"For they
that dwell in Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they
knew him not, nor the voices of the prophets which are
read every sabbath, fulfilled them by condemning
him" (Acts 13:27).
"Verily
I say unto you, Among them that are born of women
there hath not arisen a greater than John the Baptist:
yet he that is but little in the kingdom of heaven is
greater than he. And from the days of John the Baptist
until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and
men of violence take it by force. For all the prophets
and the law prophesied until John. And if ye are willing
to receive it, this is Elijah, that is to come. He that
hath ears to hear, let him hear" (Matthew
11:11-15).
"The
law and the prophets were until John: from that
time the gospel of the kingdom of God is preached, and
every man entereth violently into it" (Luke 16:16).
I think
we can recognise that the common link between Acts 13:27
and Matthew 11:13 is "all the prophets". In the
one case they heard not the voices of the prophets; in
the other it is said (vs. 15), "He that hath ears to
hear, let him hear."
THE PROPHETS PROPHESIED OF THE
KINGDOM
First of all, we must understand the
meaning of this whole statement in Matthew 11 - "all
the prophets... prophesied until John." What did
they prophesy? Of course, they prophesied many things.
One paramount concern in their prophecies was that
relating to the coming King and the Kingdom. So much was
that so that in the New Testament the matter of the
Kingdom is taken for granted. When you open the New
Testament and begin to read in the Gospels, you find that
no explanation is given. The Kingdom is not introduced as
something of which people were unaware. You find from
amongst the people those who came to the Lord Jesus and
used the very phrase, and you find the Lord Himself,
although the matter not mentioned by others who came to
Him, using the phrase 'the Kingdom' without any
introduction or explanation.
Nicodemus
was a case in point. We have nothing in the narrative to
indicate that Nicodemus said anything at all about the
Kingdom. He started by saying: "Rabbi, we know that
thou art a teacher come from God." There was nothing
about the Kingdom in that. The Lord Jesus interrupted
there and said: "Except one be born anew, he cannot
see the kingdom of God. " (John 3:2,3.) Evidently
that was the thing that was in the mind of Nicodemus, the
Lord knew it. You see, it is a thing taken for granted in
the New Testament; and although later (as we find in the
book of the Acts and subsequently) the true heavenly
explanation is given, or there is some teaching
concerning its true meaning, the Kingdom is something
that is already very much in the minds of the Jewish
people, and of course it has come from the prophets. The
prophets had much to say concerning the Kingdom, and some
of them had something very definite to say about the
King. We will not try to prove that. It is a statement
which you can easily verify.
What did
the prophets prophesy? Inclusively, they prophesied
concerning the King and the Kingdom. What was the
culmination of the prophets in that comprehensive
connection? It was John the Baptist. He gathered them all
up; he was, so to speak, the inclusive prophet. What was
John the Baptist? He was the terminal or turning point
between all that had been and that which was now going to
be, between the Old Testament and the New. That is the
statement here "all... prophesied until John."
Until John; now - from John. What was the message of
John? "Repent ye; for the kingdom of heaven is at
hand " (Matthew 3:2). But alongside that, the great
outstanding note of John is, "Behold, the Lamb of
God, that taketh away the sin of the world!" (John
1:29). Those are not two different things; they are one.
"The kingdom... is at hand": "Behold, the
Lamb of God!"
THE KINGDOM PRESENT IN CHRIST
What was
the issue, then, from John's time - the issue which
sprang into new meaning, new force, because it had become
an immediate one; no longer that of prophecy but now the
issue of actuality? It was the Kingdom of Heaven.
"The law and the prophets were until John: from that
time the gospel of the kingdom of God is preached."
The prophets had prophesied it; now it is preached as
having come, and having come with "the Lamb of God,
that taketh away the sin of the world."
What,
then, is the Kingdom of Heaven? We have led up to
this step by step, and when we answer this final question
we shall see clearly what it was that these Jewish rulers
and dwellers in Jerusalem never saw, though they heard
the prophets week by week.
