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Articles 2018-2020
From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force (Greek, HARPAZO – to seize, to take by force).
After affirming the ministry of John the Baptist, Jesus quickly got to the root of what was wrong with that present generation. They were trying to take God’s work in and through His Son and bring their agenda to it; they were trying to take it by force. To take another by force is what a boxer does to his opponent in the ring. He attempts through left jabs, right crosses, and uppercuts to enforce his will on the other fighter. It is also what a conquering army does to a city that it captures. It breaches their wall, kills many soldiers and citizens, and then enforces its laws on the surviving populace.
On another occasion, after He had fed thousands with five loaves and two fish, Jesus perceived that the people intended to come and take Him by force (Greek, HARPAZO) to make Him king (John 6:15). His response was to walk away.
Clearly, we do not take God’s kingdom by force; we receive it like children.
Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it at all.
Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude….
But the saints of the Highest One will receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever, for all ages to come.
To enter God’s kingdom, we must turn from our ways, receive His agenda and timing, and then bend our knees to His rule – not seek to impose our thoughts on Him. Nor are we to insist that He submit to our interpretation of Scripture. In fact, His rule, His emerging kingdom will bring adjustment to our ways and to our thoughts on what Heaven’s kingdom actually looks like. And there are surprises in store for all of us. As a result, we can either yield gracefully or through stubbornness experience great pain.
To then further illustrate how the generation of Jesus’ day wanted to control the narrative and establish their interpretation of scripture, Jesus described it as children in the marketplace who were trying to force other children to dance to their tune (Matthew 11:17). Clearly, if something did not change, that generation would simply fail to see God’s kingdom coming into clarity right in front of them.
Continuing His line of thinking, our Lord then began to warn the cities of His day. If Sodom had experienced the miracles that He had recently done in Capernaum, it would not have been destroyed and would still exist. If the Gentile cities of Tyre and Sidon had experienced the miracles done in Bethsaida and Chorazin, they would have repented long ago (Matthew 11:20 - 23). How amazing. How very hard had become the hearts of many in Israel.
And God was hiding His truth from those who were seen as wise and influential, and He was revealing it to seeming nobodies (Matthew 11:25). Who had foreseen that? Obviously, His ways were on a totally different level than man’s. And men trying to bring their own thoughts and abilities to bear on His work was simply a foolish expression of pride.
Looking back, the Old Testament prophets had called Israel to turn away from their own ways and to return to the Lord their God. But now something new was happening; there was a new application to the message. Here was a man saying, “Come unto Me” (Matthew 11:28). This was different. And because this Man was entering into His inheritance, because all things were now His (Matthew 11:27), He was now the key to all spiritual revelation and relational intimacy with God. “I’m walking in a yoked relationship with My Father. Join Me; put your head in My yoke, walk in step with Me, and learn Me.” Here was and is the kingdom message. Clearly it is not that people should try to forcibly seize the work of God.
Matthew Chapter 12 then illustrates how the religious leadership was misinterpreting what was happening right in front of them. They accused Christ and His disciples of breaking God’s Law when they picked grain and ate while walking through some fields on the Sabbath. Jesus’ response was to point out how David and his men had eaten consecrated bread while fleeing Saul. While on the surface this action looked unlawful, it seems that God had personally invited David into His house for a meal. Was He allowed to do this? Or was the Law written to limit God in His actions? No. Something greater was occurring that sanctified David’s conduct.
And then how about the priests who regularly worked on the Sabbath performing circumcisions as well as sacrificing animals? Though they were working on the Sabbath, they were doing God’s will in His house. Their obedience and the temple itself had a sanctifying effect on their actions. But now something greater than the temple was in the midst of Israel (Matthew 12:1 - 6). A new era had come. God’s kingdom was breaking in on humanity in the person of the King Himself. Rather than try to push their own narrative, the people were to bend their knees and receive as children what was coming forth from Heaven.
And Jesus’ response to the Pharisees revealed why they were misinterpreting what was happening.
