Our Father which art in Heaven hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. What does it mean thy kingdom come? Kingdom? We’ve talked a little bit about kingdom in our seminar together and we’ve said that for the Rabbis and for Jesus kingdom was always in the NOW. It’s present tense. But, we might ask ourselves the question, what is the difference between kingdom of heaven and kingdom of God as it is used in the New Testament. (Matt. 5:3 – “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”) Here we have the term used kingdom of heaven. (Luke 6:20 – “And he lifted up his eyes upon his disciples and he said, ‘Blessed be the poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.’”) Parallel passage to Matthew 5. One is Matthew’s account and one is Luke’s account. Matthew says kingdom of heaven and Luke says kingdom of God. What’s the difference? Is there a difference? Yes, there is…one of them is Hebrew and the other is Hellenistic. One is the Hebrew way of saying it and the other is the Greek way of saying it.
Kingdom of heaven is the Hebrew way of saying Kingdom of God. The Hebrews had an aversion against using the name of God and as you know they would never use the name of God which was YHVH. But no self-respecting, religious, righteous Jew would ever speak the name of God. Only one man, the high priest, was allowed to do this and only on the Day of Atonement as he went into the Holy of Holies. They even had a rope tied around him when he went into the Holy of Holies and bells on the bottom of his garments so that when he pronounced the name of God and spoke the name of God if he wasn’t spiritually right with God and God struck him dead they could drag him out with the rope. So heaven is a euphemism for God. I’ve sinned against heaven means that I have sinned against God. But it simply has to do with the Jews aversion for taking the name of the Lord their God in a light manner. You remember, one of the Ten Commandments says thou shalt not take the name of the Lord your God in a light manner. This may come as a shock to some of you. That does not mean thou shalt not cuss or use profanity. It doesn’t have anything to do with it. Nowhere in the Bible does it tell you that you can’t cuss. Do you know why? Because it’s impossible to cuss in Hebrew. There are no curse words in Hebrew. Hebrew is the holy language. No curse words in Hebrew. If you want to curse you’re going to have to go to Arabic with is very colorful. You could go to German, English, Russian but you can’t curse in Hebrew so this doesn’t have anything to do with using profanity. After all, vulgarity, or profanity, is nothing more than just the feeble attempt of the uneducated mind to express itself forcefully anyway. But the Bible does tell us that we’re going to be judged for every idle words that comes out of our mouth. There are a lot of idle words that come out of our mouth that aren’t necessarily cuss words. This particular injunction, or commandment, is that you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in a light manner. So, the Jews won’t even speak the name of God because he’s so holy and righteous. Even the word God itself they’ll corrupt slightly to keep from pronouncing the word God (Elohim) they’ll say elokim. Or if their writing it out in English G-d. They won’t spell it out because they have an aversion for using the name of God in a way that might be irreverent. The Jews had all kinds of euphemisms for God like the place, the name, heaven (I’ve sinned against heaven and against thee). Kingdom of heaven means kingdom of God.
But the Gentiles don’t have such an aversion to using the term God, or the name God, so the Gentile way of saying it, or the Greek way of saying it, was kingdom of God. Kingdom of God and kingdom of heaven is the same thing.
