Q&A: The kingdom of God & the Kingdom of heaven - what's the difference?
Vern Peterman · Jan 10, 2010
Questions & Answers, No. 02
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926151386189

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Take both handouts today. That's one thing. You got one that's got holes and not stapled. That's about a five pager. Then you have another one that's stapled. Two pager. Take both. And I'll bring that up in a minute here after we're through going through the main handout. Let's look at the main handout which has at the top Q&A 2.

Are the New Testament terms Kingdom of God and Kingdom of Heaven to be taken with different meanings or synonyms and why? We talked last week about why at Holly Hills, while there is validity to calling Christ the King, He was born as the Magi, the wise men asked, where is He who was born King of the Jews?

To the time of His trial before Pilate, are you the King of the Jews? And Jesus, it's as you say. Christ is the king of the Jews. God is king over the universe in the sense of over everything. However, our relationship to Christ is not described as, and by our I mean the church, the church's relationship to Christ is not described as he being our king or my king. but rather we are the bride of Christ. The question here comes to the kingdom of God and kingdom of heaven. Kingdom of God is a term that you find throughout the New Testament and used repeatedly all the way from the Gospels to Revelation and into Paul's letters and otherwise.

Lots of terminology. The kingdom of heaven, however, is a term that is used only in Matthew. Only in Matthew. And some of the other things that will sometimes cause people some head scratching, wondering, is the fact that there are variations on those terms. And we have those in bullets here. Sometimes you will simply see the term the kingdom. The kingdom of God, various places we've mentioned.

The kingdom of heaven, we give an example in Matthew 4.17, but in fact it's a term that occurs only in the book of Matthew.

The kingdom of Christ and of God, Ephesians 5.5.

The kingdom of our God, Revelation 12.10. That's a reference in the middle of the tribulation period. And then the last bullet, the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. When we talk about the kingdom, what are we referring to?

A correction, the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is 2 Peter 1.11. 1.11? Okay, thank you.

2 Peter 1.11, you can make that correction. The above terms have been variously understood, of course.

It's been quite common, and we brought this up last week, from about the 4th through the 21st centuries of church history for many in Christendom to view the church as the kingdom. You will hear people say, you know, we've got to get them saved and get them into the kingdom. And the term the kingdom is often used universally as an equivalent to the church.

One of the things we explained last week, however, is that that was based on a misunderstanding of why Christ died on the cross. It was based on a misunderstanding of the idea that often the church replaces Israel because Israel rejected their king. And so it's a misunderstanding of that. Even a misunderstanding, and it was commonly taught during this early period of time and continued into the Reformation and to some even now, that since the Jews rejected Christ as their king, Christ is the church's king and God hates the Jews.

It was actually taught quite regularly. And now what has happened is the God hates the Jews part has oftentimes been pushed away, but the rest of the teaching still continues. People not understanding where it came from. Okay. We won't reiterate other than to have me summarize that. Now, John the Baptist and Jesus began to use the terms the kingdom. The Jews understood them to be referring to a literal earthly kingdom in which the Messiah, and you'll see that most often in the New Testament as the Christ.

One of the questions to Jesus at his trial before the Jewish leaders was, are you the Christ? That is, are you the Messiah? The Hebrew term, Hamashiach, are you that one? We oftentimes think of Jesus Christ as that's his first name and his last name, and that's not quite right. But it's the Christ. The Christ was actually the Jewish term for the Messiah. It is often not brought out in our English translations. Although the Jews, when they saw the Christ, definite article, and Christ, they understood that means the Messiah. Messiah and Christ, in the Greek Christos, both of those mean the Anointed One.

What is almost invisible in our English translations is starting with Ephesians 1.10, Ephesians has the Christ, definite article, 23 times in the book of Ephesians. It is rarely brought out in the English translation. But as the Jews read that, they said, that's my Messiah. That's what they saw when they were reading that letter. And our English translations tend not to bring that across.

The Old Testament spoke many times about Christ's first coming and about his second coming to establish the kingdom. And we have this promise here, 2 Samuel 7, 16 and 17, and equivalent passages are listed there in 1 Chronicles 17 and 22. It says, And your house and your kingdom shall endure before me forever, and your throne shall be established forever.

