Mike Bickle emphasizes the significance of the millennial kingdom where saints will reign with Christ, highlighting that this doctrine spans from Genesis to Revelation and profoundly influences how believers live their lives today. He explains that during this thousand-year reign, Jesus will govern the earth with a rod of iron, ensuring that all institutions align with God's will, and that all of Israel will be saved. Bickle encourages believers to prepare for their roles in this kingdom by cultivating meekness, love, and understanding, as these qualities will determine their positions of authority in the age to come. He stresses that the natural and supernatural realms will merge, allowing resurrected saints to interact with those in natural bodies, and that the government of the earth will be established progressively under Christ's leadership. Ultimately, he calls for a shift in perspective, urging believers to focus on their eternal assignments rather than temporary earthly pursuits.

Okay, let's pray. Father, I ask you in the name of Jesus for the release of your spirit. Lord, I ask you for the release of the spirit of wisdom and revelation, even now, living understanding, in Jesus' name, amen. The saints ruling in the millennial kingdom. This is one of the more important doctrines in the Bible. It's a very, it's a doctrine that's from Genesis to Revelation, though many believers have not spent much time on it, though it is one of the prominent doctrines of the Bible, and it really impacts the way we view our life. As the revelation of this takes root in my heart over the years, more and more, I need a lot more revelation of it, it really affects the way I plan my future and the way that I spend my life in the present tense. It affects the way I spend time and money right now. John said in Revelation 20, verse 4, I saw thrones, and they that sat upon them, and judgment, or leadership over the earth, was given to them. Then I saw the souls of those that had been beheaded, martyrs, end-time martyrs. They lived, they came alive. They received their resurrected bodies, and they reigned with Jesus for a thousand years. These martyrs, and others besides, the saints that are faithful, they will be priests of God, and they will reign with Jesus, it says it twice, for a thousand years. Jesus cried out that God's will would be done on the earth, like it is in heaven. Many believers are waiting to go to heaven, to the place where God's will's done, but God's will will be fully done on the earth forever in the days to come. The Lord commissioned his people to disciple all the nations, and what we've done inadvertently, is we've reduced this to make disciples of individuals, and that's important to disciple individuals. And that's a part of this, but the mandate the Father gave Jesus was to have entire nations, not just the individuals of the nations, but the social and national life, every institution of every nation to obey the Lord. So I know that many of us are accustomed to reading this, go and make disciples of the individuals of nations, and that surely is significant, but that the social life and the legislation of every nation in the earth after the Lord's return, it'll take time for it to happen, every single institution and all the ways of all those institutions, from technology to economics to agriculture to politics, they will be fully obedient to the word of God. A, the millennium is a term that speaks of a thousand years, and you can read that a little bit more. This is the time, it's after the second coming of the Lord, where the kingdom of God is openly manifest worldwide, affecting every sphere of life. This period of worldwide blessing is initiated by the second coming of Christ, at which time God binds Satan, and then Jesus rules with a rod of iron, which means even when he comes at the second coming, because there will be people with natural bodies, there'll be at first hundreds of millions of them, and then eventually billions of them, and then eventually tens of billions of them before this thousand year period is over, and they will still have a sin nature and a sin dimension in their life experience. They will be born again, there'll be righteous laws in everything, education, media, everything will be obedient to God, but sin will still exist on the planet with people with natural bodies. We will have resurrected bodies, and we'll interact with people with natural bodies. And for a thousand years, Jesus will rule with a rod of iron, which means he will not tolerate sin in society. That every, again, every institution will obey the Lord. Every sphere of life will. Technology, agriculture, economics, social, political, spiritual, the training institutions, the academic, every academic institution on the planet. And he will rule with a rod of iron, which means he will have swift and severe consequences to any nation or any group of people who do not obey him. That's what the rod of iron means. It's mentioned four or five times in the scripture, the rod of iron leadership of Jesus. Let's go to B. The millennial kingdom is one of the major revelations of the scripture, the thousand year rule of Jesus. When Jesus comes back and actually rules on the earth, it's one of the major revelations of the Bible. C, this is the first time in history in which all of Israel will be saved. And when it says all of Israel will be saved, it literally means a hundred percent of every Jewish person that has a natural body on the earth. Of course, the resurrected ones will be saved. That's not an issue. Every single person, every Jewish person on the planet will be born again after the second coming of Christ. That's what it means. All Israel will be saved. It just means exactly what it says. Later on down in paragraph C, it says all the kings of the earth will be saved. That's mentioned six times in the word of God that all the kings of the earth will worship Jesus. There won't be one king who's drawing back. They will be among the most spiritual men and women of the earth will be the kings. Because part of their qualification to having natural leadership over a nation or the government, I'm talking about the natural government, is that they're in love with God and they have a spirit of revelation and they have the fear of God upon them. Jesus will pick really good leaders. And not just Jesus, some of you will pick those leaders. Jesus isn't going to pick them all, but he's going to delegate the responsibility to saints who have government over them. D, now this is a paragraph I say all the time that I encourage you to say all the time. And by the way, those of you that are, you know, several hundred of you are new with this here. Our copyright is the right to copy. And all of us, all our leadership team, all of us use each other's stuff all the time. And we don't mention where we got it from. Well, I have full paragraphs in my handouts straight from Alan and Stuart. I just take them right off. I don't even think a thing about it. I don't even say it's Alan. I'm just as happy that you think Alan's got my stuff. You know, it doesn't even matter to me. No, I'm kidding. It really doesn't make us any difference. Our leadership team just shares it openly. And so you'll see all of us have documents with word for word paragraphs from one another. And you're free to do that. This D is one of those paragraphs that we really want you to run with. You can reword it if you want as well. But I repeat this often. It's the paradigm. Because our problem is our paradigm, our perspective of eternity, our perspective of the second coming of Jesus is