Practical Issues of Kingdom Living - Part 2 — Stephen Kaung

I do thank the Lord for the privilege of coming here and see you dear brothers and sisters again. Will you please turn to the Gospel according to Matthew. Matthew chapter 5, we'll read from verse 1 through verse 12.

Jesus’ Teaching on the Character of the Kingdom

Matthew chapter 5 verse 1. But seeing the crowds, he that is our Lord Jesus, went up into the mountain. And having sat down, his disciples came to him. And having opened his mouth, he taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of the heavens.

Blessed they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed they who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. Blessed the merciful, for they shall find mercy.

Blessed the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. Blessed they who are persecuted on account of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of the heavens.

Blessed are ye when they shall reproach and persecute you, and say every wicked thing against you, lying for my sake. Rejoice and exult, for your reward is great in the heavens. For thus have they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

And the same chapter, the last verse, verse 48. Be ye therefore perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. Lately the Lord has put upon my heart on this matter of the kingdom of God. And I think it is the right time that we should be reminded of the kingdom of God.

The Gospel of the Kingdom Before the End

Because our Lord Jesus said, The great tidings of the kingdom of the heavens must be preached all the inhabitants of the earth, for a witness to the nations. And then the end will come. So brothers and sisters, I do feel in my heart that before the return of our Lord Jesus, before the end comes, this gospel of the kingdom must be re-emphasized.

In a sense, in the early church, this is the gospel that they preached. But unfortunately you find, as you look back through the centuries, you find that the gospel of the kingdom has not been preached as it should.

As a matter of fact, you find among God's people there are lots of God's children who are really saved. They do not even know what the kingdom of God is. And because of this you find there is such a weakness in the testimony of the church to the world.

So I feel very deeply in my heart that this gospel of the kingdom of the heavens must be emphasized more and more as we are approaching the end. What is salvation? Salvation in terms of having our sins forgiven, receiving eternal life, going to heaven.

And thank God it is. It is great that our sins could be forgiven, that we will have eternal life, even the very life of God. And it is great that one day we will go home, to our eternal home, heaven. This is the gospel.

But the gospel is more than that. You find in Colossians 1, verse 13, it says that God has delivered us out of the authority of darkness and has translated us into the kingdom of the Son of God's love.

Salvation means not only to have our sins forgiven and be saved, but salvation is being delivered out of the power of darkness and translated into the kingdom of God's Son, the Son of God's love. In other words, you find it is a change of position, a change of status, a change of environment, a change of allegiance.

That is salvation. Before we were saved, not only we have sinned greatly, we were dead in sins and transgressions, but we have to remember that before we were saved, we were actually in the kingdom of darkness.

The kingdom of this world is the kingdom of darkness. Satan, the adversary of God, is the ruler, the prince of this world. He uses darkness. Before we were saved, we were in a kingdom. That kingdom is the kingdom of darkness.

We were kept in the dark. This world has blinded our eyes. We do not know the right from the wrong. We thought we knew, but we were completely in darkness. We were groping in darkness. We were under the authority of darkness.

That was Satan's tactic to put us in darkness, that we could not see light. But thank God one day, our Lord Jesus came into this world. He defeated Satan on Calvary's cross. He has delivered us out of the authority of darkness and has translated us into his own kingdom.

The kingdom of love. The kingdom of light. You know, this is a tremendous thing that happened to our life. In other words, once we were in one kingdom, we believed in the Lord Jesus. We have been translated into another kingdom.

We no longer belong to the kingdom of this world. We no longer are under the authority of darkness. Thank God we are in the kingdom of God's Son. The kingdom of love. Now that is where we are today. Remember the story of the children of Israel.

Israel’s Deliverance from Egypt as a Picture of Salvation

They were slaves in Egypt. They served Pharaoh. They were not even allowed to live. They were put into labor, slave labor. They were in the kingdom of Egypt under Pharaoh. But thank God in his mercy, he saved them.

Israel were saved from death by the Paschal Lamb. That day, the Passover day. Because of the land slain with the blood of the Dwarf, the children of Israel were saved. Now that was the beginning. But that was not the end.

