Good morning. Let's open this
morning's service with hymn number 19 from your Spiral Gospel Hymns
hymn book, number 19. Let's all stand together. ? Off'ring ruler, Lord of all ?
? Prostrate at your feet I fall ? ? You are holy, wise, and just
? ? I'm a creature of the dust ? ? All things move at your command
? ? Governed by your mighty hand ? Heaven, earth, and hell I see
Fulfill all your wise decree There's a man, resist his lord
Stand against the sovereign God I will bow before your throne
Seeking grace in Christ your Son through his blood and righteousness. Lord, I plead with you for grace. If you will, you can, I know. Grace and mercy to be shown. Will you, Lord, my soul forgive? Grant this sinner grace to live. I've no other hope but this,
Jesus' blood and righteousness. Now I'm conquered by your grace. In the dust I hide my face. Give me Christ or else I die. I upon your grace rely. Oh, for mercy now I plea Grant
me, Lord, the grace I need Turn, O turn to me and say All your
sins are washed away And, my son, your debt is paid He for
you the ransom made Please be seated. Good morning. The ransom price
for God's people is nothing less than the shed blood of the Lord
Jesus Christ. He requires nothing more and
he will settle for nothing less. What a sufficient ransom we have. Been bought with a price. We're
going to begin, at least, in Mark chapter 1 this morning,
if you'd like to open your Bibles there with me to the first chapter
of Mark. I want to welcome our guests from
Australia. Angus Fisher pastors the church
in Nowra, just south of Sydney. And Daisy lives in Sydney and
takes the train down to Nowra to attend services there. And
she's here with us for a few weeks. And her mom, Neda, is
with her. So we're very, very thankful
to have them. Lord William Angus will be here
with us in August. He's planning to come the end
of August and stay for a few weeks. That'll be a treat. July
the 17th, Todd Nybert is going to be here to preach for us.
And Marvin Stoniker, Lord willing,
will be here on the 15th of July. So we have some visiting preachers
to look forward to and pray for as we prepare for them. Let's
pray together. Our Heavenly Father, Once again,
you have called us out of our homes and brought us into thy
house. Lord, you've gathered us together. You've promised to meet with
us, and Lord, we know not what to do except to trust your promises
and to rest our hope in thy dear son. We thank you for the for
the Word and the Spirit of God that makes
your Word alive and effectual and sharper than any two-edged
sword. And we pray, Father, that you'd
be pleased to do that now, that you would divide us under the
thoughts and the intents of our hearts and that you would bring
us to that place of confessing our dependence on Christ and
our love and and faith in him. Lord, we know that faith comes
by hearing and hearing comes by the word of God. And so, Lord,
bless your word to that end. We ask it in Christ's name, amen. I want to try to answer the question
as to what is the kingdom of God? And how do I know if I'm
a citizen of that kingdom? What is the kingdom of God? And
how do I know if I'm a citizen of that kingdom? Notice in our
text in Mark chapter 1 at verse 14, now after that John was put
in prison, Jesus came into Galilee preaching the gospel the good
news of the kingdom of God. In Luke chapter nine, when the
Lord sent out his disciples, the scripture says that he sent
them out to preach the kingdom of God. What is the kingdom of
God? We've been studying the book
of Acts and We've seen how the Jews are accusing the believers
of rebelling against the kingdom of man and how the apostles are
defending themselves against these false accusations. They
knew, as we know, that the kingdom of God was a spiritual kingdom.
It wasn't an earthly kingdom. When our Lord was brought before
Pilate, Pilate asked him, he said, are you the king of the
Jews? And the Lord asked him a very
interesting question. He said, do you ask this for
yourself or is it because someone else told you? In other words,
do you really, and this is a question that's relevant to me and you
right now, do you ask this question for your own benefit? Or are
you only interested in winning an argument or a debate with
someone else? What is the kingdom of God? We're
not asking this question just so that we can have some ammunition
to use in defeating someone else. We're asking this for our own
benefit. And our Lord asked Pilate, do you ask this question for
your own need? Or is it because someone else
told you? What is the kingdom of God? And our Lord responded
to Pilate when he said to him, my kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom was of this world,
my disciples would fight. And Pilate went on to ask him,
he said, aren't thou then a king? And the Lord said, for this cause
came I into the world, and for this reason, to bear witness
unto the truth. And they that are of the truth
hear my voice. So one of the ways that we know
that we are citizens of the kingdom of God is that, number one, we're
not fighting against the kingdoms of this world. We are We are
citizens of another country. We're pilgrims, we're sojourners,
we're strangers in this land. Our kingdom is not of this world.