really limited. It's non-biblical. Because, I mean, because we don't have a whole picture. And what I mean by that is D, as Gentile believers, we most naturally think of worshiping Jesus as God in the supernatural conditions of heaven. We emphasize his deity is the Son of God. Now that's 100% true. But there's more to it than this. And when I read that first sentence, people go, yeah, that's it. We're gonna go to heaven and we're gonna worship Jesus in the supernatural realm as God. And we're gonna probably be on a cloud or something, play a harp. We're gonna have a kind of a little bit floaty body. We don't know. It's gonna sort of float, but we don't really quite know what it's gonna do. It won't float, just so you know. You'll have a substantive, you'll have a physical material body in the resurrection. Your body will be as material as the one you have now. It would just be far superior, but it will be equally material. It'll be as solid as the one you have right now. It'll be perfected. Well, the Jewish paradigm is very different than the Gentile one. The Jewish paradigm, they think of not of worshiping in heaven, but reigning with a man on the earth. They're not thinking of going to heaven to worship. They're thinking of reigning with a man on the earth. When they think the Messiah, they think of the natural conditions of the earth, not the supernatural conditions of heaven. They emphasize the Messiah's humanity as the Son of David. We emphasize his deity as the Son of God, and both of them are true. Matter of fact, the truth is only in both of those dimensions brought together. That's the biblical paradigm. And it's not the full truth, one without the other. And so another thing that I say often, repeat regularly, is that the natural realm will not be suspended. That's what we're thinking. It's gonna be replaced or at least suspended. Most often people think the natural realm will just be done away with and replaced by the supernatural realm. And some think, well, maybe it's not that extreme, but it will be suspended. Beloved, the natural realm will be fully intact, but it will be enhanced by a significant supernatural dimension, not done away with, but enhanced. The two realms will come together. Get to the top of page two, Roman numeral two. Jesus will be king over all the other kings on the earth. We all know that passage, Revelation 19, verse 16. He will be king of kings. He's the king of other kings. B, there's two sets of kings in the Bible in the millennial kingdom. Two sets of kings. It says in Revelation 1, verse 5, Jesus is the ruler over the kings of the earth. And then John went on to say to him who loved us and he made us kings. John's talking about him in the future as in a resurrected body. He goes, we're kings and priests. Talking about the body of Christ right now, not just the people later. Of course, they'll be part of the body of Christ too. They'll have natural bodies. Number one, there will be millennial kings with natural bodies. And then there will be resurrected saints who are kings with resurrected bodies. Two types of kings. Some of you may be kings. Others of you may be governors. I believe that most people, most in the body of Christ will not have government. It's not like of the two to three billion saints that will be a part of the resurrection. They'll be two to three billion when it's, you know, when it's all there. And there won't be three billion saints, all of them kings. Only a small percentage of them will be kings. There's 210 nations of the earth and there may be a few more or a few less. You know, maybe it'd be a hundred, maybe it'd be 300. But there's not three billion nations. There's only going to be two or three hundred nations. Maybe a few more, maybe a few less. But there'll be three billion, ballpark number, from history. There's about a billion right now, about another billion coming in the great harvest. And let's say there's a billion in the past, whatever. I don't know the real numbers. But beloved, there's not going to be three billion people in leadership. The vast majority of the body of Christ will not have government in the age to come. And the government in the age to come will be mostly determined, not by your intellect, not by your impact, but by your growth and meekness and love. Not your impact. The Lord's not going to look at the men and women that had the biggest ministries that people were really touched by. He's going to look at people that grew in meekness, people that grew in love, and people that grew in living understanding. They grew in the knowledge of the word. I don't mean just they could throw out Bible facts. They had living understanding and a spirit of revelation. Love, meekness, and a spirit of revelation. Beloved, you can gain those things, love and meekness and a spirit of revelation, and never ever have a ministry that anybody recognizes. But your heart's growing big. And so the vast majority, I'm guessing a very, you know, I don't really know the number, probably 10% or less. I mean, I don't have any way to know the number. My point being, it's not the majority, it's the great minority. But look around the body of Christ worldwide. Most believers do not take living in radical holiness, a spirit of prayer, and becoming a servant. They don't take that serious. And that's the only stuff that carries over to the age to come. Most believers that all of us know do not take growing in holiness, the spirit of prayer, and becoming a servant that gets no credit for it. Most people do not take that serious. And that's the only kind of response that the Lord's going to reward. The reason I'm saying that is that this teaching is to motivate us to begin to get ready for our ministry. So we have a 70-year internship on this side. I call it a 70-year internship. Some people make it to 80 or 90, and some people have a lot less than 70. But this is our internship at best. Billy Graham is still in his internship. Billy Graham's main assignment is not his 70-year internship, although he's in his 80s now. But his main assignment is his 1,000-year assignment in ministry. He's still in seminary in the spirit. He's still in his internship. It's in this age. C, saints as priests. The saints will... Well, the main two occupations that those that have government, they will be kings and priests. Kings and priests. Those that have a reward is a better way to say it. They'll be priests and kings. They'll function that way before others. They'll function as priests, and they'll function as kings. As priests, we'll worship, we'll intercede, and we will mediate, we will communicate the knowledge of God to others. Because believer... I mean, people with natural bodies and with resurrected bodies will still learn and grow in their understanding. Some of you will be teachers in the age to come, and you're not teachers now, but you're growing in understanding. Your life is about loving and just consuming yourself in the word of God in order to empower your heart in love and in meekness. We're not interested in just disconnecting from life and getting Bible knowledge. We're interested in living understanding. Bible knowledge is good, but it's not good enough. We want living understanding, not just Bible data. We want the sort of thing that makes our hearts come into unity, a vibrant connectedness with God's heart. But some of you will have a teaching ministry in the age to come, and you don't have a teaching ministry now. Does it matter? There's not a continuity on that. Your gift mix will be surprising what the abilities that you will have in the resurrection. So as priests, we'll