In accordance with all these words and all this vision, so Nathan spoke to David. Nathan was the court prophet for King David. About 300 years after the time of David, the prophet Isaiah wrote about Christ's first and second comings. Isaiah 9, 6, and 7, this is one just this last month. As we look at Christmas time, this is a passage frequently quoted. For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us, and the government will rest on his shoulders.

And his name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father. And by the way, that's something that people ask about all the time. I thought he was the son, not the eternal father. I would translate that father of the ages, which makes a whole lot more sense. Okay? He is the source of the ages. All the ages on planet Earth originate in him and are fulfilled in him.

Okay, now, the Prince of Peace, that's one that we commonly refer to. As a matter of fact, we're going to sing about it this morning. There will be no end to the increase of his government or of peace. and on the throne of David and over his kingdom. So when they heard the kingdom, what did they think? That's the one. Yeah, there's other kingdoms, but that's the kingdom. Right? That's what they thought of.

To establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this. Do we have to work to bring in the kingdom? How's it going to happen? The Lord of hosts is going to accomplish this, right? We don't have to work to bring in the kingdom. God's going to pull it off. It's not our job. Okay?

Yes? So are you saying that when the Jews heard that kingdom, they were thinking actually the kingdom of David, not the kingdom of God? Or were they seeing the same thing? The same thing. Okay. In other words, when they heard the kingdom, they thought this is the kingdom. When they say kingdom of God, this is the kingdom God's going to bring. to put David's descendant on the throne. Okay? Is that clear? Yeah. Okay. The teachings of this passage are available at Holly Hill's website, Messages and Audio, in our Isaiah Lesson 12. So anyway, if you want to look that up, you can get that as background. Page 2.

About a thousand years after the time of King David, the angel Gabriel revealed to Mary that the son to be born to her by the intervention of the Holy Spirit would be the specific fulfillment of God's promise to David in 2 Samuel 7 16. Notice the words that the angel Gabriel used. We just went through a lot of this just this last month. Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph of the descendants of David, right? And the Virgin's name was Mary. And by the way, the descendancy from David in Matthew is through Joseph's line. The descendancy of David in Luke is Mary's line, okay? So either way is a descendant of David, okay?

But she was very, excuse me, and coming into, and he said to her, greetings, favored one, the Lord is with you. But she was very perplexed at this statement, which I'm sure if you see an angel, you gotta be perplexed, right? Anne kept pondering what kind of salutation this was. The angel said to her, do not be afraid, which of course the angels always had to say, when this bright, shining, overwhelming thing appears, you know, yeah. Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.

And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give him what? The throne of his father David. There's the throne again, right? That was promised, wasn't it? Isn't that what was promised? There's going to be a throne, right? Isn't that what it said in Isaiah, where we just read there? And he will reign over the house of Jacob. What's the house of Jacob? People of Israel, right? The house of Jacob forever and his kingdom will have no end. So when you hear the kingdom, that's what they're thinking about, right? So here's Mary. Mary had questions about what the angel said.

Did you notice that none of her questions had to do with this part of it? Her questions had to do with, wait a minute, I'm a virgin. How's this going to happen? That's where her questions lied. She did not have any questions about this house thrown in a kingdom. Not at all. It had been multiply, and we just went over a couple examples, it had been multiply prophesied in the Old Testament. When she'd go to a little synagogue there in Nazareth, she'd hear about this. They would read these things. No. You're talking about Elizabeth? Yeah, because what happens is Elizabeth's pregnancy was six months ahead of Mary's. Okay? Yeah, yeah. So that was for John.

Jesus was called at various times and places in the Gospels and in the context of Israel as a nation He was called the King of the Jews at the very beginning and at the very end. Jesus, here in front of the trial, in front of Pilate, if there was a time when he said, no, Israel has rejected me and so I'm not the King of the Jews, that would have been a time to say, right? Are you the King of the Jews? And his response? It's as you say. If he said, no, I'm not anymore because they rejected me, I'm going to be the king of the church. That would have been a perfect opportunity. Didn't happen, right?