In other words, God saved them from death. But God did not leave them in Egypt. We find that immediately after they were saved from death that night, they marched out of Egypt. God delivered them out of Egypt when they crossed the Red Sea.

They were completely out of the authority of Pharaoh. And now they belong to another kingdom. You know, God brought these people to Mount Sinai. And there the Lord began to reveal his mind to them. And he said, if you keep my covenant, if you keep my commandments, you will be a kingdom of peace unto me.

We find the children of Israel, they were not just being saved from death. They actually were taken out of one kingdom. And was made to be another kingdom. To be a kingdom of peace unto God. To serve God.

Now that was what happened to the children of Israel. So in a very real sense, we find that we who are saved by the grace of God, throw the blood on the land. The Lord did not leave us there in the kingdom of darkness.

The Lord had actually translated us into the kingdom of his own son, of the beloved son. So out of one kingdom, we have been translated into another kingdom. What we need to understand is, where are we today?

Our position today. Now it is true. We are still in this world. You remember our Lord Jesus in John chapter 17, in his prayer. He mentioned in that prayer, in verse 6 I think. He said, these people are being called out of the world.

Formerly we were in the world. But he has called us out of the world. And yet in verse 11 he says, we are still in the world. Out of the world, and yet physically we are still in this world. But then in verse 14 he said, yet they are not of the world.

So this is where we are. God has called us out of the world. We do not belong to this world anymore. But physically, bodily, we are still in the world. Now even though bodily we are still in the world, yet we are not of the world.

That's where we are. I'm afraid lots of believers, they still do not know where they are. Because they judge by things. They feel that, well, we are still in this world. And they forget that even though they are in this world, they are not of this world.

They belong to another kingdom. We are children of the kingdom of God. Let me use an illustration. You know, during the Roman Empire, they conquered the world that they knew at that time. Now after they conquered all these different countries, they set up colonies.

In different parts of the world they have their colonies. Now these colonies were formed in different ways. Some colonies were formed actually by those retired soldiers, Roman legions. And after they retired, they settled down with their family in a foreign place.

And these men became the inhabitants of a Roman colony. And they served as an outpost for the Roman Empire. Or in other ways, sometimes they conquered some countries and they set up a few cities as Roman colonies.

And all those who lived in those cities were given the privilege of being Roman citizens. Now for instance, Paul of Tarsus. Now Tarsus was a Roman colony. And because he was born in that Roman colony, so even though he was born of the Hebrews, he had a Roman citizenship.

So in different ways you find they have colonies all over the world. Now in these Roman colonies, they were under the direct government of Rome. They were not under any governors of any Roman province, Roman state.

But they belonged directly to Rome. And in these colonies, the people dressed as Romans. Their lifestyle was Roman. And the law that ruled over them was Roman law. In other words, you find they were different from the people around them.

They were colonies. They do not belong to the neighboring countries or the neighboring cities. They belong directly to Rome. And everything there was Roman. And that was the way that the Roman Empire ruled the whole territory.

The Church as a Heavenly Colony in a Hostile World

Now that was just an illustration. What I want to say is this. This is exactly what our Lord Jesus did. You know, this world was usurped by Satan. This world does not belong to him. But he got it through man.

God actually gave this earth to man to have dominion over the whole earth. But somehow you find man was deceived and giving up that rulership. So Satan is the ruler of this world. And he has been ruling this world for thousands of years.

But one day there was an invasion from heaven. And that invasion was in the person of our Lord Jesus. You know, incarnation is a tremendous event. Now incarnation, you can view incarnation from various viewpoints.

And one of the viewpoints of incarnation is heaven invaded the earth. Here was one who belonged to heaven. And he came upon this earth. Now why did he came to this earth? If you read the gospel according to Matthew, you find he was born to be king.

That was why he was born. He was born to be king. He came to set up his kingdom upon this earth. But unfortunately you find when he was born there was a king of the Jews. Herod, the Idunium, an Israelite.

And he was the usurper. He was king on the throne. But here you find the real king was born. And in a sense you find Herod is a friend of Satan. Because Satan actually was the ruler of this world. Not by legal rights, but by cheating, by deception.

