Transcription
Truth in History with Charles A. Jennings.
Growing up in church, even from a child, we have been taught that when you die, you go to heaven. And we've been told, if you're good, you'll go to heaven. Where is heaven? What is heaven? Heaven has been made a fetish in the evangelical church. Same with hell. Now, we know that there's a punishment for the wicked and there is a reward for the righteous. We understand that. But hell has been a threat and heaven has been a cookie, a reward. If you're good, you'll go to heaven. If you're bad, you'll go to hell. And it's fear and it's somewhat expectation with a degree of fear.
Does the Bible anywhere in the book tell us that we're going to go to heaven? Now many of us have had the obligation of preaching funerals and all of us have been attendees at funerals. And if it was a religious service with a minister officiating, that person is either placed in hell or in heaven, generally in heaven. Now, I went into a funeral home one time to officiate a funeral, and the funeral director came to me and said, "Do you put people in hell?" Well, I said, "No, I mean, I don't know their eternal destiny." He said, "Well, I just had a funeral out here at a Baptist church out in the country, and the preacher put the dead man in hell three times."
Well, generally, it's whatever or whoever this person is that dies. We put a crown on their head. We say they were a good person. We say they were the light in any party, the life of any party, or the light that comes in the room. And we have all these expressions. They could have been rascals. They could have been downright devils. But yet traditionally we put them in heaven. But what is heaven? The concept of heaven, as I get it among the training that I've had in the past and growing up in church and listening to other ministers, is that it's a location somewhere up in the sky. And when you die, you go there. But yet we know that that person's body is in the grave. That body, that physical body is in the grave. So what part goes to heaven? And generally, they describe it as he or she is now up there singing with the angels, and he or she is now greeting grandma and grandpa. And we've come up with ethereal, very emotional concepts of heaven, people walking through the Elysian fields, picking fruit off of trees. You know, you've heard it all. Is all that biblical?
Now, we know through many Bible verses that the Lord dwells in heaven. Jesus taught the disciples to pray and said, "Our Father which art in heaven." But the word heaven has been placed in our mentality and that concept of going to another planet. And that concept came through dispensationalism. They say that the Scottish girl Margaret Macdonald had this vision of saints leaving the earth and flying to another planet, and it became that concept was incorporated into dispensationalism futurism, and that's generally all we hear in evangelical churches.
But Jesus spoke of a kingdom. Now, he came from heaven. That's his dwelling place and the dwelling place of angels. But he never promised that we would leave the earth and fly to another planet somewhere and do all these things, sit at a table that's 99 miles long in order to accommodate everybody and have a meal, and walk through high grass and pick fruit off of trees. And some of these late comers, prophets, so-called prophets, they go to heaven every week and they come back with a report. Some of them have seen Santa Claus in heaven. Some of them have seen a whole area of heaven that is decorated like Christmas. And one little quote prophetess said that she saw chocolate fountains. And where are they getting this stuff? Because they don't have a biblical concept of the kingdom of God.
What is a kingdom? A kingdom has five component parts: people, land, law, throne, and king. Now, how many kingdoms are mentioned in the Bible? I made a list of them here, and I'm not going to turn to all these scriptures. It's not that necessary. But the kingdom of Nimrod, Babel, even had a name for it. The kingdom of Amalech, the kingdom of Og, the kingdom of Sihon, the kingdom of Og, the kingdom of Saul, the kingdom of David, the kingdom of Solomon, and the southern kingdom of Judah, the northern kingdom of Israel or Ephraim. Cyrus had a kingdom. Ahasuerus had a kingdom. Nebuchadnezzar had a kingdom. And Darius had a kingdom. People, land, law, throne, and king. And they ruled over that landmass and everyone that was living within that landmass. And they had a set of laws to govern the operation of that kingdom. And they sat upon the throne of that kingdom. And without them, without the particular man, there would be no kingdom because it requires a king. So it's people, land, law, throne, and king.
