(Church Life) Distinctives of Christ's Kingdom — Mose Stoltzfus

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Amen, beloved brethren. I just love the fellowship. It is sweet to every two years and many times in between for myself also and traveling to other places and meetings and church planning work. It is so wonderful to see the body of Christ on a bigger scale than just our local congregation and that's what we have here today represented.

It seems like sometimes we find our hearts growing cold toward each other when we just don't fellowship or don't see each other, you know. But when we have that acquaintance, then that all warms up. Praise God for that.

All right, shall we bow our heads for prayer? O God, thank you for the centrality of Christ. Thank you for the entrance into the kingdom through Christ. Thank you, dear God, for sanctification through Christ.

O thank you, dear God, for being our head and guiding us through this dark world and helping us attain unto eternal life, O Father. We have that blessed hope and glorious appearing of our God and Savior Jesus Christ that we look forward to when the fight will be over.

We can lay down the battle lines and enjoy the glories of heaven for all eternity. Thank you, dear God, for all the things that happened last night as men heard the gospel preached and then responded in their own hearts.

And we pray that much more work, God, would be done in all of our hearts together to make us what you want us to be. We pray again, break the bread of life today and watch over the things we say that we may say those things which are truth and right.

We pray in Jesus' name, amen. Yeah, just a couple of things here that I would like to mention. I have enjoyed some very interesting conversations and questions that have come my way since yesterday. One of them is a brother came to me and I just thought I would clarify that.

Christ’s Kingdom and the Stone in Daniel

When I preached that out of Daniel 2 on the stone cut out of the mountain, smiting the image at the feet, I want you to notice that Jesus Christ came in the Roman Empire. Christ was cut out of the mountain and hit the image during the Roman Empire.

That was the beginning of the crumbling of the four world kingdoms, although his ultimate end is down at the toes when the Antichrist kingdom will be destroyed. But I just wanted to make sure you have that picture correct, that the stone hits the image in the Roman Empire first at the feet and the image begins to fall apart and a new kingdom and a new dominion, which is that of Jesus Christ and him crucified in his church, begins and continues until it reigns triumphantly.

Identifying a Hybrid Church

Another thing that has been interesting to me is the subject of the hybrid, a hybrid church. And I would very much encourage your study of that, very deep study, that you determine, basically, while you're here, as to whether you're a part of a true church of Jesus Christ or part of a hybrid.

I believe that is important. Somebody even asked whether I would list or give a list of the hybrid churches, which is impossible. I'm sure you know, but I did want to give you a few more examples. I, myself, come from the Old Order Amish, was born and raised among the Old Order Horses and Buggy Amish, and that is the epitome of a hybrid church.

They believe in baptism and communion and church membership, and they believe in Christ, they believe that Christ came 2 ,000 years ago and all that, but they are a hybrid church because they even have come so far, in the last generation especially, that they consider converted people to have a strange belief and will excommunicate them out of the church, not all of them nationwide, but here locally.

They will excommunicate you out of the church for this strange belief or for being converted or for having Bible studies and prayer meetings or for having assurance of salvation, and so they are so much a hybrid church that they are over on the work side.

Basically, what they say is, we need the grace of God, we need to do the best we can and God's grace will cover the rest. So, the emphasis is on human attempt to live a godly life and not through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Well, those kind of things and many others, I could mention the Hutterites likewise, where they have taken the gospel and brought it into the Ark of God is the church, which is the living communally. So, if you don't live communally, you are not in the Ark and therefore not in the church and it's just amazing the ignorance of those people.

We were talking to an old grandma in southern Alberta one time and it was just the epitome again of the Hutterite history there and like I say there again, you have many variations of people who wouldn't take it that far, but we got in the conversation, well, if the colony is the Ark, what are the people supposed to do in California?

