Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.
And behold, I am with you always, even unto the completion of the age.
Dear heavenly Father, how we do praise and thank Thee for giving us the privilege of gathering in Thy presence, worshipping Thee, and remembering what Thy Son, our Lord Jesus, has done for us.
Our Father, we do thank Thee that we may continue in Thy presence to read Thy Word. And now we ask that Thou wouldst bless Thy Word and make Thy Word living and operative in each of our lives, that Thou mayest get all the glory. We commit this time into Thy hand and trust Thy blessing, in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
When you open the New Testament, you will find that the first four books of the New Testament are called the Gospels: the Gospel according to Matthew, the Gospel according to Mark, the Gospel according to Luke, and the Gospel according to John.
These four books tell us the story of our Lord Jesus. In other words, these four books are historical in nature; they are biographical. As we read these four Gospels, we come to a knowledge of our Lord Jesus—His life and His ministry.
But, brothers and sisters, one thing we need always to remember is that the Bible is given to us as a revelation. In other words, the Bible is to reveal Christ to us. Whether it is given in the form of history, biography, poetry, prophecy, or allegory—in whatever form it may be presented to us—the purpose is one: to reveal Christ Jesus to us.
Therefore, you find that the Bible is not only historical, but it is spiritual. As we approach the Word of God, on the one hand we need to read and study in order to know what is written there. Such knowledge is important. But, dear brothers and sisters, if that is all we get from the Bible, then we miss the very reason why the Word of God is given to man.
The Word of God is given to us as a revelation. It is to reveal Christ. And because it is given to us as a revelation, it has to be received as a revelation. It is not enough merely to receive the Book as history, poetry, teaching, doctrine, ceremony, or ritual. You have to receive the Word of God as a revelation.
That is to say, you need not only to know the story, the history, the teaching, and the doctrine, but through these you have to come to see Christ Jesus. If you do not see Christ and all you know is story, if you do not see Christ and all you have is teaching, then you miss the very purpose for which the Word of God is given.
Therefore, dear brothers and sisters, as we approach the Word of God, we need to ask the Lord to give us the spirit of wisdom and revelation, that we may truly know Him. It is given as a revelation, and it has to be received as a revelation.
By revelation, it means that God reveals Christ, and through the Book we are to see Christ in our spirit. You know, when a revelation is given, then it results in fellowship. If there is no revelation, there is no fellowship. Fellowship means having things in common. If there is revelation, then you have that which is revealed; you have fellowship with that which is revealed.
Therefore, you will find that the logos of God has to become rhema to us. Logos is the Word—the fact, the truth, the story—the Word once spoken and given by God as revelation. Rhema is the Holy Spirit breathing once more upon the Word that was given and making it living, present, real, and experiential to each one of us.
That is the reason why we need to receive the Word of God as a revelation. Only when this is the case is there fellowship, and the result of fellowship is transformation. We will be transformed by the Word, by what is revealed—or rather, by Who is revealed—and thus be transformed and conformed to the image of God.
You know, this is what the Word of God, the Bible, is really for. So, dear brothers and sisters, may the Lord help us as we approach His Word, that we may approach His Word as a revelation and receive it as such. By revelation, may we have a sight of Christ.
Now, of course, the first four books of the New Testament are history books. But even though they are books of history and biography concerning the life of our Lord Jesus, God’s purpose is that we not only know the story, but that we really see Jesus, that we may know Him. This is the purpose of God’s Word.
This morning, we would like to begin with the first book, Matthew. What is the book of Matthew given to us as revelation from God? Chronologically speaking, Matthew is not the first Gospel book written. Most commentators agree that the first Gospel written was Mark.
And yet, in God’s sovereignty—as you open the New Testament—you find that the Gospel according to Matthew is put first. Do you know why? From a human standpoint, we might put the Gospel according to Luke first, because from the human viewpoint the Gospel is the Gospel of grace for the remission of our sins.
