(274) “What Is the Kingdom to You?”

0:00 To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among you, among you Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Exactly. He's the king and he gets to live inside of us. So the kingdom of God is within you. Right. And that's a mystery. God promises in Joel 2 .28 to pour out His Spirit on all humanity. Welcome to Global Outpouring, where we contend for that promised outpouring, we equip for that outpouring, so that we may engage in that very outpouring. I'm Philip Buss.

0:43 And I'm Sharon Buss. Welcome to the podcast today. On my devotion time, my quiet time this morning, this is the thought that kind of rolled into my head that I want to share with you is, what is the kingdom of God to you? Thank you so much for joining us today. We're just absolutely delighted that you tune into this episode of the Global Outpouring podcast. And we want to encourage you, if you haven't already done so, to go to our website, to subscribe to our emails. And we want to encourage you to give us some feedback. We'd love to hear from you wherever you're listening from. It's just really encouraging to us to hear from you. And if you've got something that you'd like for us to share on a podcast, a subject that you'd like for us to deal with, or questions you have for us to answer, we'll take it to the Holy Spirit and see what he gives us. So you can give us some feedback on our... globaloutpouring .net page. There's a feedback form there, or you can write us an email at feedback at globaloutpouring .org. Well, in my morning devotion time, I was just reading in Matthew about the kingdom of God. You know, that's what kind of was kind of ruling in me, the kingdom of God and the Lord's prayer. You know, that's found in Matthew chapter 6. Well, in verse 7 it says, When ye pray, use not vain repetition as the heathen do, and he's referring to scribes and Pharisees, for they

2:16 think that they shall be heard further much speaking. Be not ye therefore like unto them, for your Father knows what things ye have need of before ye ask him. And after this manner wherefore pray ye, Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed or holy be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. We're not going to read the rest of it. I want to concentrate on this. But how many churches all over the world will start with the Lord's Prayer, will do the doxology. Or have it someplace in the service. Or have it somewhere in the service. But how many know what it really means? It has become a vain repetition for a lot of people. Yeah, it really is. Because it's empty if you don't think about it. It's empty if it doesn't have meaning to you. So I was kind of contemplating on that. And, you know, when I read that and, you know, thy kingdom come, you know, there's a lot of verses. And I used to have in the, I had in the back of my Bible, I took it out of the Strong's Concordance and I copied it. on a copier of kingdom. And you'd be amazed how many scriptures are there relating to the kingdom of God. I mean, it's got many avenues, facets, like a diamond. It can go a lot of different directions. But what does it mean personally to the, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So what is his will,

3:46 thy will, I mean, Jesus' will. Or the Father. The Father's will be done that we can know what it is and not do what we want to do. Because most times we really want to do what we want to do. Yeah. Because that's our fleshly part of us, the flesh flash stuff we deal with. And I remember someone saying it's just like 90 % of your thinking is kind of what controls what's going on. And you need to get where 90 % of the Holy Spirit is listening to him. And then you got to, of course, that 90 % can help you outweigh that other 10%. Yes. But getting there. So I want to look in the book of Luke in chapter 17 out of the Passion Translation. This is kind of gives a very good understanding of this, that the kingdom, it comes not by observation. So let's look at Luke chapter 17. And it's verses 20 and 21. We were looking at the scripture in Matthew, so this is in Luke and this is in the TPT. Jesus was once asked by the Jewish religious leaders, when will God's kingdom realm come?

5:01 Jesus responded, God's kingdom realm does not come simply by obeying principles or by waiting for signs. The kingdom is not discovered in one place. Or another one, for God's kingdom realm is already expanding within some of you. Later, Jesus addressed this again with his apostles saying, the time is coming when a great passion will be awakened within you to see me again. Yes, you will long to see the beginning of the days of the Son of Man, but you won't be able to find me. You will hear reports from some who will say, look, he has returned. He is over here or he's over there. Don't believe it or run after them, for their claims will be false. Wow. The day of the Son of Man will burst forth with the brightness of a lightning strike that shines from one end of the sky to the other, illuminating the earth. Wow. That's quite a description. Yeah, it really is quite amazing. Because there are so many interpretations of Scripture out there right now. And there's some big ones. There's some good ones, too. It's really good. Kind of what we learned through our history. I mean, we've been serving the Lord, me, 44 years here.