And God, by his grace, enables us to hear his voice and to believe
him and to follow after him. If my kingdom were of this world,
my disciples would fight. And Pilate responded by saying,
Don't you know that I have power to crucify you? Or power to release
you?" And our Lord told Pilate, he said, you have no power at
all except for that which is given to you from heaven. Your
kingdom is under my kingdom. I am the King of Kings, I am
the Lord of Lords, and you can only do that which I allow you
to do. What great comfort we find in
that when we get frustrated with or discouraged with the kingdoms
of men. We know that those kingdoms are
under the reign and the authority of our Lord. Luke, who was God's penman for
the book of Acts, spends a lot of time talking about the kingdom
of God. because there was a lot of confusion
among the Jews and the Romans as to what this kingdom really
was. And interesting, because when
you read the Gospel of Luke, Luke uses the phrase, the kingdom
of God, almost twice as many times as all the other three
gospel writers put together. And he's addressing a man by
the name of Theophilus. He addresses him as most excellent
Theophilus in the book of Luke, which gives us the indication
that this man named Theophilus was some sort of a Roman authority. And the Lord through Luke as
the penman is making it clear to the Romans that these Christians,
contrary to what the Jews are accusing them of, are no threat
to your kingdom. They're going to be the best
citizens you've got. They've been commanded by their God to
obey the governing authorities, knowing that there's no governing
authority that's in place except God put him there. So don't believe these false
accusations. They're citizens of another kingdom. It's a spiritual kingdom. It's
a kingdom established by faith in the heart. It's not a kingdom
of earthly power. The Lord tells us, not by might
nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord. So this is a
spiritual kingdom. My kingdom's not of this world. John chapter 14, the Lord speaking
of the Holy Spirit as the comforter, says to us, oh by the way, Theophilus,
though historically we know that he was a Roman official that
needed to hear what the Lord was saying about the believers,
But spiritually speaking, he represents each of us. Theos
is the name for God, the Greek word for God, and philos is the
word for love. And so these letters are addressed
to all the lovers of God, those who love the truth. And that's
how we know that we're citizens of the kingdom of God, that we
have not just an interest in the truth as an argument, but
we have a love of the truth in the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. My disciples, they hear my voice. They that are of the truth hear
my voice and they follow me. And now when the Lord speaks
of the comforter, he calls him the spirit of truth, whom the
world cannot receive because it seeth him not, neither knoweth
him, but you know him, for he dwelleth with you and shall be
in you. We have the spirit of God. Scripture is clear. If a man
had not the spirit of God, he's none of his that we, we must
be born of the spirit. We must have the enlightening
grace of the Holy Spirit to be able to set our affections on
things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
There's the kingdom of God. There's the kingdom of God. We're
not concerned, not going to sacrifice
our loyalty to that kingdom for any
other kingdoms of men. The scripture refers to the Lord
Jesus Christ as Christ in you, he being your hope of glory. And so we have hope for our glorification
in the kingdom of God by the person of the Lord Jesus Christ
who lives in us through faith. Our Lord in John chapter 14 goes
on to say, in that day, you shall know that I am in the Father
and that you are in me and I in you. There's our hope. Our hope is that Christ is our
life. We look in faith to the glorious person and the accomplished
work, the successful redemption of the Lord Jesus Christ for
all of our citizenship into this kingdom. We know that the Lord Jesus Christ
reigns sovereign over his kingdom and all the kingdoms that he
has delegated under him. The kingdom of God is not subject
to anything nor to anyone, as are the kingdoms of men. Scripture says that the heart
of the king is in the hand of the Lord, and he directs it whithersoever
he wills. So whatever the governing authorities
in this world do, they are doing it under the reign and authority
of our king. The King of Kings, the Lord of
Lords. The Lord puts it like this in
Romans chapter 13, there is no power but that of God. And the powers that be are ordained
of God. There's our comfort brethren.
