The Gospel of the King and His Kingdom
Transcript
of the gospel. Let's take a second look at that. So that is very interesting because that is part of the way we think. How in the world could we imagine that in the sermon on the mount Jesus did not preach the gospel. He tells us that's what he's doing. He tells us that that is the gospel message. It is the manifesto of the king for his kingdom. It is the gospel message. Now, the plan of salvation is part of the gospel message, but it is truly not the essence of the gospel message. And those are the things that we need to take a look at. And I want to give you just a heads up. Each of the lessons I'm going to be doing will build on the last one. So, it's kind of like uh watching one of those limited series or something. you're hopefully anticipating and waiting for the next step in understanding the picture. So, we're going to introduce this idea of the gospel this morning.
First and foremost, when we begin with this, I'd like you to consider what it is to preach the gospels. What was the preaching in the Gospels? Like the book of Matthew, etc. What was the preaching in the Gospels? I'll just look up here. this has gone dead. So that's okay. You don't need to fix it. Yeah, just do it. It's fine. Uh so when you think of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, do you see the plan of salvation in the Gospels? Well, you may see. Oh, great commission at the very end. There's no plan of salvation in the gospel gospels. And and so we need to stop and think what's really going on when Jesus in the gospels preach the gospel because what Jesus preaches is not what we would call the plan of salvation of here's the formula here and believe and confess and repent and be baptized and live a faithful life. That that is that is not what is preached when Jesus preaches the gospels.
Consider the reading that we had this morning in the book of Mark. When you see these words, he says the the um the beginning Jesus how Mark begins this. He says the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the son of God as it is written in Isaiah the prophet. Now consider that for a second. Listen carefully. the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the son of God, as it is written in Isaiah the prophet. And of course, he quotes, but when he gives the quote, he's giving us the essence of what he's about to do. He is going to give us the life of Jesus and the gospel of Jesus and the beginning of the gospel of Jesus as it is written in Isaiah the prophet. So to know the book of Mark well, it will be important that we would know Isaiah because Mark is going to tell the story of Jesus, the gospel story of Jesus as it is written in Isaiah the prophet. And there are many parallels.
We could spend [snorts] hours showing the parallels of Isaiah to the book of Mark and especially as it emphasizes the gospel account. Notice notice the the voice crying in the wilderness. Pay attention to that word wilderness. Why was John in the wilderness? Why did Isaiah say there was a voice crying in the wilderness? You're probably aware that when you come to uh chapter 40 of Isaiah where this is quote from where this is quoted that that's a key dividing line in the book of Isaiah in the first 39 chapters he's primarily talking about the fall of Israel the fall of Jerusalem the Assyrian invasion and the future Babylonian invasion and how Israel is going to go into captivity. But when he gets to chapter 40, he begins by saying, "Okay, that's done. Your punishment is over. Now there's a voice crying in the wilderness." Why in the wilderness? Because God had made Israel a wilderness.
Remember in Ezekiel when God lifted up his throne out from his movable throne, if you will, out from the most holy place and moved it outside the city, what was he doing? He was saying, "I'm not with you anymore." Remember when Jesus said in Matthew uh 23 at the end, he said as he came to Jerusalem, he said, "Behold, your house is left to you desolate." What he was saying is, "I have left. I'm not there. And when I'm not there, when the king is not present, he will not be protecting you. Babylon is going to massacre you." Lamentation shows it. Why did that happen? Because the king was not there. He left. But a voice crying in the wilderness. Israel had become a wilderness. Isaiah 32:14. The cry in the wilderness. And that cry in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord. The king is coming back. Is that what we learned when we were baptized? Did we learn that the king has returned?
Prepare the way for the king because the king has come back and the gospel is the good news that this is is going to happen. This isn't working anymore either. [laughter] So, I can preach the sermon without that. That's all right. But, uh, we can go one way or the other. Uh, very good. Okay, we mentioned this one. Isaiah there. Okay, there we're clicking. All right. So, when when you see that, look look carefully then. What happens when he says the voice is crying in the wilderness? What is the voice? What's the voice crying? Notice what he says that the voice is saying when he cries out, "All flesh is grass and all its beauty is like the flower of the field. Surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever. They are a wilderness, and God has returned in order to turn them away from being a wilderness that's going to die to giving life. You and I and the whole world are like grass.
