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Posted by Tentmaker
[A piece of part 13 of "The Kingdom of God" By J. Preston Eby found
at the
'My Father's House and the Kingdom of God site.' (whole article
linked below)]
Men would rather crown Jesus King in Jerusalem, Israel
or in London, England
than in their own hearts. Let us suppose that Jesus is
crowned King in the
city of Jerusalem—suppose He returned in that same nail-scarred
body;
suppose He sat upon a throne ruling over the Kingdom
of God on earth in the
Holy Land, at Jerusalem. I can tell you, dear ones, that
every airplane
flying to the Middle East would be loaded with people
going to see Jesus.
Every mail-bag would be full of letters from those sick
and afflicted, those
in difficulty and trial, and gifts of homage to manifest
men's gratitude and
love. You yourself, let us say, are on one of those airplanes.
And I do not
doubt for one moment that even many who read these lines
would be scrambling
for tickets to Israel! The Ben-Gurion International Airport,
when you arrive
after your long flight, is blocked with planes from every
nation.
After circling the airport for a dangerously long time
you land, and board
one of the multitude of tourist buses headed from Tel
Aviv up to Jerusalem.
Far as the eye can reach, the traffic creeps over the
highways in an endless
stream. You do not mind the scorching sun, the choking
dust, the rude
drivers, the elbowing crowds. You are in the Capital
of the Kingdom of God
on earth, and you will see Jesus! Yonder, at last, in
the far distance, are
the glittering spires of the Holy Hill, above the burnished
temple dome
beneath which He sits. But what is that dark seething
mass stretching for
miles and miles between you and the Holy City? They have
come from the north
and from the south, and from the east and from the west,
as you have, to
look upon their King. They wish that His hands might
be placed upon their
head; that His arms might be thrown around them; that
His eyes of compassion
and love might be fixed upon them, and His voice of power
fall into their
ears. But it cannot be. You have come to have an audience
with the King, but
you will not see Him! They have been there for weeks,
months, years, and
have not seen Him. They are a meter or two nearer, and
that is all. The
thing is impossible. It is an anti-climax, and absurdity.
It would be a
social outrage; it would be a physical impossibility.
If there were only one hundred million saints of God in
the whole world,
gathered out of all ages, and each scheduled a personal
interview with
Jesus; should Jesus spend only ten minutes with each;
it would be exactly
1901.3 years before your turn would come, and then another
two thousand
years before your next ten minute audience with the King!
And during all
that time Jesus would not have attended to any matters
in the entire
universe other than these interviews twenty-four hours
a day, unceasingly
for millenniums! It should be obvious to every thinking
mind that knowing
Christ and crowning Him King and communing with Him and
walking with Him
must be upon some basis other than His individual, physical,
appearance upon
a material throne somewhere in the world!
So He says to all today who would crown Him in Jerusalem
or in London or in
any other place where He might be found, "It is very
kind and earnest of you
to come so far, but you mistake. Go away back from the
walls of the Holy
City, over the sea, and you will find Me in your own
home. You will find Me
where the shepherds found Me, doing their ordinary work;
where the woman of
Samaria found Me, drawing the water for the noon meal;
where the disciples
found Me, mending nets in their work clothes; where Mary
found Me, among the
commonplace household duties of a country village; where,
since the day of
Pentecost, all who have sought Me have found Me— within
their very own
hearts." "If a man love me, he will keep my words: and
my Father will love
him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with
Him. Yet a little
while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me:
because I live, ye
shall live also. At that time ye shall know that I AM
IN MY FATHER, AND YE
IN ME, AND I IN YOU" (Jn. 14:19-20,23).
Would that I had language to express a truth so infinite!
The visible
incarnation of God in the physical man Jesus Christ must
of necessity be
brief. Only a small circle could enjoy His actual presence,
but a great and
glorious and universal kingdom like the Kingdom of God
needed a risen and
glorified King. "I tell you the truth; It is expedient
for you that I go
away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come
unto you; but if I
depart, I will send Him unto you...even the Spirit of
Truth; whom the world
cannot receive, because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth
Him: but ye know
Him: for He dwelleth with you (as Jesus), and shall be
in you (as the
Spirit). I will not leave you comfortless: I will come
to you" (Jn. 17:7;
14: 17-18). It was expedient for the whole body of Kingdom
subjects that He
went away. He would be nearer man by apparently being
further. The
limitations of sense subjected Him while He stayed. He
was subject to
geography, locality, space, and time. But by going away
in glorification He
was able to return in mighty Spirit-power, the incorruptible
river of God's
divine and eternal life, to flow and flow and flow, age
after age,
unceasingly, unlimitedly and untiringly into humanity
as LIFE. My soul
shouts a thousand hallelujahs that He went away! And
He has come again. The
King of glory has come to His temple of living stones
and is crowned in the
throne room in the hearts of redeemed men, new creation
men, the sons and
daughters of the Most High God! Should Jesus be crowned
in the flesh, it
would no more bring the Kingdom of God to earth than
crowning any of the
other kings of the world. We are to crown the Lord, the
Spirit, as King in
every place in our being, outer and inner.
