preach the kingdom of God, and to heal the sick. (Luke 9:2) |
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John the Baptist, Jesus, and the Apostle Paul preached the Kingdom of God. What are we preaching today—the gospel of "make a decision for Christ"? |
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Search the statement of faith of your church and see if the expression the Kingdom of God is found. |
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What has happened to the Gospel of the Kingdom? |
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I wondered for years why we preach that we get saved to go to Heaven since this expression is not found in the Scriptures. Recently I came across the philosophy of Gnosticism that teaches spirit is good and matter is evil. Maybe this is where the gospel of "go to Heaven" came from. |
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In any case, in these days the spiritual oppression is becoming so strong we need to base our faith on the Scriptures. |
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Most or all of Jesus' parables concerned the Kingdom. The Kingdom is like this. The Kingdom is like that. What in the world (or in Heaven) is the Kingdom? |
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The Kingdom of God is God in Christ in the saints ministering to the needs of God's creation. It is as simple as that. Tell your friends. |
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Where is the Kingdom? It is wherever God in Christ in the saints are whether in Heaven or on the earth. |
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The Kingdom of God is not designed to remain in Heaven but on the earth. God is moving to the earth. The throne of God is coming to the earth. Everybody who reads the Bible knows that. |
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The gospel of going to Heaven is pretty good but the Gospel that the Kingdom of Heaven is coming to the earth is much better. This way you can have your cake and eat it too. |
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Ask somebody what Heaven is like. They will describe the earth. Oh there are trees, flowers, birds, children playing, and so forth. You don't have to leave New England to see all this. |
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What we mean is there is no pain! We don't have a burning desire to stand on a sea of glass and play a harp. What we want is the present world without pain! |
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That's why Jesus told them to go and heal the sick and tell them about the Kingdom. The Kingdom is about getting healed. |
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If you want to go to Heaven real bad either you are in pain or else you have a lot of loved ones there—or maybe you are tired and need a rest. |
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What if the Lord came, brought your loved ones, removed the pain, and gave you unlimited energy. You still want to be a disembodied spirit and parade on a golden street with a palm branch in your hand? |
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Oh but I want to be where Jesus is! That's the point. You don't want to be a bodiless spirit you want to be where the King is. Right? Well the King is coming to the earth. Everybody knows that but I guess they forgot. |
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When He comes He is not going to make a U-turn. |
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The devil would love to see the whole Church carried up to Heaven. That's where he came from and he prefers the earth. Here's the deal. You give the devil the earth. The devil will give you the realm of spirits. Fair enough? |
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Satan will have a marvelous time here without you! |
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But what about the nations? They are Christ's inheritance—and yours if you are a coheir. Are you ready to give all these men and women, boys and girls, and our beautiful earth to a rebellious cherub? |
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Go ahead. Make your eternal home with the spirits. The Lord and His saints are going to take over the earth and inherit your people. |
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And quit praying the Lord's prayer if you don't believe it! |
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And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert graffed in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree; (Romans 11:17) |
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There is only one Divine Olive Tree—the Lord Jesus Christ. |
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The Olive Tree spoke to Abraham and he left Ur with his family. |
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By prophesy the Olive Tree continued in Isaac, Jacob, and the twelve sons of Jacob. |
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The Olive Tree continued with the Jews until Christ's death and resurrection. Then the Olive Tree passed to a remnant of Jews and a remnant of Gentiles. |
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The majority of Jews were broken off from the Olive Tree when Jesus Christ came, revealing that the Olive Tree is not physical Israel. The Jews were not broken off from physical Israel. |
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Paul tells us that the elect Gentiles were removed from the wild olive tree and grafted in among the branches of the cultivated Olive Tree. |
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Paul tells us also that after the full number of elect Gentiles have become part of the Olive Tree God will remove the ungodliness from the physical Jews and graft them back into their own tree. |
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In this manner all Israel will be saved, meaning all of those whom God has chosen to be part of the Olive Tree. |
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Olive oil is a type of the Holy Spirit of God. All who are part of the Olive Tree are part of Christ, part of the One who possesses the fullness of the Holy Spirit. |
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We see therefore that true Israel, including the elect Jews and Gentiles, are the body of the Christ, the fullness of the Olive Tree. |
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We all are baptized into the one body of Christ, whether we are Jews or Gentiles. Paul teaches clearly that in the last days God will turn again to physical Israel, take away their sins, and restore them to their own Olive Tree. |
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The Jews of today are not the Olive Tree unless they have been born again in Jesus Christ. Jerusalem on earth is under the bondage of the Law of Moses. The Jerusalem in Heaven is Sarah, the mother of us all. |
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There is only the one Seed of Abraham—Christ, the one anointed with the Holy Spirit. |
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Let each Christian do everything in his power to comfort and encourage the Jewish people. We Gentiles have treated them badly in time past. Let us realize God has not forgotten His original chosen people and has promised, both in the Old Testament and the New, that He will turn to them again and remove their sin. |
