Remember Lots Wife part 1

Lot’s Wife, Sodom’s Judgment, and the Warning of Jesus

Let's turn in our Bibles to Genesis 19, please. Genesis 19. Last week we completed our consideration of what the Bible teaches about the church, both the universal and local church. And I thought before we started our next study of a book, which I intend to do, I think, two weeks from today, and right now I'm leaning on 1 Thessalonians.

But I thought for today and for next week, we would address this warning of our Lord Jesus that He gave to His disciples. Remember Lot's wife. And of course this is based on the account of Lot's deliverance from the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah when the Lord destroyed them in His judgment, as recorded in Genesis 19.

This is an historical account, according to Scripture, of God's judgment upon a people, an event there around the Dead Sea of Israel, perhaps the southeast side of that Dead Sea. And that event in Genesis 19, recorded in Genesis 19, has become a paradigm for God's future judgment upon the unconverted world at the second coming of Christ.

And so our Lord Jesus told His disciples, remember Lot's wife. Let's read about Lot's wife in Genesis 19, beginning with verse 15. And this is the day in which God's judgment fell upon Sodom and Gomorrah.

When the morning dawned, the angels urged Lot to hurry, saying, Arise, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be consumed in the punishment of the city. And while he lingered, the men took hold of his hand, his wife's hand, and the hands of his two daughters, the Lord being merciful to him.

And they brought him out and set him outside the city. So it came to pass, when they had brought him outside, that he said, Escape for your life. Do not look behind you, nor stay anywhere in the plain.

Escape to the mountains, lest you be destroyed. And then Lot said to them, Please, know, my lords, indeed now your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have increased your mercy, which you have shown me by saving my life.

But I cannot escape to the mountains, lest some evil overtake me and I die. See now, this city is near enough to flee to, and it is a little one. Please let me escape there, for is it not a little one?

And my soul shall live. And he said to him, See, I have favored you concerning this thing also, in that I will not overthrow this city for which you have spoken. Hurry, escape there, for I cannot do anything until you arrive there.

And therefore the name of the city was called Zoar. The sun had risen upon the earth when Lot entered Zoar. Then the Lord rained brimstone and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah, from the Lord out of heaven. So he overthrew those cities, all the plain, all the inhabitants of the cities,.

And what grew on the ground.

Then, verse 26,. But his wife looked back behind him, and she became a pillar of salt. Now, in the little epistle of Jude in the New Testament, the second to the last book of the Bible, just before the Revelation, one chapter, we read in verse 7, that this event, this destruction of Sodom, again, was a paradigm, a portrayal of God's judgment, final judgment upon a wicked world.

And so we read in Jude, verses 5 through 7,.

Jude wrote,.

I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, he has reserved in everlasting change, and under darkness for the judgment of the great day, and here it is, verse 7, as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them, in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality, and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.

And then let's read the warning that our Lord gave to his disciples in Luke 17 .32, which reads very simply to his disciples,. Remember Lot's wife. Now here are our Lord's instructions to his people. He gives us his word, and by his word, of course, he directs us, not only what we are to believe, but how we are to behave, how we are to live.

Not only what we are to believe about him, but also our duty before him. And so the Lord speaks to us, and oftentimes his word comes in two forms to us. First, thankfully, the Lord gives blessed promises to his people to encourage them, to help them in their Christian walk of faith.

Here are a few promises. Our Lord told his disciples, Do not fear, little flock, for it is your father's good pleasure.

To give you the kingdom.

That's an encouraging promise, isn't it? By our Lord. He assured his disciples, Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions.

And over all the power of the enemy,.

And nothing shall by any means hurt you. Luke 10, 19. The Lord accomplishes his work through his people, and nothing can prevent it. And then before our Lord went to his cross, he said to them, Therefore you now have sorrow, but I will see you again, and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you.

And thankfully, there are many promises that the Lord gives to his people to encourage them. But that's just one form of his instruction. For our Lord, secondly, has also given many serious warnings to his people to prevent them from carelessness and complacency.

He gives promises to keep them from being discouraged and unfaithful. He gives them warnings to prevent carelessness and complacency. He told his followers, Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses.

