Luke
17:20-21 Now when He was asked by the Pharisees when the Kingdom of God would
come, He answered them and said, “The Kingdom of God
does not come with observation; nor will they say, ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’
For indeed, the Kingdom of God is within you.” NKJV
The coming Kingdom of God was anticipated by the
Jews for many centuries. Unfortunately the Jewish Rabbis looked for the Messiah
to come as a conquering King and not a suffering servant. When we look back at
the parting of the Red Sea, the parting of the Jordan River, and some of the
other visible acts of supernatural miracles that God performed to accomplish
His purposes, we can then get a sense of the Jewish rulers concept of how God
would bring in His earthly Kingdom. This interpretation of the Psalms and the
Prophets by the Jewish Rabbis completely blinded them to the reality of Jesus
Christ being truly the Son of God (the Messiah). They totally believed the
Messiah would come once in a mighty and powerful manner and crush all of Israel’s
enemies as God had done for the nation on many occasions documented in the Old
Testament. The fact is their thinking was absolutely correct except that
visible coming Kingdom was to come at our Lord’s second coming to the earth.
Now we have one of the Pharisees ask our Lord when the
Kingdom of God would come, and I’m sure this man was absolutely floored with
the answer he received from our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lord answered him by
saying, “The Kingdom of God does not come with
observation; nor will they say, ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’ For indeed, the Kingdom of God is within
you.” (Luke 17:20-21) This must have been perplexing to this
man for if it were not he would have never asked such a question. The sad thing
is that it should not have been perplexing at all. But it must have been a
universal blindness among the Pharisees because when our Lord spoke to the Pharisee
Nicodemus and told him that he needed to be born again in order to enter the
Kingdom of God, Nicodemus asked our Lord, “How can a man be born when he is
old? Can he enter a second time into his Mother’s womb and be born?” The
Pharisee here in Luke Chapter 17 and Nicodemus (also a Pharisee) both teachers
of the Law of Moses had the same lack of spiritual understanding from the
Psalms and the Prophets. Certainly both of these men read the words from the
Prophet Ezekiel. Here is what Ezekiel said:
Ezekiel
36:24-27 For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all
countries, and bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water
on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and
from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you;
I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
I will put My Spirit within
you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments
and do them. NKJV
Now we see what our Lord
meant when He said the Kingdom of God is within
you. The English word within means on the inside; internal
and there is nothing lost in the translation as some supposed that our Lord was referring to the
Kingdom being in their midst. The Greek word used for the English word within
is entos and it means the exact same thing inside. The words our Lord
gave to the Prophet Ezekiel were written to and for the nation Israel but they
also were a prophesy of the new birth our Lord spoke to Nicodemus about. In
these 4 verses of Scripture from the Prophet Ezekiel 6 times the pronoun I is
used by the Prophet as the Lord God of Israel is the speaker revealing what He
would do to and in the nation Israel by giving them a new heart and putting His Spirit within them.
This is why our Lord when speaking to Nicodemus all of those centuries later
asked him, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not
know these things?” Nicodemus and the other Pharisee here in Luke 17
should have understood the prophetic implications of Ezekiel’s words that
surely both of them had read numerous times. This is the reality of the Kingdom
of God on earth after the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus
Christ an internal Kingdom of
sinful hearts being transformed, resurrected, renewed, transfigured, and
forever made new by the wondrous working power of God the Holy Spirit through
regeneration and the new birth. The Kingdom of God is everywhere upon the earth
right now, but it cannot be localized into a continent, or country, or state,
or city, or town, or village because the Kingdom of God is individual men,
women, girls, and boys that have been born again of incorruptible seed by the
Word of God that lives and abides forever and the gates of hell will never
prevail against it.
Daniel 2:44 And in the days of these kings the God
of heaven will set up a Kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and the Kingdom
shall not be left to other people; it shall break in pieces and consume all these
kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. NKJV
John 4:20-24 “Our fathers worshiped on this
mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one
ought to worship.” Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe
Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in
Jerusalem, worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we know what
we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour is coming, and now is,
when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the
Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who
worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” NKJV
Colossians 1:27 To them God willed to make known
what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope
of glory. NKJV
“For behold the Kingdom
of God is within or among you - Look not for it in distant times or remote
places: it is now in the midst of you: it is come: it is present in the soul of
every true believer: it is a spiritual kingdom, an internal principle. Wherever
it exists, it exists in the heart.” John Wesley
“If we do anything to
further the Kingdom of God, we may expect to find what Christ
found on that road - abuse, indifference, injustice, misunderstanding, trouble
of some kind. Take it. Why not? To that you were called. In Latin America
someone who feels sorry for himself is said to look like a donkey in a
downpour. If we think of the glorious fact that we are on the same path with
Jesus, we might see a rainbow.” Elisabeth Elliot
“Even to earnest minds
the difficulty of grasping the truth at all has always proved extreme.
Philosophically, one scarcely sees either the necessity or the possibility of
being born again. Why a virtuous man should not simply grow better and better
until in his own right he enter the Kingdom of God is
what thousands honestly and seriously fail to understand.” Henry Drummond
“The Kingdom of God will
not change men’s outward condition, but their hearts and lives. Then it comes
when it makes those humble, and serious, and heavenly, that were proud, and
vain, and carnal, - when it weans those from the world that were wedded to the
world; and therefore look for the Kingdom of God in the revolutions of the
heart, not of the civil government.” Matthew Henry
“We do not have the
ability to enter the Kingdom unless
the Spirit of God gives
us life through the new birth. We are born again, then, by a sovereign, monergistic
(that is, the Spirit working alone) act of the Holy Spirit. Then, as a result
of that new birth, we exercise the faith given to us, and enter the Kingdom of God.” Jerry Bridges
“People shall never enter
the Kingdom of God through our encouragement,
persuasion, argument, inducement, excitement, or attraction; entrance can be
gained only by new birth, by nothing less than the resurrection of the spirit.”
Watchman Nee
If you do not know the Lord Jesus Christ
and His amazing healing power, pray this from your heart to the Lord Jesus
Christ (you speaking directly to Him), Dear Lord Jesus, I confess to You that I
am a sinner and I need Your forgiveness. I believe You shed Your Blood and died
for my sins. I believe that You rose from the dead proving that You alone are
God. I repent of my sins. I want to turn from my sins. I ask You Dear Lord
Jesus to come into my heart and take control of my life. I want You to be my
Lord, Savior, and my God. Amen...
Sincerely in Christ,
Clifford D. Tate, Sr.
Author of “Silent
Assassins of the Soul - Are you Broken by Pornography and Masturbation? You can
be Restored by the Lord Jesus Christ and brought into Deliverance, Freedom, and
Victory! A Guide for Men and Women in the Enemy’s Crosshairs” e-book available
now @ Amazon Kindle, @ Apple I Bookstore for IPod, Barnes and Noble for Nook,
Reader Store for Sony Reader, Kobo, Copia, Gardners, Baker and Taylor, and
eBookPie…
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