I am
going to press the challenge of this again. I feel that
it is a very solemn thing that ever the Kingdom of Heaven
should have come near to anyone. You see, the Lord is
eventually going to judge everyone on their opportunity.
The opportunity has been given - and contact is
opportunity. The very availability of the Kingdom is
opportunity. What is done with opportunity? The Lord
Jesus walked in the midst of the Jewish nation three and
a half years. His very presence among them was their
opportunity - and what a terrible, terrible consequence
followed their failure to make good their opportunity!
Now
there may be someone in this category who reads these
words. Through reading them, there has become available
to you, even if never before (but surely we could hardly
say that), the gospel of Jesus Christ - the knowledge of
the fact of the Lord Jesus and His Cross. To have ever
had that within your reach is enough to settle your
eternal destiny. If the Kingdom of Heaven is come near
within the compass and range of your life, to your
knowledge - that is the ground upon which your eternal
destiny may be settled. Of course, there was very much
more in the case of these people, and their condemnation
was so much the more. The prophets prophesied in their
hearing, and yet because of something in their own
make-up, because of some reaction from themselves, the
rulers and the people never heard what they were hearing;
they never recognised that here was something which had
very great implications, and that they must find out what
those implications really were. They did not take the
attitude - 'If there is something here which concerns me,
I must know what it is.'
You
could hardly ask for less than that, could you? but the
very absence of that kind of reaction to the presence of
the gospel, as I have said, may be the ground upon which
judgment will take place. It did in their case, and a
terrible judgment it was! What a judgment, these two
thousand years of Jewish history! "Your house is
left unto you desolate" (Matthew 23:38). Was there
ever a story of more awful desolation than the story of
the Jews since then? But, even so, that is only a parable
of desolation; something here on this earth. What
must desolation in the spiritual and eternal sense mean -
forsaken of God, and knowing it? It is a solemn message,
and of course it paves the way to this other part, the
"violent" entering into the Kingdom. This is
something to take seriously, something about which you
cannot afford to be careless or indifferent.
What is
the Kingdom? The answer to that can be given in three or
four quite brief statements. What did the Kingdom of
Heaven prove to be? I repudiate that system of
interpretation which claims that a literal, earthly,
temporal kingdom was offered to the Jews at this time. I
do not believe it. It would have been a poor sort of
thing for the people of whom we read in the Gospels to
have had the kingdom in their hands - not much glory or
satisfaction to God in them! Look at Palestine today, and
see what kind of kingdom it would be in the hands of
those people! What is possible for the world when that
kind of thing gets the kingdom? No, I repudiate the
interpretation of a temporal kingdom being offered to
Israel by Jesus at that time. But what did the Kingdom of
Heaven, which was preached in the days of John the
Baptist, prove to be and to mean, as the Lord Jesus
interpreted it, and later the Apostles?
WHAT THE KINGDOM IS
(a) A New Life
First of
all, the Kingdom of Heaven was a new life, altogether
other than that which men knew anything about in all
their history from Adam onward. That is what the Lord
meant in His own first reference to the Kingdom, when
speaking to Nicodemus about his soul's need. "Except
one be born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God"
- because it is another life that has come in, as by a
birth. It is not just the energizing of an old
life. It is not just the swinging over of an old life
into new interests, turning from one line of interest to
another, from one system of occupation to another: once
you were all out for the world, and now with the same
life and interest you are all out for Christianity. No,
it is another, different life, a life that never was,
given from God Himself. The very essence of the Kingdom
of Heaven is that it is a heavenly nature in a heavenly
life, given as a distinct gift at a crisis. Another life
- that is the Kingdom, to begin with.
