A Kingdom-Sized Gospel
The Gospel of the Kingdom, Not the Gospel of the Casket
Text: Matthew 4:23; Matthew 13; Matthew 24
Today we are going to look simply at the gospel. We are going to look at the gospel, but we are going to see that the gospel is far more expansive than what a lot of people imagine it to be—maybe even more expansive than what you have thought of the gospel. Jesus Christ did not proclaim a small gospel. Many times we shrink the gospel down in size. But I assure you that the gospel is not shrunken in size. It is the size of a kingdom.
In fact, the title of today’s message is this: the gospel of the kingdom, not the gospel of the casket. The gospel of a kingdom, not the gospel of a casket. Let us open our Bibles to Matthew 4:23.
Of course, this is speaking of Jesus. It says:
“And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in the synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people.”
This is what Jesus did. He went out and He preached the gospel. But what gospel? The gospel of the kingdom. He went throughout all the synagogues, He went everywhere, preaching the gospel of the kingdom.
The Gospel of the Kingdom, Not the Gospel of the Casket
This brings us to our first question today: What is the size of the gospel? We already have the answer right here in front of us. It is the size of a kingdom. But many, unfortunately, hold that the gospel is the size of a casket.
What do I mean by that—the size of a casket? I mean they believe that the gospel does only one thing: it prepares you to die. That is all it does. It prepares you to die. And there are different levels of this.
There are some people who simply go around with a get-out-of-hell-free card. They have played Monopoly, right? They are playing spiritual Monopoly, and they say, “Let me tell you what I’ll do here. I’ll pray a prayer, and I’ll get my get-out-of-hell-free card, because that’s a good card to have. On judgment day I’m going to go up, and Jesus is going to say, ‘Look, you’ve sinned against Me’—and I’m going to say, ‘Oh, I’ve got the remedy right here. Get-out-of-hell-free card.’” They will play that card, and then they figure they will be fine, and so they go on and live their lives however they want.
That is a very dangerous way to live. Let me explain why.
Suppose I told you that as I drove here today, I was crossing the road, and out of nowhere a semi traveling sixty-five miles an hour came and T-boned me—and suppose I came in thirty minutes late, wearing my pajamas, with sleep in my eyes, bed hair, and a bed beard, and I told you that story had happened. You would look at me and say, “No, Pastor. I think you overslept.” Why? For two reasons. First, because the evidence would point to oversleeping. And second, because if a semi hits you, it is going to leave an impact on your life—especially one going sixty-five miles an hour. That’s not very hard to believe, is it?
Well, if you believe a semi traveling sixty-five miles an hour will leave an impact on your life, let me tell you about something that will leave a far greater impact: an encounter with the Almighty, all-powerful God of the universe. If a collision with a semi leaves a mark on your life, am I really to believe that an encounter with the Almighty God of the universe will leave no impact at all—that the evidence will show nothing? I think the contrary is true. You cannot have an encounter with God and have Him not change your life. It leaves an impact. God is more powerful than any semi. Even the biggest rig is nothing, because God is the Creator of the universe.
It is a dangerous way to live, going through life saying, “I just have a get-out-of-hell-free card, and I’m planning on playing it on judgment day.” God is going to look at you and say, “Did you really believe?” Because believing is not mental assent. It is moral assent. It takes a man all that he is to believe in Jesus Christ.
Then there are also those who believe that all that matters in this life is the salvation of souls. That is another way people reduce the gospel to the size of a casket.
I encountered this several times just this last week, while I was over in Tennessee at NRB working with Equipping the Persecuted. People came up to me, and I had this same conversation more than once. Part of what we are dealing with at Equipping the Persecuted is Christians who are being persecuted and killed for Jesus Christ. The greatest threat right now is what is called the Fulani ethnic militia—a terrorist group that comes in and kills people, kills Christians.
Just about a week and a half ago, the Fulani came into a city and passed out flyers inviting people to come and listen to them preach. So Christians came out, and even some Muslims came out, and they listened to the Fulani preach. Afterward, the Fulani asked, “Do you believe?” A lot of people said, “No, I don’t believe.” And what did they do? They took out their guns and mowed them down in the street—one hundred seventy Christians killed right there in the streets for not believing.
One of the things we want to do is to stop the persecution. So we tell people: that is evil. That is wrong. They ought to stop. In fact, the Nigerian government ought to stop those people, because the government’s job is to bear the sword righteously—to be a terror to those who do evil works and to protect those who are innocent.
