Audio first posted: September 12, 2026
Below is a machine-generated transcript of the Tasting death audio word, with a few minor manual edits. At the bottom, after the transcript, is a machine-generated summary of the transcript.
| Hello. In this audio word, we would like to talk about a specific verse in scripture. I think it was yesterday or the day before. I'm not sure. I think it was yesterday that I was asking the Lord, what should we talk about in the next audio word? And because I had no clarity whatsoever, | |
| So I just became silent for a second and just tried to listen. And out of nowhere, it's like the verse came, like bubbled out, up from inside of me, if that makes any sense. It's like it came up towards my head. I'm not sure how to describe it. And when I saw it, I had my eyes closed and I saw it, it was Luke 9:27. | |
| And I said, okay. So I went to see what Luke 9:27 said. And then after that, I asked the Lord, Lord, did I get it right? Because I don't think I can say anything about this verse because I don't understand it too much. But... | |
| And I waited a little and I felt like like maybe an hour or so later or a few hours later when I was on the verge of maybe asking the Lord again to see if I if I had heard correctly, I felt the Lord say, no, that's that's what I want you to talk about. So that's what we'll be talking about, even though I must say that my understanding is a little limited. | |
| So I'm not sure how long this audio word is going to be. Uh, and, um, I'm not a hundred percent sure of where the Lord will be taking us. Um, but that's the verse. So, um, so we're going, um, Lord willing to, to talk about it and meditate on it. And, and, and I pray that, uh, somehow, um, uh, the Lord will speak to you and, uh, will, that the Lord will deposit, uh, | |
| an understanding in your heart and mind that will enable you to do his will in one way or another. So the verse that came to my head was Luke 9:27. And when I went to read it, it says, but I tell you of a truth. | |
| There be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the kingdom of God. That's all it says. So I'll read it one more time, Luke 9:27. But I tell you of a truth. There be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the kingdom of God. And I remember thinking about this verse a long time ago. | |
| I didn't know it was Luke 9 27, but I had, I have, uh, I had read this before. Um, and I, I always wondered what, what does that mean? Um, why does the Lord talk about tasting death and, and then saying some will not taste death until they see the kingdom come? Why? Um, so if I'm not mistaken, um, | |
| and I may be misremembering, but I vaguely recall hearing people preach about this verse and implying, if I'm remembering correctly, that the Lord was kind of implying that, like saying, people in the audience listening to him | |
| were going to live, some of them were going to live to see the kingdom of God come. So they wouldn't die before the kingdom of God came. | |
| But that begs the question, well, what does the kingdom of God mean? What is that? And also, the fact that this was said by the Lord 2,000 years ago, and clearly everybody there who was listening to him has already moved on, passed away and moved on. So does that mean that the kingdom of God already came? And then there's another... | |
| And that brings up another question. When the Lord said the kingdom of God is within you. So he was saying the kingdom of God is here and it's within you. Well, well, if it's already here, then that. | |
| then how does this verse make sense? Because the Lord is talking about something in the future until they see the kingdom of God, as if to say, if we're taking it the way that some people, I believe, take this verse, | |
| then it's like he's talking about a future event, but he's already said in other places that the event in some way has come, unless he's talking about a manifestation of it that is different from what has already come. So the thing is, when you interpret this verse as some sort of prediction, | |
| And if you try to see this as the way the eschatological parrots try to understand the end times and all that, if you take it as a prediction, then the verse is going to get distorted in your heart and mind. | |
| For sure, all you're going to come up with is nonsense that is not going to edify you in the spirit. And on top of that, it's not going to tell you anything real about things that will come in the future. So because the explanations that I've heard about this verse don't make sense because of the things we just said, | |
| I was always puzzled, Lord, what does this verse really mean? So let's read it one more time. And let's strip away the idea that God is trying to predict a future event. Like saying event A will happen and then event B. | |
| if we stop seeing it as some sort of a literal prediction of things, then we'll be allowing the Lord to speak to us as to what this verse really means, what God was really saying when He said these words. So we'll read it one more time. But I tell you of a truth. There be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the kingdom of God. Now, | |
| The key here is the Lord didn't say, oh, some of you will not die before. Some people here will live to see the kingdom of God. If he was talking about a prediction of like a certain specific event in history, that would have been the more natural phrasing. If what he was saying is, oh, some of you will live to see it. | |
| And that's how we would phrase it. Some of us will live to see the day when blah, blah, blah. So we wouldn't say some of you will not taste death until this happens. Because the structure of the sentence is conveying a different message than the message of you will live to see something. And I believe in my heart the key to begin to unravel what this verse means, to kind of break the normal understanding of it, | |
| The key word is the word till. The word till there was translated from the Greek word, I'm looking at it here, eos. | |
| In anglicized form, they spell it H-E-O-S. In Greek, it's Epsilon, Omega, and I think that's Sigma. So it would be EOS. But for some reason, when we anglicize it, we add an H at the beginning. I've never been clear on why that is. But the thing is, the word is EOS. Let's pronounce it like that, EOS. | |
| And when I go to see here in the Blue Letter Bible that I'm looking at, when I go to see the meaning of that word, it says till or until. And when you look at the ways that it's used throughout Scripture, in the Greek text of Scripture, it seems consistent with until. | |
| So the translation till is valid. But let's change the word till to until, which basically in English is the same thing. But this is just to give more emphasis to what God is saying. He's saying, okay, there are some standing here who will not taste death until... | |
| they see the kingdom of God. So, | |
| someone tells you you're not going to win the championship until you get a solid third baseman who can hit home runs, you know, talking about baseball. So you're saying there's a team that hasn't won the championship until | |
