4. Jesus and the Kingdom of God [Matthew] - Tim Mackie (The Bible Project)

I invite you to grab a Bible we're going to hear a reading of the scriptures today and I'll do that for us I invite you to open up to the Gospel of Matthew chapter 4 verse 12 more stories about Jesus of Nazareth and how awesome he is Matthew 4 verse 12 now when Jesus heard that John had been put in prison he withdrew to Galilee and then leaving Nazareth he went and lived at Capernaum which was by the lake in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali the way of the sea beyond the Jordan the galilee of the gentiles the people living in darkness have seen a great light those living in the shadow of death a light has dawned from that time on Jesus began to preach repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near as Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee he saw two brothers Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew when they were casting a net into the lake for they were fishermen come follow me jesus said and I will send you out to fish for people at once they left their nets and they followed him going on from there he saw two other brothers James the son of Zebedee and his brother John and they were in a boat with their father Zebedee preparing their nets Jesus calls them and immediately they left their boat and their father and they followed him so Jesus went throughout Galilee was teaching and synagogues he was proclaiming the good news of the kingdom he was healing every disease and sickness among the people news about him spread all over Syria and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases those suffering severe pain the demon eyes was having seizures and the paralyzed and He healed them large crowds came from Galilee from the Decapolis from Jerusalem from Judea the region all across the Jordan and they followed him Matthew chapter 4 here's what I'd like us to do because we're going to do this a lot I think as we go through Matthew's from for many of you you know you grew up around the church you grew up in Turkey anity or something like that some version of religious whatever and so so many of these stories are familiar to you especially from Matthew you know the calling the guys fishing and their nets and so on I mean some of you grew up singing songs you know about this very story right here and then for lots of others of you this is all kind of new and maybe you've seen a picture of Jesus or something with fishermen I don't know but it's not that familiar to we're all over the mat here and so I think it's important for us is when we come to these stories from 2,000 years ago we just we have to use our imaginations to get into the lives of these characters and to experience what was going on so let me I want to put the question to us like this let's say you're like one of these four fisherman right here and you live in in 2000 years ago israel-palestine you're Jewish right you're living on your ancestral homeland and you're very aware that your people are not living free on their ancestral homeland because there's Roman soldiers everywhere and they've been around for about 50 years big Roman Empire they've militarized the place checkpoints taxes keep going way up and that's really a bummer you know your uncle and like your neighbor and their cousin they keep going into debt and have to sell off their ancient homelands and so on to other wealthy Romans because taxes keep going up life is really hard but you know if you're a Fisher fisherman or a fisherwoman fisherman a fisher woman that's a fisher woman yeah yeah I'm sure I'm sure they existed so you're doing okay because you got a huge lake full of fish right this region of called the Galilee has a huge huge lake right at the center of it and you're doing okay although the Romans keep raising the taxes and and so on and they'll break your kneecaps if you don't pay them you know it's that kind of situation and so you you hear these reports that there's this young prophet named Yeshua Yeshua men upset it Jesus who is from Nazareth and he's been making the circuit around the towns and the villages around the lake of Galilee and he has this very explosive message everywhere he goes huge crowds people are bringing you've heard reports like people bringing sick or people who have stuff wrong with their body and then they walk away from this encounter with him totally transformed totally changed and healed and so you hear that he's coming to your synagogue your new little town by the lake or something like that and you hear these coming and you go because you're just utterly intrigued and you see the synagogue it's not that big of a building and there's like four hundred people around dammit like it gets really hard to actually see him and you you kind of crowd your way in and you actually start to make out what he's teaching and what do you hear him saying but use your imagination you're that you're that Fisher woman what do you hear Jesus saying and what's interesting is if you put if you try and put yourself in that scenario what what you think you hear Jesus saying will actually tell you a lot about what you think about Jesus in other words what comes to your mind when you think of what Jesus said on any given day as he went around you know teaching or preaching or something like that what you think of what he said will tell you a lot about how you think about him right now and maybe you might think you know he's a memorable teacher so he's got the golden rule saying