Thew Gospel of the Kingdom | Sermon 04/07/2024

Good morning. Well, that's not working, is it? How about that? There you go. Good morning. Now? No? How about there? No? There you go. Okay. All right. Good morning. Praise the Lord. It's an honor to be here with you all.

If you would, open your Bibles to the Gospel according to Matthew. Gospel according to Matthew chapter 4. Well-known section. I mean, if you are new to the Bible and you started reading in the New Testament, you've been here almost immediately, because this is Matthew's Gospel.

It's the first Gospel that we have in order in the New Testament, and so even if you're not good at reading for a long period of time, I'm sure you got to chapter 4, and you know about the trial of the Lord Jesus in the wilderness.

The Temptation of Jesus and the Gospel of the Kingdom

And so I'm going to actually read a pretty significant section of it today as we talk about the Gospel of the Kingdom. So this is the Gospel according to Matthew chapter 4 in verse 1. Hear now the word of the living and the true God.

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting 40 days and 40 nights, he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him, if you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.

But he answered, it is written. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, if you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, he will command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.

Jesus said to him again, it is written, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test. Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.

And he said to him, all these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me. Then Jesus said to him, be gone, Satan, for it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.

Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him. Now when he had heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew into Galilee, and leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum by the sea in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali.

So that what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled, the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, the way of the sea beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles, the people dwelling in darkness have seen a great light.

And for those dwelling in the region in shadow of death, on them a light has dawned. From that time, Jesus began to preach, saying, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. While walking by the sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who was called Peter, and Andrew, his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen.

And he said to them, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. Immediately, they left their nets and followed him. And going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James, the son of Zebedee, and John, his brother, in the boat with Zebedee, their father, mending their nets.

And he called them, immediately they left the boat, and their father, and followed him. And he went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every disease and every affliction among the people.

So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, those having seizures, and that's the paralyzed, and he healed them.

And great crowds followed him from Galilee and the Decapolis, and from Jerusalem and Judea, and from beyond the Jordan, thus far as the reading of God's holy word. Let's pray. God, we pray that you'd bless, Lord, the proclamation of your word today, that you, by your spirit, would teach.

Get, Lord, the teacher out of the way. Lord, we pray that people would forget me in this service, in this message, that they'd remember you, that you'd glorify your name through the proclamation of your truth.

Help us to understand, God, the good news of the kingdom. In Jesus' name, amen. This is vitally important, and I think as we, when we talk about the gospel of the kingdom, just how important this is. You've heard probably the recent controversy over saying Christ is king, and the controversy around, you know, Christians saying Christ is king, is that anti-Semitic?

Is it wrong for Christians to claim that Christ is king? And I think the only reason you can have that as a controversy today in the West is that we haven't been saying it faithfully and consistently enough.

We haven't been living like it's actually true that Christ is king. I mean, just consider one of the most basic Christian confessions, Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord. Or when we say that Jesus is king of kings and Lord of lords.

The apostle John in the book of Revelation says that Jesus is the ruler of the kings of the earth. I want you just to consider in terms of when that was written, even if you take a later dating of the book of Revelation and you place it under Domitian's reign somewhere around 96 AD, I completely disagree with that.

Or you take a earlier dating of the book of Revelation that's pre-destruction of Jerusalem before the temple fell. You have the apostle John saying in the context where it doesn't look like Jesus is king.

Right? Let's be honest. In the Roman Empire, they're killing Christians, lighting Christians on fire, throwing them to the lions, throwing them in ovens. I mean, they're martyring Christians left and right.

If you're a Christian in the first century, you're essentially on the run in many respects. It doesn't look like Jesus is the one with all authority in heaven and on earth visibly. But that was the claim of Christ as Jesus ends here in the gospel according to Matthew, Matthew 28, 18 through 20, he says, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

That's the claim of Jesus, that he has all authority in heaven and on earth. And the apostle John in the book of Revelation calls Jesus the ruler of the kings of the earth. That is basic Christian confession.