In Hebrew kingdom of heaven, and I cannot overemphasize this, was always here and now. The whole idea of kingdom is a development of one passage of scripture that we find in Ex. 15:18. If I ask you where is the first mention of kingdom in the Bible you’d never get it unless you knew Hebrew and you knew it very well. The first mention of kingdom in the entire Bible is in Ex. 15:18 where it says, “and the Lord will reign forever and ever.” What does that have to do with kingdom? In Hebrew each word is based on a root or stem form. By adding prefix letters or media letters or suffix letters we build a whole family of words. So the idea of King, or reigning or ruling, is the root malach from which we get the word king melech from which we get the noun mal koot (kingdom), the very is to lem loch (future tense-third person singular)em loch, the Adonai (the King literally). “The Lord will King forever and ever.” There can be no King without a kingdom. There can be no kingdom without a King. So this is, in the Biblical text, the first mention of the whole concept of kingdom. This develops to such a degree that by the time of Jesus the Rabbis hope for the rule, or the reign, of God to be extended over all of the earth. They understood this concept of king or kingship that it became the principle theme in the Old Testament. King, the King that was to come. Are you the one who was to come according to Zechariah 9:9? Do you remember the king that was going to come to rule and to reign having salvation in his hand? This idea develops to such an extent that in Judaism to this very day any benediction that contains no reference to the divine kingship is no benediction at all. So when you look in the Jewish prayer book, over and over, page after page talks about kingdom and kingship all the way through so that every blessing, every benediction, begins, “Blessed art thou O Lord our God, King of the Universe.” Without the word King the blessing is no blessing at all.
For the Rabbis kingdom was where God was ruling, or those people who were ruled by God. Our problem has been, as in the Beatitudes, with this proverbial future. We read about there shall be, or will be, the kingdom of heaven. They shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven and all of a sudden we come up with a concept of future tense. Kingdom is something out there, it’s something that’s coming, it’s something that we’re going to inherit, that pie in the sky by and by. For the Rabbis kingdom was always in the now.
Who was it that was to come and prepare the way for kingdom? John (Matt. 11) Let’s look at the whole scripture in its context. Jesus is increasing in his fame, and John is diminishing. John is sitting in prison languishing and he wants to know if he’s going to get out, so he sends his disciples to Jesus and he says, “I want to know if you’re the habah of Zech. 9:9?” Jesus sends back, “Isaiah 28, 35, 45, 42, 66.” And John says, “Well, the time of my departure is at hand.” Jesus goes on and asks the multitudes concerning John, “What did you go out to the wilderness to see? A reed shaken in the wind? No, I tell you a prophet, and even more than a prophet because this is he of whom it was written, ‘Behold I send my messenger before thy face which shall prepare thy way before thee.’ Verily I say unto you, among those born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist. Notwithstanding, he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” What does that mean? Does that mean that the smallest person in heaven is going to be greater than John the Baptist? If John the Baptist was great on this earth he’s going to be great in heaven. Does that mean that John the Baptist isn’t in heaven? No, what does it mean? Then he goes on and says something else very difficult. “From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence and men of violence take it by force.” Does anyone know what that means? It’s magnificent. Jesus is hinting back at a passage in the O.T. on which there was, in his day, a rabbinic midrash, or a rabbinic commentary, and it indicates that Jesus was familiar both with the passage and with the rabbinic commentary on that passage. The passage to which he’s referring is Micah 2:12, 13. Let’s look at the picture that Jesus is painting. I will surely gather all of you O Jacob, I will surely collect the remnant of Israel. I will bring them together as sheep in a fold, as a flock in the midst of their pasture. They shall swarm with men and hum with their much noise. The breaker, destroyer, leader, messiah (what is that talking about?). It’s the same word that’s used in Matthew 11 translated “men of violence.” It’s the word ha poretz…poretz is the one breaking down or breaking through. Notice that he says, “The breaker will go up before them, they will break through passing through the gate and go out through it and their King shall pass on before them and the Lord at their head.” Look at the picture. God said, that one day he’s going to gather all of his people together. He’s going to collect the remnant of Israel and bring them together as sheep in a fold. As I read that I have the mental image in my mind of Israel, I can close my mind and I can see the rolling hills and I can see the shepherds on the sides of the hills with their flocks and I can see the sheep folds. I have seen many of these sheep folds and have been in many of them as well as the working shepherd’s caves. Many times the sheep fold will be built in front of a rock outcropping or in front of a cave in which the shepherd can take his sheep and protect himself and the flock from the elements during the spring and winter months of the year. The sheep fold, in Israel, is nothing more than a rock