The Time Is Fulfilled

Well, good morning, everyone. Good to see you all here, and welcome. We have some interesting information for you today. Glad you were able to make it. You have heard probably in our letters and if you've been reading the Good News magazine and the Beyond Today telecast, you know that the Kingdom of God was the principal focus of Jesus Christ's ministry, and we're here today to talk about that.

So I'm glad you all were able to come. You're going to learn some things right from your Bible. If you didn't bring a Bible, we've got many of the Scriptures up on the PowerPoint here from you, but we will be turning to a few Scriptures as well that were just too many to put up on the PowerPoint. So I welcome you here today, and I wanted to again let you know that today what our plan is, is we're going to go through the Christ words in Mark 1 in verse 14 where he says, the time is fulfilled. The Kingdom of God is at hand. Before we do that, I pulled out a few quotes from other sources as well to let you know just how important the Kingdom of God was to Jesus Christ.

And it's interesting that, you know, while Jesus Christ spent almost all of his ministry talking about the Kingdom of God, the churches in the world today don't seem to focus much on that at all. Or where they talk about the Kingdom of God, there's a misunderstanding of what that Kingdom of God is. So let's start with a few quotes here. As we look and see that even from some other sources other than our church, you can see that the Kingdom of God was the focal point of Christ's ministry. This is from a man whose name will be on the next slide.

It says, it may be said that the teaching of Jesus concerning the Kingdom of God represents his whole teaching. It's the main determinative subject of all of his discourse. See how important it was to him? It was the main focus of all of his teaching. The reason he came, we'll talk about four purposes that he came later, but the main reason he came was to announce the Kingdom of God and give people the good news of what that Kingdom was going to be, because it provided all the answers to all the problems for everyone on Earth.

He goes on to say, this is Dr. Grant, his ethics, that's Christ's ethics, were ethics of the Kingdom. The way he lived is the way the people will live in the Kingdom. His theology, what he believed, what he preached, was the theology of the Kingdom. He came to be an example of that Kingdom. The way he lived then will be the way the people live in the Kingdom.

His teaching regarding himself can't be understood apart from his interpretation of the Kingdom of God. So to understand Jesus Christ, to understand why he came to Earth, to understand what his message was, you have to understand the Kingdom of God. One more quote from Dr.

Sabrina. He says, this is our first basic thesis about Jesus. He didn't preach about himself or simply about God, but he preached about the Kingdom of God. That's what he came for. And so many today have heard the Gospel about Jesus, about God, but they don't understand what the Kingdom of God is as described in Christ's own words and in the Bible. And we'll talk about that today. Now, many of you, I think we're here for the previous seminar. And in that seminar, we talked about what is the Kingdom, why the world needs the Kingdom now, and some of the events that would lead up to Christ's return. And if you weren't here for that first one and you'd like to get a copy of that, it's available on our church website, which you have listed there on the bulletin board that you picked up or in the bulletin when you came in.

We could also get you a CD if you want that. I want to review just a few points, though, of what is the Kingdom of God, so we're all on the same page as we begin here today. What we talked about last time, we talked about some things that the Kingdom of God is not.

One of the things that the Kingdom of God is not is that it is not going to heaven. You will recall that we talked about when Christ said, reiterated by the apostles, that no man has ascended into heaven. So some people believe that the Kingdom of God is we die, we go to heaven, and that's where the Kingdom of God is, and that's what the Kingdom of God that Jesus Christ talked about was. That is not the case. The Kingdom of God is not going to heaven. And if you want some verses to talk about that at the break or afterwards, I'll be more than happy to do that.

It's also not in your heart. Some people say the Kingdom of God is in our heart, that that's where it is. We have a feeling we are close to Christ. Well, all those things are right. God says that He wants to write His law, His way of life, on our hearts and in our minds. But that's not the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God is something different that Jesus was talking about. All those things about having the law written on your heart and the Holy Spirit that directs your life, those are true, but that's not the Kingdom of God that Jesus Christ was talking about.

