Mar. 26, 2023

The Kingdom of God 3 - The Kingdom of God is like… (26 March 2023)

Introduction - The modern church understands and attempts to practice much of what the Bible says about Jesus being Savior.  We understand grace, a free gift, an abundant life, redemption, asking and receiving, etc.  From the way it sounds through televangelists, the Christian life is a life of worldly abundance in which Jesus gives to us simply for uttering payers in His Name asking for such.  According to this teaching, there is nothing left for us to do except pursue education, career, and wealth accumulation.  With few exceptions, this is the message taught to us by our parents, our schools, and our churches.  This message leaves out almost entirely the message of Jesus being our King.  So, there’s a slight tendency to see this concept of Jesus as King as being somewhat threatening and demanding.  We learned last week that this is not so, and that kingdom life the richest and most abundant possib nble, worth giving up everything for.  Jesus taught a number of parables to explain what the Kingdom is like, who is in it, how they got there, how far it extends, etc.  These parables are deliberately obscure, the interpretations available only to those who have the Spirit of God in them:

Matthew 13:1-13 - That day Jesus went out of the house and was sitting by the sea. 2 And large crowds gathered to Him, so He got into a boat and sat down, and the whole crowd was standing on the beach. 3 And He spoke many things to them in parables, saying, "Behold, the sower went out to sow; 4 and as he sowed, some seeds fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up. 5 "Others fell on the rocky places, where they did not have much soil; and immediately they sprang up, because they had no depth of soil. 6 "But when the sun had risen, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. 7 "Others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out. 8 "And others fell on the good soil and yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty. 9 "He who has ears, let him hear.” 10 And the disciples came and said to Him, "Why * do You speak to them in parables?” 11Jesus answered them, "To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been granted. 12 "For whoever has, to him more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him. 13 "Therefore * I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. NASB

Here’s the explanation of the parable:

Matthew 13:18-23 "Hear then the parable of the sower.19 "When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is the one on whom seed was sown beside the road. "The one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; 21 yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away. 22 "And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears the word, and the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. 23 "And the one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it; who indeed bears fruit and brings forth, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty.” NASB

In this first parable, justified (saved) people are in view.  How do we know this? The farmer (likely Jesus) is sowing the Word of the Kingdom into people in His field (The church).  A later parable talks about good and evil people who are planted into the larger world.  Being born again is the first qualifier which enables a person to be able to understand the Kingdom of God, so the Word of the Kingdom is likely spoken to born again people.

John 3:3 Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, unless you are born again, you cannot see the Kingdom of God.” NLT

Notice that this parable of the sower is not called the gospel, the gospel of your salvation, or the word of your salvation, or anything narrowly confined to the act of justification.   This parable therefore likely represents Jesus actively sowing teachings about how His kingdom works to His saved people in the church.  The seeds fall into the hearts of the saved people with various conditions of heart: a lack of understanding, no endurance for persecution, choked with cares and love of riches, and lastly, a receptive heart, understanding the word and bringing forth varying multiples of increase. Notice that the effect of obeying the “Word of the Kingdom” is a multiplication of the fruits of God.  

A powerful message from this parable is that you can be saved and be part of the church, but not be functioning in the Kingdom. It is like being saved and living physically in the world, We are IN it, but not OF it.  In the same way, You can be IN the church, but not OF the kingdom.  The church is a special part of the kingdom, active in this age only, full of only saved people who obey the Word of the Kingdom in varying degrees, some fully, some not at all. 

Here’s an example of the one bit of wisdom from the “Word of the Kingdom” as it applies to the church.  We will be examining close to 50 of these Kingdom teachings in the next several weeks: 

Luke 6:38 Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full—pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back.”

Giving is a sensitive subject in any age, all over the world. We are dependent on mammon to maintain the normal lives we are accustomed to, so we guard it, save it, get as much as we can of it by whatever honest means we can.  God has always tried to get us to be dependent on Him rather than on work or the government for our supply of mammon.  We will always have to work in some form to take part in the labor-reward cycle which happened after the fall of man.  God blesses all men, saved or unsaved, for that form of work.  But, as members of the church, our prosperity depends much more on giving, than on the government and/or working for profit.  The KJV says that “men” will give into your bosom as a result.  