Boy, wouldn't it be nice if we got that embedded in our minds? We're like the flowers of the field. I visited my son last week in Phoenix where he preaches and it's the best time of year to go to Phoenix because the desert is just blooming with flowers. But it won't be long. It'll be gone. Probably gone already in one week. That's us. We are going to be gone. We are doomed to never live, not really live without God. And so he says the word of God abides forever. That word, Peter says, has to be implanted in our hearts. And that seed gives us life. And as long as the word is in our hearts and in our souls, and we're living by it, we then are going to have life eternally. It is the true rebirth that Peter talked about in First Peter. So all of those things taking place, Isaiah is telling us then about this. So look what Mark describes.
And when those 11 verses that we just read, when you think about what Mark describes, just just consider what's happening here. He talks about here is prepare the way of the Lord. Who the who is the Lord in that in that text? How what what would Isaiah what would the people reading Isaiah thought who the Lord was? We said, well, God the Father. Who's the Lord? Who's the Lord in Mark 1? Who's coming to prepare the way? Well, you said, "What's Jesus?" Exactly. It's the Christ. It's the king. That's what gospel is all around about. Gospel is the teaching of a king. So, when you see this, what you see Isaiah doing or Mark doing in Isaiah, you know, I might need this after all. I'm kind seeing seeing that quickly. It would be nice to have this thing. If you can just turn it on. I don't know. Maybe you just thought I don't know. This guy's a geek. Do you know that? [laughter]
All right. Thank you. Thank where I'm going here. Okay. So, uh when when you think of Mark, I want you to see this parallel here. He begins with a new Israel that's brought to life by the spirit. Did you Did you notice John the Baptist saying, "I'm baptizing you with water, but the one coming after you is going to baptize you in the spirit." And we look at that and we think baptism of the spirit. What what what's that? Well, it's not for us. Oh, wait a minute. See, Mark is telling us a story that comes out of Isaiah. Isaiah 32 says that Israel will be a wilderness until the spirit is poured out from on high. And when the spirit is poured out from on high, the wilderness quits being a wilderness and starts bearing fruit and starts having flowers and starts growing trees and we are talked about as that. So when you think of the immersion of the spirit, don't think about a Pentecostal church or those things.
What you need to think about is that's just simply God telling us he's giving us life. So Israel is a dead kingdom. It's a dead nation. It's gone. It has no king. And the king is returning and he's going to pour his spirit out on the nation. You hear the word poor. Now, why does the desert all of a sudden at this time of year have flowers and everything comes to life? Because they've had rain. And then they won't have any more the rest of the year. And it will rain on them and it'll come to life. Most beautiful things I've ever seen. When I would travel from California and go across the desert, all of a sudden sometimes I'd get lucky and it would had great monsoon rains coming up from the south and the whole desert would be alive. And I think of God pouring out his spirit so that I who was dead is am now alive and you who were dead are now alive.
He brought though a whole kingdom to life that was not in existence anymore. Notice how Mark goes with a baptism/exodus picture when we were baptized. It's it is a picture Paul tells us this in 1 Corinthians 10 is a picture of when Israel came out of out of Egypt and went through the Red Sea. That was a baptism by then. God has always cleansed by water and by the spirit. And how he has done that. Jesus says you must be born of water and the spirit if you're going to enter the kingdom. He's mirroring what took place in the Old Testament. Their Exodus is now our Exodus. When we're reading Mark, we should see now our Exodus. When we're reading Exodus, we should see our Exodus just like they did. And then he talks about when he comes up out of the water and being baptized. This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. Who was the son of that God had referred to as his son? In the Old Testament, it was Israel. Exodus 4:22.
