Dolly father, we thank you so much for this beautiful day. We thank you so much for allowing us to come before your throne and bring our petitions before you one last time before the message to God, we'd ask that you'd help me to convey your truth accurately and Understandably, dear God, that you'd help me to convey Christ as glorious as he is, dear God, that you'd help us to see Jesus more clearly and be able to imitate Jesus much better because of this, dear God. We'd ask that you'd speak through me, that you would use your word to preach truth, and that you would change lives from it in your name we pray. Amen. General Mark Anthony and Caesar's heir, Octavian, became rivals for the kingdom of Rome. The experienced Mark Anthony traveled throughout all the Middle East looking for recruits, for support, and for troops to battle Caesar Octavian. Caesar Octavian and Mark Anthony met off the coast of Greece in 31 AD and met for a naval battle. It was the decisive battle for the war. And lo and behold, a surprise victory came to Octavian Caesar, and he defeated Mark Anthony soundly. Mark Anthony, knowing his defeat, took Cleopatra, his consort, and traveled to Egypt, where they committed suicide. The war was over. The 13-year civil war for Rome was over. Caesar Octavian won. He is now the king of Rome. He is now king of the known world. Now suppose you had been living in Rome during this period. During 13 years of civil war, it was terrible. Even though you were not in the battle, you were quite far from the battle, there would be rumors, there'd be fighting, there'd be people trying to bully their way into office. There'd be all sorts of mess going on in Rome. Everyone would be waiting anxiously for the news. Who won? For those loyal to Mark Antony, did he win? For those loyal to Caesar Octavian, did he win? And at last news reaches Rome. Octavian Caesar wins. Mark Antony has been defeated. Octavian Caesar is now the king of the Roman Empire. Surely, if you were on the side of Caesar Octavian, this would be great news. You've been waiting for this for 13 years. You've been watching as Rome has destroyed itself inside out, waiting to see what would happen as factions battled against each other. If you're on the side of Mark Antony, this is very bad news. This is the sort of news that makes you want to pack your bags and run. You know that once Octavian returns, he's not gonna look favorably on the people who are loyal to Mark Antony. He's not gonna just slap them on the hand and say, oh well, you should have picked better. He's probably gonna put you to death, unless like Herod, you kneel before him and plead for mercy. However, it would be nearly two years before Octavian finally came back to Rome. Two years since the news reached Rome that Octavian had won and Octavian was the king of Rome. Two years when they're waiting to see Octavian Caesar's face again. Octavian still hadn't returned from Rome because he was mopping up the rest of the enemies. He was implementing the rest of his victory. And it would be two years before his second coming, his return to Rome. In the meantime, those loyal to Caesar know the good news that Caesar is king. He is victorious. We know that this mess will soon be cleaned up. We know that everything will be put back together again. We know that everything will be set right because Caesar has won. At least in theory, right? Because Caesar's weren't very good guys, but in theory, that's how it would be. You know, when I first heard the idea of a kingdom or the kingdom being one of the most prominent messages of scripture, I couldn't believe it. I didn't want to. I couldn't believe it at all. I mean, you know, Jesus is the son of God, his deity. That's definitely something we definitely look for in the Gospels, and that's good to look for in the Gospels. And other things that you look in there is the attributes of God. Where is God holy? Where is God omnipotent? Where is God omniscient? Where is God good? Where is God loving? And certainly other things we look in scripture as well. We look, what can I pull out of scripture? What nuggets of truth or application can I take and apply to my life and therefore make me a better Christian or better person? And we go through, and I did all of this reading scripture and totally missed that one of the biggest themes of scripture, one of the most prominent messages of Jesus on earth was the kingdom of God. So, that's what we're gonna talk about today. If you are a PowerPoint person, you can turn to our first slide. We're gonna read Matthew 4, 8 through 11. Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, which is Jesus, all these I will give to you if you will fall down and worship me. Then Jesus said to him, Be gone, Satan, for it is written, worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve. Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him. The kingdom of God doesn't really look like it's present necessarily in that passage, but I'll show you how it is. When does it begin, and when is it arriving? When does this kingdom of God begin? Now, there is no high enough mountain in this world to show Jesus all the kingdoms of this world. However, I kind of imagine this maybe being a temptation that we face where it's our imaginations, where Satan is taking Jesus in his mind's eye and is looking out at the cities and the kingdoms of this world. And Satan is beside him saying, Jesus, you know, I have these and I will give them to you if you bow down and worship me. Satan is now brought out the big guns. His temptation is now changed from being temptations of Jesus's physical well-being. They've turned into him and there are now a temptation about Jesus's purpose. Why did Jesus come to this earth? Satan is no longer tempting Jesus with, why not have God provide for you if you're so hungry? Or why not have God keep you from dying if you are the Messiah? Now the devil says, Jesus, you know the earth is my kingdom. You know that I am Lord over the world. All you have to do is bow down and I'll give them to you. Sounds pretty easy. But how could this temptation be harder than the first two? Especially when Jesus is so hungry after a 40-day fast. Well, in order to answer those questions, I think that it's important to start by kind of dismantling one misunderstanding that we get when we look at this temptation. Misunderstanding confuses the purpose of the temptation and therefore starts us off on a wrong foot for understanding what the temptation is there for and possibly, quite possibly, misunderstanding some of the purpose for why Jesus came. So what is this misunderstanding? Misunderstanding is that Satan is actually lying about the authority he has over the world. In other words, Satan is going up to Jesus and saying, Jesus, these are mine. These kingdoms, they're mine. The world is mine. But in actuality, Jesus has always had this kingdom. Jesus always has been king of the world. So Satan is just offering Jesus something Jesus already has. I don't think so. I think, I mean, no, for instance, if Alex just isn't here, he's over there somewhere. I ended up writing him into an illustration. That's okay. If I, if Alex is driving up in a van, And I go up to Alex, and I say, Alex, nice van. I'll give you $200. Or no, actually, you give me $200, and I will give you this van. Alex would be like, yeah, right. Boom, I drive off, right? And why not? It's his van. He's in it. He's owning it, right? I'm outside. I'm looking at his van. But if Alex walks out of the church after Sunday morning service, it's funny talking about him, he's not here. And I walk out, he walks out and he's looking around and his van is gone. He goes to where it is and there's broken glass all on the ground. He's like, where's my van? And now I saunter up to him and say, Alex, I'll give you $200 or no, you give me $200 and I'll give you your van back. That might be a little bit more tempting because I have his van. He no longer has his van. Now, of course, he wouldn't do that. He'd call the police and he'd get his van and I'd be in jail. So I won't get my $200. But do you see what I'm saying? I think Satan is actually telling us the truth here. He's actually telling us the truth. He has authority over the kingdoms of this world. So if this is a misunderstanding, then he actually has authority over all the earth. And I think if we look at the first few passages I posted up here, this will help you understand how I get there. It says, now is the judgment of this world. Now will the ruler of this world be cast out. And we'll go into more of the context of that a little bit later. In the other passage it says, and he sees the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him so that he may not deceive the nations any longer. Someone is ruling the world when Jesus steps on the scene. Someone is deceiving the nations when Jesus steps on the scene. So to put it simply, what is Satan's temptation here? Satan's temptation consists of boasting that he is king of the world and He is taking this fact and is offering it to Jesus and saying Jesus all you have to do. It's easy It's really easy. All you have to do is bow down and worship me And I will transfer these kingdoms to you. I think there's the lie But of course Jesus wouldn't worship Satan and that leaves us with a big problem and If this world is Satan's kingdom and Jesus won't worship Satan, then how can Jesus receive the world as his own? How can Jesus claim the kingdoms of this world? Well, this passage doesn't say. It just moves on. Matthew is kind of telling you a story. The gospel is like a story. He's telling you a story, and like a good mystery, you don't want to know who did it and where they are. right away. That would be bad, right? If you were watching Sherlock Holmes and Sherlock Holmes walks in and finds a dead girl, and he's like, how did this happen? And her father walks in with a snake and says, I know. That's not a good mystery. It's over. The mystery's done. It's OK. That's it. Not a good story. So, this is what Matthew is doing with his gospel. He's sort of hinting you in on what the theme of his gospel is going to be. Sort of hinting you in on the story that is going to take place in the gospel. And he's drawing you in, trying to make you think, well, what's going to happen here? How is Jesus going to get the authority over the world? But, right after the temptation ends, Jesus' proclamation is, and it's the next verse in our passage, that the kingdom of God is near and it is breaking into the scenes as you see repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand it's coming in ready or not Israel is coming it's breaking in it's not gonna wait for your timing coming Jesus is here it's coming and before you know it Jesus is saying this is the next passage okay next passage There you