He said on another occasion, Watch, therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming. Warnings. And so by these two, the promises and the warnings of Scripture, the Lord keeps his people on that narrow road of faithful discipleship that leads them, directs them, to eternal life.

Well, on one occasion, our Lord gave this warning to his disciples, Remember Lot's wife. And that's an abiding word. It's the Lord telling you today,.

If you're a Christian,.

Remember Lot's wife. There's a lesson there for us that we should take to heart. I would like us to consider the teaching session of our Lord Jesus in which he spoke these words to his disciples. And today we'll consider the context in which this warning is given.

And we'll probably have to consider the importance of this briefly worded warning.

Next week.

So basically today is introduction, and next week will be application. For again, when the Lord Jesus spoke these words to his disciples, he also gave this warning to us. And all the disciples that have followed those first disciples.

The theme our Lord addressed in this passage arose from a question that was posed to him about the kingdom of God. In his teaching, he warned his disciples of the difficult days ahead of them and their responsibility to be alert and retain a sense of urgency, respecting their salvation from God's wrath that ought to be foremost on our minds always.

And so we want to read Luke 17 verses 20 through I believe 37. Luke 17 verse 20. Now when Jesus, he was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them and said, the kingdom of God does not come with observation, nor will they say, see here or see there, for indeed the kingdom of God is within you.

I might just interject this. He was talking to Pharisees. He was not saying it was within their hearts.

Because it wasn't.

He was literally saying the kingdom of God is in your midst. He was referring to himself, where he is, the kingdom of God is, is what he was saying. And then he said to the disciples, the days will come when you will desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man and you will not see it.

And they will say to you, look here or look there, do not go after them or follow them. For as the lightning that flashes out of one part under heaven shines to the other part under heaven, so also the Son of Man will be in his day.

But first he must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation. And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will also be in the days of the Son of Man. They ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark and the flood came and destroyed them all.

Likewise, as it was also in the days of Lot, Genesis 19, they ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built. But on the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all.

And even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed. In that day he who is on the housetop and his goods are in the house, let him not come down to take them away. And likewise the one who is in the field, let him not turn back.

Here it is. Remember Lot's wife. Whoever seeks to save his life will lose it. Whoever loses his life will preserve it. I tell you, in that night there will be two men in one bed. The one will be taken.

The other will be left. Two women will be grinding together. The one will be taken. The other left. Two men will be in the field. The one will be taken. The other left. And they answered and said to him, Where, Lord?

So he said to them, Wherever the body is, there the eagles, perhaps better translated vultures, there the eagles will be gathered together. So we have Luke 17, 20 -37. This was toward the end of our Lord's earthly ministry.

He had been ministering among his people for perhaps three years. All knew about him. Even King Herod was asking questions about him. The longer our Lord was among them performing miracles, the more people asked questions about his identity.

Was he a prophet? Was he the promised prophet that Moses foretold? Was he the Messiah, the promised king? And strong opinions were held by everyone. The common people favored him highly. The Jewish leaders opposed him fiercely.

When our Lord spoke these words, he had been journeying for some time from Galilee to Jerusalem with his disciples. The journey actually began with Luke 9, 51. Much of Luke's gospel is a record of this journey of about 90 -100 miles.

But from Luke 9, 51 all the way to Luke 19, you have this journey to Jerusalem. Everyone seemed to expect a great event to occur once he arrived there. There would be conflict. Perhaps there would be a move on the part of Jesus to assert the claim he was the Messiah.

This is what some people thought. And thereby perhaps foment a revolution among the people. Rome would be overthrown. The Davidic kingdom set up.

The Millennium would arrive.

The Millennium as they anticipated. Others had done similarly before him,.

Fomented revolution.

Perhaps he would also. It is reasonable, therefore, that questions about the coming of the kingdom of God should arise. There are many differing views among the Jews respecting the teaching of the scriptures on this subject.

But what were his views? What were the views of this rabbi from Galilee respecting the kingdom of God? Well, let's ask them, as thought the Pharisees. Of course, I'm glad they did, for in the record of Jesus' answer we have details which help us greatly, although I would argue that they are details that confuse a lot of people also.