Men identify themselves with the kingdoms of this world, don't
they? And we do to one another. We refer to ourselves as Americans
or as Australians or as El Salvadorians. You know, we all come from a
different place and we identify ourselves with that place. But those are the kingdoms of
men. And though we might defend an earthly kingdom, we know that
our citizenship is really not of that kingdom. It is of the
kingdom of God. The Lord Jesus Christ himself
sets up kings, the Bible says, and brings them down at his will. Here's another very encouraging
passage of scripture as we think about the kingdoms of men Daniel
chapter four, the Lord said, I have set over the nations the
basest of men. So next time you get frustrated
with the decisions of politicians, know that the Lord has set them
up and that they, in his estimation, are the basest of men. They are doing his bidding. He reigns over all the kingdoms
of men. The kingdoms of men are not only
under his authority, but they are, every single one of them,
temporal. They're temporary. They don't
last long. The kingdom of God is an eternal
kingdom. I love thinking about that vision
that Nebuchadnezzar had of that great image head of gold and
arms of silver and belly of brass and legs of iron and feet mingled
with clay and iron and how Nebuchadnezzar saw a hand carving a rock out
of a mountain and that rock was brought and crushed that that
symbol. That symbol represented all the
kingdoms of men. All the kingdoms of men were
represented in that. And there, the kingdom of God in the rock
of ages, the Lord Jesus Christ crushes all the kingdoms of men
and it grew into a great mountain and it became an eternal kingdom.
Now, the reason why I'm interested in being a citizen of the kingdom
of God is for that, the eternal value of that kingdom. all the other kingdoms of this
world are temporal. And it's all the men of this
world have. You know, the scripture says
that the prodigal son, when he left his father, he went out
into the world and he joined himself to the citizens of that
country. until he was finally brought
to himself and came home to his father and understood that the
citizens of that country was not the citizenship that he needed
to be concerned with. It was his relationship with
his father and being in his father's house and being a part of that
kingdom. So this is the This is the kingdom of God and this
is the importance of you and I being a member of that kingdom. Our message is not how this world
should be governed. We'll leave that up to the basest
of men under the authority of our God. Our message is the rule and reign
of the Lord Jesus Christ over our hearts and lives and over
his kingdom. That's our message. Our message is not how sinful
this world is or how men ought to sin less. Our message is Christ
Jesus, the Lord, who himself is the successful sovereign savior
of sinners. who reigns over his people, who
causes them to hear his voice and to follow him. This is the
kingdom of God. This is the kingdom that you
and I need to be concerned with. This is the kingdom that we need.
Let's just leave it there. We are, in this world, pilgrims,
sojourners, strangers, This world is not our home. When the Lord was writing in
the book of Ephesians chapter two, verse 19 to the Gentiles,
he said, God has made you to be fellow citizens with the saints
and with the household of God. There's the kingdom we need to
be concerned about, to be made fellow citizens with all the
saints of God under the sovereign reign of the Lord Jesus Christ,
who himself is King. And when the Lord makes us such,
we're not resistant citizens. No, we're willing citizens of
a loving King. You know, the kingdoms of men
are made up of lots of different forms of government. We have
a democracy of such in this country. Some men are under socialistic
governments and some are under communistic governments. But
the best government of all, which men cannot achieve, is a benevolent
monarchy. That's the best form of government,
to be under the rule of a king who genuinely loves you and has
only your best interests at heart. And we know from experience that
power corrupts, and so men are not able to maintain that position
of power and be benevolent toward their subjects. But this kingdom
is a theocracy. We're under the reign of the
Lord Jesus Christ who loves us and has loved us with an everlasting
love and has nothing but good for us. And he's proven that
love in that he laid down his life for his subjects, for his
citizens, for his children, for his people, for his elect. Hearing is love. Not that we
loved God, but that he loved us and gave his son as propitiation
for our sins. Oh, what a benevolent monarch
we have. What a loving king. And when
the Lord's pleased to reveal himself to the hearts of his
people, they bow willingly and gladly. They willingly subject
themselves to the authority and the love and the care and all
that that king has to provide for them. Are you a king? I ask this for
myself. for my own need. Pilate was asking
because, as a matter of fact, when the Lord asked Pilate that,
he said, am I a Jew? He said, I'm not concerned whether
you're a king, you know, whether the Jews think you're a king.