(b) A New Relationship
It is a
new relationship, a relationship with God: which is not
simply that now we become interested in God - that God
becomes an object of our consideration and we swing over
from one relationship to another because now we have
taken up Christianity. No, it is a relationship which is
of the essence of this very life itself. We have an
altogether new and different consciousness, so far as our
relationship to God is concerned. The great truth of the
Gospels, especially as emphasized in the Gospel by John,
is that a new revelation of relationship with God has
come by Jesus Christ. "I manifested thy name unto
the men whom thou gavest me out of the world" (John
17:6). That name, of which He is always speaking,
represented a new relationship - "Father"; not
in the sense of a general and universal fatherhood of God
and brotherhood of man, but a specific, new relationship
which comes about only by the entering of the Holy Spirit
into the life in a definite, critical act. "God sent
forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying,
Abba, Father" (Galatians 4:6). When did that happen
with you? What was the very first lisp of your new life?
"Father!" - uttered out of a new consciousness.
Not now a God who is afar off, unthinkable, all-terrible,
of whom you are afraid; no, "Father!" When we
are "born of the Spirit," there is brought
about an entirely new relationship.
(c) A New Constitution
Then the
Kingdom of Heaven is a new constitution. I am not
thinking now of a new set of laws and regulations, but of
a new constitution so far as you and I are concerned. We
are constituted anew, with an entirely new set of
capacities which make possible things which were never
possible before. It ought to be recognised - and I would
have you lay this to heart anew - that the child of God,
the member of the Kingdom of Heaven, is the embodiment of
a miracle, which means that there are supernatural
possibilities and capacities in every such one. What
tremendous things go on in the history of a child of God!
When we see fully and clearly at last, we shall recognise
them to have been nothing less than Divine miracles again
and again. We do not know all the forces which are bent
upon the destruction of a child of God, and how much his
preserving through to the end represents an exercise of
the almighty power of God. Some of us know a little about
that: that our very survival is because God has exercised
His power over other immense hostile powers, that we are
kept by the power of God - and that it takes the power of
God to keep us!
The
inception of the life of the child of God is a miracle.
'How can a man be born again?' There is no answer to that
question except that God does it. "How can this man
give us his flesh to eat?" (John 6:52). That is, how
can the child of God be supported throughout, without
anything here to help, to succour, to nourish? There is
no answer to that either, except that God does it; and if
He does not, the child of God, because of the extra
forces centred upon him or her for destruction, will
simply go under. The consummation of the life of the
child of God will be equally a miracle. "How are the
dead raised? and with what manner of body do they
come?" (I Corinthians 15:35). The answer to that is
the same - God alone is going to do it.
The
whole matter is a miracle from start to finish. It is a
new constitution, having in it possibilities and
capacities which are altogether above and beyond the
highest level of human abilities; that is, above and over
the whole kingdom of earth and nature.
(d) A New Vocation
Further,
it is a new vocation. It is something for which to live,
something in which to serve, something to bring into
operation. It becomes the sphere and the means of a new
life-ministry and purpose. The very consciousness of a
truly born-again child of God is like this - 'Now I know
why I am alive! I have been wondering all along why I was
born; I have grumbled about it, and felt I was hardly
done by in being brought into this world without being
consulted as to whether I wanted to come; but now I see
there is purpose in it - I have something to live for!' A
truly born-again child of God goes off and tells people
that, after all, it is worth being alive! He has
discovered, behind everything else, that which has Divine
intent and meaning - it never existed as an active thing
until he was born anew and entered into the Kingdom. The
Kingdom of Heaven is a new vocation, a new sense of
life-purpose. It gives to life a meaning. That is the
Kingdom.
Is that
not altogether a different idea from that which would
make the Kingdom a place with certain laws and
regulations - 'You must' and 'You must not' - something
objective? "The kingdom of God is within you"
(Luke 17:21), and it is after this kind.
(e)
A New Gravitation - To Heaven, Not Earth
It is
moreover something from above, and that surely implies
that it is transcendent in every way. It is something
that lives, and it brings life up on to a higher level.
That is, if the new life comes from above, from heaven,
it will always gravitate back to its source, and if this
new life works in us, it will be lifting us, pulling us
upward to God. It will so work that we shall feel first
of all that this world is not our home. It was our home;
everything for us was here until that happened; we saw
nothing beyond. Now we do not belong to it, we
belong somewhere else; and in some strange way we are
steadily moving further and further away from this earth.
