4-16-2017 Weekly Message

Meditations on this week: Psalm 8: 1-9

Text: Acts 1: 3-11

The title of the book: A Great Sign Followed By The Resurrection Of The Lord Jesus Christ

           To the Jewish religious leaders who seek visible miracles, Jesus said that he would give them only one sign. He said that they are the evil and adulterous generation toward those who seek other signs.

         Just as Jonah was in the whale’s  belly three days and three nights, so shall the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth, three days and three nights.

” An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas:  For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.  The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here. “(Matthew 12: 39-41)

       Even in this generation,  religious people who have not met the Lord Jesus Christ have gathered in the church and have been glad to see miracles that are visible, and  to see and see such miracles continuously. The Lord has told  that the signs people want to see are different from those he wants to show.

         Though many religious people still rejoice shouting Hallelujah while they look at the things that are healing or casting out demons, but our Lord Jesus wants them to be aware of the prophecies of Christ in the Bible to see Jesus standing before them as the Messiah of Israel, He wanted  to show a sign that He is the God himself who appeared on earth to save them so that they may believe on him to have eternal life.

          As Jonah came out of the whale’s belly on the third day and resurrected, he went to Nineveh and preached the message of repentance saying forty days later, the city would fall.  Jesus also  on the third day came out of hell like a whale’s belly,  and He had stayed in the world and preached about the kingdom of God forty days. In other words, he preached, unless anyone who  repent, believe in him to enter the kingdom of God,  he would be destroyed.. The Ninevites of Assyria, who were the most outrageous people in the world at that time, repented hearing the preaching of Jonah, but the Jewish religious people did not believe in Jesus even though he was standing before them. Because they did not repent, they shall be judged by the Ninerveh  at the time of judgment saith by the Lord Jesus. .

             The Lord said that the only sign that he shows to sinners on earth is that Jonah was the sign of Christ that  died and buried because of the sins of the world and then resurrected on the third day. In other words, whosoever  hears the signs of the preached Christ, confesses him as the Lord, and accepts them faithfully, he will someday see the signs that the body will die and be buried, but will rise again like the Lord.

           The apostle Matthew testified about the death of Jesus and the miraculous sign of the resurrection:

” Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost. And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many. “(Matthew 27: 50-53)

         As to this sign, not only Matthew but also the centurion of Rome and the soldiers who kept Jesus in the tomb, when they saw the sign they saw, were greatly afraid, saying, “Yea, this man was the Son of God.” “The testimony of the Jews, Matthew and the Gentile Romans, testified that the sign of Jonah that the Lord showed was true.

         Many of the Old Testament saints who died under the law in the Old Testament times and fell asleep in Abraham’s bosom were resurrected and walked out of the tomb into the holy city and showed them who they were. When the Lord said that there was nothing to show except for the sign of Jonah, his bloodshed when he died as Jonah, waiting for their Messiah under the law, washing the saints who fell asleep in the grave, is,

          Many of the Old Testament saints who fell asleep after the resurrection of the Lord entered the kingdom of God first in heaven, as He spoke of the kingdom of God as He was staying forty days after His resurrection.

           That is correct! The Lord Jesus Christ, like Jonah, posted three days and three nights in the heart of the earth and resurrected on the third day to establish the kingdom of God in heaven and on earth. The kingdom cannot come in the place where sin and death curses. The world’s kingdoms still exist because it is the world dominated by Satan, who brought sin, death, and curse.

        In order for God to build up the kingdom of God in heaven and on earth, it was necessary to remove the sin, death, and curse of the whole world. Because of this, Jesus, the only begotten Son of God, appeared in the world to destroy the devil that brought sin, death, and curse (1 John 3: 8, Hebrews 2:14) In order to destroy the devil, he had to overcome the devil, and by resurrection he  overcame the devil who has  the power of death.

          The Lord says of his resurrection and the kingdom of God,

 ” The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it” (Luke 16:16)

         After resurrection,  the Lord Jesus spoke of the kingdom of God to the apostles, and then they immediately thought of the coming of the kingdom of Christ in Israel, and asked, “Lord, will you restore the kingdom to Israel at this time?” . By that time, they did not know that the Gospel of Christ shall be  preached to the Gentiles, and that the Jews or Gentiles who believe in the gospel would be pushed into the kingdom of God.

           That is correct! As Jonah went out again into Nineveh and preached repentance, from their king even to beasts  repented even , whosoever they receive the Holy Ghost in the name of Jesus, they shall also repent like Nineveh, Many Jews and Greeks who accepted the preaching of the apostles who received the power of the Holy Spirit after Pentecost the Holy Spirit came to repent and enter into the kingdom of God by the promise of the Holy Spirit.

             Since then for twenty years,  whosoever believes the gospel of Christ upon hearing the gospel preached, is still entering the kingdom of God, whether they are the Jew or the Gentiles without  discrimination . Until the day when  the Lord appears in the air and our body is resurrected, this kingdom of God is in the body of the newly born Saints, but on the day of Christ’s coming, we shall enter into the kingdom of God in heaven like the saints of the  Old Testaments.

             For those who enter the kingdom of God spiritually, the Lord has built church on the Rock that is Himself, making them members of his body, giving them the power and gifts of the Holy Spirit to serve one another, and to preach the gospel out to the world so that still many people to be pushed into the kingdom of God. Amen! Hallelujah!