Let's open our Bibles to the book of Obadiah. Obadiah. Adam, thank you for that hymn. I want us to be able, by God's spirit and by his grace, to worship the Lord as king. I sent Adam to Title to our message tonight, and he chose that hymn. Look at verse 21. And saviors shall come up on Mount Zion to judge the Mount of Esau. And the kingdom shall be the Lord's. The kingdom shall be the Lord's.

Obadiah. servant of the Lord. What a faithful servant he has been to us. His little book, 21 verses, we call him a minor prophet. And he is minor in length, but certainly not in content. What a blessing it's been to read of God's judgment against Esau. against Edom, the grandson of Esau, against Adam, against that fleshly man, the man of the earth, our old man. That's who we are. That's who this prophecy is about.

We saw in the first few verses of this prophecy the shaming of Edom's pride. And what a blessing it is when the Lord causes us to have some understanding of our pride and causes us to bow before Him and acknowledge Him and confess to Him how proud we are. And then as Obadiah reminds us of how this man of flesh, this first Adam will be dethroned. He will be put down. He'll no longer be able to keep us from being able to worship or being able to know God, how the Lord exposes this man in us.

And then we saw last Wednesday night the annihilation of Esau and the hope that the believer has in knowing that one day, one day, this corruptible will be made incorruptible. This mortal man of the flesh will be made into the resurrected body of the Lord Jesus Christ and that we will see him as he is and be made like him.

We saw, I believe it was last Sunday, those three glorious shalls in verse 17. How the Lord shall deliver his people and there shall be holiness among them and they shall take possession of their inheritance. How certain, how certain the shalls of God are. to bless us.

And now Obadiah is going to close this prophecy under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit with this verse that we just read. The kingdom shall be the Lord's.

I want to ask three simple questions about the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of the Lord, the kingdom of Christ, these terms are used all to describe the same kingdom. They're just the same expression. And it's the kingdom that we rejoice in the thought of being subject in and not just a subject but actually members of the court of the king so that we can we can come into the very presence of of God Almighty who is our king.

My first question is what is the kingdom of the Lord? The second question is how does God bring his subjects into his kingdom. And the third question is, am I a subject in the kingdom of the Lord? That's, I've got to know.

What is the kingdom of God? The kingdom of God is distinguished from the kingdoms of men, the kingdoms of the world. You remember what the Lord Jesus said when he stood before Pilate, and Pilate thought that perhaps the rumors that were being told were true and that the Lord Jesus was planning to lead an insurrection against Rome and raise up the Jewish people. Even his disciples thought that when our Lord ascended back into glory. He said, when they said, is it time now for you to establish the kingdom? What did the Lord say to those disciples? It's not for you to know the time or the season. You go back into Jerusalem. But he told Pilate, he said, my kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my disciples would fight. It's a spiritual kingdom. It stands in stark contrast to the kingdoms of this world. And even as we say that, we must we must be reminded that the kingdoms of this world are under his sovereign reign.

Turn back with me, if you will, to Daniel chapter four, Daniel chapter four. Yes, the kingdom of God is distinguished in scripture from the kingdoms of men or the kingdoms of the world. But look what our Lord tells us about the kingdoms of this world. Look at verse 17 in Daniel chapter four. This matter is by the decree of the watchers and the demand by the word of the holy ones to the intent that the living may know. that the Most High ruleth in the kingdoms of men, in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will, and setteth it up over the basest of men."

How often we've seen that prophecy fulfilled in the political leaders of our own country and of this world. He puts over the kingdoms of men, oftentimes the basest of men. But he reigns over those kingdoms. Let us not forget.

Verse 25, look at that, look at verse 25 in the same chapter. That they shall drive thee from men and that thy dwelling shall be with the beast of the field. Now this is Daniel's prophecy against Nebuchadnezzar. because he has lifted up his heart in pride, believing that the kingdom that he reigned over was something that he had established, something that he had made happen. And so now the Lord's going to humble Nebuchadnezzar. And he says, you're going to be like the beast of the field. And he shall make thee to eat grass as oxen. And they shall wet thee with the dew of heaven. And seven times shall pass over thee till thou know. that the Most High ruleth in the kingdom of men and giveth it to whomsoever he wills.