worship and intercede. He said, worship and intercede. That's the government of the age to come will be in the house of prayer. Worship and intercession is the way that God's authority will be released. That's the way it's released now. We just don't grasp it so clear. None of us do. I mean, we can say it, but I don't really grasp how real this really is. I talk about it, and I'm sure when I'm face to face with the Lord, I will just say, oh, I thought I understood this. I sort of understood it. And maybe my angels say, well, how about this? You barely understood it, and that's probably more accurate. D is kings. As kings, we'll rule with judicial responsibilities. We, the saints with resurrected bodies, will have authority over kings with natural bodies. Those with resurrected bodies will be in the superior position of authority and power. In paragraph D, I talk about different things that those, the saints will do with governing. Number one, they will evaluate the past. Because the nations will come before the saints. All the nations of all the earth, they're not all coming, everybody. Jesus is going to delegate like he does right now. He's delegating the authority of his kingdom. And the saints will evaluate the past. They will judge. It says in 1 Corinthians 6, verse 2, we'll look at in a minute. They will judge the world. They will evaluate and esteem who was right and who was wrong throughout world history. And not, I was going to say particularly, but of notably, I'll say it that way, because we're going to judge all of history. The saints will. Notably, they will judge the last 10 or 20 years, the last couple of decades of evil governments that led up to the Antichrist government. Every one of those governments will be tried, and they will be found guilty, and the leaders will be executed in war tribunals. There'll be courts. They'll cover the whole earth. Again, most folks kind of casually think about it, and I'm imagining that there's going to be 10 billion people standing in a big line behind Jesus one by one, and he's going to do every one of them in one billionth of a second. He's going to evaluate them. He's going to do it like a really rapid fire judgment, you know, really move quick, and all 10 billion throughout history are going to stand in the line, and he's going to judge them. He is going to use the saints. We, I don't know how it's going to work. It will be his judgments, but we will participate in a very, very meaningful way, just like we do now. Well, there's a problem in the church. There's a problem in the workplace, a problem in the family. He doesn't send an angel that appears. He sends the spirit of wisdom to the people who are close to him, and they give his answer. It's how it is now. So yeah, but when the Lord comes, won't the natural realm go away? No. Won't Africa and India be a lot closer in the age to come? No, they'll be the same distance apart as they are now, and there'll be people in all these different continents and countries. They will determine action plans for the future of nations and people. Some of you will be in, I'll say it in a funny way, you'll be in staff meetings. I don't think they'll call them that, but you'll be in team meetings, team meetings for the destiny of nations or for cities or for regions of the earth. You'll create the action plans in concert with the Holy Spirit for the future of that area. Some of you will have authority over very, very neighborhoods, and others will have cities, and others will have regions, and others will have kings over countries. You'll also, ruling saints will appoint people in their positions, and that will involve training and managing the people they appoint. Wow, I thought everybody would, wow. No, beloved, you're going to have a real ministry, a real assignment. It will really matter. Or you will have, you won't have a leadership assignment, but you will have a service. Everybody will be servants, but you'll have a support assignment to a leader in the age to come. But it's only built, it's based upon our meekness in this age and our love and our understanding. We really want to disconnect from trying to get all of our rewards and all of our attention right now. We really want to go into the hidden meekness and living understanding realm. We want to fill our life with this. We want to use our time and money to the maximum benefit of increasing in love and humility and revelation. Let's go to page three. The progressive increase of Jesus's kingdom. It will increase progressively. Some would just automatically think, I mean, just the normal paradigm is Jesus will come. I really, I have fun being kind of ornery with people because when I talk to many, I know they haven't thought about it. They haven't heard teaching on it. They haven't worked through it. And so it's not fair to be a little ornery. But it's very normal to have not thought through the issues. But I like to say, okay, so Jesus comes in the sky, right? Right. And the idea, the unspoken idea is everything is transformed. Okay, I say, okay, now there's 5 billion people on the earth after all the book of Revelation's judgments. Maybe there's 3 billion, 4 billion. Does he wave his hand and they all die? Do they just, he lands and all the unbelievers just die. 3, 4, 5 billion, they just fall over. Well, no. Do they, do they vanish into midair? No. What happens to them? I don't know. They're not raptured. They're not saved. I don't know. Well, we got a problem. We got 4 to 5 billion or 2 or 3 billion, depending on how severe the judgments are, human bodies on the earth. What is, what's going to happen to them? Aren't they all going to go to the lake of fire or something? Okay, so how's that going to happen? Are we, are they going to die first? Are you going to round them up? Are angels going to round them up? We're all going to go to one like big shaft and all jump in it? I mean, and the idea is like, I don't know. Then who's going to govern the earth? Well, we are. But all the descriptions of the millennium, there's natural life going on. Who's going to have the children that grow and plant the vineyards? Must be those people. Hope those 3, 4 million don't die. We need them. We need some workers, you know. Well, the idea, and again, I'm just having fun with it. Because if you haven't thought about it, you just haven't thought about it. And there's about, there's over 100 chapters in the Bible on these subjects. 100 chapters. There's only 89 chapters in the four gospels. There's 100 chapters. More than Jesus's power ministry in the four gospels is related to the subject of his leadership over the earth. And the predominant concept is the spirit realm takes over. And natural process somehow evaporates or something. We don't know what happens to the natural realm. We just know it can't be there because God's spirit. Yes, Jesus has a spirit, but he's human too. He's not just God. He's fully God, but he's fully human. He's got a body forever. And he's coming back to rule a concrete material planet. Not a concrete, but a material planet. Not concrete. There will be concrete on it, but Isaiah 9. Of the increase of his government. This is talking about the second coming after he returns. Of the increase of his government and even the increase of peace. See, the peace in world governments will grow slowly. The day he returns, all 210 nations, all of a sudden won't be at peace at three that afternoon. The peace will grow. The peace will grow in governments. The peace will grow in all the businesses. The peace will grow in all the Bible schools. The peace will grow in all the