And I suspect that most of us, when we heard that passage read and looked at the words, probably thought that he was talking about a certain thing that he actually wasn't talking about. And so don't presume or assume that you necessarily understand his words at a casual surface reading.

This takes some work to work through. We want to do that. For just as there was much confusion in that day, there is much confusion in this day respecting these matters. There are many inerrant interpretations, fanciful speculations among evangelicals, which really just serve to confuse the people of God and divert them from truly important matters.

Lord, save us from hobby horses. I listen to Christian radio, and so much of it is that way. I get circulars from booksellers, Christian books, and so much of it is just peddling nonsense, frankly. And so when we enter a discussion of these matters, we have to wade through a morass of varied opinions that are held very tenaciously by their adherents.

And these fanciful claims of prophecy pundants sometimes lead unbelievers to be very wary of the claims of Christians. And so this is the ground where we will encounter perhaps the zealot, and he will oppose us.

Some are very vehement about this. You know, I've had people call me and rebuke me for the things I've said because they have a certain view of prophecy that they just presume is biblical, and if I don't conform to that, then they are quick to speak up.

Now because of the nature of this material, we need to do some background work, and this is important. And so before we look at the text in detail, we should try and understand something of the Jewish expectation of the day.

And this will be review for some of you. Nevertheless, let's take a few minutes and trace some of the history of the Jews' understanding of this subject, that is, the Kingdom of God. I'm about 550 pages through a 750-page book by Thomas Schreiner, and it's entitled The King and His Beauty, where he takes the Kingdom of God as a major theme throughout the entire Bible.

Old Testament and New Testament. It's been very good. He's going to be our speaker next year at our Bolton Conference, one of them. I'm really looking forward to it. I enjoy communicating with him somewhat, and I'm really enjoying his book.

But we need to understand the Old Testament and what it says about the Kingdom of God. And so let's ask the question, or answer the question, what kind of kingdom did the Jews expect to come? Well, let's consider the Old Testament teaching.

And there are various ideas taught in the Old Testament that contributed to the Jews' understanding of the Kingdom of God. And again, the Kingdom of God is taught throughout the Old Testament, throughout its pages.

We could show you the Kingdom of God being taught in the Garden of Eden. Adam was called to be a prophet, priest, and king in the Garden, which he failed to be and do, of course. And it's found throughout all of Old Testament scripture.

So let's consider some terms and themes often employed by Old Testament writers. First, let's consider the expression or idea of the coming of God. The Old Testament portrays God coming to the rescue of His people in order to deliver them from slavery and oppression and bring them to a place of safety and security where they may dwell with Him in peace and righteousness.

And so, first, we see this was so in Israel's beginning with the Exodus. God came from Sinai into Egypt and led out His people with a mighty hand to Sinai, the coming of God to deliver His people. Secondly, it was so later, when His people were in exile in Babylon, God promised He would come to them and bring them out and lead them back to their land.

Isaiah 40, 10 -11, describes God coming to save His people from Babylon, where they'd been held in captivity for 70 years. And this event speaks of the deliverance He brought to them through Cyrus the Persian.

Behold, the Lord God shall come with a strong hand, Isaiah 40, 10. His arm shall rule for Him. Behold, His reward is with Him, His work before Him. He will feed His flock like a shepherd. He'll gather the lambs with His arm.

He'll carry them in His bosom and gently lead those who are with young. He's talking about going into Babylon, taking His people like a scattered flock, gathering them and bringing them back to the land where He would show forth the Messiah, the Savior.

Thirdly, even David described his rescue from King Saul as a coming of God in Psalm 18. God bowed the heavens also and came down with darkness under His feet. He rode upon a sheriff and flew. He flew upon the wings of the wind.

Now again, that's when God rescued David from King Saul who was trying to kill him. And David, in this poetic way, is described as God coming down and delivering him from King Saul. The coming of God.

Also, we find in Scripture the coming of God as a visitation from God. God's coming to visit His people. Now we know that God is omniscient and He is omnipresent. There's no place where He isn't. But when we talk about God coming or God visiting, we're speaking about God manifesting His presence in a special way.

Either to bring judgment or to bring salvation. And so the coming of God as a visitation of God is found in many places. We read about it in the account of Sodom and Gomorrah when they were destroyed.