Matt was pretty memorable you know so the dude unto others is you know you want them to do to you he has all these parables you might think I would hear him talk about parables about sheep and trees and birds or something like that or maybe you would hear him say you know these radical teachings of loving your enemy you know or turning the other cheek or something like that and as our odds are you would hear him say one of those things but you you would hear him say those things only as one small part big clear semen message that he was always talking about you'll always hear it on his lips you'll always see it being displayed in his action and for some reason most modern readers of these Gospels just tend not to notice the fact that Jesus is talking about this thing all of the time because if the Golden Rule if you think of Jesus primarily as a moral teacher I just encourage you like just just read the story again and see if you don't pick up another theme because there is a theme that Jesus talks about not the Gospel of Matthew is 30 pages right here in the is the Bible I've got here which means that he talks about this theme 1.5 times on every single page so there is a theme and a word and a phrase you find on Jesus's lips over 50 times in these mere 30 pages the Gospel of Matthew and what's and what is that phrase what is that idea that you for sure would hear Jesus talking about what is it how did Matthew summarize if you wanted to summarize everything jesus said here it is in one sentence and how does Matthew put it repent so pay attention there's something really significant happening that is going to force you to reckon with what is most important and that you have a decision to make about how you're going to respond that's or you could just say repent but I kind of like that version to say that so there's something and what is that thing that is here that has forces you to reckon with it and you're going to have to respond to it and this it's right here verse Matthew 4 verse 17 the kingdom the kingdom of heaven or as you read on in this gospel it also goes by the phrase what the kingdom of Kingdom of Heaven or the kingdom of God the kingdom of God if you read the other accounts of Jesus's life and Matthew and Luke you'll find the kingdom of God more often sometimes the kingdom of heaven what's interesting in Matthew is that most often it's the kingdom of heaven they mean the same thing they mean it's the same exact thing the kingdom of to say the kingdom of heaven heaven is this image in the Bible not of God actually living in the atmosphere something like that really but it's the idea heaven is high above us it's transcendent right God is exalted and high above us and he as the creator he's others than us and so heaven becomes the image for God himself it's just like um in English we might say you know Alexa the White House issued a statement today and of course no one thinks the White House actually has a big mouth that speaks it was ridiculous right so the point is the people who run you know the government in the White House they issued a statement today and so to say the kingdom of heaven is to say the kingdom of God because heaven is God's space God is above all two sides the same coin they mean the same thing so here you go here's a fisherwoman and you went to the synagogue and you hear Jesus saying hey pay attention the kingdom of God is here so points one this is just because this is going to come up over and over again and you know as a teacher I'm just going to get really pedantic about it right now when you think of Jesus you must think of the message that he made absolutely central to all as his teaching his preaching even his actions were meant to be pointers to the kingdom his parables when you think of Jesus you have to think of his announcement of the kingdom if you think of Jesus without the kingdom you're missing at least who he thought he was and what he was all all about Jesus you think of Jesus you think of the kingdom you think of kingdom you think of Jesus you guys with me here okay now of course that just raises the question what what on earth does that mean like what does that mean to walk around 2,000 years ago in Jewish Palestine and and saying the kingdom of heaven is here what does that mean to these fishermen and fisherwomen and so on and to ask that question then kicks us up a level above the story of Jesus in seeing how the story of Jesus ties into the storyline of the ancient scriptures and the storyline of human history as a whole and so here you go we're just every week you guys we're going to do a tour through the Old Testament relevant passages and then we'll read the same words again be like oh my gosh this is the coolest thing in the world so are you guys with me you guys with me so here's good here's a good trivia some of you are going to go to some gay English friends this coming Friday night and you need some good conversation starters it's nothing like that so here's one here's a good one can you think of the first time in the Bible that the idea of Kingdom the idea of ruling or raining or Kings where where does that occur first in the Bible for the first time that's kind of a trick question because that's why no one's sitting out loud or one of you is saying out loud right and you're probably right but say yeah so my great joy is to show how everything in the Bible always leads back to either page 1 or 2 of the Bible in this case is that's on page 2 the first time you find the idea of ruling or raining or