THE KINGDOM: A MEANS TO AN END
[p. 255] THE KINGDOM: A MEANS TO AN END
I read this passage as introducing the thought of retribution in connection with the kingdom of heaven. The subject of this chapter is the kingdom of heaven; we used to think that it was the church that was in view; but it is not difficult to see that the kingdom of heaven is really the subject of the chapter, and it closes with a parable, which is a similitude of the kingdom. Now the point to which I call attention is in verse 23, “Therefore is the kingdom of heaven likened unto a certain king which would take account of his servants”, and I would say that the moment you get the idea of the kingdom, you find that it is a time of reckoning; you could not quite say that the time of law or prophets was a time of reckoning, but the kingdom is so. It was in the king’s mind to take account of his servants; that comes out at the close of this chapter. Everything is brought to an issue in the time of the kingdom. Now I doubt if we take that thought in connection with the kingdom sufficiently into account. In the servant who owed ten thousand talents you get the element of grace come in — there was humbling on the part of the servant — and grace comes in in remission; and the principle and rule of the kingdom is grace, not law. As the apostle says, “Ye are not under law but under grace”.
But another thought also comes to light, and that is that this very principle of grace becomes a test. It is not law, but grace, that is the test for people according to God. The man who owed ten thousand talents is forgiven, but then grace became the test. Will he show the same grace to his fellow-servant as had been shown to him? Now it is the failure of men to appreciate this grace that has come in, that will eventually bring in the judgment of God. You see this in the case of the [p. 256] Gentiles; they are cut out of the tree of promise, because they have failed to appreciate the goodness of God, and thus grace becomes a great test. The thought of reckoning is clearly in connection with the kingdom. It has been a time of reckoning ever since the Lord was here. He came in connection with the kingdom, and from that time on it has been a time of reckoning. The Jew in one way has already come under the reckoning; but it is still going on, and will not be brought to a close until the Son of man delivers up the kingdom. But meanwhile this principle of grace has come in, and has become the test. When Christ came to the Jew, the point was, Would he appreciate the grace in which Christ came? “God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses”. God had come near to man in grace, and everything depended on the appreciation of Christ. And so too with us everything depends upon our appreciation of grace, and as I said just now, what comes out in the end is that the Gentiles are cut off from privilege, for they fail to continue in the goodness of God.
Now I think this point needs to be apprehended in regard of the kingdom: if a man shows no mercy, then God will deal accordingly with that man. We are tested by grace as to how far we are under the influence of grace in our dealings one with another. As to the individual, he may come under the discipline of God for his failure; but in the end the Gentiles will come under the judgment of God because they have failed to abide under the influence of grace.
But I desire to say a word as to what God intended by the kingdom. What it has become was of course all under the eye of God, and the Lord when here spoke of it, but that was not what God intended. What is infinitely more important is what God’s thought was in the kingdom; I want to show you how the kingdom as it is now naturally leads on to the church, but before doing that I just touch on certain things which God never intended should come in, but which yet have done so.
[p. 257] God never intended that the kingdom should become a great system upon earth before Him. If you should ask me to what I allude, I direct your attention to Popery, or even, in a sense, to Protestantism, though Popery is a more distinct example of what the kingdom has become in the hand of man — a system certainly having the character of a great tree, as the Lord predicted. But that was not what God intended any more than that it was His thought that the kingdom should be a leavened mass. The time is coming when the kingdom will be set up in power, and it is to that the Lord is leading up in Matthew 18, but I repeat that it was not in the thought of God that the kingdom should become a great system here under His eye.
Now I will try to bring before you what God did intend. He intended the kingdom to come to man in delivering power; the thought in the heart of God in connection with the kingdom was that man might be delivered. I think you see this coming out in the lifetime of the Lord here, in His ministry upon earth. The spirit and end of His ministry was deliverance for man. In the presence of Christ here grace took account of man as captive to one thing or another, and there was deliverance for man. I see three ways at least in which man is captive: he is captive to Satan, and to man, and to the world; these three things no doubt work together, but still it is easy to distinguish them as separate influences. Now, as I said, the character of the Lord’s ministry was to give deliverance to the captives — He delivered men from their bondage. Men were in abject bondage when the Lord was here — not only to the devil, they were in bondage to the scribes and Pharisees, they went in fear of man. And they were in bondage to the influences of the world; and the influences of the world are extremely subtle, and it is difficult not to be affected by them. But the object in the ministration of grace was that man might be set free from the bondage in which he was. The same thing comes out in a fuller way in the [p. 258] gospel. The Holy Spirit came down to substantiate the kingdom here, and that is really to bring man into the enjoyment of liberty. The gospel brings to him the knowledge of the grace of God, and he learns that he is not under law, but grace; and it is in the apprehension of this that man gets deliverance. If you look at the world today you will see to what an extent men are in bondage; they fear their fellow-men and public opinion, and are in bondage to worldly influences. People do not like to be thought singular, and they are thus in bondage to the opinion of men — they consider what men will say, or think, and all that kind of thing. And the influence of Satan over the minds and spirits of men is exercised in various ways.