| for several years and they've been trying to, been close but haven't been able to. And then someone says, you will not win the championship until you get a good third baseman, a solid third baseman who can hit home runs. So that means that once that event happens, then the first thing that was mentioned will happen. So the Lord is saying, you are supposed to taste death | |
| But it will not happen until you see the kingdom of God in the cases of some of you. So that means that when they see the kingdom of God, what is going to happen? They're going to taste death. I hope you see, when you start seeing it like that, because that's what it really says, then the understanding begins to change. And what other people may have thought of before, | |
| kind of becomes broken. It's like it breaks that pattern of thinking that is brought in by the thinking of other people when they try to see this as a prediction. So God is saying, when the kingdom of God is seen by these people, then they're going to taste death. But it's not going to happen until then because there's something in them that's blocking them tasting death. | |
| Just like in the example we were sharing just now, that team wants to win a championship, but the lack of a solid third baseman who can hit home runs is blocking them, preventing them winning the championship. | |
| So when they get that missing element, boom, then they win the championship. So this is not about saying that, oh, some of you will live to see the kingdom of God. In other words, the kingdom of God is going to come very quickly. And some of you will live to see it. It's like someone saying, oh, you will live to see the day that... | |
| Um, some, uh, that, that people will have many computers in their pockets, you know, like, uh, nowadays we have mobile phones, which are basically very powerful, many computers, uh, that we carry around in our pockets. So, uh, some of, some people didn't live to see that day, but, um, those of us who are still around, uh, we have seen that day. Um, so when you phrase it like that, it is, it is not, um, | |
| when you say you will live to see something or you will not die before something happens, what you're saying is that the event will happen within your lifetime. But when you phrase it with A will not happen until B happens, what are you implying? That A will happen, but B has to happen first. | |
| So when I say you will not die before you see mobile phones, let's say, then what you're emphasizing is the coming of mobile phones and how quickly they will come. But if I say you will not die until mobile phones are in the market, | |
| What is the meaning then? Oh, that means that when mobile phones come, boom, then you will die. I hope that's making sense when you say you will not die until mobile phones come. Then you're saying mobile phones came, boom, then you're going to die. So the emphasis is on you dying. And that the trigger for that will be the coming of mobile phones, you know, for some reason. This is a silly example, but it's just to illustrate. So that's what the Lord is saying. | |
| that some of the people in the audience, and I would dare say, the Lord is talking to us. He said, some of us will not taste death until we see the kingdom of God. So when we see the kingdom of God, then we'll taste death. And notice God didn't say, | |
| He didn't say you shall not die until they see the kingdom. They shall not die until they see the kingdom of God. He didn't say die. He said taste death. So clearly God is talking about something very different than predictions or literal things in the literal world. | |
| earthly realm you know people living or dying or things like that it's not about that it's it's something different so okay so now that we have like a like a hopefully broken the normal understanding that some people might have about this verse because the god the structure of the verse the way god phrased the words does not lend itself to to be interpreted as | |
| the way many people interpret this verse. So now we've broken that paradigm in our minds. So now we'll see this verse from a fresh perspective, hopefully, of the Spirit. God is saying, it's almost like God is saying, I want you to taste death, but you're not letting it happen. So with some of you, | |
| The kingdom of God, you will have to wait for you to see the kingdom of God and then you'll taste death. And what is this tasting death about? And as I was asking the Lord about that, one of the things I felt the Lord say is that the answer is in the chapter. | |
| Because we're reading this verse out of context, you could say. So let's read the context to see what the Lord is saying. So we can go back maybe four verses. And four verses earlier, the Lord is talking about something else, quote-unquote. But we'll see how it's connected. So if we go back four verses from Luke 9:27 up to Luke 9:23... | |
| It says, And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. And then verse 24, For whosoever will save his life shall lose it. But whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it. Verse 25, For what is a man advantaged? | |
| If he gained the whole world and lose himself and be cast away, verse 26, for whosoever shall be ashamed of me and my words of him, shall the son of man be ashamed when he shall come in his own glory and in his father's and of the holy angels. | |
| That's verse 26. And then verse 27, the verse that we started with. But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the kingdom of God. So what did the Lord talk about in the four verses before that? He was talking about people denying themselves, taking up their cross daily and following him. That's what verse 23 says. And then verse 24 says, whoever loses his life shall save it. | |
| And obviously when the Lord is saying losing your life, it's not you doing harakiri and killing yourself. It's about you surrendering and being dead to yourself, but that's spiritually, not literally. So the Lord is saying you need to die. | |
| You need to die spiritually. Because when the Lord says, take up your cross daily, taking up the cross is obviously meaning taking your cross to go be crucified and then die. So there is death involved. And he's saying we should, it says, if anyone come after me, let him deny himself. | |
| and take up his cross daily and follow me. So he's saying that's what we need to do. So in other words, if you think about it now, in the context of verse 27, then God wants us to taste death because that's what he's talking about in the verses before that. He wants us to deny ourselves and die, lose our life. | |
| And actually in Greek, if I'm not mistaken, the word life is soul, psuche. So in Greek, it literally says, whosoever will lose his soul for my sake, the same shall save it. So in other words, whoever is willing to die to the soul, to the dominion of the soul, that person will save that soul. | |