We are conscious of our sins. We know we are sinners. We need forgiveness; we need the grace of God. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the Gospel of grace, and through grace, by faith, we are forgiven and receive eternal life. So, from the human standpoint, we would say that Luke should be placed first.
But from the divine viewpoint, from God’s viewpoint, you find that the Gospel of Matthew is put first. Why? Because, from God’s viewpoint, the first thing concerning Christ that we need to see and know is to know Him as our King.
The Gospel of the kingdom is God’s viewpoint of the Gospel. The Gospel of grace is our viewpoint of the Gospel. Of course, it is both. But we usually begin with ourselves. We are so self-centred. We want grace for ourselves, for our enjoyment, and sometimes we forget that we need to be God-centred and see the Gospel from God’s viewpoint.
What is it that God wants us to know about the Gospel, or about the Lord Jesus, in the first place? He wants us to know Him as our King.
One reason why Christian lives are so weak and Christian testimony is so ineffective is that we receive the Lord Jesus as our Saviour and see Him as our Redeemer, but we fail to see Him and recognise Him as our Lord, as our King. We receive the Gospel for our good, but we do not obey the Gospel for God’s purpose to be fulfilled.
As you open the New Testament, the first thing God wants us to see about His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, is that He is King. The whole Bible is the revelation of Christ, and the first thing that needs to be revealed to us and received by us is to see the Lord Jesus as King. Again I say, this requires revelation.
The Holy Spirit has to reveal this to us in our spirit. It is written there in the Gospel according to Matthew, but what is written there has to be quickened by the Holy Spirit to our heart, that we may truly see Jesus as King.
When you open the Gospel according to Matthew, the first verse says:
The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham.
There are only two places in the whole Bible where you have something like the same formula: “the book of the generation.” One is in Genesis 5:1, “the book of the generation of Adam”; and here in Matthew 1:1, “the book of the generation of Jesus Christ.”
Why? Because there are only two men in God’s eyes. The first man is Adam, and everyone who comes out of Adam dies. The second Man is Christ, and in Christ all shall be made alive.
The book of the generation of Jesus Christ—what is His history? The Son of David, the Son of Abraham. From the very beginning of the Gospel, God is testifying Who this Jesus Christ is.
Who is the son of David? Solomon. Yet Solomon is only a shadow. The real Son of David is Jesus Christ. As God told David, in thy son He will build Me a house, and His throne and kingdom shall never end.
We know that even Solomon built a temple, but it was only a physical temple. Solomon did reign, but his throne did not last forever. Therefore, Solomon is only a shadow, a type of Christ. There is a Son of David Who is greater than David, and by Him the true house of God shall be built.
I will build My church; and upon this rock the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.
It is in this Son of David that His throne shall never end. He shall reign for ever and ever. He is also the Son of Abraham. Historically, Isaac was the son of Abraham; yet God promised Abraham in Genesis 22:18:
In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.
We know that Isaac is only a type, a shadow. The reality is Jesus Christ, because truly in Christ Jesus all the nations shall be blessed. Here, at the very outset, God is presenting Jesus to us as the King. He is the promised King, the promised Son of David, the promised Son of Abraham, in Whom all the nations shall be blessed.
There is something very interesting: as you read the Gospel according to Matthew, you will find that, on the one hand, God is witnessing all the time. He is bearing witness to Jesus, to His Son, as His appointed King. Yet at the same time, it is recorded how the people rejected Jesus as King. You see a conflict there.
Why is it that people fail to see the Lord Jesus as King? God chose out of all the nations a people, and God prepared that people for a long period for one reason: that the Messiah could come out from their midst.
God prepared the children of Israel from the days of Abraham up to the day of Christ. He prepared them with every preparation for one reason: that in the fullness of time, the King, the Messiah, should come.
But strangely, when the Messiah, the King, arrived, the people of Israel, having been prepared for so long, failed to recognise Him as King. They rejected Him. Why was it so? Because the concept of a king has been so distorted in human history.
The concept of a king in human understanding is very different from the concept of the King according to divine understanding. Therefore, when the King finally arrived, very few recognised Him.
