Recognizing the King's Authority in Our Lives

I saw on television one time a story about a man who was a king who lived here in the United States and he had been king of a nation, I think it was in Africa, and there had been a coup and he had to leave the country and come here with some of his friends and family who were very faithful to him. The story was an interview by the television reporter of his life and they went into this house where it was a very modest house that he lived in and he visited with the reporter about his life and all the things he had been through. His servant there had been with him wherever he was before and had come with him after this coup took place. He waited on him, he did everything for him. When he would come into his presence he always bowed. He had people from his country who had left the country because of the coup also and they gave him money to help him be able to pay his expenses. When they came to see him, as they came in, they would always bow their heads and they would treat him as if he was a royal king. They interviewed some of the people in the neighborhood and they said, you know the guy that lives in that house over there? And they said, well, I've seen him once in a while. He walks around as a very quiet fellow, ordinary in our community and nothing very special about him. Here is a man that some thought was a king and were willing to leave their home and country, willing to give their money to support him, treated him with the greatest respect whenever they even came into his presence and people right next door who thought it was just another guy. The Bible emphasizes the idea that God is trying to establish his kingdom in the world. The kingdom is really about the king. It's about the way you view the king. Is he a king with authority? Is he a king with power? Or is he just a king that has a name, king, in front of his? The difference between someone who is a part of the kingdom of God and someone who is not is the way they view the king. How is it that you see God? Is he just another creature out there in the universe? Is he just someone that people call God or king? Or do you see him as the ultimate owner of all the universe? Do you see him as the one who controls everything that takes place in the world? Do you see him as the one who has made the rules by which we must live to find life in all of its fullness? Or just another person that some people say is a king? The idea of God is really a focus on who he is, the status that he holds. If you believe he made everything and owns everything and he has plans for people who are part of his kingdom, then that's different than just saying, well, that's just another name in the Bible or something someone talks about. Who he is for you will determine all of your life in this world and all of your life for eternity. The king is someone you look at with special recognition. He has power. He has authority. He has the ability to do things that no one else can do for me. And can I really trust him? Stories in the scripture give us some insight into the way people saw God as the king of their life. In the Old Testament, God recognized his authority in the Garden of Eden directly. He came to Adam and Eve and he said, here's what I want you to do and here's what I don't want you to do. They had direct relationship with the king. After the sin that they committed, God drove them out of the garden where the kingdom was built and then he began to talk to his people in this earth through other people. He would call like Moses and say, Moses, here's what you tell the people to do and here's what you tell them not to do. With Joshua, he said, Joshua, you lead them to battle and you tell them how to fight and what not to do. And they had kings in Israel and David and other kings and he spoke to the kings and spoke to the prophets. All of this was the king directing to the people in the world exactly what he wanted them to do. And the world is divided between those who acknowledge the authority of God and those who don't. The times of the New Testament, the kingdom of God became quite different. God called a man, John the Baptist they called him because he was a baptizer, really the scriptures call him John the Baptizer. He was baptizing people, not like we talk about Christian baptism, but a different kind. But in John's life is a perfect picture of what it means to see God as the king and what it means to be a part of the kingdom. In those days, John the Baptist, I'm going to read from Matthew chapter 3 if you want to read along with me, it talks about John the Baptist and the role that he was playing in the kingdom of God. Chapter 3, verse 1, in those days John the Baptist came preaching in the desert of Judea and saying, repent for the kingdom of heaven is near. This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah, the voice of one calling in the desert, prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him. His clothes were made of camel's hair and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locust and wild honey. People went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of Jordan confessing their sins. They were baptized by him in the Jordan River. Now John the Baptizer was a son of a man who was a priest in the Jewish religion. The priests were given land on which they could live. They didn't have a plot like all the other people were given, but they were given land in the cities where they might have enough to have cattle on or a few cows on, but they depended primarily on the income from the temple. People went in and made an offering, they got a part of the offering. They paid their tithe, they got a part of the tithe. They were established and cared for and John's future with his father being a priest was to be in that role of the priest, a secure role. The priest didn't have to go to the temple every day. They had schedules where some of them went for these months and this month and that month until they rotated around and everyone got a chance to go in the temple to work. John had a secure life for him, but something happened to him. Somewhere along the line in his life, he heard the voice of God say to him, I don't want you to be a priest. Instead I have a different role for you in life. I want you to leave behind the security of your home, the security of your family, and I want you to do something that no one else is doing. I want you to go out and live in the desert, not in your family or your home, in the desert like a nomad. And there I want you