go, okay. And if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand? But if it is by the spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. Or how can someone enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods unless he first binds the strong man? Then indeed, he may plunder his house. So here we go, Jesus is making a shift here. He's saying, if I'm casting out demons in front of you in the spirit of God, then the kingdom has come upon you. This is a sign that the kingdom has come is that I am casting out demons. And then he talks about a parable and says, or how can someone enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods unless he first finds a strong man? If you want to go and plunder Tom Brzezicki's goods, You better time down first. He's not going to just watch and let you do this. You better figure out something. It's not going to work out for you. This is what Jesus is saying. If he is going to plunder the kingdom and take the goods of the kingdom, this worldwide kingdom, he has to bind Satan. He has to bind the strong man. But this is addressed to Israel. Sometimes during Jesus's ministry his proclamation is that the kingdom has come to Israel It's sort of like a ready or not. It's ready or not. It's it's coming and has come Jesus is the Messiah. He's the Christ. He's the king So Israel you better not miss the train because it's very possible that you will if you don't accept this Messiah Then you're missing out. You've got to accept them. He's offering it Instead, instead of worshiping your phony rulers, instead of looking for false messiahs, instead of seeking a kingdom that fits your desire, fits your ambitions, you have to join Jesus. But strangely enough, when we look at the end of Matthew, after Jesus' death, resurrection, and at his ascension, We see that Jesus's proclamation is that all authority on heaven and on earth is given to him. The world is his kingdom. Now, not later now. Now the world is his kingdom, and what is the proper response to Jesus's inaugurated kingdom? Well, it's the Great Commission. You can't have the Great Commission without the worldwide kingship of Christ. It flows from one another. A lot of times, this is a common thing where we just, we take the gospel of the Great Commission, right? Go into all the world and make disciples of all nations, right? Baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost. We take that passage and we almost pull it out and just throw it out there without much of a story behind it. Well, what happened? What happened that allows us to do this? Well, the verse before it says, and Jesus said to them, all authority on heaven and on earth is given to me. Jesus earlier said to his disciples, just go to Israel, don't go to the world. But now after his death and resurrection and ascension, he's now saying, go to the world. Something has happened. Some shift has occurred. Something has happened through which Jesus has become king of the world and Satan has been deposed. Satan is no longer king. Somehow, the shift happens in the Gospels, where you first had Satan saying, hey, look, I'm king. And he was telling the truth. And then all of a sudden, at the end of the Gospel, Jesus is saying, hey, I'm the king. So something happened that caused this great event to occur. So what is the temptation? We're going back to the temptation again. What is the temptation of Satan? And why is it so tempting? Well, Satan is giving Jesus the easy way out. What do I mean? Satan offered the worldwide kingdom to Jesus safely. But Jesus must gain the kingdom of the world through a trying life, through suffering, through death. As we see in John 12, 31, It says, now is the judgment of this world. Now will the ruler of this world be cast out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to myself. He said this to show by what kind of death he was going to die. The death of Jesus, defeating the ruler of the world and gathering all nations to himself. The next passage since therefore the children share in flesh and blood he himself likewise partook of the same things That through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death. That is the devil You see what's going on here Jesus can't get the kingdoms by bowing down and worshiping Satan. That would be too easy Say Jesus has to die to get them. And not only does he have to die, but he also has to resurrect and ascend. If you look at the next passages, it says, I wrote some other ones down. If you want to write them down, I think they printed out a handout for you. Maybe not, but if not, there they are. I saw in the night visions and behold with the clouds of heaven, there came one like a son of man and he came where to earth. No, he came to the ancient of days, came to God and he was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all peoples and nations and languages should serve him. You see, it's putting it all together. You have an ascension. Jesus is coming with the clouds and he's coming up to God. And what does he get? He gets a kingdom. For whom? For all peoples, nations, languages. And his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away. And his kingdom, one that shall not be destroyed. Jesus did receive the world, but it came at a great cost. It wasn't as easy as bowing down. It came through suffering, turmoil, the cross, but also through the glorious resurrection and ascension. And Satan was tempting