The mysteries of the kingdom of heaven have been revealed to man. It began to happen when Jesus spoke in parables and then explained the meaning of those parables to His disciples (Matthew, chapter 13).
Jesus was speaking to the crowd in parables and
Matthew wrote, “All these things Jesus spoke to the crowds in
parables, and He did not speak to them without a parable.” (Verse 34) A
little later we can see Jesus explaining the meaning of His parables privately
to His disciples.
Mark writes about how Jesus only spoke
to the crowd in parables and he says that, "He did not speak
to them without a parable; but He was explaining everything privately to His
own disciples" (Mark
Referring to the crowds,
the disciples asked Jesus why He spoke to them in parables (Matthew
He was quoting from Isaiah as He spoke
of the Jews who were refusing to believe the gospel message of the kingdom of
heaven but the message is to us today. The crowds will only hear in
parables because, their hearts have become dull, their ears can scarcely hear
and they have closed their eyes. They
refuse to come near to hear Jesus as He explains His parables to His disciples
and, as a result, the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven are not being revealed
to them.
Man lost eternal life when Adam sinned
but God's plan would provide a way to bring man back to God and into the
kingdom of heaven. How He would do that would not be revealed until Jesus
came to earth. The mysteries of the kingdom of heaven had been hidden
from the foundation of the world until Jesus would begin to reveal them when He
spoke in parables.
The good news of the kingdom of heaven
is the revelation of the plan of salvation to man. Jesus is telling
us how God is doing that in His parables. We must hear Him when He explains His
parables to His disciples if we wish to understand the mysteries of the kingdom
of heaven.
Jesus promised His disciples that,
after His departure, the Holy Spirit would come to them and guide them into all
truth (John
Everything that we
need has been written in scripture. As Peter writes, “- -His divine power has
granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true
knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.” (2 Peter 1:3)
After Matthew recorded how Jesus spoke
to the crowds in parables to fulfill what Isaiah had prophesied, he referred to
another prophecy that was being fulfilled. He was fulfilling something
that the Psalmist had foretold, saying, “This was to fulfill
what was spoken through the prophet: "I WILL OPEN MY MOUTH IN PARABLES; I
WILL UTTER THINGS HIDDEN SINCE THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD." (Matthew 13:35)
Matthew was referring to Psalms, chapter 78. The Psalmist began that chapter by saying, "Listen, O my people, to my instruction; Incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings of old, Which we have heard and known, And our fathers have told us". The Psalmist then repeated what their fathers had told them and it was the old Hebrew salvation story.
Christ is speaking to us through the Psalmist.
Christ was the Word of God that became
flesh and He is the creator. The Father spoke through Him and He did all
of His creation work through Him. When the Spirit spoke through the
prophets, the Spirit of Christ who would later become Jesus Christ on earth was
actually speaking through them to foretell what was to come.
Peter spoke of our salvation and how the
prophets spoke of the grace to come. They were “seeking to know what
person or time the Spirit of Christ within them was indicating as He predicted
the sufferings of Christ and the glories to follow.” (1 Peter 1:11)
When the Psalmist said, “I will open my
mouth in a parable”, Christ was the one speaking.
The Spirit of Christ is speaking through the Psalmist and He began by saying
that He would open His mouth in a parable and speak dark saying of old, things
their fathers had told them.
That was prophecy of how He would later
come speaking in parables but He also said that He would open His mouth in a
parable and speak dark sayings of old which the fathers had told them.
When we listen to the Spirit of Christ retell what their fathers told them, we
hear Him retell that old Hebrew story of how God saved His people out of slavery
and brought them through the wilderness to lead them to their land.
He says that story must be told to the generation to come. He was speaking to us, the spiritual generation to come. He is telling us the earthly salvation story of that Hebrew nation that the fathers had retold to them and He says that He is speaking it in a parable.
How could that be true? We know that old story is not
fiction. It really happened. How
could that old Hebrew story be a parable?
It can't be a parable as we think of parables
because our definition of a parable says the earthly story is a fictional story
and that old Hebrew story is a true story. Our definition of a parable
says the story is fiction but is God required to use our definition? Can
God not also cause a true story to come about as an earthly copy of the
spiritual?