And she in a curt word just let us know there is absolutely no hope for anybody down there if they don't live communally, you know. And that's the way these poor people believe and are deceived and there are many hybrids but what Leonard Verdine does in his book on the anatomy of a hybrid is to show how men actually have attempted to come back out of the Catholic church and to redo and revive the church, but they have done that without centering on Christ and His Word and so they have made a lot of corrections and there was some fresh breath of air that a lot of these hybrids brought, but they are a hybrid because they would not submit themselves fully and completely to the obedience of the Word of God and that basically produces a hybrid and I have had numerous people come to me here and testify that they were part of a hybrid church and why they were and just sharing with me those things and that was very interesting and I wish you could all hear some of those testimonies.

The Sermon on the Mount as Christ’s Kingdom Standard

But this morning I'd like to go into a message on the distinctive of the kingdom of Christ's church or Christ's kingdom. I think the title for the CD will be Distinctives of Christ's Kingdom. I return our Bibles to Matthew chapter 5 and I would just like to emphasize that here again we have the anatomy of a hybrid popping up very, very quickly to those who may believe that the Sermon on the Mount is relegated to another age.

If you believe that and do not begin to see the paradigm shift that is made between the Testaments here and the Old Testament is based on the old law. The law came by Moses but grace and truth by Jesus Christ and that division takes place basically in Matthew chapter 5 as we have the unfolding of all at once a brand new teaching and philosophy of life or reality of life is a better word and that's what we want to look at and if you belong to a theology or theological persuasion that does not embrace the Sermon on the Mount then you are in trouble with your church or with your theology because I actually believe that the warnings given of bewaring of false prophets in the book of Matthew is a warning of men who will not teach this doctrine and this truth that Jesus brought.

This shift, this change. It has been said but I say unto you ye have heard of old but now this is the way and Jesus Christ brought that change about when he came to earth and began to sit down and teach the people this new teaching and the Sermon on the Mount is a broad compilation of those teachings and very, very important.

To those who are the hybrids that we identified yesterday they go back and they take the Old Testament and what burdens me the worst there is not that there are not many good and right principles of God and teaching that are compatible with the teachings of Christ in the Old Testament such as the Psalms and Proverbs and even the law is brought over and fulfilled in two commandments and we have all of that.

However, men who go back and pick and choose out of the old Mosaic law and bring it over and have it brought to bear upon your conscience that you can't even live right or free because of Old Testament law being brought over into the new covenant, that's a hybrid.

It produces a hybrid and will not come out right and what they always do is pick and choose. Nobody will not light a fire on the Sabbath day, on Saturday as was commanded under the old law. Hardly anyone will take it to that extent but yet they pick and choose but the Bible says if you do not keep everything you are guilty of it all and so it's very important that you understand what Jesus was doing in Matthew chapter 5.

Let us begin to read here in some of the distinctives of the kingdom and I am going to abbreviate this a lot because I do need to be moving on. Again, we are talking of the kingdom of God, the kingdom of Christ or the church of Jesus Christ interchangeably here because we believe here is where the shift took place and Christ started to build His church and build His kingdom and that is what we are in yet today.

In 2008 we are in the kingdom of Christ, the kingdom of God is excellent and alive and well among the remnant of God's people across the face of the earth and they are those which believe the practical issues of the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ.

First of all, you bring your centrality as Brother Denny preached here this morning and you have a living experience with the Lord Jesus as in a conversion and then you follow the word of God and allow it to instruct you in the ways of God into sanctification and true holiness.

It is truly a holy nation, a peculiar people that are zealous of good works. All right, Matthew chapter 5. Here we have the change taking place where we have the word in verse 1, we have in seeing the multitudes He went up into a mountain and when He was set His disciples came unto Him and He opened His mouth and taught them saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Poverty of Spirit and Mourning as the Kingdom’s Paradigm Shift

Now humility is taught in the Old Testament to a degree but this is a drastic change. To see that the poor in spirit are addressed in a specific way this way and theirs is the kingdom of heaven that the way in or the entrance into the kingdom of God is always closer and quicker to the poor in spirit than to anybody else on earth.

When we see ourselves as a sinner and we see our need of a Savior and our proud and arrogant and boastful spirit begins to collapse and we come before the Lord and recognize that I am a needy man we are close to the kingdom of God.

And that's the way this whole thing is laid out this way. The poor in spirit, theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Yes, the kingdom of heaven. And then in verse 4 it says, Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be comforted.

