Q: “ARE CHRISTIANS KINGS AND PRIESTS?”
A: “DEFINITELY NOT”
THE STORY OF THE BUFFET CART
Now the Chinese call it Yum Cha … you know … the
waitress appearing at the table with a trolley full of yummy tasting pork
rolls, dim sims and other spicey delicacies. The English might delicately call
it High Tea, while the Australian sees it as a nosh-up at a buffet or stroll
down heart attack alley … you know … after stuffing oneself with numerous large
plates of prawns at a Hilton smorgasbord, there remains the endless and
delectable array of desserts.
Similarly the Christian dining at Café Laodicea
(2Timothy 4:3) has a religious buffet trolley to choose from … full of different
bible versions, different commentators, different denominations,
various New Testament writers, different dispensations, various church
constitutions, and lots and lots of New Testament Bible verses,
indeed the whole Bible, from which to choose.
Now the waiters in attendance, comprise a nefarious
bunch of grievous wolves (Acts 20:29; those of the concision
(Philippians 3:2); those who are As the MInisters of Righteousness (2 Corinthians 11:15), and false teachers with damnable heresies (2 Peter 2:1).
THE SCENARIO GOES LIKE THIS:
“I’ve been feeling down in the dumps for a few weeks,
so I need a few verses to jig me up a bit! Mmmm! Let’s see … what’s on the cart
today? Terror of the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:11)… Garghh! Not for me! What’s this
… the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (Psalm 111:10) … Urk! Not
today! Hello, what have we here?
“… And hath made us kings and priests unto
God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.” (Revelation
1:6), and here’s another … “And hast made
us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.” (Revelation
5:10).
Now that’s more like it! Munch! Munch! Gulp! Gulp!
That was delicious! What else is there? What are these two verses? I like
Peter.
“Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a
spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices,
acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” (1 Peter 2:5) and “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an
holy nation …” (1 Peter 2:9). I must be a king and a priest because Christ
is the great High Priest and King. Wow! And look at the proof!
“Thou (Christ) art
a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.” (Hebrews 7:17) and
the great High Priest (Hebrews 2:17; 3:1,Heb 4:14), as “Pilate therefore
said unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I
am a king.” (John 18:37 a) … and “… set up over his head his accusation
written, THIS IS JESUS THE KING OF THE JEWS.” (Matthew 27:37)
Hey, I sense a shift from my emotional 1st
gear into 2nd and 3rd … I’m feeling a bit special about
myself … That’s more like it! … What’s
this? If I want to be top dog, I must humble myself and serve others, as Christ
did washing feet … “So after he (Jesus) had washed their feet …
ye also ought to wash one another's feet.” (John 13:12, 14) … yes,
here it is … the verse about if I want to be head honcho and chief, I’d better
start serving others (Matthew 20:27-28).
Q: SO WHAT’S WRONG WITH THAT?
“I mean … serving others? That’s a good end result
… don’t you think?”
A: LET’S LOOK AT HOW YOU GOT THERE
“Being ignorant of the dispensations, you quoted from
Peter, John, Christ talking about kingdom of heaven works, along with Paul’s
book of Hebrews to unsaved Messiah believing Hebrews.”
Q: “But
they’re all from the New Testament aren’t they?”
A: “Yes … but
therein lies your problem. Paul sums it up very concisely and nicely by saying
…
“Look Folks, if I haven’t mentioned it in my writings
… Romans through Philemon, put it in the zero column (1Corinthians 11:1)
… because for this day and age it’s ‘follow me’ NOT the
lesser apostles of Peter and John (1Corinthians 11:1; 2Corinthians 11:5; 12:11;
2Thessalonians 3:7), because God’s given me ‘my gospel’ (Romans 2:16; 16:25) aka ‘the dispensation given me’ (Ephesians 3:2; Colossians
1:25) aka ‘my doctrine’ (2Timothy 3:10).”
Now Dear Reader, the meaning of all this is that “All
scriptures are true, informational, historical and spiritual, BUT NOT ALL ARE
DOCTRINAL FOR THE CHRISTIAN! Here is a simple rule of thumb “If it agrees with
Paul, it’s Christian doctrine!”