marriages, all the families. Peace will grow, increase over time. Peace will. As so will his government. There'll be no end to it. There's never a time where more of his peace is not... The sphere that is under his peace doesn't continue to grow. I mean, after we cover the whole earth. Well, we got billions and billions and billions of years. And then we're at the beginning. And never will there be a time where his government and his peace is not expanding outward. In terms of influencing more of life under God's leadership. There'll be no end to it. And upon the throne of David and over his kingdom, to order it, notice that word, to establish it. He's going to order it. There's no end to the increase of ordering it and establishing. Beloved, that's process right there. And he's going to establish it with judgment. There's a negative dimension. And he's going to establish it with justice. There's a rod of iron dimension. Judgment will be necessary. And some of you will be in positions of government. And you will use judgment. You will bring judgment, negative judgments. And there will be positive justice. And sometimes the word judgment is a positive word. But both dimensions will be present. And they'll be present from that time forever. There'll be an establishing forever. There will be an ordering and gaining more ground. So after we get the whole planet, what? I don't know what, but I know this. There are, and science tells us that the Milky Way galaxy is one of the smallest galaxies. And there's over a hundred million galaxies of which the Milky Way is one of the smaller ones. A hundred million galaxies. So what's going to happen? I don't have a clue. But I know that the God who established our life is tremendously smart. He's got proactive plans. He's a great leader. He's already planned things for billions of years. Nothing will surprise him. He's on top of it. And he means what he says. There'll be no end to Jesus's government. The increase, it will increase and increase all the time. A, it may take, his government will spread progressively. And it may take decades. It will take decades. It will take the thousand years, the full thousand years for Jesus's laws to cover every institution of life, of every individual, and then for every institution of life for them to mature and then to be tested and seasoned over time for the Satan to come and test it again at the end of the thousand years. It will take a thousand years to do this in a proper, seasoned, mature way that the planet will become righteous. That whole thing is gonna go together. B, what I mean is that the whole thing is gonna go together. What I mean is that the thousand years, all the processes involved will all work to one end is what I mean by that. B, the social improvement or the healing of nations will be progressive, not instantly. When Jesus comes back, the night Jesus comes back, the day he comes back, it'll be night somewhere and day somewhere else on the planet. When he comes back, the earth will be in chaos and the next day it will still be in chaos. All the streets won't be repaired and all the buildings won't be built. We will, the cities, the waste cities of the earth will go on this really long, it'll be exciting, but it'll be a hard process of rebuilding the cities and the nations of the earth because they will be absolutely in ruins. That's many, many verses on that. And we studied the second coming in Armageddon. One of the prominent things that you're working on is how many verses talk about the need to reestablish the cities and the nations of the earth. Like we think, I mean, think about how big of a task it was in the World Trade Center, just reestablishing that. That was one building in just a very, very small part of a city. In World War II, all through Europe and Asia, the cities were decimated. It took decades to fix the city, decades and decades. Some of the cities are still not fixed. You know, 60 years ago, they're still not fixed. Healing will take time. Okay, Roman numeral four. More scriptures on the saints ruling in the age to come. Jesus gave one of the greatest promises to one of the most carnal churches in the first century, to the Laodiceans. Because Jesus wanted to motivate them to resist compromise and lethargy by offering them a place of government in the millennial kingdom. He told them this carnal, lethargic church called the Laodiceans. They had sin and compromise, they were passive. Look at what he says in Revelation three. He says, if you'll overcome the compromise and the passivity, if you'll overcome your lethargy, he said, you're lukewarm, I want to spit you out of my mouth. You're just, you're passive. You're not on fire for me. And if you will overcome that, it's not just overcoming the Antichrist, overcoming compromise and spiritual passivity. The church in America is best described in the New Testament by the church of Laodicea. It says that we're rich and we have need of nothing. We're growing faster and the spirit of lethargy and passivity, and I don't mean just about kingdom work. People got a lot of zeal about ministry, but that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about zeal about Jesus and meekness and holiness and growing our spirit alive in the word of God. A lot of people are excited about ministry activity because it gives them a chance to get on a platform or make some money or get a breakthrough in their life. Or maybe this is the big thing they're waiting for, the big breakthrough. That's not what Jesus was talking about. He was talking about being zealous for the kingdom and that's righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Living our life abandoned for God, even when no one's looking. That's what we're talking about. And he told, it'd be like the church to America. He told this passive church. Passivity was as great of an enemy as their blatant compromise. He goes, if you will overcome your passivity, your lukewarmness, I will grant you to sit with me on a throne. I will grant you to sit with me on a throne if you will do this. He goes, this is my call to you. I will grant you to do this. And the same way, look at this, that I overcame. Now that's an interesting thing. Did you know Jesus and his humanity had to overcome temptation? We think of Jesus as his overcoming was so automatic pilot that, I mean, sure, he was going to overcome. There was never a doubt about it. But Jesus overcame in real flesh and blood humanity. That's why he put that down there. That wasn't something that was irrelevant. That was real when he said it. You know, maybe you think, well, Jesus, you're Jesus. He goes, I was there on the earth. I know what it felt like to do the will of God. I didn't, I had to give myself to God. I had to get the Holy Spirit's power to press through some of these things. Look at this. He says, if you overcome, and I want to give you the same exhortation. If we as a people, if we as a nation, body of Christ, I'm talking about in America, if we will overcome passivity and compromise, our secret compromises, Jesus said, I will give you a position on a throne in my kingdom, but not if you don't overcome. 