Israel is my son, my firstborn. But Israel failed. They were not well pleasing to God. Now we have a true Israel. Isaiah 49 identifies Jesus as the next Israel or the true Israel, the true son. And so here he's pronounced as pleasing God. He's the true son. You need to follow him is the idea. And then we see him perfected in a wilderness trial. Just as Israel crossed the Red Sea, went into the wilderness for 40 years, he went into trial. Did they fail or win the trial? They failed the trial. Jesus comes though and he goes 40 days in the wilderness and he succeeds in that and overcomes the trial. So, he does all of the same things. Why? because he's demonstrating a new Moses, a new king who's coming to lead his people from captivity into a new life. And Isaiah mentions over and again the release from captivity. I would think there was I think there's around seven times God likes seven, so that's a good guess.
Seven times in which God refers to a new exodus for who? For us who come to Christ. We are in a new exodus here. And then he's picturing then Jesus as a king over his kingdom. Jesus even pronounces that in verse 14 and 15 saying the kingdom of God is at hand and repent and believe in the gospel, the good news, the gospel. And we say, "Well, what is this gospel that I'm supposed to believe in when he pronounces that?" By the way, do you ever notice how quickly Isaiah, I mean Mark, uh pictures things. Jesus walking along the road. He sees he he sees Peter and John and they're fishing and what's he say? He says, "Follow me." And they go, "Follow me." Now, we know it wasn't that easy. In Luke's account, we find they had been hanging out with Jesus for months. But see, Mark doesn't want you to know that. Mark doesn't care if you know that.
Because what Mark wants you to know is when the king says, "Do it, you do it." When the king says come, you come. When the king says go, you go. When the king says the demon, get out. And he gets out. Immediately used 39 times the book of Mark. What's he showing? There's a king here. You need to respect the king. You respect the king. And so you see, not notice in this three times this word gospel is used. Verse one, verse 14, verse 15. The good news is that there's a king has arrived and his kingdom is about to be established and this is going to be very important. And yet in all of this gospel message, there's no mention of a plan of salvation. Please understand, I'm not diminishing the importance of coming to Christ and being baptized into Christ. That's not my point. Point is we are limiting how we're reading gospel to a few commands and not understanding from that the benefit of what we have come into.
I would suggest to you that unfortunately most Christians are missing the kingdom principle of what is awaiting us. How do you like living in this world right now?
There's a lot of you I don't want you don't want to even hear the news, do you? There's such junk going on you can't even imagine. Your brain's exploding. We're fed up with it. And so is our king. And he is preparing a kingdom that we need to be enamored with, loving, and helping to restore that beautiful kingdom. So what you see in these things instead of a plan uh the gospels tell us of a king and a creator and one who's returned to come back to accept his kingship over his kingdom. Did you grow up I I did now maybe you didn't grow up this way.
Did you grow up thinking that when Jesus said your kingdom come and the this new king this used to be a brand new brand new kingdom Jesus come to make his kingdom brand new kingdom that's the way I was learning it but is actually not a brand new kingdom it's a restoration of a failed kingdom and failed kings that's one of the one of the main messages of the kings and the chronicles is the failed kings and our need for a true king who will not fail, who will make the kingdom great. Oh, we just love that. That would be so wonderful. So, king and kingdom is the critical message of Matthew through Luke. John doesn't mention much about kingdom. John has a different purpose. But do you realize in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, the word kingdom referring to God's kingdom is used 105 times.
105 times the kingdom is spoken of.
Look at it this way. Here's what Isaiah defined as the gospel. How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, "Your King reigns." What's the good news there? What's the good news? You say, "Wow, peace." Well, in favor of that one, you pay. How about happiness? Did you know the good news of the gospel is happiness? Woohoo. And the good news is salvation indeed. But the reason those are good news is because your God reigns. If he doesn't reign, there's no peace. If he doesn't reign, there is no happiness and there is no salvation. there is no good news. So the wonder of what we have discovered in Christ is that we have a king. When you think of the word Christ, unfortunately you and I read that and we go Messiah. Who's me who's a messiah in the Old Testament? Who is prophesied as a Messiah in the Old Testament?