The king of Israel, and by the way, that's John 149 and 1213. And just out of interest, if you have one of these common, excuse me, one of these Bible programs where you can search for multiple words, look up king of Israel. What you find is it shows up multiple times in the Old Testament that is the title for God himself, which proves Jesus' deity.

Your King, in Matthew 21.5, which is towards the end of his ministry, not the beginning, and John 12.15.

Jesus repeatedly accepted these titles. Can you think of an instance where he rejected these titles? No. In this class where we studied, in this room, the book of Revelation, twice the angels, when they were worshipped mistakenly by John, refused the worship. These titles, Jesus accepted and never refused them.

When Thomas saw the wounds on Christ's side and on his hands, he said, my Lord and my God, And Jesus did not refuse it. I'm going to read in the middle of the paragraph there. When he said, my Lord and my God, wasn't Peter addressing The Lord as King? This is, My Lord and My God are the words from Thomas, when Thomas saw that Christ was resurrected. Because as you recall the account, he refused to believe. He refused to believe that Jesus was resurrected. He says, unless I see the nail prints in his hands and inside, I won't believe it.

But he was addressing him as king by the title lord. No, that's interesting. The title lord is not the equivalent of king. And that's an important distinction. Kingship meant a kingdom, meant a throne, meant the laws that go along with the king. The word lord means authority. but does not go along with kingship. So they're not equivalent terms. Well, there are people in Britain that are called lords but are not kings. The King of Kings expression is, in fact, that's something I've got a supplement on. It's a supplement like this from the end of your package.

It's interesting. There's a silver bowl that has the inscription in old Persian cuneiform of Artaxerxes. He was a Persian ruler there in the mid-fifth century BC. He was the one that commissioned Ezra and Nehemiah. His bowls, five of them so far as I'm aware, have been found. And this particular one has around the perimeter of the bowl, Artaxerxes, the great king, the king of kings, and the king of countries.

And so this is a long-standing terminology. Being the king of kings is being a king as ruler over other Gentile kings. And the lord of lords means he has authority, but lord and king are not equivalent terms. Okay. So as we look here, there's every reason to believe, and I'm looking at the paragraph right in the middle of page 2, there's every reason to believe that Jesus Christ continued to the very day of his ascension, and we give the reference there in Acts 1, to be the long-promised King of Israel, who was descended from David, who will come again and will reign over the literal future kingdom. which was, excuse me, which will be in the land of Israel reigning from Jerusalem in the fulfillment of all the Old Testament prophets have said at a time established by the Father. And for each one of those we gave a reference there so you could check that out and look it up.

The Kingdom of Heaven and the Kingdom of God I am proposing and with support are to be taken as synonyms At most, the differences are nuanced. The view that we're going to put forth here is that the term the kingdom and its variants is most commonly referred to referring to the literal earthly reign of Christ on the earth and upon his second coming when he will reign from Jerusalem over Israel as the king of the Jews and over the nations of the earth as the king of kings and the lord of lords. Nearly identical to what the Jews commonly understood as the kingdom. But among those who hold to the kingdom as a future literal earthly reign of Christ on the earth are those who hold that the kingdom of God and the kingdom of heaven have a different meaning. Below is a brief explanation of why these two terms were originally understood to be synonyms and ought to be viewed by us as synonyms. So on to page three here. Let's step our way through them. We've got it in bullets here.

The Jews commonly replace the words for God with the word heaven. The Hebrew there is shamayim, okay? As a widely understood means for the Jews to avoid taking the name of God in vain. And in fact, in our own culture, here we are, you know, the other side of the world, and a quite different culture, and yet, we actually have traditions that carry on this avoidance.

Let me give you an example. Instead of someone saying, oh God, you ever hear someone say, oh heavens? Instead of saying God knows, you ever hear somebody say heaven knows? You ever hear that? There is a tendency even in our own culture to have picked up that pattern and to replace heaven with the name God in order to avoid using the name of God in vain. So we even in our own culture have some of that pattern. At the same time, you are going to run into people who have no problem using the name of God in vain. So I'm not saying that that's not an issue. But there is still this continuing pattern of avoiding saying the name of God and using heaven as a euphemism, as a replacement, when we mean God. Make sense?