| So when we allow the soul to be dominant, then the soul will die. And if we will experience death and we allow and we let the soul die, we surrender the soul and allow the spirit to rule over the soul, then the soul shall be saved. So, okay, so that means that | |
| And the Lord is saying in verse 27, there are some, it doesn't say all, there are some standing here who shall not taste death, the death that I'm tasting, will not taste the death that I'm asking them to taste until they see the kingdom of God. And the other thing here is that people, | |
| when the Lord says there's some standing here, and the word standing here, the standing was translated from histemi, which we've seen before, it literally means to establish, like when you establish a foundation. | |
| And yes, in spoken Greek, it also could be used to talk about someone standing in the literal sense of the word. But histemi, the essence of it is to establish like a post, like a column being kind of | |
| put on the ground and standing straight. That's what the word he conveys. So he's saying there's some standing here. And why does the Lord phrase it like that? Why doesn't he just say there's some here right now in front of me? Why does he say there's some standing here? | |
| Because the Lord is saying there's some who refuse to die. When you're standing, it's almost like saying, I don't give up. I don't surrender. I hope that's making sense. You're standing firm. You're planting yourself and saying, I'm not going anywhere. I'm not dying. And the Lord is saying, some of you who are standing like that in your soul, you will not taste the death that I'm asking you to taste. | |
| until you see the kingdom of God. And what is seeing here? The word seeing here was translated from the verb horao. And we've seen that verb several times before in various recordings, audio and video recordings. And horao has the connotation of... | |
| of prophetic vision, as we said before. And I did a search before this recording asking online. I went to Bing and asked the question, R-A-I-D-O, E-I-D-O, that's... | |
| Edo means to know. And horao, that's the verb we're looking at right now. So the question I asked was, are Edo and horao related in Greek, or are these separate verbs? | |
| Edo means mental knowledge and it can be translated to see. So it's like seeing with your mind. And Horao is more of a prophetic thing. It's like something you perceive prophetically. So when I ask the question, are Edo and Horao related in Greek or are they separate verbs? Then the answer that came is that they're not the same verb. They do not share... | |
| a direct morphological stem. And it says, lexical resources note that Eido is used in certain tenses and is sometimes borrowed for those forms, while Oro covers the broader range of present, future, and other tenses for to see. Okay, but let me see if I can find what I, here we go. Eido often carries the nuance of seeing that leads to knowing. | |
| And then Orao emphasizes the act of looking, beholding, or perceiving and can be used for physical sight, mental perception, or attention. So the thing is Orao is about perceiving. Eido is about seeing something and gaining mental knowledge from it. | |
| If that makes sense. Oral is more abstract. It's more like you're just perceiving. It's not going, you're not receiving mental information that you're adding to your brain storage. If that makes sense, you're perceiving something. And it's more in your emotions and your soul than in your mind per se. | |
| if that makes sense. So it's more prophetic. When you're seeing things prophetically, then you oral. When you're seeing things with your mind, you eido, you know or understand things with your mind. Okay, so the Lord is saying if you prophetically see or perceive the kingdom of God, what it is, then you'll understand that you need to die. | |
| I hope that's making sense. That's what God is saying in that verse. So we'll read it again and kind of phrase it a little differently based on the Greek text. But I tell you of a truth that there are some standing firmly here without surrendering who will not taste of death until... | |
| they can, they prophetically see what the kingdom of God is and understand its nature. If you can't understand the kingdom of God and its nature prophetically, you don't understand its essence. You don't perceive it prophetically. In other words, you're not looking with the mind of your eyes. I'm sorry, the eyes of your mind. Um, | |
| See, the kingdom of... People, when they think of the kingdom of God expanding, they think more churches and bigger congregations and more visible emotionalism or whatever. And they think, oh, that's the kingdom of God expanding. But God is saying, no, you can't see the kingdom of God with your eyes. You have to see it prophetically. It is something you cannot... | |
| Just analyze with your mind. And a lot of people don't understand what the kingdom of God is. And that's what this verse is talking about. That's why people don't want to die and don't want to let the soul lose control. | |
| That's why people are opposed to the things like what we're saying often about the pastoral ministry dying or being forced out of power so that the male ministries and the male spirit of God can dominate. They don't understand that. | |
| Because they can't see what the kingdom of God is about. They can't prophetically understand it. So they remain in that attitude and they don't want to let go of the soul's control. They want pastors to continue being in control. | |
| They want the pastoral mindset of mercy and all that rubbish, human mercy and compassion and forgiveness and all that stuff. They want that to continue in control. They want a system they can see with their Girgashite eyes. | |
| A system where you have a very orderly system where you have ministers and you have a temple building and you have services and you have deacons and that's what they need to see to say, oh, the kingdom of God is here. | |
| They can't see it with their spirit because all of that is what the soul wants. The soul wants a priestly class of ministers. The soul wants a building they can literally see and touch and go to every Sunday to feel that they are in the kingdom of God. It's the eyes of the mind, the Girgashite eyes of the mind need to see that. | |
| And the Canaanite soul wants to see communion and fellowship and friendship and messages that make you feel good, messages of love and hope and understanding. They need to see that. And when you tell them, no, that's not the kingdom of God, they say, no, no, because they don't know what the kingdom of God is. They can't perceive it prophetically. | |
| So they stand their ground and they don't let their soul die. They want the soul to continue in control because they don't know what the kingdom of God is. So then the question is, what is the kingdom of God? And that's what we believe have to discern as we meditate on chapter 9 of Luke. | |
| But before we do that, one of the things that the Lord prompted me to do | |
