I will warn you
ahead of time – the following joke stinks. It’s about two skunks. One was named
‘In’ and the other named ‘Out.’ When Out was in, In was out, and when Out was
out, In was in. One day Out was in and In was out, and Mother Skunk said, “Out,
I want you to go out and bring In in.” Out quickly obeyed and went out and
almost immediately returned with In. Mother Skunk was amazed and exclaimed,
“Out, how did you do that so quickly?” Out said, “It was easy. In stinked.” I
tried to warn you it stunk!
Let’s talk for
a moment about “getting in” – in Christ that is. More specifically, getting
into Christ’s kingdom, the church. But first, note that by the time the apostle
Paul wrote Colossians (about A. D. 61-62), he could remind those Christians
that God the Father “has delivered us from the power of darkness and translated
us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through
His blood, the forgiveness of sins” (Colossians 1:13-14). First century
Christians at Colossee were already in Christ’s kingdom. Those who insist Jesus
is someday coming back to “set up His kingdom” may be sincere – but they are
2,000 (and
counting) years too late to be accurate. While on earth,
Jesus asserted the kingdom was “at hand” or “near” (Matthew 4:17; 10:7). It was
not just near but here by the time of Colossians 1:13!
Now, back to
how to get into Christ’s kingdom, the church. In Matthew 16:19, after Jesus
promised He would build His church based upon the fact that He was, as Peter
had just confessed, “the Son of the living God” (vs 16), Jesus told Peter, “I
will give to you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on
earth will be bound in heaven, and what you loose on earth will be loosed in
heaven.” That the keys were not solely in Peter’s hands is seen a short while
later in Matthew 18:18 when Jesus uses very similar language in addressing and
granting to all the apostles authority to bind and loose. Jesus designated
Peter and the other apostles as the door and gate-keepers of His kingdom, the
church! Their teaching, inspired and guided by the Holy Spirit, would become
the determining factor in whether or not people entered into Christ’s kingdom. That’s
why we read later that the first Christians “continued steadfastly in the
apostles’ doctrine” (Acts 2:42); that the apostles are the “foundation” of the
household of God with Jesus Himself the chief cornerstone (Ephesians 2:20);
that the wall of God’s heavenly city, the New Jerusalem, as seen by the apostle
John, “had twelve foundations, and on them were the names of the twelve
apostles of the Lamb” (Revelation 21:14). Peter and the other apostles used the
keys Jesus gave them to open the door to the kingdom of God for the very first
time in Acts 2:38ff. In the first gospel sermon ever preached under the Great
Commission, they told believing Jews to “repent, and let every one of you be
baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins” (vs 38). About
3,000 did just that and entered the church that day (vs 41; cf. vs 47). Peter
used the keys in Acts 10 to open the door for Gentiles to enter the church when
he taught and baptized Cornelius and others at Caesarea. Read Acts and witness
the apostles using the keys Christ gave them to admit multitudes of Jews and
Gentiles all over the Roman Empire into
Christ’s kingdom / church. All who heard the gospel and obeyed it were admitted (Acts 2:47; 6:7). The same keys still admit
us into the same kingdom / church they were in! Are you in it?
Think about it.
-- by Dan
Gulley, Smithville, TN
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