Kingdom Ready

Introduction

A rather intriguing set of passages is contained in Revelation chapter 7. The first eight verses of that chapter refer to a very specific group of individuals. Those individuals are referred to as “servants of God” – and they are subsequently “sealed”  by an angel of God. Here are those eight verses:

Revelation 7:1-8 (ESV):

Introduction

One of the most famous individuals in the book of Genesis is Joseph – the first son of Jacob and Rachel. The account of Joseph’s life begins in Genesis chapter 37 – and that account continues all the way to the very end of Genesis, in chapter 50.

Of course, quite a bit of information is contained in chapters 37 through 50. However, here is an extremely brief summary of Joseph’s life:

1. Joseph is the “favorite son” of his father, Jacob.

2. In dreams, God reveals to Joseph that he will eventually obtain a position of authority over his brothers – despite the fact that ten of his brothers are older than him.

The following article by Anthony Buzzard is from the August 2010 issue of Focus on the Kingdom, and can be viewed here.

A key verse defining the beginning of Jesus has been obscured in the KJV by the addition of the word “again” which is not in the Greek text.

Let’s start with a very important quotation from the celebrated F.F. Bruce. He is commenting on Acts 13:33, 34. Please open a Bible to this text. “‘Raised up’ – that is by raising him up in the sense in which he raised David (v. 22). For anistemi in this sense, see 3:22; 7:37; 3:26 (‘raised him up and sent him’) [raise up and then send]. The promise of 13:23, the fulfillment of which is described in 13:33, has to do with the sending of the Messiah, not his resurrection (for which see v. 34). The addition of ‘from the dead’ in verse 34 differentiates this use of ‘raise up’ from its use in verse 33.” [1]

The Kingdom in the Prophets (Continued)

Jerusalem has been under the control of the Gentiles since the time of Daniel, as illustrated by his visions of the successive Gentile empires. But a time will come when it will be trodden underfoot, and Israel will turn back to God, at which time the Gentile kingdoms will be subdued by God’s Kingdom.

Matthew 23:
38 Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.
39 For I say unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.

The Kingdom in the Prophets

The promise of land and blessings to Abraham and his descendants was only temporarily fulfilled by the kingdom of Israel. But they did not keep God’s covenant, and so they were divided, the northern kingdom (Israel) being defeated by Assyria and scattered, and the southern kingdom (Judah) being taken captive to Babylon. Yet God had promised to establish David’s throne forever.

Many mainstream denominations have the following basic belief: “Whenever God gives people a prophesy, that prophesy is guaranteed to come true – exactly as it was stated.” In other words, the belief is that God’s prophesies always come true – regardless of what humans do.

From what I have seen, the above belief appears to stem from the idea of a completely “sovereign” God – i.e., the idea that God is explicitly controlling each and every event that occurs on the earth.

In any case, the question is: is the above idea supported by Scripture? In other words, is it really true that every single time God gives us a prophesy, that prophesy always comes true as it was stated?

Since the Reformation, it has been taught more and more among Protestants that Jesus declared the Kingdom to have arrived, but that he taught his disciples the “true” understanding of the Kingdom, namely that of God’s reign in one’s heart.  In addition, another common misunderstanding that leads to the belief that the Kingdom must have been redefined is the question of when Jesus expected it to take place. If Jesus had indeed meant a political kingdom that would overthrow Israel’s oppressors, he would seem to have been wrong about it being “at hand.” Much is made of Jesus’ supposed belief that his return would be in the lifetime of his disciples, but he told them he did not know when he was going to return (Matthew 24:36; Mark 13:32).

In Part 1, we saw that the words for “generation” (Hebrew, dowr; Greek, genea) can have more than one meaning, and one of the meanings is a group of people with like characteristics, especially a group characterized by negative traits, as in “this crooked and perverse generation.”  We saw examples in the Old Testament, and we saw that this sense was in fact used more often than the literal sense in the Gospels.

One of the main reasons that other viewpoints don’t like the idea of a futurist interpretation of prophecy is that certain sections of Scripture appear to have Jesus say that the end would come before that generation passed away.  There has been much speculation about whether Jesus was mistaken or misunderstood, since the Kingdom apparently did not come to pass in the lifetime of his disciples.  C. S. Lewis wrote in his essay, “The World’s Last Night” (in 1960),