THE KINGDOM—GOD’S OBJECTIVE ALWAYS.

By

Pastor Robert B. Record

Strange as it may seem most of the people of Christendom seem not to know that the story of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation is that of a kingdom which God has been building with a servant race, and which was to be restored and come to fruition at the close of this Christian dispensation – the time in which we are now living.  Over this kingdom, Jesus Christ is to reign as King of kings and Lord of Lords. The reward of faithfulness on the part of His servants is the right to rule with Him in His kingdom. Heaven is to come to earth!

When God created man and gave him dominion over the earth, did He have a plan?  And has the history of man for the past 6,000 years witnessed the unfolding of this plan?  The reason I raise this question is, that very few people in the lands of Christendom today seem to have ever given this much thought.  In fact, most Christians seem to be of the opinion that this world is not their home.  Their citizenship is in heaven, and the Lord is coming shortly to escort them to this heaven where they will live forever in a mansion that God has been preparing for them.  One of the inevitable results of such a theology is that the lands of Christendom today are in a shambles and are heading for the proverbial ditch.

Again I ask, has the history of man for the past 6,000 years been the unfolding of a plan that God had for man from the very beginning? God has not left us to guess or theorize about this.  In Matthew 25:31-34, we are told:

“When the Son of man shall come in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of His glory; and before Him shall be gathered all nations: and He shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats.  And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on the left.  Then shall the King say unto them on His right hand, Come ye blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”

Now it is impossible to correctly understand this judgment of the nations if we do not correctly identify the sheep on God’s right hand.  Throughout the entire Bible there is only one people who are ever referred to as sheep, and that is Israel!  And as being the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, they were not to be just one nation, but many. I point this out here because Christ speaks of sheep nations and it needs to be emphasized that the Abrahamic covenant that sets forth the national development of Abraham’s seed, is actually the seed plot of the whole Bible.  To ignore this, as most of the people of Christiandom do, leaves them out on the horns of a dilemma.  No matter how much they squeeze and twist and turn, they cannot fit the Jew, a religious sect, into the role of national Israel.  The Jews are not a race, but a religious sect classed with Protestants and Catholics.  If the United Nations had not gone into Palestine in 1948, driving many Arabs from their homes and businesses, and giving a portioned area to the Jews, they would not have a national existence today!

This Zionist State we hear so much about these days is oft referred to as being Israel.  But the fact of the matter is there is probably not an Israelite that can be found among them.  Most of its inhabitants are imposters who have no more Israel blood in their veins than did Sammy Davis Jr. who became a Jew before he died.  There are Jews of every race just as there are Protestants and Catholics of every race.  I emphasize this because the Israeli are not to be confused with the people God is using with which to build His kingdom.  In Revelation 2:9 and 3:9, John speaks of these imposters who claim to be Israel in these words:

“I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews (Judeans) and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan.”

They don’t look like Israelites, and they do not act like Israelites nor do they worship the God of the Bible.  Their Bible is the Talmud, not the Old Testament.

But let us now get back more particularly to the kingdom which has been God’s objective always.  I would have you note that when our Israel forefathers incurred the curse of the Law (which was a national curse), and were divorced by God in about 721 B.C. – when this took place, it might have appeared as though this was the end of the promised kingdom. But it was all a part of the developing kingdom. God uses this divorce and subsequent captivity of Israel to start Israel on their westward trek to their new home.  Israel could never realize her national destiny in the little land of Palestine.  In her migration westward, which took several centuries, Israel would lose her identity.  She would take on different names and speak different languages.  To use the words of the prophet in Hosea 8:8:

“Israel is swallowed up: now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein there is no pleasure.”  They were to become “the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

But while Israel and all the fenced cities of Judah were carried into captivity by the Assyrians in their third raid, they were not able to capture the Judeans, or the Jews inside the walled city of Jerusalem.  It remained for Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, to later come against the city, and he took captive into Babylon the Jewish remnant inside the city.  They were never lost to the knowledge of mankind as was Israel.  The apostle Paul comments on this Judah remnant in Rom.3:1-2, where we find him saying:

“What advantage then hath the Jew? Or what profit is there in circumcision?  Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God.”

