[GTranslate]
The Kingdom is the Heartbeat of Christ

“Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, (unshakable, never be moved ) let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our “God is a consuming fire. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and for ever.” (Heb. 12; 28,29, 13; 8.)
[DDET (expand full article)]
In order to understand the terms “unchanging Christ” and “unchangeable Kingdom it is important to understand that the Kingdom of God and ‘Jesus the King’ belong together, for they are together. There is no shadow of change in either Christ or His Kingdom. Others in the Old Testament have brought suggestions of that kingdom, but they were hints, scattered descriptions (Hebrews 1:1 – 2). In Jesus the kingdom became a reality – an incarnation. The Word of the kingdom became flesh in a Person.
Jesus didn’t define the Kingdom in precise terms, because He is the definition. We may define the Kingdom since He has shown us what it is in His own person. The kingdom, which Jesus announced and revealed in his own Person, was not merely a difference in degree, but a difference in kind. The content of the character of Jesus has gone into the kingdom so that it turned out to be something quite different and other than what the prophets announced and expected. (1 Corinthians 2:2, 1 Corinthians 15:1 – 8, Acts 13:43 en Colossians 1:6)

A. THE UNWAVERING MESSAGE

1. THE KINGDOM AS ‘GOOD NEWS”

The best and wisest and most powerful man who ever lived, Jesus, made the kingdom of God His message. He called it the Good News – the Gospel. It is the only thing he called the Gospel: “He went out preaching the gospel of the kingdom” (Matt. 4:23). He sent out His disciples to preach the gospel of the kingdom of God.
He used the phrase “the kingdom of God” or its equivalent a hundred times. This is important, for the marginal, the unimportant, the unworthy never distracted Him and he made the kingdom of God the centre – the heartbeat of His message. Anything he used a hundred times is important, for the most important Person who ever lived was speaking. (Luke 4:43)

2. THE WORD “KINGDOM” AND ITS USE IN THE NEW TESTAMENT:

§ Kingdom of God 69 times in the NT
§ Kingdom of heaven 32 times (all in Mathew)
§ Kingdom in general terms (evil included) 150 in the NT
§ “Thy” kingdom 5 times
§ “His kingdom” 5 times in the gospels
§ “The kingdom” in the gospels 98 times
§ “My kingdom” 3 times in the gospels
§ Miscellaneous other uses 18 times
§ 162 times referring to royal power, kingship, dominion and rule

3. THE KINGDOM AS A LIFE CHOICE

The fact that it was a life choice and a life emphasis makes His choosing of the kingdom important. Jesus summed up His life purpose in these words:

“I must give the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, for that is what I was sent to do” (Luke 4:43).

4. KINGDOM PRAYER

Jesus taught on prayer: “This, then, is how you should pray: “`Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:9, 10). Prayer is the most important command we have received from our Lord Jesus. Praying for the coming of the kingdom is the key to all prayer. It is the foremost and the uppermost – without it prayer is comparatively meaningless. This is the framework and the core of everything. The key is this: “LET YOUR NAME BE GLORIFIED!” The phrase “Your kingdom come; Your will be done, on earth as it is done in heaven”, is significant. The second phrase explains the first; the coming of the kingdom is the doing of the will of God on earth as it is done in heaven.

Jesus is the unfolding miracle of relevancy – “the Pioneer of life”, always the same and yet forever new; unfolding but he always remains the same.

5. JESUS’ LIFE IS DEFINING THE MEANING AND THE PURPOSE OF THE KINGDOM

§ Jesus is the kingdom of God taking sandals and walking. The kingdom and the Person belong together, for without the Person, illustrating the kingdom, the kingdom – pattern would have taken many directions with all sorts of meanings, as it has done throughout history when they were separated.

§ The mutual relationship between the King and Kingdom. The rediscovery of Jesus without the rediscovery of the kingdom of God would be only half a discovery’ – a King without a kingdom, a lone figure unrelated. But a rediscovery of the kingdom without the rediscovery of the King would also be an only half a discovery, for it would be a kingdom without a King.

