God's Creation Purpose: The Kingdom

THE PURPOSE OF GOD’S CREATION: PART 3

Blog Post Date:  11-18-2019

The intent of this planned series of articles is to illustrate the creation purpose of God.  Why did God create the heavens and the earth?  What was His purpose and what was His ultimate goal?  The Creator is Omniscient and timeless.  There is no past, present, and future with God.  Thus, He knows all things before they occur (in our manner of thinking), which means that God knew that Eve would be tempted and Adam would sin; and the result of that original sin upon the historical events for the past 6000 years.

The various stories found in the Old Testament (Covenant) offer many examples of types of shadows concerning events within the life of Jesus Christ and the apostles.  Books have been written concerning these portents.  Some non-believers have asked “why there is so much violence within the Old Testament”.  Why would a god of peace contain so much savagery in one section and then allow love and non-violence to be invoked within another?

The Feast of Tabernacles

The answer can be found within the Israelites actions prior to entering the “promised” land.  The purpose of Pentecost is to give all a down payment of the Holy Spirit in preparation for the fullness that is to come when the Feast of Tabernacles is fulfilled. The feast of Tabernacles is the third and final feast day in the law. It also represents the time that Israel was supposed to enter the Promised Land after leaving Egypt and after receiving the law at Mount Sinai.

Ten of the twelve spies, sent to survey the land, gave an evil report on the 50th Jubilee from Adam.  The people believed the evil report and refused to blow the trumpet of the Jubilee that would have announced their intention to enter the land. Thus, that day was turned into a Day of Atonement. It should have been a day of rejoicing and jubilation, but it became a day of mourning, fasting, and repentance for refusing to enter the Promised Land.

If Israel had made the correct decision on the day of Jubilee, they would have entered the Promised Land five days later on the first day of the feast of Tabernacles. Instead, God sentenced them to spending forty years in the wilderness. Ultimately, they entered the land at the time of Passover (see Joshua 3:19).  This is because Israel had been unable to rise above a Passover level of faith since coming out of Egypt. They had accepted Passover, rejected Pentecost, and now they did not have the faith to fulfill Tabernacles.

Their refusal to enter the Kingdom occurred on the 50^th Jubilee from Adam, a Jubilee of Jubilees. The purpose of a Jubilee was to return to one’s lost inheritance. In this case, the inheritance was what was lost through Adam’s sin, because this cycle had begun with Adam.

If the people had been able to overcome their fear through faith, they would have entered the Promised Land five days later on the first day of Tabernacles. It is believed that they would have become the manifested sons of God on that day and that they would have conquered Canaan during the week of Tabernacles.

Moses would have instructed them to teach the nations and to baptize them, so that the Canaanites could become Israelites in the Kingdom of God. That is, Moses would have given them the Great Commission that Jesus later gave His disciples in Matthew 28:18-20. Their conquest would have been accomplished, not by physical swords but by the Sword of the Spirit.

Instead of killing the Canaanites, they would have killed them spiritually through baptism. They would have been crucified with Christ that they might live to walk in newness of life (Romans 6:4).

The feast of Tabernacles prophesied of the immortal body that was to clothe them when that feast was finally fulfilled historically and prophetically.  Without their glorification they were admitted within the land forty years later with a completely different mindset.

The Kingdom of God (Heaven)

The many and varied theologies constructed over the past 2000 years have lost the dominant theme that Jesus primarily preached to the people of Judea – which is The Gospel of the Kingdom of God.  Many, if not all, the pastors and exegetes expounding in the various pulpits of the world seem to have lost the foundation of His primary teaching which was, AGAIN, the Kingdom of God is here.

There was no question in the mind of Jesus, who He was, and His purpose for being in the world.  It was to redeem the world by preaching the message that the Kingdom of God is now upon everyone – first in Judea then to the remainder of the world.

Luke 4:43 NET But Jesus said to them, "I must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns too, for that is what I was sent to do."

He emphatically stated “for that is what I was sent to do” and that is the primary mission of His life.  Jesus also knew that His message would come with a new standard of righteousness.  It would be in preparation of the full Kingdom of God to come at a later time.  This essential message has been ignored (or lost) by the majority (or all) of the churches.

Isn’t the Gospel about one’s personal salvation?  Yes, it would be a subplot, but the primary message is “The kingdom of heaven is at hand!”  The Gospel message is not necessarily about you but about Him.  It is about God re-claiming and redeeming a renegade portion of His creation, including the planet earth itself.  Even prior to the teachings of Jesus this news was announced by John the Baptist who was preaching in the rough territory of Judea saying, “Matthew 2:3 "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near."  Was Jesus just teaching Judea and not the Church?  Highly doubtful. 

When the baptism of Jesus occurred, it was an event that was basically unnoticed by anyone outside the Jordan valley, yet it was an event that stirred up the “god of this world” into action.

action.  The kingdom of God was at hand and here to introduce it and bring it into being was God's very own Son! Yes, the devil recognized that his throne was being challenged!  After His baptism Jesus immediately went into the wilderness to fast and pray for forty days.

At the end of His time fasting and praying, along come Satan with the intention of tempting Jesus.  It is said that Satan used the same three-fold approach that was employed against Eve: i.e. lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.  Regardless of His hunger and pain, Jesus was not led into betrayal.  Afterwards He entered Galilee full of the power of the Holy Spirit.

According to Mark's account (1:15) Jesus began His public ministry by proclaiming, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel."  Matthew's account (4:17) has Jesus saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." 

