Advancing the Kingdom, Pt. 1 (01/15/2023)

The Sickness of Prosperity Gospel and Seeking God’s Kingdom First

He's a nice-looking man, young, young, and he jumps over stuff. So thank you very, very much. Bring him up here, David Huber. Thank you, sir. Yay! See? I told you.

Jumps over stuff. I was actually known for that in high school. I used to jump over stuff. That's really funny. Well, good morning. How's everybody this morning? Feeling good? You're not near as nervous as I am?

It's all right. We'll get it done. Okay. I have a lot to go over, and I don't have a whole lot of time, so we'll see. There is a sickness in the church, and that is, there are many sicknesses, one of which that is very prominent in the church today is the sickness of a prosperity gospel, that you exist for the sole purpose of prospering, and that's simply not true.

You exist for the sole purpose of honoring and glorifying God, and for prospering His purposes. Now, the way we got to this sickness came through misinterpretation of Scripture, misapplication of Scripture, which begs the question, what Scriptures got us there?

How did we mess that up? Because there was obviously something in Scripture that would lead people to believe, well, God wants us to prosper. That sounds almost right, doesn't it? Jeremiah 29, 11 tells us that He knows the thoughts He thinks towards us, the thoughts to give us, to prosper us and not to harm us, thoughts to give us a hope and a future.

So obviously there is something in it. There's something there where God wants us to prosper. And so what I hope to do today is to look at what it means to prosper God's purposes and how that can in turn make us prosper.

Does that make sense? So there's going to be a little bit of setup here. We're going to look at something that I was taught by Brother Myron Golden, and it was a concept that he brought to a business class, and it shows how to prosper.

But what I'm hoping to do is dig a little deeper into it and show you that the true purpose of it is to prosper God's purposes and to advance His kingdom. And as a byproduct, there may be some prospering that goes along with it.

We don't know what that will look like necessarily, because all we're really supposed to do is not really worry about us prospering. We're supposed to worry about the kingdom advancing. But I think what you'll see is that there are some hidden truths in here that if you will, if you will dwell on them, they're really not so hidden.

And it's a way to look at Scripture as something to live by. It's a way to look at Scripture as something to act upon. And when you do it, things tend to go better with you. It doesn't mean you're going to go out and become a wealthy person.

It doesn't mean you're going to go out and be successful in the eyes of man. But it does mean you are going to be okay. Who in here wants to be okay? Say I do. Who in here would like to be more than okay?

Say I would. Okay. So if you will follow this, you will find that there are ways to be more than okay. And so I hope to set this up in such a way that you can see something very practical to do to advance God's kingdom.

But it will also give you hope that maybe things will get better in your own life as a result of you advancing God's kingdom. Sound good? Say yes. Okay. So we're going to start with Matthew chapter six.

If you'll go there with me real fast, turn your Bibles or in this case, your iPhones and your laptops over to Matthew chapter six. And we are going to be towards the end of the chapter here. So let's see here.

We're going to start in verse 25. Therefore I say unto you, take no thought for your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor yet for your body, what you shall put on. It is not the life more than meat and the body more in the body than raiment.

Behold the fowls of the air, for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns, yet your heavenly father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?

And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They toil not, neither do they spin. And yet I say unto you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which today is and tomorrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat?

Or what shall we drink? Or wherewith shall we be clothed? For after all these things do the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly father knoweth that ye have meat of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.

Take therefore no thought for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. All right, what did we just see? We saw that we're not really supposed to worry about our own gain.

We're not really supposed to worry about the things that we eat or the things that we will be wearing. And let me clarify that. I don't mean to just don't care about what you eat, right? It's important to be healthy and eat healthy and dress modestly.

What this is saying is don't worry about it. You will be fed and you will be clothed. So our motivation should not be to go out and get stuff for ourselves. Our motivation is very clearly laid out what it should be.