to live in the most humble and economical way. And so he had clothes that were made from things he could find in the desert. Lived very simply. He ate the things that he could find out there in the wilderness, insects, honey. He had a message to begin to proclaim. Now if you're going to preach to a crowd of people, the first rule is find some people. He was asked to go into the wilderness. He was preaching there in the wilderness and God brought people in enormous quantities. The stories tell us that at times when John was preaching, all of the cities around the area would be vacated with people coming to hear him preach. He had such a powerful influence that the spiritual leaders from Jerusalem came out to hear him because his fame had spread so far. Here was John who had left the comfort and security of what he had to live this very frugal life in the wilderness. All because the king had said, John, I have a different purpose for your life. He left behind security. He left behind comfort. He left behind the convenience of life. All to live a very rugged existence. But it wasn't only that. He was preaching a message that most people want to ignore. The kingdom of God is at hand. What we've been waiting for for centuries is going to come. It's right here, close to you. I suppose you see once in a while on television or read in a paper someone who's predicted the end of the world. Do you generally laugh and say, yeah, I've heard that before? John was not preaching a message that would have caused people to say, this is really true. But because God had asked him to do it, people flocked to hear him. His message was not popular. That's why the religious leaders came to hear him. We want to hear this crackpot so we can tell all of the other people he's a crackpot and we've heard him. They were his enemies. When they came, he said to them, you must change your life. That's what the word repent means. You must stop and say, we're really not doing what God has told us to do. This was the religious leaders, preachers, deacons, leaders of the church, we'd say. You're not doing the things you should do. You should change your life. The kingdom of God is coming right to you. They thought he was really a maniac. John was so powerful in what he said that he said some bad things about the king who was committing adultery. He was put in jail and killed. Why would a guy go through all this? I don't think anybody aspires to that kind of life. Leave the comfort of your home and go out here in the wilderness and live off of bugs and live off this rugged life like that. Certainly no one wants to die because of things they've said or done. It's because John had such respect for the king, God. He loved God with all of his heart, soul, strength, and mind. So when the king came to him and said, I don't want you to have the life your fathers had. I have a different role for you. He said, okay, what do you want? Everything God told him to do, he did as best he knew how. He wasn't a man who didn't have any struggles. He thought for a while maybe Jesus really wasn't the one who was supposed to come. He had doubts and questions like all of us, but he never deviated from doing what he knew he should. Because he respected the king. He loved the king. He cared for the king. Sometimes you know we do things out of duty. Sometimes we do them because we have to. You've heard a noun story today, there's a Valentine's Day, it's February the 14th. All you guys say, oh yeah, I've got to buy her another present, get her something or others around. And if you do it just because you have to, there's a great difference between that and because you really care for her. God knows the difference between people who are doing what they're doing because they don't want to get in trouble with God. And because the difference between those and people who say, I love God with all my heart, soul, strength, and mind. And I do everything I know he wants me to do, regardless of the cost, regardless of the danger, regardless of the difficulty, because he is the king. God is an example of what God expects and wants from us. The king who wants us to recognize his power, his authority, and his position and place in the world. And he wants us to recognize that he has the right to ask us to do whatever he wants to ask. He wants us to trust him in such a way to believe that no matter what he asks us to do is really best. Even if it means living a rugged life, and even if it means giving your life, doing what God tells you. I saw someone interviewed on television. They were in Africa, I think, where Ebola was, nursing. The interviewer said, isn't this a dangerous thing that you're doing? The lady said, you know, the most dangerous place in the world is not being where God wants you to be. You're someone who recognizes the authority of the king. When Jesus came, he picked up the announcement of what John had been saying, and was telling them the message of the kingdom. When Jesus was speaking to the people, he was letting them know what God expected in his kingdom, and what he expected of them. Jesus' message was that the kingdom of God is at hand, in the same way John the Baptist was preaching the same message. The kingdom of God is near to you, right beside you, and right in your mind, and in your heart. Jesus, in chapter 4 of Matthew, verse 17, the scripture says, from that time on, Jesus began to preach, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near. Jesus' message was the very same message that John the Baptizer had. Repent. The word means recognize that you're not doing exactly what you ought to be doing according to the king's instructions. Apologize for your failure to be respectful to the king, and obedient to him, and say to him, I now want you to change my lifestyle, my thinking, my attitude, my direction. And I want to live a whole different kind of life. Jesus' message was the same as John's in this regard. What God wants for us is to look at him and say, I measure my life against you. I recognize that there are some parts of my life that don't fit what you're like, and what you say. I regret that. I don't want it in my life. I want to turn away from it. I want to turn toward you and obey you with love and passion. Change my life. Jesus' call was, repent. Get this attitude in you. For the kingdom of God is near you. The king is near you. He's ready in your mind, in your heart, around you. He's waiting for you to say, I honor you. I respect you. I want to serve you. I love you. I believe that your life and your