1 Corinthians 6, look at this. You'll judge the world. You'll evaluate and you'll set in order the world. Beloved, the saints will set in order the events from world history. Under Jesus's leadership, it's all a part of his throne, but he delegates the authority. We will judge, we will evaluate, we will assign the penalty, or we will be involved in establishing positions and action plans. We will judge the world for real. We really, really will do this. And we will also judge angels. We will evaluate angels in the past and we will evaluate angels in the present. And we will set things in order related to the angelic realm. And the Lord says, if someone says, well, what will you do? The Lord says, I'm giving you 70 years on the earth, some more, some less, to decide if you want to be a part of the government. First, you decide if you want to be part of the family. And once you decide you're going to be part of the family, then the next thing is you're going to just, you got 70 years to decide if you want to be a part of the government. There's no way to be a part of it except through meekness. There's no possible way to fake out Jesus. Only on meekness, only those who are servants in the last place will be in the first place. There's absolutely no exceptions to nobody. It does not matter. And he will not be moved on that because he is a servant and he can see servanthood. When he sees it, he knows it. He goes, okay, your first assignment, you have 70 years. Do you want to be in the family? Yes. You get born again at youth camp. Okay, good. You're born again. You're in the family. Now, your next assignment. Do you want to be in the government? Yes. How bad do you want to be in the government? Really bad. Good. You have an extra amount of decades to develop meekness and love and understanding in your spirit. Stand before the Lord. Hi, Lord, I love you. He says, oh, man, you're sincere, but you're not very mature. I watched you for 50 years. You didn't grow much in 50 years. You accumulated more Bible info. You didn't accumulate more living understanding. Your spirit actually got more dull as the decades rolled on, not more vibrant. You went to more conferences. You preached at more meetings. You led more worship, but your spirit was actually more dull as the decades unfolded. Yeah, but I love you. I know you love me, but you didn't give yourself to me. And I want you to be a support person. I want you to help for the next thousand years. I want you to help. I want you to go help that person. Oh, Lord, that gal didn't have any responsibility at all. Well, I didn't care if she had responsibility. She had meekness. She was a servant. She gave herself to me in secret. She gave herself to the word of God. Top of page four, Roman numeral five. Now, I've been kind of drawing you out on this, those that are new, because I know and I understand it, but it's a faulty understanding. I had it for a few years. We have this very wrong view of authority. People says, I don't want to be an authority. I don't want to be authority. The reason a person says that because they have a secular view of what authority is. They're only thinking of authority through the lens of a fallen world. And they're thinking, well, if I'm in authority, paragraph A, I get more honor. I don't want more honor. Jesus is enough. I mean, I got a resurrected body. I got a bunch of those problems are done with forever. I mean, I just love Jesus. I don't want to be over people. I don't want to, you know, be in a position where I get honor from people or being over people in this age is you're in the position to make decisions that secure your own comfort and your own honor. I mean, they had people make the decisions typically in this age to make sure they get comfort and honor and they get things their way. You go, I don't care about that. But beloved, that's a secular paradigm of authority. The biblical paradigm of authority has nothing to do with that. And you can be sure of one thing. If it was kind of superfluous and kind of juvenile to want rewards, Jesus would not have been the main man in the Bible to teach on rewards. Nobody taught on rewards more than Jesus did. You take everybody, all the teachings on rewards, add them all up, and Jesus taught on more than everybody else. In real, I'm talking about blatant, direct, not kind of covert or indirect references. I'm talking about direct references to rewards. Jesus taught on them more than everybody else put together. And it wasn't juvenile or peripheral that he did this. He understood it. Jesus as a man wanted rewards from his father. That was part of his obedience. He wanted to be rewarded from his father because being rewarded from his father meant he was going to be working closely with his father in the things that are dearest to his father. And he would have the ability to impact the people who meant the most to him. He could assure their quality of life would increase. And his nearness to the father would be expressed through that working relationship and governing the earth. It's about, I want to do what's dearest to him. And I want to be near him in what's dear to him. He wants to bring his father's name to the earth. He goes, oh, Mike, I love that. And I love the people. And I want you, I love it. I'd like you to help me. I want you to work really close with me. I'm making up this prophecy. I hope it's somewhat true. But I want you to work really close to me. Oh, the thing I have the most passion about is getting my father's name. And all these people, I want them filled with wisdom and understanding, saint, I mean, resurrected bodies and not. Will you help me? Will you plan with me? Work with me. Come in close contact with me. And we're going to see the smile on their face and the brightness in their eyes when they discover the things that I have for them. But I'm going to give them through your hands. And we're going to work really close together. Does that, do you want to do that? No, I want a little cabin on the edge of glory. It's just enough to be over there. Ah, you know, you think of the person or people. I may hear that all the time. I don't want authority. What they mean is I don't want to be a boss like the guy down the road over the business. That's not what Jesus is talking about. Get rid of that paradigm. Get a bridal paradigm of authority. That's deep, intimate partnership with the dearest man in your life, Jesus, doing the dearest thing, establishing his father's power and glory to the people we love most in the nations and watching the joy of discovery and the delight of encounter. And we get to help mediate that to them. Beloved, we absolutely want to do more of that, not less than that. We're not going to be in a position. So we, you know, construct through a nation. One of the Kings going, I am the one. There'll be nothing. There'll be nothing close to that because only the meekest people from the earth will be Kings in the spirit. And only the meekest people be earth on the earth will be Kings. Even in the natural to the meek will inherit the earth. They'll only be the meek ones. They're not in it for themselves. They're in it for the nearness and the dearness of the interaction with Jesus and what it does to the nations and how it brings the father's glory. Think of the person you admire the most, that you love the most. Think of the person you enjoy the most. Maybe there's two or three of them. I mean, you absolutely love and enjoy the most. Now, would you like to work closely with them in matters that are the most important matters of life for eternity? Think of the person you love the most. Would you like to work closely with them on the things that are the most important, the things of God that have eternal impact? Yes, that's what rewards are. Is that, that's the issue of rewards. And we absolutely want them. Now multiply who you would like to work with the most in this age times a thousand times a million. And that's what being a King is in the age to come working in, you know, in this deep interaction with Jesus to determine the fate of nations and