kings or kingdoms or whatever it's on page 2 of your Bible and put up to 2 right I did make it through grad school I don't know what anyway so page to page 2 and so here's page 1 page 1 is this God is depicted as this royal artist who speaks a world of order and beauty and a garden into existence out of chaos in the cycle of just one Sabbath cycle price of work and then of rest and the capstone to God packing this amazing world full of potential and goodness is on page 2 where he sets these creatures called humans or Adam over it and here's what here's what God says about these these creatures as the capstone of the project in Genesis 1 it says so God created mankind in his own image and the image of God he created them male and female he created them so these creatures who were like God they image God they reflect the Creator into the creation and God blessed them and said go for it have a blast be fruitful increase in number fill the earth and subdue it a harness it's potential there's all of this raw potential just packed into the creation harness it and by doing that you will rule there you go rule over the fish of the sea the birds of the sky over every living creature that moves on the and now the word rule in the Bible is actually very similar to how we use the word rule in English if you're like a manager you oversee a coffee shop or something like that or whatever you oversee a t-shirt printing shop or something like that would you sit would you ever say I rule this place reduce would you ever say you rule like that's your job you rule and maybe you know the people you oversee might think you act like that's what you think you know you think you rule the place but actually you don't you manage it right you you oversee it but here this is a very unique idea this is a language of kings and queens these these image bearing creatures who represent God and are like God in the creation rule along with God or on God's behalf here they're they're installed as kings and queens of creation - helps bring out its potential and make it even more awesome that it already is that's how the story the Bible begins the story the Bible is a story about God wanting to set up the world as a partnership with these creatures so that they make it even more awesome that it already is now that's on page 2 of the Bible and if things are really good until page 3 of the Bible right and so what happens on page 3 of the Bible is that is that humans rebel and they see they see their opportunity to rule as an opportunity for their own self advantage they don't trust God they don't trust God's motives they don't want to trust God's definition of good and evil they wanted to find good and evil for themselves that's what's going on with the tree and so on and so things go horribly wrong right and and instead of ruling on behalf of God or like as God's Deputies if you think of dukes of hazzard think deputies right humans were there as deputies on God's behalf and they totally they just cease you know the wheel and they want to do this thing themselves and so what they end up creating is the story the Bible goes on is an alternate kingdom the kingdom of this world it's sometimes called or resulting in a world called the age of sin and death as the Apostle Paul calls it or Jesus calls Jesus calls it this age he'll call it later on the Gospel of Matthew and it's the Bible's way of explaining how why is the world the way that it is all grewed up and tragic and horrible things happen and at the core of the Bible's explanation it's because human beings have rejected God's kingdom and have made our own instead so what is God's response to that what is God's response and again the story of the Bible goes on that that God forms the people he out of all rebellious humanity and their kingdoms he takes one people and he says these are going to be my people and I'm going to liberate them out of the kingdom of this world and make them my own people and I will be their King and that story of God rescuing his people out of the evil kingdoms of this world think Old Testament what storyline are we talking about God rescuing people out we're thinking of the Exodus story right and who's the big bad guys big bad Pharaoh he's murderous he kills babies he enslaves the whole people group wants to grind him into the dust and work them to death and so God shows up right and says like you can't do that that's no way to run a kingdom and Pharaoh's like I don't who's Yahweh this God I don't care whatever and so Pharaoh takes off his boxing gloves so to speak and so does God and if you know the story it's really intense God visits his justice on this murderous power-hungry King and he frees and liberate his people and iconic scene is God bringing people through the waters of the Red Sea and Pharaohs chases after them as well crushed by the waters now here's another good Bible trivia question for this Friday night that's coming up for you so you know the first one right about what's on page 2 the first idea of people ruling and reigning where is the first time that that God is called a king where's the first time in story the Bible that God is described as a king and where you'll find it is precisely in the song that the people of Israel sing after they passed through the waters of the sea and Pharaoh and his armies are crushed it's a musical actually this is Exodus chapter 15 the people are liberated from their slavery and they sing a song Exodus 15 it says Moses and the Israelites saying this song to Yahweh they