Seven Pillars of the Kingdom

Now Jesus announced the kingdom as the "good news", not "good views".  It was a total life plan to be practiced now both in the individual and the collective lives.  We saw that the Kingdom of God was used interchangeably with life; enter into life now and enter the kingdom.  If the kingdom is life, then it is something to be lived now, not merely the hereafter.  We also saw that the kingdom was used synonymously with the Way (Jesus). So then the kingdom is something to be followed, not a road map to be studied with no journey taken.  Listen to what Jesus stated to His disbelieving brother.

Constitutional Scripture John 7:17 If anyone wills to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it is from God or whether I speak on My own authority.

Focus Point:  Keep this in mind:  we know as much as we are willing to practice, and no more.  Your creed is your deed.  Your creed is not something that you repeat on Sunday morning or as a part of a ritual.  It is a  serious road map which you are to follow, or get lost.

Focus Point:  The Kingdom of God has restrictions, but those restrictions are to keep you focused on the message and the individual that carries and possesses the message.  Remember the Kingdom of God is God's laws and principles working in your life on His behalf.  

Now before we take up the nature and scope, let us view the possibilities of the Kingdom of God in relation to the total believer's belief and movement. What place does the kingdom occupy?  Now one of the writers of God's Constitution, Dr. Luke, after writing his gospel, starts to write the book of the Acts of the Apostles where everything that Jesus expounded and exposed in Himself was to be transferred into the lives of His followers.

Keep this in mind, it is Dr. Luke that has condensed seven headings in five verses.

Constitutional Scripture:  Acts 1:1-5 The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, 2 until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen, 3 to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.  4 And being assembled together with them, He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father, “which,” He said, “you have heard from Me; 5 for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

Constitutional Scripture:  John 1:14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

First:  The Word became flesh--Jesus began to do and teach.  The Gospel begins with Jesus, the Incarnate.  You cannot say God until you have first said Jesus, for Jesus puts character and content into God; His own character content.  You cannot say Christ, the Kingdom of God, and the Holy Spirit until you have said Jesus, for Jesus puts His own character content in all of these.  The Gospel lies in His person.  He did not merely bring the Good News; He was the Good News.

Second:  The Word became deed--Jesus did and taught, the Word was a deed before it was an exposition.  Therefore it was not a philosophy or a moralism.  It was a fact, a deed, vital not verbal.  His Words were expounding on how He was living and what he was doing.  So His deeds became words, and His words became deeds and together it showed what and who He was.  The Word became flesh.

Third:  Jesus after His death--The Word became atonement.  When this Word came in contact with the sin of man; it became crimsoned into sacrifice.  He gave Himself for our sin.  The outer cross lighted the nature of God as a self-giving love.

Fourth:  Jesus..."showed Himself to these men...and gave ample proof that He was alive during"--The Word became victorious.  Death could not hold Him.  The keepers were like dead men.

Fifth:  Jesus "over a period of forty days...taught them about the Kingdom of God"--the Word became ultimate and the final authority as well as the pattern for the new world.  The kingdom became the unshakable Kingdom and Jesus the unchanging Person; the absolute order and the absolute Person.

Sixth:  Jesus was taken up, taken up to the right hand of the Father--the Word became the center and the final power of authority.  So the earliest believer's creed was "Jesus is Lord".

Seventh:  Jesus instructed them not to leave Jerusalem.  "You must wait for the promise made by My Father...you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit"; the Word became the inner core for this world's revolution by the coming of the Holy Spirit within them.  Keep in mind, the Holy Spirit was and is the applied edge of redemption.

Please note:  These seven things constitute the seven pillars upon which the Believer's structure rests, all of them necessary and essential.  But Jesus made the sixth center on His message.  It was His first emphasis.  "From that day, Jesus began to proclaim this message: 'Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is upon you" (Matthew 4:17)

Constitutional Scripture:  Matthew 4:23 And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people.