Now, the Bible tells us that the Lord has a kingdom. And here's where I'm going to turn to some scriptures. In 2 Chronicles 13:8. 2 Chronicles 13 and 8. 2 Chronicles 13 and 8. I don't think that's the scripture that I'm looking for. It says that the verse that I'm looking for says that Solomon sat on the throne of the kingdom of the Lord. So the Israel kingdom was the Lord's kingdom. And Solomon, as an earthly man, sat upon that throne because the Lord established it through his people. He elected a man first of all called Abraham. And he said, "I'm going to use you and your family. You're mine." And then Isaac came along. And then Jacob. And the Lord gave Jacob a landmass in Genesis 28, north, south, east, and west. And then the 12 sons, and they became a tribal family. And under Moses, they became a nation. And under David, they became a kingdom. And the Lord said, "This is my kingdom. It was on the earth, not on another planet out in space. It was right here on the earth."
Now, when the Lord established his kingdom, actually before he established his kingdom, he gave them some laws, kingdom laws. And in Deuteronomy 17, beginning with verse number 14, "When thou art come unto the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, and shalt possess it, and shalt dwell therein, and shalt say, I will set a king over me, like as all the nations that are about me. Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee whom the Lord thy God shall choose." It's not by vote. It's by God's choice as to who rules over his kingdom. The people didn't have to vote for King David. The Lord chose him and anointed him. "One from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee." That's pretty clear. Israel, you shall not have a foreigner to reign over you. Well, there's a lot of foreigners in this nation ruling over millions of Israelites. Maybe not in the office of president, but look in the Congress. There's governors, mayors, city councilmen in places of rulership that should not be there because they're not Israelites. Let me read this again. "Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, whom the Lord thy God shall choose. One from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee. Thou mayest not set a stranger over thee which is not thy brother." That is clear. The Lord was very emphatic. When you go into the land of Canaan, when you cross Jordan and you establish yourselves as a nation, don't say we will select someone to be a king over us like the other nations. The Lord said, "No, that's my choice. And never set a king over thee that is not your blood brother." That's basic. We've disobeyed that commandment in many of our Israel nations. This is getting right down to brass tacks: rulership, wrong rulership. Those were the kingdom laws.
And when he shall be king, he shall not multiply horses to himself, verse 16. Or wives, verse 17, gold or silver, verse 17. And he shall also take a copy of the law and handwrite it, and then he shall read it, and it shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the days of his life, in order to learn the fear of the Lord God. The king is not to amass unto himself possessions, property designated by horses, gold or silver. He doesn't have license to take wives plural. And he's obligated to take the book of the law and write him a copy of this law. And then he shall read it from time to time that he may learn to fear and to obey the laws of God. Now, there's a lot that can be said at this point, but we've set the law here in America. Our government on many levels, even churches, has set the law of God aside and says the Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the land. Well, we've made it that. Our institutions have made it that, but it's flawed. It's weak. It does not follow the laws of God as set down for any Israel nation.
David, King David, the man that we are so familiar with. In Psalm 22 and 28, he says, "For the kingdom is the Lord's." Now, he was made king by Judah and by Israel. He was king over a united kingdom. But in essence, he says the kingdom is the Lord's and he is the governor among the nations. And in Psalms 45:6, he says, "Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever. The scepter of thy kingdom is a right scepter. Thou lovest righteousness and hatest iniquity. Therefore God thy God hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows." That's a prophecy of Jesus Christ. Above thy fellows means above thy fellow priests. He was the one that was anointed.
In Psalm 103 and verse 19, I want to read several of these verses rather quickly. 103 and verse 19. "For the Lord hath prepared his throne in the heavens; and his kingdom ruleth over all." His kingdom, the Psalmist said, is superior to all other kingdoms. The physical, literal, visible people of Israel of the Old Testament was the kingdom of God on the earth. Then Psalm 145 verse 11. "They shall speak of the glory of thy kingdom, and talk of thy power to make known to the sons of men his mighty acts and the glorious majesty of his kingdom. Thy kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and thy dominion endureth throughout all generations." Right here on this planet.