The Jews at that time were disappointed in Him. They were expecting Him as King in the beginning, and there was a probability that He was the King. They were waiting for Him to overthrow the Roman Empire, throw off its iron yoke, and make Israel the head of the nations. But He did not do that.
Because of that, they were disappointed in Him. In their concept, He was not a king according to their thought. Therefore, even though He claimed to be King and was born to be King, they rejected Him. He did not fit their concept.
Only a few among all the children of Israel received Jesus as their King: Mary, Joseph, Zacharias, Elisabeth, John the Baptist, Simeon, Anna, a few shepherds, and a few of the disciples of John the Baptist. These shepherds were probably very special shepherds, perhaps shepherds of the temple who kept sheep set apart to be sacrificed on the altar.
Only a few among the whole multitude, the whole nation of Israel, received Jesus as their King. How? Through revelation. The human concept stands in such contrast and opposition to the divine concept of the King that it takes revelation to see Jesus as King.
Brothers and sisters, this was not only true in the first century, when the Lord Jesus came upon this earth in a human body. It has been true and is still true today. Do you think you can really see Jesus as King without revelation?
You may read the Gospel according to Matthew, where He is presented to us as King. But as you read it, perhaps there is a conflict within you. Even though Jesus is presented as King, you may not see much of His kingly nature, His kingly manner, or His kingship there. Probably you would take the same position as the Jews in old days: “He is not much of a king. What has He done?”
It takes revelation. We really need revelation—an unveiling by the Holy Spirit in our heart—as we read the Gospel of Matthew. God has to open our eyes to see that Jesus is truly King. But He is not a king according to human thought; He is a King according to God’s thought. We must receive Him as such, as our King.
When Jesus was born, Galatians tells us that in the fullness of time He was born of a woman, born under the law, that He might deliver us from the curse of the law, that we might have adoption—that is, sonship.
To God, it was the fullness of time. In other words, the time was right for the Lord Jesus to come as King. But if you read history, perhaps you would say, “This is not the time.” When Christ Jesus was born, who was on the throne of Judea? Herod—an Edomite, not even a Jew, not a son of David. And who was on the throne of the world empire? Caesar Augustus.
We would say this was not the time. Yet in God’s viewpoint, it was the fullness of time for His Son to come as King.
When He was born, He was not born in Jerusalem. We would expect a king, a prince, to be born in the capital of the nation. But He was born in a little village, in a little town called Bethlehem.
When He was born, nobody was aware of it—only a few wise men, Magi, from the East. They looked at the stars, saw a tremendous, brilliant star, and interpreted it to mean that a King had been born.
They probably had some knowledge of the prophecy of Balaam. Balaam was a Gentile prophet, and these Gentiles may have known something about his prophecy concerning the star and the sceptre. They thought a King must have been born in the region of Judea, so they came seeking Him.
Naturally, they went to Jerusalem, because that was where a king should be. But He was not there. Herod was disturbed because he was king, and another King had been born. So he called the Pharisees and scribes together and asked where the King of the Jews should be born.
The Pharisees and scribes were Bible scholars. They were living concordances. When Herod asked where the King of the Jews should be born, immediately they answered, “In Bethlehem of Judea.”
They knew because there was a word in the minor prophet Micah. In Micah 5:2, there is a prophecy that Bethlehem, though it was the least among the towns, would bring forth a Ruler Whose days are from eternity.
These scribes and Pharisees knew the Word by heart. Even today, if I ask you to find Micah, I do not know how many of you could find it quickly. But they did not even need to look. They knew it by heart. They really had the knowledge, but did they go to seek the King? No, they were disturbed.
In other words, even though they had knowledge, they did not have the King. Brothers and sisters, the same thing is true today. We may mentally say that Jesus is King, but spiritually and really, do you seek after Him as your King? Do you yield your life to Him and let Him rule over your life? There is a great difference here.
This King was reared in Nazareth, in the upper part of Galilee, in the hilly country. He was not raised in a palace. He had never been to rabbinical school. He did not have a theological degree. There He was, in that hidden place, for about thirty years.