Jesus shows us what God is like and also shows us what the kingdom of God is like in operation. The kingdom of God is Christ likeness. Was there any better way to introduce the meaning of the kingdom than to introduce it in a Person and was there any better person through whom it could be introduced than Jesus?

B. THE UNCHANGEABLE PERSON

“Jesus Christ never changes! He is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” Heb 13:8

1. JESUS – THE BLUEPRINT

“But of the Son he says, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever, the sceptre of uprightness is the sceptre of your kingdom. You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness; therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions.” Heb 1:8

The wonder of the Unshakable kingdom and the Unchanging Person is that Jesus did not merely preach this kingdom; He was the illustration of what the kingdom is like. This fixed and unfolds the character of the kingdom. Jesus is the centre point, and the unfolding pattern. Therefore the kingdom and Jesus are predetermined and unfolding. The more you see the more you will see there is to be seen. It is an exciting adventure, a surprise around every corner, never a dull moment, horizons cracking, new horizons looming, every possession an invitation to possess more, every solution the key to further solutions.

2. JESUS – THE KING AND KINGDOM GETTING TOGETHER

“Being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them, “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed, nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There!’ for behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you.” Luke 17:20, 21

This identification of the order, the Unshakable kingdom, and the Unchanging Person, the same yesterday, today, and forever, the Son of God, is unique. Never did the highest order and the highest Person ever come together in such a unique way. We could never have understood the one without the other. Since this was the most important combination ever seen upon our planet with the greatest consequences for the future of the race, it had to be an illustrated junction; it could not be merely verbal. It had to be vital, to be acted out, lived out, and proclaimed.

3. JESUS – PROGRESSIVELY REVEALING THE KINGDOM

“And the Word became flesh” (John 1:14)

In all other religions it is the word becomes word, a philosophy or a moralist. Once, and only once, the Word became flesh; the ideal became real. Everything, which Jesus taught, He embodied. You cannot tell where His words ended and His deeds began, for His words were deeds and His deeds were words and, together with, what He was, the Word became flesh.

4. JESUS – IN AUTHORITY PROCLAIM HIS KINGDOM

When He finished the Sermon on the Mount, which many people think is impossible idealism, the multitudes were astonished at his teaching for “He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes” (Matt. 7:29). The Scribes quoted authorities, the authority of the past. Jesus spoke with authority, the authority of the past, present, and future, the authority of reality.

C. JESUS’ VISION BECAME THE MISSION OF THE CHURCH

“He said to them, “I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns as well; for I was sent for this purpose.” Luke 4:43

There are some important truths that should be communicated by the Church in order to recognize that Jesus and the Kingdom goes hand in hand.

1. JESUS – THE CREATOR

“Through him all things came to be” – the touch of Christ was upon all creation. All things were created by him and for Him. This fact is the light of men, the key to life and creation. All things were made by and for Jesus Christ, which is the light of men, the master light of all their seeing.
Pray for a revelation on this fact and you have the key; miss this fact, and you stumble in the dark as to what it is all about.

“He was in the world; but the world, though it owed it’s being to him, did not recognize him” (John 1:10).”

The world owed its being to him” – the world and everything in it is structured by Him and for Him, destined by its very make up to be His.

“But in this final age He has spoken to us in the Son whom He hath made heir to the whole universe, and through whom He created all orders of existence” (Heb. 1:2).

Man and nature were created by Christ and for Christ. The most comprehensive:

“He is the image of the invisible God. In him everything in heaven and on earth was created, not only things visible but also the invisible: the whole universe has been created through Him and for Him” (Col. 1:15, 16).

Not only created through Him but for Him – everything is destined to work in His way. The Kingdom and Jesus are The Way eternally integrated, the way to think, to act, to feel, to be – in every relationship. There are just two things in life – The Way or not the way.
Three writers, all important and prominent – John, Paul, and the author of Hebrews – all say in varying terminology that man and nature and the whole universe were made by Christ and for Christ. A destiny is therefore written into the structure of new things, and that structure and that destiny is a Christian destiny.