It was the humiliation of France, in the fifteenth century,
that her king
Charles VII, was not crowned in the proper city, where
former kings were
crowned. Joan of Arc, burning with the high resolve to
remove this dishonor,
and have the king crowned in Rheims, emerged from obscurity,
gathered an
army, drove the enemy back from one point to another,
until she dislodged
him from Rheims. The king came then. The crown was placed
upon His brow in
the right place; and the fair maiden, Joan, bowed at
the foot of the throne,
the tears of joy streaming down her beautiful cheeks.
Where are we to crown
our King? We are to crown Him in the most sacred and
authoritative chamber
of our nature from whence proceed the impulses and propensities
of our
spiritual life. Jesus taught His disciples to pray, "Thy
kingdom come, Thy
will be done in earth, as it is in heaven." So then the
Kingdom of God
originates in the realm of spirit (heaven) and finds
expression in the
physical realm (earth). If you walk after the spirit
you will live, you
receive the crown of life, the crown which IS LIFE, the
dominion of life out
of your spirit. The authority of life is in the spirit,
even the Spirit of
Life in Christ Jesus. And this Spirit of Life is in YOUR
SPIRIT, AND FROM
THENCE HE WOULD BE CROWNED AND RULE IN LIFE OVER THE
KINGDOM OF YOUR BEING.
Ah, the thing of importance is that the King be crowned
in the right place.
We are to crown Christ as King in every place of authority
in this earth,
but first and foremost, in every human heart.
Many years ago a brother wrote of his visit to Westminster
Abbey in London.
"I remember how," he recounted, "when in the Jerusalem
Chamber attached to
Westminster Abbey, where the last revision of the Bible
took place, the
verger conducted us through a door, and down a dismal,
low-roofed, winding
corridor, bare and unadorned. He told us that the heir,
or heiress, to the
crown of Great Britain, in former years, had to spend
some time in the
chamber, and then pass down this dark and forbidding
passageway, to the
place in the great cathedral where the crown was to be
received." So,
precious friend of mine, when you conduct the King to
the place of crowning
in your nature, you may have to escort Him down a winding
passageway,
intricate with illusions, fears and wild distortions
of the carnal mind,
dismal with sin, sickness and weakness, bare and jagged
with earthly
consciousness and evil tendencies, on through the gloom
and grime of
corruption and death, to the most sacred altar of your
heart. There crown
the Omnipotent Ruler—the Spirit —and implore Him to arise
and cleanse and
purify all your entire nature every whit. Bid Him write
His laws upon your
very heart, so that it cannot beat unless it beat in
conformity with the
TRUTH and LOVE and RIGHTEOUSNESS and POWER and LIFE and
VICTORY of the
KINGDOM OF GOD'S GLORIOUS CHRIST! Then you will know
the reality and
dominion of the Kingdom of God within.
The word "kingdom" is derived from the two terms "king"
and "dominion"
—KING'S DOMINION. It exists wherever the dominion of
the Christ rules and
holds sway over the hearts of men. Christ is the great
King right now,
ruling all things for the well-being of His subjects
and bringing absolute
perfection and completion to His plans which He ordained
before the
foundation of the world. He is the King of the ages and
invincible. He is
establishing His Kingship in all its power within His
elect in the earth.
God's elect are the seat of His Kingdom in the earth
at this present time.
Though He has all power in heaven and in earth, He is
not ruling anywhere in
the measure that He is ruling in the hearts of His beloved
sons and
daughters who are being called to His Kingdom and His
glory. He shall yet
arise in power and in glory from that throne in His completed
and perfected
body—the MANIFESTED SONS OF GOD—and reveal Himself as
the great conquering
King, initiating the mightiest of all campaigns, bringing
deliverance to the
whole creation, reconciling all things unto Himself,
and then shall all know
the glory of His Kingdom as every tongue confesses and
every knee bows, and
all in that day declare that JESUS CHRIST IS LORD. At
the triumph of His
Kingdom sin, sickness, sorrow, pain and death all flee
away to be remembered
no more in the consciousness of creation.
