How Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and Peter Obeyed the Gospel of the Kingdom (Part 1)

Well, I’m going to tell you one of the most powerful things you’ve ever heard in your life, but it’s going to take you weeks and months to let it sink in. As far as that goes, I’m going to spend a good part of the summer helping this sink in. The message I’m bringing this morning, by the way, may get brought up again this summer. Don’t sit there and look at it like it’s old hat. It’s the newest thing out. How did He become declared? According to Scripture, God declared Him the Son of God. How did He win that? By obedience unto death.

Now, listen to me. Something new, brothers and sisters. I wish that we could have done all this in an unbroken line, night after night after night, and all of this could have been seen by you so clearly, but we’ve had big pauses. You thank the Lord for those big pauses, and I’ll tell you why. It means that this didn’t come out of somebody’s book of sermons somewhere. We asked the Lord to do a new thing among us. He’s taking His time with it, and these things are not just coming out like pancakes on Sunday mornings.

We started with: how many divine creatures in the universe? One. Who was it? God. Then how many did we end up with? Two. Who’s the second one? Man. Now, are there two? The Scripture clearly says there’s only one God. God had become a man. Okay, but let’s say God and God’s Son. That’s how far we’ve gotten, and now we’re almost to the book of Acts. We’ve been getting right up to the book of Acts quite frequently now.

Now tell me, how many divine creatures are there? Three. Who are they? The Father? The Son? You say the Holy Spirit? I’ll take that, but I want you to know that Jesus Christ got Himself a fiancée. Now, is she divine? Yes. Is she human? Yes. Still, if she’s divine, there are now three divine creatures. Lord, forgive me for this. You know, I can get hung for this. In 200 years from now, they can write books about this blasphemer, you know, this heretic. If you take me real seriously, then we have problems. That there are three gods? No, but I’m only saying that Jesus Christ, who is the Son of God, is going to have a bride one day.

Now, you argue with me. You tell me that she is not divine. She has to be a perfect match for Him. If you try to put this in a theological system, I’m a heretic. If you will do what the Scripture does, and that is to present something and walk off and leave it, then I’m no heretic. Scripture presents that Jesus Christ is going to have a bride and doesn’t explain it, and praise God; that’s all I need to know, and that’s all you need to know.

There are three divine creatures in the universe. Now, that’s impossible because there’s only one God. How will you explain that? Three in one? Still only one God. I’ll turn it around. God was in Christ, and Christ is in us. But better: God was in Christ, and out of Christ’s rib came His bride. One day, He and His bride will throw the biggest supper in history, and they’ll get married…and they will be one. There will still be only one God. So you see, I’m not a heretic.

I want to drop all of that and come back to what I said a moment ago. Jesus Christ was the Son of God. How did He win His sonship? Through obedience unto death. I want to enlarge that. That is exactly the proper answer, but I would nonetheless like to enlarge it. How did Jesus Christ begin to become the Son of God…before that? I think I’ll press you. How did Jesus…what was his very first step in beginning to become, to earn, Son of God? The first thing he had to do was to give up his Godship. Do you know how he gained the kingdom of God? By losing the kingdom of heaven. Let me repeat that. This is important.

What was the most glorious kingdom universal history has ever known? The kingdom of the heavens. Is that neater than being president of the United States? Is that neater than being king of England? Is that neater than some wealthy guy in Santa Barbara sitting up in one of those hills overlooking the Pacific Ocean with a couple hundred thousand dollars in the bank? Is it? Well, Jesus Christ gave it up. He gave up His title to the neatest fortune, kingdom, and greatest security in all the universe.

I want to try to explain something to you. He has already experienced everything that will ever be demanded of you. Are you clear? You’d better be impressed by what I’m talking to you about, because I am talking to you about the gospel of the kingdom, and it is a gospel that hasn’t been preached in over a millennium.

Jesus Christ gave up security, wealth, and title. He abandoned everything. For what reason? He lost the kingdom of heaven to gain the kingdom of God. What else did He lose? He lost His Godship to gain His bride. He had to become human to have a wife. Jesus Christ turns to a man and says, “Give up everything and follow me,” and I don’t care what that man gives up; it pales in comparison to what He gave up. The Lord Jesus Christ has no problem demanding everything from anybody, because he has bested us all.

Please get this and get it clear. I am learning not only from the Word of God, but from experience: I can only demand what I have attained. Let me put it this way: not attained, because that’s got a little law put in it. I can only demand that which I have experienced. Well, that really frightens me, because that means I’d better experience an awful lot. After all, the Lord would have me demand an awful lot. I hope I can stay on the course here, because I’m going to get off course just a minute.

Let’s get this over with now and move into the earthly side of spiritual things. I used to be a minister, but I don’t want to talk about myself. I want to talk about us ministers in general. We are God’s prophets. We’re in charge of the kingdom on this earth. Now, a man stands up in a pulpit. He’s standing there in a silk suit with a $40 pair of shoes on. The sun’s shining through a $10,000 stained-glass window and falls on his face and a $75,000 organ choir that’s robed in $5,000 worth of fancy garb, and he’s speaking in a building that costs $250,000 to a congregation whose average family income is something like $7,000 to $10,000 a year. He’s making about $10,000 to $12,000 a year, plus a parsonage, and if he belongs to the denomination, he has a retirement plan.