So though the kingdom of God is distinguished from the kingdom of men, the kingdom of men is not something that men build or something that men are sovereign over. It's God. Look at verse 34. in this same chapter. Now, Nebuchadnezzar is going to be humbled. And in verse 34, it says, after these things that had been prophesied actually happened to Nebuchadnezzar, at the end of the days, I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up my eyes unto heaven, and mine understanding returned unto me, and I blessed the Most High, and praised and honored him that liveth forever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom is from generation to generation. And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing, and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay his hand or say unto him, what doest thou?

Nebuchadnezzar learned this This truth, I was going to say this most important lesson, but this glorious soul-saving truth that God reigns over the armies of heaven and over all the inhabitants of the earth. And the kingdoms of men, as he raises them up and brings them down, are all under his sovereign reign. He is King of all kings, and he is Lord of all lords. What a blessing that we serve and worship such a glorious God.

We don't have to be, we're to obey the governing authorities. God put them in place, but we know that we do it as unto the Lord, because he's the one He's the one that we look to. He's the one that we depend upon. He's the one that we follow.

How long will the kingdom that we live in last? I don't know. I don't know. The kingdoms of the world generally don't last long. In the same book, Nebuchadnezzar, you remember, has a dream. The next morning, his heart is troubled by the dream, but he can't remember what it was. And so he goes to his soothsayers, and he tells them, I had a dream. Tell me what the dream was, and then tell me what the interpretation was for that dream. And the soothsayers say, no, there's not a man on Earth that can do that. You tell us what the dream is, and we'll make up an interpretation for you. They didn't say it like that, but that's what they were going to do. And Nebuchadnezzar threatened to have them all killed.

Daniel came to the king and said, give me a night to go and pray to my God. See if he will reveal to me your dream. And he did. And when Daniel comes back to Nebuchadnezzar the next morning, he says to Nebuchadnezzar, first off, before he interprets the dream, he said, I'm no wiser than any of these other men. But God has revealed this to me. And you remember what the dream was. It was a great figure, had a head of gold. And Daniel said, that's you. You're the head of gold over this great image. And it was the Babylonian Empire.

But it won't be long that your kingdom will come down. and the arms and the chest of silver will be an image of the Medes and the Persians, which will overthrow the Babylonians. Then you'll have the belly of brass and the thighs of brass, and that'll be the Greek Empire, and it'll overthrow the Medes and the Persians. And then the Romans will come, and the two legs of iron represented the Roman Empire.

The reason I want to go through that is those four empires, are the only world empires that there's ever been or ever will be. Many have attempted to rule the world since the fall of the Roman Empire. But none ever have, and if God's word is true, none ever will. Because at the bottom of that image we see the feet of the image mingled with iron and clay. And Daniel tells him, some weak and some strong. But these nations will be mingled together, and never will there ever again be a world-dominating power, superpower, until the rock comes.

It's the rest of the prophecy. Daniel saw a rock. cut out of a mountain without the hand of a man. And this rock came and smashed the entire image. The head of gold, everything was smashed and turned to dust. And then the mountain turned in, the rock turned into a great mountain. And Daniel says, that is the kingdom of God. That is the kingdom of God.

All of these kingdoms of men come and go. The kingdom of God, as Nebuchadnezzar tells us here, is an everlasting kingdom. It's an eternal kingdom. It's a spiritual kingdom. It's a kingdom I want to be a part of, a kingdom that will never fail, never stumble, a kingdom that's reigned by our sovereign God.

Revelation chapter 11, at the end of all these earthly kingdoms, the kingdoms of the world have become the kingdoms of the Lord and his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever. I'm thankful for the freedoms and the prosperities that we've enjoyed in our country. these so many years. How much longer they'll last? I don't know. I don't know. But that's not my hope. And I know it's not your hope.

Our hope is whatever God does in this world with the kingdoms of men, that we have a place and a part in the kingdom of God. That's what Obadiah tells us, after all is said and done, after Esau is to be no more, then the kingdom shall be the Lord's. It shall be the Lord's. And it won't be like the kingdoms of men. You know, the kingdoms of men are measured by different types of government. There are dictatorships. There is communism. There is a republic. There is democracies. There's monarchies. There's been all sorts of forms of government. And yet, the kingdom of God is a spiritual kingdom. And it is a theocracy. And a benevolent monarch

We have found in history that power corrupts. Power corrupts because men are sinners. But oh, what a blessing it is to be a part of the kingdom of God, to have the Lord who is incorruptible, the one who is holy and undefiled and separate from sinners, reigning in perfect love over his people. This is the kingdom of God. It's not like the kingdoms of this world.