Jesus is the king. He's the ruler of the world. Every king, every ruler, every Lord, every everything has to yield to Christ in his glory and his authority. Amen? Amen? You guys say amen and apology at Utah, don't you?

Okay, good. All right, there you go. But what's interesting here is that while it can be today in the West so controversial to say, wait a second, Christians, are you saying that this entire nation has to come to faith in Jesus, that that's your goal, is that this whole nation from bottom to top acknowledges the Lordship of Christ and trusts in Jesus?

You really believe that that's going to happen? We'd say, yeah, we believe the Great Commission is not wishful thinking. It's what God's going to do in the world. We believe that Jesus is actually king, and that means something, that yes, rulers and everybody from mother and father to parents, children, everything from the bottom to the top, everybody has to acknowledge the rule of Jesus and come under his Lordship.

And it's interesting, when you read the gospel according to Matthew and you get to this section of the trial of Jesus, you end this section seeing that a section of scripture is quoted from the Old Testament as a fulfillment, and it leads immediately into Jesus saying, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

And it says that Jesus, after all of this, is proclaiming something specific, the gospel of the kingdom. Now stop there for a moment. Gospel according to Matthew, these are the words of God. Here is the incarnate one coming to live that life of faithfulness and obedience before Yahweh the Father, and Jesus now is the perfect Adam.

He's doing what Israel failed to do in their wilderness trial. He is appealing to the word of God, obeying the Father everywhere through all the trials. He is the true and perfect Israel. He is the true Adam, what the image of God was supposed to be, and Jesus is fulfilling all this, Matthew is portraying all this, and then Jesus immediately starts proclaiming something that, let's be honest, the average Christian today in the West has no way to articulate.

They just have no concept. Like if you were to ask the average Christian today, what is the gospel of the kingdom? Now typically if you ask Christians today, right, you would say, what's the gospel? And people would have just sort of a very rudimentary, sort of just bare bones basics, and it's not wrong.

It is part of the gospel. It's a part of the gospel. They'll say, well, the good news is that Jesus died for sins and He rose again from the dead so that through faith in Him, you go to heaven one day, and that's true, of course, as far as it goes.

If you have faith in Jesus, He lived and died and rose again. We have eternal life. We have peace with God. We're reconciled to God, and yes, we are going to heaven one day, and if you were to say to the average Christian, so that's the gospel, yeah, well, that's how Paul articulates the gospel.

Here are the pieces of the gospel. Here's who Jesus is. This is what He did, and this is what it means to us, and so repent and believe, and that's true, but if you say, well, what is the gospel of the kingdom?

Why is that good news? Because what's gospel mean? Good news, right? And in Scripture, what do we have? We have gospel. We have God's gospel in Romans 1. We have the gospel of the kingdom. We have the gospel of Jesus Christ as described in a number of different ways, and we typically can get at the main parts, but if you say to the average Christian today, what is the good news of the kingdom?

Why is the rule of the Messiah good news for the world, that His rule, His kingdom is good news? Now, what's interesting here is to consider the very Jewishness of the Christian faith. We share the same Bible in terms of the Old Testament as Jews.

We have the same books, same Bible. We share exactly the same Bible. Roman Catholics have added works to the Old Testament, the apocryphal works that the Jews always rejected, but we share the same Bible as the Jews.

We are the true descendants of Abraham, amen, through faith, yes? But Jews, and this is a very Jewish gospel before us. It is filled with references to the Old Testament, whether they're direct references or it's allusions to Old Testament and symbolism.

It's so entirely Jewish, which is why this is so significant. The Jews were anticipating, because of the promises of God in the Old Testament, a messianic figure that would do what Christians all say that Jesus did.

He would be the one that would be pierced through for our transgressions, Isaiah 53. The Lord would lay on Him the iniquity of us all, Isaiah 53. That He'd be counted guilty, though they thought He was dying for His own sins, He'd be dying for the sins of God's people, their transgressions.