But if you had known what this means, I desire mercy and not sacrifice, you would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.
(Matthew 12:7 - 8 NKJV)
God’s call on His people had always been for them to come to Him, to learn His ways, and to receive His work of conforming them to His likeness. To focus on sacrifice instead of seeing His heart of mercy for them was to miss Heaven’s main point. And now God had come among them and they could not recognize the time of their visitation. This Man Christ Jesus, standing right in their midst was the Lord of the temple, the Lord of the sacrificial system, and the Lord of all special days including the Sabbath.
When the Pharisees then tried to condemn Him for healing on the Sabbath, His response was devastating. So then, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath (Matthew 12:12). That one statement shattered their legalistic paradigm. And apart from learning God’s heart of mercy, they simply would not be able to recognize His will to do good to others every day – even/especially on holy days.
In fact, Christ’s intent was to personally touch hurting people. If they were battered reeds, fragile and broken through the mistreatment of others, He would bring justice to them; He would treat them the way God intended (Matthew 12:18 - 21). Our Father is just. The way He treats people is perfect because His motives are totally pure. How humanity longs for justice among the nations. Think of how much damage has been done to so many souls over the years because of ungodly treatment by others.
And so, Jesus laid His hands on those who were hurting and revealed His Father’s heart of mercy to them. And after they had been healed, He warned them not to make Him known (Matthew 12:15 - 16). This was to fulfill Isaiah’s prophecy that the Messiah would not be one who put together marches, raised His voice in the streets, quarreled with others, and assembled great crowds for the purpose of gaining influence to establish justice among men. No. His way was to touch one battered reed, one smoldering wick at a time.
And today, if we are not careful, we can fall into an approach similar to that of first century Israel. We can bring our strength to bear and seek to promote our particular theology, our stream of churches, our method of church structure, or our perspective on the end times. “If we could assemble a million people who are on the same page as us, think of the influence we could have.” At such a time, I fear that the Lord would at some point simply slip out the door. His kingdom does not need human promotion; it demands human submission.
Also contained in the prophecy of Isaiah that Jesus quoted was the implication that justice on earth would be a long time coming. He will faithfully bring forth justice. He will not be disheartened or crushed until He has established justice in the earth; and the coastlands will wait expectantly for His law (Isaiah 42:3 - 4).
The fact that He would not be disheartened indicates that it would seem to many that He was failing in His purpose, that injustice was prevailing. And today, that perspective still seems to hold plausibility. But at the same time, He continues in our day to faithfully touch hurting individuals by the power of the Holy Spirit. And so, His purpose is proceeding. But it seems obvious to all that something needs to change. At the very core of the fiber of their being, the nations are expectantly waiting for something. What is it that they are anticipating? Isaiah tells us that the coastlands, the ends of the earth are waiting for God’s law.
Here is God’s strategy – the New Covenant. Heaven’s answer to injustice on earth is His law written into the fiber of His people. Again, our priority is not to insist on our interpretation of what He should do but to bend our knees to His initiative, His writing project. And when I consider my own life, I can sometimes see why one would think the Lord might be disheartened in His project. When I ponder many recent great injustices against various ethnic groups or religions or when I think specifically of the present resurging spirit of antisemitism, I start to wonder if God’s initiative will come to its full expression.
Two thousand years ago, one man stood in the midst of a planet filled with injustice and perfectly revealed the heart of God for mankind. Justice was revealed among men as one point of light in a world filled with darkness. Today His writing project continues and He is faithfully increasing both the clarity of His message and the amount of parchment on which He is writing. And the ends of the earth are awaiting His Good News not simply spoken by believers who mean well but lived out and expressed from their hearts – hearts that have been radically altered by the very words they speak.
Today we live in the early part of the next great season of world missions. The ends of the earth are not waiting for a new political revolution but for the work of Heaven presently being written into the hearts of many who are hidden from the view of the powers that be. And here is our rallying cry.
Let God arise, let His enemies be scattered, and let those who hate Him flee before Him.
Donald Rumble – August 2019
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