The kingdoms of this world are measured by material wealth. The kingdoms of this world, some like the toes of the figure of Nebuchadnezzar, some iron and some clay, some weak, some strong, some poor, some rich. We measure the kingdoms of this world by per capita income by GDP. We use monetary measures to find out what the value of a kingdom is. And yet, being in the kingdom of God, everything, everything is on the table for the pearl of great price. The value of money is of no significance whatsoever. No person who is a member of the kingdom of God would take the whole world for their part in that kingdom. You could not persuade them if you offered them all the kingdoms of the world and all the wealth of the world. What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? This is the kingdom.

The Lord tells us in James chapter 2, God has chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom. Heirs of the kingdom. Comparatively speaking, to the rest of the world, I think we could all consider ourselves to be well off monetarily. And yet, when we stand before our God, the hope that we have is not based on anything that we have in this world.

And just as the Lord said that for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven, It's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. A man who is rich not in material wealth, a man who's not willing to lay down everything for Christ, or doesn't consider it all but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ, but a person who's rich in their own righteousness, they're rich in their own good works, they're rich in their own ability to save themselves. All of that, what did the Beatitudes start? Blessed of God are those who have been made poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God.

So when James says God has chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith, he makes us poor regardless of what our standing might be. Monetarily in this world, all of God's people come before him poor, poor of spirit, in need, in need of the Lord to provide for them what they cannot provide for themselves.

Though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that through his poverty we might be made rich. Rich he was, inhabiting the throne of heaven before he came into this world. And though he was rich, yet he became poor. Born of a virgin, born in a stable, worked as a carpenter, and then went to a Roman cross. and became poor before God, that we might be made rich through His poverty.

The kingdom of God is not measured in the same way that the kingdoms of this world are measured. Kingdoms of this world are measured by military might, how strong the army might be, and whenever a weaker nation is made subject by the strength of a stronger, they're invaded by a stronger nation, those people are resentful and reluctant to become servants of the conquering nation. And yet what a contrast it is when the Lord comes to conquer and conquering our hearts. and how beautiful it is when he makes us willing in the day of his power.

Turn with me to Revelation chapter six. Revelation chapter six. Verse one, and I saw when the lamb opened one of the seals And I heard, as it were, the noise of thunder, and one of the four beasts saying, come and see. Come and see what? And I saw, and behold, a white horse. And he that sat on him had a bow, and a crown was given unto him. And he went forth, conquering and to conquer." What a glorious Savior. He conquered sin, he conquered death, he conquered Satan when he came to conquer. And he rose victorious and ascended back into glory. And now, by the power of his Holy Spirit, he conquers the hearts of his children. He makes them willing servants. He brings them into his court. And shows them glimpses of His grace and His glory, His beauty and His strength. And they worship Him. They worship Him in the power of the Holy Spirit.

You're there in Revelation. Turn with me to Revelation 19. Verse one, and after these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven saying, hallelujah, salvation, and glory, and honor, and power unto the Lord our God, for true and righteous are his judgments, for he had judged the great whore, which did corrupt the earth with her fornications, and hath avenged the blood of his servants at her hand. And again, They said, hallelujah. And her smoke rose up forever and ever. And the four and 20 elders and the four beasts fell down and worshiped God that sat upon the throne saying, amen, hallelujah.

When God brings destruction against this world, believers are going to know that what he's doing is for his glory. And the only thing that will consume their hearts is his glory. Lord, hallelujah, this is to your glory. And a voice came out of the throne saying, praise our God and you servants and you that fear him, both small and great. And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude and the voice of many waters and the voice of mighty thundering saying, hallelujah, for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth. By grace now and in glory forever. We worship our God who reigneth, who reigneth.

This is the mark of a subject in the kingdom of God. And how much in contrast it stands against the one who would say, we'll not have that man reign over us. We'll not bow. We'll not submit. We'll not worship. We'll not rejoice. Verse seven, let us be glad and rejoice and give honor to him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and his wife has made herself ready. And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white, for the fine linen is the righteousness of the saints.

The Lord makes us meet to worship him. by giving us the righteousness of Christ. We're able to come before the throne of grace, before the throne of our God who reigns sovereign, and we're able to do it boldly. We're able to do it with confidence. This is our confidence. This is our boldness in the day of judgment, that as he is, so are we. Here's the bride of Christ being able to enter into worship of her King. Psalm 22. This is the psalm that begins with, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? This is the psalm that our Lord quoted from on the cross when The skies were darkened, and the father could not allow his eyes to look upon Christ. He was forsaken of the father, having been made sin, having been made sin. And yet the father says that the kingdom is the Lord's In the end of Psalm 22, they shall come and worship him and declare his righteousness unto the people that shall be born and they shall confess that he hath done this. He hath done this.

