ABOUT THE BOOK
  The Mystery of the Kingdom is a virtual “Christianity 101, and is truly MUST-READING for every believer!” It puts the entire “big picture” of the Christian experience and life into proper perspective, as well as answers many common questions regarding God and the Kingdom of God. Its subtitle, Bearing Kingdom Fruit, reflects the book’s ultimate message. The medium through which that message is conveyed—The Parable of the Sower—is what Jesus Himself indicated is the most important of all His Parables. In it, He delineates the four categories of hearers of the Word of God. According to the Parable, everyone who has ever heard the Word of God falls into one of these four categories, and thereby chooses their own future and eternal destiny. Dr. Lambert unveils in the volume the four-step path of progressive spiritual growth revealed in this “dark saying” of the Master. The most profound and intriguing “hidden pearl” inherent in the rich and ingenious Parable, however, is the spiritually appraised “secret” of how the entire Kingdom of God operates and how every believer can bear Kingdom fruit in his/her own life. And, indeed, as the book so clearly points out, the unequivocal message of Scripture is that bearing Kingdom fruit is not optional but absolutely imperative. The Mystery of the Kingdom offers definitive and straightforward answers to all these age-old questions—right out of the Word of God. By demystifying many of the conundrums of life, The Mystery of the Kingdom, will bring you new inward peace, rest, and faith, and in the process quench the psychological and emotional “fiery darts” with which the evil one assails all believers. It will also arm you with added “ammunition” for quelling the sometimes hostile questionings and criticisms of the unbelieving. The inspiring and empowering message unfurled upon the pages of The Mystery of the Kingdom is a tremendous evangelizing source.
Foreword

Mystery of the Kingdom

For days, the multitude followed Him all over the countryside, listening with amazement and awe to His authoritative oratory concerning something He called “The Kingdom of God,” and watching with astonishment as He wrought all sorts of incredible displays of supernatural power.

Then suddenly without warning He abruptly but unceremoniously withdraws from the fervor and retreats into solitude to fervently seek the face of His Father. Then just as suddenly and subtly, He reemerges onto the sandy shore of the Sea of Galilee. Immediately, the throng spot Him and scurry to reassemble before Him, pushing and shoving to get as close as possible, in eager anticipation of hearing more of the inspiring and wondrous yet authoritative words that had been flowing from His gracious lips, and of seeing with their own eyes more of the mighty miracles of healing and deliverance He had been performing.

For most, the latter was the overriding reason they had followed Him around for days of itinerating through the towns and villages of the “chosen nation,” rather than the revelatory and revolutionary teaching He had been dispensing at every juncture. To Him, however, the weightier matter was the message He was delivering rather than the miracles He was demonstrating. The latter merely punctuated and validated the former.

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Introduction

Mystery of the Kingdom

This entire world is about to be thrust into a chaotic period in which everything that can be shaken, will be. All the kingdoms of men shall be toppled, and in the midst of the rubble, another Kingdom shall rise up, a Kingdom of all majesty and glory — the Kingdom of God. For a brief time, the eyes of the world shall be upon this spectacular phenomenon, the exaltation of a people, a nation, what is called, “A Holy Nation,” the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing, a mighty throng, clothed in white garments, girded about with the Truth and the golden breastplate of righteousness, having the high-praises of God in their mouths and a two-edged sword in their hands.

Every former event and move of God throughout history shall be eclipsed by what is about to take place. The hearts of men everywhere shall be stirred, supernatural signs and wonders shall abound, the dead shall be raised, the captives set free, the blind shall see, the deaf shall hear, the lame and paralyzed shall walk, the diseased shall be healed, hoards of devils shall be cast out, and multitudes shall receive Everlasting Life and an enduement of supernatural power.

But, God is now orchestrating the prelude to this exaltation of the Church into “all her glory,” which is the prerequisite that she come to the place in which she has “no spot or wrinkle or any such thing.” To bring the Church to this place, God has begun to effect a kind of judgment of the Church, a period of judgment which must precede judgment of the world, for “judgment begins with the Household of God” (1 Pet. 4:17). However, this is not the kind of punitive judgment that will come upon the unbelieving world, but rather a judgment for purging, refining, and pruning, which God foretold He would bring upon the remnant of true believers:

“And it will come about in all the land,” declares the Lord, “that two parts in it will be cut off and perish; but the third will be left in it. And I will bring the third part through the fire, refine them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, and I will answer them; I will say, ‘They are my people,’ and they will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’” (Zech. 13:8,9)

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Chapter One

Mystery of the Kingdom

The Paramount Parable

The parable of the sower, upon which this book is based, may very well be the most important of all the parables of the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus indicated it was necessary to understand this parable in order to understand all His other parables: “Do you not understand this parable? And how will you understand all the parables?” (Mk. 4:13). This comment demonstrated the importance of this parable.

Why would this particular parable rank above all the others in importance?

The Law of Reciprocity

There are two major reasons this parable is so important. The first is that it is based upon one of the most important and fundamental Laws of the Kingdom of God — the Law of Sowing and Reaping, or the Law of Reciprocity. Simply defined, this Law provides that in due season one will reap what he has sown in multiplied return.

God established this Kingdom Law upon the Earth following the great flood at the time of Noah. Promising to never again destroy every living thing and to never again curse the ground, God established the Law of Sowing and Reaping, saying, “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest…shall not cease” (Gen. 8:21,22).