He had never been to school, but He was in the school of God His Father. Then the day came when He was thirty years old and was presented to the world, as it were. How did He present Himself to the world? Not by a royal banquet, but by going to the River Jordan and being baptised by John the Baptist.
The baptism of John the Baptist was the baptism of repentance. John preached, “Repent. Change your mind. Turn around—make an about-face. The way you are going is entirely wrong.”
Even if you are very religious—having the temple, the sacrifices, the priesthood, the city of God, the Old Testament, the five books of Moses, the Torah, the prophets, and the Psalms—even if you seem very religious and seem to be doing all the right things, repent. Turn about-face. You are completely in the wrong direction.
Why? Because the kingdom of the heavens has drawn near. The King is coming. Being religious will not help you. You need to repent of being religious as well as of being irreligious, because the King is coming.
Yet here you find the King Himself coming to be baptised. He had nothing to repent of. Our Lord Jesus had absolutely nothing to repent of, because He and the Father are one, and He always pleases the Father. Yet, in presenting Himself to the nation, He took the baptism of John.
Why? He offered Himself as a sacrifice for the sins of the nation, for the sins of the world. That was His presentation. Here is the King of love. He gave Himself as a sacrifice for us. That was His credential; that was His qualification; that was the proof that He is King.
His kingship is not proved by fanfare and pomp. His kingship is proved by being the sacrifice. As He went down into the water to be baptised by John the Baptist, identifying Himself with a sinful world and offering Himself as a sacrifice, He revealed the nature of His kingship.
When He came out of the water, the Holy Spirit came upon Him—not only upon Him, but to dwell in Him—as a dove. Do you know what a dove is? The dove is the offering of the poor. The poor could not afford to offer a bullock or even a lamb; they could only offer a dove.
Here you find our Lord Jesus offering Himself to God as the offering of the poor. This is the way He presented Himself as King.
Then He was led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil for forty days and forty nights. There He overcame the enemy. In the garden of Eden, under the best of circumstances, man—the first man, Adam—fell before temptation. But here, in the worst of circumstances, in the desert, fasting for forty days and forty nights, He overcame.
It is just like the way King David was presented to the nation of Israel. The first time King David was presented to Israel was when he slew Goliath. By slaying Goliath, everybody knew that here was a king.
Here, brothers and sisters, our Lord Jesus was tempted in the wilderness for forty days and forty nights, and He overcame the enemy. The enemy could do nothing to Him. There was no place in His life for the enemy. His victory over the enemy proved to the world that He is the King.
When He came out to preach—I am just going through the Gospel of Matthew with you—at the time when John the Baptist was in prison, the Lord Jesus began to preach in earnest.
In Matthew 4, as He was walking by the Sea of Galilee, He began to call disciples. He saw Simon Peter and Andrew casting nets into the sea, and He said:
Come ye after Me, and I will make you fishers of men.
They left everything and followed the Lord. Then He went a little farther and saw the two sons of Zebedee mending their nets. The Lord said, “Come, follow Me.” They left their nets, their father, their boat, and everything, and followed the Lord.
What does discipleship really mean? The Lord came and called people to be His disciples: “Come, follow after Me.” These people responded to His call. They gave up everything and were with Him. They put themselves under His kingship and let Him transform them, conforming them to His own image.
The call of discipleship is the call of the kingdom; it is the call of the King. The King is calling His people to put themselves under His kingship, His rulership, so that He may transform them and make them truly His own kingdom.
If this is what the call of discipleship is, can you be discipled to any man? Does any man have the qualification to call you to be his disciple? No. We are disciples only of Christ, not of anybody else.
People may help us in discipleship, but they are not our masters. We have only one Master; we have only one King. We do not have the Lord Jesus and Caesar. We have only one King: the Lord Jesus.
The call of discipleship is the call of the King. It is according to the kingdom. It is the call to be His subjects, the call to submit ourselves wholly to Him. That is why every time the call of discipleship comes, the response has to be leaving all and following Him.