| or I felt led of the Lord to do, when I started looking at this verse, wondering what are we going to talk about, was to do a search on the words taste and death to see how many times they appear together in Scripture. So I took the word taste. That's in Greek. It's the word geouomai. That's the verb geouomai, to taste. And the word death is thanatos. | |
| So I took the two words and that's the two strong numbers. And I did a search on the Blue Letter Bible website on the two Greek words, because as we shared before, I don't trust the search when it's in English, because that means that we have to depend on how the translators chose to translate words. | |
| And they're not always consistent. So it's better to do a search directly on the Greek text and on websites like the Blue Letter Bible website. You can do that very easily. If you know the Greek strong numbers of each word, you just type them in the search box and press go and it will do a search on the Greek text. | |
| So I'm doing that right now, doing a search on the words taste and death, geomai and thanatos in Greek. And interestingly, it only appears five times in all of scripture, those two words together. And it's always talking about tasting death, tasting death, tasting death. It's like a phrase, you know, the two words are in the same verse and they're together. So it's not like taste is at the beginning of the verse and death is all the way at the end. They're together in all five verses. | |
| So the first time it's there, the two words are in scripture together in the same verse is Matthew 16:28. Verily I say unto you, there be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. So as you can see, it's almost the same verse as Luke 9:27, but with a little bit of a different phrasing. It says, till they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. | |
| And let me just, I apologize, let me just do one thing before we continue here. I just want to confirm one thing here. Yes, the word see in the verse we just read in Matthew 16:28, is also horao. So Matthew says that what has to happen for some of us to taste death | |
| to be willing to taste death, it is seeing the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. So Luke 9:27 just says the kingdom of God. Matthew says the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. And then the second time that taste and death appear together is Mark 9:1. It says, And he said unto them, Verily I say unto you that there be some of them that stand here | |
| which shall not taste of death till they have seen the kingdom of God come with power. So as you can see, it's almost the same verse again. The wording is a little bit different. So it says... | |
| What is the event that has to happen for us that we shall see? And again, the word see is horao, to finally be willing to taste death. It is horao, to see the kingdom of God come with power. And the word power in Greek there is dunamis. | |
| So as you can see, the first two appearances of taste and death together are talking about the same thing. It's the same verse as Luke 9:27, just phrased differently. So it's Matthew 16:28, Mark 9:1, Luke 9:27. So as you can see, the first three gospels, | |
| each of them have this verse there. Just phrased a little differently. So the difference is that Matthew 16:28, aside, without focusing on what the verse says at the beginning, the difference is Matthew 16:28 says, the son of man coming in his kingdom. Mark 9:1 says the kingdom of God. | |
| coming with power, with dunamis power. And Luke 9:27 says, just kingdom of God. So Luke just focuses on the kingship of God. And that makes sense because Luke is the evangelist gospel. So the evangelist is focused on kingship. So he just says kingdom of God. Mark 9:1 is the gospel from the man phase, from the pastor-teacher phase. | |
| And so it's interesting that he says kingdom of God too, but coming with power, with dunamis power. And then Matthew, which is the gospel, the apostolic gospel, the gospel from the lion face. There it says the son of man coming in his kingdom. So it's emphasizing the son of man. | |
| The son of man who makes judgments so that the kingdom of God can come. That's how I perceive it in my heart. So Matthew is emphasizing that it's through the son of man, through man in the flesh, that the kingdom of God will come. Mark is emphasizing the power of that kingdom. And Luke is just emphasizing kingdom. | |
| Okay, and so the first three appearances of taste and death together are in, as we said, in Matthew. Let me just, I apologize, I lost the results here. Let me find them again. | |
| Matthew 16:28, Mark 9:1, and then Luke 9:27. The fourth time that taste and death appear together is in John 8:52. And it says, Then said the Jews unto him, Now we know that thou hast the devil, Abraham is dead, and the prophets. And thou sayest, If a man keep my saying, he shall never taste of death. | |
| So as you can see, John is the first one who doesn't repeat the same verse, basically. Now he's talking about something different. So tasting death is spoken of in all four Gospels. The first three, Matthew, Mark, and Luke all speak of, basically say a very similar thing. | |
| And then John 8:52 says something completely different, you could say, on the surface. But it's also talking about tasting death. So it's interesting that it's not Jesus talking about tasting death. It's his enemies, the Jews. So we'll read it once again. Then said the Jews unto him, Now we know that thou hast a devil. Abraham is dead, and the prophets, and thou sayest, If a man keep my saying, he shall never taste of death. | |
| So notice that they are saying, hey, they are associating taste of death with literal death. And that's what this verse is kind of emphasizing. The tasting of death is not literal death, but to the mind that's in the soul, that's not in the spirit like the Jews here, | |
| The tasting of death and death are the same thing. So they say Abraham is dead. So he tasted death. And the prophets are dead. They tasted death. And let's just go there very quickly to this verse. | |
| So I just went to John 8:52 to read the surrounding verses. So let's read from verse 49. Jesus answered, I have not a devil, but I honor my father and ye do dishonor me. And I seek not mine own glory. There is one that seeketh and judgeth. Verily, verily, I say unto you, if a man keep my saying, he shall never see death. | |
| Now I'm curious what the word sea is in Greek, and it's theoreo, which looks very different from orao, but I think it's related. Yeah, it's kind of a combination of theaomai and orao. Theaomai means to behold. | |
| and oral uh is the word you know that we're we've been talking about prophetically seeing so i think it's it's almost like saying prophetically seeing and and and beholding like like uh it's almost like an expanded form of oral like like seeing and just staring at something and just perceiving it in the spirit um | |
| Well, that's what I'm getting here. So I say unto you, if a man keep my saying, he shall never see death. So, and then John 8:52. | |