fence and it’s built of all sizes of rocks and their just piled up one on top of another. It’s constructed circular or as a square on front of a rock outcropping or a cave but sometimes in the middle of nowhere in the middle of a field and in the evening the shepherd will bring his sheep into the fold to protect them from the beasts and the elements. He’ll stay there with them all through the night tending them, caring for them, and then the next morning he’ll go down and knock down a section of the wall and then lead the sheep into pasture. Jesus, in this pasture, is making a fantastic, exciting commentary on Micah 2:12, 13. It indicates that he’s also familiar with the Rabbinic Midrash on this subject because the Rabbinic Midrash on Micah 2:12, 13 says that in v. 13 the King is Elijah and the Lord is Messiah. Jesus goes one in Matthew 11:13, for all the prophets and the law prophesies until John. But if you receive it this is Elijah that is to come. You see how he’s referring back using this Rabbinic midrash and painting the picture and he says, “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been breaking forth, (God has collected all of his people into the fold and now John the Baptist, the ports, the one knocking down the rocks, knocking down the side of the fold, has gone up knocked down the fold, knocked down the wall, and now I, Messiah, Lord, am leading a noisy multitude into pasture and into victory. It has nothing to do with violence or men of violence. “From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has been breaking forth and now I, King Messiah, am leading a noisy multitude out into pasture and into victory.” For Jesus kingdom was those people over whom he was ruling and who were demonstrating his rule in their lives. “Among those born of women there was none greater than John the Baptist, but he that is least in my kingdom now is greater than he.” Why? Because of the commission that he gave to his kingdom and because of the capacity that his kingdom has. John’s commission was simply to prepare the way of the Lord. But for those who were ruled by Jesus, who were a part of his kingdom, their commission was something entirely different. Not only different but much greater in scope, in activity and in power.
How do we know those who are in kingdom? How do we recognize those that are a part of kingdom? Matthew 7:16-21, “You shall know them by their fruits. Do men father grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree brunet forth food fruit; but the corrupt tree brunet forth evil fruit…Every tree that brunet not froth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Therefore by their fruits ye shall know them. Not everyone that says unto me Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.” What does he mean, not everyone that says unto me Lord, Lord, will enter into the kingdom? Those who are a part of Jesus’ movement, his disciples, his followers, they always call him Lord. Those who not a part of his movement, those who are on the outside, always call him Rabbi or teacher. You can always tell if the person is in the kingdom or out of the kingdom by the way that they address him. Those in the kingdom call him Lord. He goes ahead to emphasize that not everyone that calls me Lord, that says unto me Lord, Lord, is going to be a part of my kingdom. But he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. How does that fit in with everything that he said about the Beatitudes, attitudes for kingdom people to be in? Blessed are the poor in spirit for these are the people over whom God is ruling. These are those who constitute the kingdom. These are those who make up the kingdom. What did we say poor in spirit meant? Those who have repented of their sin, who are thoroughly penitent, who had turned to God and loved his word and kept his commandments. Not everyone that says unto me Lord, Lord is going to be part of the kingdom but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. By their fruits will you know them? What are to be the fruits of kingdom people? That gets us back to the discussion that we had briefly in our last session, “How do I lay up for myself treasures in heaven?” Not by playing church, not through faith, not through experience, not through emotion, not through ceremony or ritual, not through giving of your tithes, not by being religious. How do I lay up for myself treasures in heaven? By ministering to the needs of people on a very basic fundamental level of need out there. What is the commission of kingdom? To go into the cities and villages and lay your hands on the sick and they’ll recover. Take the authority of the devil and he’ll flee from you, but more than that to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to care for the sick, and the orphans and the widows and the strangers, to visit the prisoners and to minister to the needs of the people on a very basic fundamental level. This is the commission of kingdom. God didn’t call us as his people out of the world to form some kind of little bless me club or praise the Lord society. He called us to be the kingdom of God. Who and what is kingdom? Where is kingdom? You tell me. The kingdom of heaven is in you. Is that right? Is that what the word says? Who is the kingdom? You are. What is the kingdom? It’s what you are. Who else is in you? The Bible says, Christ in you, the hope of glory. Who else is in you? The Bible says, do you now know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit that is in you? But you’re not your own, you were bought with a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body. It’s no coincidence that all of these terms are used and they all refer to the individual over whom God is ruling.