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What rejoicing there will be when the Jews receive their Christ! How glad Christ will be! |
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Let the wicked tremble for they soon will be driven from the earth. |
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Welcome home, Jewish people. The Gospel of Christ is your bread, your salvation. We Gentiles are as Asenath, standing by while the great Joseph delivers His people. We rejoice with you for we, through our marriage to Christ, are now an integral part of Israel. |
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Shalom, friends! |
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Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. (I Corinthians 15:50) |
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The most direct meaning of the above passage is that we will not go into the Kingdom of God in our present body but in a resurrected glorified body. There is much more to it than this. |
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Our entire first personality, the descendant of Adam and Eve, cannot enter the Kingdom of God. |
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There are many good traits in our first personality, varying from one individual to the next: honor, truthfulness, faithfulness, integrity, moral purity, and so forth. God is not saving any of these. |
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In the beginning God took a handful of red clay and fashioned a prototype of His image. It wasn't until two thousand years ago that the true, eternal image of God set foot on the earth. |
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Our good traits are not eternal. And they will fail if pushed hard enough. |
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You can only make so much out of dust! |
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When the Lord Jesus died on the cross He exclaimed, "It has been finished!" Not only had the blood atonement been finished, the whole first creation had been finished. |
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When the Lord Jesus came out of the cave He was the Firstborn of an entirely new creation. |
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Water baptism demonstrates we are nailing our first personality to the cross with Jesus and are rising with Him into new life, into the Kingdom of God. Baptism means nothing less than this! |
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Now we are crucified and risen—by faith! |
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What's next? |
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God makes our crucifixion and resurrection a fact. |
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How does He do that? |
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By crucifying and resurrecting us. |
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Moment by moment, day by day, God brings our first personality to death by frustrating, sometimes painful, experiences. If we look to God instead of complaining and blaming people, God raises us into Christ each time we "die." Death and life. Death and life. This is the only true Christian walk. |
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The philosophy of humanism has inundated the United States. Humanism will never agree to pursuing life through death. In humanistic thinking the individual must always get what he or she wants, even if it destroys society. |
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(Kind of stupid when you think about it.) |
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A remnant is being drawn from the churches today, something like Gideon's army. The majority of Christians will attempt to save their life. They will never bear eternal Kingdom fruit if they labor in Christian work all their life. They will bring forth religious people in their own image. |
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The remnant will accept God's plan of death and resurrection. The fruit they bear comes out of their death and will stand in God's Presence for eternity. |
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How about you? Will you seek to save your life or will you give it up to God so He can bring forth His Kingdom in you? |
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Are you tired of trying to be a Christian? If you will accept the death He brings you through He will accomplish in your personality what you desire. |
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Fear not little flock! |
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In him was life; and the life was the light of men. (John 1:4) |
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You're not going to enjoy being called a dead animal. But that's what you are if Christ hasn't breathed life into you. |
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Why should you object? Don't you believe in evolution? Any doctor will tell you that you are a hairless ape. Some monkey is your uncle. So don't get mad at me. I'm just saying what all the great scientists are telling us. |
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How could the majority of great scientists be wrong? You're a smart ape. Get used to it. |
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But why are you dead? Because you don't have the Life of God in you. Your body is winding down. You're getting wrinkles. You're getting tired more often. Start your funeral plan early. Caskets and plots are expensive these days. |
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Maybe you're the type that wants to live. Maybe you would like to live forever—in the body yet! |
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This is what the Christian salvation is all about. It's how to escape the cycle of nature and start on the graph that's climbing toward eternity. |
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Into the spiritually dead zoo strides the Son of God, eternally alive, with the keys of death and Hell in His mighty grasp. Fortunately for you and me He is willing to share His Divine glory. |
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Listen! Forget what you have heard about religion. There is a Man! His name is Jesus! He sits on the highest throne in the universe! He possesses all authority and power in Heaven and on the earth! |
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It's true. I've got better things to do than to write lies to you. I wasn't raised in church. God called me in a supernatural way. I'm just being obedient. I would rather be out in the woods than doing religious stuff. |
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I'm telling you that this Jesus is alive! I've been at this thing for fifty-two years and while I am not overly intelligent I can see that the things that have happened when I pray have not been random. There's design here. |
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I'm glad of it. Our whole world seems to be filled with liars. Everyone is out for his own. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. It's a mess. It's disgusting and repulsive. |