Verse 33, but seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. And if we'll do that, all that stuff that we want and need in our lives, he'll take care of it. So far, so good. Yes. Okay. So we start there.

Now I want you to turn over to Romans chapter 14 for me and we're going to be Romans 14 verse 7 for the kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness. There's that word again, righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.

Okay. So if we are supposed to seek the kingdom, that's what we're supposed to look for the kingdom. Who knows what a kingdom is? Any answers? Yes. Serenity. What's a kingdom? Maybe a place filled with joy.

I like that answer. Good answer. Any other answers? All right. Kingdom is a compound word. It's two words put together king and domain. So the kingdom is the king's domain. That's why you always see a king sitting in the kingdom, right?

We're supposed to be seeking the king's domain. But what king? The king, God, right? The king of kings. Seek ye first the kingdom of God. But it says, and all his righteousness. So we're supposed to be looking for righteousness.

And here in Romans, we see that, uh, it says the kingdom of God is not meat and drink. So it's not necessarily something physical, but it's these intangible things like righteousness, the spiritual stuff, righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy ghost.

What did I say? Thank you. Thank you. I'm looking at it. It says 1417, but I just left out a one. Must be the nerves talking. Thanks, Pop. So Romans 1417, for those of you who are still flipping around saying that's not my Bible.

It is. Read it further down. Giving you some context, Pop. Go from 7 to 17. Yes, so Romans 1417, uh, the kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy ghost. So we now know we're supposed to seek the kingdom, and that that kingdom has more to do with spiritual things than physical things.

Right now, that is the context of what this whole message is about. We're going to seek to advance the kingdom. Now, with that in mind, you're about to see something really cool. That can be applied in a very practical manner to gain domain.

But if you're going to use this very practical lesson to gain your own domain, which, by the way, it could very well work, then you're going to build a domain of wood and stubble that will burn away. That's why we're going to seek the kingdom of God.

We're going to seek to store up treasures where moth and rust don't take it away. Does that make sense? Okay, so now we're going to go all the way back to Genesis, and I believe we'll be in chapter 3.

Let's see. I don't typically sit here and pull it up, but I do want to do that for you guys. I talk about this quite a bit in our business classes that we do, and so I usually just go from memory, and for sake of time I have to paraphrase, but I don't really want to do that here.

Genesis 1. Let's see. Chapter 1, verse... Let's skip on down to where God made man and told him what to do. Thank you. Verse 28. Okay. All right, so God makes man. God blessed them, in verse 28, and God said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

What was the first word that came out of God's mouth and into man's ear? Very first word. Maybe. It says he blessed them, but then it says he said something. He could have maybe blessed them without actually talking.

So the first thing we're told that he said, true, be fruitful, but what was the first word? Be. Let's start there. Be. Okay? And the reason why we're going to start there is because we are human beings.

What are we? Human beings. We're not human doings. We're not human havings. We are human beings. And so God tells us first, we're supposed to be. Now, how many of you have ever said, I'm going to get something done just as soon as I have more time.

I'm going to make a change just as soon as I have more money. I'm going to, you name it. XYZ as soon as I have this or I have that. Have we all done that? Okay. Now here's the problem with that kind of thinking.

God clearly lays out how we get to the halves in his scripture right here. But I want you to notice in this verse, he tells us that we are supposed to have dominion. There's a have there, right? But did something come before having dominion?

All this other stuff, right? And the very first thing that came was be. So the very first thing God told man is that he is going to be something. So we've got to be. All right, what do we have to be? First thing he told us to be is fruitful.

And if you'll look up the word for fruitful, it actually means to produce. So you are supposed to be a productive person. That is what man as a human being is called to be. That's not even counting that you're a Christian.

That's just man, right? That's just the purpose of man right there. Like human beings are supposed to be productive. That's what we were created to do. It's the first thing God told us to do. Be productive.

What's the next thing he told us to do? Right there in verse 28. Somebody tell me. Multiply. Now most of the time when we hear multiply in this context, we think that means go have babies. Some of you are pretty good at this, right?