millions of people for the glory of God. That is so, that is so wonderful in the realm of intimacy with God. Jesus enjoys ruling under his father's authority and you will really enjoy it. Look at D, paragraph D. Jesus cherishes ruling with his father. He, he loves it. He loves it. It's not just that he says, well, I don't really want to do it, but somebody needs to do it. No, he goes, father, I love working with you. Or, I mean, I'm working together with you to the most, with the most important thing on your heart. I love working with you, father. Look what he says in Matthew 25. He says, good, well done, good and faithful servant. You were faithful over a few things. Beloved, 99.9999% of the people of the earth in all of history only have a few things. All of us in this room and almost everybody in history. There's, there's, you know, there's a few, a few exceptions in history. We only have a few things. And yet we're in so much pain about the few things that we're not faithful with them. We're just in so much pain. We don't have more. And the Lord says, well, just be faithful with the few and I'll give you a big assignment in the age to come. Oh, I just gotta get more people knowing that I'm godly. I gotta get more people paying attention to me right now. The Lord says, you're stumbling with the few things I give you. Be faithful, forget the size. Don't measure the impact. Be as faithful and committed to serve four people, eight people at the side, you know, in the out of the way place. So the people could never pay you back and be faithful with a few things. And the Lord says, I will make you ruler over many in one hour, the thing will turn. And here's what he says. And then when I make you ruler, he won't say this to everybody because only, only a small percent will be ruler over many things, but it's available to everybody. And then when those people receive that commission to rule in deep partnership with Jesus, then he will say, enter into the enjoyment of partnership with me, the joy of your Lord. He goes, I have this joy. It's my joy. Enter into the enjoyment of working near me pertaining to that which is dear to me. Enter in and you'll go, oh yes, I love it. And you have a thousand year assignment. And we'll wonder, why did we ever look back over our shoulder like Lot's wife? Reconsider going backwards to the old days, the things of the world. We don't wanna put our hand to the plow and start, man, you know, I could have this, I could have that. I could be this and that. We got five, we just got a minute on the earth. I don't wanna spend five minutes looking back over my shoulder. I wanna, I want the Lord to take my little and I will always have just a few things and you will always have just a few things. And unless you're the really, really rare exception, there's so few people that have more than a few things. And if I can press in and be faithful and the Lord says, I want you to be now ruler. I want you to have government over many things. And then if he says anything close to that, his next sentence will be, with that assignment comes and a waking of joy in the individual who gets that assignment. Beloved, there will be so much joy. The thing that you and I, the thing that we fear most, many of us, not all of you, but many of you. I know we have a kindred spirit. I know a number of you in this room. I fear regret related to this more than anything in my life. I fear regret. I do not want to stand before God on that day and have him say, Mike, you just had a ball down there on the earth. You did this and that. You did a whole lot of things. I didn't know what you're doing. You kept telling everybody. I told you, I don't remember telling you and I wasn't in half of it, but I love you. You're my favorite, but you know what? I'm not calling you into government over many things. And there will be a certain joy. There's a certain joy that comes with the assignment and the joy is in the deep partnership with Jesus in the government of what's dearest to him, bringing the planet under his father's influence. And it's not just for the father. That's the big one, but it's the discovery and the delight of the individuals that you're impacting. The light in their eyes goes on and they discover the father's love through your ministry to them. And you have a thousand years. And then undoubtedly, whatever goes on in this thousand years, you know, impacts the next run. And who knows what the assignment after that? I don't even want to think about it because there's no revelation of the scripture on it that I know of. The thousand year assignment is already for most people so out of, off their radar. Most people don't ever think of the fact they're in an internship and they really are going to get an assignment in a minute. They think their internship is their eternity. This is it. Well, they know it's not really true, but they live. Most people live as though they're not going to die. And most people live as though they're not going to be evaluated and assigned to some place, to some role. Every one of us in this room are going to die. Unless we meet the Lord in the rapture and every one of us in this room, believer and unbeliever will be assigned to a place and will be assigned to a function. Every one of us, 500 years from now, when we interact, every one of us will have an assignment and we will be at a place. And in 5,000 years, well past the millennium, we will still have a place and we will have an assignment related to our responses to God. Top of page five. I love preaching on this. I get an extra benefit preaching on it because I get think on it, say it, say then they get questions. I got to say it again, do they answer the questions? But here's the downside. I mean, that's the good side of teaching. It goes through your being a lot. Then the downside is the Lord said in the book of James chapter three, he said, let not many of you become teachers because if you say yes and the Lord blesses you, then he requires more of you. There's a higher standard of judgment. The Lord's gonna, I'll stand before him. He goes, hey, little guy, come here. Don't tell me you didn't know about the millennium. You talked about it. Why didn't you make different choices? You knew better than most. Why did you do this and this and this? So those other guys never thought about it. They grew up in a part of the body of Christ. They never mentioned the hundred chapters about the Lord's purposes beyond our present life right now. I mean, I talk about the end times and beyond. So there's a glory with teaching us, but you can teach it one-on-one. You don't need a crowd to teach it to, but there's something about saying it. It gets into your spirit and that's a good thing, but then you're more accountable for it too. So I had one guy say, well, what if I don't say it and I don't learn it? Then I'm not accountable. I go, don't go there. That's a real downward spiral. Roman numeral six, living in the new Jerusalem while reigning on the earth. That's where we're gonna live. This is another one of these passages. I'm saying to the several hundred new ones here. Those that come regular to this, you've heard this so many times. One of the primary verses is Ephesians 1.10. Look at this. God made known Paul speaking to us the mystery of his will. God made known the mystery means the plan, the hidden plan of God's heart. And here's the plan. Here's the central plan of God. Here's the centerpiece of God's plan. Here it is in one sentence. Ephesians 1.10. That God is going to bring together into one reality. He's gonna bring together into one reality all