Don't just say Jesus. who was prophesied the Messiah to King David was a king who would come from the loins of David. A king who would build a kingdom that would be greater than anything David could imagine. It's the king and the kingdom that are the good news. That's what really makes the difference here. In contrast to the word kingdom in Matthew, Mark and Luke and John, the word church is used only one time in reference to the Lord's future church.
That make an impact on you. 105 times kingdom one time I will build my upon this rock I'll build my church. Have we placed that same emphasis? I'm afraid not. Our emphasis has been on church. Church is a very common word in the quaint a Greek that simply means a bunch of people and in context a bunch of people who are saved. The same word eklesia is used in in the book of Acts to refer to a in in Acts 20 to refer to a mob of uh Greeks trying to kill Paul. They're called an eklesia, a group.
Church is not our hope. Church is a gathering of us. And that's a great thing. And it's a godly thing and it's something God prepared. But kingdom is the hope. And this is what we miss all the time. In contrast then to preaching a gospel that is simply a plan. The apostles did not preach the church. ever see a see a a sermon in the book of acts where the word church is preached importance for you is to get into the church no it's not church is the result of teaching people the gospel they then become added to God's group of people but kingdom is something different now we've also taught and I know I'm shocking some of you Maybe. But we're also taught that when you think of the church, just think of the kingdom. When you think of the kingdom, just think of the church. That is simply not so. And if you just try this out on your own, I can't do a whole lesson on it, but try this out on your own.
Everywhere you read kingdom, substitute the word church and see if it fits. It won't fit. It doesn't fit. And so, we need to be careful. Besides that, church just is talking about us. Kingdom is referring to something much greater. Church is saved people. Kingdom is the hope of saved people. Do you have a hope of inheriting the kingdom? We're in the kingdom. We have not inherited the kingdom yet. The beauty of all the blessings of the kingdom. In other words, church does not communicate the ultimate purpose of God that is found in the kingdom. The kingdom is the gospel gospel message. The kingdom is what we hope for and what we're looking for. When you think of the of of the gospel sermons in the book of Acts, just consider there are seven recorded sermons. Now, the sermons are like cliffnotes. Please, if you read each of these sermons, they'd be three to five minute sermons. And don't get that in your heart.
Now, that's [laughter] but but this is just a reader's digest version of what they actually preached because we know they were there for quite some time listening to Paul and Peter and stuff. But when you read all of those things, these sermons did not empty the gospel story. Have you ever wondered why when you read, for example, in Acts seven, Stephen's sermon, do you ever notice that whole chapter practically is his sermon. And what's it about? Well, the story of Israel. And and you read that and go, "Oh, come on, Stephen. We all know the story.
Why do you keep repeating it?" Then Paul preaches in Acts 13, he does the same thing. He's telling the story of Israel. Two Israelites who know the story. Uh but they don't know the story. They haven't put the facts together. And what Stephen is doing is he is showing failure, failure, failure, failure all the way through. But God is going to fix the failure. and the kingdom is the fix.
There's where the difference is. He didn't empty. It's not just get to the point, man, and tell me what to do. Had a had a guy a number of years ago, I was teaching and after about uh I don't know, five or six lessons, he says, "Look, Berry, I that's all real cool. I mean, you know, all that kind of stuff, but let's just cut cut to the chase. just tell me what I need to do.
And I said, "No, Louie, I'm not going to tell you what you need to do." Can you imagine how stupid that was of me to say, "I'm not going to tell you what to do to be saved."
Louie later thanked me to this day. He thanks me for not telling him at that point because I knew he didn't know the king and he wasn't doing it to serve the king. He was doing it for fire insurance. He was not doing it for love of God. He was not doing it because he was so excited about a savior who had come to save him. He's just trying to get it done so he could go on with his life. He's like, "Berry, I guarantee you I'd have fallen away." I said, "I know you would have." That's why I didn't tell you. You had to know God. That's the covenant relationship. They will know me from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. It's so important to understand the pictures that are given here. These sermons called people to believe in a king to believe in one who had come to save them from the the devastation that other rulers and kings had done.
