Defining the Kingdom – Part 6

And that was exactly what prophecy said would happen.

But God also said He’d bring them back, and of course we’ve seen that happen in our lifetime.

But God cannot really enter into a dispensational relationship with Israel again with the church here on earth because that would be a mix that just couldn’t happen. Two Ages don’t exist together.

So, we find ourselves today at the tail end of this current dispensation, The Age of Grace, The Church age, and as we’ve seen, God’s focus has moved from the Messiah rejecting Jewish Nation to us, the gentiles.

God took one man, the Apostle Paul, Saul of Tarsus, and told him “I will send you to the Gentiles,” which, as we saw, was exactly the opposite of what He told the other Apostles.

Jesus told the Twelve Apostles “do not go to the Gentiles but go only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” but Israel rejected everything and topped it off with the stoning of Stephen which was virtually the last straw for Israel as a nation.

We’ve seen a transition through the Book of Acts where the Apostle Paul is now coming to the front and Peter and the Eleven are taking more of a back seat even though the epistles of Peter, John Jude, James, are immensely relevant to us as believers, both Jew and Gentile.

God’s now changing His operations from dealing with Israel under the Law to dealing with the Gentile world, as well as some Jews of course, under Grace.  It is a whole different set of directions.

In Ephesians chapter 3 verse 1 we read Paul, writing from prison in Rome,

For this reason, I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for (Who?) you Gentiles—

What a difference.  Everything else, all the way up since Genesis chapter 12, whenever God spoke, who was He speaking primarily to who?  Israel!

Gods now unveiled a whole body of truth that we call the dispensation of Grace and He did not tell Paul to take it to Israel, He told Paul to take it to the Gentile world.

That’s exactly what he did, and it cost him an immense amount of pain and suffering from both the Jews and the Gentiles.

Ephesians 3:3 tells us how this ministry came to Paul,

how that by revelation He made known to me the mystery (as I have briefly written already,

See the revelation had been made known to Paul. Not the other Apostles but to him alone was made known the mystery, which, we’ve already seen is a secret thing that had never been revealed before but is being revealed now.

Even the process of Salvation has changed with the arrival of this new dispensation.

When Peter comes into the house of Cornelius all he can tell them is that this Jesus of Nazareth presented himself as Israel’s Messiah, that Israel had rejected Him and killed Him, and how God raised Him the third day.

Acts 10:44,

While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word. 

And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also. 

See while Peter was still speaking. The Holy Spirit fell on all those who heard the word. We don’t know how many there were, but they all suddenly became believers by believing that Jesus was the Christ and that He’d been raised from the dead.  The Holy Spirit fell in response to their believing, but what haven’t they done according to the Jewish plan?

We go to Acts chapter 2 verse 36 and 37, where on the day of Pentecost, Peter’s talking to who?  Jews.  Not Gentiles.

Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly (There are no Gentiles in the house of Israel.) that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.” 

Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?” 

Now look at the process.  Repent.  Be baptized.  Be forgiven and be filled with the Spirit.

Act 2:38

Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 

Repent, be baptized, be forgiven, and experience the Holy Spirit.  That’s the Jewish process.

Now, look what happens up in a house of Gentiles.  It’s opposite to this process.

Now, instead of repenting and being baptized and being forgiven, it’s the other way around.

The Romans suddenly believe, and they’re being forgiven.  They haven’t repented.  They haven’t been baptized.  And the Jews are just completely perplexed! This isn’t the way it’s supposed to work!  It’s all backwards.  Why?

Because we’re dealing with Gentiles.  We’re not dealing with Israel. It’s a whole new ballgame, a whole new operating system.  It’s the beginning of God’s dealing with Gentiles on a whole new plane, not with repentance and water baptism, not with a forgiveness and then that filling of the Holy Spirit.

The moment these Romans believed, they were forgiven naturally, and the Holy Spirit evidenced Himself upon them, and poor old Peter and the other Jews are just beside themselves.