things. He's gonna do it through Jesus and under his leadership. And what are the things he's gonna bring together? He's gonna bring the heavenly realm and he's gonna bring the earthly realm together into one reality, heaven. We're not going to heaven. Heaven is coming to the earth in terms of the big picture. Now we go to heaven if we die between now and the second coming of Christ. But we go to heaven as a holding pattern. We go to heaven in a disembodied spirit. Our spirit goes to heaven. You know why we don't have a resurrected body in heaven? Because we don't get one till the second coming. Because we're in heaven. We don't need a resurrected body to relate to the environment of heaven. That's why we don't have one. But when heaven comes, when that holding pattern's over for 2,000 years from the cross to the second coming or the resurrection to the second coming, when that holding pattern's over and we got the next billions and billions of years, it's a little holding pattern for 2,000 years between the resurrection and the second coming. Once that's over, we get a resurrected body. Why do we get a resurrected body in the second coming? Because we're on the earth and we need a resurrected body to relate to the natural environment of the earth. That's why we need one. We have to have one. Both realms are coming together. The realm of heaven, the realm of earth. B, the spirit realm and the material realm come together as the new Jerusalem, says it three times in the book of Revelation, the new Jerusalem descends to the earth. And it descends to just above the millennial Jerusalem. That's a big subject. We spent six weeks on this subject. It's a big subject. It's a big subject in the Bible. And there's a, it's my term or our term, meaning it's not a biblical term or it's not an established theological term outside of here is what I mean by that. It's a term that we just all made up and worked on together, a bunch of us. We call it the corridor of glory. The two Jerusalems are connected together. It's clear in scripture. We live in the new Jerusalem. That's where our residence is. We, we serve, we rule on the material earth. We have a material body and we live in the new Jerusalem that's descended to the earth. That's where the saints will live. Number C. D, what kind of body will the saints have? And the reason we want to know where we're going to live, what kind of body we have is because once, you know, there's so much mystery about that and the Bible is pretty clear about it, actually. There's much, there's many, many insights on it. If we just take a little time and put it together. I mean, there's not a chapter that, you know, says five points on the resurrected body, but there's many, many pieces of information in the Bible. We bring them together. The saints will have a solid material body that has supernatural abilities. Mary Magdalene, when she saw Jesus resurrected, John chapter 20, verse 14, she didn't even know it was him. So we have this idea because Jesus can turn the glory on, like in revelation one, he turned the glory on and, you know, John, the apostle, his, was totally overwhelmed. But Jesus, he's standing there in his full resurrected body and he looks so human, she thinks he's the gardener. And he says, woman, why are you weeping? Well, who are you seeking? Ask her two questions. She goes, sorry, I'm a gardener, Mr. Gardener. I just, if you know where Jesus is, she doesn't know it's him. And he goes, Mary, look me in the eyes. Ah, my point is, my, here's my point. We're imagining Jesus is standing a foot and a half off the earth, tilted with brighter than the sun. Mary, ah, it must be Jesus. That's not, he can do that. But he, when he relates in the natural environment, he can be, he can clothe his glory. And I don't know that the saints, that we will have the dimensions of the full dimensions of the glory he has, or maybe partial, or I don't know all that degree. But I know we'll have glory in our body. We'll have light and brightness. But Jesus could veil that brightness. And I don't know what the rules of that are. You know what the rules of the game are. But he veiled it whenever it was appropriate to veil it. It says in Hebrews chapter 13, it says, don't forget to entertain strangers. In other words, be nice to strangers. Why? Because some people fail to be nice to strangers and without even knowing it, they're amusing angels. Because angels appear often through the world. I mean, through history, they appear exactly looking like a person. Angels appear. And the writer of Hebrews says, don't neglect strangers because unwittingly, unknowingly, you are angels. You're a spectacle to the angels. You're not entertaining them. I don't know what the best word would be that. But they're looking at you. And they're wondering, why aren't you paying attention? Beloved angels appeared many times through the Bible. And the people who saw the angels did not know it was an angel. Other times the angels appear in their glory. And other times they appear veiled. And whenever it's appropriate, my point being is that the supernatural realm can interact with the material realm with the appropriate veiling that life is tremendously different than maybe we're thinking. Luke chapter 24, the disciples on the road to Emmaus. So they're walking with Jesus a couple miles, I'm assuming. Talking maybe a couple hours possibly. They're conversing. They didn't even know it was him. They're telling Jesus about Jesus. Well, this guy, man, he was really... This guy from Nazareth, awesome. He was so anointed and he's so fiery. And Jesus walking with him. They don't know it's him. He's raised from the dead walking with them. Then he eats with them. He sits downstairs breaking the bread. They went, wait a second. Oh my, you're Jesus. And Jesus was telling them about Jesus. I mean, it didn't get any better, Jesus preaching Jesus. You know, he was telling them about himself using the prophets. I tell you, you get no higher than that. And he says, boy, didn't our heart burn within him? I mean, here's Jesus preaching Jesus and their heart's burning within them. Wow. But the point is he vanished. So he had all the properties of the resurrected supernatural properties of the resurrected body. But he had all the physical properties of a resurrected body where they didn't know that he was... That he had all this supernatural dimension. He could eat and talk to them and never raise their suspicion. Beloved, you will have a resurrected body like this. You'll never get tired. You'll never gain weight. Sounds like I'm getting right to my points of interest and concern, doesn't it? Okay. Some guy said, how come you always say those two? And I go, huh, good point. John 20, after eight days, his disciples on the inside, Thomas comes. Jesus comes, the doors are shut. He walks through the door and Thomas goes, that better be you. He goes, I got to touch you. It's probably you. I watched you walk through that door. I mean, it looks like you, but you seem so human. I got to touch you. I mean, Jesus walks through the door and it's the Jesus he saw die. And Thomas is going, this is so intense. I know you died. And I know you walked through that wall and it touches his wound. And he goes, touches his wound. He goes, I am having a paradigm shift, Jesus. Give me a moment here. How did, what's going on? What's going on is Jesus was the first installment of heaven and earth coming together. The two realms coming together. He's the first installment of it. Fully human, fully in the natural dimensions. So we're not fully natural because the sin is part of that. With