They knew there was redemption. All the families of the earth will return to worship Yahweh, Psalm 22. The promise of salvation is there, that the nations are going to be drawn to God, that there'd be redemption, there'd be peace, there'd be a payment for sin, the Messiah would be cut off, He'd die a violent death for the sins of God's people.

Listen, the Jewish people knew that this messianic figure would bring peace between God and man. They knew that. But that's not all they knew. The Jewish people who had the same Bible as us would see Jesus coming in saying the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God is at hand, and they'd say, here we are.

This is happening now. God promised to do something in the world that was beyond simply my own private romance with Jesus, which is what much of modern evangelicalism has done with the gospel. They've turned it into just personal, right?

It's just between me and Jesus. It's just about my intimate relationship with Jesus, and there's nothing wrong with that so far as it goes. It's true. Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Romans 5 .1. That's true. But the Jewish people reading this gospel would be astonished. They'd say, it's happening. This really happened. The Messiah has come. The kingdom of God is now in the world.

It's going to grow in the world, and this Messiah is going to rule as the Bible said. They would have understood that the Messiah ruling on David's throne, which the New Testament authors explicitly state that Jesus is on that throne now at the right hand of the Father, that that's good news for the world, not just me personally.

That Christ ruling and reigning on his throne is good news for the world. It's not just about my own relationship with Jesus. It's what God is doing to glorify himself through the redemption that he's bringing into the world that goes far beyond my own salvation.

And so my question to you is this, when you see in Matthew's gospel, this terminology being used that Jesus is proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, do you know what it means? Do you know why it's such good news that goes beyond your own private relationship with Jesus?

You see, Matthew begins this, and he's quoting scripture. He's quoting from Isaiah. He's going to the law word of God, to the prophets, and he's saying, see, here's the fulfillment. Jesus is exactly what was promised.

But do we know what was promised? You see, let me challenge you with it in this way. Oftentimes today as Christians, we have really bad eschatologies around us. Eschatology is the study of last things.

We're talking about what's going to happen next. And boy, are we in it right now, right? Isn't it crazy? You guys seen TikTok lately? You shouldn't be on TikTok. Okay, have you seen the crazy stuff lately?

Like the lunar eclipse, and you got a bunch of lunatics like traveling on airplanes. We're going to go watch the end of the world, and we're going to Rapture, Texas. It's like, you guys are absolute buffoons.

We do this like every six months, Jesus is coming back, because there's this weird thing happening in the sky, and we've got an eclipse that happens, you know, only about every other year sort of a thing.

But this one's the one. It's the end of the world, and you've got blood moons, and John Hagee, and you've got Y2K. I've lived through all this stuff. Every six months, Jesus is coming back, and the world's going to end.

Eschatology gets freaky in the West. And you've got people making prophecies today. I've seen so many TikTok videos in the last week, people saying, the Lord spoke to me. The Lord spoke to me, and he wanted me to deliver you this very important message, that the lunar eclipse is the end of all things, and that Jesus is returning, and we've got Rapture, and all these different things.

Bad eschatologies, bad Christian eschatologies. Some of them weren't even in the mind of Christians about 200 years ago. Some of them are brand new inventions. They're novel, novel beliefs in the whole history of the Christian church, but we've got bad eschatology that the Jews today will seize upon.

And they'll say, oh, so you're saying that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah? And you're like, well, yes, I can show you how, and the prophecies, and when he's coming, and that he's going to die, and die for the sins of God's people, and his identity is God himself, and he's coming.

And you can go, and they'll go, okay, yeah, all that's well and good, but you're saying he's the Jewish Messiah. Well, yes, he's the Jewish Messiah. Okay, so what about all the justice, and the righteousness, and all these things that are supposed to come as part of the Messiah's kingdom?

What about his, you're saying he's not ruling, really ruling today in the world, and it's going to come some other time, some other coming, he's going to come and actually bring his kingdom. And Christians today will say, yeah, well, you know, he's kind of reigning now, but not really, and then someday he's going to come and reign, and he's going to fulfill all those prophecies about justice, and righteousness on the earth, and all those things.