6:13 And first, you know, Jesus was coming in 1988. That was a big one. You know, 88 reasons Jesus will come in 88. And I looked at a lot of them and they really look legit. You know, wow, this could happen. You know, and then in 1970s late, the prophetic word going around that Jesus is coming. And I thought, I want to live a little. And I backslid for some years. And I didn't know about actually 77 was a prophetic word going around because I was backslidden. And I might have, maybe I wouldn't have backslid so bad. But it's like the kingdom is within you. And so in our daily walk with the Lord, in our time of our devotion, we're building the kingdom.

6:58 Because the kingdom of God, it's just all around you. And like it says in the Passion, I like it, kingdom realm. And even our convention, you know, Pastor Tony or Bishop Tony, Apostle Tony was talking about realms, different realms, things that operate in levels. They operate in realms. And it's like we're taken from glory to glory or we're taken from realm to realm. Maybe that's another way. to look at it. It doesn't quite say it, but that's kind of the concept that can be on a personal note. We go from greater glory to greater glory, from one realm to another realm. So we look at everything going around. We look at the war going on right now with Israel and Iran, and that pops a lot of scriptures up all over. You know, everybody's got their idea. This is it, you know. This is it. This is Ezekiel.

7:53 This is Jeremiah. This is Psalm 83. And it really is in part, but it's not quite the end of the picture yet. There's things that still have to happen. There has to be a harvest first. We know, and we've talked about this before, like the presence of God coming down, that John Hinkle vision where the Holy Spirit came down and stood next to each person, and immediately they knew when their walk of God was. Things are going to happen before it's the end. But we're seeing preparations of things. Right. We know the Scripture talks the Antichrist who is going to walk and everybody's going to turn to him. Yeah, but that's after the one who restrains is no longer there.

8:36 Yeah. Personally, I think that's the church. The intercessors are restraining that Antichrist kingdom from coming. And I looked that up in the Strongs about the kingdom of God. You know, that it comes not by observation. Yeah. You know, what we observe, what we see. And it says that in such a manner, it can be watched with your eyes, you know. So it's kind of, we're looking with our eyeballs, you know, to see everything that's happening. We're watching, you know, and now we can really watch because we've got. instant news from around the world. True. I mean, we can watch China Uncensored, you know, and you get a great picture of what's going on in China and what's happening with Taiwan. Sure. You know, and it's just, I mean, all these different ones that are specified. Different things. And where does this fit in the kingdom of God? Right. How does this fit? So we're analyzing. We're putting all these things we're hearing on our own personal think tank. And we're trying to decipher how this is going to work. Or we listen to somebody else's think tank to see what they are saying.

9:47 Lots of opinions. But that doesn't mean you're going to see it with your eyes. Right. And that's our problem. to look with our physical eyes. And we tend to analyze with our worldly brains or, you know, maybe we've got enough scripture in there to analyze, but you have to have the Holy Spirit. You have to have the Holy Spirit. And when it comes to eschatology, I have an opinion. For what it's worth. We want to hear your opinion. You're going to anyway, right? So in John 14, Jesus is speaking to his disciples. You know, this is their last supper together. This is their last time to really fellowship together. And in verse 27, it says, Peace I leave with you.

10:37 My peace I leave with you. He's leaving, right? They don't understand that he's leaving, but he's trying to get it through to them that he's leaving. My peace I give to you, not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. You've heard me say to you, I'm going away and coming back to you. If you loved me, you would rejoice because I said I'm going to the Father, for my Father is greater than I. Here's verse 29. This is the key piece that gives me my position on eschatology. So eschatology, in case you don't know, is the study of the end times. Like, what's going to happen next? And there are lots of opinions out there about what is going to happen and in what sequence. And, you know, it's sort of like the...

