THE KING AND HIS KINGDOM

THE KING AND HIS KINGDOM

                God was the king of a vast domain long before He created the physical universe. God is Spirit and so He ruled over a vast spiritual kingdom. But in His mind He had a plan. He wanted to create a physical universe and with it a very special creature to oversee His physical creation.

                He wanted to create a man in his own image and since God is Spirit, therefore man is first of all a spirit that is housed in a physical body. Paul mentions this in Romans 1:9. Saying: “For God, whom I serve in my sprit in the preaching of the gospel of His Son is my witness as to how unceasingly I make mention of you.”

                John 6:63 says, “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life.” So, as the tabernacle of Moses demonstrates, man is a triune being made up of spirit, soul and body, and God being Spirit dwells in our spirit as seen in the Most Holy Place. So when God speaks to us, He speaks to us Spirit to spirit and we pray in the spirit, thus speaking to God as 1 Cor. 14:4 says: “For one who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men, but to God; for no one understands, but in his spirit speaks mysteries.” Are we listening?

                So we need to understand that God created the physical universe, as a part of His ever expanding domain, but He also created a unique being in His own image to rule over His physical creation. This creature, man, had to be totally unique in a number of ways. He was a part of God’s spiritual kingdom and so he was a spirit. But He was also a part of the physical creation and so God gave him a physical body to dwell in that was a part of the physical creation… soil. But there was a third component that made mankind a one of a kind new model. God gave man a soul, a mind that was capable of interfacing between the physical realm and the spiritual realm.

                This was risky business because a man could choose to turn away from His spiritual nature and live by His flesh, but if he did, his spiritual connection with God would be broken and since man was in charge of it all, the entire universe would come under the control of someone who was no longer operating by the power and presence of God in his life. AS such Satan won it all by default. He became the god of this world.

                But there are things we need to understand. God created this physical realm as a part of His kingdom, but He would rule the physical realm through the man He had created who was both physical and spiritual, with a mind that was capable of interfacing between the physical and the spiritual realms.

                So we need to understand that when Adam and Eve sinned and chose to obey Satan, (God’s arch enemy,) they sold the entire physical universe out to Satan, so that this physical creation ceased to be a part of God’s domain. It became a kingdom of darkness and as a kingdom of darkness, it relied on the powers of darkness and without God’s immediate presence the universe entered into entropy. In other words god pulled the plug and the entire universe began to die, to wind down and in this way God could place term limits on how long the rebellion could last. Everything ends up in death.

                So when Adam sinned, this physical universe became a domain of darkness outside of God’s kingdom.  We live in enemy territory so to speak. It was now a kingdom without hope and without a plan other than to rebel against its true Maker and to do everything as a part of pleasing the flesh rather than the spirit, and, of course without God’s Spirit in man, mankind ceased to represent the will of God in the administration of this realm.

                I have set this up in order to explain what God had to do in order to rescue this physical universe and to restore the man back into His spiritual position and kingdom. To begin this process, God found a man of faith in the physical world that was willing to agree with God and to believe God’s promises and so God started His kingdom in this one man. To this man Abraham He gave promises concerning His ultimate plan and purpose for the world.

                It is important to understand that in Man’s redemption the first purpose is to restore the spirit of man so that man can once again become the habitation of God. 1 Cor. 2:10-13 says:

                “For to us God revealed them through the Spirit for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man, which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God that we might know the things freely given to us by God which things we also speak not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit combining Spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.”

                The fact is, that God in order to restore the physical universe back into His kingdom He must first of all set up His kingdom in the spirit of man. It was man He had put in charge and it was man who sold his birthright to Satan. If we understand this then we will also understand that our new birth, happens as we invite the Spirit of God to take up residence in our spirit once again. We allow God to establish His kingdom in our spirit so that by His Spirit He can once again reign over our bodies and in turn we can administer His kingdom in the midst of Satan’s dark domain, bringing God’s kingdom into our dark world like a candle in a very dark place.

                Now, that the hope of the entire universe is at stake, we can to understand, for it says in Romans 8:19-23. “For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. (Being sons of God means that the Spirit of God has once again taken up residence in the spirit of man and this is the only hope of redemption for this dying universe.) “For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now and not only this, but we ourselves groan within ourselves waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body

                Now friends, I want you to pay close attention to what I am saying here because I am going somewhere very important with this that can be absolutely life changing if we get it. God gave Abraham his overall plan based upon promises that mankind would be restored to that which Adam lost, but it would take time and it would cost God His very life to do it, and God demonstrated something of the pain that He would go through by having g Abraham come within an inch of  sacrificing His only son.