And the Jewish people will say, and they're right for saying it, oh, then he's not the Messiah. Because the promises of the Messiah in the Old Testament, they don't give to us this split coming of Jesus, and like, he'll do some of this stuff, but maybe not even really do some of that stuff, and just sort of spiritualize.

No, all the promises are that there's a real rule of the Messiah in the world, yes, he brings salvation, but it comes with some important aspects of justice, and righteousness, and the blessing and light of God's law.

And so, as Christians, we need to understand how Jesus actually fulfills all those things, and is actually doing those things now. Jesus refers to the kingdom of God as a mustard seed that becomes a tree, and it grows even taller than a man.

The birds of the air will nest in its branches. He talks about the rule of God like leaven in a lump of dough. It grows, and some of you guys, women in here, you guys I'm sure make bread, you know exactly what we're talking about.

When you guys are doing your starters, and all the things that you're doing, when you're doing this thing to make this bread grow, and be delicious, and amazing, you know that when you're making it in the kitchen, you don't hear a bunch of hammer sounds, and drilling, and clanking, and working.

It just grows slowly, and quietly even, and it permeates the entirety of the loaf. That's how Jesus talks about his rule. It's small to large growth, and by the way, this is precisely how the Old Testament said the Messiah's kingdom would come.

In Daniel, you have a number of instances in Daniel where he gives specific prophecy about Jesus, even down to exactly when Jesus is coming, and the fact that he would die, and he would die before the second temple's destruction.

That happened in 70 AD. So specific that he would make atonement for iniquity, that he'd bring an everlasting righteousness, but it also gives you specific prophecy about the future of the world from Daniel's day.

He talks about four earthly kingdoms. He talks about it from Babylon, and you move through history, and it lands on Rome, and how in that time, God would bring this kingdom that would never be destroyed, and it'd be like a stone cut out of a mountain, a little rock basically, and then it would become a huge mountain that filled the entire earth, small to large growth.

That's how the kingdom grows, but brothers and sisters, do you know, do you know, can you explain, can you defend what the good news of the kingdom is, what God said he was going to do, and by the way, I'm going to just give you, I'll just give you the most important point I want you to get now as I go to the text.

Here's the most important point I wanted to give to you as one of the fellow elders and pastors of what God is doing here. I want to encourage you with the good news of the kingdom, that God is going to have victory in the world he promised it, and so your labor is not in vain.

No matter how small you think you are, no matter how insignificant you think you are, no matter how small you think the work is, God has promised the Messiah will rule the nations and draw all the nations up to God's mountain, that he would have victory over the world, that the Messiah would put all of God's enemies under his feet as a footstool for his feet.

You see, the story of the gospel of the kingdom is total victory over the world, and if you are a believer in Jesus Christ today, you are one of the ones he has already had victory over, and he is going to extend that victory to the ends of the earth.

And so we can't do a comprehensive look at the promises of the kingdom from the Old Testament, but I'll give you some that you need to bury into your hearts and minds to give you hope for today, hope for the future, hope in your labors as a church, hope in your proclamation of the gospel and God's truth.

Just consider, when the Bible opens up, it gives you the story at the opening that humanity makes a wreck of things at the very beginning, God makes a promise after that wreck of things, he promises that he is going to send the woman's seed, there's some portrayals there of the virgin birth, the woman's seed, who will crush the head of the serpent, so there's one who's coming that's going to destroy all the work of the devil, he's going to destroy this work, we went from a garden with God walking with us, and now we're separated from God, out of the garden into the wilderness, and so all of this fall, all of this curse, all of this brokenness, and God says he is sending someone to crush the head of the serpent.

