The Early Parables Of Jesus 4

INTRO: Now before we go on in this series let me give a few further explanations. There are those who hold that the sermon on the mount is not teaching for the Church age. Jesus was teaching the Jews how to live in the kingdom He was about to set up on earth. That kingdom is what we know as the millennium. Well, the Jews rejected the kingdom, and so this sermon is not for our day, but for the future time when the kingdom will be set up.

It is my view that this sermon is the beginning to a transition from where God worked through Israel as a nation. Some have likened that time to God’s centripetal method of reaching the world with the Gospel. God meant Israel to be the light of the world. And people who got saved came to Israel and converted to Judaism. So the centripetal method of evangelism is like when you drain a sink and the water all draws in toward the center of the sink to where the drain is. In that way, God drew people in to the nation of Israel.

But because Israel will reject Christ as their Messiah God’s original method will be set aside and the kingdom will now operate like that which has been termed centrifugal force. It is like driving around a corner at high speed and it wants to thrust you outward, not pull you inward. Instead of drawing people in to one nation, God will now thrust believers out into the world. They will be scattered into the world like salt which is used to preserve meat is scattered over the whole piece to be cured.