THE WHOLE OF CREATION DECLARES THE MYSTERY OF THE KINGDOM

If God created the world by and for Jesus Christ, then He created the world for the Kingdom. This throws light, an important light, on the passage: “Come,… inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world” (Matt. 25:34), The Kingdom was prepared for man not merely in point of time, but prepared for man in that by its very nature it fits man. Man and the Kingdom are meant to be identical. When we obey the laws of the Kingdom we obey the laws of our own beings. The Kingdom is written not merely in the New Testament and in the message of Jesus, it is written into our blood, our nerves, our tissues, our organs, and our relationships – in our whole makeup. We are structured for the Kingdom.

The starry heavens above and the moral law within speak of the steadfastness and utter surety of the Unshakable Kingdom. This kingdom is either outside us or within us “the kingdom of heaven is within you” therefore if you break its laws written within you, you get broken. On the other hand, if you obey its laws and its principles and its attitudes at any period of life, in any circumstances, you can say to yourself, “what a life!” The laws of your being are the laws of the kingdom of God. Once the kingdom of God is within you, it is in your conscience, nerves and mind, in your organs and your relationships. This Kingdom’s substance is love “Agape” Gods love, so now you may understand why we aught to first love ourselves, (what you have become as a regenerated person in Christ “Re-gened”) in the loving of others.

2. JESUS – THE WAY

“Predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son” (Rom.8;29)

When we work in His way, we work well; when we work in some other way we work our own ruin. Man’s nature and society is allergic to sin, in the individual as well as in the social. It is destructive. Life will not work except in God’s way and God’s way is Christ’s and Christ’s way is the kingdom of God.
Just as Jesus was called “The Way”, so the Kingdom is called “The Way”. We read in the book of Acts that Paul entered the synagogue in Ephesus and spoke out fearlessly, arguing and persuading the people about the Reign [i.e. kingdom] of God.

“Paul entered the synagogue and spoke boldly there for three months, arguing persuasively about the kingdom of God. But some of them became obstinate; they refused to believe and publicly slandered the Way.

Paul left them and took the disciples with him and had discussions daily in the lecture hall of Tyrannus (Acts 19:8, 9). Here the kingdom of God is called The Way, and Jesus called Himself The Way.

“Jesus replied, I am the way; I am the truth and I am the life” (John 14:6 NEB).

Christ is the Kingdom embodied. Again, Jesus uses “life” and “the kingdom of God” interchangeably: “Better get into life a cripple, better get into God’s Realm [i.e. kingdom] with one eye” (Mark 9:45, 47). Jesus said, “I am…the life.” Therefore we conclude that Jesus and the Kingdom were called interchangeably the Way and the Life.

3. JESUS – REVEALED

When Jesus went to Caesarea Philippi he went deliberately to ask His disciples a question – a question that held the destiny of the world in it. And He asked it at this particular place, for in a white grotto in Caesarea Philippi there was a statue of Caesar where Caesar was worshiped as God. With that background Jesus asked his disciples: “Who do men say that I am?” When he got their answers he became more specific: “Who do you say that I am?”
Simon Peter spoke up, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” Jesus told him: Simon, son of Jonah, you are blessed! You didn’t discover this on your own. It was shown to you by my Father in heaven. Mat 16:16,17

Personalize this question. Give your honest answer of who Jesus is to you at this very stage of your life:
_______________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________

“Let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken” (Heb. 12:28 RSV).
Not only will it not be shaken, it cannot be shaken, for it is ultimate reality. All other kingdoms are shakeable. They have to hold it together by force.

Definition:
Give your own definition of the Kingdom in one sentence:
_______________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________

WE ARE CALLED BY CHRIST TO PERCEIVE PURPOSE IN EVERY INCIDENT,
FOR EVERY INCIDENT FOCUSES THE ATTENTION ON THE FACT THAT
“THE KINGDOM HAS COME, THE KINGDOM IS IN YOUR MIDST”

[GTranslate]
[/DDET]