And it is not the Church. The Church is the body of Christ. The Church is the organism through which Christ is preparing people for His Kingdom, as we'll talk about. But when we talk about the Kingdom of God, now when Jesus Christ talked about the Kingdom of God, He was not talking about just the Church.

Yes, He began the Church. Yes, it is His organism today, but it is not the Kingdom of God. What the Kingdom of God is, is a literal government, a literal Kingdom that will be established on earth with Jesus Christ as King.

It'll have its own set of laws, laws that we can find in the Bible today, a way of life that we can learn when we look at Jesus Christ and the way His disciples lived in the early New Testament Church lived. That's what the Kingdom of God is that Jesus Christ talked about. He spoke about Him returning to earth to establish a Kingdom, to establish that government on earth that would last forever and ever and ever, and that would be a literal world-ruling Kingdom. So as we go through the process today, and as we go through the lecture, keep that in mind of what the Kingdom of God is. And again, if you have any questions about that, I'll be more than happy to talk about that with you, and we'll get you whatever information you need from the last seminar, but that's the premise that we're using today.

Okay. After Christ, when He began His ministry, He came to talk about the Kingdom of God. And here in the first chapter of Mark, as Mark talks about Christ, He says that Jesus came to Galilee preaching the gospel of the Kingdom of God, preaching the good news of the Kingdom of God. And He said, the time is fulfilled, the Kingdom of God is at hand, repent, and believe in the Gospel.

Now, many people, when they read that, think that He was the Kingdom of God that brought at that time, because some of the words in here can be a little confusing. This morning, we'll talk a little bit about the one phrase, the time is fulfilled, because it has created some problems with some people in understanding, and it's part of the problem with the English translation of the Bible.

Many times, if a verse doesn't seem to make sense, or it's contradictory, or you need to get better meaning on it, you have to go back to the original Greek words of the language to understand it. And that's what we're going to do here for a few minutes. If we look at the word time in that verse of Mark 1, verse 15, it comes from the Greek word keros. And the word keros has a different meaning than our time, if you will. In English, you can say, you know, what time is it? And someone wants to know, it's 1110 or 1115 or whatever it is.

Some people will say, you know, is it time, is it time, or is it wintertime? Is it summertime?

Is it time to plant the crops? Is it time to harvest the crops? All these other things that we can use that have to do with time, but don't mean a specific instant. Keros, the Greek language, was pretty descriptive, and they have different words that describe the times or the word time. This particular word has to do with time, not in the sense of a specific moment in time, not by looking at a time on a clock. It is a fixed moment in time, something that happens, but it's something that happens that's been in preparation for a while. It's seasonal. We have a little picture of a plant there, because we can plant the seed in the springtime, and there comes a time in the fall that we harvest that plant. It's grown over that time, and it's not a specific day that you might go out and harvest, but you know by what you, by being, you know, growing those things, when is the time to harvest? You're not going to harvest something that you plant in March, in April, necessarily. You're going to wait until September or October, but it has a process of growing over time, and this Greek word keros has an element to it that it's a seasonal, something that's planted that's working toward a harvest time. This comes from the Komskys commentary on the New Testament. He says, keros is a season, a brief period of time that's marked in some special way, implying that the season is now filled full and remains so. The thought in this verse, he says, is that the time has now fully arrived for the spread of the Messianic Gospel. The time.

Now it's time. If you recall from the Old Testament, everyone that was in the Old Testament was focused on the coming of Jesus Christ. They thought that he was going to bring a kingdom and restore the kingdom to Israel at that time that he was there. That wasn't the case, but they didn't know that at that time. But Christ comes and he says the time is fulfilled. Now is the time for what you've been waiting for to happen. The time is ripe, if you will.