If you still try to look back and cling to something, the Lord said you are not worthy to be His disciple. Let go of everything. Let go of yourself, and let Him do what He wants with your life and in your life. Are you afraid of that? Thank God for that.
If you hold on to yourself, how much can you make of yourself? You make a mess of yourself. But if you let go of yourself and let Him take care of you, He will make you a son of the kingdom. In other words, He will conform you and let His kingly character be wrought in you, so that you may truly be kings and priests unto God.
Do you know that we are not only redeemed by the precious blood, but we are also made kings and priests unto God? Do you know that you are a king—potentially? He called you to be His disciple that He may make you a king in reality.
What is the concept of a king? How different is God’s concept from man’s concept. We may think, “If He calls me to be king, then I will sit high up and give commands. Let everybody serve me.” No, that is not the type of King our Lord Jesus is.
As we have already mentioned, His kingship is so divine, so different. He calls us to be His disciples, and as we come to be His disciples, what is going to discipline us and train us?
I believe we all know the Sermon on the Mount. He gathered His disciples, went up to the mountain, and as the disciples came to Him, He opened His mouth and began to speak.
Remember, Matthew 5, 6, and 7 were not words spoken to the world. Even though many people in the periphery heard them, these words were spoken to His disciples—people who had already put themselves under His kingship and allowed Him to have absolute sway over their lives.
The Lord Jesus said:
Blessed are the poor in spirit:
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
What is the Sermon on the Mount? There the Lord Jesus describes to us what His kingdom is like. His kingdom is not of this world. We know what the kingdoms of the world are like, but we do not know what His kingdom is like. So He describes to us the nature of His kingdom.
His kingdom is just like Him, the King. This is what He is; and because this is what He is, this is what His kingdom is like, and this is what those who are in the kingdom are like. It is not law; it is grace. That is to say, this is what He is able to do and make us to be.
What is meant by poverty of spirit? It does not mean that you are spiritually poor. On the contrary, because you are spiritually rich, therefore you can be made poor in spirit.
Think of the Lord Himself. In Philippians 2, He Who was equal with God did not regard equality with God as something to be grasped at, because that was what He was essentially and eternally. He was equal with God. He was in the form of God, and the word “form” there means the inward character. Whatever God is, that is what He is.
He is rich. Spiritually, He is full. As we study the epistle to the Colossians, all the fullness of the Godhead makes its permanent home in Him. That is how rich He is, how full He is. Because He is so rich and so full, therefore He is able to empty Himself.
Actually, there is not much for us to empty, because we are empty. We do not have anything, though we think we have a great deal. But with the Lord Jesus, all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Him bodily. Can you imagine the fullness of the Godhead? That is beyond our understanding.
Yet He emptied Himself. Of course, He could not empty Himself of His deity; that is impossible. But He emptied Himself of all the things connected with deity—His glory, His honour, His worship—and He took the form of a slave.
Not just the form of a man, but the form of a slave. Inwardly, He became a slave, a love slave to God His Father. He Who was equal with God took an inferior place to God, to such an extent that He became a slave, a love slave to God.
Outwardly, He took the fashion of a man. He put on flesh, the likeness of sinful flesh, yet without sin. Being found as a man, He humbled Himself. That is, He took His place as a man, as a created being before the Creator. He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto God, even unto death, and death on a cross.
That is poor in spirit. In other words, poor in spirit simply means humility. Humility.
Think of the Lord’s words. If you read Revelation 3, you find that the church in Laodicea boasted of itself, saying, “We are rich. We have everything. We lack nothing.” Yet God said, “You are poor, miserable, naked, and blind.”
Brothers and sisters, how arrogant we are, how self-assertive we are, how self-confident and self-sufficient we are. We think we know everything, have everything, and lack nothing.
The Bible says that pride goes before a fall. If you are proud, you will fall. But the man upon whom God looks is the one who is of a poor and contrite spirit, and who trembles at His Word.