In the Old Testament, God taught the Israelites what His idea of giving was: simply put, 10% of the increase of your labors, whether it be farming ,or service, or manufacturing, or anything else, was to be given to the Lord.  This was called tithing, the giving of 1/10.  Giving was always the transfer of mammon (money or goods) of some sort, not labor or promises or time.  It was always something you possessed. It is true that tithing was mandatory under the Law of Moses and that the penalty for not tithing was paid for by Jesus in His atoning death. In the church age, You will not go to hell for not tithing.  When you read the Old Testament, some practices are plainly outlawed (animal sacrifices). Other provisions of the Old Testament have wisdom, but are not laws (dietary restrictions).  Still others are good and right laws which are carried over in some form into the New Testament (all 10 Commandments except the Sabbath; prohibitions against murder, lying, adultery, theft, etc.).  So, for Christians, the mentions of tithing in the Bible were put there by God to give us an idea what “giving” meant to Him.  Before relegating tithing to be discontinued along with animal sacrifices, remember that giving is still important to God, mostly because it demonstrates your dependence on Him. 

My personal testimony:  I can tell you that Luke 6:38 works.  At the age of 27, I decided to leave a guaranteed income and career in the Air Force, resigning a regular commission as a captain at Elmendorf AFB, Alaska.  In Anchorage, my wife and I had gotten involved in a good church which was planting churches in the “Lower 48” and elsewhere. We learned early about tithing and practiced it faithfully whether we had little or a lot.  When I witnessed the church-planting process, I understood that we were supposed to free ourselves up for the work of the Lord someday.  When I finally left the Air Force, I was completely dependent on the Lord for income.  I laid carpet for a while, worked for a bank for a while, and was eventually hired by our church as a teacher and counselor.  A rather clear idea came to me from the Holy Spirit that we were to start a church in Pittsburgh, my home area. My wife and I owned a small house in Anchorage at the time which doubled in value.  We were able to sell it and build a bigger one, which appreciated dramatically, and eventually sold at a profit of $93,000. We used most of that money to move to Pittsburgh, get a home, and help other team members moving with us to move there and start a church, eventually called the Orchard Christian Fellowship.  We never missed a meal or were without housing.  The three families on our team experienced the same provision, which has continued unbroken to this very day.  

Your testimony will be the same:  Jesus wants you to depend on Him, not solely on the US government for your sustenance.  Good people set those US laws in place, but they can never make you prosper.  Only giving can do that.  God can give to you from a variety of sources, but generally, MEN will give into your lap, as the KJV says.  If you have a fixed income it is all the more important that you learn to give as God illustrated in the Scripture. This is Jesus’ appointed way to prosper you.  Commonly, people say, “You don’t understand, I’m on a fixed income.  All of it goes for needs.  I can’t give anything to anyone.”  You’re actually in a great position to exercise faith.  The story of the widow’s mite is in the Bible to embolden us and encourage us to give first and trust God afterwards.  

Mark 12:41-44 Jesus sat down near the collection box in the Temple and watched as the crowds dropped in their money. Many rich people put in large amounts. 42 Then a poor widow came and dropped in two small coins. 43 Jesus called his disciples to him and said, “I tell you the truth, this poor widow has given more than all the others who are making contributions. 44 For they gave a tiny part of their surplus, but she, poor as she is, has given everything she had to live on.” NLT

In the early church, money was given to the apostles, who in turn had it distributed through deacons to the needy in the church.  Give wherever the Lord leads you, but please give.  This is a common growth step for all Christians.  If you are faithful in that which is a small thing, you will be faithful in much. Participation in the dynamics of the Kingdom requires that we be childlike in our faith.  

Luke 18:16-17 Then Jesus called for the children and said to the disciples, “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to those who are like these children. 17 I tell you the truth, anyone who doesn’t receive the Kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.”

Conclusion:  The kingdom of God is “the realm of God’s uncontested rule.”  This is more than our typical idea of a court, buildings and lands, etc.  We will see that all of the universe is included in God’s Kingdom. Planets follow the designed order of their maker.   Moral beings who exercise faith in Him are part of His Kingdom.  The only place where the Kingdom doesn’t exist is in the heart of the evildoer, who contests God’s rule.  In coming weeks, we will learn more about how the parables which Jesus taught to explain the kingdom, how the church fits into the Kingdom, the major events which are ahead for the church and the larger kingdom of God, and how to be a good subject of the King.