| Then said the Jews unto him, Now we know that thou hast the devil, Abraham is dead, and the prophets, and thou sayest, If a man keep my say, he shall never taste of death. John 8:53 Art thou greater than our father Abraham, which is dead, and the prophets are dead, whom makest thou? | |
| Then John 8:54. John 8:56. John 8:56. | |
| And he saw it and was glad. And the word saw there is the word horao. Excuse me. So it says your father Abraham rejoiced to horao my day and he horaoed it and was glad. So he saw it prophetically. So even though this, so here in this passage, even though it looks very different from what we were reading in Luke 9:27, it's basically spiritually the same thing. | |
| The Lord is saying, Abraham prophetically saw the kingdom of God. And that's why he did not taste. And he did so because he tasted death. He was willing to die. You know, like when he was willing to kill his own son, Isaac. | |
| uh, that, that he, that, that was a death to him. You know, he was dying on the inside as he was doing that, but he was willing to let the spirit be more dominant than the soul. And, and, uh, but, but what the Lord is saying is if you're willing to taste death, then you will not see death forever. You will not stare into death forever. Um, | |
| I hope that's making sense. Okay, so let's go back to Luke chapter 9. Oh, I apologize. We were supposed to also... Yes, let me see if I can... | |
| We were supposed to see the fifth and final verse that combines taste and death. So I'll do that right now. The fifth and final verse that has the two words together. And this one seems, I believe, is the clincher, the one that helps to kind of really understand what tasting death is about. It's Hebrews 2:9. | |
| So Hebrews 2:9 says, But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor, that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man. So Jesus tasted death. That's how it's phrased. To taste death. So Jesus tasted death. | |
| And it says for every man. And in Greek, it really says for all. The for is hyper, which can mean over. So he tasted death for or over all. It doesn't say man. It just says all. So it's the word bas, which means all. So Jesus tasted death for all. | |
| And that means that his death was sacrificial so that he tasted death on behalf of all of us. And then in Luke 9, he says, take your cross daily and follow me. Follow me to die. So he was the one who tasted death for all of us. And then when we join him in the spirit, we taste death with him. | |
| I hope that's making sense. We participate in his tasting of death, but he's the one who initiated it. He tasted death for all of us so that we can also now join him and taste death with him. And that's what God is calling us to do, to taste death on behalf of others. | |
| And that's how the kingdom of God expands. When you understand that, then you have begun to see what the kingdom of God is prophetically. It involves you dying so that life may flow in others. And I think that's part of what the Lord is saying here. So we're going to go back to Luke chapter 9. | |
| And we'll read what it says at the very bottom. We're going to skip a few things and go to Luke 9, to the very bottom of Luke. And then we'll go back, jump up back to the top of Luke 9. So at the bottom of Luke 9, it says in verse 57, And it came to pass that as they went in the way, a certain man said unto him, Lord, | |
| I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest. Verse 58, Luke 9. And Jesus said unto him, Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head. So as you may recall, the Lord said, Whoever comes to me, if someone is to come after me or follow me, take up your cross daily and follow me. | |
| So this man literally came after Jesus. He came up to him and says, I want to follow you. And the Lord had said it, and let's go back to Luke 9:23, I think it was. He said, if any man will come after me, that's exactly what this man did. Let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. So this man says, yes, I'll come after you. | |
| And then the Lord answered him, saying, And I think there's like a double message there. One is that if you're coming to follow me, and you don't understand that there's a price to pay of hardship and discomfort, | |
| because you will not have a place in this world that will find you acceptable. This world that's run by the soul will not understand you and you will not be found acceptable. If you're willing to embrace that and not have a home anywhere, then do follow me. But if you're coming to follow me because you think I'm going to be the next king and you're going to become an important person | |
| because you're following me and you're only thinking of, you know, in the natural, then you, then you haven't denied yourself. Um, then, uh, okay. So Luke nine 59, the next verse says, and he said unto another, follow me. So now it's interesting this time. It's not someone coming to Jesus saying, I'll follow you. It's not Jesus point pointing to another guy and saying, follow me. Uh, | |
| But he said, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. And then verse 60, Luke 9 says, Jesus said unto him, let the dead bury the dead, but go thou and preach the kingdom of God. So notice the kingdom of God, the kingdom of God that that was mentioned in Luke 9:27. | |
| So, and if you think about it, it's interesting what the guy said, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. So that means the father was alive. So what does that mean? Like that Jesus had to wait like 15, 10, 15 years or five years or who knows how long for the father to die so that this guy could then follow him. | |
| It just seems like a very strange thing to say. Oh, somebody could say, well, maybe the father maybe had a terminal disease and he was dying and this son wanted to take care of him as he was dying. | |
| But who knows? But it's like, but I get the sense the father, I could be wrong on this. It doesn't say here, but I get the sense that the father was going to live a lot longer than just a couple of days, if that makes any sense. It's like it would have been a process of several years. And the Lord Jesus said to him, follow me. So it's like the Lord saying, it's okay. It's okay. | |
| It's okay to let go of your father. It was basically kind of almost saying... | |
| Take up the Nazirite vow and decide not to touch dead souls. We've talked about this in other recordings. I forget which ones, but maybe in the videos or the audios, we talked about the Nazirite vow and all that. | |
| I think it was in the videos when talking about Paul and when he shaved his head and all that in Acts 18, I think it was. So the thing in Acts 19, I think also talks about that a bit, or 21. But the thing is that the Nazirite vow included not touching dead souls, including your father. | |
| In other words, if your father died, you couldn't go touch him. You couldn't go near him, even though it was your father. So you couldn't bury him because obviously to bury someone, you have to touch the body and carry it and go bury it. So a Nazirite couldn't even do that. And it was a figure of totally rejecting God. | |