Got in the head of myself. Let's talk about the word fulfilled a little bit. The word fulfilled can also be confusing. In Matthew, we read about Jesus Christ came that he said that, you know, he came to fulfill the law. And some people interpret that meaning that he did away with the law. And that's not at all the case. Because the word fulfilled can have a different meaning in English than it did in the original Greek language as well. This word has a sense of completing what it's done. The time is complete, we might say in English. Not time is fulfilled as in it's all done, but the time is complete. The waiting is over. When Christ talked about doing away or when he talked about he came to fulfill the law, he wasn't talking about that he came to do away with it. He came to complete the law, to give more information on how the law would be kept. Not just physical anymore, but a spiritual sense as well. And that's what his sermon on the Mount was all about. Yes, in the old times, you were told you shall not kill. But here in the New Testament times, as he was teaching them, you can't even hate someone. Don't have the spirit of killing and hate in your heart. So the same word play row O is right here in this verse. The time is fulfilled. Fulfillment in the sense that all was complete. Now was the time that God was going to set the stage for his gift to all of humanity. Because his kingdom, when you understand it, is a gift to all humanity. It's a time when there will be peace on earth. All the suffering, all the mishaps, all the anguish that's on earth today will be replaced with a time of calm, security, a time of plenty for everyone. And that happens when they obey and live by the law that will be in that kingdom. The same principles, the same ethics, the same behavior in the way of life that Jesus Christ and the early two testament church lived. The time was ready for the Messiah to appear, that the people had been waiting for all those thousands of years, time for him to come and for the message of the kingdom of God to begin to be spread on the earth. We might say, instead of the time that's fulfilled, the time was ripe. The time was ripe for one covenant to end and a new covenant to begin and the new covenant to begin planting for a harvest that was going to be some time down the road from that. The prophets of old spoke many times about Christ's coming.

They knew and people were focused on Christ's coming from early, early on, as we'll see in a few minutes, but this verse in Isaiah 46 verse 10 is a good verse for us to look at because it talks about exactly what Christ's coming was. He says in Isaiah 46 10, I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times what is still to come. And he says, my purpose will stand and I will do all that I please. God set in motion before the earth was formed a plan for mankind and he has the power and he will bring about that plan exactly in the order and exactly in the time that he wants. Part of that plan and a very important crucial part of that plan that was set in motion before the world was founded was Jesus Christ living and living his life and leaving an example for us. What is his purpose that had come to fruition? Why was the time right now? Why was the time ready for people to come or for Christ to come? Let's go back to a few of the verses in the Old Testament that you're aware of, but that show how people were pointed toward this time of Jesus Christ. You, of course, remember the story of Adam and Eve and how when they had a choice between the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they wrongly chose the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They took to themselves and decided they were going to determine what was right and wrong rather than following God's principles. And so the world was subjected to what we see today. Wars, anguish, strife, separation, all the things that aren't so pleasant in life. There are some good things in life as well. That's the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. When Adam and Eve made that choice, they were ushered out of the garden of Eden. No longer had access to the tree of life. They made their choice and now they were going to live with that choice and see what the end results of it were. Christ, when he came, said, Come, inherit the kingdom that has been prepared for you from the foundation of the world. That's what he told the people of his time. And indeed, that plan had been in place since the beginning of time. When God was talking to Eve and Adam, and when he ushered them out, he told them and prophesied of a Savior that would come that would reconcile God and man again. Genesis 3.15, he says, output enmity between you, between your seed and her seed. He, speaking of Christ, will bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel. He was predicting or saying that a Savior would come that would end the dominion of Satan who has dominion over this world or who is the God of this world, as it says in 2 Corinthians 4, verse 4. And Eve counted on that verse. She was looking for that Savior. And you remember when she had her first male child, she thought that she had received that male child from God who would reconcile man again. It wasn't the case. Over history, other people have claimed that, and pagan religions have claimed that as well, and set up people that they thought or wanted to believe were the Savior. One Savior, one Jesus Christ.

Genesis 12, that's God is working with Abraham. Abraham was the father of the faithful.

