Daniel 7:13-14 English Standard Version

The Son of Man Is Given Dominion

13 “I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him.
14  And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.

Yesterday we talked about Jesus preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God. Here is the one prophetic message that upset the religious leaders of His day. When Jesus came into the temple and threw out the merchants He literally overturned the applecart. He declared in Matthew 21:13 He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers.” 

Jesus took on the responsibility for cleaning out His Temple. 

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

Scholars estimate Jesus fulfilled over 300 Old Testament prophecies. Some believe it could be as high as 400. This makes His life, death, and resurrection truly remarkable. (SOH Church)

There are so many prophecies concerning Jesus that it is difficult to pick just one to begin with but I chose the Son of Man prophecy from Daniel because it ties in directly with the promise of an everlasting Kingdom. This one prophet keeps the most important promise that God has made. We can have eternal life if we can enter His Kingdom.

Is it just that simple? Can we enter this Kingdom by just hearing and believing the “good news”?

Yes.

As was stated yesterday, there are four gospels with many words that Jesus spoke and many acts that He performed. We have to take it all in to discover just how and why it works.

Trust the God that keeps His prophetic promises.

Luke 4:18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed,”

With these words Jesus announces the beginning of His ministry. He does not define the meaning of “good news”. He does however identify His audience, the poor, the captives, the blind and the oppressed.

Matthew 4:23

Jesus Ministers to Great Crowds

And he went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people.

This passage indicates where Jesus went to declare the good news, but in this passage the word gospel is used, the gospel of a kingdom. Along with those words came the healing of every affliction.

Vine’s defines it this way. Gospel (Noun and Verb: to Preach):

originally denoted a reward for good tidings; later, the idea of reward dropped, and the word stood for “the good news” itself. The Eng. word “gospel,” i.e. “good message,” is the equivalent of euangelion (Eng., “evangel”). In the NT it denotes the “good tidings” of the Kingdom of God and of salvation through Christ, to be received by faith, on the basis of His expiatory death, His burial, resurrection, and ascension,

When we look at the words “good news” as just a proclamation apart from the acts that accompany His Word, then we ignore the larger part of the power of His Gospel to change lives for the better, a removal of afflictions. He changes lives.

At this point we have jumped forward from just delivering a proclamation to the acts of an evangelical message that takes in all the words and works of Jesus. It can be a wondrous thing to know it all and believe it all but in doing that we might overwhelm those who are hearing it for the first time.

In consideration of order, for God is a God of order, let us address first whose words we preach and why those words should be considered life changing.

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me.” He is the one the prophets promised.