Through the Bible with Les Feldick
LESSON 2 * PART 1 * BOOK 77
CONNECTING THE DOTS OF SCRIPTURE – PART 41
Genesis – Revelation (The Kingdom)
Okay, it’s good to see everybody in again today. My goodness, we’ve got a full room. We’ve got folks from various places around the country. Again, we always appreciate the fact that you come in and are a part of this, not only by your presence, but by your prayers and your financial help. I think most of you in the room realize that your faces are familiar now from coast to coast. They just feel like you’re family.
For those of you out in television, if you’re catching us for the first time, we’re just an informal Bible study. We don’t try to get too theological. I want to keep it down at a level where kids can understand. You know, we had a letter the other day from some folks and their seven year old kid. I don’t remember whether it was a boy or a girl. The minute they hear our music, they come running. Got a couple here today with a little seven month old infant. They swear up and down that the little fellow already recognizes our music! So anyway, we just have to praise the Lord for the folks that we’re reaching with the Word. Like I said, I try to keep it simple and yet not just scratch the surface.
We want to get down into the deeper things. That’s why I’m so convinced that a lot of these things people have never heard before, because that’s the kind of comments we get. This is all new to them. I made reference to it once before. I had a fellow who called who had two Ph.D.’s in Theology. He said, “Les, how in the world after forty years in the pulpit and two degrees in Theology and I missed all of it!” He said he had never seen any of this before. Well, that’s why we’re going to keep teaching it the way we are.
All right, now ever since the beginning of Book 74, we’ve been connecting the dots of Scripture. Today we’re in the middle part of Book 77. We may wind this series of lessons up. We’ve been connecting the dots now for quite a long while. We started way back in Genesis connecting the dots and are now into the 1,000 year Kingdom portions of Scripture.
This study has not been detailed like we did in our Through the Bible Series. We are only hitting the highlights and just sort of covering the timeline from Genesis. We’re just about to the end. In our last taping, we were at the final days of the Tribulation and the horrors of it. So today I’m going to introduce that 1,000 year period of time that most of you have heard as the millennium. It’s the 1,000 year earthly Kingdom, which most of Christendom knows very little, if anything, about. They just don’t know what we’re talking about when we speak of the Kingdom.
Now you remember years and years ago, way back in one of the early programs. I made the statement “the Kingdom is the Kingdom”…you remember, don’t you, Jerry? People didn’t know what I was taking about. What are you talking about—the Kingdom is the Kingdom is the Kingdom? Well, you see the word in Scripture all the time. You see the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven. But, they just don’t know the difference. About two years ago we did a series, you remember. Sharon drew the circles on the board. We had the big circle of the Kingdom of God. Inside the Kingdom of God she drew two small circles for me. One was the Body of Christ. The other was the Kingdom of Heaven.
All right, now whenever I speak of the Kingdom is the Kingdom is the Kingdom, I’m speaking about the Kingdom of Heaven—which is that earthly 1,000 year reign of Christ that’s going to be on the planet. It’s going to follow the horrors of the Tribulation. That’s where we left off in our last half hour—the final days and the death and destruction that will hit the planet. We feel soon. So today’s taping I want to take us back and reconstruct, again, the promises as well as the bringing in of that final 1,000 year Kingdom—Heaven on earth.
Heaven on earth—like I mentioned in a couple of my seminars lately, and I think I did at the Tulsa Bible Conference. If it’s going to be Heaven on earth, will there be any room for gambling casinos? Why, the Mississippi Gulf Coast will just have to be cleansed clean, because that’s all that’s down there anymore. All across the country the casinos are popping up everywhere. They won’t fit in a heavenly environment. So, what’s going to happen? Poof! They’re going to go—and not only the casinos, but everything else that smacks of the ungodly world.
But since we’re going to go back and reconstruct the promises of the Kingdom as Paul refers to it, I’m going to take you back to Exodus chapter 19 and verse 3. For a lot of you this is probably the 15th or 20th time you’ve heard me teach these verses. But it’s the only way we can start, because this is the place of first mention. The scenario, of course, is Israel has just come out of Egypt. They’ve crossed the Red Sea. They are gathered around Mt. Sinai. While they’re encamped around the mountain, God calls Moses up into the mountain.