Isaiah chapter nine, a very familiar verse to all of us. Isaiah 9. I'll get there. "Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end." This is talking about the child that is born, the son Jesus Christ that is given. "The government shall be upon his shoulder," civil rulership, "his name called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." And the prophet said, "His government shall increase, shall continually increase. There shall be no end upon the throne of David." David's throne was not on a planet a million miles out in space. His throne was right here on the earth, "upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom, to order it, establish it with judgment and with justice or fairness henceforth even forever."
Daniel chapter 2. Daniel chapter 2 speaks about Nebuchadnezzar's kingdom, but it speaks about another kingdom. It speaks about the Lord's kingdom [snorts] in verse 44. "And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all other kingdoms, and it shall stand forever." Now, if the kingdom of God is quote heaven on a planet a million miles out in space, [snorts] first, David's throne was not in outer space. And how is this kingdom going to consume all the other kingdoms if the Lord's kingdom is just strictly in heaven somewhere, a million miles away? How could it destroy the kingdoms down here? This verse alone establishes the fact that other kingdoms have existed because he earlier in this chapter talks about the head of gold, which was the Babylonian kingdom, the breast and arms, the Medo-Persian kingdom, the belly and thighs, which was the Grecian kingdom, and then legs of iron, which was the Roman kingdom. And Daniel continues and says, "But there's another kingdom on this earth, and it's going to consume all those previous kingdoms."
Amos chapter nine, verse 8. "Behold, the eyes of the Lord God are upon the sinful kingdom." He's talking about the kingdom of Israel, "and I will destroy it from the face of the earth, except that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob." So really, where is the kingdom? It's in the people. See, the kingdom of God right now exists, but it's very dirty. It's filthy because we Israelites have disobeyed the commandments that he gave us to live by. We have the wrong leadership. We have those that are not of our brethren. We've legalized iniquity, homosexuality, abortion, the liquor industry. We've legalized the filth that comes out of the movie industry, corrupt politics, a Babylonian money system operated by our enemies. We've allowed that, and the Constitution allows that. The Lord can destroy it, the kingdom, the structure of the kingdom. But he says, "I will not utterly destroy the house or the people of Jacob."
Someone asked me recently, "What's going to happen to this nation?" You see, this nation, really, there's different ways that you can look at it, and if you have a different opinion, that's fine. But it was not established as the kingdom of God on the earth. I mean, America, but yet it was established by Israelites. Israelites established it, but they did not go by the constitution that we have in this Bible. They came up with another constitution. You notice in the 13 original colonies, if you will look at each respective constitution of those states, in order to hold public office, you had to believe in the Old Testament, the New Testament, and that Jesus Christ was the Son of God. And I think it was in the Articles of Confederation, they had a religion clause. But in the Constitution, they took it out. In order to hold office, you could now be a Jew or Muslim or an atheist or a tribalist, or you could be Hindu, Tao, whatever you want to be, and hold office. We're seeing the fruit of our disobedience. [snorts] When you have a person that is not of us, not of our brethren, voted in as the mayor of the largest city of the US, and in other places, and in London, same way.
But in the next book, going from Amos to Obadiah, when it says that there's a fire coming, a fire deliverance upon Mount Zion, and there shall be holiness, verse 17, "and the house of Jacob shall possess their possessions." Whatever belonged to us or was given to the house of Israel, the house of Jacob, the family of Jacob, they're going to come back home. "And the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble." Why Esau? Because Esau and his people are our arch-enemy. You can talk about the devil all you want to, but you're skirting the issue. The arch-enemy of true Israel, I'm not talking about that sandbox in the Middle East, but the arch-enemy of Christian Israelite people is the house of Esau Edom. Well, in verse 18, it mentions the two rivals, Jacob, Joseph on one side, and Esau on the other. The kingdom is going to be cleaned up. And I don't mean just in the US, but throughout the world, wherever Israelites have established. Esau for stubble, and they shall kindle in them, and devour them, and there shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau. For the Lord has spoken this. And saviors shall come up on Mount Zion to judge, to judge the house of Esau, and the kingdom shall be the Lord's once again. You see, other places in the Old Testament, it says this kingdom is going to be forever, and that's true. But the Lord, being that it's his kingdom, he possesses it. We're his people. He can destroy, quote, the kingdom or that political social structure as prophesied in the book of Amos and send his people into dispersion for hundreds of years. But he gathers them because he saves the house of Jacob.