Did He cause that story to happen as it
did as a true story copy for our instruction? Was He working in the lives
of Abraham’s earthly descendants to bring about the old covenant story of how they
were saved out of slavery in Egypt to be brought to their land as an earthly
copy of how God’s spiritual people are being saved out of slavery to sin on this earth to be
brought to their spiritual land?
Regarding God’s spiritual people having been in slavery to sin, Jesus spoke to a crowd of Jews and told them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin.” (John 8:34) He told them that a slave does not remain in the Father’s house but the son does remain forever.
He told them, "So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.” If we are to be set free from slavery to sin we must hear Jesus as He tells us to follow Him out of slavery.
We heard John tell us about Christ being the Word and the Creator but Paul also tells us about His creation work. Paul tells us His creation work causes things to happen in people’s lives.
He tells us
that Christ is the image of the invisible God and He is the Firstborn of all
creation, “For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on
earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or
authorities--all things have been created through Him and for Him.” (Colossians
1:16)
All things have been created through Him
and for Him and that work includes rulers, authorities and
kings. As Paul says in another place, "there is no
authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God." (Romans 13:1)
The Creator places all rulers and kings
into their positions of power as a part of His creation works. Every
ruler since Adam was selected by Christ and that includes the Pharaoh who ruled
over
It
sounds like the Creator may have made that earthly story happen like it did when He brought those
rulers into power and then caused them to make the choices that they
made. Did His creation work include causing that old Hebrew salvation
story to come about for our instruction?
Was He working to create that story when He placed Pharaoh into power and later hardened his heart to cause him to delay letting God’s people go free until God’s power had been displayed with great signs and wonders in the land of Egypt?
Christ is bringing
God’s spiritual
We can see how God was causing that old
story to happen as it did when we hear Paul quote Moses and say, “For the
Scripture says to Pharaoh, "FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED
YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED
THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH." (Romans
9:17).
If the scripture said those words to
Pharaoh, then it was Christ speaking to Pharaoh because He was the Word.
Christ is the creator who put Pharaoh into his position and
then He directed his actions to make that old story happen as it did.
Paul said that
Christ did it to show His power and that His name might be proclaimed
throughout the earth. Did Christ make that
earthly story happen to foretell how the gospel’s power to save would
later be proclaimed throughout the world in the name of Jesus Christ in our new
covenant salvation story?
His gospel message is of His power to
save and it is to be proclaimed in His name through all the earth. It is the gospel
that Paul preached and he said that he was not ashamed of that gospel because,
"it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew
first and also to the Greek" (Romans
When He caused
Pharaoh’s heart to be hardened so that His signs and wonders would be
displayed, was He foretelling how He would come proclaiming the gospel message
of salvation in His name and show His power in signs and wonders as He went
about preaching the gospel?
We can see how His name would be declared throughout
the whole earth when Jesus told the apostles that, “repentance for forgiveness
of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem." (Luke 24:46-47)
We are to preach the gospel of salvation that includes repentance for forgiveness of sins and we are to proclaim it in His name to all nations.
Each person must make their own choice. Peter says that God is “not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9)
The Lord also spoke through Ezekiel to say, “As I live!' declares
the Lord GOD, `I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that
the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil
ways! Why then will you die, O house of
If the scriptures say that God does not wish for any to perish but that all should repent, then we make that choice for ourselves. If God was the one making the choice for us and if He means what He said (He always means what He says), and He does not wish that anyone would perish but that all would come to repentance, then the Potter (Jesus is the Potter and we are the clay) would cause everyone to repent so that no one would perish.
We know that is not the case. He allows
us to make the choice and His wish is that we will make the right choice. Whatever choice we make, however, He will have foreseen us
make it.
When we read how Christ raised Pharaoh
up to become an evil ruler who would be destroyed when that old Hebrew
salvation story took place we can now understand that Pharaoh had chosen his
own destiny. God foresaw Pharaoh as one
who would choose not to love Him and obey Him and He chose Pharaoh to become a
vessel meant for destruction.
Just as He created earthly stories to
teach spiritual truths about the kingdom of heaven when He walked on earth,
Christ did the same thing when He brought Pharaoh up and hardened his heart
to bring about that old earthly story as a copy for our instruction.