That’s right, all scriptures belong to separate DISPENSATIONS
… you just can’t lump the apples and oranges together. Put it this way, all
scriptures are to be for a particular time for God to govern and instruct a
particular group of people … you know … like for Israel in the Old
Testament, or Christ on earth as the Son of man for the Jew, or Paul’s
commandments for those saved into the kingdom of God (1Corinthians 14:37).
That means we must rightly divide the word
(2Timothy 2:15). It’s like going to the Supermarket and seeing a box of
Kelloggs Corn Flakes sitting amongst the cans of sardines or with the Fly
Sprays ... IT JUST DON’T FIT!
Q: BUT WHAT’S WRONG WITH QUOTING JOHN FROM REVELATION?
A: These scriptures are
for a future dispensation
“… And hath made us kings and priests unto
God and his Father; to him be glory and DOMINION for ever and ever.
Amen.” (Revelation 1:6), and here’s another … “And
hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we SHALL REIGN
on the earth.” (Revelation 5:10).
Dear Reader, we shall (future) reign as
kings and priests and have dominion …. JUST NOT YET! Put it this way, Christ
does not have dominion yet! Christ came as the King of Jews but was not
received as such and so he didn’t rule and reign then. But it’s coming at
Armageddon when his enemies shall be put under him (Revelation 19;
Hebrews 2:8; 1:13; 10:13: Psalm 110:1)
Q: WELL WHAT’S WRONG WITH QUOTING PETER?
A: Firstly he’s not Paul
There’s an old adage that goes like this “You can take
the boy out of the country but you can’t take the country out of the boy!”
Peter uses a lot of Jewish language not found in Paul’s writings, such
as sprinkling of the blood
(1Peter 1:2); oracles of God (1Peter
4:11); tabernacle (2Peter 1:14; Exodus
25:9); priesthood (1Pet 2:5,9; Exodus
40:15); stone of stumbling (1Peter
2:8; Isaiah 8:14); lively (1Peter 1:3; 2:5); rock of offence (1Peter 2:8; Isaiah 8:14); astray sheep (1Peter 2:25; Isaiah 53:6-7); Noah (Genesis 7:1; 1Peter 3:20); pilgrims (1Peter 2:11) and so on.
Having
had a ministry to the circumcision, some of the warp and woof of Peter’s
vocabulary has the ingrained DNA of the Hebrew language, where he uses Jewish
words and terms, although he writes to Christians.
He
doesn’t express himself the same way as Paul does. I mean it stands to reason
doesn’t it? Peter wasn’t taken ‘upstairs’ like Paul (2 Corinthians 12:2-3),
where Paul’s make-over was a throughly one (2 Corinthians 11:6; 2 Timothy 3:17). Paul was able to wear his new Christian suit without the ‘lint’
of his former Jewish hippie days … I mean he was able to completely step aside
from being Jew #1 under Gamaliel (Acts 22:3) and become Christian #1 … and
never the twain met.
So
Peter has a mixture as follows … “Ye also, as
lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood,
to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” (1 Peter
2:5) and “But ye are a chosen generation,
a royal priesthood, an holy nation …” (1 Peter 2:9).
Almost by the force of habit, this is his language
heritage that echoes the Old Testament (Numbers 16:10; 18:1; Exodus 1:19; Acts
7:38; Genesis 7:1; 16:15; 1Samuel 27:5 and so on).
Secondly,
by his own admission, he takes the lower seat to Paul’s knowledge and
understanding of the scriptures.
Peter says “As
also in all his (Paul’s) epistles, speaking in them of these
things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that
are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the
other scriptures, unto their own destruction.” (2Peter 3:16)
You see,
Peter was a ‘slow train coming’ … it took him five years to come to the
knowledge that there was no such thing as “unclean” food (Acts 10:9-15), and ten
years for the fact that Christians were not 2nd class citizens (Acts
15:1-4,5-8,9-12,13-16,17-19,20-21).
It was a
hard struggle for ‘get behind me’ and ‘in your face’ Peter (Matthew 16:23;
Galatians 2:11), followed by a decade ‘on the outer’ in Babylon (1Peter 5:13).
And lastly,
the bottom line is this … while Peter has evidently read some of Paul’s
epistles, Paul is still yet to pen several more eg Ephesians, Philippians,
Colossians, Philemon, Titus, 1&2 Timothy and Jude, along with Hebrews.
Peter, therefore, although he writes with a full knowledge of the kingdom of
heaven, does not yet have the full and complete knowledge of Paul’s kingdom of
God gospel.