And you just get the picture. Wow, this is strange. We are now looking for men who mourn. Mourn over what? Mourn over their need. Mourn over their sin. Mourn in repentance before God. And are beginning to say, Whoa, wait a minute.

How am I living? What am I doing? I need somebody. A supernatural help and power and grace like the man who tried and tried to stop drinking, stop smoking, stop adultery and all that. And he finally just comes to the end and says, I can't quit.

Help. I need help. And that's what he did. And he begins to be poor in spirit and he begins to mourn. And that is the great paradigm shift that the Sermon on the Mount brings to humanity. When Jesus started his earthly ministry he lived obediently under the law and worked in the carpenter's shop up to 30 years of age.

But when he sat down and began to teach the people you have a major shift in theology that is brought to the people. Back in the Old Testament it seemed like many times it was the rich and the famous and, you know, the Abrahams and men like that, the Isaacs and Jacobs, the patriarchs that were the men of God and all that.

But here you reach down to the slave, you reach down to the lowly, you reach down to the hungry and the thirsty and that is brought here. Also, we have in verse 5, Blessed are the meek. Look at that. Blessed are the meek, they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are the ailing to hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy. And it just brings everything as a lowly, simple life of reality at the foot of the cross.

And there we become poor in spirit, we become meek and mild and needy and we hunger and thirst after God and there is the new kingdom opening up to humanity. And the church of Jesus Christ is based on that doctrine and on that experience.

Peacemakers we have mentioned there too. And then we go on into verse 10 and we have, Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. And there again we have, you know, in the Old Testament and this is why we just cannot accept the theology of a flat Bible is because in the Old Testament if an army come against you and somebody destroyed your city by night and gave you a problem, you know, you rallied your men together and went and fought back the next day.

And that's the scene throughout the Old Testament by and large through chronicles and kings and judges in many of the Old Testament books that are given like that. But here it's very different. Now we accept persecution, we accept a misunderstanding, we accept the cross upon our lives, we accept the fact which Jesus was a perfect example of.

And we do that all without fighting back and to be non-resistant and love our enemies. And we have all those things here which we want to just mention. I received a very interesting phone call the other night.

A man living out in central Pennsylvania somewhere went out on a cold winter night to his phone shanty and called me up and we talked for quite a while. And one of the things he said, my, you fellas in there, you have quite a bad reputation.

And I forget what he said, do you realize what people are saying? You know what, you really have some reputation. But yet the man had come to the light and gotten born again and he wanted to talk for quite a while because it seemed like he also was coming to this point where he saw that perhaps those are the people that might be able to help me or might have the light that I would like to be a part of.

And that is the way we should accept that. Woe is us when all men speak well of us. You know, and we should be able to accept that like the scripture says here, blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, and this is really the beauty of this whole thing, for great is your reward in heaven for so persecuted they the prophets that were before you.

Persecution and the Defenseless Christian

If you want to identify a hybrid today versus the true church of Jesus Christ, this is a very important point to see whether they will accept the sufferings of humanity upon their life, upon their church, and be ridiculed and talked about and their name cast out as evil, and they can take it patiently and they can even smile and rejoice and be excited that they have the opportunity to suffer with the Lord in that way without always retaliating and trying to get back and figuring out how we can give them the next punch or something like that, and that is often the identification again of a hybrid to those who will not believe this, and like one man said, I can't put up with this, so I don't have to put up with this, being talked to like that or being treated like that, and that's the attitude of the hybrid many times, and they will want to fight back.

All right, furthermore, so we have that, and if you go back, it's very easy for you to go back over the last 2 ,000 years, and brother, it is not hard to identify that line of people who were opposed and persecuted and hunted down and their material goods confiscated and their houses burned down and they're put in the prison and they were beheaded and they were at the stake and all of that, and today you are persecuted and opposed for even visiting or joining that group, a group of people like that.

That is the line of history, and not only that, but in the future, according to the book of Revelation, we will have great difficulty coming upon us, yet in the future, I believe as the church of Jesus Christ, for the faith when it becomes more and more intolerable by the world, and we see that happening before our very eyes that there is less and less toleration for the Christian today.