                So God raise up a people of faith from the seed of Abraham and God instituted a temporary covenant with laws and types and shadows and a tabernacle through which God would show them what His plan would be.  But it is vitally important for us to understand that the first covenant was not the real thing. It could not accomplish God’s ultimate plan. All it could do is to teach the chosen people what the real plan would be. The Old Covenant then was created as a temporary system of laws and types and shadows that would accomplish two things.

1.       They would teach God’s people what the coming covenant would be.

2.       They would act to curtail sin to a certain extent until the real covenant could be ratified by God Himself. This is what Jesus did on the cross.

                This is why Paul can explain to us in Galatians 3:23, 24 saying: But before faith came we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed. Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, that we may be justified by faith. Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, that we may be justified by faith. But now that the faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor, for you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.

                We need to take more seriously everything Jesus did and said, for instance, as my friend Jana pointed out: Jesus washed the disciple’s feet after the Seder meal, but before the New Covenant Communion service with bread and wine. In doing this Jesus was washing away the Old Covenant and instituting the New Covenant and washing their feet represented changing their walk. They would now walk in the New Covenant. Do we let the Word of God speak to our spirit? It is saying more than we think and more than our traditions often allow.

                Listen friends: If we are ever to rightly divide the Word of God we must get this. The Law was a temporary measure given to curtail sin until the real thing came. That real thing is the Spirit of God once again residing in the spirit of man. This is what it means to become a son of God and this is what Jesus is what Jesus came to accomplish. This is exactly what Paul is teaching us in both Romans 8 and Galatians 3. The Law was added because of transgression, but it was not the real deal. Only Jesus as our true Lamb of God and as our Eternal High Priest, could,  by sending His Holy spirit into our hearts, accomplish the real thing.

                Friends, we take these things much too lightly and we take the New Covenant much too lightly often treating it as an appendage of the Old Covenant. It is not an appendage to the Old Covenant. It is in fact the REAL THING to which the Old Covenant pointed. And while we realize that the Old Covenant pointed to a New Covenant and therefore became the foundation upon which the New Covenant sits, the New Covenant is nevertheless a full and complete covenant on its own. It is the real and eternal plan of God to restore us to son ship and to restore His kingdom.

                The Law and all that it contained was only a stop gap measure to curtail sin until the real thing came and that real things is God taking up residence in man once again. Only then can we begin to administer His kingdom in this physical universe once again.

                Think about how important this is. God left heaven and came to this war torn planet, lived among His people a sinless life and then died a most horrible death at their hands, at our hands, so that He could pay the ransom and buy His physical kingdom back again. But He chose first of all to establish His kingdom in us, by coming into our spirit and taking up residence in us just as the tabernacle shows, and we are in training to live by that Spirit as well as to learn how to administer God’s kingdom within the physical realm once again.

                This training will go into overdrive when Jesus has come back to tabernacle with us once again. He will rule the nations with a rod of iron and we will reign with Him as sons, who must learn how to run the Father’s business. Yes, we will be glorified then, but ruling and reigning with Christ takes experience and training. It will take 1000 years just to re-establish us in that which Adam lost in the fall.

                Jesus, God’s only begotten Son came here to bring His kingdom of light into the midst of Satan’s dark domain. The Old Testament served as a temporary stop gap measure to tell us what the Messiah would do when He came and to curtail sin UNTIL, UNTIL, UNTIL THE promised one came and now that He has come, we are to be born again thus dying to this dark kingdom, dying to the Law, dying to the flesh in order that the Holy Spirit may take up residence in us and  fulfill the promises in us and through us.

                This New Covenant was so important to God that He was willing to give His life for it. How is it then that we keep preaching and keeping those weak laws that could not transform us? Why are we so confused as to what constitutes the Old Covenant and what constitutes the New.

                Do we understand what a slap it is in God’s face when we resort to Old Covenant laws and types and shadows, after He has brought the real thing to us? Do we know how this grieves the Holy Spirit, when we ignore Him, or give Him lip service, but then treat Him as inadequate to transform us into Christ’s image? “Are we so foolish? Having begun by the SSpirit, are we now resorting to being ferfect by the flesh? Gal. 3:3. Do we know what we are saying to Jesus when we ignore the kingdom that He came to establish in the world and we choose instead to go back to the temporary laws and types that pointed to these realities?