But there are people who have come up to me and said, “Oh, well, don’t you think we really just need to minister to the Fulani and preach the gospel?” Now, do not get me wrong. We saw over seven hundred Muslims come to Christ last year through Equipping the Persecuted. We believe in preaching the gospel. We are a gospel-centered, gospel-facing mission. But let me also tell you this: I do not think that is all we should do. I think it is right to tell them, “No, you are wrong.” And yes, the government should do something. And yes, justice should be established—because the gospel is not the size of a casket. It is the size of a kingdom.
Those who believe we must only change hearts and minds through the saving of souls are going to get this wrong. They will say, “Look, the only thing that matters is that people get saved, that we preach the gospel and leave it at that.” That sounds great in theory. But let us take a step back for a minute. Let us put this in a different sphere of government. Let us put it in the family.
Your child is standing on top of the table, saying, “I won’t eat my broccoli. I won’t eat my broccoli. I won’t eat my broccoli.” If you go and say, “Well, child, don’t you know Jesus Christ died for you and loves you so much?”—you are parenting wrong. You are not applying the Word of God rightly there. You grab the child off the table and you blister their backside. That is what you do. Why? Because the gospel is the size of a kingdom, not the size of a casket.
It is important that we understand this: the gospel does not merely prepare us to die. It also prepares us to live in this world. When the gospel is the size of a casket, it leaves us with a gospel that is either nonfunctional for living on this earth or so spiritualized that Christianity becomes abstract and flaky. As I said, the Fulani are killing Christians in Nigeria. Should we demand that they stop, or should we simply tell them they need Jesus? It is fine to tell them they need Jesus. It is good to tell them they need Jesus. But we should also tell them to put their guns down, to stop killing Christians, and that they are wrong.
When the gospel is the size of a casket, it only prepares you for the next life and leaves you unprepared for living in this one. It is a gospel that focuses on death by making death the liberation from sin. It makes power over sin futuristic instead of a present promise. Ultimately, it delays grace instead of giving you the empowerment of grace.
But Christ did not preach a gospel of the casket. He preached a gospel the size of a kingdom. And what does a kingdom imply? The first thing is right there in the word: a king. It implies a king, an authority. And the king, by the way, is Jesus—in case you were curious.
That is the King. He is the King who comes back. He is the King who returns riding on a white horse, with a sword proceeding out of His mouth, and a name—King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And He makes war with all of His enemies. Sometimes we go around just telling people, “Oh, Jesus loves you. Go smell a flower.” And I am sitting here thinking, don’t you know that Jesus, when He comes back, does not say, “Sniff a flower”? He does not say everything is okay. He comes back with a sword, ready to make war. So we need to tell people: you had best get right with Jesus. He is coming again.
This King has authority, and kings work in terms of law, jurisdiction, and dominion. That is the realm in which kings operate. The gospel of the kingdom tells us how we ought to live our lives and how our lives must be governed. It teaches us what rightly belongs to Christ. And what must be submitted to Christ? What does He own? Every inch, every centimeter, every millimeter of our lives ought to be surrendered to King Jesus. It ought to be His. Otherwise, we are setting ourselves up as king.
In looking at a gospel the size of a kingdom, let me tell you something that might offend you—and that’s all right. It is right to offend you on this point if it offends you. It implies that you are not the king. You are not the king. This life is not about you. It is not about me. It is about Jesus Christ.
But there is good news, and the good news is that there is a King and a kingdom. You are not the authority. You are not the king. But there is a King who is over you, and He is good. His kingdom is good to dwell within. His ways are higher than my ways. His thoughts are higher than my thoughts. He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and He is a good, benevolent, merciful, and just King. We must not forget this. We must not forget who Jesus is.
The gospel of the kingdom does not just prepare you to die—though it does prepare you to die, praise the Lord. Outside of the rapture, death is appointed for all men, and after that the judgment. So I sure hope it prepares us to die. And it does. But it also prepares us to live.
Let us go over to 2 Peter chapter 1, and I will read verses 2 through 4:
“Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”
The gospel that Christ preached did not just get you ready to die. It gives you everything you need to live—everything that pertains to life and godliness. It gives you precious promises. I love that you are not abandoned until eternity. You have the power of the gospel now.