Go back with me to our text. This is spiritual kingdom. That's that's engaged in the Spirit, in the power of the Spirit of God. It's what the Lord told the woman at the well, that the day is coming and now is that the Father seeketh those that will worship Him in Spirit and in truth, according to the truth of the gospel and in the power of His Holy Spirit. So that's the kingdom of God.

How does God bring his subjects into this kingdom? Well, go back with me to our text in Obadiah. And saviors, notice that it is plural. And the word there is also translated deliverers. And saviors shall come up on Mount Zion to judge the Mount of Esau.

Turn with me to 1 Timothy chapter four. 1 Timothy chapter four. Paul's writing to Timothy. He's going to tell him to preach the word. But here in verse 16 of 1 Timothy chapter four, he says, take heed unto thyself and unto the doctrine. Continue in them for in doing this, thou shalt both save thyself and them that hear thee. This is the fulfillment of what the Lord is telling us in Obadiah verse 21, that the Lord's going to raise up saviors.

The men are not saving anyone. I've heard preachers talk about how many People have been converted under their ministry. You don't have any idea who's actually being converted. We won't know who's saved or who's not saved till it's all said and done. How many times I've been so encouraged with somebody only to watch them years later fall away. How many times I've thought, well, they're not hearing a word, only to see them show such great evidence of loving Christ. We can't tell. We can't tell.

So we're not going to say, well, I did this or I did that. No. The ones being referred to here call themselves unprofitable servants. They call themselves nothing but a voice of one crying in the wilderness. And yet God raises up shepherds after his own heart. And he gives them a message. and they are his ambassadors. And an ambassador can only say what the king tells him to say. He can't add his opinion to it and he can't water it down.

An ambassador, turn with me to 2 Corinthians chapter five. Let's read that passage real quick. 2 Corinthians chapter five. Look at verse 18, 2 Corinthians chapter five, verse 18. And all things are of God who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ and has given to us the ministry of reconciliation. This is the means by which God brings his subjects into his kingdom. through these saviors, these deliverers that he raises up in Zion. To wit that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, and has committed unto us the word of reconciliation.

Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us. We pray you in Christ's name, be ye reconciled to God. For he, the Father, hath made him, the Son, sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." Salvations of the Lord. God does it all from beginning to end. If we call upon the name of the Lord, it's because He gave us faith to call upon him. How shall they call upon him in whom they've not believed? If we believe upon him, it's because somebody told us about him. How shall they believe on him in whom they've not heard? And if we hear, if we hear the gospel, it's by someone that God sent. And how shall they, how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach except they be sent. So that's what Obadiah is saying. The way that the Lord brings his subjects into his kingdom is through the preaching of the gospel. He uses the foolishness of preaching. And what a blessed means it is. Everybody's humbled by it. We're not asking for men's opinion. We're just being faithful stewards and ambassadors of the message that's been given to us by the King.

Now notice back in our text, I want you to see something. Part of this message, well, the message cannot be preached without this. The message cannot be preached without this. Yes, we preach Christ and him crucified. But the message also has to be declared in contrast to the error of the lie, because men by nature believe the lie.

And so look what he says, and saviors shall come up on Mount Zion to judge the Mount of Esau. In other words, we preach the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace in the glorious person and finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ in contrast to the gospel of Esau, the gospel of the flesh, the message of works, the message of man's free will. There is no place where these two come together.

You hear a preacher say, well, you know, there's a sense in which God loves everybody. There's a sense in which Christ died for everybody. There's a sense in which man has a will to make a decision to accept or reject the gospel. He's not, he's not making a judgment against Esau. There is no sense in which God loves everybody. Jacob I've loved. Esau I've hated. I love righteousness. I hate iniquity. All the love of God is found in Christ. There's no sense in which God wants everybody to be saved. If he wanted everybody to be saved, everybody would be saved. He's elected a particular people, and he's performed their salvation.

You see, there's no way that these ambassadors, these preachers, can preach the gospel without exposing the error of the false gospel. There's no way they can do it. And that's what El Padilla is telling us. The saviors are going to come. They're going to come up on Mount Zion. They're not going to find them anywhere else. Nothing in the Bible about parachurch organizations or any other The ministry of the gospel happens through the assembly of God's people. It happens through the church.