Abraham did whatever God asked him to do. And it says in Genesis 12 that he obeyed all of God's commands, statutes, and judgments. He moved. He did whatever God asked him to do without asking. He just simply had that much faith in God. And because of that faith, God raised up a nation through him. And he made some promises to Abraham. They were both physical in nature and spiritual nature. And in Genesis 12, verse 3, he says to Abraham, and you, all the families of the earth, will be blessed. They were blessed physically. And as you know the history of Israel and look through them and know the identity of modern-day Israel today, certainly they've been blessed physically. But how they were going to be best blessed, more importantly, spiritually, is that through Abraham's line, the Savior of mankind would be born, Jesus Christ, the one who would bring the kingdom to earth and make it possible. He would be the thing that people would look for, the coming of him. That would be evidence that God's promise stood and that the kingdom was coming to earth. In Moses, as he was beginning to talk to Israel as he was going to die and God let him know he wasn't going over to the Promised Land, he told Israel, God will raise up a prophet like me from your midst. He was talking about there is a Savior coming, there is a Messiah coming who will do the things, and he wanted the people of God to look for that coming of Jesus Christ.

And they did. For 4,000 years they waited for that Messiah to come, and you could go through the other, the minor prophets, and you could see they're all focused on Jesus Christ coming. Isaiah talked about it. Isaiah 9, verse 6, a well-known verse. Unto us a child is born, and it talks about how he will be the King, mighty, wonderful, counselor. The Psalms talks about the coming of Christ as well. The whole focus of the Old Testament is the people they went through that time, they were looking for this Messiah to come. The Savior that would reconcile man and God back together again, the one who would be able to bring the kingdom back to earth. They thought, when he appeared, that he was there to bring the kingdom at that time. They didn't understand what it was, but they knew when he was there, or the few who did know who he was, that he was there to bring a kingdom. And then when he's born, or when he's beginning his ministry, Christ says, the time is fulfilled. The time is ripe. The time is here that the Savior, the Messiah that you've been waiting for, is here. Paul talks about the same thing in Galatians 4.4, and notice the verbiage that he uses. When the fullness of time had come, when the time was right, when God determined that the seed had been planted and that Israel and his people were looking toward that seed growing, and a time to be harvested, when the timefulness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. He came for a great purpose in the fullness of time that God wanted him to come, at that time that God prescribed. And it was a monumental, the most important event and the most important life in human history, because without him, there's no hope, there's no future, there's absolutely no reason for us to live, because all we would do without the promise and the hope that Jesus Christ brought, well, we wouldn't even be alive, so let's point at least even talk about it. We would just live and die, and that would be it. But he brought all those things to it that all of us count on. And notice the last verse in the second session this afternoon, we'll talk a little bit more about that. He came to redeem those who were born under the law, under the Old Testament, where the law was preeminent, if you will. He didn't come to do away with the law, but he came to magnify it, and he came to teach a new way that we live, the life of the kingdom, rather than just the physical obedience that they had in the Old Testament.

He came that we might receive the adoption of sons, because God's purpose and his will was that people, mankind, become part of his family. And he makes that option and that choice available to people. When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son and a world that had been previously enveloped in darkness, now had light. Remember how many times that Christ said, I'm the light. Now there's light in the world. Now there was hope. Now there was something that people could cling to. His life, his death, brought light to the world and brought hope to the world, and light and hope to all of us. Now, it's interesting as you look at Christ's life, and you see the time that he was born in, the time that he lived in, that it was exactly the right time for him to live.

Scholars and historians have put together some of the things, and it's quite interesting as you look at some of what they say. And, you know, you can go through many college websites, and George Mason University has a lot written on that. They say that Christ was born at a unique time in history, and if he had been born at any other time, his message, his identity, and his fame may not have grown the way that it did. He was born at the time that the Romans were in charge. They were there, and they had dominion, or the rule over Israel, or the Jews at that time.