The gospel frees you, first of all, from the penalty of sin. You have a home in heaven. But let us not stop there. It also frees you from the power of sin. You can now have dominion over the sin that once ruled and reigned in your life. Think about that for a moment. Sin no longer has dominion over you. You have power over sin. That is what the grace of God does. It allows you to say, “I once was a slave to sin, but now I am a slave to righteousness. Sin no longer has dominion over me.”
And one day, of course, the gospel will free us from the very presence of sin, because there will come a day when there is no more sin around us, and sin and death will be defeated. I look forward to that day. We serve a victorious God. What did we sing today? We did not sing “defeat in Jesus.” We sang victory in Jesus. Victory in Jesus. As Christians, we ought to live in victory, because we do not have a gospel the size of a casket. We have the gospel the size of a kingdom. It prepares us to live, and it gives us victory over sin and death and the grave.
The devil might think he wins in your life one day because you get put six feet under. But there is news for the devil: when the trumpet sounds, you will not stay there. You will rise again. That is the ultimate victory. It is a sting and a spitting in the face of the devil. The devil is a defeated foe.
Now you might be sitting here thinking, “But Pastor, don’t you know that grace just saves you? That’s all grace does?” Well, let us go over to Titus chapter 2, because I want us to see that grace does much more than save us.
The Grace That Teaches Us to Live
Grace does more than save us. Let us look at Titus chapter 2, reading verses 11 through 15, so we can see the grace of the gospel here. This is powerful. It says:
“For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works. Speak these things, exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no one despise you.”
First of all, we need to realize that we are talking about the grace of God that brings salvation. We are not talking about multiple graces here. We are talking about one grace—the grace that actually brings salvation. And I love this, because it says that grace has appeared to all men. This means that Christ died for all. First John 2:2 says that He is the propitiation, the substitute, for my sins—“and not for ours only but also for the whole world.” Does this mean everybody will be saved? No, because there are going to be people who reject God. But it does mean that Christ’s sacrifice is sufficient.
When Jesus Christ went to the cross, you can live without a shadow of a doubt that He paid the price for your sin. He can save to the uttermost. It does not matter how much you have sinned. It does not matter what you have done. It does not matter who you were. Jesus’s blood is sufficient. His sacrifice is sufficient. He can save us. He paid it all. The old hymn puts it this way: there is room at the cross for you; though millions have come, there is still room for one. And that is true of every single person who walks the face of the earth. There is room at the cross for them. There is an invitation. Jesus died for them. He died for you. He died for me.
This is so important. There are some people who do not believe that. They think Jesus only died for a select few. But that is a complete decimation of the imago Dei, because what they are really saying is that they are so special that Jesus came and died for them in particular. Let me tell you this: yes, Jesus died for you, but He died to redeem His image. That is where He finds value in you—you are stamped with the image of God. Every single human being, from the moment of conception, bears the image of God, and God finds this valuable. That is what He is coming to redeem, because He will not let the devil mock Him; His glory is too great.
We have a God-centered salvation. It is so important to understand this: our God is so great, and He died so that you might live. Yet it seems many people stop reading right here when they come to this passage in Titus, and so their gospel becomes the size of a casket. But Jesus’s gospel is the size of a kingdom, and the passage actually continues. It says, “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men.” And then what does that grace do?
It says, “teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.”
The grace of God that brings salvation—that same grace—also teaches. And what does it teach? First, it teaches a negative: to deny two things—ungodliness and worldly lust. The gospel teaches us that there are things in this world that are bad, things we should deny.
Did you know that not everything is for you? Not everything is for you, and not everything is good for you. This is important to understand, because a lot of people look at Christianity and say, “Oh, I went to church once. It was just a bunch of lists of dos and don’ts.” Well, let me tell you some don’ts. When you look at your children, you might say, “Don’t run with scissors in your hand.” Does that give the child the right to say, “Oh, parenting—it’s just a bunch of don’ts. They’re telling me I can’t run with scissors”? Well, don’t run with scissors. What happens if you do? You might fall and cut something. But unfortunately, that is the level of maturity a lot of people bring toward the church, toward God, and toward religion—because the “don’ts” are ungodliness and worldly lust.
Grace teaches us, simply put, that we should deny sin. This is because we are not saved only from the penalty of sin; we are also saved from the power of sin. Jesus came to save us from sin. He did not save us so that we could sin. That matters, because sin is destructive in our lives. The grace of God puts up guardrails to make sure we do not go over the cliff of destruction. That is what the grace of God does, because it is a kingdom—and so it has laws, boundaries, jurisdiction, and authority. That is what the gospel is.