You can get up and read the Koran in school, and you can read Harry Potter, and you can read the Sons of Wicca, and anything you want to read, but don't bring that Bible into the church, into the school, and read it in front of the students.

You can't even quote a scripture hardly in commencement, the exercises of graduation in our nation anymore, and that shows you what's happening in that way. All right, then he further says in verse 13, you are the salt of the earth, and you are the light of the world, and this is again a great difference, a great shift from the Old Testament saints.

They used to live in a city, and they'd build walls around themselves to defend themselves, you know, but all at once, you have a city set on a hill, and there's no walls, and there's no fence. You simply have an open heaven, an open door, and you try to beam the lights of truth, the lights of the gospel out across the known world that is ahead of you, and I just love the illustration.

Somebody mentioned it maybe on Sunday or yesterday already how that, I think the communists, how that they built walls to keep their people in, and it's been interesting in the analogy of the United States versus Russia, you know, they build a wall to keep the people in, and we're putting walls in Mexico to keep the people out.

They all want to come in, and that's because if you have what you need, then the people want to come in because they love the life, and they love what you have, and that's the way the light of the gospel should be.

We should have sinners that want to come in because they can get rid of their sin, and they can have victory over it, and they can stop their sinning business and their adultery and their fornications and their stealings and their smoking and drinking and all that, and that's what the church should represent, a power over the human nature and over the messes we get ourselves into in our youth, in our young years.

A city that is set on a hill and the light of the world, a city that is set on a hill and the light of the world cannot be hid, and also there the salt of the earth, and you know, salt, by the way, is a preservative, and I do believe that the matter of the true church and the Christians that are left in this world have been the preserving element of not having fallen under the major outpouring of the wrath of God already, and it's because of you and I here in the United States and many more like us yet that God has held back his wrath as much as he had, I believe, because salt, purify, or salt preserves in that way, but if the salt is lost its flavor, then I believe the wrath of God is going to come.

Salvation as Walls and Bulwarks

Also, very interesting in that same subject, I'm hoping I have time to address a little bit the conflict due to many in us, many who have heard the accusations here over the years against us because we don't have these written laws or written standards we have over our last 25 years here, tried to maintain that Christianity is that of the heart, you know, and that if we don't have the people's hearts, it's just hard to fence them in and to make them stay there and to make them behave in certain ways with rules and regulations.

And maybe I'll get to talk about that, but Brother Emmanuel Lapp when he had the opening meditation brought out this wonderful scripture in Isaiah, salvation now has to be determined for walls and for bulwarks.

And that's still the unique part of the true church or the unique doctrine or practice of the true church is that salvation should be thorough enough and an experience in our lives that we want to live godly.

We don't have to be fenced in and hemmed in and begged and bartered and all to live a certain way and not go here and not go there and not do this and not do that. Salvation is for walls and for bulwarks and that brings the salvation itself brings the separation from the world and our desires change and we don't want to be in the middle of the world.

And go to the places they do and do the things they do. Examine yourself whether you have had that kind of sin-killing experience in your life. Whether salvation that you have is good enough and great enough to be a wall and a bulwark for your life.

Of course, in the New Testament theology we know that's accomplished through the spirit of the God living in the midst of the believer. Salvation for walls and bulwarks. But here throughout this this sermon and various times here in the New Testament I just love it that we have this major shift in it has been said but I say unto you.

And so we notice that that negates or puts to fulfillment and finality a former commandment and raises up a new one. And we must see that change as we read the Bible lest we will be confused with Old Testament law that formerly was a practice but now there is a new practice brought upon us through the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus’ Teachings on Anger, Lust, and Divorce

Here in this sermon we have the fact that you cannot be angry with your brother anymore. In the Old Testament I believe that was allowable. You could get angry with your brother and there were times I realized that in a case with Joab when he smote two of his fellow countrymen there under the fifth rib and so on you know we have that finally dealt with at the end of his life but there was a lot of anger back and forth even amongst godly men against their enemies.