He is the great King of kings and Lord of lords, crowned
with glory and
honor, and His Kingdom rules over ALL. And, praise His
name, He is even now
bringing forth in the earth a KINGDOM PEOPLE— the firstfruits
of His
redemption—who are discovering His Lordship over all
of their lives. When
all hell assails those who have been called in this day
to His Kingdom, when
the power of death all around crowds in upon us and would
suffocate us, when
the pressures of this world would frustrate and vex us,
when our own soulish
passions and emotions and self-will would drown us in
a sea of carnality and
ungodliness, HE THEN STANDS UP WITHIN US AS KING—in Kingly
authority. When
the outer man, the flesh, the carnal mind, mortal consciousness
of this
gross material realm, would tear us apart, frustrate
our lives, suffocate
our inner reality, and smash our sonship upon the rocks,
HE IS THERE, the
still small Voice, that deep, Inward Knowing. Let us
learn of the real and
eternal, and make way for the reign of the Spirit, the
Kingdom of Heaven,
the rule of His Truth and Love and Life within each one
of us. Thank God, in
every situation and circumstance of life HE IS PRESENT
TO SUBDUE ALL THINGS
UNTO HIMSELF, thus reigning as King over our domain.
Not in heaven, not
during the millennium, but right now "we see Jesus...CROWNED
with glory and
honor" within our own experience. Hallelujah!
HOW THE KINGDOM COMES TO EARTH
Yes—the Kingdom of God is within you. Do you yearn, as
I do, to see the muck
of television and the mire of movies cleaned up, politics
made honest and
honorable, sexual relationships sanctified, the divorce
rate reduced to
zero, education employed as an instrument to glorify.
God, and a thousand
other glaring ills of society cured? There is only one
way. The rule of God
in the hearts of men will transform society in all its
relations. The new
order of the reign of God works from the inside outward
for the renewal and
transformation of every department of earthly existence.
From the power of
the Kingdom goes forth a regenerating power into art,
culture, philosophy,
politics, commerce, education, science, literature, economics
and social
programs, and when all these areas have been brought
under the control of
God's nature reproduced in men, the Kingdom of God has
come in the earth.
None of these objectives can be attained through legislation
or coercion,
but only by regeneration and transformation. The principle
is as clear as it
is certain—the Kingdom of God is within you! When God
reigns in a man's
life, all of the relations of his life are brought within
the sphere of the
Kingdom. Your home should be a Kingdom home, with Christ
influencing and
controlling all its relationships and activities. Your
business should be a
Kingdom business, not conducted by the spirit and standards
of the world,
but after the spirit of divine love and righteousness.
Your school should be
a Kingdom school. Your church should be a Kingdom church,
for the Kingdom is
greater than the church. Your city should be a Kingdom
city. Your state
should be a Kingdom state. Your nation should be a Kingdom
nation. Your
government should be a Kingdom government. And planet
earth must become a
Kingdom planet. The outer, natural world must be brought
under the dominion
of the inner, spiritual world. If heaven doesn't come
to earth then the
Lord's prayer is never answered, "Thy kingdom come, thy
will be done in
earth, as it is in heaven." That is happening to us right
now as our bodies
and souls are brought under the dominion of the life
of the indwelling
Spirit.
Out of the dominion of the spirit our souls are being
saved and even this
mortal shall put on immortality and this corruptible
shall put on
incorruption. The Holy Spirit is turning us inward. As
we turn from the
outer to seek the reality of the Christ within we discover
that our goal in
life is not to make money, accumulate things, or fulfill
earthly ambitions
and pleasures. If that is our goal, then we need to set
our priorities
straight. You see, in the world within, that world which
you are, there is
no money and there are no things. There is no need for
money and there is no
need for things. The only need for money and things is
in the world on the
outside. But if we go out and try to seek that which
is on the outside, then
we have left the Kingdom. "Take no thought, saying, What
shall we eat? or,
What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?
For after all
these things do the Gentiles (and the prosperity people)
seek. But seek ye
first the kingdom of God and His righteousness..." (Mat.
6:31-33). The
Kingdom of God is within you. The world of the Kingdom
is that inner world
of the spirit. There are two dimensions of "you"—the
outer you and the inner
you. Paul refers to these as the "outward man" and the
"inward man". "Though
our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed
day by day" (II Cor.
4:16). The outward man is the visible, tangible and fleshly.
The inward man
is the invisible man of spirit. The inward man is born
of God. Some people
hold the crude notion that should the outer man go by
way of the grave the
inner man would likewise perish—you would be gone, unconscious,
non-existent, body, soul, and spirit, until the day of
resurrection. No way!
The outward man is of the earth, the inward man is from
heaven. The outward
man is from Adam, the inward man is from Christ. The
outward man is born of
the flesh, the inward man is born of the Spirit. God,
Christ, and the Spirit
would all have to be susceptible to death in order for
the inward man to
perish!
To choose or seek anything in the outer world, whether
it be a job, money,
relationships, or possessions, must be for the divine
purpose of expressing
the inward through the outward. Anything that does not
fulfill that purpose
has nothing eternal or of God-substance or life in it.