They're bringing these charges against you, and I've got to
settle it, lest there be some sort of uprising against the
Roman government, which we can't tolerate. But he wasn't asking
for himself. We do. We ask for ourselves,
what is the kingdom of God? And has the Lord made me a willing
subject and citizen of that kingdom? If we are, then we know that
we are completely dependent upon our God to make us so. When when one of the centurions, in
the passage we've been looking at recently in Acts chapter 24,
I think it is, asked, they were gonna scourge the apostle Paul.
And Paul said, do you do that to a Roman citizen without charges? And the centurion said, are you
a Roman? Paul said, I am. And he said, Here's what the
centurion said, I paid a great price for my freedom. And I'm
looking at you and you don't look like you have the resources
to be able to buy your freedom. Where'd you get yours from? And
Paul said this, I was free born. I was free born. I'm a man of
no mean city. I was born a Roman citizen. If
we're going to be citizens of the kingdom of God, we have to
be freeborn. We can't buy our citizenship.
We can't present to God anything worthy of us to be made citizens. He hath to birth us into the
kingdom of God, accept a man be born again. He cannot see
the kingdom of God. He can't perceive of it, can't
understand it, can't be a part of it. Got to be born of God,
got to be born of this, but got to be free born. Free born means
that we didn't do anything to earn it. Born of the spirit of
God, paid for by the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Suffer the little children to
come unto me for such. is the kingdom of God. Lord,
we don't, we're like a, and that little, that term little children
is referenced to an infant. What does an infant have to offer?
What did an infant have to do with its own birth? Nothing. It had nothing to do with it.
You know, we, We sometimes say when a mother is delivering a
baby, that baby was ready to come out. No, it wasn't. That
baby would have stayed in there forever if it could have. It
was the mother's body that couldn't handle it anymore. She forced the baby out. And
so it is in our birth. You know, the Lord forces us
out. Paul said, when it pleased God. who separated me from my mother's
womb, when He pleased Him to birth me into the kingdom of
God and to call me by His grace, this comes at the pleasure of
God. We must be freeborn. If we're looking to anything
that we've done, a prayer that we prayed or any decision we've
made or any works that we performed as the evidence or the cause
of our salvation, we're not freeborn. We can say with that centurion,
I paid a great price for my freedom, for my citizenship. What did
you pay for yours? You paid anything at all for
it. It's a false citizenship. It's bogus papers. And no one will slip through
any open borders and sneak into this kingdom. You know, we have
pretty much open borders in our country right now, but you're
not going to get into the kingdom of God that way. There are no illegal aliens in
the kingdom of God. And what I mean by that is the
law has to be satisfied in order to be a part of the kingdom of
God. It has to be maintained. It has to be fulfilled. Every,
every I has to be dotted. Every T has to be crossed. Not
a jot or a tittle will pass from the word of God. The Lord Jesus
Christ fulfilled the law of God for his citizens. Again, we're
freeborn. We didn't sneak across the border.
