Keys to the Kingdom
So God gave people – men and women – the authority to rule over all creation. That was His great plan. He created this beautiful world and entrusted it to people to rule and enjoy.
But as you know, satan was jealous, and he tricked Eve into eating the forbidden fruit and in doing so he stole the ruling authority from Adam and Eve.
The Bible tells us that at that point, satan became …
... the “god” of this age (2 Corinthians 4:4) (NIV),
... the “ruler” of the kingdom of the air (Ephesians 2:2) (NIV)
So satan now ruled over the world. he not only ruled over the “fish and the birds and every living creature;” he also ruled over mankind as well.
satan was a cruel slave master, and people were his slaves, his possessions. He probably felt that he was strong enough to hold his possessions in bondage forever.
But he was wrong. In Luke chapter 21, Jesus compares satan to a “strong man,” and He tell us this:
When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are safe. But when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up his plunder. (Luke 11:21,22) (NIV)
In other words, satan was the strong man. He was fully armed, and he kept people – his possessions, his prisoners, his slaves - locked inside his invisible walls. But then Jesus came. And He was stronger than the strong man. Jesus was stronger than satan.
At the cross, Jesus attacked satan, overpowered satan, disarmed satan’s weapons, and set the captives free!!
Colossians 2 explains this beautifully:
He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross. (Colossians 2:13-15) (NIV)
Halleluiah!! On the cross, Jesus not only forgave our sins and cancelled the charges against us; he also overcame the devil and set the prisoners free!!
But what happened to the ruling authority? Jesus set us free but now where is the ruling authority? Who rules the world now?
Let’s read from Matthew 16:19. This is where Jesus told Peter:
I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. (NIV)
So here, He told Peter, “I will give you the keys,” in other words, the authority. So we see that Peter is going to get the keys… Peter will be the new ruler of the world. But wait just a minute. We’ll see that Peter’s not the only ruler- it gets so much better!
Later, after Jesus died, He gathered His disciples around Him on a mountain in Galilee, and He said this:
All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations…” (Matthew 28:18-19 NIV)
Jesus basically said, “I’ve been given authority, so go.” In other words, I took back the keys from the devil and I’m giving them to you now so run with them- open every door that you see!! Set every prisoner free!!
And did you notice that here, it’s not just Peter who gets the keys anymore- it’s all the disciples. And wait just another minute- it’s going to get even better than that! Ephesians 3:10 says:
His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms (NIV)
God’s intent is that the church will make something known…
That the church will send a very clear message to the invisible rulers in the spiritual realm….
What’s the message? That we, the church, have the power!!
Remember, who is the church? The church is the body of believers.
The Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance defines church as “… a Christian community of members on earth or saints in heaven or both…” (Strong 1983)
If you are a believer in Jesus, then you are a member of His church. And the church has been given authority by Jesus to rule over all of creation!! Halleluiah!!
The church has the keys to the Kingdom of God!! As Jesus said,
I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. (Matthew 16:18 NIV)
So again, here’s the path that the keys, the ruling authority, took:
God gave them to Adam and Eve and all mankind
satan stole them
Jesus won them back at the cross
Jesus gave them to us, the believers, His Church
Many times people wonder, “if there is a God, why does He let all these bad things happen?” Men and women have pondered and debated that question for years. Books and sermons and articles are written to try to explain that question. Some people look at all the evil in the world and they decide there is no God.
Other people realize this….
The world is a mess. There are wars and famines and pain and suffering and evil of all kinds. The world as a whole has no power over the devil. Who has the power? The church.
Only we- the church, the believers, have the power over the devil.
Legally, all authority now belongs to the church. The devil is still the strong man who wreaks havoc on the world, but the church is stronger than the strong man because Jesus gave us the keys!!!
We hold the keys, the authority, the power. If you are a Christian, this is very good news – it means that satan no longer has any power over you. he cannot make a mess of your life anymore. You hold the keys. Colossians 1 tells us to give…
joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. (Colossians 1:12) (NIV)
He has qualified you.
He has given you authority.
He has given you the keys to overcome the strongman; the keys to the kingdom of God.
How do you receive your keys, your authority, that Jesus has bought for you? Faith. You use your faith.
I like to paint a picture in my mind of the cross in an empty battlefield. (The cross is empty of course. Jesus has risen from the dead and He sits on a throne now in Heaven.)
So I like to imagine this empty cross, standing in the middle of a large battlefield. And there are no people there at all, but there are all these glittery, sparkly gifts scattered all over the field.
Thousands and thousands of sparkly gifts, and they each have a tag- one says salvation, another healing, another peace, joy, success, revival, deliverance….
These are our promises. And for every problem you could ever have, the answer is found in one of these promises. They were purchased by the blood and given to us at the cross.
So let’s say that you walk up to the one that you need, but to your dismay you see that it has a lock on it. This beautiful, sparkly gift that is exactly what you need to solve your problem doesn’t do you any good because you can’t open it up. It’s locked.
But then you realize something…
Not only did Jesus purchase these gifts for you at the cross, He also took back the keys to the Kingdom.
And, remember… where the keys are now? He gave them to the church. He gave them to you.
You hold the keys to all these sparkling gifts. I believe there’s a master key to all these promises, and it’s shaped like the cross. The cross is your master key to opening any gift that you need.
The next time the devil knocks you down, just remember the cross standing in the middle of that battlefield. Look around the battlefield until you find the promise that will bring you out of your mess. And then rise up in your faith, and say,
Thank you, Jesus, because of the cross, I have health
Because of the cross, I have success
Because of the cross, I have deliverance
Because of the cross, I have peace
Because of the cross, I have victory
Because of the cross, I have freedom
And when the devil reminds you of your mess, remind him that you hold the keys now, not him. he lost them at the cross.
And start thanking Jesus all over again. And again and again. Until when?
Until you have your answer.
That’s faith.
References
Strong, James. Strongs Exhaustive Concordance: Showing Every Word of the Text of the Common English Version of the Canonical Books, and Every Occurrence of Each Word in Regular Order, Together with Dictionaries of the Hebrew and Greek Words of the Original, with References to the English Words. Baker Book House, 1983.
Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, NIV Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.www.zondervan.com. The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.
Scripture quotations marked (TLB) are taken from The Living Bible copyright © 1971. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
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