But here you find the Lord was born. He was born to be king. And he came into a hostile world. When he was born there was no room for him. And after he was born, Herod wanted to murder him. He came to set up his kingdom upon this earth.

You find that there could be no neutral ground. After he came upon this earth, you either receive him or you oppose him. There is no neutral ground. You can be with him and those who accepted him. Both of this world into his own kingdom.

Death and resurrection and ascension. On the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came down. And 120 disciples were baptized into one body. In other words, that was the first colony of heaven upon the earth.

He invaded the enemy's land. He destroyed the enemy on Calvary's cross. And now he sent his Holy Spirit to come upon those who believed in him. And started to set up his heavenly colonies. These are his kingdom.

The kingdom of the Son of God's love. He first set it up in Jerusalem. And it began to spread to all Judea. It began to spread into Samaria. And it has been and it is still spreading to the end of the earth.

In other words, here and there throughout the enemy's land as it were. You find he set up his colonies. So we are his colonies. And we who are in these colonies. We are who are in the kingdom of God's love.

Brothers and sisters. We are no longer under the rule of the ruler of this earth. We are directly ruled by the king who is in heaven. It is different. We speak a different language. We belong to the kingdom of the heavens.

That is where we are today. Are we there? Scripture says we are strangers and sojourners. We belong to this world that we are no strangers. We are not passers-by. But in 1 Peter you find that we are strangers and sojourners.

Why? Because he has delivered us out of the power of darkness. And has translated us into the kingdom of his own son of love. And it is because of this we are strangers to this world. Now are we strangers?

Are we sojourners? Are we just passing through? Or do we being rooted and grounded into this earth? Now where are we? Concerns me deeply is. We know that we belong to another kingdom. Are we living today in that kingdom?

The Present and Future Manifestation of God’s Kingdom

For the sake of some who are not familiar with the kingdom of God, of the kingdom of the heavens. Probably I need to explain a little bit more. In one sense the kingdom of God is from eternity to eternity.

Wherever God rules there is his kingdom. And of course his dominion is over all. From generation to generation. In one sense, in the broad sense, the kingdom of God is from eternity to eternity. But there is a stricter sense of the kingdom.

And the stricter sense is not only wherever God rules. And of course God rules and overrules. You know, Satan can set up his own kingdom outside of the kingdom of God as it were. But he is not outside of the authority of God.

What is the kingdom of God? What is the kingdom of God's son? What is the kingdom of the heavens? It is the domain of people, him, voluntary. So that he can work in their lives. To character into them.

That they may... It is not only that God rules over all. But the kingdom is, there is a people. Out him work of building his own character into them. That they may express him. And glorify him. Now that is the kingdom.

In one sense, one day that kingdom will come. You remember our Lord Jesus taught us to pray, Thy kingdom come. Now when he pray, Thy kingdom come, it means that it hasn't come yet. It has already come, you don't need to pray anymore.

So one day that kingdom will have his public manifestation upon this earth. In other words, at the second coming of Christ, we find that the kingdom of this world will become the kingdom of our God and of his Christ.

And righteousness shall rule over the whole earth. And at that time you find that there will be nothing that will hurt anyone. The lion and the lamb will be together. The whole environment will be changed.

The kingdom of God has come upon this earth. And what a day it is. And we are looking forward to that day and thank God it's coming very soon. So in a sense it is still in the future. But at the same time we find, even though Thy kingdom come is still in the future, but that refers only to his public manifestation.

So far as his spiritual reality is concerned, it has already come. But people do not see it. Only those whose spiritual eyes are open, only those who have given themselves to the Lord, they are actually already in the kingdom.

To the kingdom of his son. In that kingdom, do we know how to live? In that kingdom. I think that is the real problem and the real concern. So my burden for this time is, how do we live in the kingdom?

Not in the future, but now. Add something. If we do not live in the kingdom now, when the kingdom of God shall be publicly manifested upon this earth, you will not be in that kingdom. You will not reign with Christ for a thousand years.