They had light and truth that the rest of the world did not have.  I think the reason God committed the oracles, or the Scriptures, into the hand of the Jews in Babylon, is that they were safer there that in a people ever migrating to their new home in the west.  But while the Jews had the Scriptures, they were obviously not walking in the light of them when they returned to Palestine.  They were opposed to Christ at every turn. We thus find Christ saying in Matthew 21:43: “Therefore I say unto you, the Kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof.”  This Judah remnant had fulfilled its mission, and when Jesus cursed the fig tree that it dried up from the roots, it signified the end of the Jewish nation.

You will please note that the kingdom was given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof. It was given back to the nation of Israel to whom it originally belonged.  But while the transfer is here made, it would be some years before Israel would be able to function as God’s kingdom nation.  We are not to gather from this that the Kingdom of God was not literal, but spiritual, as many are given to claiming.  Just how would you go about describing a spiritual kingdom?  As further proof that the kingdom of God is to be taken spiritually, they turn you to Luke 17:20-21, where Jesus is replying to a question put to Him by the Pharisees who were demanding that Jesus tell them when the kingdom of God should come. Our Lord’s reply was, “The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: neither shall they say, Lo here! Or lo there! For the kingdom of God is within you.”  A more correct translation is “for the kingdom of God is in your midst.”

And as not being able to observe the kingdom, simply means that its growth would be so slow, like the growth of grass or a tree, that you would not be able to detect it. We are not to gather from this that the kingdom of God is not literal, but spiritual.

In Acts 1:6, shortly before our Lord’s ascension back into the heavens, we find the disciples asking Him, “Wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom of Israel?” They were looking for a literal kingdom.  And what was our Lord’s reply? That they were wrong in looking for a literal kingdom?  No!  He simply said, “it was not for them to know the times or the seasons, which the Father had put in His own power.”

We have now reached the end of this Christian dispensation, and the kingdom which was begun some 6,000 years ago, and for which our Lord taught us to pray, is now shortly to come forth into manifestation. We would expect that the church, therefore, would be looking forward to it with great anticipation.  But what do we find?  For the most part, the people of Christendom have supplanted the kingdom of God with a heaven above.  They are putting disclaimers on this world as being their home, and are expecting momentarily for the Lord to come and take them off to heaven where they will live in mansions God has been preparing for them.  We are thus fast entering what Jeremiah calls “the time of Jacob’s trouble.”(Jer.30:5-7)  Jacob-Israel is in trouble because he has lost his vision and is bent on a way that is not God’s, and must be brought to a national awakening and national repentance!  This trouble is described in part in Psalm 83:1-5.  God’s people are crying out, “Keep not thou silence, O God: hold not thy peace, and be not still, O God. For, lo, thine enemies make a tumult: and they that hate thee have lifted up the head.  They have taken crafty counsel against thy people, and consulted against thy hidden ones. They have said, Come and let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.  For they have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee.”

How well do these words describe what is going on in God’s kingdom nation; America.  But because our enemies have taken “crafty counsel” against America, many remain oblivious to what is going on. Our enemies within and without are plotting our destruction; and in the not too distant future when they make their attack, our cry will be much like that in verse one, “Lord come and save us!”

The seriousness of all this lies in the fact that if our enemies who seek our destruction would succeed, the kingdom planned of God from the beginning would never come to fruition. But though our enemies may propose, it is God who disposes.  In the hour of our seeming defeat the Lord will come in power and great glory to destroy our enemies. Praise ye the Lord!  Our Lord will then cleanse His kingdom and gather out of it all things that offend and those who practice lawlessness.  Our Lord Himself will then take His throne as King of kings and Lord of lords; and those who have been faithful in His service will be made rulers with Him in His kingdom.  What a glorious future awaits us in the kingdom of our God!

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