They taught the hating of their enemies and there is a major shift and a major change in the Sermon on the Mount where he tells us that we cannot be angry with our brother anymore. Brother Aaron mentioned it last night I won't spend a lot of time on it that you cannot it used to be said that you can't commit adultery and as far as you need to restrain yourself from the very act but now if you look on a woman to lust after her you have committed adultery already in your heart.

We see that the commandment is actually strengthening and increasing in some of these areas and that is very important that we see that change taking place. We can see a radical change that word was used last night and I'd like to underscore it again today.

The New Testament lifestyle the New Testament experience is a radical change in human life and in church life and in personal life and we we need to see that. You used to be able to give a writing of divorce but you had a hardness in your heart and you didn't like the woman you were living with you could find the excuse if she burned your food in a New Testament time you could put her away.

But all at once the Lord Jesus sits on the hill and says no more. You can't divorce your wife and go marry another other than that you will be living in adultery. You'll cause her to commit adultery and you will be living in adultery if you do that.

Don't listen to the hybrids. Don't listen to the hybrids that are setting aside the Sermon on the Mount and trying to find a way out around it. You can't even swear an oath anymore. Oaths were very prevalent in the Old Testament times but now it's yay yay and nay nay and whatsoever is more than that cometh of evil.

You may affirm things and you may say I'm speaking the truth. I tell you the truth maybe and perhaps some of those things are acceptable but basically we should be known for our honesty that we say it is so it is believed to be so.

Loving Enemies and Refusing Retaliation

And there is no question or no emphasis needed further than that. You cannot resist evil anymore. You are commanded now to love your enemies. And that is often somebody goes down into the details of that and tries to take it apart and give you hypothetical situations of men attacking your wife and all of that and try to make it sound absurd and it doesn't mean what it says but the Bible says resist not evil and it says if your enemy hunger feed him and if he thirst give him drink.

Some time ago a farmer out in I think it was in the Franklin County area some years ago had trouble with things being stolen and finally his gas tank started emptying out and he just noticed that he believes somebody is stealing gas.

And so on Sunday morning he decided I'm going to stay home and see if I can catch this fellow. Sure enough some time it happened while he normally went to church on Sunday morning and the neighbor knew it and so he came in there and he backs up to the gas pump and he didn't apparently didn't have a padlock or whatever and he starts pumping gas into his tank.

The farmer got up went out to walks said here let me help you. Got a hold of the crank and crank continued to crank. My man was so ashamed he didn't know what to do and he said please don't report me.

And the man said I'll do that on one occasion if you come to my house for lunch. He went home got his family the farmer demanded the whole family comes and he came that next week in the evening for supper I believe it was.

And that's all it was done. He just gave him a meal and sent him on his way. But a few nights later a whole pile of goods showed up back on the farm. It even works. But whether it works or not you're still called to do it.

And anything else than that is a hybrid. That is what Jesus taught. That is what Jesus taught. Once again you can take your church history books for the last 2 ,000 years and it's even called uniquely so the defenseless Christians.

The story of the martyrs mirror the defenseless Christians. Those who will suffer all kinds of things. I was just reading about Diocletian I think it was there the other day pouring hot lead down people's throats you know and I just tried for a moment to imagine that I cannot.

I cannot imagine those kind of things.

But this is what men patiently endured.

Patiently took their role in life saying my master has suffered for me on a cruel cross. And endured all those things and rejection and he was a righteous and perfect man. Here at least I am not a righteous and a perfect man and yet he followed in his footsteps and wrote the books the defenseless Christians.

Jesus' father said in the book of Matthew wise as serpents and harmless as doves. He did not allow a man to rally his buddies around him and get a machine gun and blow somebody's head off on the other side.

You know it's very interesting if you study the history of the Civil War that there were pauses in fighting that the northern army went to the Confederates and the Confederates came over to the northern and brothers sat in the tent and visited and chatted together even it is known that fathers lived in Pennsylvania and their sons may have lived in Maryland so the sons were with the Confederates and the father was in Pennsylvania with the northern army and they took a pause for a Sunday and the people sat there and visited and maybe read their Bibles and all that and on Monday mornings slaughtered each other by the thousands.