11:22 Scribes and Pharisees didn't recognize Jesus when he came because he didn't fit their eschatology. True. Okay. So Jesus said, and now I have told you before it comes that when it does come to pass, you may believe. In other words, let it come to pass before you interpret it. Don't interpret what you think is going to happen. Don't speculate about what you think is going to happen. Is this that? Is that this? Is this that? It was. on the day of Pentecost, that Peter said, this is that that was spoken of by the prophet Joel. Yeah. Okay. And then he quotes the prophet Joel. So when you get to the point in the scheme of things that it lines up with scripture, that's when you say, this is that. Right now, there's a lot of people saying, well, this might be that.

12:17 And it might be. There are some of the things that do have to take place first. And the closer we walk with the Holy Spirit and the more, like Jesus said, if you loved me, you would rejoice. Yeah. When we love him, we can rejoice over the fulfillment of things. Yeah. Because when it boils right down to it, this idea of being a kingdom, having a kingdom, having the kingdom in you, having the kingdom operate in you, there's a kingdom because there's a king. If there wasn't a kingdom, there wouldn't be a king. So we know that our Father is the king of the universe, that Jesus is his embodiment on the earth, and he's the king. Jesus is the soon -coming, returning king. Yeah, so who's the king of your kingdom?

13:09 Exactly. What kingdom are you? Yeah, what's the kingdom to you? Who is the king to you? Are you the king of your own kingdom? A lot of people, a lot of us, you know, we kind of think that we can be in control. Yeah, because a lot of this, it's a mystery. Right. And in Colossians, you know, chapter 1, and this is out of the King James. This is Paul. Wherefore, I am made a minister according to the dispensation of God, which is given to me for you to fulfill the word of God. even the mystery which has been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest or known to the saints. Now you're talking 2 ,000 years ago now. Right. To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among you, among you Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Exactly.

14:04 He's the king and he gets to live inside of us. So the kingdom of God is within you. Right. And that's a mystery. Kingdom is a mystery because we're trying to figure out, you know, we don't know from once we're like the wind. We don't know where it's coming from or where it's going. Right. And that's the way it is a lot of time. You know, even listening with the Holy Spirit. It doesn't give us the full picture all the time. Right. Because we might take a wrong turn. Exactly. Trying to. He can't trust us with all the details. Yeah, it's like going through the mountains or something. You know, you can go through Nebraska. You can go through Illinois, Indiana, and all the flat roads. Okay, so now you want to go to Kalampong or you want to go to Darjeeling. Yeah, yeah. And you got these hairpins. I mean, continual.

14:53 Hairpins all the time. Hairpin turns. Hairpin turns that are just neck jerkers, you know. Yeah. You know, and if you have problems with motion, it's not fun, you know, because the road just curves and they're just carved out of the side of the mountain, you know. So, you know, God's path isn't always a straight line as we would like it. Yeah. Because that makes it predictable. Right. You can see down the highway a long way, you see what's coming. But when you're going around curves and that, you don't know really what's quite ahead. And like the expression we use, you know, I remember reading when you're taking your driver's ed class, you don't overdrive your headlights. I mean, you don't go faster than what you can stop from what your headlights will look at. Right. And so that's a good spiritual lesson too. Don't overdrive your headlights.

15:43 You know, if you can't see what's coming around that corner, it'll go so fast where you're going to miss something. Yeah. You're going to miss a sign or a roadmap or something like that. Right. You know, that reminds me of years ago, I was canoeing on a river, and there was one thing that I learned about around every turn, you can just be guaranteed that there's going to be another turn. You know, that's about all you can see ahead is you can see to the next turn, and when you get to the next turn, you're going to find there's another turn out there. Maybe you'll find some rapids. Yeah, that might be. But it's the same thing on these mountain roads. You go around a curve, and sure enough, there's another curve. That's kind of where we live, too. Yeah.