We didn't, we didn't do it contrary to the law. We came into the
kingdom of God through the Lord Jesus Christ, who himself is
the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believe. This
is the kingdom of God. And everyone in this kingdom
must have an advocate. You know, for a person to legally
come into this country, they've got to have a sponsor, but here
we have to have an advocate with the father. We have to have a
righteous advocate, Jesus Christ, to intercede on our behalf. So
he has to satisfy the law. He has to stand in our stead
and present himself on our behalf. And that's exactly what he does. And every citizen of this kingdom
rejoices in that. We have to be. Citizens of this
kingdom are elected by God the Father. They're redeemed by God
the Son. They're sanctified by God the
Holy Spirit. They look to the work of God
for the hope of their citizenship, for the hope of their salvation. What is the kingdom of God? And
am I a member of it? Am I a citizen in that kingdom?
Is my heart in that kingdom? Is that the kingdom of God I've
got to be a part of? John chapter 17, verse two says
that God gave him power over all flesh to give eternal life
unto them which God had given unto him. So he has the, you
see, this is why he's the king. This is why he's sovereign. He's
sovereign in salvation. He's sovereign in election. He's sovereign in redemption.
He's sovereign in sanctification. He's the king. This is the kingdom
of God. This is what our Lord was saying
to Pilate. This is what Paul, in the studies we've been doing
in the book of Acts, has been defending himself against the
Jews who say, you know, the Romans didn't make a distinction between
the Christians and the Jews. As far as the Romans were concerned,
the Jews were a sect of Judaism. And so, You know, the Jews want
to make sure that the Romans don't identify. They're trying
to blame the Christians for the very things that they're guilty
of and trying to find deliverance themselves. And Paul's being accused of the
very same thing the Lord was accused of. And he's making it clear. that kingdom of God, not the
kingdoms of man. We're not here to overthrow the
kingdom of man. How do I know if I'm a member
of the kingdom of God? I must be a part of that. It is the
first and foremost concern of my heart. That's what the Lord
said when he said, when it comes to your life in this world, what
you should eat, what you should drink, what you should wear,
what you should live, why do you fret over those things? The
unbelievers fret over those things. Your heavenly father, he knows
what you have a need for. He'll provide for you. And then he said this, but you
seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all
these other things that be added unto you. How do I know I'm a citizen of
the kingdom of God? Mary chose that one thing that
was needful for her soul. The kingdoms of men and the politics
of men and the economies of nations might have something to do with
my life in this world, but my concern is for my soul. My concern
is to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. And I'll trust my king who reigns
sovereign over all these other kings to provide for me what
I need. when I need it. But I've got
to have the kingdom of God. I've got to have Christ as my
righteousness. I've got to know him. And we renounce all other kingdoms. When the Lord makes you a citizen
of his kingdom, You renounce your citizenship in all other
kingdoms. Now, I'm not talking about earthly kingdoms. I'm talking
about religious kingdoms. You renounce all false gospels.
You know, there are countries in this world that do not allow
for dual citizenship. The United States is not one
of them. North Korea is. Iran is. Tonga is, there's countries in
this world that will allow you to have dual citizenship. And
I was thinking, what if a woman fell in love with a man from
one of those countries? And he couldn't leave, she had
to come to him. And in order for her to do that,
from America, she would have to renounce her citizenship,
give up her passport and forget all the protections and all the
benefits and all the things that America has to offer her and
move to a country like that. How much would she have to love
that man? That may be a weak illustration,
but God puts the love of Christ in your heart. You give up your
passport. You renounce your citizenship.
You don't trust in the things of men. All of your hope and
all of your trust is in Christ. The Lord told the Pharisees,
the publicans and sinners will enter into the kingdom of God
before you. Why? Because they were trusting
in their righteousness. The publicans and sinners had
nothing to trust in. They had to have Christ. They
had to have Christ. Are you a publican, a sinner?