| communion with dead souls. In other words, souls that are not moving in the spirit because a soul that is not dominated by the spirit is dead. It's always like that. It's in a state of death. And when the Lord Jesus said, let the dead bury their dead, I get in my heart that the father was not spiritually clean, if that makes sense. The father was a bad influence on this person. | |
| And the Lord was saying, be willing to cast off this negative influence, even if it's a fatherly figure, to follow me. | |
| Well, there's no comment about what the guy said in response to Jesus' words, but at least the fact that it was important for him to bury his father, even though Jesus said, follow me, and obviously he was saying, follow me right now, just shows that he was bound to his father more than to God. | |
| Because if God was more important than his father, then he would say, hey, I will follow you, Lord. No matter if my father is alive or dead, I will follow you. And so he didn't bury the... He didn't allow his soul to die. He didn't deny himself. And that's... | |
| And the Lord was saying, let the dead bury their dead. Don't focus on soul communion. Don't focus on dead souls. Go and preach the kingdom of God, which is the dominion of the spirit over the soul. | |
| And then, okay, so let's keep reading. Luke 9:61, the next verse says, And another also said, Lord, I will follow thee, but let me first go bid them farewell, which are at home at my house. So this one was a little different because the first one or the second one said, Please wait until my father dies. | |
| Um, so who knows how many years that might've been, but this guy is a little different. He just says, Oh, I just want to say goodbye to, to everybody at home and in my house. Um, uh, and, and, and it's interesting with this one, it's not the Lord Jesus saying to him, follow me. Uh, it's the guy came up to him and said, I will follow thee, but let me first go bid them farewell, which are at home at my house. | |
| And even though that would have been faster than waiting for the father to die, like in the other case, I do feel that was going to take a while. And... | |
| It might have been, I don't think he would have just stopped by his house and said, hey, so long, see ya. I don't think it was kind of like that. And I'm pretty certain his house must have been in a different region of Israel. It might have been, you know, day's journey to go, you know, to go, you know, over there and come back. | |
| And if he had said farewell to his family, I'm pretty sure it was not just, you know, kind of sneaking his head, you know, in the door and just saying, hey, goodbye, everybody. I'm pretty sure it would have been a long, long goodbye to all the relatives, you know, grandma, grandpa. | |
| Uncle Joe, Uncle Ben and Aunt Jemima and all these people that he had to go say goodbye to. And I get that sense that it was not just a regular goodbye, but at least that would have been faster than waiting for the father to die. | |
| But then the Lord says to him in verse 62, Luke 9:62, the last verse of that chapter. And Jesus said unto him, No man having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom. So it's, and again, fit for the kingdom of God. So again, it's the Lord saying, the emphasis is, | |
| If you understand what the kingdom of God is, then you're going to be willing to taste death. And these people were not willing to taste death. They had a resistance to tasting death. The first one wanted... | |
| To kind of gain power in the world, you know, and become important because they he saw that Jesus was an important person. And he thought maybe he's going to become the king of Israel or something. And I want to follow you. And the Lord said, no, you're not. | |
| you will suffer discomfort because you're not going to be welcome in this world. You will not have a home, a place to lay your head on. | |
| because this world is run by the soul system and you will have to be of the spirit and you will not feel welcome. You will not rise in the rank, in the hierarchy of the world because the world does not like you if you're of the spirit. So, and this guy was hesitant, but we don't know what he said, but obviously he had this hesitation in his heart. Otherwise, Jesus would not have said this to him. | |
| Jesus knew what was in the guy's heart. And he said, so the guy was not willing. He had a reluctance to die to something. And the second guy came and said, you know, let me bury my father. And there was something important about his father. And Jesus said, be like a Nazarite and don't touch dead souls. Go and preach the kingdom of God. He was having trouble dying to his father. | |
| if that makes sense. And he was not willing to taste death in that sense. And then the third guy, same thing. His fellowship with his family was very important and he was having a hard time just dying to that completely. He wasn't willing to taste death. And the Lord is saying in Luke 9:27, some people are gonna have reluctance to taste death | |
| until they can prophetically understand and see what the kingdom of God is. And the kingdom of God is the spirit of God being king, which means the soul being under the dominion of the spirit of God. That's how God becomes king. And it involves being willing to... | |
| to deny or go against the soul system, if that makes sense, and detach yourself from soul emotionalism, soul communion, things that bind the soul and prevent it tasting death. So you have to let your soul taste death | |
| that's what God is asking you so that you can operate in the kingdom. So that's what God is saying in the spirit in Luke 9. It's like he wants to show us the kingdom of God and he wants us to prophetically see it so that we may taste death. Be willing to taste death so that we can enter into that kingdom and expand it across the earth. | |
| I think that's the essence of it, of Luke 9:27, if I'm understanding correctly. It's a limited understanding, but I feel that that's the essence of it. But now let's start going back a little bit in Luke 9. So let's go back to the top of the chapter and see what the Lord is saying there. So Luke 9:1 says... | |
| Now I'm curious. How many times does kingdom of God appear in this chapter? Seven. Seven times. Seven times. | |
| Okay, so Luke 9:2 says, And he sent them to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick. And I've always believed that, as we shared before, the evangelistic endowment is connected to the gift of healings. And... | |
| So in other words, I strongly believe that people have a strong evangelistic calling, have an ability or a pre-built anointing of God to heal. And that means literal healing and healings of other kinds. So... | |
| That's why it's not a coincidence that healing the sick is said right along preaching the kingdom of God. It's like Reinhard Bonnke, for example, who was an evangelist, he had the gift of healings. | |