said I sing to Yahweh he's highly exalted the horse and the driver he's hurled into the sea talking about the destruction of Pharaoh and song Yahweh is my strength he's my defense he's become my salvation he's my god I will praise him he's my father's God and I will exalt him that's the beginning of the song and look at the last sentence right at the bottom there what's the last sentence of this song who's King Yahweh's King Yahweh reigns this King forever forever and ever so here's here's what was the story of the kingdom is about it's a story you got to have a king right the king involved there's a king who's trying to make and form a people and those people are going to be people that experience or live we're just going to say under the reign or under the rule of the king and first it was the creator god who makes the people and they instead of submitting to God's reign they want to make their own Kingdom and it all goes horribly wrong and so God takes the new people and rescues he calls them into being and what does it look like when God's kingdom or God's reign shows up he defeats evil he confronts everything that screwed up about humanity and our human kingdoms he calls it what it is and he's victorious over and he rescues his people and they need invites those people to live under his reign the next thing that happens in the Exodus story is these people that he freed out of slavery he brings them through the desert to the foot of a mountain and then at this mountain God gives these people his Torah his teaching instructions on how to live well as a human community and live under God's reign so to speak and so that's what this story is all about now how does Israel's do living obediently under God's reign with God as their king well that's where the biblical story gets even more complicated why it is because they do a horrible job because they're just too screwed up as the rest of humanity and so they run the nation into the ground because they themselves don't submit to the reign of their very God who's trying to rescue them in the first place right it's a tragic story and so Israel's poets and Israel's prophets they kept alive this hope this idea that one day God would take his world back but he would become king the God would do something where he would install his kingdom over humanity over his people Israel and it would be the right king right the creator Redeemer God over the right people the ones whom he's called who were submit immediately to his rule into his reign and the prophet Isaiah this is the last full stop we'll make on a tour the prophet Isaiah he describes this anticipation in this hope and he paints the beautiful scene in a poem that you got to place yourself on the city walls of like an ancient castle city and you're like some of the Watchmen and you're you know it's like morning time and you're anticipating news there's horrible things happening and the city could be destroyed and you see a messenger right coming down the hills and he's running and you can see like the messenger shouting you're like what what what am i hearing what's the messenger going to say that's the little story of this poem and look how Isaiah depicts it Isaiah depicts it as beautiful he says how beautiful on the mountains are the speed of those who bring good news who proclaim peace who proclaim good news they proclaim salvation they say to Zion your God is king your God reigns is king listen your Watchmen lift up their voices together they shout for joy when Yahweh returns to Zion they will see it with their own eyes so bursts into songs of joy you ruins of Jerusalem Yahweh has comforted his people he's redeemed Jerusalem Yahweh will lay bare look at this very powerful metaphor Yahweh will lay bare his holy arm in the side of all nations and all the ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God so the prophets keep this hope that despite the fact that humanity has rejected God's kingdom and even Israel has rejected God's kingdom but Yahweh will come back one day and he will reclaim his world and he will form a people who will live under his reign he will bring salvation and rescue for all the nations of the earth there you go hey guys done so that so if you're Jewish and you go to synagogue every week and you sing the Psalms every morning and every evening with with your family these are the stories and the images that are just alive in your imagination you already know all of this right and so you're that Fisher woman and you go to see the crowd of Jesus around Jesus outside the synagogue and you hear him saying something like the kingdom of God is here it's arrived and you need to make a decision about what you're going to do about it here we go so what what is the kingdom of God the kingdom of God is the story about how God is taking back his world from us and what we've done to the place now is depending on how you spin that that could sound very suspicious to you and in fact it has sounded suspicious to a lot of people and I think for good reasons I mean how many movements throughout history you guys how many movements are on like the current world scene right now who claim to be bringing some divine God's will Kingdom to bear here on earth and people need to submit to it can you think of anywhere in the world where that might be a live issue right now right and so you're right to be suspicious because there are lots of people who who forward their own agendas and call it God's kingdom but they use violence or coercion and so on and so we come