It was after a divine visitation at which God, as well as two angels, inspected the city and its inhabitants. He came and visited them. And, of course, they failed to show hospitality to those strangers, which was one of their great sins, as well as their going after strange flesh.

Secondly, again, when God would come to Egypt to bring out His people in the Great Exodus, it was described as a visitation. God visited His people. Thirdly, Isaiah declared that God would visit the city of Tyre, which was a very prominent coastal city on a little island set out a little ways from the shoreline, not very far, a couple hundred yards, but it was one of the great sea powers of the ancient world.

It carried on sea trade on behalf of the nations. And God brought judgment upon Tyre. God visited Tyre with His judgment. He came and He destroyed that city, Tyre, by Babylon and later Morpholi, Greece.

In fact, I would encourage you to examine the many references to the word visit and visitation, as well as the words come and coming, respecting the manifestation of God to His people in Old Testament times.

This is a common idea. The Jews anticipated a future visitation of God to come among them to bring them salvation from their sin. And, of course, this was realized in the coming of Jesus Christ. God visited His people.

Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, spoke of this prophetically upon the birth of his son, the forerunner of the promised king, John the Baptist. So we read in Luke's Gospel, Luke 1 .68, Blessed is the Lord God of Israel.

Why? For He has visited and redeemed His people. This was in anticipation of the birth of Jesus. John was born as His forerunner. He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of His servant David.

And he went on to describe the promised Messiah, God visiting His people. Then we'll drop down to verse 78 in Luke 1. Through the tender mercy of our God with which the day sprang from on high has visited us.

Again, God visited His people when Jesus came into the world. And here, of course, He was visiting His people with salvation through Jesus Christ. In Genesis 19, He visited Solomon and Gomorrah with view to judgment.

God visiting, coming in among people to assess them, evaluate them, and pass judgment upon them. And so we have the coming of God, we have divine visitation, and thirdly, of course, the common expression, the day of the Lord.

Important expression. The day of the Lord should not be viewed as a single specific date, but rather it's like an event that takes place. An intervention of God. The phrase describes God intervening in the affairs of nations in order to punish sin and deliver His people.

The day of the Lord. Perhaps it could be explained in this way. Man has had his way, that is, his day, and now God's going to have His day. His will is going to be done. The day of the Lord. It's as though God says, it's enough, no more, and He executes justice in punishing evildoers and relieving the oppression of His people.

And so God intervenes, He acts, and He does it in such a way that all know it, that He brought it to pass. And He alone is exalted in that day. Perhaps a good description of the day of the Lord is found in Isaiah 2.

Here's verse 11. The lofty looks of man shall be humbled, the haughtiness of men shall be bowed down, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. For the day of the Lord of hosts shall come upon everything proud and lofty, upon everything lifted up it shall be brought low.

In that day a man will cast away his idols of silver, his idols of gold, which they made each for himself to worship, to the moles and bats to go into the clefts of the rocks, into the crags of the rugged rocks from the terror of the Lord and the glory of His majesty when He arises to shake the earth mightily.

And this language is often used, it's apocalyptic language, to describe this day. This language is filled with graphic imagery, poetic symbolism. Men hide in caves, the earth shakes, great hailstones fall, stars fall from heaven, and the glory of God is revealed.

Now please understand, because the day of the Lord is an event, we should realize the Bible indicates there have been a number of days of the Lord in history.

Most people today,.

When they hear the word day of the Lord, they're thinking only of the second coming of Christ. And that is not biblical. There have been many days of the Lord through history, biblical history. God has intervened in overthrowing kingdoms, punishing the wicked, bringing relief to the oppressed.

And great harm comes when this expression, day of the Lord, is associated solely with a single date or single event in the future, like the second coming of Christ. Many Christians do err greatly because they see this expression and it's always in every instance referring to the second coming of Christ.

That is a terrible error because many times in the scripture it speaks of the day of the Lord and it's not a reference to the second coming of Christ, but rather it's a reference to God judging people in history.

And so the day of the Lord is used to describe a number of historical events in the biblical record. A day of the Lord occurred when God judged Egypt in 605 B .C. A day of the Lord occurred when God judged the nation of Edom in about 600 B .C.