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Chapter Six Excerpt

Mystery of the Kingdom

Chapter Six (Excerpt Only)

Those Like Rocky Ground

Mark 4:5,6,16,17:
5 And other seed fell on the ROCKY GROUND where it did not have much soil; and immediately it sprang up because it had no depth of soil.
6 And after the sun had risen, it was scorched; and because it had no root, it withered away.
16 And in a similar way these are the ones on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy;
17 and they have no firm root in themselves, but are only temporary; then, when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately they fall away.

This portion of Jesus’ parable concerns the second category of hearers, who Jesus allegorically described as “rocky ground.” He indicated that the Word was not fruitful in the lives of these hearers because their hearts were like “rocky ground.”

Next to the seed itself, the most important element in agriculture is the soil. The soil is what the seed is actually implanted in. It is the incubator, or “womb,” if you will, in which the seed undergoes its gradual metamorphosis unto life. There are two factors regarding the condition of the soil that are crucial to successful crop production. The first one is the fertility and condition of the soil, and the other is the depth of the soil. There must be sufficient depth of soil to foster the development of a root system adequate to sustain the crop all the way through its development to full maturity. Otherwise, the crop will die before reaching maturity and fruition.

Jesus revealed in verse five of our text that not enough depth of soil was precisely the problem in the case of this category of hearers. Because the ground was “rocky ground” “it did not have much soil.” It did have some soil, enough to receive the seed implanted, but not enough to foster the development of a root system adequate to sustain the proper growth of the plant unto full maturity.

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Chapter Seven Excerpt

Mystery of the Kingdom

TEMPORARY BELIEVERS

The following is an excerpt of my book, The Mystery of the Kingdom, which is an exposition of what Jesus indicated was The Paramount Parable—The Parable of the Sower—meaning it was the most important of all His parables. It is The Paramount Parable because it reveals the keys to the “mystery of the kingdom” of God. This excerpt is of a chapter in which I examine the second category of hearers in the parable, who Jesus described as being “like rocky ground.” He went on to reveal that this category of hearers of the Word are only “temporary believers,” who “have no firm root in themselves, but are only temporary” (Mk. 4:17).

Luke’s account of this part of Jesus’ parable aptly describes their walk this way: “they believe for a while, and in time of temptation fall away” (Lk. 8:13). This is an extremely crucial statement in that Jesus Himself explicitly and definitively indicates that these people were indeed bona fide “believers” rather than bogus believers as proponents of “once saved always saved” Eternal Security doctrine allege. Jesus said, “they believe for a while,” which inherently means there came a time when they ceased being and living like a true believer, or saint. To argue otherwise is to call Jesus a liar. Likewise, to say these once bona fide believers did not subsequently fall away after having truly believed is to call Jesus a liar as well, for Jesus explicitly stated, “and in time of temptation (they) fall away.”

Unfortunately, there are many people today who are of this category of only temporary believers. There was a point at which they truly believed in and accepted the Gospel of Christ, and were thereby Born Again and saved. At first, they are willing to follow Jesus and obey His Word. But, later, when they began to meet with temptation (Lk. 8:13), afflictions, and persecutions (Mk. 4:17), these temporary believers fall away in their relationship with God.

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Chapter Nine Excerpt

Mystery of the Kingdom

Falling Away

Jesus specifically said that in the case of this second category of hearers: “…when affliction and persecution arises because of the word, immediately they fall away” (Mk. 4:17). According to Jesus, the result when they met with adversity after having believed is that ─ “immediately they fall away.” According to the doctrine of a number of Christian denominations today, this just cannot be so. Nevertheless, according to Jesus and God’s Word, it is immutably so.

Before going any further, some readers may note that the King James Version says they were “offended,” rather than that they fell away. However, this Elizabethan English usage does not accurately convey the intention of the original language. In the Greek, that word actually means to cause someone to stumble with the end result of falling. It is always used metaphorically to connote a falling away. Most translations other than the King James Version do indicate a falling away in this passage and others where the same Greek word is used.

There are a number of Christian denominations today who espouse what is commonly known as “the doctrine of eternal security.” Simply stated, this belief purports that once a person has made a verbal confession of Jesus Christ as his Savior, there is virtually no way he can ever lose his salvation or fall away, but that somehow, someway, God guarantees his eventual salvation; hence, that person’s salvation is “eternally secure.”

While I must say such an ideology would be extremely convenient, it is nonetheless quite unscriptural. Many people have used the auspices of this doctrine for license to continue in their sin and licentiousness under this false sense of “eternal security,” by which they are duped into believing they shall escape divine judgment for their deeds.

 

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Table of Contents

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About The Author

Steven Lambert

Steven Lambert, ThD, DMin (b. 1948) is a noted Pentecostal/Charismatic minister, Bible scholar, theologian, adjunct professor, counselor, publisher, Gospel Music singer, and prolific writer. His articles are published and republished on many websites. He is the founder/overseer of Ephesians Four Network of Churches & Ministers (www.ephesiansfour.net) and its subsidiary, Ephesians Four Network of Deliverance Counselors. He also founded and is the publisher of Spirit Life Magazine (www.spiritlifemag.com). His main website is www.slm.org.

Product Details
  • Length: 134 pages
  • Publisher: Real Truth Publications (July 29, 2012)
  • IBSN 1-887915-02-8

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by Steven Lambert | Real Truth Publications

The Mystery Of The Kingdom

By Steven Lambert

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