to this Jesus and we're like well what kind of Kingdom is he bringing and what kind of Kingdom is he trying to build right now and lucky for us that's what the rest of Matthew chapter 4 is about so Jesus he says here it is and so you're just wondering like what's going to happen what does this mean if God's gonna return he's going to take back his world what does what does that even involved what's the first thing that Jesus does after we're giving this announcement right here what's the first thing he does this was so great he takes a walk he takes a walk on the lake like you do he just he will go there you go I mean if this is an explosive message and then the next thing is just Jesus like walking along a lake like yes it's so typical what he would do right and so here's what he does he it's these four fish right Simon Andrew and look what he says to this suspicion you know so they're not the poorest of the poor there's certainly not powerful influential guys at all fishermen and Jesus just walks up to him and there's out you know we don't know 100 meters out or something and Jesus just says hey you guys follow me I'm gonna make you fish for people now and they left their nets and they followed him now what's the story underneath that you know like what so that don't think like they were looking for a career change or something like that they're gonna just add a side fishings kind of boring or whatever this no this is like their livelihood the family it's a family business look at the next two guys so as pursue become second to there with their dad James and John they're with their dad it's the family business in the family boat the family nets and Jesus waltzes up like he owns the place and he just cost them follow me and they leave not only their livelihood they leave their dad they leave their dad and then they follow Jesus now just stop and think about this what what is Jesus doing he announces that the kingdom has arrived it's near it's right here at the doorstep and as we're going to see as we read on the story he's claiming that is that it is actually present God is taking back his world here in me Jesus says and then what I'm doing and so he announces himself as the one who's bringing God's kingdom as its king and what the first thing Jesus says he starts forming a new people now how many core disciples is he going to circle around himself close what's he doing he's doing the same exact thing that John the Baptist was doing who went back to the place of Israel's roots by the Jordan River and his saying let's reboot the story and start the Israel story over again it didn't go well it was rebooted and started again and so Jesus comes as Israel's and as the world's king and he forms the nucleus of a new people of God around himself and he asked them to submit to his rain we don't know the conversation that happened but it's this radical call like these guys they don't we're not told of any debates they have the point is that if they're going to follow Jesus it's this radical reorganizing of their priorities of their life goals of their identity I mean and specifically these twelve and seventy others they're going to become homeless with Jesus and be itinerant or whatever and this is a really big deal total reorganization so when when God calls a people into being a king what is the kingdom of God it's a story about God reclaiming his world in Jesus and forming a people who are going to live under the reign of the king now so let's think about this one a little more because this is what the next paragraph is about what does it look like once Jesus shows up and forms a people and then actually starts like taking the world back like what is the what does it look like when Jesus takes over the world alright that's what people would hear and that's what the next paragraph tells us we're told Jesus went throughout Galilee and what's he doing three things were told doing what teaching proclaiming healing so you because of current events might have in your mind some idea of what it means for someone to take over the world what does it mean when Jesus shows up it means two things first of all he goes around teaching and proclaiming and now this is really cool um the way this works out in Matthew teaching and proclaiming and what's he teaching and proclaiming what does it say here the good news of the kingdom you with me the good news of the kingdom now if you have a Bible that makes all of the words of Jesus in red which I'm guessing is quite a number of you look at the next chapter five do you see a lot of red letters loads look at chapter six red letters oh yeah chapter seven lot chapter eight not as much a lot of black and red kind of mixed together here what so what what's going on here what what Matthews doing he has compiled what does it look like when Jesus teaches and proclaims the good news of the kingdom Oh lo and behold he's given you three chapters so that you can relive the experience of the Fisher woman standing outside the crowd of the synagogue so Matthews five through seven is Jesus bringing the kingdom into being we could just say here through his word so teaching Jesus is going to explore sit with okay sorry we call this section of Matthew what's the famous name for this section of Matthew right here all those red words the Sermon on the Mount what does Matthew's title of it that we just read the good news of the kingdom so Jesus went around teaching and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom hmm I wonder what that involved