And the Roman culture at that time was quite easy to live under. One historian put it that there was no other time in history in the 200 years that the world was just sort of at peace, even though they were under the rule of the Romans, because the Romans at this time would conquer people, but they would allow the people to just live the way they used to. So as you read about Christ's life, and you see how they walked in those days, the Jews were able to just keep their religion. They were able to continue worshiping the way they want. They, even, you know, when they met to accuse Christ of all the things, and decided that he was worthy of death, they took him to Pilate, or you remember. Pilate didn't get involved with it, other than now he had to make a decision, but the Jews were able to live and go through their processes just as they would, as if they weren't under Roman rule. It was a time that cultures were allowed to live, and Augustus, who was there at the time, at the beginning of this time, I'm going to read just a couple of paragraphs here from one of the books. It says, Augustus preached the virtues of morality and discipline and justice and courage. He realized that the Roman Empire was centered on the family and that its stability depended on it. There was originally pro-family bank of legislation that encouraged marriage and children inside the marriage relationship. Later, Rome became a very depraved society, but at this time, it still had some of its values in place. At the time of Christ, it says, the Romans remained, for the most part, moral and family-oriented. It was the most stable time in the history of the world.

No one that lived under Roman rule at that time had anything to complain about.

Life was good. The society was wealthy, it was growing, and the rule at that time was very good. So, for instance, the Jews were able to move about and live their life without someone, without a government selling them. They couldn't do this or couldn't do any other things.

Pax Romana is just that. The Peace of Rome. It was a good time to live in the Roman Empire.

They also had, at that time, roads that were being constructed.

And if you read through, and you probably remember this from your history classes, the Romans were genius at building Rome, so they were able to connect various parts of the Empire, the known world at that time, so people could easily get from one city to another. So, when you read of Paul, for instance, traveling from Ephesus to Corinth to Thessalonica and other places like that, the Romans built roads. All of a sudden, there was a way to get from one place to another more easily than ever before. And it was in this time that Christ was born, a significant time in history for him to be able to be born. Now, the other thing that was happening at this time was the Greek language. We talked a little bit about the Greek language already this morning when we talked about Charos time and Playrao fulfilled. But the Greek language at this time was just one of those unique languages on earth. Let me read, because they can verbalize it far better than I can, let me read from a university on Western civilization. It says, in the process of conquering the Hellenistic world, the Romans absorbed and adapted many facets of that civilization. Language was one of the most important. Alexander the Great had made verdacular Greek, known as Koine means common, the common tongue of the East. Under the Roman Empire, it became the common tongue of the West. Of course, the presence of a nearly universal language meant Christianity could spread quickly, especially since the followers of the Nusect used this language for their writings. This rapid dissemination of ideas was further enhanced by the nature of the language.

Koine was the language of the conquered rather than the conquerors, and so it wasn't associated with imperialism and domination. In addition, the Greek language was equipped with a large philosophical and theological vocabulary that made it especially suited to the spread of a religious message.

It goes on to say, Koine Greek was the greatest language in history for written communication. Through it, many complex and subtle concepts could be communicated with clarity. Now, those of you who attend church with us regularly hear me regularly talk about going back to the Greek words and talking about how the Greeks had a much more expressive language than we do. So when you take a Greek word and try to match it to an English word, a lot of times it just doesn't match up. You lose a lot of the meaning. We lose a lot of the meaning, for instance, in keros, as we talked about time. We lose some of the meaning, certainly with playrao and some of key verses in the Bible. And when you understand what playrao means, that you can't describe in just one word in the English language, you lose some of the meaning of the Bible and what Christ had recorded for us. So at the time that the New Testament was being recorded, this language that historians say was probably the best language in the history of the world, had all these terms, and it was so expressive that you could just capture the feeling in it. This was the time, the very time that Christ was born into, and the very time that the New Testament scriptures were recorded. So it was a very, and of course, being the fact that it was a universally known language. Today we have over in Europe many different languages, but at that time one language dominated the Roman world at that time. And then, of course, you have the Jewish synagogues.