All right, we pick it up in verse 3. Now get the scenario—just fresh out of Egypt. The nation has arrived as nationhood in Egypt, but yet this is really the beginning of all the promises and the putting of Israel under the Law. Verse 3:
Exodus 19:3-5a
“And Moses went up unto God, and the LORD called unto him out of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel; 4. Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, (this recent crossing of the Red Sea) and how I bare you (the Nation) on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto myself. 5. Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant,…”
Now that’s a word that we used quite extensively a couple or three years ago—all the covenants between God and Israel beginning with the Covenant with Abraham and then this Covenant of Law and the Covenant with David and so forth (found in Book 63).
Exodus 19:5b
“…and keep my covenant, (covenant of Law) then ye (The Nation—never forget who we’re talking to.) shall be a peculiar treasure (That is a treasure of intrinsic value.) unto me above all people: (So, that’s what puts Israel in their, what we call, the favored nation or the chosen people category.) for all the earth is mine:” Now, here comes the verse I was heading for.
Exodus 19:6a
“And ye (the Nation of Israel) shall be unto me a (What’s the next word?) kingdom…” Now, if I’m not mistaken, this is the first mention of this word Kingdom. This is where I start when I say the Kingdom is the Kingdom is the Kingdom. It’s this Kingdom on earth that God is promising to Israel, right from day one. They’ve just come out of Egypt as a Nation of people.
Now, you know why I’m saying this over and over? Come back with me, because it all needs review. Come back with me to Genesis. I think it is chapter 46. I may have to look a moment. I didn’t plan to do this. But it just dawns on me that some of these things I haven’t said for a long time. Genesis 46, this bears repeating and reviewing. This is just as Jacob is being invited to come over into Egypt under Joseph, remember? We might as well start at verse 1.
Genesis 46:1-3a
“And Israel (or Jacob) took his journey with all that he had, and came to Beer-sheba, and offered sacrifices unto the God of his father Isaac. 2. And God spake unto Israel in the visions of the night, and said, Jacob, Jacob. And he said, Here am I. 3. And he said, I am God, the God of thy father: fear not (Because remember, they’d been told all the while until now to not go down into Egypt! See, that was the command given to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. But now God says–) to go down into Egypt; for I will there (in Egypt) make of thee (What?) a great nation:”
So, when did Israel become a nation of people? Down in Egypt while they were under slavery. But even though they were under slavery, if you remember the first chapter of Exodus, what was happening to the population? My, it was exploding. The little Jewish babies were coming so fast the Egyptians got all shook up. They had to do something to stop it, or they would be outnumbered. Well, that was the purpose. Because down in Egypt is where Israel became a numerous number of people and achieved nationhood.
So, back to Exodus 19 verse 6 once more. Then we’re going to move on up through the Old Testament. But here is the first mention of this coming earthly Kingdom promised to the Nation of Israel – and nobody else! All right, read it again.
Exodus 19:6
“And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, (In other words, every Jew was to be a go-between between the rest of the nations and Israel’s God.) and an holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.”
Now, we don’t hear too much more about the Kingdom until we get up to II Samuel. Jump all the way up to II Samuel chapter 7. Now we’re dealing with King David some 500 years later.
II Samuel 7:10a
“Moreover I will appoint a place for my people Israel, (in other words, a geographical territory of land) and will plant them, that they may dwell in a place of their own, and move no more;…” Now see, you’ve got to know this in view of today’s news.
What does the world in general say about Israel? They’ve got no business being there. Who are they to displace those poor Palestinians? Well, those poor Palestinians should have known before they went there that they were going into foreign territory. This is God’s Land! And He’s given it to the Nation of Israel ever since the call of Abraham. Don’t ever forget that. They’re dealing with God’s Promised Land. And here’s just another one of the instances.
II Samuel 7:10b
“…I will plant them, that they may dwell in a place of their own and move no more; neither shall the children of wickedness afflict them any more, as before time,” Now stop a minute. Has that happened yet? No. It still hasn’t happened. They’re still afflicted. They still are not in their real homeland under their own authoritarian king. This has been promised now for these thousands of years. You and I are living to see it, we feel, come to final fruition. Now reading on in verse 10:
II Samuel 7:10c-11a
“…neither shall the children of wickedness afflict them any more, as beforetime, 11. And as since the time that I commanded judges (Which, of course, was a few hundred years previous to this.) to be over my people Israel, and have caused thee to rest from all thine enemies,…”
Now remember who He’s talking to. He’s talking to King David. David had the throne and had the Kingdom up into it’s epitome of all of Israel’s history. We’re going to look at it again later, if we get there this afternoon, in Acts chapter 1 when the Twelve ask Jesus, “Will you at this time restore again the Kingdom?” Oh, what Kingdom? David’s! But also the same one we’ve been talking about and will talk about all afternoon – this 1,000 year reign of Israel’s Messiah over planet Earth. All right, go all the way back again to King David at about 1,000 B.C. in verse 11.
