Tarrying Time in Galilee

137:8.1On Sab­bath, June 22, shortly be­fore they went out on their first preach­ing tour and about ten days af­ter John’s im­pris­on­ment, Je­sus oc­cu­pied the syn­a­gogue pul­pit for the sec­ond time since bring­ing his apos­tles to Ca­per­naum.

137:8.2A few days be­fore the preach­ing of this ser­mon on “The King­dom,” as Je­sus was at work in the boat­shop, Pe­ter brought him the news of John’s ar­rest. Je­sus laid down his tools once more, re­moved his apron, and said to Pe­ter: “The Fa­ther’s hour has come. Let us make ready to pro­claim the gospel of the king­dom.”

137:8.3Je­sus did his last work at the car­pen­ter bench on this Tues­day, June 18, A.D. 26. Pe­ter rushed out of the shop and by midafter­noon had rounded up all of his as­so­ciates, and leav­ing them in a grove by the shore, he went in quest of Je­sus. But he could not find him, for the Mas­ter had gone to a dif­fer­ent grove to pray. And they did not see him un­til late that evening when he re­turned to Zeb­e­dee’s house and asked for food. The next day he sent his brother James to ask for the priv­i­lege of speak­ing in the syn­a­gogue the com­ing Sab­bath day. And the ruler of the syn­a­gogue was much pleased that Je­sus was again will­ing to con­duct the ser­vice.

137:8.4Be­fore Je­sus preached this mem­o­rable ser­mon on the king­dom of God, the first pre­ten­tious ef­fort of his pub­lic ca­reer, he read from the Scrip­tures these pas­sages: “You shall be to me a king­dom of priests, a holy peo­ple. Yah­weh is our judge, Yah­weh is our law­giver, Yah­weh is our king; he will save us. Yah­weh is my king and my God. He is a great king over all the earth. Lov­ing-kind­ness is upon Is­rael in this king­dom. Blessed be the glory of the Lord for he is our King.”

137:8.5When he had fin­ished read­ing, Je­sus said:

137:8.6“I have come to pro­claim the es­tab­lish­ment of the Fa­ther’s king­dom. And this king­dom shall in­clude the wor­ship­ing souls of Jew and gen­tile, rich and poor, free and bond, for my Fa­ther is no re­specter of per­sons; his love and his mercy are over all.

137:8.7“The Fa­ther in heaven sends his spirit to in­dwell the minds of men, and when I shall have fin­ished my work on earth, like­wise shall the Spirit of Truth be poured out upon all flesh. And the spirit of my Fa­ther and the Spirit of Truth shall es­tab­lish you in the com­ing king­dom of spir­i­tual un­der­stand­ing and di­vine righ­teous­ness. My king­dom is not of this world. The Son of Man will not lead forth armies in bat­tle for the es­tab­lish­ment of a throne of power or a king­dom of worldly glory. When my king­dom shall have come, you shall know the Son of Man as the Prince of Peace, the rev­e­la­tion of the ev­er­last­ing Fa­ther. The chil­dren of this world fight for the es­tab­lish­ment and en­large­ment of the king­doms of this world, but my dis­ci­ples shall en­ter the king­dom of heaven by their moral de­ci­sions and by their spirit vic­to­ries; and when they once en­ter therein, they shall find joy, righ­teous­ness, and eter­nal life.

137:8.8“Those who first seek to en­ter the king­dom, thus be­gin­ning to strive for a no­bil­ity of char­ac­ter like that of my Fa­ther, shall pres­ently pos­sess all else that is need­ful. But I say to you in all sin­cer­ity: Un­less you seek en­trance into the king­dom with the faith and trust­ing de­pen­dence of a lit­tle child, you shall in no wise gain ad­mis­sion.

137:8.9“Be not de­ceived by those who come say­ing here is the king­dom or there is the king­dom, for my Fa­ther’s king­dom con­cerns not things vis­i­ble and ma­te­rial. And this king­dom is even now among you, for where the spirit of God teaches and leads the soul of man, there in re­al­ity is the king­dom of heaven. And this king­dom of God is righ­teous­ness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.

137:8.10“John did in­deed bap­tize you in to­ken of re­pen­tance and for the re­mis­sion of your sins, but when you en­ter the heav­enly king­dom, you will be bap­tized with the Holy Spirit.

137:8.11“In my Fa­ther’s king­dom there shall be nei­ther Jew nor gen­tile, only those who seek per­fec­tion through ser­vice, for I de­clare that he who would be great in my Fa­ther’s king­dom must first be­come server of all. If you are will­ing to serve your fel­lows, you shall sit down with me in my king­dom, even as, by serv­ing in the simil­i­tude of the crea­ture, I shall pres­ently sit down with my Fa­ther in his king­dom.

137:8.12“This new king­dom is like a seed grow­ing in the good soil of a field. It does not at­tain full fruit quickly. There is an in­ter­val of time be­tween the es­tab­lish­ment of the king­dom in the soul of man and that hour when the king­dom ripens into the full fruit of ev­er­last­ing righ­teous­ness and eter­nal sal­va­tion.

137:8.13“And this king­dom which I de­clare to you is not a reign of power and plenty. The king­dom of heaven is not a mat­ter of meat and drink but rather a life of pro­gres­sive righ­teous­ness and in­creas­ing joy in the per­fect­ing ser­vice of my Fa­ther who is in heaven. For has not the Fa­ther said of his chil­dren of the world, ‘It is my will that they should even­tu­ally be per­fect, even as I am per­fect.’

137:8.14“I have come to preach the glad tid­ings of the king­dom. I have not come to add to the heavy bur­dens of those who would en­ter this king­dom. I pro­claim the new and bet­ter way, and those who are able to en­ter the com­ing king­dom shall en­joy the di­vine rest. And what­ever it shall cost you in the things of the world, no mat­ter what price you may pay to en­ter the king­dom of heaven, you shall re­ceive many­fold more of joy and spir­i­tual prog­ress in this world, and in the age to come eter­nal life.

137:8.15“En­trance into the Fa­ther’s king­dom waits not upon march­ing armies, upon over­turned king­doms of this world, nor upon the break­ing of cap­tive yokes. The king­dom of heaven is at hand, and all who en­ter therein shall find abun­dant lib­erty and joy­ous sal­va­tion.

137:8.16“This king­dom is an ev­er­last­ing do­min­ion. Those who en­ter the king­dom shall as­cend to my Fa­ther; they will cer­tainly at­tain the right hand of his glory in Par­a­dise. And all who en­ter the king­dom of heaven shall be­come the sons of God, and in the age to come so shall they as­cend to the Fa­ther. And I have not come to call the would-be righ­teous but sin­ners and all who hunger and thirst for the righ­teous­ness of di­vine per­fec­tion.

137:8.17“John came preach­ing re­pen­tance to pre­pare you for the king­dom; now have I come pro­claim­ing faith, the gift of God, as the price of en­trance into the king­dom of heaven. If you would but be­lieve that my Fa­ther loves you with an in­fi­nite love, then you are in the king­dom of God.”

137:8.18When he had thus spo­ken, he sat down. All who heard him were as­ton­ished at his words. His dis­ci­ples mar­veled. But the peo­ple were not pre­pared to re­ceive the good news from the lips of this God-man. About one third who heard him be­lieved the mes­sage even though they could not fully com­pre­hend it; about one third pre­pared in their hearts to re­ject such a purely spir­i­tual con­cept of the ex­pected king­dom, while the re­main­ing one third could not grasp his teach­ing, many truly be­liev­ing that he “was be­side him­self.”