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But there is Someone worth living for. His name is Jesus. He doesn't lie. He is faithful. He came to bless the poor especially. |
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He is alive and He is eternal Life! You and I are dead baboons until the Man breathes Divine Life into us. Then He—Christ—is born in us. We not only are eternally alive but we also have become a child of God, not just an orangutan that can read. |
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It's for you, and the offer won't last forever. |
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Grab it now while you have the chance. The Christian way is not easy because you have to follow the Lord each day and do what He says. |
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But I'm here to tell you it's the only show in town! |
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Get a life—eternal life. |
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If we suffer, we shall also reign with him: if we deny him, he also will deny us: (II Timothy 2:12) |
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Often the question is asked, "What about those who were saved and then died a short while later? Will they receive the rewards of the overcomer?" |
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It is our present point of view that the promises to the overcomer, as set forth in the second and third chapter of the Book of Revelation, are not, in a sense, merely "rewards." The term rewards suggests an external "prize." The various aspects and stages of glory of the Kingdom of God indeed are rewards, or prizes for running the race successfully, but not in the sense of external prizes that will be handed to us one day in Heaven as we stand in line for our rewards. |
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Rather, the promises to the overcomer are increments of personality. They are eternal transformations of our personality and actions. The transformations make it possible for us to fulfill our calling as kings and priests of God, to function in the infinitely varied positions of service and responsibility in the eternal Kingdom of God. As we wait patiently in God's prison the ability to rule is formed in us, the courage, faithfulness, and willingness to wait before making a decision until we are certain what the Lord is saying. |
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Perhaps those who have not been given time on the earth to be changed have not been called to the roles that require the kind of personality that can be formed only by the tribulations of life on the earth. This is nothing more than speculation on our part. |
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However, it appears that if it were possible to form in Paradise the stern obedience to God, the patience, the humility of mind, the ability to rule in the Kingdom, it would not have been necessary for the Lord Jesus to be tempted as He was, to have had to overcome as He did. |
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We are not ignoring the fact Christ Jesus had to come and fulfill the Law of Moses so that the righteousness of the Law could be imputed (ascribed) to us. Neither are we unmindful of the fact that by being tempted in this manner He is better able to help us when we are tempted. We are speaking only of the Lord's acquiring of His predestined inheritance. |
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It is not that we cannot be tempted in Paradise. Perhaps there will be times after we die and are in the spirit realm when we will have to exercise patience. We will have to be obedient to God whether we enjoy or do not enjoy that which we are called upon to do. |
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There will be no Satan to overcome. There will be no world nor the lusts of the flesh to resist. But we still will have to obey God in all matters even though we may have conflicting desires. |
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We understand that some kinds of temptations are possible in Paradise because Adam and Eve were in Paradise when they fell. Also, Satan and his followers fell from God's Presence and blessing while they yet were in Paradise. But it does not seem likely that the setting that can produce trustworthy rulers can be found in the spirit Paradise, in Heaven. |
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We can be tested concerning our willingness to hope in God for our security, our pleasure, and our ambitions when we are dwelling in the spirit Paradise. But there are not the series of lessons accompanying the test that press the desired virtue into our character. |
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The temptation of Eden was (and is) that man cease trusting God for his betterment (in this instance to become wise, to know good and evil) and proceed to act on his own behalf apart from the Presence of the will of the Lord. |
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What temptation is it that God's rulers must overcome? It is the temptation to take matters into our own hands; to act for our seeming betterment apart from the Presence and will of God. |
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What goes on throughout the world today? Men are taking matters into their own hands because they do not trust God for their betterment. |
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Dying and going to Paradise will not change the tendency in us to seek our own betterment, to solve our own problems apart from the Presence, will, and way of God. If there is a lack of obedience and trust, if we still cannot be trusted to rest in God's will, then, in the resurrection, there always is the danger we will take matters into our own hands in order to "better" our condition just as Satan did. |
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God is perfecting rulers who will serve forever as guides and teachers, making sure that no creature of God ever at any time acts for his seeming betterment outside the will of God. (from Chosen To Rule) |
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Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. (II Corinthians 4:10) |
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Our redemption begins with belief in the Gospel, repenting of our past manner of life, and receiving by faith the blood atonement made by the Lord Jesus. |
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Then we are baptized in water. Water baptism signifies we have died with the Lord Jesus and have been raised with Him to the right hand of the Father in Heaven. |
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The remainder of our discipleship consists of working out in practice what we declared to be true in water baptism: our whole first nature, not just our sinful tendencies but our entire old nature has died with the Lord Jesus on the cross; our new born-again nature has ascended in Jesus to the right hand of the Father, there to await the Day of Resurrection. |
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We bear about in our physical body the dying of the Lord. |