II Samuel 7:11
“And as since the time that I commanded judges to be over my people Israel, and have caused thee to rest from all thine enemies. (In other words, David finally achieved a period of peace.) Also the LORD telleth thee that he will make thee an house.” Now, I always have to stop and qualify. What kind of a house are we talking about? Not a building of sand and stone and steel, but a genetic house, rather a bloodline house—a Royal House.
I always go back and rehearse, especially in Europe, the families of Europe’s Royalty. All are named as a “house.” You remember, the House of Orange was the Netherlands. Great Britain still has the House of Windsor. Austria had the House of the Hapsburgs. But what was it? It wasn’t a “house.” It was family. The House of Windsor has provided the Kings and Queens and Princes for England for hundreds of years.
All right, God is doing the same thing now with Israel. He is setting up a royal family. And who’s going to be the beginning of it? King David. And that’s why when everybody referred to Christ and His Earthly Kingdom—He’s going to sit on whose throne? David’s! Because that’s when all of these royal house promises began. So He says:
II Samuel 7:11b-12
“…he will make thee an house. 12. And when thy days be fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will set up thy seed after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will establish his (What’s the word again?) kingdom.” Now, who are we talking about? Solomon. Solomon was the next in line. It wasn’t only that He was building an earthly kingdom for that period of time, but in the long view, in the big picture, he was in that royal family that would lead all the way up to Matthew and the coming of the real King.
II Samuel 7:13
“He shall build am house for my name, (And again, it’s referring primarily to the royal family rather than the temple of stone and so forth. He’s going to be second in line, now, of this royal bloodline. And God says–) and I will establish the throne of his kingdom for ever.” In other words, we know that after the 1,000 years has run its course, this kingdom is going to slip right on into eternity, under different circumstances of course, but it’s not going to end with the 1,000 years.
All right, then you come on down to verse 14. In the interval, while Israel is waiting for this glorious King and Kingdom, they’re going to go through some trials and tribulations, as we well know they have for the last 2,000 years or more, verse 14:
II Samuel 7:14
“I will be his father, and he shall be my son. (You see that relationship between God and Israel?) If he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men:”And goodness sakes, if you know anything about biblical history, did it happen? Why, over and over.
The one we’re the most acquainted with is the Babylonians. My, how Nebuchadnezzar came in and just literally slaughtered the Jewish people in Jerusalem and totally destroyed the Temple. He took all the Temple artifacts, whatever you want to call them, the gold and the silver back to Babylon. That’s all part of Israel’s history. And then, of course, the next awful occurrence was A.D. 70 when the Romans did the same thing all over again. They came in and slaughtered the people in Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple, and Israel was sent out into the dispersion. You go on up through history, and you come to Hitler’s Holocaust. And so it’s been, over and over in Israel’s history, a constant under the heavy boot of the Gentile world. But then verse 15, what’s the first word?
II Samuel 7:15-16
“But (Even though Israel is chastised and always for a reason, God didn’t do it because He enjoyed their misery. They deserved it. In spite of all of their chastisement and in spite of all of their problems, God says–) But my mercy shall not depart away from him, as (like when) I took it from Saul, whom I put away before thee. 16. And thine house (And again, I’m going to come back to the royal family.) and thy kingdom shall be established for ever before thee: thy throne (That is the place of rule and authority.) shall be established for ever.”
All right, this Kingdom, we’re going to chase it on up all the way through the Old Testament. Everything, especially when you get to the prophets, is talking about the preparation of the Nation of Israel for this coming Kingdom. Now, let’s jump all the way up to Psalms chapter 2. Again, this is a chapter that most of you are well acquainted with. We use it quite often, because I like to use it as an outline of the Old Testament program. We can look back and see how it was fulfilled to the very jot and tittle. And that’s the beauty of prophecy. That’s the beauty of this Book. No other book on Earth can do that – foretell the future thousands and thousands of years and then have it fulfilled exactly.
Psalms 2:1
“Why do the heathen (the Gentile world, the non-Jewish world) rage, and the people (Israel) imagine a vain thing?” See, you’ve got to remember. So far as Scripture is concerned, on the one hand we’ve got two groups of people. Who are they? Jew and Gentile.