| Um, and there've been other evangelists like that. Um, the evangelistic endowment has a strong connection to, to the gift of healings. And that can mean literal, you know, uh, healing of diseases, but it can also mean healing and other things. Uh, the evangelist in, in the Lord has the ability to, to restore and, and, and, and make whole things, um, | |
| and to save them from decay, there's a healing quality to the evangelistic endowment. And as we said, when it's done in the spirit, and that covers not only physical diseases, but other types of, quote, diseases or corruptions, or what's the word? When something is not right. Okay. Okay. | |
| And I pray that anointing goes in the spirit to those of you who have the evangelistic endowment for the gift of healings to be awakened, if it's not awakened already, so that you will bring wholeness and restoration and completeness and healing to everything you touch, everything you're involved in, in the name of Jesus. | |
| Okay, so Luke 9:3 says, and he said unto them, take nothing for your journey, neither staves, nor script, neither bread, nor neither money, neither have two coats apiece. Verse 4, and whatsoever house ye enter into, there abide and thence depart. Verse 5, and whosoever will not receive you, when you go out of that city, shake off the very dust from your feet for a testimony against them. Okay. | |
| So, and then verse 6, and they departed and went through the towns preaching the gospel and healing everywhere. So they started manifesting what Jesus himself had been doing, you know, doing healings and manifesting the presence and the power of God. So the kingdom of God involves people manifesting the nature of God on earth. | |
| It's not when we think of the kingdom of God, we think of people coming like Jesus coming from the sky and landing on earth and becoming the king of the world in a literal sense. That's how we think of the kingdom. But when you prophetically see the kingdom, you see the kingdom of God is about people manifesting the nature of God on earth and expanding and conquering. | |
| having a conquering nature. It's through God's people that the kingdom of God is expanded. And how is it expanded? By them, by us manifesting his nature. | |
| And then verse 7, Now Herod the Tetrarch heard of all that was done by him, and he was perplexed because that it was said of them that John was risen from the dead. And then verse 8, And of some that Elias had appeared, and of others that one of the old prophets was risen again. Verse 9, And Herod said, John have I beheaded, but who is this of whom I hear such things? And he desired to see him. | |
| And then verse 10, and the apostles, and just a sign that Herod is mentioned. Herod was a king, an unrighteous king. And this Herod was puzzled, but by what was going on, it's like in his inner being, he felt his kingdom being challenged in some way, or he was feeling the expansion of a kingdom that wasn't his. And | |
| And that's why he became kind of perplexed, it says, by what was going on. And then verse 10. And that's the thing. When you're expanding the kingdom of God, even the earthly kings begin to feel the effects of what you're doing. | |
| See, it's like God is in different ways describing things about the kingdom of God here. And I think we're just scratching the surface in a very superficial way, but I pray that it's of some help. | |
| So just have that awareness. When you're expanding the kingdom of God, the earthly kings will feel what you're doing. Even if they don't know who you are, just like Herod. Herod had no idea who Jesus was or the disciples were. Is he John? Is he Elijah? Is he one of the old prophets? No, he didn't know. And your work in the kingdom will have an effect and people will know about it. | |
| even if they don't know you by name. So then verse 10, Luke 9:10, And the apostles, when they were returned, told him all that they had done. And he took them and went aside privately into a desert place belonging to the city called Bethsaida. And Bethsaida means house of fish or house of, what was the other word? | |
| it can also be translated house of, oh, I forgot. I apologize. Let me just go look. Um, let's see, house of fish, or, uh, it can also be translated as house of hunter, uh, house of hunters. Yeah. Uh, and that makes sense. Again, it's all related to the kingdom, uh, because, uh, uh, hunters, uh, | |
| are conquerors. And conquerors establish kingdoms. So it's all connected to the kingdom of God. Okay, so verse 11. Okay, so in verse 10, it says that the apostles, they said all that God had done through them | |
| And then Jesus took them and went privately with them into a desert place in the city of Bethsaida. And the name Bethsaida points to house of hunters. So it's like God says in the spirit, when you see the kingdom of God, you will see yourself as a hunter. I hope that makes sense. You are a conqueror. You are a hunter. You are establishing the kingdom of God on earth. | |
| through your presence, through everything you do spiritually. If you're in the spirit, you're a hunter. Okay. And then verse 11. And the people, when they knew it, followed him and he received them and spake unto them of the kingdom of God and healed them that had need of healing. So again, when the people found out, you know, that what was going on, they followed him. | |
| And Jesus received them. And then what did he do? Speak to them of what? The kingdom of God. Notice how the kingdom of God is just everywhere in this chapter. And it makes even more sense that it's in Luke because Luke is the gospel of the evangelist. Evangelist has to do with conquering and kingdom and kingship. So, okay. So, and speak unto them of the kingdom of God and healed them. Again, healing connected to the kingdom and in conquering and the evangelist. | |
| Heal them that had need of healing. And that's the thing that God is saying. Where the kingdom of God expands, things get healed. Like underlying issues that have been festering, problems, they get healed. You bring healing to the land. You bring healing to the soul. You bring healing to whatever you expand the kingdom of God into. You come with healing. And I pray in the name of Jesus that you receive that. | |
| that when you expand the kingdom of God, you come with healing. You heal things. Things that have been broken, diseased for a long time, will be healed because of you. Because of God manifesting through you, you will be a source of healing, just like Jesus was, a source of healing everywhere. Notice how it's phrased, and healed them that had need of healing. So where there was a need for healing, | |
| There the healing came. It's like saying, okay, what is wrong here? What is wrong here? Oh, here's something wrong. Let's fix it. Here's something wrong. Let's fix it. But it's God fixing it, healing it. Okay. | |
| And then verse 12, Luke 9, the next verse, And when the day began to wear away, then came the twelve and said unto him, Send the multitude away, that they may go into the towns and country round about and lodge and get victuals, for we are here in a desert place. | |
