The Simple Answers… To Life’s Most Important Questions.
Bible Study Course Lesson 2 – 2
The last lesson made it clear that the kingdom of God is a real, literal kingdom coming to rule this Earth. But that’s not the whole story. It is a literal kingdom, first and foremost. But it’s ALSO a spiritual kingdom! The Jews were very familiar with the prophecies you read in the previous lesson, the ones that promise a literal restoration of Israel as the Kingdom of God on Earth (Luke 19:11). They understood their promised inheritance. They were certain that when Christ came, He would AT THAT TIME restore the Kingdom to Israel (Acts 1:6).
Prophecies are often dual; there is usually a physical AND a spiritual fulfillment. The physical fulfillment is clear from a thousand scriptures; Jesus will return and set up a literal government on this Earth, administered by the saints under Him (Matthew 25:34).
But there is also a spiritual fulfillment! A spiritual TYPE of God’s Kingdom! To understand the spiritual version, think carefully about the literal Kingdom of God; read Romans 14:11 and Philippians 2:10. How will Jesus rule this kingdom? Revelation 12:5. When? Revelation 19:15. And what is His title then? Revelation 19:16. What is the point of this Kingdom of God? 1 Corinthians 15:24-28.
Jesus is coming here to set up a kingdom, so He can one day – when the kingdom is perfected – deliver it up to His Father. Remember, it’s really the Father’s Kingdom! The gospel was always about His FATHER’S rule. But before Jesus can hand it over, He must first “subdue all things” to Himself. After all, you wouldn’t give your dad a broken present, would you?
Likewise, Jesus won’t give an imperfect Kingdom to His Father. First, He must put down ALL rule, ALL power, and ALL authority. Rule the nations with a rod of iron; make EVERY KNEE bow before His rule. Whether they like it or not! This won’t violate free will; the nations will have free will to refuse His rule – but they will suffer the consequences of their sin if they do! (Zechariah 14:16-19).
This will be a time of SURRENDER to Christ, of learning that God’s way really DOES work, and that when followed, the laws of God really will make the deserts blossom like roses, and make the waste places inhabitable! This is what the Kingdom of God WILL be like in that day! This is the perfect fulfillment of this prophecy. Now remember that picture for a moment!
Back in Luke 19 once more; there is more in this parable that we passed over in the previous lesson. The primary purpose is to reveal the LITERAL kingdom, but Jesus also mentions the SPIRITUAL kingdom if you noticed it! Jesus acknowledges that He did not yet have a kingdom; that His inheritance was not to be received until His return. He was not yet a king! Just an heir (Galatians 4:1-2), with no real authority yet, even though He was technically Lord of all.
And yet, even though He had no official authority, He had servants (Luke 19:13), and citizens (Luke 19:14), even though He hadn’t yet received His REAL kingdom (Luke 19:15) These are citizens of His present, spiritual kingdom! Did Jesus come as a King, or as a servant? Philippians 2:7-8. But was Jesus a king? John 18:37. [Note: “thou sayest” was an expression meaning “what you said is right”]. But was He a king to everyone? (Last part of that same verse). To whom is He king? Revelation 15:3.
Notice that Jesus was a king “and everyone who is of the truth hears His voice”! See, Jesus is GOING to be your king. He is GOING to be your ruler. You WILL bow before Him one day. He has sworn by Himself that it will happen (Isaiah 45:23). And Jesus came to announce that fact IN ADVANCE! Now imagine if you could go back in time a decade or two and buy stock in Yahoo, bitcoin, bottled water, or cell phones. A few dollars in the right company then, when they were just starting out, would be worth billions today! In a similar way, Jesus compared the Kingdom of God to a grain of mustard seed, which starts out as the smallest of seeds but grows into a giant tree (Matthew 13:31-32).
The Kingdom of God started just as small, with one man, Jesus; one man who acknowledged the kingship and rule of God, His Father. And if you buy one tiny seed, one share of that kingdom – and have the patience to wait for it to grow – it will turn into a world-girdling empire! And that tiny seed you buy today and carefully protect and nurture for the rest of your life will be beyond price when it grows into that great tree!
Jesus came to announce that HE WAS KING. He has sworn by Himself that HE WILL RULE THE NATIONS – and if you believe Him, you can take advantage of the greatest insider stock tip ever! Jesus came to proclaim the Kingdom of God was COMING! And even though He had no official authority AS YET, if you BELIEVED He would be King – that is, if you BELIEVED THE GOOD NEWS – and if you voluntarily chose to accept Him as King TODAY, you would be given a position of authority in His future Kingdom! Because you helped and supported Him when He was “without reputation”, He will help and support you when He is famous!