And they didn't empty it from or con disconnect it from what happened in Israel. Some of all of you who are as old as I am can remember when we would maybe have a study in the Old Testament and somebody would say, "Oh, no. While we're studying it, we're not under it."
Oh, how sad. How terribly, terribly sad. Because that is what tells us our story. Their story is our story. We are the ones who failed. We were the ones in bondage and captivity. We were the ones who needed a new promised land. We were the ones who needed to be delivered. And all of those things were telling us about the king that was going to come from the beginning in Genesis just as Jesus walked on the road uh to Emmas and told those two two men and opened the scriptures to them from Moses on told them about himself. That's where you learn about him. That's where you learn the very character of God. Romans in the Gospel in Romans, did you see the words I am not ashamed? We can all quote it together, couldn't we? I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ. He goes on to verse 17 and says, "For in it the righteousness of God is revealed." Where's God's righteousness revealed? Well, it's revealed in the gospel. You say, "Well, what's what's what's that?
What do you mean? What's God's faithfulness to his promises are revealed in the coming king, Jesus?
That's what I need to know that this revolves around a completion of God's story. Baptism is mentioned one time in the book of Romans and not as a command to do to be saved. Now, don't get me wrong, they'd already done it. It is a command and they have to do it to be saved. Yes. But what's he using it for? To show that when you were baptized. I wonder, did I think of this when I was baptized? When you're baptized, you came out of the water. You go, "Hey, dude, look at yourself in the mirror, have a conversation with yourself. You died to that old life. Are you really going to quit it? Are you going to treat it as dead? Are you going to now raise and live as one born again? Is that what you're going to do?" The emphasis in Romans is about believing, confessing Jesus as your king. We we don't particularly care for Romans 10:9 and 10, do we?
If you believe in your heart that that Jesus, you know, raised from the dead, etc., and you confess with your mouth, you will be saved.
Wait a minute. What about baptism? Paul's emphasis was not the plan itself in detail. The emphasis was you have to recognize your need to serve this king. You know what kings do to people who don't serve them? Not a pretty picture back in the Old Testament. This is important. Believe is the idea of trusting one's entire self and salvation to the king. That's the idea of belief. The true meaning of believe the gospel is what we read in Isaiah 52:7. Your God reigns. Israel Jew in the book of Romans. Are you going to believe it's your God who's reigning now? and Jesus is your God and he is reigning and he's died for you. Are you going to accept your position in that or are you just going to think you're saved because you do works? This what this is emphasized then is we can't just persuade people to go, "Hey, you need to be baptized.
Admit your sin and be baptized." I I'm I'm really afraid that we are very very close to killing our children when we emphasize to them that our children me let me let you soak in on the word children that when we're urging children to be baptized. You know what they think when they hear that? It's no different than a Jew who thought they could be circumcised and they've got it done. This is not a child doesn't understand the picture of what a king is and who this king is and what the king does when he returns to set up his kingdom and how this allegiance looks like. Just getting immersed is not the key either for a child or an adult. It is a commitment and allegiance to the king, to the Messiah. We cannot diminish that simply to remedy our plans.
There is an emphasis we've made on a formula, but all churches have done it. All religions, the Jews did it when they said, "Well, we do we we we keep the Sabbath. We we are circumcised. We we don't eat uh pigs and uh we go to the festivals and uh Sabbath. That's it. We're in we're ch children of Abraham. There was their formula. Roman Catholic Church came along. Here's a formula. You got to be in the church. That is the Roman Catholic Church because the church will save you. We almost tiptoed on that at times. Evangelical churches, they got a formula. It's accept Jesus in your heart as your personal savior and you'll be saved. Just a little formula with this. Churches of Christ came along and said, "Well, that was good, but we need to add baptism that so that we have our formula of what it needs to be to be saved." And the result of that is how this formula then has evolved.