Then on the other hand we’ve got two groups of people – lost and saved. But in this chapter, we’re talking about Jew and Gentile. The heathen which are Gentiles, and then the other half of the verse is a reference to the Nation of Israel. Here they are now—the whole human race in those two categories of Jew and Gentile. Verse 2:
Psalm 2:2
“The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers (that is of Israel) take counsel (What’s the next word?) together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying,” Don’t ever let anyone put all the blame for the crucifixion on just the Jew. The whole world is guilty of the crucifixion, because they consorted together.
Psalms 2:2b-3a
“…and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying, (Of course, the Anointed in Scripture is always a reference to the Messiah, Jesus, the Christ, the Son.) 3. Let us(Jew and Gentile) break their…”
Now here again I like the little intricacies of Scripture. Why a plural pronoun in a reference to the Godhead? Because God is Three in One, so it’s a plural pronoun. And you’ll see that all the way back into Genesis chapter 1 verse 26. This is just a fact of Scripture that we have a plurality in the Godhead. Even though Deuteronomy 6:4 says, “Hear O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD,” yet that One God is made up of the Three: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. All right, now in Genesis chapter 1 verse 26 at the creation of Adam, we have the same use of the plural pronoun as in Psalms chapter 2. And it’s for the simple reason that God is Triune.
Genesis 1:26a
“And God said, Let (What’s the pronoun?) us (Well, come on you English grammars, us is a singular or a plural? Plural. It’s not singular. But yet the word God is singular. Us—well, it’s just a complete picture of His plurality in the Godhead.) make man in our image,…” Not my image, see that? And, again, it’s a reference to the plurality.
That’s all I wanted you to see. All right, come back to Psalms chapter 2. We have the same thing. This same God is speaking, but when they respond in verse 3, humanity says:
Psalms 2:3-4
“Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us. (Not his, but their. All right, now verse four. We’re back to the singular.) 4. He (God) that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision.” It’s not a laugh of entertainment. It’s a laugh of derision, a laugh of scorn to think that they can stand up against the God of creation. Well, God says, I’ll show you a thing or two. And, of course, we’re still waiting. But it’s coming.
Then, after they have rejected the Messiah; they’ve crucified Him. And they have no remorse over it whatsoever. Then verse 5 says:
Psalms 2:5
“Then shall he (God) speak unto them in his (What’s the next word?) wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure.” Now we’ve got the timeline on the board, don’t we? Here we are. We’ve come out of the Old Testament, and we’ve come all the way up to Christ’s earthly ministry. They’ve crucified Him, and He’s ascended back to Glory.
Now, according to all the Old Testament prophecies, with no inkling whatsoever of this period of time we are now in—where God is calling out the Gentile Body of Christ by having faith in the finished work of the cross. These Old Testament prophets thought everything would be coming right on through one thing after another.
He’d been rejected, and He’s ascended. The next event on this Old Testament timeline is the wrath of the Tribulation, as we’ve been talking about it in the last several tapings now—that seven year period of time which we refer to as the Tribulation. Psalms 2 puts it so obvious that that’s the next event after the crucifixion. It was to be followed by the next great event, the Second Coming of Christ and the bringing in of this Kingdom that we’re talking about.
But of course, God stopped that upper timeline and brought in the one below. We’re still in that period of time waiting for the out-calling of the Church. Then will come the Tribulation, and then will come the King and the Kingdom.
All right, back to Psalms chapter 2, so that you can see with your own eyes how perfectly true this prophecy in Psalms as a timeline is laid out.
Psalm 2:5-6
“Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure. (That’s the seven years that we’ve been talking about lately. And then what’s the next event? The King!) 6. Yet I have set my king upon my holy hill of Zion.” Now, whose throne was on Mt. Zion? David’s throne. So Christ will rule from Mt. Zion in Jerusalem.
Okay, I’ve only got one minute left. Let’s go over to Isaiah. Now, I’m not going to try to separate these four programs. We’ll just go as far as we can get. We’ll take the break, and we’ll come back. We’ll do that all afternoon. So, for you in television, you may have to wait until tomorrow morning, and then we’ll pick up where we left off yesterday. Okay, Isaiah chapter 2 verse 2, and this is as far as we’re going to get in this program. All got it?
Isaiah 2:2
“And it shall come to pass (It hasn’t yet, but it will.) in the last days, that the mountain (or the kingdom) of the LORD’S house shall be established in the top of the mountains (kingdoms), and shall be exalted above the hills; and (This is going to be such a great and glorious Kingdom that the last part of the verse says–) all the nations will (What?) flow into it.”
In other words Jerusalem is going to be the Capital of the World, and all the nations of the world will funnel all of their business as well as their faith relationships into the city of Jerusalem.