Q: BUT SURELY WE ARE PRIESTS … BEING IN JESUS CHRIST
THE HIGH PRIEST?
A: Absolutely not! This claim to fame is a total lie
for this present day and age.
Christians are saved (Acts 16:31); have salvation
(Romans 1:16); are believers (1Timothy 4:12); are sons of God
(Philippians 2:15) and are saints (Philippians 4:21; Romans 1:7) having
been put into Christ as THE SAVIOUR … NOT AS THE HIGH PRIEST!
Christ’s appointment as the new High Priest (Matthew
3:16) was simply the steppingstone necessary to earn the right to be the
Saviour on the cross (Hebrews 5:8). After his death and resurrection, his High
Priest function and duties had ceased (John 19:30) … kaput! zilch! zero!
Christians have themselves on, albeit ignorantly,
about being kings (1 Corinthians 4:13) and priests, however, they will reign as
kings (Revelation 19:14) and priests in a future time (Revelation 1:6; 5:10).
BUT HERE IS SATAN’S UNGODLY HIDDEN INTENT AND
BLASPHEMY!
Concentrating on the end product of being servants,
Satan has deceptively got Christians to believe that they are kings and
priests, through a process of misappropriating dispensational verses and by
appealing to Christ washing feet under kingdom of heaven rules.
WASHING FEET!
No-one beats the Catholics at this – they’re masters
at it, however is this how we serve others best … with ‘will worship’ and
prideful ‘humility’ (Colossians
2:23)?
“Man, look at the Pope on TV … washing the cardinals’
feet … what a guy!”
Are churches filled with impotent foot-washers
‘shining their kingdom of heaven lights’ (Matthew 5:16), perishing and ashamed
at the foolishness of preaching of the cross under Paul’s the kingdom of
God dispensation (1 Corinthians 1:18, 21)? Mmmm! Sadly Dear Reader, it is the
case.
We serve and love people best by ‘upsetting’ them with
THE PREACHING of the cross … not the cross itself … ah yes … this
includes ‘christians’.
BUT HERE ARE SATAN’S DEEPEST REASONS FOR CHRISTIANS TO
CALL THEMSELVES PRIESTS AND KINGS …
1. To get the focus, and worship, off and away
from Jesus Christ as the Saviour, and onto Jesus Christ the King and the High
Priest.
2. To cool down the Christians by getting them
to focus on themselves and their holiness walk … where their ‘sanctification’
drowns out the source of their justification in Jesus Christ.
3. To have churches filled with chest-out and strutting
Pentecostal and Charismatic kings and priests (and this can be appealing to
some Christians, not all, who’ve a had a bit of a bad trot in life … you know …
education, picked on, pushed from pillar to post, family upbringing, money and
so on.
4. To have the separated brethren (a Catholic
term for non-Catholics) return to mother church with its kingdom of heaven
works salvation (Matthew 5-7).
Dear Reader, it may come as a shock, but there are
religious Pied Pipers pushing their Pudding Trolleys in many Café Laodicea …
operating As MInisters of Righteousness … and they look like the real deal ….
Man, they appear like they’re walking the walk and talking the talk. I suspect
there might be more than a few in heaven saying “Really! He wasn’t saved
????!!!!!”
And Rome is being run off its feet … mailing out
Certificates of Commendation to their servants who convince Christians to call
themselves ‘kings’ and ‘priests’ (2 Corinthians 11:15).
Mmmm! Let the 2T-43 crowd take heed about these
totally irrelevant and fabricated ‘kings’ and ‘priests’ titles for this present
age (2 Timothy 4:3 2 Timothy 4:3) … but of course, I forgot …
they can’t … as an itch can never be healed (Deuteronomy 28:27)
Dear Reader, Satan doesn’t wear the titles of subtil
and the angel of light
for nothing … he’s had 6,000 years of practice
(Genesis 3:1; 2 Corinthians 4:4; 11:14)
And the Pied Piper got on his flute again, with his
enticing and delectable Buffet Cart behind him, for those Christians who would
call themselves kings and priests (Isaiah 5:18).
Dear Reader it’s S.O.S. … the subtilty of Satan.
Harley Hitchcock
This
website’s front page is:
www.
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"Your good works can't
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and your sins won't
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