The items that most often fill our news feeds are disheartening at best. Much of what’s reported on the mainstream media is gaslighting, the attempt to persuade people that the things they see and experience are not real. The repetition of lies has been effective; most people go about their lives unaware of the dangers hidden by the misdirection of the day pointing them to a return to a semblance of normalcy.
The widespread deception of our time fulfills Bible prophecy. When His disciples asked Jesus about the signs of the last days and His Second Coming, He began with the words, “Take heed that no man deceive you” (Matthew 24:4). Paul also warned about the “wicked deception” that would characterize the appearing of the antichrist (2 Thessalonians 2:10).
Behind the false information that permeates today’s airways lies Satan’s agenda to establish his kingdom on the earth with the man of lawlessness at the helm. He mistakenly believes he can stop the Lord’s restoration of a kingdom to Israel and thus prevent Jesus from setting up His realm.
There’s actually good news behind the push of the World Economic Forum (WEF) and UN to establish the devil’s new world order. It not only tells us that we live in the last moments of human history, but it also points to the nearness of the glorious kingdom that we will inherit, one that will be far more glorious than we can imagine.
We Are Heirs to a Kingdom
Amid the wickedness, terrors, deception, lawlessness, and violence that define our day, we possess an unfailing hope of a realm where righteousness will reign supreme and our joy will know no bounds. The Bible says we are heirs to this glorious realm.
In Ephesians 1:11-14, Paul writes we have “obtained an inheritance” of which the Holy Spirit is our “guarantee.” It’s one of the many blessings we have because of Christ. In another passage, the apostle identifies our inheritance as “the kingdom of God” (1 Corinthians 15:50).
Yes, of course, God transfers us to His spiritual domain at the moment of our redemption (Colossians 1:13-14). However, the Bible also tells us that we are also heirs to the physical and yet future manifestation of the Lord’s kingdom. Oh, what a jubilant day that will be for us!
At first glance, the words of 1 Corinthians 15:50 seem to convey bad news to us regarding our inheritance:
“I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.”
Despite telling us that we are now physically unfit to receive our inheritance, these words contain remarkably good news. They signify that our current experience in this vale of tears cannot be the glorious realm that the Lord promises us.
If we received our inheritance of a kingdom in our “flesh and blood” bodies, it would leave us with an exceedingly brief time to enjoy the Lord’s bequest to us amid the pain, suffering, and death that come our way here below.
Does it not dishonor Him when teachers tell us that this fleeting, troubled existence is His gift to us of a kingdom? I’m certain that it does. I fail to see any encouragement in viewing the church as our inheritance of a kingdom.
Furthermore, our current experience in this troubled world is not even remotely close to how the Bible describes Jesus’ future reign upon the earth (see Psalms such as 2, 46, and 110 as well as Revelation 20:1-10). Things such as wars, abortion, lawlessness, gaslighting, ethnic strife, and sex trafficking will be nonexistent when Jesus rules over the nations.
Jesus Will Make Us Fit for the Kingdom
The comforting news in all this is that Jesus will someday, hopefully soon, make us fit for the kingdom in which we will reign with Him.
In 1 Corinthians 15:51-55, Paul writes that He appears, Jesus will raise the dead with “imperishable bodies,” and “we,” too, will experience immortality. Although we cannot receive our inheritance in our current existence, the Lord will make us fit for His eternal realm when He appears and “transforms our lowly body to be like his glorious body” (Philippians 3:20-21).
Earlier in 1 Corinthians 15, Paul states that apart from the hope of this resurrection, which later in the passage he says happens at the time of the Rapture, “our faith is futile” and “we are of all people most to be pitied” (1 Corinthians 15:17, 19). The good news of the Gospel includes the promise of a realm that we will enjoy in glorified, incorruptible bodies.
Those who say that God has rejected Israel and transferred its kingdom blessings to the church, albeit spiritually, not only severely minimize His covenant promises to the nation but also seriously degrade the wonder of our inheritance of New Testament saints.
All this is exceedingly good news for us because it signifies that:
- Our current experience of suffering, pain, and death is most certainly not the realm to which the New Testament says we are heirs. (The Bible says we are heirs to a kingdom, not possessors of it.)
- We will reign with Jesus in His kingdom with immortal bodies because Jesus will make us fit for His eternal realm when He takes us home to glory.
We will reign with Jesus for a thousand years and then forevermore. We greatly rejoice knowing that our glorious inheritance lies in the future rather than now in the confines of the church.