Doesn't make sense. Not in my kingdom the Lord says. Things don't operate that way. Not anymore. Used to be that way. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But not anymore. That's all over. The same is true for laying up treasures in heaven rather than on earth.

Treasures, Anxiety, and the Kingdom’s Radical Priorities

Brother Aaron mentioned that last night and I won't say a lot about that. You cannot serve God in mammon and you can't even take anxious thought about tomorrow. You can't just sit at home and worry about what I'm going to do next year or next winter or something like that and I do not believe in his teaching that a person can't cut wood for the summer for the winter heating season.

But his anxious thought that thing of fretting and worrying you know, what am I going to do and how is it going to work out and oh my and oh me and we sit down and bring calamity upon our whole nervous system and body because we worry and fret and do not trust the God of heaven for the future.

But especially we have an attack upon laying up treasures where moth and rust is corrupt and thieves break through and steal and yet our whole society is looking for early retirement and substantial retirement and all those things to try to have their nest egg well padded and they even try to equate the rate of inflation that is going on so they are sure it's going to reach when they're old.

And they kill the security that old men used to have and that was children. Isn't that something? How the world can get twisted so drastically out of order. Matthew 12, 46. We have another strange thing going on here.

The distinctives of the kingdom. Verse 44. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a treasure hidden afield that which the man hath found he hideth and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he hath and buyeth that field.

What is he saying? A man has found eternal life. A man has found the reality of the Christianity to be so precious that he lets hold of that thing and his father says, Now son, if you're going to do that you're going to lose the family farm.

And he doesn't care anymore whether he loses the family farm or whatever he loses. He has found that great treasure and he's willing to part with everything Radical. Oh, what a shift that is from what we knew it had been said.

But now I say unto you. Look at the next one. Basically saying the same or very similar. Again, the kingdom of heaven, the church of Jesus Christ, this new belief, this new way of looking at things. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant seeking goodly pearls who when he has found one pearl of great price went and sold all that he had and bought it.

Christianity is so high, so beautiful, so wonderful that it's right for you to leave everything in order to get it. That's the teachings of the kingdom. Nothing should stop us from embracing the kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven, the church of Jesus Christ, the new life in Christ.

And so it goes on. I mentioned verse 47 yesterday about the kingdom of heaven there. And that indeed is some of the radical Christianity. Matthew chapter 10 talks about trouble in the family and clearly lays out that the family of God, brothers, is higher than earthly family.

The Family of God Above Earthly Family

Jesus was preaching one time and I think one of His disciples came in and said, hey, thy mother and thy brothers are out there and they seek you. They wanted Him to stop the meeting and go out and talk to them.

And He looked across the crowd and He said, behold, my mother and my brother, this is my family and it's more important than this family. You know, we have other records that His brothers didn't believe Him.

They were offended at Him and all that. And He had a right reason to say what He wanted to say there because it was real to Him. They were embarrassed. My brother Jesus, the way He's talking and the way He's acting, we're embarrassed.

He makes Himself sound like He's somebody special. And He's bringing a special message and He's going around healing and preaching people and putting all this focus and the people wonder who we are and what kind of a family this is.

You know how the scribes and the Pharisees looked down on Him and they had to suffer some shame for that. And they didn't like it. But the secret that is given out and this is something many of us still can hardly come to grips with, that the family of God is higher and more important and more precious than our earthly family.

And that it is not right when the earthly family and the earthly brothers and sisters, especially when they are not converted, are pulling you away from all kinds of godliness and church meetings and things that you should be attending to and the things of God and saying, well, my family, they don't like it when I do that.

Let me first go and bury my dad and then I'll come and follow you. He that put his hand to the plow and look it back is not fit for the kingdom of heaven. My kingdom is exclusive. The distinctives of my kingdom will demand a loyalty you will not see anywhere else.

And I've seen some pretty high loyalties of what family members will do to family members in the world for each other. But God is calling for a higher one on the church of Jesus Christ. In fact, in 1 John, He goes so radically far that He asks us to lay our lives down for the brethren.

That's what the Scripture teaches. Oh, radical Christianity. Those who trespass or who have been trespassed against must actually forgive those trespasses before they can be forgiven. Is that possible?