A day of the Lord occurred when God judged Babylon in the late 6th century B .C. A day of the Lord occurred when God judged both the northern kingdom of Israel and Judah according to Amos 5. And that would have been the 6th century for Judah and the 8th century for Israel.

A day of the Lord occurred when God judged Jerusalem in the 6th century when he brought Nebuchadnezzar and Babylon. A day of the Lord occurred. But what happens is people see that term day of the Lord they think that's the second coming of Christ and they take those prophecies of the fall of Jerusalem and they project it as something that's going to take place at the second coming.

And there is most of your error regarding in the interpretation of prophecy taking place in my opinion because they misunderstand the term day of the Lord and so they infuse a meaning that is not there and they begin to interpret all kinds of details as though it is a future event when in actuality it was a historic event that was fully realized.

Well what about the term the Messiah? Of course this would carry a thought about the kingdom of God. The word Messiah in Greek it means anointed and it's the word Christos anointed one, Christ is Greek.

Messiah, Old Testament idea Hebrew. In the Old Testament when a person or thing was anointed with oil and again that's what the Messiah is, the anointed one. When a person or thing was anointed with oil it indicated that person belonged to God and that he was thereafter an instrument to be used by God to accomplish his work.

And so judges and kings were anointed of God in order to administer justice on behalf of God. In the Old Testament we see frequently the expressions the Lord's anointed or mine anointed referring to the God's servants.

Messiah as a specific title of the coming Savior did not emerge until rather late in Israel's history. Through most of Israel's history there was little anticipation of a coming Savior. Now it's found throughout the Old Testament but it wasn't vividly on the people's minds.

Now you and I see the need of a Savior throughout the Old Testament but the people through most of biblical history did not. Before, early in their history before the periods of the kings they saw their need for specific instances of divine intervention against their enemies.

They'd cry out to God and he'd send a judge, a Savior. And often times that Savior would be anointed. The periods of rule by King David and his son Solomon were the glory years of the kingdom of God in the Old Testament.

And the nation of Israel, the theocratic nation was a manifestation of the kingdom of God during Old Testament times. And with the birth of each succeeding heir of the throne of David the people's hopes were raised that God through him would bring Israel to her former glory.

It never occurred of course. There was a continued degrading was there not with each subsequent son of David. Oh yes, occasionally one would arise and do better than others but there would be disappointment usually by the end of his reign.

And so they weren't looking necessarily for a far off Messiah they were looking for a son of David presently to save them from their enemies. The prophets as well as other writers of the Old Testament declared that they needed a Messiah.

They needed a Deliverer that was far greater than just any ordinary son of David. Because of their own sin they had violated their covenant with God because they had repeatedly broken God's law. It was not merely a problem of their enemies being against them God himself was against them.

And that's what the prophets declared. And so they didn't just need deliverance from their enemies they needed deliverance from God who was against them. And so we have increasingly the promise of God that he would graciously, mercifully come to them and save them to, again, a promised Messiah.

And so what finally began to emerge in their thinking is that in order to be delivered they needed God to send someone send his Messiah, his anointed one. And not only was he regarded as the son of David but there are places in the Old Testament when they look beyond just a human figure and they saw a divine figure one like the son of man like Daniel's prophecy who would come and deliver his people.

And so these two ideas really emerged in the Old Testament record. You had a divine figure coming from heaven to deliver his people and you had a human figure, son of David who would arise and deliver his people.

And so there are different ideas of the nature of the Savior, the Messiah, who would come. There are different thoughts and ideas early in the first century. The people down at Qumran, down by the Dead Sea the Essenes who thought Jerusalem was corrupt and the priesthood corrupt they viewed themselves as a spiritual temple they were looking for a heavenly man to come a heavenly son of God to come and deliver them, defeat Rome.

Whereas the people in Israel were looking principally to an earthly king to come and restore the fortunes of David and restore the political independency and ascendancy of the nation of Israel over the kingdoms of the world.

And so they had questions, they weren't sure. And then of course the main theme that we have our idea is to determine the kingdom of God. And there is a lot of confusion about what this means. In fact the Bible speaks of the kingdom of God in several ways.

Often times the kingdom of God is a description of God's sovereignty over all of mankind, over all history. Because he is the creator, he is the king. He is the sovereign ruler over all peoples at all times.