KING DAVID’S ARMY
The Bible often works in symbols; there are patterns throughout the Bible. Paul calls our attention to many of these when he says things happened to ancient Israel as examples for us. While they did literally happen, they were also inspired by God to teach us lessons (1 Corinthians 10:11). And in a similar way, David is an allegory of Jesus – while of course there was a literal David, many of the things David was inspired to do also pictured things Jesus was one day to do. This is why God said David was a man after His own heart (Acts 13:22). David was very similar in nature to Jesus; so many of the choices David made were naturally similar to choices Jesus would make. God capitalized on this similarity and caused events to happen around him that would picture events in the life of Jesus as well – for “our admonition”.
David was anointed head of the Kingdom of Israel (1 Samuel 16:13), a long time, perhaps 10 years, before he actually took power and was accepted as king by Israel. Jesus, likewise was anointed (Acts 10:38) by God long before He actually will take power and be accepted as king by Israel.
When David was fleeing from the then-king of Israel, Saul, he was already officially king. He had been anointed by God, so his kingship was assured. But he had no power! No one to follow him, no kingdom to lead! A king’s power is in his people – if he has no people, what is he king of? You could proclaim yourself king of England – but unless the people of England are willing to follow you, are you really king? What if God, Himself proclaimed you king – until the people are willing to accept you as their leader, are you their king? Technically, yes – but in practice, no.
This is the same situation we find Jesus in when He became a man. Jesus was king of Jerusalem (Matthew 21:5), but His subjects rejected Him (Luke 19:14). He didn’t come to call fire from heaven (Luke 9:54-56), so He had no way of establishing His rule… unless some people voluntarily CHOSE to follow Him, on FAITH that He would indeed be king one day and reward them then!
So what did the follower-less, not-yet-king David do? 1 Samuel 22:1. And of whom was his first army composed? 1 Samuel 22:2. Who does Jesus call into His spiritual “army”? 1 Corinthians 1:26-29. Did He spend time with the respected people, or the dregs of society? Mark 2:15-16,17. Why? Verse 17.
The Pharisees didn’t NEED a new king. They were very happy with the king they had – Caesar. They had money, respect, authority – if things changed they had everything to lose and, as they saw it, very little to gain. They were – they thought – “whole”. In reality they weren’t (Revelation 3:17), but they thought they were, so they weren’t interested in new leadership.
People who had authority, money, and respect under Saul’s leadership likewise had everything to lose by thumbing their nose at the powers-that-were. Why rock the boat? They were comfortable, they were happy. But those who were in debt, those who were distressed, those who were unhappy with the present regime WERE interested in new leadership; so they followed David, SURRENDERED THEIR WILLS TO HIS, and “he became a captain over them”!
These four hundred men became the foundation of his new army, and those who were with him from the beginning gained very high positions in the new government, once David received a real kingdom! Because they had faith in him, believed in him, and served him WHEN HE HAD NO AUTHORITY YET! They accepted him as their king, when he was king in name only!
Likewise the prostitutes, bookies, destitute, sick, and unhappy are the ones who seek Christ, because they seek a BETTER kingdom! They have something to GAIN by the arrival of a new king who will crush and absorb the present kingdoms! But the rich are too good at twisting our corrupt system to their own ends to have any interest in changing it!
This world already has a king. The Jews rejected Jesus as their king, screaming to Pilate “we have no king but Caesar!” (John 19:15). He came unto His own people, those who should have been glad to hail Him as King, and they rejected Him (John 1:11). But those who DID receive Him – now, in this time – He offered salvation (John 1:12). He gave them a chance to be kings and priests in His fledgling government!
Because someone accepts Jesus as king when He is not officially a king, because they bend the knee to Him NOW while the rest of the world laughs at them, because they serve Him and His rules now, as if His Kingdom were already here, Jesus treats them AS IF they were in His Kingdom now! Giving them protection, assistance, and support – and also judging and punishing them if they reflect badly on Him.
The world stubbornly refuses to surrender to Christ now, because they don’t believe He’s REALLY coming back – even the Christians! If they REALLY thought their works would be judged by God tomorrow, don’t you think they’d act different? For that matter, if you were REALLY certain, wouldn’t YOU take the word of God more seriously?
The world won’t surrender to Jesus today, but YOU CAN. They will bow down, sooner or later, when Jesus returns with the POWER to establish His kingdom – Jesus has sworn it! But for you, the Kingdom of God CAN BE NOW. Not the REAL kingdom – merely a small spiritual TYPE of the Kingdom of God. The EARNEST of that kingdom (Ephesians 1:14), the DOWN PAYMENT of your inheritance, “until the redemption of the promised possession”!
