Your Kingdoms and the Coming King

Camino Chronicles. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to today's Camino Chronicle as I'm back (laughs) after a couple weeks of actually being on the Camino del Norte in Spain. I had a wonderful time with two of my granddaughters and survived the 105 degree heat wave. Oh my goodness. For today's Camino Chronicle, I want to declare to you, a king is coming. Now, I've been saying that a king is coming for quite a while, and I get mostly blank stares. Look, I- I'm not trying to pick a fight. I- I'm not trying to sound weird, but I am alarmed by the indifference, not- not just in the, in the world, but especially in the Church. People seem so dominated by their own lives, uh, all the tasks of the day, all the concerns for family and health or, or whatever, that being concerned about Jesus' return isn't given much attention. Excuse me. Sort of like the cry wolf story. So, it gets forgotten. Look, I get it. We are all self-centered. We're all self-concerned, self-absorbed, selfish people. Even when we try to be other centered because of how we, we have to do that, we want to be in charge. I want to offer you a new way of looking at this subject. Not only is the king coming, according to the Bible, but this king is going to set up, establish, and rule his kingdom. Excuse me. But I get ahead of myself. We Americans don't think well of the idea of a king. We fought a revolution to get free from one, and we act like we don't have a king over us now. (laughs) Saturday is July 4th, and for us Americans, it's our Independence Day. That alone should give you pause. Are you really independent today, or do you realize that you do need some help? If a kingdom is the realm of a king, well then what do we call our multiple governments? We have a national government and state government. We have county governments. We have city governments. We even have things like HOAs to rule over us, homeowners associations (laughs) ... gone wild. Now, look, I'm sure you can think of more, but businesses i- in our capitalist society surely establish kingdoms, as do all the nonprofits. I mean, even the churches are well-infused with internal government oversight. Hmm. Back in the Old Testament, there is the sad tale of a people who actually asked God to give them a king so that they could be (laughs) like the pagan nations around them. Now, the Lord was wanting to be their king, but they rejected Him as such, and they even wanted to do away with His government of them by what were called the judges. Well, so God gave them over to human kings. Now, what follows is the record. History tells us how it went. There were some good kings and... with things going better, but there were so many bad kings that the people grew to despise their situation. I- it's interesting to me that when things are going well for us, w- we tend to ignore the Lord. Then when things go badly, especially if they go very badly, th- the people rent their clothes, they try to repent, they get fervent in their prayers for deliverance and help. All of this history, of course, set up the first coming of Jesus Christ, the New Testament, and the record of God's amazing grace as the Bible unfolds for us some information about what is to come. Well, what is coming? A king is coming, a king who will rule and reign supremely, sovereignly over his domain, which will include, well, everything. (laughs) Before we try to understand this king or his coming or his kingdom, let's go back and look again at what a kingdom is and see if you are part of one or, or have a kingdom of your own. I mean, how many kingdoms can you think of? Is your home your castle? Is your business or your job set up as a kingdom? Are your sports teams not kingdoms of their own? I mean, face it. You are surrounded by kingdoms, and you yourself spend a lot of time trying to establish your own kingdom. Your ideas of what is moral get defended by rules and regulations, laws, if you will, that you establish- Hmm. ... and are willing to submit to, which are the ways these kingdoms work. Town councils become kingdoms, as do our volunteer organizations, you know, like the Lion's Club. Your neighborhood associations are kingdoms. I mean, the list is almost endless. Think about hurt feelings as somehow your sense of what is right gets violated and how strongly you can defend your rights. Hmm. After all, this is America. All our political goings-on are simply kingdoms in conflict, each trying to win the day so that they can rule. You see, this is a reality, that kingdoms exist, and that we not only participate in them, excuse me, but we often get into emotional blowouts by some perfe- perceived kingdom offense. The human way seems to be universally structured to establishing and maintaining kingdoms everywhere. This actually gets me very excited because as I look at history and all the failures of the human way, and then read about Jesus Christ who will come again to this planet and establish His kingdom, His rule, well, come on. It's (laughs) it's going to be supernaturally better than the way we're running the place. (laughs) It's gonna be so good, the enemy doesn't even want me to give this message. (laughs) The Bible is very clear. A king is coming, and we're told to be ready for him. Folks, I look forward to sharing more about this with you in coming Camino Chronicles, so stay tuned. The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life, which should make us who are concerned about kingdoms ask, "Which way, what truth, and what kind of life?" Wow. What sort of kingdom will it be? Wow. Come soon, Lord Jesus. Pastor Skip, signing off.