Corinthians chapter 3 and we’re going to be talking about the whole idea that as a believer now we work, not for salvation, but we labour for reward.  A lot of people don’t like that, but it’s still a fact of Scripture.

News travelled fast and when Peter got back to Jerusalem was the Jewish church there happy about what had happened? No way!

Act 11:2-3,

And when Peter came up to Jerusalem, those of the circumcision contended with him, saying, “You went in to uncircumcised men and ate with them!” 

They argued with him over what? They were horrified that Peter had actually entered their house and ATE with them!

Here we are almost ten years after Pentecost, and the Jews have made no moves whatsoever to approach the Gentiles, except this one time when God forced Peter to share with Cornelius. Because of Peter’s experience he could come to Paul’s defence about 10 years later in Acts 15 and Galatians chapter 2.

Then Paul becomes the prominent apostle.

There’s so much we could talk about here that stacks truth upon truth about this new direction of God, this move that’s temporarily away from Israel and toward the Gentiles through the Apostle Paul’s ministry.

But all that will be covered when, God willing, we get to our study of Paul’s epistles.

For now, though, we just want to see how this Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of Heaven and the Body of Christ fit together.

It’s enough to say that the things that’re revealed to this apostle Paul were truths, biblical statements from the ascended Lord, which you can’t find anywhere else in Scripture.  Why?  Because God revealed it only to this apostle, because it’s such a unique period of time from all the rest of Scripture.  If we ignore Paul’s epistles, this Bible would be a completely different book than it is now.

We just need to remember that this portion of Scripture, Paul’s epistles, are strictly for us, the Body of Christ in this dispensation of the Age of Grace.

So, according to all the Old Testament prophecies, after having ascended into Heaven Jesus would, a short time later come with the wrath of God, which we call the Tribulation.

The Old Testament is full of it.  All the prophets spoke of Christ’s rejection and of His ascension, and of His bringing in the wrath of God to be unleashed on an unbelieving world.

Then that would end with the Second Coming, and Jesus would establish His earthly Kingdom.  That’s all the Old Testament writers knew, and that was all under Israel’s Law.

After Pentecost, Israel keeps on rejecting until God just gives up on them, but only for a time.  He lets them go on in their unbelief and He permits the Romans to destroy the Temple and the city in 70 AD and they’re scattered into every nation on the earth. Then God does something totally different.  He turns to the Gentiles with this glorious dispensation of the Grace of God.

Our dispensation of Grace has now been running some 1960 years.

Romans 1:16-17 Paul speaking, or writing,

For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ (the death, burial, and resurrection), for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek. 

For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “THE JUST SHALL LIVE BY FAITH.” 

Does it add And who is baptised?  No.  To everyone who believes and joins the church.  No. it doesn’t say that.  To everyone who believes and speaks in tongues.  It doesn’t say that either.  To everyone who gives his tithe.  Nor does it say that.

This is what’s happening today. We’re adding to this finished work of the cross for a person’s salvation.  But we must take what Scripture says and not add to it. The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes.

I Corinthians 1:17-18 and Paul’s writing again,

For Christ did not send me to baptise, but to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of no effect. 

For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 

The lost world around us think we’re crazy. Let’s be honest. They think it’s ridiculous to believe that that horrible work of the cross is all we need for eternity.  But that’s what the Book says.

Now we take a big leap over to 2 Corinthians 5.

This we’ll be right after we’re taken up to Glory in the Rapture, and that’ll be before the anti-Christ appears as we’ll soon show.

And it’s during the time that the seven year Tribulation is raging here on earth that this Bema Seat, or Judgment Seat, of Christ will take place.

We believers must all appear before this Bema Seat to determine reward. We’ll all have to give an account of what we have done in labouring as a believer.  Not our sin.  That’s not going to be in question.  It’s what we’ve done for reward.

2 Corinthians 5:10

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad. 

1 Corinthians 3:13-14,

each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is. 

If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward.

Notice it’s reward singular.