Now is the time for YOU to surrender your will to Christ, to learn God’s way really DOES work even in the midst of a crooked world! Now is the time for you to learn that, when followed, the laws of God really will make the deserts blossom like roses, and make the waste places inhabitable! The world will be FORCED to learn that in the world to come – but you can CHOOSE to learn it now. And be greatly rewarded for your proactive attitude!
Is Jesus the Master (or King) of His disciples? John 13:13. Who is your master? Matthew 23:10. Do you have a Master in heaven right now? Ephesians 6:9. Did Jesus act as a king would act? Matthew 7:28-29. Are you supposed to follow Jesus and acknowledge Him as your guide? 1 Peter 2:25. If, through FAITH that Jesus WILL be King, you treat Him as your King TODAY, you will be like one of those 400 debtors, the mighty men who followed David and were the first line of attack in setting up the new Kingdom of God!
There will be a kingdom, with or without you! You will learn to love your neighbor, now or later – so you might as well join up now! But do you have the FAITH to invest in that small mustard seed, and believe the true gospel?
THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS WITHIN YOU
Read Luke 17:20-21. Many have read these verses and based on them alone, concluded there IS no literal kingdom, when you’ve read a hundred verses that say there MUST be! Remember that rule – one vague scripture cannot dismiss a hundred clear ones! And the other rule – always stop and read EXACTLY WHAT the verse says. Most of the time you just assume it means what you’ve always heard. But what does it really say? And finally, a third rule I haven’t mentioned before, WHY did this come up?
Often a verse makes much more sense when you realize it was to answer a SPECIFIC misunderstanding someone had. Here, the Pharisees, not rightly dividing the prophecies, were convinced IF He were the Christ, He would bring the Kingdom of God right then. Since He hadn’t, He must not have been the Christ! This was the basis of most of their arguments, and the main reason they rejected Him. The logic is sound enough, actually. Just built on a bad assumption – that Jesus was coming only once.
Because they thought that, Jesus said “the kingdom of God doesn’t come with observation” – that is, you can’t see it coming. This sounds very strange, because He appears to contradict Himself in Luke 17:24 and in another prophecy of the same period in Matthew 24:27, 30 and also in Revelation 1:7.
It is clear from many scriptures that Jesus – and hence His literal kingdom – DOES come by observation – you CAN see it coming! In fact, every eye sees it coming! So why did Jesus say you can’t? Get the context! If I could give just ONE piece of advice to every Christian, it’s READ THE CONTEXT! That alone would solve virtually every misunderstanding!
Go back and read Luke 17:20-24 again, but this time keep reading all the way to verse 24, and then reread verse 22. Do you see what it said? In these five verses, Jesus says first you CAN’T see His Kingdom (because it’s inside you), and then says when He comes, EVERYONE will see His Kingdom! But if you’ve read the context, He explains the riddle in verse 22 where He says “ye shall desire to see ONE OF THE DAYS of the Son of man, and ye shall not see it” (“Son of man” is another name for Jesus).
Get that! ONE of the days! That means there is more than ONE day when Jesus comes to set up a kingdom! The one you can’t see, and the one you can’t miss! We already know a great deal about the principal day when Jesus comes to set up His literal Kingdom – at His return – so when is the other day?
Did the disciples desire to see Jesus come and set up the kingdom? Acts 1:6. Were they disappointed when, after He died, Jesus didn’t set up the kingdom immediately? Luke 24:21. So they DESIRED to see Him set up that kingdom – and they did not see it! Just as He prophesied! And yet He said His kingdom would come, and they just wouldn’t see it – so when and how did that happen?
How do you become a servant – or how do you acknowledge a king? Romans 6:16. Whom does Jesus save? Hebrews 5:9. And how do you become one of His? Romans 8:9. And to whom does God give His spirit? Acts 5:32. Did Jesus promise it would be given at a certain time? Acts 1:5. And when did God give the spirit? Acts 2:4.
So you see, to have His spirit, you must obey Him! You must treat Him as your King in order to be given His spirit, and be considered “one of His” – that is, a part of His spiritual Kingdom! And that Kingdom BEGAN on the day of Pentecost in Acts 2. That was “ONE of the days of the son of man”, and the disciples MISSED IT!
They were there, they watched it happen, but they didn’t realize it was the beginning of the spiritual Kingdom of God – the “type” of the real thing that you and I can participate in while we wait for the real thing to get here!
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
Was Abraham left out of this new promise? Are we given access to the holy spirit, whereby we can be a part of the Kingdom of God today, and Abraham left out? The promises we read in the last lesson seemed to be physical promises – physical land, many children, and so on, but don’t forget Abraham was promised an ETERNAL inheritance (Genesis 13:14-15)!