all the materials dimensions of the natural realm, but fully supernatural. People don't even know it's him when he's talking to them. John chapter 21, he's on the shore. They're out, you know, maybe some, you know, 50, 100 yards out. And they look at him. They see this man on the shore. They get closer. They don't even know it's him. He goes, Jesus goes, hey, do you guys got any food? They go, no. And come on. And he's cooking for them. And they walk up to it and they figure out it's Jesus through the process. Beloved, this is, this is awesome where we're going. Top of page six. I'm going to wind down just a moment here. Natural and supernatural government. They go together. They're not in conflict. There, there's a, an order to it. The resurrected saints will occupy the highest positions of government in the spirit. In the millennial earth. They will be parallel yet superior to the relationships of angels to demons right now. Right now, and I'd even say angels to demons as well as angels to humans. Right now, above the, every city and nation, there is a spiritual hierarchy right now. There are demons and there's angels in the atmosphere above all the regions of the earth. And they, the demons have the government of darkness, but they have government. Right now they do. And the angels have the government of God. They have the government of righteousness and there's angels over cities and nations and angels over water, angels over fire. Angels are assigned in all of these roles. Now angels, when we pray, they have the power, but only when we pray to drive demons back. They have authority over demons and angels can, uh, uh, set things in motion in the natural room. They have the premier position now. But in the resurrection, they are manifest as our servants. We have the superior position and it's us and angels. Demons are now in prison and the two of us, the two different groups working together will influence the people in the natural realm. Right now, the main government over our nation is not the leaders in the natural. It's the demons and the angels that are moving in relationship to righteousness and prayer. And when, when, when, uh, Daniel prayed, Michael drives back this demon of Persia, which is Iran. Daniel 10, I have it there. Michael pushes this demon back, pushes him back, but he can only do it related to the prayers of the earth. There's an interaction and Daniel sees these angels, talks to them and they go, you keep praying, we'll keep pushing. If you pray, the father will let us push. You quit praying. The father tells us to quit pushing the demons off the, out of the geographic region or from their position of power. So Daniel keeps praying and fasting. Michael pushes. But here's the part that's interesting. Michael's now, I mean, the demons out of the position of influence. This ungodly king called Cyrus, he's a Persian king. It's an Iranian of, of, I mean, it's the same places of Iran. He's an unbeliever. This angel, this is my version of it. But this angel now through the Holy Spirit and the angel, I don't know how it works, come and touches this man. I don't actually know exactly how it works. But my point is they're in a position of influence. The man gets in a Holy Spirit good mood. The fog lifts. Now this is real. I'm sure it's not exactly this way, but the concept is real. And he says, I'm going to let Israel go free. I'm going to send them back because they're right now, they're in captivity under his dominion. He goes, I'm going to free Israel to go back home and I'm going to give them a hundred million dollars for the journey to go build the temple or 50 million. I mean, he paid for the journey, paid for the temple. He got in this outrageous good mood one day. That's an angel influencing him and driving back demons related to prayer. And this king makes his decision. Israel's released. He probably, you know, sometime later gets in one of those bad moods again and the demons start pounding on him. Why did I let Israel go? Beloved, angels make great impact on life right now in ways that we don't see. Demons come the other way around and touch a person and they get this horrible, dreadful, foreboding mood of fear and possessiveness and anger and jealousy. Lust inflames them. A demon's breathing or, I mean, not breathing. I'm thinking like a dragon breathing on them. Demons touching them. They're incited with fear and dread and lost. And I'm going to get my stuff and I'm going to pay that guy back. That's a demon touching the person. Angels do the same thing. My point being is that we will have the superior role in the spirit to the world affairs. We will appear many times and interact face to face just like Jesus did for 40 days after he rose from the dead. He appeared him for 40 days. He was with them. The two realms are coming together in a substantial way in the millennial kingdom and then in the full way after the millennium, but substantially during the millennium. The realms will begin to merge in a very substantial way. And we will talk to them face to face like this. In other ways, undoubtedly, we will influence them in the spirit like angels and demons influence kings right now. Well, I'm going to take one more minute in the literal. So worship team, come on up. And I'm just going to tell you about the next few pages. The next few pages, because I want you to read them. This is a little bit. Actually, we covered more of this last week. Is that the apostles there? I have about maybe eight or 10 people. And on the notes here, they received more information, more prophecies recorded in the Bible about their millennial role than they had prophecies about them in the Bible for their internship role. David had more prophesied in the Bible about his role in the millennium than David had about his his 40 year kingship in Jerusalem round one during his internship. David had profound revelation on his role as king in Israel after the second coming of the Lord. He says it publicly and he shows up a number of times. And until you have a lens for it, you don't see it. But I just challenge you to read some of these verses. Jesus tells the apostles. He goes, hey, when we I return in the regeneration, the millennial kingdom, he goes, you will be judges. You will be governors inside of Israel. You will rule in Israel. They go, really? He goes, why? Well, because you followed me now and gave up everything. I will give you government in the age to come. Can you imagine having insight about your role in the millennial kingdom? Well, there I got a whole list of people that have it, that insight. I'm not advocating. Let's try to go get it. Forget that. Someone says, oh, I want to get it now. Get your mind off that. I think the reason these are in the Bible is so we know there is a role. I don't care what my role is to know it now because I know one thing, meekness and humility is if you do that full blast, you're going to end up in your role. I don't care to have it defined right now. I just need to know the role does exist. And that's why these biblical examples are. So don't try to, you know, try to get yourself in some little try to talk some angel into visiting you or something. I don't know what somebody might do with that. But my point is, we're not concerned about some angel visiting us and telling us what some of these men of the days of old heard from the spirit. We are encouraged because they give us information that the realm exists, that we have a role of the age to come. And that's all we need to know about is that the realm exists, the reality exists, and that meekness is the way to it. Amen. Let's stand.