Now, we’re not talking about salvation, we need to be clear on that. We’re talking about reward.

We don’t know what that reward’s going to be, but we do know that it’s not the crowns of the book of Revelation. That’s something totally different. Possibly it has to do with our inheritance where we reign with Christ and the position we’ll have there, but we don’t know.

We’ve been at pains to point out that all of these things that we’ve been talking about in this interlude to the Gospel of Matthew, are all tied up in this period of time that we call the dispensation of the Grace of God.

The early church, before Paul, all thought everything would just keep going on as it was, past the ascension of Our Lord, and into the Tribulation.

That would end with the Second Coming of Christ and the establishment of the Kingdom.

But that was never going to be the case as there was never going to be a mixing with the Jewish economy in the Tribulation with the Age of Grace.

Unknown to all of them at the time, was this break in the timeline right after His ascension, when Jesus called out the Apostle Paul and sent him to open up this Dispensation of Grace to the Gentiles.

It’d be so easy to understand if people could just ask God to open their eyes and help them to see that all the things Paul teaches between Romans and Philemon are never addressed anywhere else in Scripture.

We need to either chuck that all out or believe it. If we chuck it out we as the Body of Christ have nothing.

So, we have to realise that this whole out-calling of the Body of Christ is Paul’s revelation of things kept secret but have now been revealed. As we’ve so often pointed out.

Okay, now let’s look at our key verses of the Rapture, where Paul teaches and Paul alone. You won’t find it anywhere else.

Let’s start in 1st Corinthians chapter 15 verse 51 and, what’s in the first words?  Mystery!

And let’s watch the language! Gods made sure that these things are plainly understood.

Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed— 

There’s coming a point in time when God’s going to intervene in human history, which means that there’s going to be some believers who are still living!

They haven’t died.  So, what does this verse say?

God’s not going to kill those of us who alive at this time just so He can resurrect us.  He’s going to change us immediately in a moment that’s outside of our time span.

Science is now aware that there are probably as many as eleven or twelve dimension that we can only perceive through complex mathematics.

Those of us who’re alive at this time are going slip from our current four dimensional world of length, width, height, and time to other dimensions. We’re out of here.

So, there has to be a point in time when the trumpet sounds and Christ calls up the believers of the Church Age.

Old Testament believers are going to have to wait.  Daniel says they are going to have to wait until after the Second Coming.  But for the Church Age believer, there’s coming a day when the trumpet’s going to sound, Christ is going to leave Heaven, and we who are alive will be changed.

Now let’s read on in 1 Corinthians 15:52-53

in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

For this corruptible (which is prone to death) must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. 

We have to understand that the Christian who was a believer when he died is going to have to be resurrected into a new body. I think most of us understand that.

The soul and spirit went to glory the minute that believer died.

2 Corinthians 5,

We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. 

That soul and spirit went into the presence of the Lord waiting for this great resurrection day when Christ returns in the air with a trumpet, a singular trumpet, not the seven trumpets of Revelation, a singular trumpet, God’s trumpet.

The dead in Christ will be resurrected from wherever they are. Whether they’re in the deepest cavern in the ocean, whether they were burned at the stake, no matter where, there’s going to be enough of that corpse left for God to resurrect it.

It may be only a single atom, but that’s all God needs.

He does have to have that because you can’t resurrect from nothing.  That’s the whole idea of resurrection: that you’ve lived and died and been resurrected.  And that has to be by an act of God.

But He knows where every atom of your old body is.  Don’t ever worry about that.

There’s not a single cell of any believer that God doesn’t know where it is.

So, we see that this body is only fit for death and corruption even though we’re saved in the soul and the spirit.

Let’s see that verse.

Romans 8:22-23

For we know that the whole creation groans and Labors with birth pangs together until now. 

Not only that, but we also who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, (or that great transition) the redemption of our body.

The soul and spirit were redeemed at salvation, but our old body is still part of the old curse.  It’s still prone to sickness and disease and injury. But the day’s coming when we’re going to get a new body, and it’ll be reunited with the soul and the spirit.