And what they're gonna do is they're going to, yes, they're gonna preach Christ, but in preaching Christ, they're gonna pass judgment on Esau. And let us not forget, brethren, what we've seen in the past several weeks concerning Esau in this book. Esau's, yeah, he's the world. He's the world. But I'm a whole lot more concerned about the world here than the world out there. I'm a whole lot more concerned about the Pharisee here than the Pharisee out there. A whole lot more concerned about the Esau that lives in my old man than the one that rules false gospel.

And so when a faithful man who's been called of God to preach the gospel stands up in Zion and passes judgment against Esau, he's not just pointing his finger out there in the world and exposing the false gospel, he's at the same time lifting up Christ. It's like we've heard so many times, you can't preach Christ high enough. You can't preach sinners low enough. And you can't preach grace free enough. And the ambassadors that God calls does all three of those. This is the way in which the Lord brings subjects into his kingdom.

Now, the last question quickly. Am I a subject in the kingdom of God? Well, do I believe my God reigns? Not just in creation. Yes, he does. A lot of people would agree with that, that there is a God in heaven who has made everything as it is, and he holds it all together by his omnipotent sovereign will and power. Yes, we believe that. What about providence? You hear people all the time say, well, you know, everything happens for good and, and, um, you know, God, God's doing it and we don't understand it, but you know, the, the Muslims in the mosque just on the other side of our parking lot will, will praise Allah believing that whatever happens, he did it. We believe that God is sovereign in providence, we do. We believe that he works all things together for good for them that love him and those of the called according to his purpose.

But what about salvation? Does he reign there too? Did he, according to his own sovereign will and purpose, have the right to choose a particular people? before time ever was? Did the Lord Jesus Christ actually accomplish the salvation of an elect people when he hung his head on Calvary's cross and said, it is finished? Did he fulfill all righteousness for them? Did he satisfy the demands of God's law and put away their sin once and for all? Did he do it? His salvation of the Lord? Did he arrest me on the road to Damascus when I was riding on my high horse in pride, believing that I had done something, that God was obligated to bless me because of some good thing that I had done? And did he, by the power of his spirit and according to the truth of his gospel, shine a light from heaven and knock me off my high horse and put my face in the dirt? Paul said that his conversion was a pattern for all believers. It was a pattern. All believers saved in the same way he was saved. Brought down, humbled. Lord, what would you have me to do?

Or did I make a decision one day and evidence that decision by something that I've done? Salvation in election, salvation in redemption, salvation in regeneration is all of the Lord. He gets all the glory. He's king. He reigns sovereign in salvation. What about my sanctification? Oh, Lord, restrain the evil nature of my sin. Lord, keep it from manifesting its ugly self. in my life. And Lord, whatever restraining of sin there is in my life, Lord, you get the credit for that. You get the glory for that. And whatever is profitable in my life, whatever might have been a blessing to God and to others, Lord, you did that. You did that. And whatever growth and grace that I have and whatever knowledge of Christ that I grow in, Lord, you did that. You get all the glory in my sanctification. And the more I grow in grace, the more I realize how dependent upon you I am every day.

Lord, if I'm going to be accepted into heaven, into that eternal kingdom of God, You will have to, you will have to vouch for me. You have to present yourself on my behalf. Lord, I don't have a word to speak. I've got no defense for myself. I've got nothing that I can offer to God to obligate him to save me or to accept me. You're going to have to keep me and you're going to have to present me. faultless before the throne of God.

Lord, you're king. You're king in creation. You're king in Providence. Most importantly, you're king in my salvation. How do I know I'm a subject? Because I love that. I love knowing that the sovereign, omnipotent God of creation reigns, reigns. And I look forward to that day when I'll be able to worship Him as I ought.

We bow to Him. We believe on Him. We rejoice in Him. We worship Him. And we long for that day when we'll see him as he is.

We saw Sunday from John chapter 10, the sheep hear my voice and they follow me. Strangers, they will not follow. Strangers, they will run from. All that came before me were thieves and robbers. came in some other way, robbing from our king his glory, his glory, taking it to themselves.

Lord, is this not the evidence that we're subjects of his kingdom? And we delight that we would not say that those unfaithful servants will not have that man reign over me. Lord, I need you to reign over me. If you don't reign over me, Lord, I see enough evidence every day in my life, a mess I can make of things.

and saviors shall come up on Mount Zion to judge the Mount of Esau and the kingdom shall be the Lord's.

Adam. 127. Let's stand together. 127.