Got a lot of babies in here. But if you'll look it up, it doesn't mean to have babies, although it can be applied in that manner. It actually means to multiply whatever he just told us to do. It means to increase.

So if you go and increase, what are we increasing? And by the way, when you multiply, is that something that you be? It's something that you do. So now we've moved out of the place of be and into the place of do.

See, when you be something, you will do something. Right? Think of it like a computer. Computers have inputs and outputs. When you put something in, it spits something out. Right? If you put in a video game, it's going to spit a video game up on the screen, right?

Got a lot of kids in here, so I can keep their attention. And if you put in something, if you input anything, it will produce an output, typically. If you input more of the same thing, you will get the same kind of output.

What happens if you change the input? It will change the output. What happens if you don't change the input? Do you get more of the same? What if you increase the input? Does that change the output or just increase the output?

That increases the output, right? So think of it like a computer. Life works a lot like a computer. You can put something in, and you will get something out. If you put more of the same stuff in, you'll get more of the same stuff out.

So think of it in this manner. If you need a lot of time, but you are inputting a lot of stuff and filling up your time, your output is you are now out of time, right? And if you go, okay, well, I just need to work harder so that I have more time at the end of the day.

I got to work faster. You're basically just going to find yourself running out of time again because you haven't really changed the output. You've just increased the input. So your output becomes the same, but more of it.

Are we following so far? Okay. So God tells us to be productive, but then he tells us to increase. That's something that we do. And what are we increasing? We are increasing our production. Now, why would God tell us not just to be productive, but to produce a lot?

Believe it or not, gives us the answer for that in the very next part of the verse. What's the next thing he tells us to do? Replenish the earth. Now, is that something that you do or is that something that you be?

That's something that you do, right? So now we have two do's. We've got one B, be a productive person. And then we have two do's. Multiply your production and replenish the earth. See, this is a point at which you provide value to others with your production.

You're providing value. Now, when you provide value, something else is going to happen. You're also going to run into some clashing, some battles. When you start to provide value, the spiritual aspect of providing value to other people kicks in and you are actually doing something that you were created to do and the enemy hates it.

Especially if you belong to God. The enemy is fine with his people being productive. Because what you're going to find is that this ultimately leads to the end of this verse where it says have dominion.

Everybody following? So if you are putting lots of input and you're producing and you're producing a lot and you begin to provide value to the people around you, the enemy doesn't want that to happen.

He wants his people to produce and provide some kind of value to the people around them so that he has the dominion. Have you ever wondered why so many of the biggest corporations are run by not God's people?

They are providing a whole lot of value so that Satan can continue to have dominion in this earth. But God tells us that we're supposed to be seeking his kingdom. We're supposed to be spreading the king's domain.

And this is a battle. And what happens when we get into providing value to other people, that battle comes to a head and all of a sudden there's a clashing. And that's why we are told in the very next part of this verse to subdue it.

What does it mean to subdue? Bring unto bondage, trample upon. If you look it up, it means to trample down. In other words, don't let anything get in your way. In the way of what? Producing value and a whole lot of it to the people around you.

How do we do that? We're going to look at that here in just a second. But ultimately, we see that it should lead to having dominion. And in this case, over the fish of the sea, over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

Now, I want to break these things down just a little bit. I want you to start looking at what we just read from a militaristic point of view. As if it's truly a battle. We talk about a spiritual battle and we use that terminology, but we don't really look at it as war.

Do we? But that's what it is. It's a much more brutal war than the wars we hear about playing over in Ukraine and Russia and stuff. This is a war for the soul. This isn't just lives lost. It can lead to that because spiritual battle often manifests in physical war.

But this is much, much deeper and much more important. So when we say we're in a spiritual battle, we should realize we're at war. So I want you to look at what God told man to do, his purposes, and keep in mind that God has adopted us into His family.