There are things in your life, or things that have been in your life, that you must deny. How do we deny something? You stop giving it life. Some things you must remove. Some things you must replace. Some things you must pull up by the root. Ungodliness—these are the things that are overtly against God. Worldly lust—these are the things that attract you away from God.
If the devil wants you to get hit by a car in the middle of the road, he is probably not going to say, “Hey, go stand right there in the middle of the freeway.” Do you know what he is more likely to do? He will take you to a quiet, rural place where there is not much traffic, and you will be standing there, and all of a sudden you will see a twenty-dollar bill flutter by. You go to grab it, and it moves just out of reach, and then you chase after it—because you are attracted to that twenty-dollar bill, or whatever it might be—and all of a sudden, boom: a car hits you, because you let yourself be drawn out into the middle of the road. That is how the devil works. He tries to attract you away. That is worldly lust. It seems shiny. It seems good. It seems wonderful.
Sometimes we need to stop and look: are the things attracting us of God, or are they of the world? What is drawing your attention—the things of God, or the things of the world?
Grace does not only teach us to deny things. It also teaches us to live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age. In this present age.
First, to live soberly. This means to live inside of wisdom. God wants us to be wise and not driven by our feelings. Now, feelings are good. We should have feelings. God wants us to experience feelings. There are times in the Bible when David danced for joy—that is full of feeling. There are also times when he worshiped with tearing of clothes and ashes and sackcloth—that is feeling too. These are good. But we should not be driven by our feelings. Feelings and emotions make a wonderful caboose and a terrible engine. If they are the engine of your life, they will lead you to destruction. But if they are the caboose, and the wisdom of God is your engine, you are going to go places. You are going to do great things for God, and your worship will be pleasing to the Lord. This is why we must live soberly. The gospel teaches you to be grounded.
When the gospel is only the size of a casket, it produces flaky people. I just got back from NRB—the National Religious Broadcasters convention—and there was a lot of good there. But let me tell you, there was also a lot of flakiness, a lot of odd stuff. You walk by and see all these booths with all these books and all these things, and there are some strange Christians out there. And those strange Christians, I can tell you, are not kingdom-minded. They are not seeing the gospel as the gospel of the kingdom. They are seeing it as the size of a casket, and it makes them weird.
Don’t be weird. Now, some of us can’t help a little of it—I sit down next to somebody I’ve never met before, and I just have to talk to them. That’s probably a little weird, I understand. So some of us already have weirdness to overcome. But we don’t need to add to the weirdness by standing around saying, “Man, the gospel is just the size of a casket. It just prepares us for death.”
Some people say they believe in the rapture—I believe in the rapture; I believe Jesus is coming again—but some people are outside jumping up and down every day, and you ask, “What are you doing?” “Trying to get caught up first in the rapture. He’s coming back in the next three minutes, don’t you know?” That’s weird—especially when Jesus told you it is a gospel of a kingdom. Occupy until I come. Do My business. Do My work. And some folks say, “Wow, look at all these charts—chart after chart after chart—and I’m trying to figure it out, this is exactly when Jesus comes back.” And I think, okay, but what are you doing for Jesus? Did you miss the entire point of the Bible? Don’t be flaky and weird. The gospel is the size of a kingdom, not the size of a casket.
Grace also teaches us to live righteously. What does this mean? It is what is right and lawful. God wants you to live inside His law, because this is the gospel of the kingdom. This means the gospel teaches you what is right. Christ died for our sins—and what is sin? Sin is transgression of the law. Therefore the gospel is pro-God’s law, or it could never deal with sin. That is why you will hear me preach often on God’s law: because sin is transgression of His law, and Jesus died to save us from sin. That is what He saves us from.
That is why you hear me say, “Look, we are not abandoning the law of God.” It is precious. Psalm 19:7 tells us the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. Psalm 1 tells us, “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord.” I want you to live a blessed life. I want you to have something that is perfect. I want you to have something that converts the souls of your neighbors, your children, and your friends. That is God’s law.
You have two choices: you can live in sin, or you can live inside of God’s law. There is no ground in between. We are either living lawfully or unlawfully, either living in sin or outside of sin; there is no gray area in between. When the gospel is the size of a casket, it leaves you inside the power of sin. And let me tell you, sin is a cruel master. Sin brings chains. It brings depression and despair into your life. It takes you further than you ever wanted to go. It will zap you and drain you and leave you a dry morsel. That is what sin does. I don’t want that for you. God doesn’t want that for you. That is why we must live inside His law—because His law is the place where blessing is found.