16:26 Wow, wow. So we read in Colossians, it was in 127, that Christ in you is the hope of glory. Absolutely. And so I want to turn to Ephesians. This is chapter one. You know, everybody's favorite book. I love it. And especially if you follow Kenneth Hagin, too. I mean, this is the scriptures in here. He left his Bible open to the pulpit, on the pulpit, Ephesians 1. And he would frequently, during the day, go to the pulpit and just read the first chapter of Ephesians, you know, about the mystery of his will. Yeah, I think verse 17, the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, give unto you the spirit of wisdom, revelation, and the knowledge of him. Amen. That was one of his favorite verses, and I really like that. But I want to look in verse 4. We'll do verse 3. Blessed is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places. According as he has chosen us in him before the foundation of the world. Beautiful. I mean, he chose us before we knew ourselves. Yeah. When you think about that, you think you really know yourself?

17:37 You really don't. We've forgotten a lot, I think. We forgot a lot. Yeah. Wow. So he's chosen us before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blame before him in love. That's what our destiny is. And so we have to walk it out through the curves and the rapids and everything else we've got to go through. And having predestined us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his will. Yes. You know, his will is a mystery, but it's for good pleasure. That's right. And for thy pleasure, what's that song we used to sing? And for thy pleasure we are created. Thou art worthy, O Lord. And sometimes we don't feel like we're walking in good pleasure.

18:22 We go through our trials. Trials are not good pleasure, but we can't see the end of the story. Why did God let this happen? What's he trying to work out in us? You need to read my book, Rich Wounds. Wouldn't you agree? Yeah, I think so. Very much so, yeah. So to the praise of the glory of his grace, he's made us accepted in the beloved. Hallelujah. And we just got to read verse 7 too. In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace, wherein he has abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure, which he hath purposed in himself. So we want to make Jesus smile. Yes.

19:14 We really want to make him smile. And doesn't it make you smile when someone smiles at you? Yeah. And I try to do that. I do too. And people notice that. They'll smile back usually unless they're having a rough day. And sometimes they need that smile. But it's the same thing when we are looking at the Lord, if we just smile at him. Yeah. You know, that thankful heart makes him respond. So we go on in verse 10, that in the dispensation of the fullness of times, he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth, even in him. I mean, let's talk about the kingdom of God coming together. It's kind of like we had a prayer time for our devotions on Tuesday morning. And Jean Little was bringing the word forth and just finished everything and the phone rings and it's Clarice Fluitt. Yeah. You know, was coming with the word of the Lord, you know, for Jean. And she says, you know, I'm in my pee patch over here. You're in your pee patch over there. Yeah. You know, and sometimes when this big kingdom of God, we just might feel like we're just like little nothing. You know, but God has a plan whether your ministry is out there. Or if you have a hidden ministry like Timothy Bentz.

20:36 Right. Or God will take you places where you couldn't go with a big ministry. Yeah. You couldn't go with a big name because you got the holy paparazzi following you, you know. Unholy maybe. Unholy paparazzi. Yeah, you got that too, you know. But if you stay hidden. But so he's gathering all things together. And in verse 11, and in who or in him we have obtained an inheritance. being predestined, what he wants us to do, according to the purpose of him who works everything after the counsel of his own will. Beautiful. Jesus' own will for us. And that's what the kingdom is to us personally. So what is the kingdom of God to you? What is he? Working out in your, you might be a loose cannon out there. Hopefully not. You know, you need to, you know, it's always good to have somebody over you that you can bounce things off. Someone in the Lord that has a lot of wisdom. Yes. Which may not be your brother or sister -in -law or something. It might be, you know, an apostle or a bishop that is really, you know, has revelation in that. And that's somebody you really like to be attached to. You know, people that are close to God that you need to surround yourself with. So that we should be to the praise of his glory who first trusted in Christ. Amen. So, you know, we're supposed to be a praise on the earth. Right. To his glory.