Naturally, we are all proud and arrogant. We exert ourselves. We are self-sufficient. We think it is a shame if we must look up to somebody else. Naturally, that is what we are.
But as we come to be disciples of Christ, as we enter the call to the kingdom of the heavens, the first thing the King will work in our lives—working His own character into us—is the character of humility.
He has to transform us from thinking, “I am somebody. I have everything. I can do all things by myself,” into saying, “I am nothing. I can do nothing. I have nothing. Therefore, He has to be everything to me.”
Brothers and sisters, this is the first quality of a king according to the divine concept. According to the human concept, that is the last thing. If you are king, you think you cannot afford to be humble. You have to exert yourself; you have to be authoritative; you have to be proud—just like Louis XIV said, “I am the state.”
Oh, no. The King in the divine sense is the opposite. The first quality of the King in the divine sense is humility. Are you a king in God’s thought? Do you have that kingly quality in you? Is there humility in you? If there is humility in you, then, brothers and sisters, the Bible says God loves that man.
Think of the disciples whom He called. They did not come from noble backgrounds. They were fishermen, publicans, and so forth. Yet one thing among them was that they struggled and strove with one another throughout the years they followed the Lord.
Think of it. They were following the Lord. They were His disciples. They were all being trained to be transformed by Him. Yet something in them seemed to trouble them, even to the very end. What was it? “Who is the greatest? Who is the greatest?”
Their whole concept was the worldly concept of a king. Everyone tried to sit in the highest seat. Everyone tried to get to that position so that he could look down upon the others and the others would have to serve him.
That concept was very deep in the disciples, and again and again the Lord had to teach them. In Matthew 18, they were again struggling and striving with one another, asking, “Who is the greatest?”
The Lord took a child and said:
Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
Why is it so? Because a little child has nothing and knows nothing. He has to look up to others. There is the spirit of a child. God wants us to be very childlike, but do not be childish.
Then in Matthew 20, when the Lord was going to Jerusalem for the last time, all the disciples thought that was the time when the King would be crowned, and they would sit at His right hand and His left.
The two sons of Zebedee came with their mother. Humanly speaking, their mother was the aunt of our Lord Jesus, and the word of an aunt has weight, you know. She came with her two sons and asked the Lord for something. She wanted Him to promise beforehand that He would grant it.
The Lord never signs a blank cheque. He asked, “What do you want? Come out. Be honest. Do not be subtle.” The mother then said, “Let my two sons, one sit on Your right and one sit on Your left, in Your kingdom.”
That was the worldly concept of the King and of the kingdom. The Lord Jesus said:
Are ye able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?
Are ye able to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?
The two sons of Zebedee, the sons of thunder, did not really know what the cup was or what the baptism meant. But they wanted the right and left positions so much that they would do anything. They said, “We are able.” The Lord said, “Ye shall.”
But whether they would sit on His right or left was not for Him to give; it was for His heavenly Father to give. In other words, kingship is not in a position. Kingship is in drinking the cup and being baptised with the baptism. That is where the kingly character is revealed.
What is the cup? The cup in Scripture stands for the will of the Father. In the Garden of Gethsemane, the Lord said, “If it be possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not My will, but Thine, be done.” Finally, the Lord said, “The cup which the Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it?”
The will of God—whether it is bitter or sweet—does not matter. It is the will of God. The baptism is the cross. It is the cross with which the Lord would be baptised. Through doing the will of God and by taking up the cross, the kingly nature, character, power, and energy are manifested.
The Lord said that in the world, those who are rulers and high up rule over people. They give commands to people. But among you it is different. In the kingdom of God it is different. He who is greatest should be the least; he who would be great should serve as a slave to the others.
Dear brothers and sisters, our Lord Jesus is truly King. But what kind of King is He? What is His kingly character? How do we know He is King? You cannot judge Him from the human viewpoint. If you do, you will be disappointed. You have to see Him from the divine viewpoint.
See His humility. See His meekness. See His purity. See His gentleness. See His lowliness. See how He does the will of God. See how He goes to the cross. In all these things, He reveals Himself as the King.