God's going to fix this, he's going to cover the sins of God's people, all that's there, but as the story moves in the book of Genesis, you get to the story of Abraham, and what's the story of Abraham, Abraham is told by God that he's going to have descendants as numerous as the stars, as numerous as the stars, there's a lot of stars, a lot, if you consider the common belief of the modern day evangelical, it's that, well we're just going to lose in history, right, I mean people are so excited now for the eclipse because all they can think about is, I get to leave all my underwear and shoes behind and get taken away into heaven and leave this whole hell behind me, and everyone else is left behind, the average Christian today in the west thinks with that mindset, I can't wait to leave this world to get to that better world, that real spiritual life, out there somewhere, this is all just tainted sinful stuff, I've got to get out there somewhere, and you know, the truth is that Jesus is a powerful savior, but most of humanity is lost, you know, we're the minority in history, God's people are the minority, and you go to Genesis and you realize, oh wait a second, that doesn't make any sense with the story, Abraham's descendants are going to be as numerous as the what?

As the stars, that's not a, that's this incalculable, there are so many stars, it's supposed to blind you with the light of it, and then it goes even further, God makes another promise to Abraham and says, you're gonna have descendants and it'll be like the sand on the seashore, try counting that, try counting that, it'll be frustrating, won't it?

Super frustrating, because it's, there's no way to do it, and so the scripture says one of the promises of what God is going to do through the Messiah, through Abraham's seed, is that he would actually have descendants as numerous as the stars, and like the sand, this is gonna be an incalculable number, it's gonna be overwhelming what God does in the Messiah's kingdom, but then Genesis moves a little more, it has another hint of here's what's to come in Genesis 49 10, it says that one is coming, and to him, listen to this, mark it down, shall be the obedience of the nations, to the one who's coming, he shall have the obedience of the peoples, of the nations, that's what he's coming to get, descendants as numerous as the stars, and the obedience of the nations, do you see why the Jews think the way that they deal about Mashiach, about the Messiah, that the nations have to come to God, and he will rule over the nations, now let's do a little hint for a second here, okay, look around the room for a moment, and just consider first of all where you're at, okay, you are in Utah, on the other side of the planet from Israel, on the other side of the planet from where Jesus did his earthly ministry, and here we are now, about 2 ,000 years later in Utah, worshiping and loving the Lord God of Israel, how many of you guys have, are Jewish by ethnicity?

Anybody? Anybody, raise your hand, don't be ashamed, he's like, we're all mutts in a way, right, but just a little, I got a little Jewish, shalom, okay, just a little bit, but I want you to notice what I just said, it says the Messiah is gonna have descendants as numerous as the stars through that seed, and he will have the obedience of the nations, and I just asked you in Utah, about 2 ,000 years later, how many of you guys are Jewish by birth or ethnicity, and we've got, maybe a little, I got about 10%, right, whatever it might be, but here we are now, all basically the descendants of pagans in history, worshiping and loving the Lord God of Israel, confessing Yahweh as our God, obedient to the law word of God, pursuing the God of Israel because of Jesus, to him shall be the obedience of the peoples, the obedience of the nations, that was the promise, but then the promise gets deeper, and it grows more and more and more through God's Old Testament scriptures, one example, go to your Bibles, you know this passage, and I want you to make note of something about this section of scripture that you may not have noticed before, you know this part, everybody knows this part, it's in all the Christmas cards, right, it's one of my favorite verses, so I bring it up a lot, because it says a lot about Jesus and what he's gonna do in the world, in Isaiah 9, 6, it says this, for to us a child was born, to us a son is given, all right, so what is that?

That's a human being, right, this is someone that's one of us, a son and a child, we've got that going on in this room right now, okay, this is a person, it's human, all right, and it says this, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, wait, wait a second, that's a specific name of Yahweh, that's a title of Yahweh in the Old Testament, what are we doing?