But by the influence and effect of grace man was to be delivered from these things; and where redemption is known and the grace of God truly apprehended, that is the proper result — man is delivered from Satan’s power, from the fear of man, and the influence of the world.
When the children of Israel were redeemed out of Egypt, and brought through the Red Sea, they were saved from the judgment of God, and they knew too deliverance from the fear of Pharaoh and the Egyptians — that is Satan and the world typically. They had been brought out of Egypt, the scene of man’s power and of Satan’s domination. And that is what is fulfilled now spiritually in christians — they are brought into the light of God’s grace, they have access by faith into the grace wherein they stand, and in the reality of that, they have deliverance from Satan, and man, and the world. Then they are prepared to refuse utterly and entirely the influence of man or the world over the soul. Anyone truly under the sway of grace would refuse the system of priest-craft; and when one sees men in bondage to it, it proves this, that such do not enjoy the privileges of the kingdom, “for the kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy”, in divine
[p. 259] power, and there is no room for Satan, or man, or the world. The kingdom, in the thought of God, meant deliverance for man, as seen most distinctly in the ministry of the Lord Jesus down here: “who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil” — it was the blessed God making known His pleasure in setting men free from the influences under which they were held in bondage.
At the outset of His ministry, in Luke 4, the Lord stands up in the synagogue and reads, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord”; and the passage in the prophet goes on to say, “and the day of vengeance of our God”, because, as I said, the kingdom brings in the idea of a day of reckoning — but grace came in first, and the effect of the gospel of the kingdom is to set at liberty those who are captive. It is often a long time before saints come fully to deliverance. For myself I am ashamed to think of how much one is affected by the influence of the world and the fear of man. Deliverance is no light thing; many a brave man physically is dreadfully afraid of man at heart, and I believe that it is that fear which hinders many a christian. When you come into the liberty of the Spirit you are free from the world, and man, and officialism; and further, it becomes a great day to you when you recognise the presence of the Spirit. It was the recognition of the presence of the Spirit that brought many of us out from what was attractive to us naturally; we felt that in the knowledge of His presence it was inconsistent to go on with things to which we had been accustomed.
Another thing comes in, and that is you are conscious that God is here; if the Spirit is here, God is here. When the Lord Jesus was here, it was a great moment in the [p. 260] history of any who came to Him, when they apprehended that God was here; and the same holds good now where the presence of the Spirit is recognised. Jew and Gentile are builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit. It was a red-letter day to us when we recognised the presence of God here in the Spirit. But I doubt if we recognise that before we are brought into the liberty which God intends to give to us in the kingdom. If He brings our hearts under the sway and influence of grace, it is that we may recognise the presence of the Holy Spirit here.
I would just ask you to turn to a verse or two in Ephesians 2: 22, and Ephesians 4: 1 - 3. It is a great thing to be brought face to face with the fact of God being here. We cannot then go on with priest-craft or clergy. The ruin of the church, which I fully admit, does not alter that for an instant. God will be here in the millennium manifestly, but now He dwells here — Jew and Gentile are builded together for His habitation. Consequent upon the accomplishment of redemption, and there being a vessel suitable for the Spirit, Jew and Gentile were builded together in order that God might dwell here.
Now having recognised that, you get the moral effect of it, lowliness, and meekness, and long-suffering coming in. You are conscious of the love of God, which is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit given to us, and in the presence of the love of God, you find what is becoming to that love. When the Lord Jesus speaks of Himself in connection with the Father He says, “I am meek and lowly in heart”; it was the first time, as far as I know, that the Lord spoke in that way of the Father and the Son. He was all, as a man down here, that was becoming in the presence of the Father’s love; and if we apprehend the love of the Father, we shall be before God in all “lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love; endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace”. Everyone that has part in the Holy Spirit must accept the obligation to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting [p. 261] bond of peace; there is one Spirit, and we all partake of that one Spirit. If I see christians going off on some particular line, not accepting the obligation to unity, my conviction is this, they do not realise the presence of the Spirit, for I am confident if they did they would be marked by what is suitable to the presence of God; they would be endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit. “By one Spirit are we all baptised into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free, and have been all made to drink into one Spirit”. Well, how is the unity to be kept? First, you need to be delivered from the influence of Satan and man and of the world. Thousands of christians would be glad to carry out their obligation, but the power of the world is too strong for them; they are under the influence of man and the fear of society, and this keeps people in bondage, and so they fail of their obligation to keep the unity of the Spirit.