We find that we become less comfortable here every day.
You are in the Kingdom if you have something like that
experience. If you can be comfortable and happy and
content to go on here you ought to have grave doubts as
to where you are as regards the Kingdom. But if you are
increasingly conscious that inwardly the distance is
growing between you and all that is here, then the
Kingdom is truly at work, the Kingdom of Heaven has come.
THE KINGDOM COME BUT ALSO COMING
Now,
another thing: the Kingdom has come, but it is always
coming. We have entered, but we ought to be always
entering. There is a little word at the end of the letter
to the Hebrews - "Wherefore, receiving a kingdom
that cannot be shaken..." (Hebrews 12:28). The
literal sense there is - "being in the course or
process of receiving a kingdom that cannot be
shaken..." It has come, but it is coming; and it is
at that point that I think we all need to recognise a
difference, to discriminate between two things - between
conversion and salvation.
Have you
ever made that distinction? There is all the difference
between conversion and salvation. Conversion is a crisis,
something that happens perhaps suddenly, in a moment, and
it is done. Salvation? That is something that has
commenced; but you find also that the New Testament
speaks about "receiving the end of your faith, even
the salvation of your souls" (1 Peter 1:9), thus
indicating that salvation is still future. Some people
have built a false doctrine upon this, teaching that you
cannot know you are saved until you are at the end,
because it is spoken of in the future tense. But we are
saved, and we are being saved. We have entered the
Kingdom by conversion, but salvation is a far greater
thing than conversion. Oh, salvation is a vast thing, and
is only another word for the Kingdom - the Kingdom coming
all the time. A spiritual babe who has just received
Divine life has not got everything, except potentially.
It has conversion, it has new birth. Would you say that a
little babe has everything it is intended to have?
Potentially, in the life, all is there. But how much more
there is to be known of what that life implies, of all
that it carries with it and may lead to, of all the
capacities that are there!
That is
the difference between conversion and salvation. The
Kingdom is a vast kingdom - "His kingdom is an
everlasting kingdom" (Daniel 4:3). "Of the
increase of his government... there shall be no end"
(Isaiah 9:7). 'No end' simply means eternally expansive.
Can you make just a geographical matter of that? Surely
not. It must be spiritual - the vast inexhaustible
resources of God for His own people. It will take
eternity to know and to explore all those resources, the
dimensions of His Kingdom.
THE KINGDOM SUFFERS VIOLENCE
Now,
having in a very imperfect way considered what the
prophets were talking about and what you and I have come
into touch with, let us see what can be missed. Let us
look at these other words: "The law and the prophets
were until John: from that time the gospel of the kingdom
of God is preached, and every man entereth violently into
it" (Luke 16:16). "From the days of John the
Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth
violence, and men of violence take it by force"
(Matthew 11:12). It "suffereth violence." That
does not simply mean that it permits of violence. It
really means that it calls for violence, and it is men of
violence that take it by force. Luke puts it
"entereth violently".
Here is
the spirit of citizenship in that Kingdom - "by
force". Why? This is not merely an appeal to be in
earnest - though it certainly includes that, seeing what
a tremendous thing this Kingdom is, and what an immense
loss will be suffered if we do not take it seriously. But
you see, the Lord Jesus is speaking as in the midst of
things which are constantly opposing. There is a whole
organized system, expressing tremendous prejudice. He
said to them on one occasion: "Woe unto you, scribes
and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye shut the kingdom of
heaven against men: for ye enter not in yourselves,
neither suffer ye them that are entering in to
enter" (Matthew 23:13). There is everything, from
devil and men, to obstruct; to enter in requires
violence. If you can be hindered, you will be hindered.
If you are going to be easy-going, you will give to
antagonistic forces all the ground that they want to put
you out.
That is
why I pointed out that it is not only a once-for-all
entering into the Kingdom, but it is a continuous
entering. The Kingdom is so much bigger than conversion.