He created fictional stories when He spoke while in the flesh to teach the same
message that He spoke through that old Hebrew true story.
Paul referred back to that old story and he
tells us,
“For I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that our fathers were
all under the cloud and all passed through the sea; and all were baptized into
Moses in the cloud and in the sea; and all ate the same spiritual food; and all
drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock
which followed them; and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most
of them God was not well-pleased; for they were laid low in the wilderness.”
(1 Corinthians 10:1-5)
A few verses later Paul tells us, “Now these things
happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon
whom the ends of the ages have come. Therefore let him who thinks he
stands take heed that he does not fall.”
Are we listening to Jesus? The Spirit of
Christ is speaking through Paul. Paul does not say that the things that
happened to them just happen to work out the way they did. If those
things happened as an example, did not God cause that story to happen and did
He not have it written for our instruction?
Let’s look in more detail at that old
story and see how it may be a copy of our story.
After the last plague (The death of the firstborn of
God told Moses that Pharaoh would see
them wandering aimlessly and God would harden his heart, again, and he would
chase after them (Exodus 14:3-4). Pharaoh and his army chased after
God’s people were trapped between the
Egyptians and the
Moses stretched out his hand and the
sea parted and he led God’s people through the sea. When the Egyptian
army pursued after them, Moses stretched out his hand over the sea from the
other side and the waters returned to their place. The entire Egyptian
army was drowned in the sea.
God caused that event to happen when He
hardened Pharaoh’s heart one last time. Pharaoh had already let God’s
people go after the sign of the death of the firstborn but God hardened his
heart again and caused him to change his mind and gather his army and go after
the Israelites.
Why would God harden Pharaoh’s heart and cause that event to happen when His people have already been told they could go free? God made it happen for a reason. Was it just to punish the Egyptians?
All of the Egyptian’s firstborn had already died
during that last Passover night. Much or most of their livestock had died
and their crops had been destroyed.
God made Pharaoh chase after
When He hardened Pharaoh’s heart He
brought about an earthly copy of what was to come when the new covenant gospel
would be preached. When God’s people went
through the sea, their Egyptian slave masters tried to overtake them to bring
them back into slavery but they were washed away in the sea. Not one of them
remained (Exodus
Can we see that happen when we read about how Paul was saved from slavery to sin? When an unbelieving Paul saw Jesus and became a believer, he was told to, “get up and enter the city, and it will be told you what you must do." (Acts 9:6)
Later, he was told, “Now why do you
delay? Get up and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.” (Acts
Our sins are to be washed away but they are not our slave masters. At first glance, it appears that our sins are our slave masters but the scriptures are really saying something else.
Paul tells us what
happens when we come through the waters of baptism in Romans, chapter 6. He says that all of
those who have been baptized into Christ have been baptized into His death and “if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His
death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection,
knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that
we would no longer be slaves to sin” (Romans 6:5-6).
Our slave master is our worldly body of
sin. If our slave master has been put to death in the sea we will have
been set free from slavery. We must
believe and obey the gospel message and repent of having lived for that body of
sin and follow Jesus through the sea of baptism so that our body of sin can be
washed away.
If
we have truly repented of having lived a
life of sin for that old slave master and become united with Him in the
likeness of His death, "certainly" we will be in the likeness of His
resurrection.
Our old body of sin will have been
washed away when we follow Jesus through those waters, just as Israel’s slave
masters were left behind in that old sea. The new body that comes up out
of the sea will belong to Jesus and it will have become a part of His church
body on earth.
God’s Spirit dwells in Christ’s body and, therefore, it dwells in us if we have been baptized into Him. Only after the old slave master has been crucified with Christ and has been washed away in the sea can we be born, again, raised to walk in newness of life and filled with the Spirit of God. When we are raised up out of those waters we will have been born, again of water and Spirit.
Remember, Jesus told Nicodemus, "Truly, truly, I
say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the
If we believe His message and have repented of
the old life of sin and have washed that old body of sin away, our new body will
come up free from sin because Jesus has redeemed us with His blood. We
have been called to serve our new master, the one who paid the price for our
sins.
Christ spoke through Moses to tell them to go forward into the sea (Exodus 14:15). He tells us to, "Go into all the
world and preach the gospel to all creation. He who has believed and has
been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned.” (Mark
16:15-16) We are to tell them to go forward into the sea.