Reign with Christ for a thousand years. It depends upon today, whether we are living in that kingdom. Not positionally, positionally you are there, but conditionally. Are we living in the kingdom now?

And that is the only guarantee for the future. Whether you will be reigning with Christ for a thousand years or not. So you see how important it is. You know, we are only thinking, well, if I got saved, that is all that needs to be.

If I can go to heaven. The gift of God knows no repentance. And if you believe in the Lord Jesus, He has given you eternal life, and eternal life is eternal life. And you will go to heaven, no doubt about that.

But brothers and sisters, what about the kingdom? Before eternity, and this age, in the Bible we find there is the age to come. And the age to come is the millennium kingdom, a thousand years, when the kingdom of the heavens is publicly manifested upon this earth.

The heavens rule over this earth, in a public way. Eternity, by believing in the Lord Jesus, you are given that privilege. It is the gift of God. But to be in that kingdom, to come, to reign and rule.

Remember, it is to reign and to rule. And that is not just something given to everybody, but only to those who live in the kingdom today. And that brings us to Matthew, chapter 5, chapter 6, and chapter 7, the so-called Sermon on the Mount.

Discipleship and the Sermon on the Mount

Now you remember, the Sermon on the Mount was spoken to the crowds. The Lord Jesus saw the crowds coming to him. He ascended to the mount, and his disciples came to him. And he opened his mouth, and taught them.

So in other words, you find the Sermon on the Mount is not for the crowds. The Sermon on the Mount is for his disciples. Now who are the disciples of our Lord Jesus? In a sense, all believers are disciples.

That's what it should be. But, so far as our experience goes, you find that many are believers, but few are disciples. To be a believer, all you need to do is to believe him. That's all you need to do.

But to be a disciple, you have to answer his call. You have to leave all and follow him. You have to put yourself under his authority. You have to be a learner to learn of him. You have to let him discipline you, train you, put you through lessons, many lessons to learn.

You have to be absolutely obedient to him and follow him. Wherever he goes, you go. Now that's a disciple. So you find many are believers, but few are disciples. If you read the Gospels, you find that to call disciples was walking by the Sea of Tiberias, Galilee, and he saw Peter and Andrew, and he called them, come and follow me.

And they left all and followed him. And then a little ahead, he saw the Sons of Zebedee, and he called them, and they left all and followed him. You find every time one responds to the call of discipleship is to leave all and follow him.

Now, today is not in a physical way, but in a spiritual way. You have to leave all and follow him. By that it means you have to give yourself over to him. That's the only way he can teach you. The Lord will not teach a half-hearted person.

He will only teach those who surrender themselves completely to him. The Lord Jesus is showing the disciples what the kingdom is. In other words, the Lord is telling them, you belong to another kingdom.

And you better understand the nature of that kingdom. And you better know the secret of living in that kingdom. And you better know how to live in that kingdom now. Now that is the Sermon on the Mount.

The Sermon on the Mount is spiritual, but most practical. But it is only for the disciples. That is the qualification. He is not a disciple to people, to man. You know, we talk about discipleship, and unfortunately you find that somehow we were being distracted and try to disciple people unto man.

Disciple to Christ, not to man. You know, people can be used by God to help in the discipling, but don't forget that you are not discipling them to yourself, but you are discipling them to Christ. As God's disciple, it is important to know where you are.

You are in the kingdom of God's Son, under His authority. And you better know what is the nature of that kingdom. You need to learn the secret of living in that kingdom. You are all familiar with the Beatitudes.

I am not going to enter in details. You find the Lord begins with the Beatitude, or happy, or the poor in spirit. For theirs is the kingdom. Trying to show us what the kingdom is. The kingdom of God is not in eating and drinking.

It is an inward character, qualification, quality. And in the Beatitude, actually what the Lord is trying to show us is that is His character. And He characterizes the kingdom. What is His kingdom? The kingdom is where His character is built in and expressed.

That is His kingdom. Poor in spirit. Now, who is the poor in spirit? The one who is poor in spirit? Not poor spirit, but poor in spirit. We have a lot of people poor in spirit. Have you ever found anybody that is poor in spirit?