appears three chapters to show you what it looked like so Matthew intentionally puts this right here so that you could hear on a given day what is Jesus teaching and proclaiming the good news what does it look like so we're going to spend the next three months right here right here that's what we're going to do for with our Sunday gatherings for the next three months and but here's what happens after that you were looking at chapter 8 and you'll see the chapter 8 doesn't have as much red because it's stories about Jesus doing stuff or sometimes saying things and if you just even scan chapters 8 and 9 and look at the headings maybe you have headings in your Bible you see that every single one of those stories is the story about Jesus doing some kind of sign or wonder or healing something utterly remarkable and so you could say you could say it this way you could say in chapters 8 & 9 is about Jesus revealing the kingdom through his deed and so this is about another two months so here we here we are what does Jesus mean when he says the kingdom of God is here well there you go the next six months we're going to explore that together as we work through the good news about the kingdom and as we work through Jesus bringing the kingdom into being but in summary Matthew's told us what it looks like when Jesus takes over world and it look and look in verse 23 it involves Jesus teaching proclaiming and healing and all of a sudden people realize who Jesus is and they have these encounters with him and they walk away totally transformed and totally changed and so it looks like people who are totally at the bottom who are the most vulnerable who are the most sick the most hurting the most unassuming they're not so really the elite they're not the healthy wealthy and wise these are the people that flock to Jesus and they find life they find healing they find good news about who God is and about and about what God is about to do on their behalf that's what it looks like when Jesus takes over the world people find themselves healed and transformed people find Jesus reading their mail and and they walk away from these encounters with Jesus and his words utterly changed and transformed that's what it looks like when the kingdom of God comes and that's because this is never this isn't just the old story about something interesting that happened in Palestine this is this is Matthew's trying to tell us the story of our world this is the story of how God is getting humanity back on track again in humanity you and I as building our own little individual kingdoms and then we organize and hundreds you know and build little tribal kingdoms based off clothing or food eat whatever and then we organize and bigger ones than that hundreds and thousands and millions and we make those kingdoms and they're kind of good and kind of really screwed up all the same time and Jesus is coming to get to the root of the issues that makes things as horrible as they are and to deal with us as human beings to end to call into being a people who will follow and to call into being a people who will begin to live under the reign of King Jesus what does it mean to live under the reign of King Jesus and here we go oh my goodness Jesus is he he is gonna he's going to Italy stick every single one of us off once in the next three months like big-time and he's going to do that because he's he's getting at the root shoes of what's wrong with us as human beings and he's not gonna let any one of us be comfortable he is as some would say going to get in your business big time and and so here's and here's any what he's going to walk around just like he did on the side of the lake saying follow me and he's going to say whoever hears my words and rejects them you're a fool building your house and your life on the sand and whoever hears my words and follows them you're wise and it's like you're building a house on a firm bedrock foundation now that takes some gumption to say something like that and and Jesus is going to do and say stuff like that but at the same that the same Jesus that waltzes around like he owns the place and summons people to follow him is the same Jesus who's the compassionate gracious one who's constantly looking for the outsider and the ones who are down and out to bring healing and hope to their lives they're not opposite Jesus's there one Jesus and that's because Jesus is here to summon us to a new way of being human he's here to both expose the the ridiculousness and the pride and the pettiness of our own little kingdoms and he's forming a new group of people who will lay down their kingdoms and just follow him that's the king and it's a radical call to leave your family you have a whole way of doing things and living as humans and it's your family and it's wood that you're living and it's what you've been doing for all these years and Jesus is just like kingdom of heavens here stop it follow me and as you do that you find life I mean the irony irony is that it sounds really intense you know submit to the king and so on but the fact that is Jesus around going around acting like he owns the place is actually the best news even I could possibly imagine because and I don't know where you're at this has to do with each of our own personal journeys some of us have already come to a place where we like yeah I totally tried defining good and evil for myself and not paying attention to Jesus at all and here's where it got me and that was the bummer because I just didn't work out at all and so a lot of us