It is void. It is
vanity. It is temporal. It is death. So choosing a vocation
is not for the
purpose of making money, but to fulfill the will of God,
to express His life
and bless the world. The carnal mind says, "If I live
for God and bless the
world, then I get nothing for myself." But that isn't
true—because the real
world is not the one out there, it's the one within.
The world within is one
of love, life, light, joy, peace, grace, faith, righteousness
and blessing.
Therefore the inner world delights to bless all men on
whatever level they
are, asking nothing in return. The outer world, on the
other hand, is one of
selfishness, ego, pride, avarice, greed, stinginess,
corruption and
meanness. The resources of the inner world are unlimited,
for they draw out
of God; the resources of the outer world are finite.
People who live only in
the outer world feel they have a right to cheat one another,
take advantage
of one another, use one another and oppress one another.
You can hardly
trust anyone in the business world today, everybody is
out for himself. They
are not for the people they serve, they are in it for
what they can get out
of it, and they will lie, misrepresent, cheat or steal
to come out on top.
Men will do that to you because they believe that when
they do that to you
they are not doing it to themselves, because that's the
way it is out in
this world. They are living by the spirit of the world.
They know nothing of
the reality, power, purity, and glory of the inner world,
so their
perceptions in the outer world are distorted.
All our choices in the outer world should serve to extend
the reality of
what we are in the inner world. When we choose a job
or any activity, we
don't choose on the basis of its value in the outer world,
we choose that
which will serve as a vehicle of expression for the inner
man. That's where
peace is. That's where joy is. That's where fulfillment
is. And that's where
success is! "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His
righteousness, and all
these things shall be added unto you!" That's where the
Kingdom is, that's
where life is, that's where reality is, that's where
heaven is. So many
people work on their job just to make money, just to
pay the bills and put
food on the table. They don't really like the job and
are miserable. That is
what the outer world calls "making a living." But making
a living is more
than making money, for "a man's life consisteth not in
the abundance of the
things which he possesseth" (Lk. 12:15). To make a living
means, first and
foremost, to LIVE! It's making what you are live! It
denotes quality of
life, and the only life of quality is the inward man—Christ.
"She that
liveth in pleasure, is dead while she liveth," saith
the Lord. You will know
true joy when your inward man lives through your outward
man, your inner
world is expressed through your outer world. Matters
not what you do
outwardly, where you live, what your job is, what your
responsibilities
are—when your inward life is dominant all outer things
are affected,
sanctified, transformed, swallowed up. As sons of God
we are not victims of
either money, things, or circumstances. These are not
able to take away our
peace. They are unable to rob us of our joy. They cannot
take our life. The
Christ within is our peace, our stability, our reality,
our substance. That,
my beloved, is the power and glory of the Kingdom of
God!
When the mind of Christ has mightily conquered, the state
of things is
called the Kingdom of God. Where hearts are transformed,
where man's
mistaken identity is replaced by the knowledge of his
sonship to God, where
communion with the Father is begun and deepened, there
the Kingdom of God
has come. The Kingdom of God brings a way of thinking
and living that seems
contrary to logic. It is not something you could have
guessed. It breaks in.
It startles. It overwhelms. It opens vistas so breathtaking
that we can
hardly stretch our minds and spirits to take it in. It
is a new, vibrant,
mysterious, revolutionary, dynamic, powerful life-style.
Men and women today
can experience the Kingdom of God in their lives. Anyone
in this world who
is willing to put on the mind of Christ and be joined
in union with God can
live in its power and glory everyday.
The seventeenth century English mystic, George Fox, penned
these
inspirational and instructive words. "The pearl of the
Kingdom of God is hid
in the field, and the field is the world, and the world
is in your hearts,
and there you must dig deep to find it; and when you
have digged deep and
found it, you must sell all to purchase and redeem this
field. And there you
shall know the merchant-man that makes the exchange,
and there you shall
know Christ in you the hope of glory, to save you and
redeem you, the
Immanuel, God with us. And there you shall know the woman
that lost the
piece of silver, and was seeking it without; but when
the candle was lighted
and the house swept, she found it in her own house, and
then she did know
the joy, and went and told her neighbors; and then she
did know the day-star
arise in her heart, and the day dawning, whereby the
light shall be known
that shines from the east to the west, and the word of
faith in the mouth
and heart, and the oil in thy lamp if thou enterest in
with the bridegroom.
========================
Tentmaker: Imagine also that you are a literal stone in
the New Jerusalem as
the book of Revelation says and you are stuck in your
place.....forever. I
don't think that is what the book of revelation is referring
to. It's a
symbol...and symbols need to be properly interpreted.
Tentmaker - The Kingdom of God-Part 13
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