The Gospel of Luke begins the ministry of Jesus as He enters the synagogue of His hometown Nazareth.  He is given the scroll of Isaiah and He begins reading in chapter 61:1, 2a, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and the regaining of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor."  The remainder of verse 2 (and onward) deals with the millennial aspects of God’s soon coming earthly kingdom and were not appropriate for that moment in time. 

Please note that no message of placing one’s faith in Jesus Christ for salvation can be found within the Isaiah 61.  That is not saying of faith in Jesus Christ is not important.  It is highly important, but that is not the primary message that Christ is giving to us.  The primary and most important communication is that the Kingdom of God is at hand.

The coming Kingdom as exemplified by Christ was proven by many miracles.  Not just any miracle but those that needed absolutely no healing time.  They were spontaneous i.e. instant.  No recovery period at all.  The blind could instantly see, the deaf could instantly hear, and the lame could instantly walk without any rehabilitation.

Matthew 4:23-24 NET Jesus went throughout all of Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of disease and sickness among the people. (24) So a report about him spread throughout Syria. People brought to him all who suffered with various illnesses and afflictions, those who had seizures, paralytics, and those possessed by demons, and he healed them.

Jesus proved that He was more powerful than Satan by cleansing various people of demon possession.  His authority demonstrated the reality of the Kingdom of God being manifested on the earth.

The Sermon on the Mount illustrates good news being preaching to the poor and comfort coming to those who mourn (proclaim good news to the poor). 

Isaiah predicted that the "mourners" would be transformed into "oaks of righteousness" by the message of the Anointed One, that they would rebuild what had become desolate, and that God Himself...

...will direct their work in truth, and I will make an everlasting covenant with them. And their seed shall be known among the Gentiles, and their offspring among the people: all that see them shall acknowledge them, that they are the seed which the LORD hath blessed. (Isaiah 61:8-9)

Here Jesus was making it clear that He had not come to advocate lawlessness.  His message was not to be received as against the Law and the Prophets, but should instead be recognized as fulfilling the Law.  Jesus makes this clear at the beginning of His ministry, yet the Gospels go on to record that this was precisely the issue that caused so much friction between Jesus and the "Teachers of the Law." 

On one hand Jesus says that every jot and tittle of the Law will remain until heaven and earth pass away, yet on the other hand we see Jesus breaking the Sabbath (at least by the rules of the legal teachers), violating purity regulations by deliberately touching lepers and corpses, and opposing (and in fact halting) the perfectly lawful application of a punishment upon a guilty adulteress (John 8). Jesus goes on to say,

Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I say unto you, that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven. (Matt. 5:19-20)

Through all of this we must remember the spiritual nature of God's Kingdom. For Jesus the Kingdom is occurring at the present, yet at the same time it is something to be expected and anticipated that will not arrive in its fullness until the very end.  That is why Jesus can say that "the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:21) and, "If I cast out demons by the Spirit of God know that the Kingdom of God has arrived" (Matt. 12:28), while at the same time He can speak parables and make predictions that show the Kingdom arriving at the end of the age. This is the paradoxical “already but not yet” nature of the Kingdom of God.  This must be understood before we can even begin to understand Jesus' relationship with the Laws of the Old Testament.

Consider for a moment all of the jots and tittles written down throughout the Torah that concern the Levitical priesthood, the upkeep of the sanctuary, and the comprehensive and detailed system of animal sacrifices. 

Heaven and earth are both still here, yet even the most devoted "Torah-observant" Christian accepts that all of these jots and tittles are of little to no effect in the everyday life of the believer who is "in Christ."

The need for sacrifices has ceased, the Temple will soon be destroyed, and the Levitical priesthood has been replaced by the priesthood of all believers with Jesus as our High Priest.  We all realize that for all intents and purposes these areas of the Torah have been abolished by the death and resurrection of the Messiah (despite the fact that it seems that Jesus said that He had not come to abolish the first five books of the Old Testament). 

With this reality in mind it appears to become clear that Jesus' statement speaks specifically of His purpose rather than being a strict literal statement upholding "every jot and tittle" Torah observance until the end of the age. In other words, Jesus did not come for the specific purpose of abolishing the law, rather He came to fulfill it. 

Jesus made the claim to His audience that their righteousness must exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees if they want to enter into the kingdom of heaven.  The scribes and Pharisees were the teachers of the law who prided themselves on a strict and literal observance of the legal aspects of the Old Covenant down to the smallest letter, yet Jesus declared that you must be more righteous than these legal experts to enter into the kingdom of heaven.

This appears rather obvious after Jesus gives His preliminary statements of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5:1-20, ending with his remarks pointing to a higher standard of righteousness,

It appears that was precisely the point that Jesus was trying to make when He said that His purpose was not to abolish the law but to fulfill it. Jesus said, "The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached," (Luke 16:16). 

Luke 16:15-17 NET But Jesus said to them, "You are the ones who justify yourselves in men's eyes, but God knows your hearts. For what is highly prized among men is utterly detestable in God's sight. (16) "The law and the prophets were in force until John; since then, the good news of the kingdom of God has been proclaimed, and everyone is urged to enter it. (17) But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one tiny stroke of a letter in the law to become void.

Jesus fulfilled the Old Covenant but then at the same time He gave us the Kingdom of God which is known as the New Covenant.  This new kingdom is the starting point of the ministry of Jesus i.e. Isaiah 61:8.  The Sermon on the Mount is the teaching of Jesus concerning this New Covenant which founded the way to follow Jesus and to enter into the God’s Kingdom.