Now I could not press too strongly the truth that God is here; and what an amazing truth that is! When the Lord was here the enigma was that One was here whose body was the temple of God, and now God is dwelling here by the Spirit. I have said sometimes that when God has taken a place upon the earth, speaking reverently, He does not leave the earth. He may dwell here in different ways, but He has set foot here and He intends to maintain His foothold. Of course, the new heavens and the new earth will have to take the place of those which now exist, so that God may dwell in them, that there may be nothing unsuitable to God; but God does not leave the earth, and faith comes in now to lead you to recognise the presence of God here by the Spirit, and the Spirit will bring home to you that there are purposes in the mind of God for you. This is one great gain of giving place to the Holy Spirit.
If I am speaking to those who have in some measure [p. 262] recognised the presence of the Spirit, I would say it is the pleasure of the Holy Spirit to lead you into the secrets of God’s mind.
To revert again to the kingdom. The application of the kingdom is individual, and if you have followed what I have tried to bring before you, you will see this; if you have followed the thought of deliverance, you can see that the application of the kingdom must be individual. Deliverance must be individual, and the thought of the kingdom is to give deliverance to the captive. It was not in the divine thought that the kingdom should assume the form of a great system here upon earth; and the Holy Spirit makes known to you that the kingdom is a means to an end. Now that comes out in Matthew 16. Peter learns that Christ is the Son of the living God, he confesses Him as such; but then the Lord gives to him the keys of the kingdom. He never gave him the keys of the church, but of the kingdom, and that was because the kingdom was to serve an end. But in chapter 13 the Lord gives the disciples three parables of the kingdom of heaven, in order that they might understand the truth of what was here under the eye of God, not what man had made of the kingdom, but what it meant to God, and that you get in the last three parables. He had shown in the first three what it would become in the eye and in the hand of man, but in the last three He shows what it was in the eye of God: it was a treasure hid in a field. God alone could discern it. The field was bought because of the treasure that was hid in it, visible to the eye of God, but not brought into manifestation. God had His own purpose in regard to the church. Then the same thing comes out in the pearl of great price. Whose eye saw that? Only the Merchantman’s, and He went and sold all that He had to buy it. The pearl was there under the eye of God, but it was not discerned of man. The fact is, the church was in the purpose and mind of God from eternity. Then in the parable of the net, what is under [p. 263] the eye of God are the good fishes, and you get a sorting in the end: the good are gathered into vessels, and the bad cast out. The kingdom is serving God’s blessed end in delivering men’s spirits from the different things around them, that they may be led into the purpose and thought of God. A special revelation was given to Peter, in chapter 16, that Christ was the Living Stone; but we too apprehend Christ as that, and none ever came to the Living Stone except in the power of the Holy Spirit; and it is when you have got there that you too are seen as a living stone.
Depend upon it, the first thought in the kingdom is a delivering power for man, that he might be freed from the influence of the world, and of man, and of Satan; and I desire that everyone might be in the reality of the kingdom, in the enjoyment of righteousness, peace, and joy in the power of the Holy Spirit. But then the Spirit of God will not leave you there: He will lead you into the thought and purpose of God. It is a great day for you when you recognise the astonishing fact that God is dwelling here by the Spirit. I feel how much we have got out of the reality of these things. We have become so used to the terms, that we have lost in great measure the reality of the things. Do you think we are characterised, as we should be, by lowliness, and meekness, and long-suffering? Divine things have, to a great extent, lost to us their power and freshness, and the only way in which this can be restored is by the Spirit bringing our souls into the reality that God is dwelling here.
I thank God for the gain of these things; it is a very blessed thing to see in the truth one great and blessed whole, and every part of truth serves every other part of truth. It is like the organisation of the human body, every member serves every other member, and the more you apprehend the truth of the kingdom, the more you will apprehend the thought of God in the pearl of great price — the church which Christ loved, and for which He gave Himself.