Christ in you the hope of glory? What does that mean? I can understand that only when I understand who he is. God. So if Christ is in me then who is in me? God. Eph. 3:16, “May he grant you out of the rich treasury of his glory to be strengthened and reinforced with mighty power in the inner man by the Holy Spirit himself indwelling your innermost being and personality. May Christ through faith actually dwell, settle down and abide and make his permanent home in your heart. May you be rooted deeply in love and found securely in love that you may have the power and be strong to apprehend and grasp with all of the saints what is the breath and the length and the depth of it. That you may really come to know practically through experience for yourself the love of Christ which far surpasses mere knowledge without experience. That you may be filled through all your being unto all the fullness of God. That is may have the riches measure of the divine presence and become a body holy filled and flooded with God himself.” That’s the capacity that the man of God has. With Christ in you becoming a body holy filled and flooded with God himself. You say, that’s wonderful, but unless you know who God is you haven’t got the faintest idea as to the real implication of that. We know who Jesus Christ is, he’s God. But who, and what is God? Who is it that’s in me? God. I have the capacity to be a body holy, filled and flooded with God. But who’s God. What is God? If I ask you to tell me in one word the word that best describes the essence of God. That is, what he is, we’re not talking about a characteristic of deity but essence. Love is not the answer. Spirit is not the answer. The essence of deity what is it? Power. What is another word for power in English?…energy. God is energy, pure unadulterated energy. That’s the reason that we call him omnipotent. It’s not that energy is God, but God is energy, power. You want to want to know what kind of energy? What kind of power? The Bible says that my faith we understand that the totality of the universe as we now see it was created ex nihilo out of nothing simply by the word that went forth out of his mouth. Let there be light and there was light. Pure unadulterated energy. I made a study a little while ago on the subject of energy. I found out that there are two different kinds of energy. One kind is called potential and I can best describe it by telling you that I like to hunt. I hunt a lot of times with a bow. I have a compound bow with a 55 pound draw, and when I put an arrow in it and I pull back to draw and it breaks over I’ve got 55 pounds of stored energy. That arrow isn’t going to go anywhere or do anything, and not going to hurt anything until I let it go, but when I let it go and that bow flips that arrow out and it strikes the target heat is generated, energy is created and the potential energy is converted to kinetic energy and kinetic energy is both creative and restorative and that’s the difference between a miracle and healing. Energy is both creative and restorative. It will create and it will restore. That’s the difference between miracle (creative) and a healing (restorative). Who is it that in us? Christ in us the hope of glory. Who is Christ? God. We have the capacity to become a body wholly filled and flooded with God himself and he has given us his holy spirit, his power to empower us to do the work to which kingdom was commissioned. His Holy Spirit is within us which means that all of the manifestations of the spirit should be flowing in us and through us to minister life and health to the body. We’ve been confused about this. We’ve talked about the 9 spiritual gifts. I want the gift of healing and pray for it. You can pray for the gift of healing from now until the day that you die and you’ll not get it unless you need to be healed because there isn’t such a thing as a gift of healing except for the person who has been healed. Nowhere in the Bible are these 9 things that we see recorded in 1 Cor. 12 called spiritual gifts. They are the 9 ways in which the Holy Spirit manifests himself in the life of every believer. Every believer who is a saved, born again, spirit filled with the Holy Spirit living and dwelling within them, child of God has the capacity for all 9 of these manifestations of the Holy Spirit to be working in them and through them to affect life and health to the body. That’s who we are.