So we're a part of the royal family and we are told to gain domain. So whose domain is it? God's. We're supposed to advance the kingdom. And that requires war. Have you ever seen a movie? Medieval times.

The king wants to go out and conquer new lands. He sends an army out. And he sends that army out and they go to battle. Alright, so let's just go right back over this real quickly with a mental picture of an army going into battle.

Can we do that real quick? Alright. He tells us to be fruitful. I want you to imagine B. That is the place at which you are going to be preparing. This is the getting ready for war. Notice even before he tells us to do anything, we have to become something.

So we are going to start by becoming the warriors that will be sent out into the battle. Alright? So this is training ground. We're not charging yet. We're not swinging swords yet. We haven't even come to the enemy yet.

Your becoming starts right now. Right now it starts. Even before you get back out into the world. You've got to get ready for that battle. And so we're training. And we're going to talk primarily about how to train today.

There are going to be three things that we're going to cover, time permitting, of what we're supposed to become in order to be the warriors that God has called us to be. Does that sound good? Say yes?

Okay. So think of the becoming part as the training ground. Then think of the production part where God tells us that we're supposed to be fruitful. Right? We're supposed to produce. I want you to think of that as the beginning of the march.

Alright? You've now become a soldier. And producing is where you begin the march toward the enemy. And when an army advances into battle, do they just do it like this? They might start like that, right?

But what happens just before they get to the enemy? They go from a steady march to an all-out sprint. Right? And that's what the multiply pictures. Because if producing is your beginning of the march, and increasing is an increasing of that march, I want you to imagine you are going to go from a place of preparing for battle to headed towards battle.

And before that battle really hits, you're going to be going full steam ahead. Okay? And that's the increase. That's momentum. That's charging the line. Then we are going to come to the place of replenishing the earth.

See, replenishing the earth is that part where you provide value to people. And that is the point of impact. That is when the lines meet. That's when all of a sudden you've gone from sprinting towards enemy lines to you have clashed into enemy territory and the battle is truly on.

Okay? That's the point of impact. Why is it the point of impact? Because that's the point in which lives begin getting changed. You are now providing value to the people around you. That's when things start getting real.

That's where you enrich the lives of those around you. In Acts chapter 2, when we see the early church, we see that church had favor with God and with man. And if you really study that, if you really look into what the words mean, you find out that you could read it in Hebrew and actually see that the early church had favor from God to the advantage of the people around them.

So, it wasn't that they received favor from man, it's actually that they transferred favor from God towards the people that were surrounding them. So the early church it was a full frontal attack on the gates of hell.

And that's what it's supposed to be. When Jesus asked his disciples, who do they say that I am, what did Peter say? He said, you are the Christ, the Son of God. And that's when Jesus said, you've said well, and he tells him, Simon, or in this case, you are Peter, and Peter means little rock.

And we've heard Pastor David preach on this before. He says, upon this rock, I will build my church. But the word rock, when he says upon this rock, means like massive rock. So in other words, it's like you are a little rock, but upon this massive rock, I will build my church.

See what happens is, who's doing the building? God's doing the building, but it's interesting to me that he identifies Peter in that process. He looks at Peter's identity and who he has become and what knowledge he has gained of himself and says, I'm going to use that.

I'm building the church and it's going to be built on me, the cornerstone, that's what Jesus is saying, but you're going to be a part of it. Hey, little rock, you're going to be built on the big rock.

Isn't that cool? And so he uses this concept of identity and tells him, you're coming into the battle with me and that's what the early church looked like. It was a massive expansion into enemy territories and what did Jesus tell Peter?

Upon this rock, I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Somebody tell me, what is a gate? It's an entrance sometimes or an exit. It is a defense. It does not go on the offensive.

Gates don't advance forward. Gates are stationary and they block. That's what they're for. But Jesus said, I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. What does that mean?