The third thing grace teaches us, positively, is to live godly. What is this? It is piety and worship. God wants you to be a true worshiper of Him. This means the gospel teaches you not only how to live inside of law, but how to worship God. True worship is saturated with obedience, but it comes from a heart of humble allegiance. Let me say that again: true worship is saturated with obedience, but it comes from a heart of humble allegiance to God. When you say, “God, I am aligned with You. My allegiance is to You. I am obeying You, and I am going to do so humbly”—that is where worship is found.
This is why the words of the songs we sing matter. When we sing, we understand that God inhabits the praises of His people. His presence is there. We want songs that align with what God says, who God is, and what God has commanded, because that brings us into alignment. We are not just singing tunes, not just saying words; we want songs that are in alignment with God in truth.
Now, it is interesting—when does all this teaching take place? In eternity future? No. It says in this present age, not merely the world to come. Right now He is purifying for Himself a people zealous for good works, a special people, redeeming them from lawlessness. And this is only done through a gospel the size of a kingdom. It is not done through a gospel the size of a casket.
That is why the passage ends as it does. Titus is a pastoral epistle—this is Paul instructing young pastor Titus, whom he sent to Crete to appoint other pastors, as you can read in chapter one. And it says, “Speak these things, exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no one despise you.” This is about the grace of God specifically. This is why pastors are to preach this with all authority. The casket mindset is contrary to the purpose of God. The kingdom mindset is what God has for us. It is so important that we understand this.
The Gospel Applied to Every Area of Life
So then the question is: how does this get practical? Okay, Pastor, you have said a lot of interesting things—but how does this get practical? Where do we apply the gospel?
First and foremost, apply it to your individual soul. If for a moment you think I am shifting away from the necessity of a personal Savior, you have missed what I am preaching. I am saying that you need a personal Savior. You must be saved. You must be born again, as Jesus says. Christ died for our sins, He was buried, and He rose again the third day to provide a way of salvation for all who believe. Romans 10:9 tells us that if we confess with our mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in our heart that God has raised Him from the dead, we shall be saved. Romans 10:13, just a few verses down, says, “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” Praise the Lord for those passages.
But that is where people stop. We must continue. The gospel ought not only be applied to our own individual soul; it must also be applied to every area of our life. Take, for instance, our relationships. Your relationships should be under the authority of King Jesus Christ. In family devotions today, we read this out of Colossians chapter 3: wives, submit to your husbands; husbands, love your wives; children, obey your parents; fathers, provoke not your children to wrath. This is only possible if Christ is ruling your family.
When you get saved, it requires the humility of realizing that you cannot do it yourself—you must do it God’s way. I cannot earn my way into heaven. Ephesians 2:8–9 tells us, “For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.” I cannot get to heaven the way I would choose to.
If it were up to me, I would say, “God, at the end of all this, take all my bad works and put them on one side of the scale, take all my good works and put them on the other, and let us see which weighs more.” And let me tell you, that would be a frightening thing, because the weight of my sin is great. That is how I would think, because it seems fair. But the reality is that one sin condemns us to hell. One sin is too weighty. One sin is too great for us to pay back. It takes the blood of Jesus. The only way we can be saved is not my way, not my desire, not my system. It is by humbling myself and saying, “God, I can’t do it. I need Jesus to save me.” That is how we get saved.
Why do I bring all this up? Because it is the same way when it comes to the matter of marriage and family. We have to do it God’s way. That takes the humility of saying, “I can’t do it my way, God. I have to do it Your way.”
The gospel means good news—and there is good news for your relationships. If Christ can raise you from the dead, then He can do the same for your marriage. How bizarre it would be to think that when the trumpet sounds, you are going to rise again, but God cannot save your marriage from the dead. There is hope, no matter how dark it may seem. Christ can raise you up.
He can do the same with your relationship with your child. Many have given up hope because their child has gone wayward. Maybe you are in the midst of despair, because, simply put, parenting isn’t for sissies. But again, it would be bizarre to believe that when the trumpet sounds, God will raise you from the dead, yet He cannot restore the relationship with your child or bring your child back to Christ. There is hope, because the gospel is powerful. Keep proclaiming the gospel. Keep applying it in your home. Keep applying it in your relationships. Why? Because it is not the gospel the size of a casket. It is the size of a kingdom—and that kingdom is over every area of our lives.