What did Jesus speak of? Jesus spoke of the kingdom of heaven in the book of Matthew. It tells us this. "In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judea, saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." He didn't say the kingdom was in heaven. He said it's of heaven. Its design, its origin is in the mind of God that dwells in the heavens. It's of heaven, a heavenly nature, a heavenly origin. That's the message of John the Baptist. When Jesus started preaching, "From that time Jesus began to preach and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." How many times did Jesus speak of the kingdom of heaven? Something like a little more than 20 times it's mentioned. It's mentioned more than 20 times in the book of Luke chapter 1. When Gabriel came and spoke to Mary, he said, "Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found favor with God. And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest. And the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David." David's throne was established a thousand years before Jesus was born. But that's the throne. That's the people. That's the kingdom that Jesus is going to possess. "And he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end." Who is he going to reign over? The same people that was chosen in the Old Testament: Abraham, Isaac, and the family of Jacob.
Jesus was talking to his disciples one day, and then answered Peter after the Lord had talked about the kingdom of heaven. Matthew chapter 13 talks about the kingdom of heaven likened unto several different times of all those parables. This is the nature of the kingdom of heaven right here on the earth. Then answered Peter and said unto him, "Behold, we have forsaken all, and followed thee. What shall we have therefore?" Jesus answered and said to them, "Verily I say unto you, that ye which have followed me in the regeneration when the Son of Man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." It sounds like the kingdom is promised to be cleaned up, gathered, renewed, regenerated, and with government. Twelve tribes, twelve apostles judging those twelve tribes. Well, they had this in mind. They had the kingdom concept in mind in Acts chapter 1. "When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?" See, Israel is the Lord's kingdom. We are part of his kingdom. If you are an Israelite, you're part of the kingdom of God. And hopefully, you're a regenerated child of God by accepting the provision of salvation paid for by Jesus Christ, and Christ alone, not just a sinful Israelite. I hope you're a holy Israelite.
So we look at the United States established by Christian people. It became tarnished, tainted, dirty, filthy. The enemies have come in and they've come in at different times in our history. A bunch of them came in during the war between the states and joined Abraham Lincoln's army. And their influence was in the government ever since. A lot of them came over in the 1890s from Russia, Germany, Lithuania, Eastern Europe, and they brought their filth with them and they established Hollywood. And out of that came propaganda, anti-Christian movies. It was the Jews that established that place, Edomite Jews. And you can read the book by Neil Gabler, "A Kingdom of Their Own: How the Jews Established Hollywood." Look for it on Amazon. It'll tell you who changed the American mind, who changed the values, the moral values of America, of young people through education. They write the school books. They publish them. Their influence is everywhere.
Go back to Obadiah. Someday there's going to be a fire. There's going to be a flame in the house of Jacob and Joseph, and Esau is going to be stubble. And that question that the disciples ask, "Lord, at this time, are you going to return the kingdom back to Israel?" Are you going to restore it? That was their concept. Not flying away to a planet somewhere a million miles from here. No, it's a kingdom right here on this earth. Don't be discouraged when the enemy is in control. He has his day. But let me tell you, God also has his day. Jesus Christ is coming back, and he's coming back in flaming fire to devour the house of Esau.
I would like to offer our magazine to those who would like to have a copy absolutely free of charge. Just send us an email. Let us know that you would like to have a copy and we will mail you an absolutely free copy. Send no money. We don't ask for money. The Lord has provided. So we distribute these magazines to those who desire it. So be encouraged. The kingdom of God is here. We are part of the kingdom. But Jesus's parables explain that some of these kingdoms, some aspects of the kingdom of God, the kingdom of Israel is filthy. It's dirty. Needs to be cleaned up. But he's coming. Just remember Jesus Christ was given that promise by the angel Gabriel. He's going to sit upon the throne of his father David and over the house of Jacob. He shall rule over that kingdom forever.