Living the Kingdom Life

Sent Series - Week 2

Luke 24:36-49

Sent is intentional. Sent is with a purpose and a plan, and you are sent to live the Kingdom life. Expound.

Ever wonder why the plan for the time after the resurrection was days instead of hours, minutes or seconds. Expound

Summary: God has truly employed us and empowered us to live the Kingdom life in and for Him. We must embrace the gospel in its fullness and be who and what God has called and created us to be.

A big tool that is at work in our minds against our being successful and victorious as Christians is the work of doubt. We doubt and question so many things that God has said. We are naturally a show me/prove it people.

The disciples were no different. Even when Jesus Himself appeared to them after His resurrection, they doubted in their own hearts. Jesus confronted the doubt and uncertainty in their hearts and minds however by speaking a word of reassurance, comfort and promise.

Luke 24:36–49 NLT

36 And just as they were telling about it, Jesus himself was suddenly standing there among them. “Peace be with you,” he said. 37 But the whole group was startled and frightened, thinking they were seeing a ghost! 38 “Why are you frightened?” he asked. “Why are your hearts filled with doubt? 39 Look at my hands. Look at my feet. You can see that it’s really me. Touch me and make sure that I am not a ghost, because ghosts don’t have bodies, as you see that I do.” 40 As he spoke, he showed them his hands and his feet. 41 Still they stood there in disbelief, filled with joy and wonder. Then he asked them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” 42 They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43 and he ate it as they watched. 44 Then he said, “When I was with you before, I told you that everything written about me in the law of Moses and the prophets and in the Psalms must be fulfilled.” 45 Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. 46 And he said, “Yes, it was written long ago that the Messiah would suffer and die and rise from the dead on the third day. 47 It was also written that this message would be proclaimed in the authority of his name to all the nations, beginning in Jerusalem: ‘There is forgiveness of sins for all who repent.’ 48 You are witnesses of all these things. 49 “And now I will send the Holy Spirit, just as my Father promised. But stay here in the city until the Holy Spirit comes and fills you with power from heaven.”

1. Jesus brings clarity of mind and understanding concerning the things of the Kingdom.

a. The gospel of the Kingdom is not an easy, feel-good message. The gospel is bloody. The gospel involves death.

b. Jesus Christ really did die on a cross.

c. The message of the kingdom is not a message of forgiveness only, but of forgiveness by repentance.

d. If we do not repent, we are not forgiven. In order to repent, we must obey and submit to the authority of Christ and forsake the sin in our lives.

e. The “just take this and leave out that gospel” is not the gospel of God.

f. Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation. Anyone who does not repent of their sins and follow Him in their lives will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

2. Jesus employs us in the work of the Kingdom.

a. The believer has been employed by God to share the true message of the gospel with the world.

b. Believers do not have the right or privilege to share their own version of the gospel with a desire to be peaceful or “loving”.

c. IT IS AND ALWAYS WILL REMAIN THAT ONLY THE TRUTH WILL SET PEOPLE FREE.

d. Jesus uses some rather harsh words in dealing with those who distort or water down the gospel.

Matthew 23:15 NKJV

15 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.

e. The message of the Kingdom is not always a popular one, but it is always right.

f. If we truly love those who are lost we will tell them the truth.

3. Jesus promises empowerment for the work of the kingdom.

a. The beauty of the Kingdom is that not only have we been employed by God, He has also given us His Spirit to empower us to do what He has employed us for.

b. The believer who longs to fulfill the calling to which God has called him will find his job much easier when he is fully and properly empowered.

c. Imagine the absurd idea of hiring a carpenter but telling him he couldn’t use any tools. Or, what about sending a soldier to the front lines of battle without a single weapon. This is the picture of trying to effectively perform the work of the Kingdom without the empowerment of the Holy Spirit.

d. Jesus told the disciples to wait to do their work as witnesses until they were clothed with power from on high.

e. This power was first poured out upon them on the Day of Pentecost and it is still being poured out upon hungry and willing believers today.

f. The initial physical evidence of this empowering from on high is speaking in tongues, but it really goes much beyond that.

g. We have made a religion out of speaking in tongues, but the importance is the power of God that comes with the Holy Spirit.

h. The empowerment of the Holy Spirit is the power from on high that enables the believer to effectively live for and serve God in a manner that is a demonstration of the Kingdom of God on earth now.

Closing: Woe vs Life vs Woe - Louie Gigli

Isaiah 6:1–7 NKJV

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple. Above it stood seraphim; each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one cried to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; The whole earth is full of His glory!” And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke. So I said: “Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, The Lord of hosts.” Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth with it, and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; Your iniquity is taken away, And your sin purged.”

John 3:16–17 (NLT)

“For this is how God loved the world: He gave* his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him.

This is so much more than a poster at a ballgame, but for many that is all it is

Matthew 23:15 NKJV

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.