Peter showed his love for Jesus when he obeyed Him and
preached that gospel message on the Day of Pentecost. Many of those who heard
him believed his message and cried out and asked what should they do? Peter told them
to, "Repent,
and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of
your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” (Acts
Those who received his message and believed
were baptized and they were added to the church. They heard Jesus explain
His parable and they obeyed and were baptized for the remission of their
sins. They heard Him tell them to go forward into
the sea and they would be saved from slavery to sin.
If we are obedient to His command
just as Peter was obedient on the Day of Pentecost, we will tell the lost how
they are in slavery to sin but if they will only repent and follow Jesus
through the sea and have their slave masters washed away, Jesus will bring them
out of the land of slavery.
After Moses led them through the sea and the Egyptians were drowned in the sea, scripture records that when the Israelites saw what God had done and they saw the bodies of the Egyptians dead on the shore, they were believers.
Moses said that, “When
Just as they were a nation of saved believers
after their slave masters were washed away, we are also a nation of saved believers
after we have been brought through those waters of baptism and our slave
masters have been washed away. We will have been saved out of
slavery to be led to our Promised Land but we will not yet have
received that land.
Remember, that old story was written for our instruction. Those Israelites had believed the message and they followed Moses through the sea to freedom in the wilderness and they have the promise of a land of milk and honey but they had not yet received that land.
Most of
them will never receive that land. They must faithfully follow the LORD
through the wilderness to that land and be willing to fight for it. It
will not happen for most of them. Most of them will die in the wilderness
and never receive their land. Most will be afraid to fight for their
land. They will want to return to a life of slavery, instead.
Are many of God’s new covenant people
longing to return to a life of slavery to sin? Was Christ not telling us
that when He opened His mouth in a parable and spoke that old Hebrew story
through the Psalmist (Psalms, chapter 78)?
They were to tell that story to the
generation to come so they would not be like their fathers and be rebellious
toward God. We are the generation to come and Jesus is telling that story
to us. We need to study that old story because it was created for our
instruction.
Jesus continues to explain the meaning of that old Hebrew story when we hear Him speak through the Hebrew writer. The Hebrew writer spoke of that Israelite nation in the wilderness and how they refused to hear God’s voice and they hardened their hearts and provoked Him (Hebrews 3:8).
We heard Paul retell that old Hebrew salvation story and say how the things that happened to them happened as an example and they were written for our instruction. He spoke of those who were displeasing to God and how they were struck down in the wilderness. He said that we should watch out if think that we stand and take heed lest we fall (like they fell).
The Hebrew writer is telling us the same
thing in chapter 3. He tells us to,
“Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil,
unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God.”
The writer continues the comparison in
chapter 4 and he tells us not to harden our hearts like they did or we will not
be allowed to enter our rest. He says, “Therefore let us be
diligent to enter that rest, so that no one will fall, through following the
same example of disobedience.”
We must not only listen to His parable
story, we must have open hearts to hear Him explain its meaning to His
disciples. When we pass through the sea, our slave masters will have been
washed away but our journey will only have just begun. We will not
receive that land until we have finished our wilderness travels, having
faithfully followed Jesus.
Christ caused that old story to happen for our instruction. He is speaking to the church, the ones who have been saved from slavery to sin. Jesus is telling us that some may have unbelieving hearts that can fall away. He is telling us about that in their example of disobedience.
If we are
being warned, that means it can happen to us but we do have a choice. We
can just listen to that old earthly story and not hear Him as He explains its
meaning to His disciples or we can stay and listen to Him explain what it
means.
We may have been saved from slavery to sin but we must not be like those unfaithful ancient
ones. We must continue to fight the fight of faith until our wilderness
travels are over and we enter that land of rest. Only then can we cease
from fighting and rest from all of our labors.
In that old Hebrew story, of the men in God’s
army, only Joshua and Caleb continued in His word and only Joshua and Caleb
wanted to keep fighting for that land. Therefore, they were the only ones
of God's army who would be allowed to enter the Promised Land. God,
however, told them that their children would also enter.