The Jews had set up a system of synagogues throughout their times in captivity. So throughout the known world at that time, or the Roman world at that time, there were these synagogues of worship that were there. The Jews were allowed to worship as they saw fit, but they also had places of worship other than the temple that was there at that time. And so you had a system throughout all the Roman Empire at that time where the gospel message could be disseminated. You had Jesus Christ, who became a central figure more after his death than during the time he was there, than he went he was alive. But you had a language that would express what his will was that was recorded. And then as Paul and the apostles went out, they had synagogues throughout the new world that they could go to. At that time, the fullness of time when Christ, or when God determined that was the appropriate time for him to come into the world.

Of course, Christ was the reason, and there were many purposes, that he came to earth. You could recite all those to me, but let's take just a few minutes to talk about why he came to earth.

He didn't come to earth at that time to establish his kingdom. We'll talk about that a little bit more in the next session. People thought that he came to establish his kingdom at that time, but his purpose for being on earth at the time he was alive was, we'll talk about four, and there's really more than four here, but we'll talk about four. He, of course, came to be our Savior.

Everyone knows that Christ came to do that. Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Revelation 13, verse 8, says that he was slain from the foundation of the world.

Before the world was founded, it was planned that he would be born, he would live a perfect life, he would sacrifice his life so that all of us could have sins forgiven, and so that we would have the hope of eternal life through him. Everyone, I think, even if they don't believe in Christ, understands that that he is the Savior of the world. He also came to destroy the works of the devil. In 1 John 3, 8, it says, for this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil. Well, you remember before his ministry began, he went through the great temptation, he overcame Satan through the Holy Spirit that was in him, and he gave us the ability, and I didn't give us the ability, he gave us the gift of the Holy Spirit whereby we could overcome the works of the devil as well. He did it, and his life and his death opened the opportunity for God's Holy Spirit to be put in all those that he called and that responds to his call. And since we have that Holy Spirit, we can resist the works of the devil, we can resist the temptations of Satan, we can overcome him not by any might of ours and not by any power that we have, but only by the power of Jesus Christ. If there's a lesson of the Old Testament that's there, it's that even though people saw God, even though they saw the miracles that he manifested, they weren't able to keep his law. They weren't able to resist Satan, and they broke commandment after commandment after commandment after commandment. We do the same thing, and without God's Holy Spirit, there's no way we can live the life of the kingdom, no way that we can live the life that Jesus Christ lived, no way that we can live a life that pleases God without his Holy Spirit. Christ came to destroy the works of the devil, but he came and he gave his life as a sacrifice for us that our sins could be forgiven and that we could receive the Holy Spirit when we respond to his call when we turn from our old way of life and choose to live the way of the life of the kingdom. He came to become a high priest for all of us. Hebrews 17 says, for this reason Jesus had to be made like his brothers in every way so he could be their merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, then Jesus could bring forgiveness for their sins. Well, he's our high priest. He is the one, also our intercessor. He lived a life, went through everything just like we do so that he understands the trials, the concerns, the temptations of this life. So when we pray to him, he understands and he intercedes with God on our behalf. He is a high priest that he's also our example. The high priest back in the Old Testament times were to live the example of God's law. And Jesus Christ came to be our example.

1 John 2 verse 6 says, we ought to walk as he walked. Peter says in 1 Peter 2, 21, he left us an example. He's our high priest, but he's also our example. He is the high priest in the kingdom. He's the one to whom we look, but he's also the one to whom we emulate. If we want to be part of that literal world-ruling kingdom of God, then we simply have to adapt or adopt, I should say, the lifestyle of that kingdom. Walk as he walked, live as he lived, follow the same ethics, have the same theology that he had. And he came to establish his church. You know his church? He talks about it in Matthew 16, 18. He says, I'll build my church, and no power on earth will be able to stop it. His church had a very real purpose. It was there so that he could bring people into it, so he could prepare people for his kingdom, so they could learn, worship him, of course, but also learn the way of the life of that kingdom. This church, it says, is his body. It's made full and complete by Christ, who fills all things everywhere with himself.

It was the body that he was looking to form, a body that he would be directing.

I didn't put some verses up here, but let's, if you've got your Bible, let's turn over to Ephesians 4.