In a natural way, we are all proud people. Nothing to be proud of. That is our nature. That is the very nature of sin. In the beginning, the archangel, through pride, turned himself into the adversary of God.

He became the originator of sin. And brothers and sisters, you find that in the natural, we are all proud of ourselves. It is only for those who are poor in spirit. Because that is what the kingdom character is.

Do we have this kingdom character? Person upon this earth who is qualified for this. And that is our Lord Himself. Equal with God. And there was not something to be blessed. He had every reason to be proud.

Rich in spirit. He emptied himself. He emptied himself of all his dignities. All his glory of honor. Of course, he couldn't empty himself of his deity. He couldn't do that. But aside from that, he emptied himself of all the honor and glory that was due to him.

Worship. Praises. And he came down to take the form of a bond slave. Poor in spirit. Poor in spirit doesn't mean that there is nothing in you. It means that he is so rich that he is able to empty himself.

You know, we have almost nothing to empty with. But he has so much himself. And took up the form. The form there actually is the same word as he had the form of God. He took up the form. The image. The inner character of a bond slave.

Having no right whatsoever. And he took upon himself the fashion of a man. Likeness of a man. And become obedient even unto death. And that the death of the cross. That is poor in spirit. That is the kingdom.

And the Lord said, blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of the heavens. Now how can it be with us? Now even though we are saved. But brothers and sisters, flesh is still very much alive.

We are still very proud of ourselves. If we are not proud of earthly achievement, probably we are proud of our so-called spiritual achievement. Look at our brothers and sisters and to esteem others and more excellent than ourselves, that will be hypocrisy.

Because you feel you are all more excellent. This is humanly impossible. You know, brothers and sisters, one thing we have to understand. To live in the kingdom, it is impossible with man. As long as you think it is possible for you to live in the kingdom today, you are not living in that kingdom.

You have to be brought to a point to see that it is beyond you. With man it is impossible. But thank God, with God, all things are possible. That is the only way to live in the kingdom. Now, the cross has to work in our lives.

We have to be put to death. We have to deny ourselves. Take up the cross and follow the Lord. And it is only through the working of the cross by the power of the Holy Spirit that we come to an end of ourselves.

And we begin to realize what a life that has been given to us. Brothers and sisters, we do not appreciate the eternal life he gives us. We think of eternal life reserved for eternity and not for today.

So, that is the reason why you find that we are still living by our own strength, by our own good intention. Formerly, we used ourselves to serve sin. Now, we use ourselves to serve God. We can be poor in spirit.

Try it. You think you are poor in spirit, the prouder you are. Humility is not natural. Remember when I was young, a young believer? Among us young people, you know, we feel that we are Christians. We need to be humble.

And the only thing we can do is to try to walk and with our eyes looking on the earth, ground, you know, and back hunched. That's all we can do. But the more we are doing that, the more we feel, well, how spiritual we become in the life that God has planted in you when you believe in the Lord Jesus.

The very life that lived for thirty some years, two thousand years ago, is the only life that can live in the kingdom, no one else. Now, thank God we have that life. But the problem is, are we living by that life?

Or are we still living by the old life? In order not to live by the old life, well, in a sense, you know, the old life we have lived for a number of years, we know its ways, we are accustomed to it, we have habit, becomes habit, you know.

When it becomes a habit, you don't need to think about it, it just happens. We are used to it. And unconsciously, we are doing the same thing, we are thinking the same way, we are saying the same thing, and we are the same.

And that's the reason why you find we have to be discipled to Christ. You find that the Holy Spirit has to so work in us and applying the cross into our lives until we come to the end of ourselves and say, Lord, it is just impossible for me to live in your kingdom.

It is beyond me. You give up. And then you begin to appreciate the life, because you discover that the life is there. All you need to do is to live by that life. And until it becomes a habit to you, and when it becomes a habit to you, a character, a new character is formed.

You know, today we are forming a new character all the time. You allow the life of Christ live today, something is built in. And you let the life of Christ live again tomorrow, something more is built in.