King Nebuchadnezzar learned of this in Babylon. His dominion is an everlasting dominion. His kingdom is from generation to generation. In a sense the kingdom of God has always existed throughout all history because God is sovereign in all of his dealings.

And he has never been frustrated, never been defeated in any of his efforts. However, there is a second idea of the kingdom of God and this describes a realm in which the citizens of the kingdom of God are willingly subjected.

To God's rule.

The first idea, God rules over all, whether they are his people or not, over the wicked as well as the righteous. But in this second idea, the kingdom of God comprises people who willingly submit to God as their king.

So the idea of the kingdom of God arose in ancient Israel. Israel was the kingdom in which God himself ruled through his judges and later kings. David, of course, was the ideal king by which all future kings were judged.

But then thirdly, the idea of the kingdom of God emerged in the Old Testament. And this is where God gave many promises of a future kingdom that would come, that God himself would inaugurate, setting up the promised son of David as his eternal king.

And this is in the sense that the kingdom of God is not now, but it's coming. And this is especially set forth in the prophets of the Old Testament. Within this promised kingdom, there is freedom from pain and oppression.

There is peace, joy, and righteousness. The people in the kingdom live before God in a manner that pleases him. They experience his blessing with an abundant life that only he can bestow upon them. And the Jewish people anticipated this kingdom of God.

But again, they saw it only in physical terms. They looked for a restored, glorious, Davidic kingdom. They perceived it as a kingdom ushered in.

By the Messiah.

That would be sent into history. And Israel would once again regain its ascendancy. So this was the idea of the kingdom of God in the Old Testament. What about the intertestamental period? The 400 years between the end of Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament, and the opening of Matthew?

Well, you had different views. Again, they began to be more formally articulated. And there were different groups within Israel that adopted certain views of the coming kingdom. I already mentioned the Essenes at Qumran by the Dead Sea who were thinking of a heavenly figure to come.

Others were looking for a political king. And so by the time the Lord Jesus arrived on the scene, there was an anticipation by everyone of the soon coming of the Messiah and His kingdom. But there was really not a clear understanding of the nature of that kingdom.

And so our Lord Jesus taught His disciples about the nature of the kingdom.

And He did it in a way.

That He really had to re-educate them and correct a lot of misunderstanding. That's why He called Himself the Son of Man to these people. Had He gone around and told His disciples right at the outset He was the Christ, the promised Messiah, they would immediately infuse all kinds of wrong ideas about the kingdom and about Him as king.

He called Himself the Son of Man among them, and over the course of time was able to infuse in that idea of the Son of Man the true nature of the kingdom of God and the true nature of the promised king.

And so when our Lord taught His people, taught these people, again there is anticipation by everyone about the coming kingdom, but there is confusion by everyone, everywhere with respect to the nature of that kingdom.

And we would argue there is confusion today about this matter also. Well we now come to our passage in Luke 17, 20 -37. We have to kind of pick up our speed here. First we read Jesus' response to the Pharisees in verses 20 and 21.

Now when Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, He answered them and said, The kingdom of God does not come with observation, nor will they say, See here or see there, for indeed the kingdom of God is within you, or rather in your midst.

They were looking for an earthly political kingdom. They were looking for a Jewish millennium like a lot of people today are anticipating a future thousand year Jewish millennium. That is the kind of kingdom they were looking for.

And Jesus said, You are wrong. The kingdom is not that way. It is spiritual in nature. Our Lord's entire ministry focused on that theme, that through Him the promised kingdom of God would be present and manifest.

By the way, the Gospels do not present the kingdom as something that would have taken place if the Jews had embraced it. The old dispensationalists taught that. Jesus came offering the millennium, the Jewish millennium, and had the Jews accepted Him as their king, then the millennium would have begun.

But when they rejected Jesus as their king, God withdrew His offer of the millennium, postponed it 2 ,000 plus years. And this church age is an intervening parenthesis. That is not what the scriptures teach.

The Lord Jesus brought the kingdom, and He established the kingdom through His life, death, and resurrection. The kingdom of God was inaugurated when our Lord Jesus ascended from the grave and was enthroned in heaven.