KINGDOM COME

When I first began working on a shrimp trawler I was convinced that the captain should be on the stern of the boat helping me with the work I was doing rather than sitting in the wheelhouse, enjoying the captain’s chair,

watching the fathometer and talking on the radio. Only when I was given the wheel and the chair did I realize that no captain would catch shrimp if he stayed on deck doing the deckhand’s job.  Only in Kingdom order will the local church bring any “shrimp” to the dock.

There was a choir director and a choir. The harmony among them was so beautiful until that moment when the bass singer decided he wanted to be a tenor and the tenor decided he wanted to direct. The same happened to the orchestra that made the most beautiful music together until the trombone player decided he wanted to play the tuba part.  Since the director of the choir didn't sing well and the conductor of the orchestra could play neither the trombone nor the tuba, the correction of either had no effect.  This is the local church attempting New Testament function outside of Kingdom order.

You’re standing in the middle of the highway and an eighteen-wheeler is just about to run over you. Your head tells your legs to run. Your legs tell your head how self-centered, selfish and self-serving it is and how self-preserving are the orders it gives. So it goes with “doing church” outside of the government of the Kingdom.

So, show me Kingdom order!  “Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21).  Go look in the mirror.  Consider how your physical body is one singular organism made of many different parts, each with a different function, but yet all functioning together as one under the directive of the head (1 Cor 12).  This analogy of our physical body clearly defines Kingdom order, the government of the Kingdom of God. This is the government of God working in the human microcosm of His Kingdom, which government, which order, He desires for all His earthly creation, beginning in the family, then the local church, then the church universal, then all nations of the earth (Matt 24:14).  Your physical body’s order is typical of the Kingdom of Heaven that many now desire to come in earth:  “Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven (Matt 6:10).”  This is the governmental order that the nations will flow unto in the last days (Isa 2:1-3).  This is the ever-increasing governmental order that the “Child born” and the “Son given” established in the earth two thousand years ago (Isa 9:6-7).  This is the Kingdom order by which all governments and nations shall be enveloped in the end of this age (Rev 11:15).  But listen, oh child of God, this Kingdom can be yours now to the level you wish to biblically by faith apply it. Be born again and you’ll see the Kingdom.  Be born of the water and of the spirit and you will enter it.  Teach the Kingdom to your household and your home will become the Kingdom.  Carry your Kingdom family order to your local church and, if other families do the same, the church will become the Kingdom.  Carry the Kingdom church to the world and, as it receives you, the world will become the Kingdom of God.

Great!!  We can do this!  But, remember, the kingdom of God is first within you. See the way that your body is ordered and seek to establish that order and operational harmony in every institution of your life, beginning with your personal lifestyle, then your home and your local church, then on to the uttermost part of the earth.  Remember now, if you don’t do your assigned part, it will never happen.  It all begins with you.