BECOMING A NATION AND A KINGDOM

 Excerpted from: The Unfaithful Bride & The Faithful Groom

One of the hardest things for any Christian is to come to the full realization that God has set us free from sin and Satan’s dominion. Christians have been set free from sin, Satan, and self. As Christians we have become new creations as part of God’s new creation. We are no longer slaves. We have been
translated out of Satan’s kingdom of darkness and into God’s kingdom of light. “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (Col. 1:13-14). However, even though we have been set free, we find the concept of our freedom, yes, the concept of freedom itself, really hard to understand. Why is this? It is because we are so used to being slaves. It is like the prisoner who has served his time after decades in prison. He has been used to all the regularities of prison: when to rise, when to sleep, when to wash, when to eat etc. He has been institutionalized. Thus, freedom has become an alien concept to him.

After being set free from slavery, Israel spent forty years wandering around in the wilderness being reprogrammed by God regarding their new-found freedom. Many yearned to be back in captivity, remembering the food and so forth. Thus, like much of the seed in the Parable of the Sower, many fell by the wayside and perished. However, we see this mostly new group of people, offspring of those set free from captivity in Egypt, cross the Jordan into the Promised Land to become a nation and a kingdom, yes, a kingdom that will never end.

All the way through the Bible, even with Christians today, we see this “slave syndrome” manifest itself amongst God’s people in a variety of different ways. It is simply Satan, our old prison-keeper, our old jailor, reminding us of how good we used to have it while in captivity. We shouldn’t, but we still tremble when we hear his footsteps or his voice calling us or the keys jingle on his keychain. Though our old master may make us shudder, we must not fear him, for we have a new and kinder Master. Surely Luther knew what we speak of here:

Did we in our own strength confide,
 our striving would be losing,
 were not the right Man on our side,
 the Man of God’s own choosing.
 You ask who that may be?
 Christ Jesus, it is He;
 Lord Sabaoth His name,
 from age to age the same;
 and He must win the battle.

And though this world, with devils filled,
 should threaten to undo us,
 we will not fear, for God has willed
 His  truth to triumph through us.
 The prince of darkness grim,
 we tremble not for him;
 his rage we can endure,
 for lo! his doom is sure;
 one little word shall fell him.[1]

As we walk around in Christ’s kingdom of light here on earth, reclaiming everything that the usurper Satan has stolen, we must not fear him. We must be aware of his wiles. For, “Satan disguises himself as an angel of light” (2 Cor. 11:14b). Israel in the Promised Land needed to learn this, and sadly, so still does Christ’s kingdom and Church on earth today.

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[1] Martin Luther, A Mighty Fortress, English translation of ‘Ein’ Feste Burg’.