Now let’s go over to 1st Thessalonians chapter 4. Again, you’ll never find language like this anywhere except in Paul’s writings. It’s insulated and separated from all the rest of Scripture.

1 Thessalonians 4:13

But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep, (Or if you got a King James, the word is asleep.  It just simply means physical death.) lest you sorrow as others who have no hope.

He’s telling his believers, if you’ve lost a loved one who was a believer, don’t sorrow like those pagans.

We’re going to see our loved ones again if they were believers.

Now verse 14 and look how simply put this is,

For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus. 

See, we’ve qualified for salvation if we believe Jesus died and rose again. That’s the Gospel and God will bring them with him.

So, here we have every one of the believers of the Body of Christ covered, whether they’re alive or whether they’ve died and gone on to be with the Lord, we’re all going to come in under this great resurrection day.

1 Thessalonians 4:15-16

For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede (or go ahead of) those who are asleep (who have died). 

For the Lord Himself (Jesus the Christ) will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 

1 Thessalonians 4:17-18,

Then (that’s after the dead had been resurrected; reunited body, soul, and spirit) we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus, we shall always be with the Lord. 

Therefore comfort one another with these words.

The greatest comfort is knowing we won’t face the terror of the tribulation. If we were it’d hardly be comfort.

We’ll be gathered or caught up, as he says in 2nd Thessalonians, or in other words, we’ll be raptured. It simply means the same thing, that we’ll be snatched off the planet.

I Thessalonians 5:1-3

But concerning the times and the seasons, brethren, you have no need that I should write to you. 

For you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord (the Tribulation, the coming in of the anti-Christ) so comes as a thief in the night. 

For when they (this is not us believers, but when the ones left behind-) say, “Peace and safety!” then sudden destruction comes upon them, as labour pains upon a pregnant woman. And they shall not escape. 

This is exactly what the anti-Christ is going to promise when he first comes?

This antichrist or pseudo Christ is the prince or the little horn who’s described in Daniel’s vision in Daniel 7:7-8,

After this I saw in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, exceedingly strong. It had huge iron teeth; it was devouring, breaking in pieces, and trampling the residue with its feet. It was different from all the beasts that were before it, and it had ten horns. 

I was considering the horns, and there was another horn, a little one, coming up among them, before whom three of the first horns were plucked out by the roots. And there, in this horn, were eyes like the eyes of a man, and a mouth speaking pompous words.

He’s going to be a flatterer.  He’s going to promise peace and prosperity.  Israel will think he’s the Messiah because of what he’s accomplishing.  But what happens next?

Then sudden destruction comes upon them,…” Sudden destruction and the horrors of the Tribulation all unfold.

Daniel 9:26 and 27,

And after the sixty-two weeks Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself; And the people of the prince who is to come Shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end of it shall be with a flood, And till the end of the war desolations are determined. 

Then he shall confirm a covenant with many for one week; But in the middle of the week He shall bring an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall be one who makes desolate, Even until the consummation, which is determined, Is poured out on the desolate.” 

Now, where are we?  Well, we’re in the Tribulation.  It’s a period of time that’s going to come when all of a sudden the anti-Christ makes his appearance and signs a seven-year treaty.  Well, there’s no hint in there of the Church Age whatsoever.

2 Thessalonians 2:2-5

Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, we ask you, not to be soon shaken in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as if from us, as though the day of Christ had come. 

Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. 

Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? 

The Day of the Lord has no reference to the church.

After the Rapture, the age of grace, comes to an end and the Day of the Lord begins. The Day of the Lord is a subject which is often mentioned in the Old Testament, whereas the Rapture isn’t.

Apparently someone had been circulating a letter or an oral word among the Thessalonians that the Day of the Lord had come.

There is always a group of know all saints who seem to think they get direct information from the Lord.

They don’t see the need to study the Word of God; they imagine they get their information directly through dreams or visions or special revelations.