Some of the places where that shows up, the Pharisees and the Sadducees requested Jesus in Matthew 16.1 to show them a sign from heaven. Didn't they mean a sign from God? Right? But they used the word heaven instead.

The use of heaven twice in Matthew 21.25 with the chief priests and the elders may also be similar euphemisms to avoid saying God. This would explain why only the Gospel of Matthew, which is the Gospel of the four directed to the Jews, it's the one directed to the Jews, would have the replacement term there, Kingdom of Heaven instead of Kingdom of God. Just like we say, Heaven knows, O Heavens.

The other Gospels did not use the term at all. Why? because they weren't directed to the Jews specifically. And so it would really be clarifying for the Gentile world to hear kingdom of God rather than kingdom of heaven. They wouldn't understand the euphemism. We in our own culture have adopted that because we've picked that up from the Jews.

Interestingly enough, we haven't picked up a lot of things, but that's one of them that we did pick up. where we have all these expressions about, you know, heaven knows, you know, a sign from heaven. The next bullet there, Matthew used the term the kingdom of heaven almost exclusively rather than the kingdom of God because he was directing his gospel to a Jewish audience who would be quite reluctant to speak the name of God as explained above. It wasn't that you were prohibited from saying the name of God, but if you had any doubts you would avoid saying it. You could say it if you were sure but if there was any doubt the tendency was to use the word heaven instead of God to avoid saying the name of God in vain. Why was it such a serious thing among the Jews to say the name of God in vain?

Pardon? Yeah it was breaking a commandment and by the way what was the consequence of that? Now the Jews had, by this time, lost the straight across privilege and right of carrying out capital punishment. Sometimes they got away with it anyway, but in general they didn't carry it out. But nonetheless it communicates how seriously they took it.

Whenever Matthew uses the term Kingdom of God instead of the Kingdom of Heaven, which only happens a few times, He does so only four times. It appears in context to be a deliberate emphasis on the divine character and origin of this coming millennial kingdom. Compare these similar passages, which seem to use both terms interchangeably in the same context.

Here's Matthew 5.3, which is a verse that is at the very beginning of what's called the Sermon on the Mount. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Luke 6.20 has an equivalent statement. Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

Here is Matthew 10.5-7. These twelve Jesus sent out after instructing them. As you go, preach saying the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

You look to Luke 9.1-2. And he called the twelve together. He sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God. See that?

Now, verse, excuse me, page 4. Matthew 19, 14. But Jesus said, Let the children alone, and do not hinder them from coming to me. For the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these. If we look at Mark, Mark was written to a Roman audience. Mark 10, 14. But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, Permit the children to come to me, and do not hinder them. For the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.

See the distinction there? Matthew, with those four exceptions, Matthew puts in Kingdom of Heaven. He wants to avoid any possible offense to the Jews. And by the way, that's just a sampling. There are others that we could quote from, but similar pattern.

You look at the different Gospels and Matthew has Kingdom of Heaven where the others have Kingdom of God. The next bullet there, there's nothing in Jewish literature of the day or in Christ conversations with the disciples that indicate that they or any of the Jews understood a difference in the terms kingdom of heaven and kingdom of God. I reference a footnote on the prior page, bottom of page three. You go to the Jewish encyclopedia, they actually talk about these passages in the kingdom of heaven and the kingdom of God, they just say it's the same thing.

It's just we avoid using the name God by putting in So that's their understanding of it. Both Jesus and his disciples at times used shortened reference to the kingdom without distinguishing between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of heaven. Which that would tend to indicate that there wasn't any difference. This would imply that it was simply not necessary to clarify which kingdom was meant because there was no significantly understood difference to have to clarify.

The next one here just before the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 4.23 Jesus was going throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every sickness among the people.