have already been there and so we're on this journey of becoming disciples of Jesus and we're discovering what it's like to live under his reign with him as our King but there might be some of us who were we're still totally at some other phase right here and Jesus is going to say stuff that's totally going to tick you off because it's going to be like awesome social justice serve the poor Jesus because he's all about that and then it's also like utter sexual integrity impurity and what do with your money and reconciling your most difficult relationships Jesus and I think most of us are stoked on this one and we're like not really into this but this Jesus here and it doesn't work like that Jesus comes walking on the lake and he sees us in the context of our lives and our families and you just follow me and it's going to be this halting revelation of who we are but also the good news of the kingdom about who about who Jesus is and so here's here's where I want to I want to land the plane here as we come to take the bread in the cup together Jesus coming as the king and calling into being a people who will submit to to his reign that's what the rest of the Gospel of Matthew will be about until Jesus is confronted by the kingdoms of this world who try to kill him and put him out so that's where this whole story is going and you and I as a community of Jesus's disciples we are being given the same opportunity to respond and hear the call of Jesus and follow and live under his reign as those four no-name fishermen right who would by the Sea of Galilee and the reason why these stories are in the gospel in the first place is so that they will actually confront us in the midst of our life activities and fishing and family and so on and Jesus just interrupts and just says dude you need to you need to follow me for some of us it will mean a huge huge life change for some of us that will mean smaller tweaks for some of us it will mean doing deep you know work inside of us about our motivations and all of the things about why we make the decisions that we make and why we are the people that we are Jesus forces us to just wade through all of that stuff and so let me let me conclude by highlighting two issues I think that this this announcement of the kingdom puts in front of us I guess yeah so one is just to clarify the reason why I wanted to take a whole message and just camp out on clarifying what Jesus means by the kingdom is because this word has gotten really how Christians used this word has gotten really sloppy in the last hundred years or so there was a movement about a hundred years or so ago of a number of churches mostly mainline denominations and they saw that a lot of churches here in America were withdrawing from the public sphere and they were with instead letting like the government take over fully the care for the poor and the most vulnerable and issues of social justice and so there's a whole movement of churches that said no we need to reclaim this is what the church has always done education and hospitals these are all things that came from the history of the church and so on and so and this was the movement called the social gospel or something like that you might be familiar with it but what happened was that the word kingdom came into play in that movement and so within that movement it became very common to talk about building God's kingdom or advancing God's kingdom or we're going to spread the kingdom as something like that and but here's what you'll find is you'll find as you read the Gospel of Matthew you won't ever ever ever hear phrases like that what you will find is Jesus calling disciples to submit to his rule in his reign and to live as participants in the kingdom and what do participants in the upside-down kingdom of Jesus do and and what did participants in the counterintuitive kingdom of Jesus do and so a whole bunch of what he's going to say is we'll you reevaluate what you do with your money so you have lots to give it away to those who are vulnerable and who are hurting it involves good works which means serving the poor in the widow and the orphan so people can see the bright light of the kingdom through what Jesus people do it involves radical commitment to forgiveness indirect halation and so on those are all things that Jesus calls his disciples to do but he never says we are building the kingdom when you do that what he says is we are entering the kingdom we are experiencing the kingdom when those things happen we we are seeking the kingdom we're participating in it whose kingdom is it so it's God's kingdom that's come among us in Jesus so who builds the kingdom Jesus builds the kingdom who advances the kingdom Jesus advances the kingdom how does the kingdom advance by forming a people who participate in it who submit to the word of the king and try to reorganize our lives and follow this radical call to come and to follow me now you might think that's just semantics and maybe it is I don't know but I think there's a real danger we need to avoid between just but here's the danger to avoid he follow errs of Jesus build institutions and organizations and churches or whatever and we are called to bear witness to Jesus in the kingdom and experience it and enter it and seek it and so on but somehow something happens when the organization that we build becomes so merged and identified with Jesus's kingdom that we come to think about our deal as the actual kingdom and we're like building the kingdom and isn't a good thing Jesus has us