So, there was a word circulating in Thessalonica that had come to them, and it was a special “revelation,” something that Brother Paul had not told them.

This caused a problem with the Thessalonian believers, and we can see why.

They were enduring a lot of persecution and because of this it was very easy for someone to say, “Well, this is the Great Tribulation that we’re in. The Day of the Lord has come, and we’re already in it.”

The Day of the Lord is a phrase that speaks of the period beginning with the Great Tribulation and continuing through the Millennium. It’s a day that begins with judgment.

“Let no man deceive you by any means.” says verse 3.

If we’re not to be deceived, then let’s listen to Paul.

“For that day shall not come.” Which day? The Day of the Lord, not the Rapture. The Day of the Lord shall not come except there be the fulfilling of two conditions: (1) “There comes a falling away first” and (2) “the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.”

Both of these things must take place before the Day of the Lord can begin, and neither one of them has taken place as yet.

There must be “a falling away first.” Many have interpreted this to mean a great apostasy or falling away from the church, and it does refer to that.

But it means more than that. The Greek word that’s translated as “falling away” is apostasia. The root word actually means “departure or removal from.”

Paul says that before the Day of the Lord begins there must first come a removing, actually, two kinds of removing.

First, the organized church will depart from the faith. That’s what we know as apostasy. But there’ll be total apostasy when the Lord comes, and that can’t take place until the true church is removed. The Lord asked, “Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth?” that’s Luke 18:8.

He means that body of truth which He left here.

The answer is no, He’ll not find the faith here when He returns. There’ll be total apostasy because of two things: (1) the organisation of the church has departed from the faith and (2) there’s been another departure, the departure of the true church from the earth. The departure of the true church leads into the total apostasy of the organised church.

The Day of the Lord can’t begin, or the Great Tribulation period, until the departure of the true church has taken place.

Paul’s not going into detail about the rapture of the church because he’s already written about that in his first epistle 1st Thessalonians 4:16 to 17,

For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 

Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. 

That is the departure, the removal, of the church.

The organised church, which is left down here, will totally depart from the faith. We see it pictured as the great harlot in Revelation 17. The Laodicean church, which is the seventh and last church described in the Book of Revelation, is in a sad condition.

That’s the period we’re in right now. When the true believers are gone, it’ll get even worse. It’ll finally end in total apostasy.

From the viewpoint of the earth the removal of believers is a departure. From the viewpoint of heaven, it’s a rapture, a snatching or catching up.

I think the world’s going to be glad when the Body of Christ is gone. No more high and lofty moral rules to live by. Now anything really does go.

They don’t realise that it’ll actually be a sad day for them. They won’t realise that they’re actually entering into the Great Tribulation period, which will be a time of trouble such as the world has never before seen.

The second thing which must happen is that the “man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.” When he’s revealed the Great Tribulation period has already begun. Here he’s called “the man of sin.” John calls him “the antichrist.” John’s the only one who uses that term, by the way.

The Antichrist has about thirty different titles in the Bible. He’s a subject of the Old Testament. He’s going to be Satan’s man. This is the man who will put the Roman Empire back together again, the 10 toes of clay and iron in Nebuchadnezzar’s vision. He’ll finally become a world dictator. He’s going to deceive the world. He could be in our midst today, but he won’t be able to appear in power or reveal who he is until after the Great Tribulation period begins.

Paul tells us more about him in 2 Thessalonians 2:4,

Who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. 

One of his claims will be that he’s God. In Revelation 13 we find that the beast out of the sea (the Antichrist) brings together western Europe, and he’ll put it back together again.

When he does this, he’ll show himself as God. The world will think that he’s Christ. That’s the big lie.

2Thessalonians 2:5 Pauls says,

Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? 

Paul hadn’t hesitated to talk about these things. Some say that a preacher shouldn’t dwell on these topics. Well, Paul did. Paul says, “When I was with you, I told you about him.”

Until next time my friends may God bless you richly.