By the way, what was Jesus doing with this healing? What was that all about? Why was he bothering to heal? Because that was his prototypical idea of what he was. That's right. The Old Testament, Isaiah has passages to this effect, the Old Testament says the Messiah will come with healing and miracles as a validation of his Messiahship. So here is after the Sermon on the Mount in chapter 9, Jesus was going through all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the Gospel of the Kingdom, healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness. I'm the Messiah, and let me prove to you that I am. I'll do some miracles and some healings as verification, and meanwhile I'm going to tell you about the Kingdom. the coming kingdom over which the Messiah would reign.

Notice the pattern of and the information about the kingdom is evident in the last time that the Lord would see his disciples before ascending from the Mount of Olives into the heavenlies. And this is a pivotal passage, Acts chapter 1 verses 1 through 8. So here's Luke recording what took place when Jesus was just about to take off and ascend into the heavenlies and leave the disciples.

And I'll start with verse two, until the day when he was taken up to heaven after he had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom he had chosen. To these he also presented himself alive after his suffering by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days and speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God. Gathering them together, he commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the Father had promised, which, he said, you heard of from me. For John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. This is, he's talking about Acts 2, the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit was given and the church was begun. So when they had come together, they were asking, saying, Lord, is it at this time you are restoring the kingdom?

What did they think the kingdom related to? The church or Israel? Israel. The kingdom to Israel. They really had no idea that the kingdom had anything to do with the church. So they were even specific. Are you restoring the kingdom to Israel? So, now would be the perfect opportunity. for him to tell them, oh, you don't understand. The kingdom has nothing to do with Israel anymore. I'm not Israel's king, if that were the case. Now would be the perfect opportunity to say, no, I'm going to be the church's king and we're going to have the church as the kingdom. Now would be the chance. He could clarify it and there would be no confusion, right? So what does he do?

He said to them, it is not for you to know the times of the epics by which your father has fixed by his own authority. You're not going to know about the times and the epics for the establishment of the kingdom. What's going to happen instead, we're not going to transfer the kingdom to the church. We're not going to make Christ the church's king.

He said in verse 8, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you should be my witnesses both in Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and even to the remotest part of the earth. The kingdom, that's going to be for a time and epochs later. The Father is going to call the shots on that. Right now the church is going to begin and you, this group of guys right here, you're going to be the ones who are going to be empowered and enabled and energized to carry that out. Now, five.

The differences which are often claimed between the two terms, Kingdom of Heaven and Kingdom of God, are difficult to derive from the text of Scripture. There is no place, not even in the Gospel of Matthew, the one book that has the two terms, The one book that has the term Kingdom of Heaven that explains any difference between the two terms. In some context at the end of Matthew, the much less commonly used term Kingdom of God seems to have been chosen to emphasize the divine origin of the kingdom. In other words, an allowable use of the word God. The kingdom of God seems to have been chosen to emphasize the divine origin of the kingdom, but that is as much distinction as is evident from the biblical text. In those contexts, it is only a matter of emphasis, not a difference of fundamental meaning.

The parables in Matthew 13, often the major passage claimed to support a difference in the two terms, kingdom of heaven and kingdom of God, contain references to evil people, Darnell and fish as well as the Darnell and bad fish as well as the righteous ones in the same parable with regards to entrance into the kingdom not the continuing of both within the kingdom. One of the things that is often overlooked is what Jesus came in with and it's focused on especially in the book of Matthew which is written to the Jews. Jesus' issue that was a shock to the Jews and I mean a shock, they were just stunned, was that not all Jews are getting into the coming millennial kingdom, the coming reign of Christ. Just because you're Jewish, you're not automatically going to be there. You see, the Jews had this tradition that if you were Jewish, You've got the right genealogy, you're a sweep-in into the Kingdom. You're just going there. There's just no question. If you're of the right ancestral background, you're entering the Kingdom. That's it.

So here comes Jesus, and even John the Baptist, and saying, not everybody's getting in. This is like the Matthew 7 passage. Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, is going to enter. And he even tells them, strive to enter the narrow gate. This is about Jews, by the way. Strive to enter the narrow gate.