And as you go on with the Lord, you find gradually the very character of Christ begin to develop, to be developed in you. When a character is developed, you become that person, blessed of the poor. Not just poor in spirit once in a while, but the poor in spirit becomes a character.

You become a person. You are living of God. So we often said, we often quote the Bible and say, now you are the light of the world. You are the thought of the world, you are light of the earth. But you know, if you read within context, you find that we are not really light and thought, until we are really disciple to Christ.

We really learn of Him. And let His character build in in us. And then you have that salty taste. And you have the light that shines. Now from verse 17 on to the end of the chapter, the Lord mentioned another thing.

Righteousness Beyond the Scribes and Pharisees

And that is, unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you cannot enter into the kingdom of the heavens. Now there is a righteousness that is called the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees.

Now today we look upon, look down upon the scribes and Pharisees before, because they are hypocrites. They have a righteousness according to the law. They have a righteousness according to the traditions of the fathers.

You find that they have a righteousness that is in the letters. In a sense they are moral, they are ethical, they are legal. That's their righteousness. But the Lord said unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees, you cannot enter into the kingdom of the heavens.

Now what is the righteousness that exceeds? Well you find the Lord began to use lots of illustrations. The righteousness of the Pharisees is they keep the law, thou shalt not murder. And they don't murder, they don't kill.

But the righteousness that excels and exceeds is when you get angry with your brother without a cause. The righteousness of the Pharisees is do not commit adultery. And they don't. If you look at a woman and you have the desire after her, you have already committed adultery.

The righteousness of the Pharisees is do not swear. I mean do not swear. If you swear, you know, but keep it. But the Lord said don't swear. If you say yes, yes, no, no. The righteousness of the Pharisees is love your neighbors but hate your enemies.

Love your neighbors is God's command but hate your neighbors is from the rabbis. But that's their righteousness. But the Lord said if somebody strike your right cheek, turn the other cheek. That's the righteousness that excels.

Now who can do it? Impossible. Because the requirement is that you may be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. Live in the kingdom, not by law but by grace. By law it is impossible. By law the best you can do is to get to the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees.

That's the best you can do. As a matter of fact, many people fail. But to excel in righteousness that inward righteousness that right with the Lord from the heart, it is only by the grace of God. It is not law.

The sun on the mountain is grace. Life has been given and the grace of God is sufficient. But you do not realize that grace until you are brought to the end of yourselves. We are like the apostle Paul.

You remember in 2nd Corinthians chapter 12. He had a thorn in his flesh that weakened. And he felt for the glory of God that thorn should be removed. Because what would the people think, thought if he was preaching the resurrection, the life of Christ and there he had that thorn upon his flesh that weakened him.

There was no testimony. So he felt he had to appear strong before the people. And he wanted for the Lord's sake, not for his own sake. And he wanted that to be removed. But the Lord said, my grace is sufficient for you.

My power is manifested in your weakness. And Paul said, I boast in my weakness that his power may be perfect. This is grace. We will not appreciate grace. We do not know how to use grace until we come to an end.

And then we realize that only grace can get us through. We just cannot. By the grace of God and not by our own wisdom. Here you find one thing. And that is to live in the kingdom now. The secret is to live.

So in other words, we want to live in that kingdom? Here is the secret. It's an open secret. But the problem is to be not I is not easy. See, the I is so great, so big. We have to see that that I was crucified.

To stand on that of co-crucifixion. And it is only when we stand on that.

Ground, we.

Allow Christ lives.

In us. And as you do that,.

You discover you are living in the kingdom. Heavenly Father, we want to thank Thee. Because in Thy salvation Thou has actually delivered us out of the power of darkness. And has translated us into the kingdom of the Son of Thy love.

We thank Thee that we are in the Son of Thy love. But we do acknowledge that more often we are not living in that kingdom. Lord, we do pray that we may be a people who really give ourselves to Thee. To be disciples of Thee, to be learners of Thee.

We do pray that Thy Holy Spirit, we're daily working our lives, that we may come to the point to see that it is no longer I. It is Christ who lives in us. And Lord, we.

Want to live in Thy kingdom today. We ask in Thy precious name.