The Kingdom Is at Hand

By Jason R. Harris

The Kingdom of God was a major topic of discussion between Jesus and His disciples. Much of Jesus' teachings were built upon the foundation of kingdom truths and spiritual realities. Jesus, on many occasions spoke of doing the will of the One who sent Him. The will of His Father was the driving force of His purpose in the flesh. He came to do the Father's will. Jesus' primary goal was the establishment of the Father's will on the earth. As Jesus would move and act and speak on behalf of His Father the kingdom of heaven, through His life, would be in full advance, made obvious by the supernatural demonstrations of the Spirit. Strongholds were smashed, prisoners were set free, and the kingdom of darkness was falling! Jesus, by the authority given Him from the Father, walked this earth in the liberty of the kingdom of heaven, and put into motion the Father's plan to reconcile all things back to Himself.
But the message does not end there. The same things that Jesus taught and did throughout His ministry He would later pass on to His disciples. At the close of Jesus' earthly ministry He would bestow upon them the mandate of His Father to preach the Gospel of the kingdom to every nation, tribe and tongue. They were to do what He did. They were not going to be alone in this endeavor but would have with them, living in them, the Holy Spirit the Helper. On the Day of Pentecost the kingdom had come in power and had transformed their lives. Through the release of God's kingdom into the earth the disciples went about turning the world upside down. This same transformative power the power of the kingdom of God is still here today. God is in the process of restoring a kingdom paradigm a kingdom mindset back to the church.

In "The Kingdom Is At Hand" Pastor Jason R. Harris gives us his own unique perspective on the nature of the kingdom of God. In this book you will learn such truths as:
The kingdom is the will of the king.
The king is a direct reflection of His kingdom.
The edicts of the king are the rights of the citizens.
AND many more...

Join Pastor Harris in discovering the kingdom of God and begin to walk in the truths revealed in this book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 31, 2014
• ISBN: 9781499024777

Book preview

Copyright © 2014 by Jason R. Harris.

Library of Congress Control Number:     2014909648

ISBN:                  Hardcover                        978-1-4990-2478-4

                            Softcover                          978-1-4990-2484-5

                            eBook                               978-1-4990-2477-7

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 Biblica. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

Rev. date: 05/23/2014

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CONTENTS

Foreword

Introduction

1   Thy Kingdom Come

2   Thy Will Be Done

3   As It Is in Heaven

4   Our Daily Bread

5   Only Believe

6   All Things Possible

7   A Spiritual Kingdom

8   The Kingdom Advances Forcefully

9   Every Word of God

Notes

This book is dedicated to the memory of

Rev. Anna Mae McPhail

(1945-2012)

a true warrior of the kingdom!

Foreword

T HE KINGDOM OF God has become a hot topic these days. Just open a Christian magazine or turn on a Christian radio station and a Christian television station and the kingdom of God is near. In the book The Kingdom of God Is At Hand , Rev. Jason R. Harris gives biblical answers to what the kingdom of God, or the kingdom of heaven, is. If God is ruler over all the earth, why does Jesus say the kingdom is at hand? The beginning of Jesus’ ministry is marked by a show of power when the heavens were ripped open. In the remainder of Mark chapters 2 and 3, Jesus heals the sick and casts out demons. In Mark 3: 27, Jesus explains that He has bound the strong man and set the captives free. Jesus had come with power!

It is interesting to note that the coming of the kingdom of God was prophesied as coming with a show of power in Daniel 2:

⁴⁴ And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.

⁴⁵ Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure.

Two thousand years ago, the kingdom came with power! The final heavenly kingdom is also coming with power: 1 Corinthians 15 states the following:

⁵⁰ Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.

⁵¹ Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,

⁵² In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

⁵³ For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.

⁵⁴ So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.

What you are about to learn in The Kingdom of God Is At Hand has the potential to liberate you. I encourage you to read Rev. Jason R. Harris’ book The Kingdom of God Is At Hand.

Rev. Paul J. McPhail

General Secretary of the Independent Assemblies of God International (Canada)

Introduction

T HE KINGDOM OF God is such a timely topic of interest for the church today. I believe that it is a God-given interest whereby the Holy Spirit is preparing the church, through greater insights concerning the kingdom of God, to arise in this prophetic hour as the voice heralding the coming of Christ and His kingdom into this world. We stand at the threshold of our adoption as the sons of God. All creation is waiting with great anticipation its own redemption from the curse of sin. That glorious moment approaches at a greater pace than ever before. But let us not lose sight of the reality that the kingdom is already in our midst. Jesus said that the kingdom is at hand—it is near—it is within His people. What does that mean exactly? What does that look like?

I have written this book in such a manner whereby I chose to refrain from quoting a lot of scripture so that the book is not tedious to read. Instead I have filled the book with a multitude of text references with the hope that you, the reader, will take the time to go through your Bible and consider what I have said in light of the texts referenced. I would ask that you read this book with a gracious heart realizing that we will possibly see things differently. My hope is to possibly get you to reconsider your way of looking at the topics addressed here.