Why? Because not everybody Jewish is getting in. See, the Jews also had another little piece of mythology, and that is that Abraham on the last day would stand by the gates of hell and make sure that no Jew ever went in. That's again another one of the little pieces of mythology. Why? It's because they thought if you were Jewish, you're not going to hell and you're for sure getting into the kingdom.

And Jesus is saying, that's not the issue. He says, you've got a choice to make. If you don't understand who I am, you're not getting in. So here's John. And Jesus is talking to these Jewish leaders. He says, if you don't believe that I am He, you're going to die in your sins. And that's a problem. Yes? How close was this before his crucifixion? Which one? Christ saying this to the Jews. The issues of entrance were from the very beginning of Christ's ministry and continued until almost the very end. Almost three years. Yeah. So, you can see now, the mom can kind of start getting a little bit uncomfortable. Well, yeah, and here's the other thing.

You remember John chapter 3? Here's Nicodemus, you know, he figures, okay, I'm the best of the best, right? Everybody respects me. And so Jesus comes up and says, if you're not born again, you're not even getting into the kingdom. And he's like, whoa! This is blowing his circuit. He says, wait a minute, I'm Jewish! I'm as Jewish as they get! And so Jesus comes up and gives this big exclusion. If you're not born again, you don't even have a chance. So Nicodemus was like, whoa! I'm really confused. But this was the message that Jesus consistently brought forward to the Jews.

And the issue was, who do you say that I am? He brought it to the disciples. Who do you say that I am? Who do other people say that I am? He brought it up to the Jewish leaders. Unless you believe that I am He, you're going to die in your sins. This was a huge dividing line. and they didn't understand it. And guess what? They didn't like it either. They said, wait a minute, I like the story that I'm born Jewish and so I'm in the kingdom, I'm already there. I like that version better.

Christians have kind of adopted that same kind of thinking. Well, I was born into a Christian family and therefore I am a Christian. That's a good point. Isn't it possible for Christians to get that idea? Well, I was born into a Christian family. I've been going to church all my life. Doesn't that qualify? Nope. They call us a Christian nation. Pardon? Yeah, yeah, we're a Christian nation or some such thing.

And the reality is that what Jesus came to bring across, and people didn't want to hear it, people didn't want to hear it, was not everybody's getting in. And you can say, Lord, Lord, not just one Lord, but two, right? Lord, Lord. That sounds like, you know, boy, Lord, Lord, and that won't do it. And he says, well, wait, we did this and did this and did this. Works. Okay, right? And he says, that isn't working. He says, you've got to believe who I am and what I came here for.

If you don't believe that, you're not getting into the kingdom. I don't care if you're Jewish or what. Matthew 25, he does two things. He spells out to the Jews, here is how you're getting into the kingdom. And by the way, this is crucifixion week. He's going to be crucified in just a couple of days. So, Matthew 25, he first tells the Jews, here's how you're getting into the kingdom, and then he tells the Gentiles the basis on which they will be judged.

And you know what he has as the basis for which they'll be judged? God's promise to Abraham. Those who bless the Jews I will bless those who curse you, I will curse. That's the passage where you visited me when I was in prison and you gave me a glass of water and all that. Did you bless the Jews or did you curse them? That's going to be the condition for the Gentiles to enter the kingdom. It goes back to the fulfillment of Genesis chapter 12 verses 1 through 3 just like God promised. God is completely consistent. For centuries, He's consistent. And He'll be consistent on into the days to come. He will fulfill His promise to Abraham.

So here's Jesus coming in and telling them, not everybody who's Jewish is coming in. That was not a message they wanted to hear, and one of the reasons why they rejected Him as the Messiah. Wait a minute. We like the, I was born Jewish message. That sounds good to us. And what's this thing about being crucified and resurrected and all that?

We just want to get the Romans out of here. We would love to get these Romans out of here. And that's why you can understand the disciples were really distressed. Wait a minute, this is a guy who's going to get the Romans out of here and he gets crucified by them instead.