And read a little bit about the church, that body that Christ began. Ephesians 4, beginning in verse 4. There is one body, that's his church, and one spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in you all. But to each one of us, grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift.

One body of Christ, just like he started one church that had one commission.

And you know the commission in Matthew 28 verse 19?

Well, that's Mark 16 verse 15, where he says, go out and preach the kingdom to every creature.

But in Matthew 28 verse 19, he said, teach all nations to observe all things I've commanded you and baptize them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

He gave a commission to the church, one church, that would be doing that commission throughout time. Going on in Ephesians 4, in verse 11, it says, he himself, Christ, gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers. He set people in there so that people could be taught the way of the kingdom, the way of life that he lived. Why did he do that? For the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.

He was looking to build his people, prepare them for the life and what his purpose for them was down the road. And he says in verse 13, till we all come to the unity of the of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, till we all come to be a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. See what the goal is? When Christ calls and we respond to his call, he's looking for us to become more like him as time goes on. Yes, he forgives our sins. Yes, he lays all those aside, but his calling is a calling of change. Over the process of time, as we're taught, as we follow him, as his Holy Spirit is working in us, we become more like him until we come to the measure of the fullness of Jesus Christ that says here.

It's a big job, isn't it? Big job to become over a lifetime working toward perfection all that time, working toward the same standards and the same morality that Jesus Christ had, the same way of life that he lived. When Christ established his church, he established it so that people would begin preparing and working toward that time.

Let's go over to Ephesians 5. In Ephesians 5, Paul is talking about husbands and wives, but he compares that relationship to the relationship between Christ and his church. Ephesians 5, verse 22, says, wives submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church, and he is the Savior of the body. He's the one Christ.

And as his church submits to him, we do his will. We no longer walk according to the ways of the world. We no longer determine for ourselves what is right and wrong, like the world does, but we submit to God and his will in his direction. Down in verse 25, it says, husbands love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.

And indeed, he showed his love by giving his life so that we would all have the opportunity to have sins forgiven and the opportunity to show by our actions that we want what he has to offer.

Verse 26, he gave himself for her that he might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that he could cleanse her over the time, that as time went on, that she would become a clean church. Verse 27, that he might present her to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.

That was his will for his church. When he calls us into his body, he wanted the church and the people in it to allow his spirit to lead us toward a state of cleanliness, a state of being without blemish, allowing all or allowing him to forgive our sins, but then walking in a life that would walk in that direction. Not the way we used to walk, as Peter says, but now walking in a new life, now living the way Christ lived, now using his spirit to give us the strength to say no to the way we used to do things, and yes, and make a determination that we are going to live in accordance with the words, his words, the words that you read in the Bible, every single word in the Bible that talks to us about what life in the kingdom will be like and how people that live in the kingdom will live. The Bible is kind of like our Constitution. This is the law of the land. This is the way people will live. And his church, the people he calls out, the people who say, yes, Christ, yes, God the Father, I want what you have to offer. I believe in your kingdom. I see the vision of it. I want what you have to offer. I'm looking forward to a time when there will be a world of peace and security and calm, when all sickness and all the bad things of life disappear.

If we say, yes, we want that, there's only one way to get there. And that's through Jesus Christ, the Savior. And that's through his body as he works with us and perfects us so that we are able to live in that society of the kingdom. That's what he's looking to do with his people. That's what he wants us to do now. And as he established his church, he established it to preach the gospel of the kingdom of God. The true church of God will always be teaching the truth of the kingdom of God, just the same message that Jesus Christ preached when he was on earth, but also be preparing a people. Preparing a people for the kingdom of God as we have talked. Turn to one other verse in Revelation. Revelation 19. Christ came to establish a church, and between the time that he was when he was on earth and then went back to heaven, by the time that he returns to earth again, he's preparing people for that kingdom. And as we'll see in the next session, some roles that they will play in administering that kingdom. In Revelation 19 in verse 7, it says, Let us be glad and rejoice, and give him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his wife, the church, has made herself ready. Now you know the context of Revelation 19. This is the time after the seals have been opened. This is after the time the world has been in a time of great tribulation. A time that the world all knows about a time called Armageddon, when armies of the world will gather together. And in Matthew 24 it says that if Christ didn't come down, the world would blow itself off the face of the earth, no flesh would be saved. But he comes down to earth and saves mankind, because he has a purpose. His purpose was never for mankind to die, his purpose was for mankind to live. And Christ said in John 10, He came that we might have life, and we might have it more abundantly. When we live the laws of the kingdom, we have life more abundantly.