Jesus with an escape from suffering. He's attempting Jesus. It's the same temptation as Gethsemane, where it's Jesus, maybe there's a better way. In fact, there is a better way. I have it for you. Here it is. Bow down and worship me. You don't have to do all this, the weeping and crying and all the pain that you know is coming for you. All you have to do is bow down and worship me and I'll just give him to you. It's that easy. He's offering Jesus a crown without a cross. He's offering Jesus rulership without a fight. All Jesus has to do is bow down. Maybe, maybe the devil's plan is better than God's. The devil's plan is easier after all, right? It's painless. And if God's plan involves pain and suffering and fighting and dying, maybe it is better to serve Satan. Maybe it is in my best interests to do that. After all, with the devil's plan, I can just float along through life and try to avoid all the temptations, all the struggles, all the pain that this life can bring. It's easier that way. Maybe divorce would make your life so much easier. Marriage is hard, as statistics will tell you. Christian divorce is through the roof. Worldwide divorce is through the roof. And young people aren't getting married, they're deciding to either do cohabitation or whatever else, friends with benefits. Maybe it's easier that way, right? You know, God wants this for us, but if we do friends with benefits, the friends with benefits idea, you know, we can not really be loyal to one another. We can kind of go out and do what we want and not really have to answer. I want to live the way I want to live. Sex, pornography, drunkenness, drugs, selfishness, unkindness, whatever. Whatever makes my life easier. Whatever helps me to get the crown but not have to deal with the cross. Whatever helps me to be able to reign but not have to fight. Don't we all want the easy way out? Isn't that sort of what we go through all the time where, hey, if something is offered to you and it's much easier to take it now than to take it later, but we know it's right to take it later? Isn't it so tempting for us to say, you know what? I'm going to take it now. Why wait? Right? This is a common message to teens, right? If sex is better in marriage and it's offered to you now, why not take it now, right? It's easier that way. It's a lot easier. You have to fight for the other one. The devil's lying. The devil wouldn't have given Jesus the kingdom without the cross. Jesus had to get the kingdom through the cross. Jesus's victories in his private life lead to his victories in his public life. And that's what we see in Gethsemane. He faces the same temptations and he's able to defeat them because he's defeated them in his private life. If you go to Matthew 4, 23 through 24 through 25, I'm sorry, it'll bring us to our second point. Jesus went through Galilee teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people. News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those who were suffering severe pain. The demon possessed those having seizures and the paralyzed, and he healed them. Large crowds from Galilee and the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and the region across the Jordan followed him. The kingdom of God, what is it? We talked about when is it? We know it's coming. You know that it's coming when Jesus is announcing it. We know that it's already there at Jesus' ascension. So the kingdom is now, but what kind of kingdom is it? This is a hard question. This is a hard question for Christians. Because you ask Christians what their idea, not even the kingdom, you ask people what their ideas of the gospel are, right? What's the gospel? You'll get, every person will have a different answer for you, right? But when you ask people about the kingdom, it sort of goes the same way. What is this kingdom? What does it look like? First, before I answer that question, I want to make a bold claim. That is that the claim that the kingdom of God is the gospel, or at least if it isn't the gospel, it is a huge part of the gospel. That when you talk about the gospel, the kingdom should be in the forefront of your mind. The kingdom of God is how we make sense of who Jesus was, what he did, and the apostle and the epistles that were written in light of him. And I have some passages for you. Now, after John was arrested, there you go. Now, after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee proclaiming the good news of God. And what is the good news? And saying, the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news. Proclaiming the good news of God saying the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God has come Repent and believe the good news That is Jesus speaking to Israel but in the next passage acts 812 We see but when they believed Philip who was proclaiming the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ they were baptized both men and women and Now Philip is proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and where is it being proclaimed? Not to Israel anymore. Well, it is still being proclaimed in Israel by the apostles, but it's also being proclaimed in Samaria. If you look at the next passage, and now I know that none of you among whom I have gone proclaiming the kingdom will ever see my face again. Therefore, I declare to you this day that I am not responsible for the blood of any of you, For I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole purpose of God. Keep watch over yourselves and over all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to shepherd the church of God that he obtained with the blood of his own son. Paul is in Ephesus now. in the Gentile world. And what is he proclaiming? Paul is proclaiming that he has gone about proclaiming the kingdom. He is telling them, hey listen, all of you guys that I've gone about proclaiming the kingdom, I have not withheld anything from you. In the next passage, it says, let it be known to you then that the salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles. They will listen. And he, that's Paul, lived there for two whole years at his own expense and welcomed all who came to him, proclaiming the kingdom of God and teaching about the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness and without hindrance. This is Paul to the Romans. Jesus is proclaiming it in Mark to the Jews. Philip is proclaiming it to the Samaritans. And Paul is proclaiming it to the Gentiles, Judea, Samaria, the outermost parts of the earth. And what's being proclaimed, the kingdom of God. So the here and the nowness of Jesus's worldwide kingdom is the gospel. Or again, if it's not the gospel, it is a huge part of the gospel. And now we know that the kingdom of Jesus is worldwide. It's here, it's now, it's breaking in. But what is the worldwide kingdom of God? What kind of kingdom is it? Many have believed that the kingdom of God is only in heaven, where if you die there, if you die and you've accepted Jesus, you go there when you die. It's up there somewhere. And Jesus's gospel of the kingdom is about how to get there when you die. Some believe that the kingdom is a spiritual one, right? Where it's a kingdom where God saves his people and reigns within their hearts and helps them to do what he commands them to do. Others believe that Jesus's kingdom is about taking care of the poor, taking care of the needy, the hurt, the sick, the oppressed, the stranger, the immigrant, the orphan, and the widow. So which one is it? It's a hard choice. Which one is it? I know as evangelicals, we'll lean to one and not the other. And I know liberal Christians will lean to the opposite one and kind of describe the others, right? So which of these views is correct? Well, in a way, they all are correct. All three of them are correct. All three need each other. The good news of the kingdom is now breaking into the world and involves heaven, and it involves the salvation of souls, and it involves the lordship of Jesus Christ in your heart, and it involves social justice. Yes, buzzword. It involves taking care of the poor and the hungry and the needy. But first let's look at heaven, because I think we need to qualify this a little bit. It says, I don't think I have a passage up there, no, okay. Jesus says, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So where is his kingdom coming? Is it coming to heaven? No, no, no, it's coming to earth. And his will be done in heaven? Well, no, his will is being done in heaven. Our prayer is that his will will be done on earth as it is in heaven. You see, believing in the kingdom is only the place you go to when you die is a mistake. If you think it's only up there and when you die you go there and that's it, that's the kingdom of God, then that's a mistake. Why? Well, because Jesus is wanting heaven to come here. He wants heaven to transform earth. The kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God is breaking into earth. Lord's Prayer and the Kingdom Parables get confusing if you try to translate it as just a heaven that's up there. But not only does Jesus' prayer kind of help us out here, but Genesis 1 and Revelation 21 also give us a hand where we see Adam and Eve walking in the garden. and we see God walking with them, the cool of the day. There's no need for veils. There was no need for them to be afraid that God would strike them dead. Why? Because heaven and earth were united. There was no problem. They could walk with God. And what do you see in the end of Revelation? The new Jerusalem coming down and landing on earth, transforming earth completely. God is in the uniting process once again. What was once united has broken apart because of the fall, and God is in the process of putting it back together again. The song, Heaven is a Place on Earth, isn't really that far off, at least that phrase. It is, sort of. Not really, but it's becoming. Heaven is becoming a place on earth, where soon, when you talk about heaven, you won't be able to talk about heaven without talking about earth. And soon, when you talk about earth, You won't be able to talk about Earth without talking about heaven. They'll be united once more. Jesus will be here, God will be here, and everything will be put right. So if you think of heaven in that way, then yes, the kingdom of God definitely has to do with heaven. But also, let's deal with the salvation and the rulership of Jesus over our hearts. The kingdom of God being salvation of souls and the lordship in our life. Jesus says, what does he say? Repent. Turn away from what you were doing. Stop worshipping false gods. Stop worshipping false rulers. Worship God. who through Jesus has conquered and claims the world as his own. This is his message. The kingdom of God has come. Repent. What does repent mean? You're going one way, turn around, go the opposite way. It was used many times