You have nothing. You can do nothing. You know
nothing. You're completely dependent upon the Lord Jesus Christ to
reign as king and as your advocate and as your monarch and Mark 1, verse 15, the time is
fulfilled. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent ye therefore and believe. So repentance and belief, repentance
and faith are evidence of the fact that I'm a citizen of the
kingdom of God. Repentance and faith are the
gift of God. Repentance is a change of mind. There used to be a time
that I thought that I could do something to turn the hand of
God to show me mercy. Now I know that I have nothing
to offer God. I'm completely sinful, dependent
upon the Lord Jesus Christ alone to make me a citizen of the kingdom
of God. It used to be a time when we
thought God loved everybody and Christ died for everybody and
God wanted everybody to be saved. And you know, that, that you
just, you just threw in your two cents worth, you know, you
can make it happen. God gave you repentance. You
don't believe that anymore. If you still believe that, then
maybe you have to question whether or not you're a citizen of the
kingdom of God. But the believer has been given the mind of Christ. He's been given a new mind. He
doesn't believe that God loves everybody and wants everybody
to be saved and Christ made an offer of salvation for everybody.
Doesn't believe that at all. That's what the citizens of another
country believe. No, we've renounced that citizenship,
we've given up that passport. God's given us repentance, a
change of mind over what we thought about God and what we thought
about ourselves and what we thought about what it is that God required
for salvation. And he's given us faith. He's
given us hope in the Lord Jesus Christ. We're resting all the
hope of our salvation in him. in his accomplished work and
in his glorious, glorious person. He's my savior and he's my Lord
and he's got to... In Mark chapter 12, one of the lawyers came to the
Lord and said, said, Master, what's the greatest commandment?
And the Lord said, the Lord your God is one God and you must love
the Lord your God with all of your heart and all of your mind
and all your soul and love the Lord, love your neighbor as yourself.
And the lawyer approved of the answer that the Lord gave him, as if the Lord needed that approval.
The lawyer said, you've answered well. And because the Lord knew that this man understood
what was required to enter into the kingdom of God, the Lord
said to him, you are near unto the kingdom of God, in that you
know what God requires. But you'll never come through
that gate into the kingdom of God until you come to believe
who it is that satisfied what God required. Who is it that
loved the Lord God with all of his heart and all of his mind
and all of his soul all of the time, satisfied that requirement
of God? Who is it that loved his neighbor
as himself and laid down his life for his sheep? Who is it?
It's Christ. You see, to be near the gate
is not to be through the gate. Our Lord said this about men
who trust in something other than Christ. Either they're trusting
in their material wealth or they're trusting in their religious possessions,
their good works. And he said, it's easier for
a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a
rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. A man who's rich in his
own righteousness. A man who's not dependent upon
God for his salvation. He's offered something to God
to buy his way in. I paid a great price for my freedom. What'd you pay? Oh, I was free
born. It's easier for a camel to go
through the eye of a needle than for that man to enter in the
kingdom of God. And the disciples were amazed, said, Lord, who
then can be saved? Who then can be saved? And the
Lord said this. He said, with man, it is impossible. You can't renounce your riches.
You can't change your mind. Can a leopard change his spots?
Can Ethiopian change the color of his skin? Can we change ourselves? No. With man, it is impossible, but
with God, all things are possible. God has to do that, doesn't he?
Lord, make me a citizen of your kingdom. Why do you speak to them in parables?
It's what the disciples asked the Lord. And the Lord said this,
unto you, It is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of
God. If you understand the mystery of the kingdom of God, the mystery
of iniquity, that if you believe that yourself to be a sinner,
that you have nothing to buy your citizenship with, that you
must be free born. If you believe God to be absolutely
sovereign and the Lord Jesus Christ to have been absolutely
successful in everything that God required to keep the law
of God and satisfy God's justice. The mystery of God. The natural
man cannot receive the things of the Spirit. These are mysterious.
They're strange to him. They're hidden from him. But
unto you it has been given. to know the mysteries of the
kingdom of God. That's why I speak to you in
parables, but unto them, which are without, it's not been given.
It's not been given. We respond by saying, Lord, open
the eyes of my understanding, open my heart, turn me, Lord,
reveal Christ in me, make me a citizen of your kingdom. All
the kingdoms of this world, the scripture says, are a drop in
the bucket. They are a speck of dust on the
scale. That's how God described the
kingdoms of this world. The great kingdom of America
is a speck of dust on God's scale of justice. Lord, I've got to
be part of your kingdom. And the Lord Jesus Christ came
preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God. Amen? Amen. Let's take a break.