A Tree Ripe With Fruit

Hello again, this is Dave Scherrerrer and welcome to Kingdom Offerings. This is the podcast environment of 100 Full Ministries and I'm the President and Founder of 100 Full Ministries and so welcome to our podcast here at Kingdom Offerings where we like to unpack scripture especially as it helps us to celebrate and advance the Gospel of the Kingdom. Where you're checking in right now is the third podcast in a series that we're calling Help, I Can't Pass This Essay Test. This is where we've been asking the question, the essay question, what exactly is the Gospel of the Kingdom? And then the follow-up question, what difference does it make in my life? We're exploring Jesus' words, His first sermon really, the time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is at hand, repent and believe in the Gospel. Those are the first words of public ministry from Jesus, they're found in Mark chapter 1, verses 14 and 15. And if you're just joining us now, you can listen to the first two podcasts in this series to get some background or you know what, you could just kick in here and come along for the ride. In the first podcast in this series, we chatted about really the sad circumstance that many, I don't know, maybe most Christians can't describe or define the Gospel of the Kingdom, even though it was the central theme of Jesus' teaching and life. In the very last podcast, we unpacked the idea of what Jesus was saying when He said the time is fulfilled. There's a sense of urgency in His statement. Now today, we are staying after Jesus' teaching here where He starts in on the Kingdom of God. We remember that these are seemingly the very first words of Jesus' teaching as He begins His public ministry and we find them, I think, carrying a special weight because they are indeed His first words. Let's say you and I just think out loud for a second. Let's talk about the idea of having a King. When Jesus says the Kingdom of God is at hand, He's actually creating quite a mental challenge for the average 21st century American. Kingdom sort of demands that there is a King, doesn't it? One of my recent blogs, I noted that this kind of conversation begs a question because there are problems when it comes to the presence of a King. Here in the United States, we don't really have such a positive regard for monarchies and kings. We might be curious, but that's about it. The United States made our name, so to speak, by doing away with our relationship with the 18th century British monarchy. By George, we established our own republic governance. But here's the point. Up until that event that we call the Revolutionary War, all that humanity had ever really experienced by way of political governance was monarchies and kingdoms. Now you're saying, well, wait a minute. What about ancient Rome? But even ancient Rome, that experiment didn't last very long until it devolved into once again a monarchy of kings that they call Caesars. So throughout human history, kings held their authority by and large through raw force. They were straight up coercive dictators. It was the biggest and baddest who held onto their power. And so we can go all the way back to near ancient history in the East and the Sumerians gave way to the Assyrians who gave away to the Babylonians who gave away to the Egyptians who gave away to the Persians and then the Greeks and Romans. And well, you get the point. Even the Romans gave way to the barbarians. It's the bigger, badder kings enforcing their rule. So you fast forward to the 21st century and you would say, well, why does anybody want a king then, for God's sake? So I want to say I'm a big fan of the freedom that we enjoy as a nation and the representative government of the people and by the people. There are things we could do better, but sure beats dictatorships. So by way of my opinion, I want to say I wouldn't prefer a king unless a king were good and had my interests in mind and was just and wise and true to his word. I'd want a king who was unwilling to settle for second best and was also powerful enough to deliver all of this. I want a king who can't, can't be threatened, but has the authority to act swiftly and righteously for his people. I want a king who will not let evil go unpunished. I want, you know what? I want Jesus. I want Jesus to be my king. I want the almighty Jehovah. So maybe you remember in the old Testament, the people of Israel, they grew tired of having Jehovah for their king. They grumbled and moaned until they got a human king, and that's in 1 Samuel 8. And so for the next several hundred years, the various kings of Israel ruled. A few, not many, ruled with righteous distinction, but most let Israel down and followed down a troubled and evil path. So I'm pretty much done with human kings. I'd like Jehovah back if I could. There is another pretty great doctrinal gem hidden in this story that Jesus is telling that we don't want to gloss over. The kingdom of God is at hand. What exactly does that mean? This kingdom, this kingship is at hand. What does that mean? Are we talking about right this second, in the next couple of weeks, or a year or two, or 2,000 years later? When is this kingdom of God going to manifest? When Jesus says that the kingdom of God is close at hand, how close is close anyway? So there's a lot to get into here, and we're going to do that eventually. But for today, I want to just leave you with this word picture. Imagine a tree thick with fruit. I like to think of a peach tree with dozens of full, ripening, lush peaches. You reach out to pick the largest and the juiciest, and just as you place your hand under the fruit, the peach drops into your hand, perfectly ripe by tree standards. This is what's meant by the kingdom of God to be at hand. It is ready and ripe and fully formed. It just needs a hand to drop into, maybe yours. So since we don't have a bunch of time left today, soon we will launch a two-part series on the idea of now but not yet, a phrase made famous in the 1950s by a theologian named George Eldon Ladd, now but not yet. The basic idea is that the kingdom of God was inaugurated when this little baby Jesus was born so long ago, and this long-predicted king had come, born in a manger in a little town just outside of Jerusalem called Bethlehem, and he would live and teach into his full authority over all things. The kingdom was inaugurated then. It has been growing since, but it's not realized fully yet. Soon enough, the king will come. The king will, as the Bible says, receive his bride, the kingdom church unto himself, and that's going to be a party. So as we continue on in this series, I hope I can't pass this essay test, the next podcast is going to talk about what it means to repent and believe. That's probably about 10,000 pages of text that we're going to try and handle in about nine minutes. That should be easy. So as we stop, I'm going to invite you back to Kingdom Offerings to get after these life-changing truths. I pray that as you lay claim to them, you'll experience the hundred-fold hopes of the kingdom gospel. And again, I'm not sure how you came by this podcast, but you can find more conversations and resources in your pursuit of the kingdom at 100-Fold Ministries. That's 100, the digit, 1-0-0-FOLD, F-O-L-D, ministries.org. All right, take care. This is Dave Scherrerrer, 100-Fold Ministries. Let's connect again soon. Peace.