That's terrible, right? That's how they saw it. They weren't expecting the resurrection. That was a complete surprise. That whole thing about dying and being buried and resurrected, that's just a great mess in their minds. Because now that you're resurrected, is now the time you're going to restore the Kingdom to Israel. I went back on with the plan. He said, no, not yet. Not yet. Does this make sense?

Yes? You know in Romans 9, verse 6, it's the same thing we were talking about, you know, not all Israels, where they talk about Esau and Jacob, and it says, for they are not all Israel, who are descendants from Israel. That's right. And that's what some of the churches make the mistake in saying Well, that means that the church replaced Israel, and that's not what he's saying at all.

Nope. But that's what they use. They use that passage to say, oh... You're talking about what Hanegraaff is going around saying? Yeah. The so-called Bible Answer Man? Yeah. Churches... what we just went over these last couple of weeks, churches get this mixed up left and right, and it's very popular to say that now Christ is the church's king. where now the church is now the kingdom, the church has replaced Israel.

There are even some who still continue with the message, God hates the Jews. But it's only by turning a blind eye to these passages and superimposing a not intended allegory or figurative interpretation. But they don't say it's just equal, they say it's spiritual, but you have to accept Christ. I mean, not just because of your descendants, do you? Yes.

Massive confusion. But I think once you look at it, the Jews were in no wise expecting some church to come along. And Jesus does not talk about, nor were the disciples anticipating, some subsequent situation where, okay, now the Jews are out of the picture and the church is now the kingdom, the church is now the one who has Christ as its king. All that is confusion that is not what you see coming out of the pages of scripture. It's read back in by those who misunderstand. They also say that God wouldn't have two programs. Why not? I know. Where's that written? I don't know.

The thing is, if you look at it, how about the angels? Are there different kinds of angels? Yeah. You look at it and there's seraphim and all these different categories. The cherubim, different categories of angels. We went through Revelation this last year. This is a particular kind of angel and there's that one. They have different assignments. There are different kinds of angels. There are different classes. Some of them have a hierarchy. Repeatedly in Scripture, there's a hierarchy of authority. God has different programs for the angels. For us as believers, yes, God does have different programs, but all who are saved are saints. Yes?

When you describe the gospel of Jesus, does that include the two halves? You have the kingdom and then you have the king. So when he preached the kingdom of This is one of the questions, and you can check that off, because it really gets into something fairly substantial. It is fascinating to go through the book of Acts and find out that the apostles, all the way to the very last verses of Acts, are still preaching the gospel of the kingdom and the gospel of Jesus Christ of salvation separate. The gospel of the kingdom is not the same as the gospel of salvation by faith in Christ. They are two separate things. That's the quick answer, before I light the forest on fire.

And see, this is the thing, you have to understand, in the Gospels, here's Matthew chapter 10, remember he sent out the disciples two by two? He tells them, go only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, don't even go on a road that leads to the Gentiles. Chapter 15 of Matthew, again written to the Jews. What does he say? I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. This is a message for Israel. His ministry was to Israel. He sent the disciples to go beyond Israel, Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and where? To the ends of the earth. That was their job. But the gospel of the kingdom was specifically directed and formulated for the Jews.

Now, there's a lot more to that, but that's the quick answer. But you'll have to hope that they don't burn me first. Yeah, we're out of time. We're not out of fun, but we're out of time. Okay, let me bring this up. There are two handouts for today. The second one is one that is stapled. It has, on the first page, three pages and a little bit more, lists of questions. If you want to have those addressed, check those off. The last page has lines, right on the back, lines for you to add your own questions. get these back to me at latest by two weeks from now.

Okay? Even sooner is fine. After that, it begins to be questionable whether we'll have time. Because the way this works is we've got 52 Sundays to try to answer all the questions. Fifty. Nancy's right. Fifty left. And we've got four of those already planned. So, okay? Pick this up, make your selections, get it back to me within the next two weeks. Okay? Let's pray.

Lord, we do thank you for what you have laid out in your Word. You indeed have marvelous truths revealed to us. You love us so dearly, and we just thank you for that. We thank you for the joy set before you. you endured the cross. And what a wonderful and gracious thing that is. We thank you in Jesus' name. Amen.