22:06 To his glory. And that's an everyday thing. Yeah. To the praise. There was a song, I remember Ramona Dix of the Olive Branch wrote. Years ago, and I love it, to the praise of his glory, I am created. Yes. Yeah, and I thought, and that's where this was taken from. I thought, oh, and I just love that song. You know, but even when we don't feel like praising sometimes, you know, but it's a command. And that's how we stay on top of it. Yeah, you overcome. It's an overcoming thing that we have to walk in all the time. Yes. And it really helps you. When you don't feel like praising and you do it out of obedience, you just start because he said praise. And he says, in everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. So when we do it because we know that it's the right thing to do, even if we don't feel like it, but if you start it. You don't have to feel like it to start it. You just start and the feeling comes as you start because when you begin to praise, when you begin to give thanks and you put your eyes on Jesus, then the things of earth grow strangely dim. All of the clouds begin to go away, the dark things that are giving you ideas that are not. productive, those begin to flee because you're putting yourself into the light of his glory and worshiping him in his

23:38 glory. He's the king, remember? He's the king. It's about the kingdom. So as we worship, it sets us free. Yeah, it's like that song. The tag of it is, even when I don't see it, you're working. Right. Even when I don't feel it, you're working. You never stop working. Right. You never stop working. Way maker. Yeah. You know, great. Hallelujah. So sometimes you have to get it in the song to remember, yeah, that's true. We see with our natural eyeballs unless you have the real gift of discernment to see what's happening around you. Yeah. Somebody just recently, please forgive me, I don't remember who it was, but I think it was somebody at the convention or maybe somebody I heard after that said something about the angels are singing to you to try and get you to pick up that song. And then you sing it. Sometimes I get songs in my head. It doesn't occur to me, or it didn't until I heard that, that I need to just sing it out. Sing it out.

24:43 Because I've got songs going in my head all the time. But I don't always think to sing them out. So the angels are standing by, waiting for us to give the word, releasing the word, giving voice to the word. Psalm 103 .20 says, Bless the Lord, you his angels, who excel in strength, who do his word, heeding the voice of his word. The angels are standing around waiting for us to give voice to his word so that they can go to work and do what his word says. So as we listen, they're trying to help us. As we listen to the Holy Spirit, as we tune into that spirit realm where the angels have come to work with us, And if there's an angel singing to you and you think it's just a song in your head, go ahead and sing it out or go ahead and speak out the word that you're hearing in your spirit. And your voice, your voice activates them. The kingdom of God is a voice -activated kingdom. So that's another one of those mysteries that's a part of this, but that's how he designed it. Yeah. So this is just a great thing you could do for your own study. What is the kingdom of God for you? You can go and look up the word kingdom and see how that applies to you. I think that could really help you get some direction in a lot of ways.

26:12 Because you talk about kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven, and they're really the same. Right. So because the kingdom of God is operating in you, if you've welcomed the king to live inside of you. It will be a mystery revealed to you. Absolutely. It'll be mystery after mystery, day by day, all the time. He's ready to give you downloads if you just tune in. So Holy Spirit, we ask you to tune us into your spirit. We need more input from you. So Lord, we lay aside the distractions that are trying to keep us from hearing your voice, trying to keep us from accomplishing what you put us on this planet to accomplish.

26:55 Lord, we submit to you. We humble ourselves before you and we recognize that we need you. We need your spirit. We need your word operating in us. Thank you for giving us that grace to overcome as we seek your kingdom, as we seek you as the king. Lord, we just want to have that relationship growing moment by moment from glory to glory in you and you in us. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen.

27:49 Check out our website at globaloutpouring .org to find out more information, read our blogs, connect with us, and donate. You can also browse our web store for life -changing anointed books. Until next time, this is Sharon Buss. And I'm Philip Buss. God bless you with His overwhelming, loving presence.