in Jesus' time period. When people were in factions and were fighting for warlords, someone else, a general from Israel would come up and say, Repent. Stop doing what you're doing and follow me. Fight with me instead. Stop doing stop worshiping whatever you think is the best and worship Jesus Stop fighting on the losing side the Satan has lost so stop fighting for him The kingdom of heaven is like a pearl or a treasure in a field The kingdom is something you sell all for it's something that is worth everything you have if you see its worth The kingdom of heaven is worth giving your life for. Kingdom of God involves heart transformation. It involves the Lordship of Jesus in your life. And what is Paul's gospel summary? If you confess that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you shall be saved. If your claim is Jesus is the true Lord, he is the true king. And if you believe that God raised him from the dead, you shall be saved. This is very innermost. This affects your whole private life. The truth of what Jesus did for the world can't leave your heart and your life unchanged. It changes things. But then we'll deal with the third point, and that is social justice, or as what I named it, kingdom justice. Some believe that the kingdom Jesus proclaimed is only a spiritual one. It only has to do with spiritual matters. It only has to do with purity and pride and selfishness. And that is all true. That is true. It does deal with those, but it deals with more. It doesn't just deal with the spiritual. It deals with the physical as well. God has always been concerned with matters of social justice. It's almost like once the liberal theologians or the liberal Christians came around and were like, you know what the gospel is? I know it's about taking care of the poor. Don't worry about proclaiming anything. We'll take care of the poor. All of a sudden there was a shift and evangelicals saw that and were like, oh no, that's bad. We need to proclaim. Well, that's true. We do need to proclaim, but we need to proclaim and take care of the sick and the poor and the needy. God has always been concerned. with matters of justice. To show you, I have Matthew 4 again, where he is proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness among the people. Jesus is not only concerned with teaching and proclamation, he is very concerned with that, he's doing it, but he is also healing all the sickness and diseases. Later in the Sermon on the Mount, he says, give alms to the poor this way. And then later he says, and when you give alms to the poor, he's expecting this. He's expecting this to be a result. James 1.27 says, the religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this. What is it? To care for orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained by the world. What is pure and undefiled religion? It's caring for orphans, it's caring for widows. This is New Testament, this isn't even Old Testament. But to go back to Amos 8, or go back to the Old Testament rather, Amos 8 is in the Old Testament, I have a big passage for us to go through. If it's up, well, when it gets up there, I'll start reading anyway. The end has come upon my people Israel. This is the Lord speaking. I will never again pass them by. The songs of the temple shall become wailings in that day, says the Lord God. The dead bodies shall become many, cast out in every place. Be silent. Hear this, you that trample on the needy and bring ruin to the poor of the land, saying, when will the new moon be over so that we may sell grain on the Sabbath, so that we may offer wheat for sale? And listen to this, we will make an ephah small and the shekel great. We will sell small amounts for lots of money and practice deceit with false balances. We'll use balances that when you put the weed on one side and the money on the other, well, it's like a carnival where you're throwing things, but it doesn't really work the way it's supposed to because they waited it. buying the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, selling the sweepings of the wheat, the chaff, you sell that, it's no good. The Lord has sworn by the pride of Jacob saying, surely I will never forget any of their deeds. What deeds? Deeds of injustice that they're doing. I will never forget it. Shall not the land tremble on this account, and everyone mourn who lives in it, and all of it rise like the Nile, and be tossed about and sink again like the Nile of Egypt? On that day, says the Lord God, I will make the sun go down at noon, and darken the earth in broad daylight. And he goes on and it doesn't get much better. God is so concerned that Israel, his people, are just. that his people care for the poor, that his people care for the needy, his people care for the hungry, the widow and the orphan. But he doesn't just stand by and watch as they're unjust. In fact, his judgment is harsh. It looks as though he is judging them with the same plagues he judged Egypt with. Or if you go to Jeremiah 22, 13 through 23, It says, woe to him who built his house by unrighteousness and his upper rooms by injustice, who makes his neighbors work for nothing and does not give them wages, who says, I will build myself a spacious house and large upper rooms, and who cuts out windows for it, paneling it with cedar, painting it with vermilion. Are you a king because you compete in cedar? In other words, are you a king because you have