In this book you will find what I believe to be kingdom truths. I see them as fingerprints of the kingdom. They are clues that identify or indicate a truth that is unique to the kingdom—an impression that is left by its touch that identifies kingdom realities. My hope is that you will be inspired and changed by these truths.

I pray that you are challenged in thought and blessed in heart by reading this book.

Jason R. Harris

1

Thy Kingdom Come

The Kingdom of God

S INCE THE BEGINNING (Genesis 1:1) God has been working toward one overall goal. That goal is the establishment of His kingdom on earth. When God created mankind, He gave them dominion over the earth and everything in it with the express intent being the establishment of His kingdom through the very lives of the men and women He would create. Starting with Adam and Eve and following through multiple generations, mankind was to be His representatives on earth (two for agreement—Matthew 18:19). As those who were made after His image and likeness (Genesis 1:26-28), they would be able to best express and decree the will of God on earth. Eden was not simply a garden; it was a declaration of God’s will! God would use both the creation of the earth and the formation of mankind from the earth to procure His ultimate dominion as king over all things! This plan was hidden by God, a mystery, but revealed in Christ (Ephesians 3:9-11; Hebrews 10:5).

Through Christ, the Son of Man, and all redeemed mankind—the elect, the church, those of the seed of the faith of Abraham—God would subdue all His enemies under His feet (signifying total dominion) (Genesis 3:15; Psalm 2; Romans 10:15, 16:20; 1 Corinthians 15:20-28; Ephesians 1:21, 6:15; Hebrews 2:5-18; Revelation 11:15). God had this in mind before He even spoke creation into existence (1 Corinthians 2:7; Revelation 13:8). This is the context in which the scriptures are placed, and it is from this context that we must interpret the scriptures. We will not be able to fully grasp the Gospel message if we fail to realize that the Gospel is a message about a king and His kingdom (Matthew 4:17)!

The scriptures teach us that somewhere in the past the kingdom of God was split by a usurper. His name is Lucifer, the Morning Star (Isaiah 14:12-15). Lucifer was created by God as an archangel (Ezekiel 28:11-17) and was given a special place among the angels as the guardian of the worship of God. The scriptures declare that pride rose up in Lucifer’s heart against God and he eventually attempted to overthrow God and make himself king over all creation. Lucifer was easily defeated by God and was cast from heaven to the earth along with one-third of the angels of heaven who rebelled with him (Luke 10:18; Revelation 12:1-9). His domain would exist (as it would seem) exclusively for a mere short time in heavenly places until he was able to win the rights to the earth through the fall of man—the rightful overseer and protector of the earth (Genesis 1:28, 2:15; Job 1:6, 2:1; Luke 4:5-7; Ephesians 2:2, 6:10-12). Through the kingdoms of men—operating by means of a Babylon spirit (false worship), the gates of Hades (the keys of hell in Satan’s control until Christ took them—Hebrews 2:14; Revelation 1:18), and Mammon (the world system economy as the driving forces) the natural realm would now be overseen by the authorities (principalities, powers, rulers—Ephesians 6:12) of an unseen realm—a realm of fallen spirit beings. Now it is true that the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof (Psalm 24:1), but it is equally true that the kingdoms of men, because of the fall, belong to Satan (Luke 4:5-7).

What the scriptures show us then is that there are two major kingdoms at war with each other. This is the backdrop that sets the scene for what we see taking place in the scriptures. There are unseen forces fighting in the midst of human history. What this tells us then is that we must learn to be kingdom-minded in order that we might be kingdom-empowered. After all, a kingdom is about power and authority (over other kingdoms and authorities—Mark 9:1; Acts 1:8; 1 Corinthians 2:5, 4:20). Kingdom power though only comes through kingdom perception. The church today lacks the power of the early church that we observe in scripture because she has failed to understand that she is part of a kingdom. A kingdom does not operate like a democracy or a republic (whether capitalistic, socialistic, or communistic). We lack the biblical realities in our lives that we see in the scriptures because we don’t know what a kingdom is meant to look like in our lives (Hosea 4:6). Many try to live their Christian lives (and run the church) after the construct of earthly-style government, not realizing that those governmental structures are really counterintuitive to the Gospel. You did not vote God into power, nor can you impeach Him! Your rights are not based upon your opinion but upon the decree of a king! The Gospel was never meant to operate within any other context except a kingdom paradigm.

The church needs to get a picture in their mind of the kingdom and be liberated by kingdom truths (Matthew 22:16; John 1:14-17, 4:23-24, 8:32, 16:13). Perceiving the kingdom properly opens the doorway to a threshold of kingdom power and authority. The degree of truth you have is measurable to the degree of liberty you will experience in Christ. The degree of faith you have in that truth is likewise parallel to the power