Of course, if you are going to be saved at all - I mean
saved initially - you will have to mean business for
that. You will have to make it a desperate matter,
because there will be everything to stop you. But the
Kingdom means a very great deal more than merely getting
into it, far more than being converted. There is a great
deal more in the purpose of God for our lives than we
have ever imagined, and if we are to enter into that,
violence has to characterize us. We must desperately mean
business, and come to the place where we say: 'Lord, I am
set upon all that Thou dost mean in Christ. I am set upon
that, and I am not going to allow other people's
prejudices or suspicions or criticisms to get in the way;
I am not going to allow any man-made system to hinder me;
I am going right on with Thee for all Thy purpose. I am
going to do violence to everything that would get in the
way.' It calls for violence, and we have to do a lot of
violence to get all that God wills for us.
Oh, how
easily many lives are side-tracked, simply because they
are not desperate enough! They are caught in things which
limit - things which may be good, that may have something
of God in them, but which none the less are limiting
things, and do not represent a wide open way to all God's
purpose. The only way for us to come into all that the
Lord means - not only into what we have seen but into all
that He has purposed - is to be desperate, to be men of
violence; to be men who say, 'By God's grace, nothing and
no one, however good, is going to stand in my way; I am
going on with God.' Have that position with the Lord, and
you will find that God meets you on that ground.
No men -
not even Paul himself - knew all that they were going to
know. Paul was constantly getting fuller unveilings of
that unto which he was called. He received something
fairly strong and rich at the beginning; then, later, he
was shown unspeakable things (II Corinthians 12:4). He
was growing in apprehension. But why? Because he was a
man of violence. God meets us like that. "With the
perverse thou wilt shew thyself froward" (Psalm
18:26). That, in principle, means that God will be to you
what you are to Him. He will mean business if you mean
business. There is a vast amount in the Kingdom that we
have never suspected. Do believe that. There is more for
all of us to know than anybody on this earth knows - far
more than the very greatest saints, the most advanced
Christians, know of the purpose of God.
Paul
intimates that. In his Philippian letter he makes it
clear that, even at the end of his life, he has yet to
apprehend, he needs still to know. "That I may
know..." (Philippians 3:10). There is far more to
know. Do you believe that? Are you going to allow your
life simply to be boxed up within the measure that you
know, or within the measure of other people? No - it is
the measure of Christ that is God's end. "Till we
all attain unto the unity of the faith, and of the
knowledge of the Son of God, unto a fullgrown man, unto
the measure of the stature of the fullness of
Christ" (Ephesians 4:13). No movement, no society,
no evangelical organization, no church on this earth has
come to that yet, but that is the objective in view. But
God requires, in order to bring us to fullness, that we
be men of violence, that we really mean business, that we
say to everything that gets in the way - and oh, the
plausible voices, which nevertheless are subtly
influenced by prejudices! - 'Stand thou aside: I am going
on with God, I am going to allow nothing to stand in the
way.'
"The
gospel of the kingdom is preached." Can you imagine
those Judaizers speaking to the people about Jesus? 'Be
careful; mind you don't get caught! Our advice to you is
to steer clear of that - don't get into too close touch
with Him!' All that was going on. Paul was up against it
all the time. He was tracked down throughout his journeys
by these very people who, following on his heels, said,
'Be careful - it is dangerous!' The Lord Himself
experienced the same kind of thing; and He said:
"the kingdom... suffereth violence." It calls
for violence; you will not get in to begin with, and you
will certainly not get in in growing fullness, unless you
are one of those people who do violence to everything
that stands in the way of God's full purpose as revealed
in Christ. You will not even know what that purpose is,
God will not be able to reveal to you the next part of
it, unless He finds that you are one after this kind -
entering in violently.
Are you
like that? Well, if we are passive, there is everything
to be lost; if we mean business, there is everything to
be gained. The Lord make us men and women like that, lest
we be numbered among those of whom it is said that they
"have ears to hear, and hear not" (Ezekiel
12:2).