such a nice palace? Does your nice palace make you a king? Did not your father eat and drink and do justice and righteousness? Said Josiah. Then it was well with him. He judged the cause of the poor and the needy. Then it was well. Is this, is not this to know me? Or as other translations put it, isn't this what it means to know me? Isn't this what it means to know God? The fact that you are acting in justice and in righteousness, that you are not oppressing the poor and the needy, that you are taking care of those in need, whoever they may be. This is God's concern. This is the heart of God. This is the Lord speaking and saying this. I'm not saying this. He's saying, isn't this what it means to know me? And he's talking about what? He judged the cause of the poor and needy. or he did justice and righteousness and it was well with him. That's what the Lord is saying. So what does this kingdom look like? It looks like heaven breaking into earth. It looks like conforming to the will of God by following Jesus as Lord. And it looks like doing deeds of righteousness and justice. It's all-inclusive. It's not where you can sort of put one part of your life off and say, you know what? During the day, when I'm alone, that's when I worship Jesus. When I'm out in public, nah, no big deal. You could be doing sacrifices and offerings. You could be doing incense. You could be keeping the law seemingly perfectly. Pretty much perfectly, I don't know. That sounded kind of weird grammatically. You could be doing everything that makes you look like you're doing a good job and you're being righteous. But if you aren't acting justly, if you are oppressing the poor and you aren't standing up for the needy and the widow and the orphan, well, judgment's of God. It's scary, but God is saying, this is how you know me, by taking care of the poor and the needy. Speaking to issues of justice, I'll just kind of give some avenues of how do we do social justice? How do we take care of the poor and the needy in the 21st century? Well, racism. Look at racism. I'm not saying by any chance that everybody that is African-American or everybody that is a Mexican-American or whatever, I'm not saying that everything they do is correct. What I am saying is that there's a problem here. I don't think that's a surprise to any of us. There's a problem, a deep problem of racism in our country. There's a problem between African-Americans and Americans all over our United States. If you don't know about it, all you gotta do is watch the news. It's all over the place. We saw Ferguson, we saw New York, saw North Carolina, we see Baltimore. I'm not defending anything. What I am saying is that there is a problem. There's a problem, a deep-seated problem. And who should be the ones reconciling African-Americans and Caucasians? Who should be the ones reconciling Mexicans and Caucasians? Who should be the ones reconciling Asian-Americans with everybody else? Who should be the ones at the front doing this? Well, what did Jesus do? Jesus united Jew and Gentile. He broke down the barriers that were set up between Samaritans, the Jews, and the Gentiles, reconciling them all into one family. So imitating Jesus would be reconciling, reconciling those who don't really fit with our standards, who don't really look like what we want them to look like, who don't really do what we want them to do. It's reconciling them all like Jesus reconciled Jew and Gentile. People who will take the persecution from both sides, and they will comfort those who are hurting. They will help. They will supply for their needs. There will be people of justice. What other sorts? There are many other sorts and avenues of justice. Maybe not all of you are called to do all of these at one time, and that's fine. I don't think it's possible. But some of you are concerned with some, and some of you are concerned with others. And hopefully some of you will be concerned with some of these that I list. We have taking care of the poor, taking care of the needy, the hungry, the sick. I know a couple of people in our congregation are really focused in on orphan care. That's great, that's wonderful. What other avenues? Some have decided to work with widows, which I would love to see that get off the ground. I'm not sure it has. Loving and providing for the immigrant and the stranger. Historically, evangelicals have done very poorly in this area, thinking that they were to do the job of the government. And, well, if they don't belong here and the government lets them here, I will make sure they don't feel like they belong here. No good. No good. Christians should be the ones that are kind and helping the cause of the immigrants, helping the cause of the stranger. Do you not think it was the same in Israel? Do you think Israel was happy with the strangers that were coming in? And the immigrants? Probably not. As you can look from the time of Jesus, it looked like it would have been a very bad idea for them. They would have thought, no, no, this is not good. The single moms. I've heard young lives and the mystery of single moms is actually meeting in this building and I know that some of you are meeting with them. It's a great opportunity, great opportunity for justice. Freeing slaves, sex slaves, child slaves, etc. I know this is the passion of some. Standing up for the well-being of infants. You know, if this is tough, you know, there's this vaccination, you