No wonder that when He was crucified on the cross, Pilate wanted to mock the Jews. So he put over the cross the sentence, the crime: “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.” He used it to mock the Jews, and it was written in three languages: Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, for the whole world to know.
Unknowingly, Pilate was doing God’s will. There on the cross, Christ was declared to the whole world as truly the King. There was no place where He made His kingship clearer than at the time when He was crucified.
Dear brothers and sisters, look at the cross and you see the King. How different it is from the world. Do you see the cross? If you see the cross, can you fail to see Christ Jesus as your King? Has He not conquered you with His love?
Are you not constrained by the love of Christ, thinking that One died for all, therefore all died? Now that you live, you live for Him Who died and rose again for you. Can you live for yourself any longer?
Do you not recognise the King? When you receive the cross, can you reject the King? When you receive the cross, you have to recognise that the One Who was crucified on the cross is your King. He has a claim upon you. He has bought you with His price. You belong to Him.
Dear brothers and sisters, He is going to transform you and make you a king, because He is the King of kings. He is to build His own character into your living life—the kingly character: humility, meekness, purity of heart, lowliness, gentleness, selflessness.
“Deny thyself, and take up thy cross, and follow Me,” the Lord said. From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force. We do not like the word “violence” because it has such a bad connotation today, but the word itself is neutral. It simply means force.
It does not mean that you do violence to other people. It means that you do violence to yourself. You deny yourself. That is the violence to yourself. You deny yourself, take up the cross, and follow the Lord.
Brothers and sisters, whenever we see the mark of the cross upon a person, we know he is a king. Remember Paul. He told the Galatians, “From henceforth let no man trouble me: for I bear branded on my body the marks of Jesus.”
Do you have the mark of the cross in your life? What is the mark of the cross? It crucifies self, that Christ may be all in your life. That is the mark of the King.
Finally, you find that our Lord was raised from the dead. He appeared to the disciples for forty days. Before He left, in Matthew 28, He said:
All authority hath been given unto Me in heaven and on earth.
Go ye therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit:
teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I commanded you:
and lo, I am with you always, even unto the completion of the age.
How did He come into all authority? He came into all authority through the cross, through emptying Himself, by proving that He is truly King. Therefore, He is fit; He is qualified to have all authority in heaven and on earth.
Brothers and sisters, if a little power is given to you today, can you handle it? That is why power and authority have been so misused in this world: people are not fit or qualified to use power and authority.
But the Lord Jesus has all authority given to Him. Why? Because He has proved Himself to be One Who can handle it. And He said, “Go to the nations. Disciple all nations.”
Remember, dear brothers and sisters, the Great Commission is not merely evangelising the nations. It is more than that. Of course, evangelising is included. The Great Commission is to disciple all nations.
Bring them to Christ, that they may be saved; but bring them to Christ also that they may submit their lives to Christ, accepting Christ not only as their Saviour but also as their King. This is the Great Commission: disciple all nations. Bring all nations to Christ.
The kingdoms of this world will one day become the kingdom of our God and of His Christ. What do you do? Baptising them in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Why baptising them? Baptism is an outward testimony to an inward reality: everything in the past is dead and buried. From now on, everything is new. Everything is Christ.
Then teach them all things that He has taught you. That is, build them up. And the Lord said, “I will be with you to the completion of the age.” This is the Gospel according to Matthew.
Dear heavenly Father, we do praise and thank Thee because Thou dost present Thy Son to us as Thy King. Yet how different He is from the king and the concept of a king that we know.
Oh, do change and renew our mind, that we may truly see Christ as King; that we may admire His kingly character; that we may give ourselves to Him and let Him disciple us, transform us, and build that kingly character in us, that truly one day we may rule and reign with Christ.
Lord, we ask that these may not be merely words passing through our minds. We ask that Thy Holy Spirit will open our spirit and reveal Christ to us, that we may truly take Him as our King and let Him make us kings under Him, the King of kings and the Lord of lords. We ask in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.