In Deuteronomy, chapter 1, Moses recounts to the next generation what had happened when their fathers had refused to obey God and fight for that land. Forty years had passed and the rebels had all died in the wilderness.
Moses repeated God’s promise
of how none would enter except Joshua and Caleb but he adds, “Moreover, your little
ones who you said would become a prey, and your sons, who this day have no
knowledge of good or evil, shall enter there, and I will give it to them
and they shall possess it”.
Their little ones would enter that land
because they had no knowledge of good or evil. Only
those little ones who do not know good from evil and those faithful soldiers in
God’s army will enter into and take possession of that land.
The Psalmist said that story was a
parable. Paul said what happened to the people of that story happened as
an example and God had it written for our instruction. Christ is the one
speaking through Paul just as He spoke through the Psalmist. He tells us
that the old Hebrew story happened as an example for us. He says those
things happened as examples and they were written for our instruction.
Christ only speaks to the crowds in parables but He reveals the true meaning of that story to His disciples. His disciples will take the time to hear Him and they will believe Him.
We need to hear Jesus as He explains the meaning of His parables in the New Testament scriptures. Only then can we understand the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven.
As He speaks through Paul, He tells the church in Colossi how the mystery had been hidden in past generations but God has now made the mystery known to His saints, saying, “God willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27).
He wants us to come to a true knowledge of God’s mystery, “that is, Christ Himself” (Colossians 2:2). He says that all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden in Him.
If we have washed away our
old slave-master body in the sea, our new resurrected bodies will have become a
part of Christ’s body, the church. His Spirit dwells in that
body. The mystery is how Christ is in us and we have the hope of
glory. The Gentiles are now fellow heirs in Christ Jesus. We must
be in Christ and His Spirit must be in us if we are to live with Him in
glory.
Paul tells us more about God’s mystery when he
says that, "He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His
kind intention which He purposed in Him" (Ephesians 1:9). He says
that God is summing up of all things in Christ.
God is summing up all things in Christ by
bringing both Jew and Gentile to God in Him. The mystery is being
revealed and it is Christ Himself. We have all obtained our inheritance "In Him". He speaks of
the gospel news of salvation and he wanted us to understand the "riches
of the glory of His inheritance in the saints".
This mystery had been hidden in God, but Paul was preaching it to the Gentiles in the first century. He prays for them to understand the mystery of salvation that is in Christ Jesus.
He tells
them (And us) that, “-by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote
before in brief. By referring to this, when you read you can understand
my insight into the mystery of Christ” (Ephesians 3:3-4).
The mystery of the kingdom of heaven is the mystery of Christ. Paul tells us that the mystery of Christ "in other generations was not made known to the sons of men". It had not been made known to man in other generations but it was being revealed in their day.
He says, "to be specific, that the Gentiles are fellow heirs and
fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus
through the gospel” (Ephesians 3:6).
We are fellow partakers of the promise in
Christ Jesus through the gospel when we obey the gospel message given in the Great
Commission. Remember,
Jesus tells us to, go into all the world and preach the gospel to all
creation. Those who believe and are baptized will be saved and
those who do not believe will be condemned (Mark 16:15-16).
Paul tells us how obedience to that command saves us. He tells us that if anyone is in Christ he is a new creature and the old things have passed away and the new things have come to us (2 Corinthians 5:17).
He then tells us, "Now all these things are from
God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of
reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to
Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed
to us the word of reconciliation.”
Paul then tells us how we can only be reconciled
to God through Christ because He became sin on our behalf so that we could
become the righteousness of God in Him.
We can only be reconciled to God in Christ Jesus and we must be
baptized into Christ to become sons of God and heirs with Christ.
Paul tells us about that when he
says, "For you are all sons of God through faith
in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were
baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ" (Galatians
He says, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there
is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are
all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are
Abraham's descendants, heirs according to promise.”
The revelation of the mystery of the kingdom of
heaven is how God is reconciling the world to Himself through Christ. No
one can come to the Father except through Him (John 14:6). We
must believe Him when He tells us that we must obey the gospel and become
clothed with Him in baptism.
When we become clothed with Christ in baptism
we will have met God’s covenant requirement of circumcision of the flesh. Remember, God told Abraham that circumcision
of the flesh was an everlasting covenant requirement (Genesis
He gave Abraham’s earthly descendants that earthly circumcision requirement
as a sign and a copy of His true circumcision requirements. God’s true circumcision requirement is
spiritual circumcision of our earthly flesh through a circumcised heart.