reign is what I need in my life. This was Jesus' message. Now, here's the way that he lived out this message. Verse 18 of chapter 4. As Jesus was walking along beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, called Peter, and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. Come, follow me, Jesus said, and I will make you fishers of men. At once they left their nets and followed him. We're used to that, church people, aren't we, that story? Think about this. In the course of your everyday life, doing your job, if someone came along and said, I want you to quit your job here, I want you to walk away from the highway department, just go and tell your boss you're through, and I want you to come and do what I tell you you should do. You call your wife and say, God's asked me to do a special mission for him, and I'm not going to be home for a couple or three years. I'll come back and visit once in a while. Your income is gone, your job security is gone, your future is gone, you change your relationship with all of your family. One day, why? Because the king told me to do this. Here are people who believe so much in God that they were willing, with one single word, to change the whole course of their lives. They respected him, they loved him, they wanted to please him more than anything in the world, and they just turned and walked away. Going on from there, he saw two brothers, James the son of Zebedee and his brother John. They were in a boat with their father Zebedee, preparing their nets, or mending the nets, fixing them so they were ready to fish some more. Jesus called them, and immediately they left their boat and their father, and followed him. You're at work, the family business, a stranger comes by, says, get out of the boats and come with me. Now, they knew who he was, probably had been disciples of John the baptizer, but they just said to their dad, we're not going to stay here to take over the family business. God has asked us to do something else. How can you do that? You have to have such confidence that God is speaking to you that you know. You have to have such confidence that God's plan for your life is better than your own. You have to have such confidence that he's going to guide you with all the choices that you have to make, that he's going to provide for you and your family, that he's going to protect you from all the dangers that might come to you. You have to trust the king so powerfully that you are willing to do whatever he asks. This is what it means to be in the kingdom of God. Now when Jesus called these people, he didn't stop with that. Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the good news of the kingdom, verse 23, and healing every disease and sickness among the people. News about him spread all over Syria, and the people brought him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, and demon-possessed, and epileptics, and paralytics, and he healed them. What Jesus did to the people who said, I'm ready to leave because you've asked me. He didn't ask you to do this. He didn't say, okay, call this person, I'm going to do the same thing. No, you wait for your own. I'm going to do what you told me to do, and I'm trusting you. Okay, well let me tell you now, I've said, repent of what you've been doing, and come and enter the kingdom and live a different way, and I'm going to teach you what to do. So immediately, these guys who left were gathered around Jesus, and he was telling them what God demanded, what God asked of them, what their responsibilities would be, how their life should be shaped. Now the fact is that once God calls you into his kingdom, it is a lifelong experience of learning and growing. So the more you read the Bible, the more you hear sermons, or Sunday school lessons, or just reflect on God, the more he starts saying to you, here's what's wrong with you. Here's something in your life that needs to be changed. It doesn't matter how long you've been a follower of Christ. Every one of us are still imperfect, and God is constantly showing us the difference between our own attitudes and the attitude of God, our own values and the values of God. And he's saying to us, what you're doing is killing you. I want you to change. Acknowledge that you're doing it wrong, and I will show you what you should do right. And then the story of him healing all these people of powerful diseases that no one else could do. How did he do that? I think he wanted to show his disciples, when you do what I tell you, I have the power to make it work. So you look at what God's asked of you and say, phew, I don't know if I can leave my family and all these things, and he said, just look at what I did yesterday. They brought to me people who couldn't even walk. They brought to me people who were helplessly sick. And I spoke the word, and they were healed. Do you trust me to take care of you? You're healthy and whole. I can give you anything and everything you need. You can't follow Christ unless you believe that he can do that. Because he's going to ask you to get in situations where you're over your head. So you say, okay God, I'm over my head in this, I'll hold my hand up so you can see where I am. Come and get me. And you know he has the power to be able to reach out and take you out of the water and put you on solid ground. He has the ability, whenever you start to speak something, he wants you to speak to give you the very words to speak it. He has the ability, if you live in obedience to him, to provide the financial resources for you. He can provide protection for you from those who would criticize you or hurt you or even try to kill you. He has power. When you look at the king and you say, not only is he a great man and I love him with all my heart, soul, strength, and mind, but he can do anything in the world that needs to be done for me. Even when he comes to you and says, here's what I'd like you to do. You can say, okay God, whatever you say, I'm on board because I trust your judgment, I trust your wisdom, and I believe if I do what you tell me, everything in my life will work exactly as you want it to work. Here I am. The kingdom of God is comprised of people who love God more than anything in the world with all their heart, soul, strength, and mind. They look out at all the problems that face them, and then they look at their father, the king, and they say, those are nothing compared to the power of the king. And whenever he asks us to do something, whether it's to give our money away to him or whether it's to work for