It's caused us to think in terms of what we do instead of what he has done. You know, I may feel real strongly about my response to Acts 238, but do I feel strongly about my response to Acts 236? Acts Acts 2:31 where he says he's reigning as king and let all the house of Israel know assuredly that this Jesus whom you crucified has been made both Lord and Christ and King. And that's when they said, "Men and brethren, what shall we do?" And when he said repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and you'll receive the gift of the Holy Spirit and the promises to you and your children all I guarantee you they were more excited about the promise of the spirit following the fact that their sins were forgiven than just oh goodie my sins are forgiven. But that's what you and I have often done. Oh, goody. My sins are forgiven. What's this gift of the Holy Spirit? I don't know. Whatever.
Gift of the spirit. The promise of the spirit is the kingdom and all that he promised Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And what we are to be is the offspring. The gospel is preached by the apostles is boldly declaring Jesus as king. Today's evangelism shortcuts that takes that away just in an act then of immersion. Listen listen to Paul's words in at the church in Antioch when he was in Antioch preaching preaching there. Listen to what he he says here. And we bring you the good news that what God promised to the fathers, this he has fulfilled to us in their children by raising Jesus as also it is written in the second psalm. You are my son today I have begotten you. And as for the fact that he raised him from the dead no more to return corruption. He has spoken in this way. I will give you the holy and sure blessings of David.
Most of you would probably know what Psalm 2 was about. The world, the kings and the rulers of the world trying to keep God from setting his own king on the throne and how he would destroy those who did not sub obey the king and bowed to the king. That's the picture of the whole Bible. And now he says quotes this and he says if you come to him I will give you the the the holy and sure blessings of David when you are baptized. That's the first thing came to your mind. Oh goody. I get the holy and sure blessings of David.
What's the holy and sure blessings of David?
And yet those words are the fulfillment of everything that God has planned to be in his kingdom and to have the benefits of his kingdom. These are things that we should know. So we're baptized based upon this victory that we see in Psalms 2 and the blessings that David was promised in 2 Samuel. So, we're very very wired to see what do I have to do, but not enough to see what God has said. I'm going to skip this part. The the gospel is I'm going to say one thing. When you when you when you read Ephesians 1 through3, did you understand it? It's a lot of stuff, isn't it?
Just get to chapter 4 through 6. That's what tells us what to do. Telling us what to do is worthless. unless we know what he did and what he's doing because there's the motivation as and as Andy over here as uh Erik so so beautifully uh preached this morning. So the final thing I want to point out to you is that that makes a difference in how you are a disciple of Christ. If you just baptize to have your sins forgiven and that's that you don't have the motivation that you see in these first century disciples. Saul was ravaging the church and entering house after house. He dragged off men and women and committed them to prison. Now those who were scattered went about preaching the good preaching the word. If that happened to us today and there was people going house to house and I'm telling you it's getting closer to that kind of junk happening. It's happening in other countries. It's happening even in Western countries that that kind of thing happened to us.
Would we go everywhere just finding a secret place to meet or would we go everywhere preaching the word?
That says a lot about where our commitment is and how we see our commitment to our king and to our kingdom. These disciples weren't simply taught that their sins are forgiven. Go on your way rejoicing. That's that's not what that's about. Today's gospel needs to include God's kingdom. Scott McDite said, "When we reduce the gospel to only personal salvation, we tear the fabric out of the story of the Bible and cease even needing a Bible." Indeed, why didn't God just give us one gospel, the book of Acts, and have it done with? Because there's so much more. We have a great hope. A kingdom without all this junk that we're seeing now. A king who's righteous and holy. Isaiah 11. A king who judges righteously and brings justice to the world. A king and a people who are holy and without blemish. That's what we're looking for. That's the gospel of the kingdom of God. That's mentioned 105 times in the Gospel of We're going to conclude this with a song. You have not come to Christ.
If you need any way for to be helped in that direction, we encourage you think carefully about this. Talk to us about it. We're glad to help you. know what you need to do to come to the glory. If you already know what you need to do, why not now? Satan's kingdom's gone. It's already lost its battle. It's it last gasp trying to destroy as many as possible. Don't let it be you. Don't let it be you. Jesus has come with a king kingdom and he's the great king who provide for us. We can help you in any way. Please come all together standing.