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A firstfruits of our personality, our born-again spiritual nature, already has entered the Kingdom of God. Now we are to interact with the Divine Life of Jesus until all of our inner personality has experienced the death of the cross and the resurrection Life of the Lord Jesus. It is a daily death and a daily resurrection. It is the forming of Christ in us. |
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In this manner we attain the first resurrection, the resurrection to righteousness, immortality, and glory. |
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At the time of the Lord's appearing we shall be given the white robe—the body of incorruptible life that is formed as our mortal body is sown to the death of the cross. |
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Then we will descend from Heaven with the Lord (or be changed if we are still alive on the earth) and clothe our mortal remains with the white robe of resurrection life that has been formed as we faithfully have sown our body to the death of the cross. |
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This is the first resurrection, the resurrection to righteousness, immortality, and glory. It is achieved by entering the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus on a daily basis. |
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The Christian pilgrimage is full of challenges. Let us say someone has hurt us grievously. Now the battle is joined. We can place the hurt before God and seek the grace of forgiveness, or we can plan on avenging ourselves. |
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If we choose to avenge ourselves our inner nature remains unchanged. We have saved our life, so to speak, but we have lost the part of the first resurrection that could have been ours. We have not attained the first resurrection in this instance. |
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If we place the hurt before God, obtaining the Virtue of the body and blood of Christ, part of our natural man dies on the cross as he forgives his enemy. In his place comes the body and blood of the Lord, which is eternal life. |
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The action of forgiving the person who hurt us has resulted in our attaining the first resurrection, in this measure. Part of us has died. Christ has been formed in part of us. The new creation, the Kingdom, has come into being. The new creation is neither Christ nor us. The new creation is a new person formed from the marriage, the union of our personality with Christ. It is eternal. It is "new wine" and God will put it in a new bottle in the Day of Resurrection. (from The Christian and the Ten Commandments) |
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For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. (Ephesians 2:8,9) |
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Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only. (James 2:24) |
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The two statements, one by Paul and one by James, appear to be contradictory. Yet we know that both are true. |
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There are seeming contradictions in the Scriptures. A notable one is the concept of predestination versus the concept of God's willingness that all be saved. |
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Another has to do with the overwhelming love of God that does not seem compatible with the idea of people incarcerated for eternity in a lake of fire and sulfur. |
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A third is the exhortation that we must endure to the end to be saved. Yet the Bible says he who believes and is baptized shall be saved. |
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It appears that current theology chooses the most appealing emphasis and neglects or discards the other. |
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Today we are emphasizing that God is willing that all be saved and discarding the tremendous New Testament emphasis on election. |
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We are stressing the love of God but not His severity. His severity is as great as His love! |
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We press people to "make a decision for Christ." Do we then tell them that they have committed themselves to a lifetime of cross- carrying obedience?—that they will gain the crown only if they hold fast their confidence to the end of their pilgrimage? |
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We submit that historically the present emphases are new. In time past there were excesses in the teaching of predestination, God's anger, and the extraordinary asceticism required of the saints—just the opposite of today. |
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We would submit also that these new emphases are a product of the philosophy of humanism, that man's welfare, rights, and happiness must be the first consideration of every endeavor, religious or otherwise. |
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Philosophers tell us that when there is a thesis and an antithesis truth is found in the synthesis. If the thesis and the antithesis are both God-given, then it undoubtedly is a fact that truth is found in the synthesis. |
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Are we justified by faith in Christ? Absolutely! |
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Are we justified by works of obedience to God? Absolutely! |
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Does God desire that every individual be saved? Absolutely! |
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Does God work in terms of election and foreknowledge? Absolutely! |
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Are we saved the moment we believe and are baptized? Absolutely! |
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Are we saved by enduring to the end? Absolutely! |
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Please note we are not speaking of balance. Balance tends to remove the power of the exhortation so we are left with jelly. God's love is not balanced by His wrath. The joy of the Kingdom is not balanced by the torment of the Lake of Fire. Christ's fierceness as a king is not balanced by His gentleness as a shepherd. Both are totally true, neither one modifying the other. |
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Christ's warnings to us are not negated by His love! True, edifying balance is attained when we tell people the whole truth about God and His salvation. |
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We arrive at truth by serving Him who is the Truth. We find then that we are saved both by faith and works. We are free to choose whom we will serve and yet we were called out from the world by election. We were saved, are being saved, and shall be saved in the future. Salvation is always today. |
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How could a loving God let a child die of cancer? |
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The problem is our pride—we have trouble letting God be God. If we do not understand how the seeming contradictions resolve we refuse to play. |
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Time to leave the sandbox and come in from recess! |
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