him or to serve him or to pray, whatever it is, we say, I know God has told me this, and I know that I can't make this work, but I believe my father in heaven can provide anything in the world that I need. So I'm going to start as if I can do it, and I'm going to watch as God gives me, through his power, what I need. That's the kingdom of God. Ordinary people who believe a God who is beyond ordinary, who respect him, who believe that he has wisdom and power, and they're ready to say, God, I give you my life, whatever you want, whenever you ask, I will obey. That is the kingdom of God. Now let me tell you, there will be people living next to you who will look at you and say, I don't know why you do such stupid things. You give all your time to serving God, you give your money to him, you do all these things for him. That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard of. But you know differently, because you've seen his hand at work, and you know that when you do what he tells you, life comes to you. They look at God as someone who's trying to control their life. You look at God as someone who's given you life. You know what it's like to give yourself away to God and find yourself. The rest of the world looks at what you see and what you do, puzzled, until they come to the place where they hear the king say to them, I would like to do for you what I've done for the people you know who are in my kingdom. Will you trust me? Now here's the deal. I want you to say to me, I give you my life. I haven't lived the way you want me to, I don't even care about you, but all of a sudden I've come to realize there's something here. So I'm going to say to you today, God, I give you my life. I'm afraid, I don't know what's out there, I'm not sure I can do this, but if all this stuff is true in the Bible, you have the power to make it happen. And so I'm going to just close my eyes and say yes to you. I will give you my life. You don't know what he's going to ask you to do, and you don't know how it's supposed to work, but that's what the church is for. We will teach you about God, we will tell you what he wants of you, we'll tell you how to get in touch with him, how to listen to him, how to follow his direction, we'll teach you what the Bible says about all those things just like Jesus did. He taught them about the kingdom of God, but there is no one in the world that can do the one thing you need to do, and that is to say, I trust you as the king, I respect your power and authority, and I'm willing to do this because I trust you and I love you. That has to come from inside you, this faith in God. Two thousand years ago Jesus came and said the kingdom of God is near you. It's close. It still is. It's in your mind, the thoughts that you have that God places there. Quit living the way you're living, it only causes you trouble, and start living as I tell you and you will find life. It's that close. What you have to do is decide whether you trust the king or you trust your fears. Would you bow your head please? So what about it? The kingdom of God is at hand. You have to do something about this. You either have to say yes to God, or you have to say I don't trust you. It can't be simpler than that, and no one can help you. You have to decide, and maybe you've made this decision to follow God, but your life is not nearly as exciting as it was when you first started. You've taken care of learning all the simple things to do, and you've got a lot of your life cleaned up, but then there are the harder things, like controlling your personality and changing the way you react to people around you, relationships. Some of the things that he asks you to do you don't like, and you know you're saved so you say, well, I don't like those. It's like saying to the king, you're not in charge of this part of my life. Do you have notes put on part of your life saying, God, don't touch this? God, I'm not going to give you this one. I can promise you if that's true, your Christian experience is pretty dull, and you feel the distance between you and God that wasn't there when you started, when saying nothing is off limits to you, repent, admit it to God, turn away from those things that you don't trust God with, and one by one begin to say, God, I'm scared to death, but I trust you about this one. I'll do what you tell me. And then you'll discover again the wonderful joy of seeing God at work in your life. Lord, you came saying the kingdom of God is near, and we see what happened to all the people that believed you. We're 2,000 years away from this. You're still saying to us the kingdom of God is near. I pray for those battling about this, that you would place in their heart a confidence that your word is true. They may not stumble at all the things that could go wrong and simply say, I trust you, I'm going to jump into your arms right now. Make each of us convinced that what you say to us are the words of life. I want to ask the pianist to play, and you may feel a need to make a promise to God today. Maybe to commit your life to Him, maybe to become part of the church, maybe to change some things in your life. This is between you and the king, I have nothing to do with this. But if God's made it clear to you that you ought to get up from your seat and make this promise, you come, Marlo will be here, I'll be here, we'll pray with you. This is God's time. Jesus said it, John said it, the kingdom of God is near you, one decision away. Would you stand, please, for a moment of prayer. If you've been wrestling with God this morning about some part of your life that He's laid claim to as a king, and you think, whew, this is over, now I can go about my life, just remember, John and his friends were out fishing, doing their work, so you may be at work tomorrow and hear the voice of God as clear and plain as you have today, I want your life. God is talking to you, He doesn't quit when this is over. If you want to talk, you can call me, I'd be glad to talk with you about how to do what God wants, and to find peace in life. So Father, we give thanks that you are our king, you know everything, you have all power and authority, you even know what's best for us when we don't, you even know how stupid our decisions are when we think they're smart. Give us the wisdom to listen to you, and obey you, our king, amen. Shine, Jesus, shine, fill this land with the Father's glory, place, spirit, place, set our hearts on fire, flow, river, flow. Flood the nations with grace and mercy, send forth your love, let there be light.