know, the vaccination issue. I don't know. I'm not saying that you should or shouldn't. Maybe we should vaccinate our children. Maybe we shouldn't vaccinate our children. Or maybe we should vaccinate them, but not with all the vaccinations that they want you to vaccinate them with. Or maybe you shouldn't do that when they're so young. Maybe you should do it in stages as they get older. I don't know. What I do know is that this is something that we can get involved with. This is something we can research and try to figure out, try to help a world that is confused and is hurting and wondering, what do we do with this? It's the works of kingdom justice. Or, there's another thing. This is one very common to us. The abortion. Standing up to fight an abortion. Standing up to fight all abortion in America. Or, some people are concerned about Christian circumcision and how it's not Christian. There are more cons than there are pros. Another avenue of justice. Well, I think I let you in on enough. What I'm not saying is that you have to be involved in all of these. What I am saying is that God calls us in Jesus to follow Jesus. and to do works of justice. He calls us to be ones who proclaim the kingdom of God, who teach about the kingdom of God, and to do our best to heal and take care of those who are poor and needy. It all comes together. It's all one. But being a kingdom person will take up my time. Being a kingdom person will cost me money. Being a kingdom person will make me feel uncomfortable. Being a Kingdom person will mean that I have to get to know people, personally know people, that I'm not comfortable knowing. People I don't want to know. You mean you see people and you're like, yeah, I don't want, I have any desire to talk to that person. That's what kingdom justice means. Talking to those people who no one else wants to talk to. The lepers, right? The ones who are outcasts. The woman with the issue of blood. The one who is ceremonially, ceremonially, ceremonially, ceremonially, yeah, okay, whatever. That word. Ceremonially unclean. Jesus went to, and talked to, and comforted, and ministered to, and healed. These works of kingdom justice are what it means to know God. It's not a result of knowing God. It's not what helps you know God. It's not like if you do these things, all of a sudden you wake up one day and you're like, I know God. It's what it means to know God. If you know God, this is what's going on. Last point, and this one's very quick. Who is the king of the kingdom? Who are the servants of the kingdom? Who belongs to this kingdom of God? Well, first, who is the king? God is. Jesus is. God is reigning in Jesus through the Spirit over the entire world. Who are the people of this kingdom? Well, it's those who are smart, witty, funny, good-looking, strong. No, no, no, that's not it at all. The kingdom servants that God uses are those who look like the Sermon on the Mount. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are those who are hungry for righteousness. Those are the kingdom people. In other words, the people that God uses in his kingdom are the people whose lives look like Jesus. Those are kingdom people. In other words, our lives model Jesus's life. We can't get the crown without a cross. We can't reign without a fight. We have to imitate Jesus in this life. And that involves being kingdom, being Sermon on the Mount people. Now you may say, or you may want to say, It doesn't look like Jesus is king now, right? Look at all the things that are going on in the world. There's a ton of bad stuff going on in the world. I agree. I understand. I watch ISIS and, oof, it's rough. I watch the problems we have in America and, oof, it's rough. Well, the enemy doesn't want to admit his defeat. Like some of Mark Anthony's crowd, like some people who are loyal to Mark Anthony, they were still causing problems. Caesar still had to travel around implementing his victory. Caesar still had to go around mopping up the problems. However, Jesus has won the victory. That's the important part. Jesus has won. The war is won. And we wait for Jesus to return, and he will finish out weeding those whose loyalties lie elsewhere and set all things right once again. We long for God's will to be done on heaven as it is on earth. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you so much for this day, and we thank you again for the opportunity we have to come before you and worship you. God, I'd ask that you would help the words that I have said, not to be mine, but to be God's, and that they would make a difference, that people would see the kingship of Jesus now and here. And that is not something that they can push off to the end of their life, not something that they can push off to a part of their life, but something that fully consumes and takes every bit of their lives. and uses it for your honor and glory. We'd ask those who are struggling and who want to give up the fight, who want to try to reign without a fight, who want to try to get the crown without a cross. It's tempting, dear God. We know it's tempting. It's a temptation brought before Christ. But we'd ask that you'd help them to persevere. Help them to stay faithful. Help them to love you. And if they fall and falter, dear God, that they would get up and start fighting again. Father, we'd ask that your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. In your name we pray. Amen.