The church is going to advance upon those gates. The church goes on the offensive. It expands the kingdom and the gates are there just to try to stop it and it can't. If we begin to look at how do we actually advance the kingdom and we begin to apply these things to advance the kingdom, not caring about ourselves or what will happen to us or what we will gain in the process, because God's going to take care of all of that.

If we'll do these things, we'll ultimately get to the point where we are going on the offensive, like the early church did, and expanding the kingdom, like the early church did. If you read through Acts, this is something we're doing in our Bible study on Wednesday nights right now.

Almost every chapter, it talks about the church multiplying, about the church growing. And the kingdom of God is found in the church. That's why Jesus said, you can't see it, but it's in the midst of you.

So the point of impact is when we begin to have that value that we bring to the world, the salt, the light that we bring into the world, and it becomes something that clashes. There's impact there. There's something that has to change at this moment because all chaos breaks loose in war, right?

And there's something very important that we're going to talk about a little bit later regarding that chaos. The next part of this be, do, have concept is to subdue the earth. So when you get into the battle, right?

We have reached the point of battle. We are at war. Always reminds me of Matt and Ben when they were little. I've been a part of the Mitchell family since Matt and Ben were itty bitty. Matt was five when I met him, and Ben was like seven.

And they used to run around the house with little walkie talkies. We are at war. I repeat, we are at war. It's awesome. Katie and I used to laugh about it all the time. Still do. But that's the mental picture I get.

We're at war, all right? And we are in the midst of the battle. And that is the point at which we are then called to overcome, to subdue. Because when things get rough, some people tend to flee. Some people tend to lay down their swords and quit, surrender.

But that's not the end of the battle. You don't advance a kingdom by doing that. You only advance a kingdom if you win. If you lose, does the kingdom advance? Uh-uh. I've seen plenty of movies where the team that lost, their kingdom did not advance, right?

So once you get into battle, then you must overcome. What do we overcome? The enemy. How do we overcome him? That's what this study is truly all about. And we're going to see in the... You overcome the enemy long before you get to the enemy.

You overcome the enemy by becoming the person who will overcome the enemy. So we must overcome. And then finally, the part where it says, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and the fowl of the air and every living thing that creepeth upon the face of the planet, that is the advancing of the kingdom.

Because there is a kingdom that sends out an army. We are part of that army. And as it goes out and begins to pick up speed and charge into battle and then clash with the enemy and ultimately overcome the enemy, the kingdom has not yet truly advanced yet.

It just hadn't really happened. What's happened is the enemy has been vanquished and now there's neutral territory. It's really only slightly neutral because the army is there to protect it. But at that point, what happens is the kingdom then sends out reinforcements and maybe plucks up their gates or their walls and moves them forward.

You see? That's when the king's territory or domain truly advances. It's after the battle has won and the land has been kept. Because we also have a problem in this spiritual war in which we will go and win a battle and then we leave and we forget to hold the ground.

We can't do that. We have to hold ground. Okay, so can we all kind of see how that's going now? Okay. Wow, it's already 12 .16. We're running out of time. Let's see if we can run through some stuff here.

Okay. Let's talk about what we're supposed to be. These are the things we're supposed to be and I've only got three of them. There's a lot more, I'm sure. But these three things will get us to the point where we are ready for the battle and we will overcome in the battle.

How many of y 'all have ever seen a sports match where you just know who's going to win before the ball is even thrown? Or you hear of a war starting. Like if somebody said, we're going to go fight America.

Right? Most of the time that's not a good idea. Right? Most of the time you go, well, you're ready for a beatdown. It's coming. Why? Because we have become an army that is very tough to destroy. Now, I don't know if we have stayed that way like we should, but let's pray that the Lord will keep us strong.

But you can usually tell who's going to win before it ever starts. That's the kind of preparation that is required so that you can be that type of person so that when you get into battle, it's a foregone conclusion.

And it is a foregone conclusion because greater is he that is in me than he that is in the world. We are the greater army and the gates of hell are just that, defensive. They are not on the offensive.