                Jesus came here to re-establish His kingdom in this dark domain. He brought with Him the Covenant of promise that He had spoken to Abraham and with it He brought a new and eternal priesthood after the order of Melchizedek and new laws. “For when the priesthood is changed, of necessity there takes place a change of law also.” Heb. 7:12

                When Jesus said in John 14:15: “If you love Me you will keep My commandments” He was not referring to the temporary laws of Moses that had no power to save us. He was referring to His commandments of the new and eternal covenant and in fact HE said in John 13:24: A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. Even the Ten Commandments He reduced to two. Loving God and loving each other with a God kind of love.

                Now, when we talk about life in the Spirit, people immediately presume that the Holy Spirit is not enough. We must keep the Law also. And when you talk about love, their restricted minds automatically revert to the Hippie movement of the 60s and free love and peace, but this is not the kind of love that Jesus died to bring us.

                The love of God is a transforming love, it is an obedient and faithful love, it looks beyond self to the needs of others, it walks by the Spirit and not by the flesh and it administers God’s kingdom in this dark world by sharing this love and light with others. We see it reflected in the fruit of the Spirit. Gal. 5:22. Listen, the Law may have worked to curtail sin a bit, but they were unable to keep it because flesh without the Spirit cannot fulfill the Law. It requires a change of heart and the power of God.

                Only the love of God is enough to transform us into the image of His Son Jesus. So why do we keep going back to God’s temporary measures rather than entering fully into God’s New Covenant, with its New Priesthood and New Laws. What an offense it must be to Jesus when we turn from Him in this way. Hebrews 6:4-6 says:

               

                “For in the case of those how have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God and put Him to open shame.”  We do this by falling from the New Covenant and resorting to the Old Covenant types and shadows and laws.

                That is to say that once we have tasted of the eternal things and the love and power of God through His indwelling Holy Spirit and then we fall back to the temporary things of the Old Covenant, we have denied the very gift that Jesus bought us with His own blood and we have insulted the spirit of grace and we have grieved the Holy Spirit.

                And because we do not understand the issues and we don’t understand what Jesus had to do in order to bring to us this New Covenant, we wrongly divide the Word of God. We mix up covenants. We pick and choose. We live by traditions and half- truths, because we will choose the texts that support our beliefs and ignore the rest when in fact Jesus told us to live by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God and when we live by every word and not just the ones we choose, then we will understand the purposes of the Old Covent as well as the New Covenant and we will rightly apply them. one covenant brings us to death, while the other brings new life.

                The Old Covenant has a continuing role to play. It is given to convict those who still live in Satan’s dark domain. We are ruled by law until we come to Christ, where in His cross and resurrection, we die to Satan’s dark kingdom and we are born again into the Kingdom that Jesus brought to us at the cost of His own life. As Paul says, “Through the Law I died to the law in order that I might live unto Christ.” The New Covenant is a whole new thing administered by different eternal laws and a different eternal priesthood after the order of Melchizedek.

                We need to get this my friends. We have not really entered into Christ’s training program until we are learning to live by the Spirit rather than by Law. People still think that they can go to church and gossip and back bite and ignore those who are needy and be just right with the Law and that may be, but that doesn’t make them right with the Holy Spirit.

                Jesus came to transform us into His image and that is why reverting either to Law, on one hand, or false grace on the other hand are both diabolically wrong.

                In this day and age there are many Christians who are now renouncing faith in Jesus and turning back to the Law through the Jewish roots movement. Still others are renouncing Jesus by turning to the Pope and His coming global religion of the Beast but: “All who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. Isn’t it time for us to put behind us the weak and temporary things and to enter fully into the New Covenant that Jesus bought for us at the cost of His own life and to live by His Holy Spirit and to love one another with the love of God which more than fulfills the Law?

                Wow, this is a long article, but it is one whose time has come and I may lose a lot of people over this one. But we have not really paid attention to what the Bible is really saying, nor have we paid attention to God’s eternal plans… so we are strung out between two covenants and we don’t really understand what it means in 1 Thess. 5:23, 24 that God’s intention is to restore us, spirit, soul and body without blame at His coming. We are coming full circle back to the King and His kingdom.

                Even in Old Testament times God made a promise through Jeremiah saying: Behold, days are coming declares the Lord, when I will make a NEW COVENANT with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, NOT LIKE THE COVENANT WHICH I MADE WITH THEIR FATHERS WHEN I TOOK THEM OUT OF EGYPT.”          In OTHER WORDS GOD TOLD US WAY BACK THEN THAT THE New covenant would not be like the old covenant for this covenant would be written in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.

                Have we really paid attention to the Bible? Do we really understand what it is saying to us? Those people that are denying Jesus and going back to the God of the Old Testament are not really going back to God. God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. IF you want to see God, you must see Him in Jesus.