We become born again sons of God in His image and have become Abraham’s descendants “with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ; having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.” (Colossians 2:11-12)
God told Abraham that circumcision was the sign of the covenant between
God and him (Genesis
Our new covenant is the only everlasting covenant. We must meet God’s everlasting covenant conditions of
circumcision of our body of flesh. It must be removed so that we can be raised with Christ and Paul tells us, “Therefore if you have
been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is,
seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not
on the things that are on earth.” (Colossians 3:1-2)
The mystery of the kingdom of heaven is the
mystery of Christ. It is the mystery of salvation that is
only found in Christ Jesus. Only those who have become one with the
Firstborn Son by having been born again as sons of God in Christ Jesus will be
revealed with Him in glory.
We have become born
again children of God by faith in Christ but we must continue to carry our
cross and follow Jesus (Wholeheartedly) through our spiritual wilderness if we
are to receive our land. We must be in Him and He must be in us for us
to become heirs to the kingdom of heaven but if we are not following Jesus and
seeking that land we will have become lost in the wilderness.
Jesus is telling us to not be like the fathers who provoked Him and were struck down in their wilderness. Jesus is telling us the story and we need to believe Jesus because it is those who believe in Jesus who, "shall not perish, but have eternal life".
What if one of those Israelite elders
had told his people that they could get to the other side without having to go
through the sea as Moses had commanded them to do? I doubt that the LORD
would have been pleased with any elder or leader who would tell his people that
they could go around the sea without having to go through it and still be
brought out of the land of slavery. God’s message through Moses was to, “Tell the sons of
We should listen to our teachers and preachers
but we must be careful to hear Jesus. We should listen to our
teachers but we must be sure to check out what they say with the
scriptures. We are truly saved by faith
in
Jesus and, therefore, we must believe that He means what He says. We need
to hear Jesus explain His parable to His disciples.
We must be careful what we tell others.
We must tell others what Jesus told us to tell them because those who teach
others will be judged more closely than others (James 3:1). We must not change His message because it was
a difficult task for Jesus to stretch out His hands on the cross to provide
that pathway for us to pass through the sea.
For those ancient ones who chose to
love and obey Him and follow Him fully, He caused good things to happen for
them. He will do the same for us if we will be diligent to enter that
rest. We can choose to love Jesus with obedience and follow Him through
the sea and through the wilderness or we can harden our hearts like they
did.
Understanding the mysteries of the
kingdom of heaven requires that we listen to and believe Jesus as He explains
the meaning of His parables to His disciples. That old story is a copy of our
story but everything necessary for salvation has been clearly revealed in the
New Testament scriptures. We sometimes, however, have trouble understanding
the word spoken so He created the same message in the earthly copy.
His disciples will
hear Jesus tell them that they must deny themselves and take up their
cross and follow Him. They must not look back. They
must not be like that old Hebrew nation and look back and long for the
flesh pots that they had n the land of slavery.
I am not from one of
the schools of theology. I am a retired engineer and have been a
Christian most of my life. It has only been within the last few years
that I have come to realize how God caused that old covenant story to happen as
an earthly copy of our spiritual story.
He wrote in parables in the Old
Testament scriptures what He would say in direct statements in the New
Testament scriptures. If we are confused with the direct statements of
the New Testament, we need to study the old parables.
We need to study them
anyway, so that we can know that, "JESUS IS LORD". We must
truly believe what our LORD Jesus is telling us and not be like those who only
heard in parables “so that WHILE SEEING,
THEY MAY SEE AND NOT PERCEIVE, AND WHILE HEARING, THEY MAY HEAR AND NOT
UNDERSTAND, OTHERWISE THEY MIGHT RETURN AND BE FORGIVEN”.
You will notice that I
have used the New American Standard translation for the copied scriptures in
this book. You may wish to also read the same scriptures from the translation
that you normally use.
Johnny Rogers
Revised
Image of
the cross is from FreeFoto.com
Link
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05-08-10&k=Cross+at+Sunset
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1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation
Used by permission." (www.Lockman.org )