This means the gospel does not just apply to our relationships; it applies to our work and our business. Remember, the gospel teaches you wisdom—to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live righteously and godly. All of this will greatly impact your business. If you say, “Pastor, I would love to know how to become better in business,” then go to the book of Proverbs and read a chapter every day that matches the day of the month. There are thirty-one chapters in Proverbs. I know we are in February, so it is a terrible time to pull out this illustration—but plenty of months have thirty-one days, and you can read one chapter a day that corresponds to the date.
Let me tell you, it will bring wisdom. It will bring godliness. It will bring righteousness. It will keep you away from ungodliness and worldly lusts in your business practices. It is very practical. It will tell you not to be a sluggard. It will tell you to be generous. It will tell you how to make friends. It will tell you all of these things. Apply the gospel of the kingdom to your business.
If you apply the gospel to your business, you will deny ungodly business practices. You will deal justly and fairly. You will apply godliness. If you own a business, don’t be open on the Lord’s Day. Chick-fil-A got that right. Now, I get a little frustrated—I go in and try to order a burger, and they tell me they only have chicken sandwiches. But let me tell you, they got the Sunday thing right.
Apply the gospel to every area of your life, because Christ is King over all. We could go through every area of life, but we won’t take the time, or we would be standing here for an eternity. Apply the gospel of the kingdom to your relationships and your business. Apply it to your hobbies. I always think of Tim Tebow praying in celebration of a touchdown. That was applying the gospel of the kingdom to football, wasn’t it? It shook a nation. I remember being in high school and thinking, he just put John 3:16 on his eye black, and then he bowed down—and people lost their minds. Why? Because he was applying the gospel right there to the game of football. Now, God may have had to teach him he probably shouldn’t play in the NFL, since they play on Sundays instead of Saturdays—you need to be in church—but we look at that and see something powerful.
Apply it to your hobbies. Apply the gospel through your pain and your suffering. Apply the gospel to your talents and your time. Everything that you have, apply the gospel to it, because Jesus Christ is the owner of every area of our lives. There is hope for everything you are going through. For everything you are going through, God did not leave you hopeless. He left you with hope, because the gospel is powerful. It is powerful enough to raise you from the dead. That means it is powerful enough to fix the problems in your life. Amen.
In case you think this is novel, let us go back to the book of Matthew. I find it interesting that Matthew 24 continues the very same theme. This is the verse we will end with. Matthew 24:14 says, “And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.” Not the gospel of the casket, but the gospel of the kingdom. It will be preached to all the nations. It will be preached in all the world. Every area of your life needs the gospel of the kingdom preached to it.
That is what it means. You proclaim the gospel that Jesus came to conquer sin and death, that Jesus came to restore and renew, that Jesus came to redeem. Preach the gospel to your life, and watch what God does. The gospel that Christ has given us to proclaim is not the size of a casket. It does not just prepare you to die. It is the size of a kingdom. Whatever you are going through, there is resurrection power that can be applied this day, in this age, because He has given us all that we need for life and godliness.
Invitation
So right now, if you have a casket mindset—if you thought this was just a get-out-of-hell-free card, if you thought it only prepares you to die and doesn’t really prepare you to live—if you have that mindset, or if there is an area of your life where you have been resisting, working at it on your own, and you know you need to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ to it, to make sure that area knows He is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords—if that is you today, I want to invite you to come forward.
Come forward to pray today, to ask God to preach the gospel right there to that area of your life. Come forward right now if you need to. Come forward and preach the gospel of the kingdom to that area of your life. Whatever it is, come forward today, while I pray.
And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to Aaron and his sons, saying, ‘This is the way you shall bless the children of Israel. Say to them:
The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace.’ So they shall put My name on the children of Israel, and I will bless them.”
Closing Prayer
Lord, I pray that Your name would be upon Your people today—upon each one of Your children. Father, I pray that Your name, Jehovah Rapha, would be upon each one, Lord; that if there is sickness, there would be health and healing that removes that sickness.
Father, I pray that Your name, Jehovah Jireh, the Lord who provides, would be upon each one; that if the day of the devourer comes, You would rebuke it in that day, Father, and that Your name would preserve a provision for Your people.
Lord, I pray that Your name, Jehovah Shalom, would be upon each one; that if there is a spirit of anxiety, or any spirit that seeks to attack any of Your children, Father, Your peace would repel it and protect Your children. In Jesus’s name we pray. Amen.