Here's a monotheistic Jew who believes there's only one God, writing about 700 years before the earthly ministry of Jesus, and he says that a son is coming, a child is coming, and he's using now titles that are specific to Yahweh, Wonderful Counselor, but it gets worse, then it says El Gabor, the Mighty God, one chapter later Yahweh is called the Mighty God, El Gabor, this doesn't make any sense, what are you saying Isaiah, you're a Jew, you believe there's only one God, you just said a son and a child, and now you're calling him Yahweh, you're saying it's God himself coming as a son, coming as a child, but then it goes on, it says Everlasting Father, that means the Father of Eternity, the Eternal One, it says Prince of Peace, listen, remember we talked about progress, remember we talked about it, mustard seed to tree, leaven, lump of dough, right, it grows like a stone that becomes a mountain, it says this about the Messiah's kingdom, ready, of the increase of his government and of peace, there will be no end, just consider that, the promise of Messiah is, listen, it's not coming into the world as my friend says, like the 82nd airborne dropping out of the sky and obliterating everything, what is the promise of Messiah's kingdom, is it starts slow, small, and then it increases, and grows, and grows, and grows, but what is he called, he's called the Prince of Peace, how is he the Prince of Peace, because he brings peace between God and men, between God and women, he reconciles people to himself through his cross, he's the Prince of Peace, and of the increase of his government, that is what he rules over, and of peace, there will be no end, here it is, on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it, listen closely, gospel of the kingdom stuff here, it says with justice and with righteousness, from this time forth and forevermore, the zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this, when you get frustrated and discouraged, as sometimes we all do, and I do, over the state of the world and the brokenness you see around you, even in your own life, or around you in the world, in your community, and you think about the promises of God and his kingdom, you remember this, it's not you that's going to accomplish this, how is this all going to happen, the zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this, it is God that is going to fulfill this, it is God who is going to oversee it, it is God who is ultimately going to do it, but here is what I want to make note of, you know that verse, have you all heard that verse before, yes, you've received a Christmas card before, right, that's always on the Christmas card, right, because it's amazing, there's the incarnation, a son, a child, it's God himself, and he's come, it's his kingdom, and it's going to grow, and he's the prince of peace, we love that verse, 700 years before Jesus comes, it's saying that God is coming as a man, that's pretty specific in terms of the identity of Messiah, because how many gods are there?

There's one God, so to be the Jewish Messiah, it's very specific, it's the true God that's coming as a man, but did you notice that Isaiah 9, 6 through 7, that famous verse that we all know, is in the section of Scripture that Matthew was just quoting from in Matthew chapter 4, you might be thinking, well, why is that significant?

Well, Matthew thought it was quite important to make note of the fact that this incarnate one, God as man, came in and did what Israel failed to do in the wilderness, so he's the true and perfect Israel, he does what they should have done, he obeys the Father at every trial, he appeals to the word of God at every trial, he resists the devil and the devil's lies, which is what Adam should have done, and Eve should have done, he's the perfect Adam, the perfect Israel, and then as he comes out of the wilderness in victory, the quotation is from Isaiah 9, and what is Isaiah 9 talking about?

Light has come, light has dawned, the ruler of the world, that prince of peace is here now, repent for the kingdom of God is at hands. Matthew sees the story in a much different way than most modern evangelicals in terms of like, you know, Jesus is a friend of mine, Jesus is, you know, it's just sort of like my buddy, the thing I put me is, he's like, you know, between my ears and like in my family, in my home, it's like a personal romance, we just want to start Bible studies in basements sort of a thing, we're satisfied with that, you know, you guys are in charge over there, but Jesus is in charge of heaven, you know, he's Lord over my own life personally, but you know, he doesn't necessarily have anything to say to you.

Matthew doesn't see it that way. Matthew sees Jesus as the ruler of the world, broken into history, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand, turn, because the rule of God is, has broken into this world, heaven has now come into the world to invade the world, that's what's taking place in the incarnation, and so Jesus goes to a Jewish audience, and he says, guess what, the good news of the kingdom is here, he's proclaiming the kingdom of God has arrived, the rule of God has arrived in history, and that's good news for the world.