There's real benefits to living the way of life now. With the vision to the future, and the whole world will see what the benefits of living God's way of life is, when He brings His kingdom to earth. But this is talking at a time right before Christ returns to earth, and there's a marriage between Him and His wife, because the time then is fulfilled. The time then is ripe for Christ to make His return to earth, and this time establish a literal kingdom on earth. Revelation 19, verse 8, His wife has made herself ready, and to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright. For the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.

It's how they've lived their lives. It's the changes they've made after they've accepted Christ's invitation and call. It's how they live their life with the Holy Spirit of God leading them and directing them. And then Christ says the church is prepared. The wife has made herself ready, and together they return to earth so He can conquer the armies and the kingdoms of this world and make them His own. The true church of Christ, the church that He started, the church that He began, will be doing these things. Preaching the gospel, and it will be preparing a people.

Teaching them. Working with them. Showing them the words of God, and using the Bible as the basis, because that's the Word of God. That's where His will is. That's where our life is defined.

From the time He started His church, it was doing that. And His church today should still be doing those same things. Preaching the same gospel of Jesus Christ. The same gospel that we talked about in the first seminar. The same gospel that we talked about today. A literal kingdom of God that will be on earth with Jesus Christ as King of Kings. And in between the time that He was here and the time that He returns to earth, there will be a church that's teaching the things of God.

A church that is making itself ready for His return.

Who's He preparing? Well, there's many verses we can go to. Second Timothy 1, verses 8 and 9, it says, God who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began.

Every one of us sitting in the room today, every one of us has been called by God. You wouldn't be sitting here today if God wasn't opening your mind to understand the truth. You wouldn't be sitting here today if God wasn't working with you and that you didn't know and understand because of what He's done in your life to begin to understand there's more to life than what this world has to offer. That there's a deeper truth and a meaning and a purpose to life than what anything you can find in the world.

You can only find the sense of fulfillment and completion, if you will, than Jesus Christ in God the Father in His plan. There's no other place that you can find a fulfillment and purpose of life that will transcend or take you out of a state that you're in to a place where you appreciate and look forward to every day and have a vision and purpose.

That you just can't find in the world today.

In the next session, we'll talk a little bit more about God's calling.

But I want to leave you this morning, as we take a break here in a few minutes, every single one of you is being called.

Every single one of you is here for a purpose.

It's a great invitation. It's a great calling. It's not always the easiest way of life, but it is the most rewarding way of life. Take a break here for a few minutes, but in the next session, we'll talk about a few things. Who is God preparing for His kingdom?

Well, I've talked a little bit about that already. How and for what purpose is God preparing people for His kingdom? What will we do? What is He looking for us to do? What will that kingdom be like? When Christ was on earth, He said, the kingdom of God is at hand. And the people didn't understand what He meant. They didn't understand that. We'll talk about that because the kingdom of God isn't on earth today. 2 Corinthians 4, verse 4, says, Satan is still the God of this world. But there is a time when Christ is returning.

Is His kingdom at hand now? And what will we be doing if we want what God has to offer us?

So let's take a break for about 15 minutes here. And there's some coffee and I think some cookies out in the back. And we'll come back for the next session that'll talk about these topics.

If you have any questions, I'll be here, you know, of course, during the break. I'll be here long after our second session as well. So I thank you for being here. We'll see you back here again in 15 minutes. And that'll be right about 5 after 12.