It feels that way. It feels that way because Christians have extracted themselves out of the culture and so the enemy gets to go, well, they're not here. Pluck up those gates. Let's move them forward.

But when Christians get into battle and they gain ground and they keep that ground, all the enemy can do is play defense. That's it. They can play defense. So let's talk about some of the things that we're supposed to be.

First, we're supposed to be congruent Christians. What does that word mean? Any guesses? Same. It means that we are supposed to be balanced, in a sense. Let me tell you why I say it that way. In jiu-jitsu, for those of you who don't know me, I grew up doing Shaolin jiu-jitsu.

Back before anyone knew what jiu-jitsu was, you'd say, I do jiu-jitsu, and people would say, jiu-jiu, what? And you'd say, jiu-jitsu, and they'd say, what is that? And you basically just say, well, it's like karate.

Oh, you do karate, martial arts. Yeah, that's cool. Nowadays, most people know what that is. But I was in that for many, many years in my life, and I was trained by a very passionate teacher who was very good, and actually a Christian man.

And he trained me up to the point of black belt. And one of the primary things we always worked on through all those belts, through all that training, was becoming balanced. Now, when people hear becoming balanced, in association with martial arts, they think, oh, mysticism and Far Eastern religion, and the world would have you believe that.

The world would have you believe that becoming balanced would be like the yin and the yang, you know, coexistence of light and dark. You know what becoming balanced in martial arts means? A whole lot of sit-ups.

That's what it means. It means strengthening your core to the point where, regardless of your orientation, you are able to redistribute your weight equally on all sides. So being balanced, there's no mysticism to it.

It's equal weight in all directions. Everybody follow, say yes? Okay, so in geometry, a congruent triangle, or what we would say congruent triangles, are triangles that are of the same size and shape, equal.

You see, they're equal size and shape. We say those are congruent triangles. A balanced scale becomes balanced when objects of equal weight are on either side. All right, that's when it becomes balanced.

So while congruent doesn't necessarily mean balanced, that, in my mind, is exactly what it means. The world won't describe it as that, but it means balanced, and I'll show you why I believe it means balanced when we look at how do we become congruent Christians.

I want you to think of the fact that when we were born again, we began to experience what it was like to have two spirits within us, ours and Christ's, the Holy Spirit. Now, how do we know this? 1 John 4, 15, whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God and dwelleth in him, or God dwelleth in him, and he in God.

Okay, so if you confess that Jesus is the Son of God, that means that God lives inside you. So you've got his Spirit. That's what's on the scales. God's Spirit is on the scales. What does that weigh? Matthew 4, let's go 1 Peter 1, 16.

Be ye holy, for I am holy. That's just part of it, but Christ is holy. All right, that carries a measure of weight. Imagine it that way. Holiness is on the scale. And if we do not align ourselves with that holiness, the scales are imbalanced, and an imbalanced warrior is easy to topple.

Matthew 5, 48. Go ahead and turn to Matthew 5 for me real quick. Verse 48 says, Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. So perfection, in a sense, is on the scales, but it's not necessarily the sense that we would think.

Go to Matthew 5, and I'll show you what the context of this is, because we are certainly imperfect beings, and we are not going to be perfect until the Lord comes back and takes us to heaven and changes us in the air.

But go on down to verse 38 and see the context for which this is said. It says, Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say unto you that ye resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.

And if any man will sue thee at the law and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. This is showing us to return evil for good. This is showing us... Did I say it backwards? Return... Well, in my mind it's right, because return evil, so evil's coming to me, return it for good.

With good. Okay, I'll go with how y 'all say it. When people are evil to you, you are good to them. So much easier. Let's just keep it that way. All right. So, love, true love, is agape love. And it is that one-way street love.

It requires nothing to be shown. It can only be shown by those who are of God. Because agape love comes from God. Right? And God is showing us what that can look like in respect to enemies. And this is really great, because if you think of what Ben was talking about this morning, he was talking about how are we supposed to feel towards those enemies.