Only an IMMORTAL person can inherit something FOREVER! So in order to inherit the Kingdom of God as promised to Abraham, you must be able to live there forever, and mortal man cannot do that! Can flesh and blood enter the Kingdom of God? 1 Corinthians 15:50. Is our inheritance corruptible (prone to decay)? 1 Peter 1:4. Can corruptible flesh inherit an incorruptible reward? 1 Corinthians 15:50. In order to inherit the promises given to Abraham, what must happen to Abraham – and us? 1 Corinthians 15:52-54.
Abraham could not inherit an eternal kingdom without first becoming an eternal creature! God knew this when He made the promise! And so for Abraham to inherit the Kingdom of God, Abraham had to first ADOPT the IMAGE and LIKENESS of God – back to Genesis 1:26! Really, it all goes back to that one verse, which more than any other encapsulates the plan of God!
And now to tie up the loose ends, read the key passage that ties these two promises together, the physical and the spiritual, Ephesians 1:13. Notice how it was AFTER you heard the GOSPEL, you trusted – had faith! The gospel is the gospel of the kingdom; it speaks of salvation through faith; the adoption into the family of Abraham – and thus adoption into the Family of God, the Kingdom of God.
Remember, the gospel was preached to Abraham! (Galatians 3:8). Whatever was a part of this gospel, was a part of the promise to Abraham! So after they believed the gospel, they were sealed – branded – with the holy spirit OF PROMISE! Get that! The holy spirit was PART of the PROMISE of the gospel! And what is the blessing of Abraham? Galatians 3:14. And how do we receive that blessing? (Same verse). The blessing of Abraham WAS THE SPIRIT OF GOD! How do so many professing Christians read these verses and miss that Abraham was promised the spirit of God!
The promise of the spirit was GIVEN to him, BECAUSE of his faith – and WE can now take part in that very same blessing – whether Gentile or Israelite because anyone who has faith will be blessed like faithful Abraham! (Galatians 3:9). Last time in Genesis 15:1, we focused only on the physical promises God made to Abraham; but go back and read it again, because this verse is a SPIRITUAL promise, not just a physical one! God said “I am your shield” – and what is a shield? Ephesians 6:16. FAITH – faith in GOD is your shield.
Abraham’s faith in God gave Him this shield! But the second part of Genesis 15:1 is the key – God said “I am… your exceeding great reward” – it’s so easy to read over that and miss the MEANING there! God said “*I* am your reward”. GOD is the reward! But how is that possible? There is only one way – God is the reward because He will give Abraham something of Himself to live inside Abraham! A piece of the divine nature IN him! God’s own spirit! So literally, GOD was Abraham’s reward!
Does Christ dwell in the true Christian? Ephesians 3:17. Are you now a temple of God? 2 Corinthians 6:16. If you don’t have Christ’s spirit in you, are you even a Christian? Romans 8:9. What is your “hope of glory”? Colossians 1:27. What do these “exceeding GREAT” promises make possible? 2 Peter 1:4.
Now go back and read Ephesians 1:13, but this time read it together with Ephesians 1:14 – do you SEE? The holy spirit “of promise” IS the earnest, the down payment of our inheritance! It is the COLLATERAL that God gives us, as proof that we will one day inherit IMMORTALITY and REIGN ON THE EARTH with Him!
The land was a reward, yes… immortality a reward, yes… but the exceeding GREAT reward God gave to Abraham, which reward can now be YOURS, was to have “Christ in you, the hope of Glory”! To be a literal partaker of the divine nature!
This will finish the second part of your Genesis 1:26 creation, by making you in the LIKENESS of God! So that “His seed remains in you, and you cannot sin” (1 John 3:9). To become a better person, a person with an incorruptible nature who will never be tempted to sin throughout eternity – that is the “exceeding great” promise God made to Abraham!
Acts 2:39 For the PROMISE is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call. And the exceeding great promise God made to Abraham because of his faith, was offered to all his children – and through Christ is now made available to “all that are afar off” – Gentile and Israelite children alike! Isaiah 63:16 Doubtless thou art our father, though Abraham be ignorant of us, and Israel acknowledge us not: thou, O LORD, art our father, our redeemer; thy name is from everlasting.
Even though Abraham was unaware of us, we can all be his children! Even though the Israelites call us goyim, we can inherit the blessings promised to them! Today all can partake of that same exceeding great inheritance of Abraham, the inheritance of the Family and Kingdom of God! Good news, indeed! Revelation 21:7 He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. Now why haven’t you heard THAT gospel preached?
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