Listen, it's a good news for the world, that this world will be filled with light and peace, that it will be filled with justice and with righteousness forevermore, is that good news for the world? There's a lot of hell in this world, a lot of brokenness, a lot of pain, a lot of injustice, and human beings are just sort of like clamoring, it's what do we do, how do we fix this injustice, how do we do this, how do we do that, how do we solve these problems, and people just looking inwards at themselves and trying to just figure out some solution, and Jesus comes into the world with a perfect law, with a perfect standard of justice, with his law word, and with righteousness, and he promises that through the salvation of the nations, then the law of God comes from the people of God and brings justice and righteousness in the world.

Jesus is coming to reverse the curse as far as it is found. That was what they were expecting the Messiah to do, and so I want to give you more in terms of why is this good news for the world? That's Isaiah chapter 9.

If you would, turn to Isaiah 42, another precious promise about the Messiah's kingdom. In Isaiah chapter 42, a promise of the Messiah, again, this is written about 700 years before the time of Jesus. The text says, That's good news for the world.

That's why the kingdom is gospel. The kingdom is good news. Listen, Stop and think about how beautiful and how precious that promise is. These are the words of God. God's going to do this. This is what Jesus is about in his gospel of the kingdom.

Did you notice, again, again, progress. There is something here that is a process. He will not grow faint or discouraged until he has established justice in the earth. This is a process in history, but you see that the promise of the Messiah's kingdom is that there's going to be descendants as numerous as the stars.

This Messiah is going to have the obedience of the peoples, the obedience of the nations. He is going to have an increase to his rule, his government, and of peace. He's going to rule on David's throne.

He's going to bring righteousness and justice forevermore, and here you have Messiah is coming as this gentle, gentle ruler. I mean, Jesus and his earthly ministry upset a lot of Jewish sensitivities because they have, you have to give them some grace, this very complex portrait of the Messiah given to them in the Old Testament.

They've got a suffering servant. They've got one who dies for sins. They've got one who is rejected by men. They've also got one who's going to rule the world, draw the nations, establish justice and righteousness.

The portrait that the scriptures give to us of the Messiah is so complex and amazing, but the Jewish people in Jesus' day would seize upon the fact that, wait a second, Jesus, just wait, please wait. Explain this to me.

You are from Nazareth. There's nothing little place Nazareth. Can any good thing come from Nazareth? I mean, I don't know what it's like here in Utah. I'm not like totally into like, you know, geographical stuff and everything, but I guess they'd be like saying like, Messiah came from Ogden or something.

I don't know. Is that a thing? Right? Like, who's there? Like, whatever. Like, I don't know. Did I do it right? Okay, all right. But it throws them a little bit. It throws them a bit because they're like, how can the ruler of the world look like you?

Jesus, you don't have any money, right? Like you're having to feed people with these massive miracles of fish and loaves and you're doing all this stuff. There's not enough money in your money bag and you're going to rule the world?

I mean, even like some like political people who like fail, like they try to run for a political office and they fail miserably. They'll raise like $65 million. They still got money in the bank and they still fail as politicians.

You're saying you're going to rule the world as king of the world and you've got like a money bag that one of your followers is actually stealing from? You don't even have the money to feed your followers.

And yeah, you're the Messiah. You're the ruler of the world. I mean, I thought flowing robes and royal colors and a huge entourage and maybe even like a private military would be what we'd see first with Messiah.

And Jesus comes in and he throws them because he comes as a suffering servant to come and die for the sins of his people. And they just couldn't put it together. They didn't understand. But what they did understand is this Messiah is going to bring forth justice to the nations.

If Jesus doesn't do this, Jesus isn't the Messiah. Do you hear that? If Jesus doesn't do this, Jesus isn't the Messiah. But Jesus does do it. And he is doing it. Think about what it says there. It says, he will not grow faint or be discouraged till he has established justice in the earth and the coastlands.

Wait for his law. How does Christ establishing justice look in this world? Just consider your life as a believer. You personally, your life as a believer. I know some of you. I saw you at your worst. I have.

I know people in this church and your trials and where God has brought you. And it is amazing. It's amazing. I've been in rooms for hours with certain people that are in this room and I've seen them at their lowest, the most broken, total darkness apart from God.