Thy Kingdom Come # 23

4. The Gospel of the Kingdom (continued)

The New Kingdom In Christ (continued)

Daniel's frank confession and earnest plea for undeserved mercy received an immediate answer. The Lord is always eager to answer a prayer of that kind. The answer was the promise of the Saviour. God's way of deliverance and the secret of His new kingdom is found in the coming of "the anointed One, the prince" (9:25), who is, of course, Christ the Lord. He is our hope! The Gospel shows the way out of man's failure into the blessings of the kingdom of heaven: "who delivered us out of the power of darkness, and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love" (Col. 1:13). What a glorious kingdom this must be! We are told that by means of His anointed King God undertakes "to finish transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy" (9:24). These are tremendous undertakings.

The End of Sins

The first is "to finish transgression, and to make an end of sins". It would be useless for the Lord to provide a sinless realm if He allowed uncleansed sinners to enter in. No, the old kingdom went wrong not because of environment but because of man's heart. For this reason the new kingdom demands a new heart. Time does not remove transgression. The sins which Daniel was praying about had been committed years and years before. He was still remembering them. past guilt is not only still recorded in heaven, it has an uncomfortable way of rising up anew in our own consciences and memory. How can the past be blotted out? How can sins be so dealt with that even God remembers them no more forever? The revelation which came to Daniel showed him how: it was by the advent of this "anointed one' and above all by His atoning death. "The anointed one shall be cut off, but not for himself" (9:36).

Those who make a study of these things assure us that the time prediction was absolutely accurate, and that in truth the Lord Jesus was 'cut off' at the end of the sixty-nine weeks. Our immediate concern, however, is not with dates, but with the glorious fact that Christ's  death on the Cross has done what nothing else can ever do - it has put away all sin, however dark it may be and however long-standing. This perfect cleansing is foundation for those who would have a part in the new kingdom.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 24 - (A Reconciliation Made)