on his side so thing none of us none of us would ever say that I don't think but there's a danger is there because humans are screwed up and churches are screwed up I don't think that's news to any of you right because they're full of screwed-up people there's a lot of good things happen there's a lot of bad things that happen and so to completely identify any you know organization of Jesus's disciples with the kingdom that Jesus is built I just think it's dangerous and it's not the way that the New Testament talks about Kingdom the kingdom is what Jesus is doing bringing God's reign and his rule over his people and we are called to submit to it and be disciples in it and to live according to this new way of God's remaking the world which will involve all of those things that are significant but it's not the kingdom now is there's probably 30 of you that care about that topic so but I think it's important to say it and we'll explore it even more the second implication is really where I want to circle around and land about this the scene by the lake this is such a powerful scene and the story these four fishermen you know hearing the radical call of Jesus's and his announcement of the kingdom and the fact that they just leave what they're doing and they just follow for what is what is this is a model for us this is an image for us as we hear the call of Jesus now I don't think that means that every single one of us needs to quit our jobs and go be homeless or something like that so I think the point because there were plenty of Jesus's disciples who didn't Jesus did not ask to go to or around with him and become homeless than something so they stayed where they were they lived in their homes they have their communities and so on but what this story it puts this just radical mark in the sand the becoming a disciple of Jesus is not is not a story about how I'm attracted to a church or to Jesus or Christianity or something because I really like these pieces of it but then there's these pieces of what Jesus says and I'm like I just don't know what I think about that right so I love the the social care for the poor and I love this generosity theme and then when he starts talking about marriage and about sex I'm just like well that's too little too much Jesus for me right and and I just want to put it in front of us like this the way this works is not like that that's not the mindset of a disciple the mindset of a disciple is someone who's so enamored with Jesus and just because he's so awesome and the way he treats people is so amazing and the way that people walk away from their encounters with him finding themselves whole and transformed he's so awesome Jesus is so compelling and so there there comes this moment where you and I are forced with this decision about if I'm going to be a disciple of the kingdom someone who lives in the kingdom there has to be I have to start from this position of trust and so there's going to be things that I like that Jesus says there's going to be things that I don't like at all the question in that moment is as I'm going to trust him and I'm I going to trust that Jesus is calling me to become a different kind of human than I've ever known from my family or my way of fishing and like do to my life here or am I going to just step out and be like okay and be open-minded like what if Jesus is right about what it means to be a human being and like we are the ones who have all these distorted screwed up ways and that's what leads to all of our stupid decisions that we make and so the mindset of a disciple is to look at King Jesus and just say I trust you and I'm one step one day I'm going to follow you and that's going to involve very difficult decisions for every single one of us as we go along through this journey of Jesus's presenting the kingdom in Word and in deed and I don't know what else to tell you I don't know what else to tell myself it's just like one day at a time one day at a time of hearing the call of leaving my net and choosing to follow and so I'm going to conclude us in prayer news what I'd like us to do for our time of worship and communion I'd like you to get maybe it's a decision that you're in that you have to make right now in this front and center and it's a difficult decision and you're you're trying to figure out what's the way of a disciple of Jesus in this in this moment maybe some of you are in some kind of tense relational difficulty right ever had one of those before so a difficult relationship what and the way of Jesus is the way of love and giving and of generosity and of forgiveness what that's crazy and that's because that is crazy because it is crazy and it's the way of it's a way of a disciple and some so I just encourage you get whatever scenario whatever life choice that you're in the thick of right now and if following Jesus is hard and just put that in front of you and as we sing and as we reflect and as we pray I just ask you like read over these scriptures and here Jesus is called to you in this call to the fisherman and ask yourself what is the what does it mean for God to take back his world and to take back my life from myself so that I can become the kind of person that he is made possible through his life and his death and his resurrection on my behalf amen let me close with the word to prayer you

Channel: Tim Mackie Archives

Views: 68,427

Rating: 4.8886895 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: yACigFnNKwg

Length: 47min 6sec (2826 seconds)

Published: Sat Aug 19 2017