| And then verse 13, but he said unto them, give ye them to eat. And they said, we have no more but five loaves and two fishes, except we should go and buy meat for all this people. But so now that I'm thinking about it, I hadn't thought of this, but that the people who follow Jesus followed him to a desert place. So that meant denying themselves to follow him. | |
| Because if they were after comfort, kind of like the first guy that we read at the bottom of Luke 9, the Lord said, Hey, foxes have holes, birds have nests, but the Son of Man does not have where to lay his head. These people were not like that. They were not looking for a place to lay their head or a place of comfort. They went to a very uncomfortable place to listen to Yeshua and to follow him. | |
| But the Lord always provides what you need. So if you deny yourself, then the Lord will compensate for what you deny of yourself. Whatever you need, he will provide it. Just like he provided healing to those who needed healing. And if you deny yourself, then the Lord will take care of you in whatever you need to be taken care of. | |
| And these people needed food. And the Lord says in verse 13, give ye them to eat. So that's another thing about the kingdom. That in the kingdom is not just God doing all the work. And us just being like sheep being served pastoral food. | |
| No, we are the activators. We become the active people doing the work, if that makes sense. So in other words, if people are in a pastoral mindset where they're like sheep waiting to be fed, then the kingdom of God is not there. It's as simple as that. | |
| It's when people begin to exercise the gifts of God, the presence of God. That's when you see the kingdom is here. I hope that's making sense. That's why the Lord Jesus said, give ye them to eat. You, not me, you. | |
| Um, but you know, they were still not fully understanding. So they just went back to their, uh, so they said, well, Oh Lord, we have not no more, but five loaves and two fishes, except we should go and buy meat for all this, this people. So they went in the natural, you know, uh, do you, do you meet? We only have like these five fishes and two, five loaves and two fishes. We'll have to go to the, to the supermarket. We'll have to go, go shopping for all these 5,000 people. Do you have money for that Lord? Um, | |
| And then verse 14 says, for they were about 5,000 men. And he said to his disciples, make them sit down by fifties in a company. And that requires, I know it doesn't say it and we kind of downplay it sometimes. So the disciples were hesitant at first. Like, you know, we don't have food for them. They didn't allow the spirit to speak to them immediately. But | |
| so so jesus says he doesn't doesn't give them a big explanation he just says make them sit down by 50s in a company but he didn't say you know i'm going to do this i'm going to do that i'm going to do the other he didn't say anything and they went ahead and did it it says in verse 15 and they did so and made them all sit down and that means that they had faith and that wasn't and there's another thing | |
| When they went out to sit everybody down, there was a bit of tasting death and denying yourself in doing that. Because you know that all you have is five fishes and two loaves. Why do I keep switching them? It's five loaves and two fishes. So you know that's all you have. And you're telling everybody to sit down by groups of 50. | |
| And by doing that, you are kind of insinuating that you're about to feed them. And if you don't have the food, if you can't produce the goods, at the end, what you're going to get, what you risk, if you're thinking in the soul, is a very nasty riot. Because you promised food to these people, | |
| and then they find out you were just lying to them, and they can turn on you and come attack you. So the disciples had to have a willingness to deny themselves and say, okay, I don't know how it's gonna happen, but these people are gonna get fed. If the Lord said, make them sit down in groups of 50, | |
| then God knows how it's going to happen. I don't know, but he knows. So they denied themselves. And then verse 16, then he took the five loaves and the two fishes and looking up to heaven, he blessed them and break and gave to the disciples to set before the multitude. So they saw it was all they had was five loaves and two fishes. | |
| And they began to see the Lord splitting the food. And I don't know the word splitting, but he broke the bread and he started handing out the bread. And he said to the first group of disciples, go give this to the people. And he said, well, this is not enough. But it was like one group of 50 at a time. | |
| How many people were there? 5,000. So they were around groups. If they were sitting in groups of 50, then it's 100 groups of 50. And when God sent the first disciples to feed the first group of 50, you can imagine the faith that these men had. This is just for the first group. And there are 99 more. But... | |
| It's just one step at a time. So you just trust God one step at a time. And that's how it slowly started to happen. And then verse 17 says, And they did eat and were all filled. And there was taken up of fragments that remained to them, 12 baskets. So the disciples would go, hand food to one group of people, then come back. | |
| And Jesus just had enough for the next batch, you know, to send out. And they would go deliver it, then come back. And Jesus just had enough for the next batch. And that's how they did it. And they trusted that every time they came back to Jesus, he would have enough for the next batch to deliver. | |
| And that's how you go in the spirit. And they were denying themselves the whole time, denying their understanding, denying their natural understanding. And that's how the kingdom of God was expanding because they were handing out this supernatural food. | |
| And it says, and there were taken of fragments that remained to them, 12 baskets. And 12 is a number of, that's what people always say, and I believe it. I think it is correct that 12 is a number of government. So the government of God was being established. That was the leftover of this. The leftover was, so not only were people fed, the kingdom of God had expanded in these people's hearts. | |
| Something was gained from this. And the leftover, the consequence of this action of feeding these people was to have the kingdom of God expanded in them. The government of the spirit expanded in them. And then verse 18 says, and it came to pass as he was alone praying, his disciples were with him. And he asked them saying, whom say the people that I am? | |
| And then verse 19, they answered, the answering said John the Baptist, but some say Elias or Elijah and others that one of the old prophets is risen again. And Luke 9 20 says, he said unto them, but whom say ye that I am? And Peter answered, answering said the Christ of God, the Messiah of God, the anointed one of God. So, | |
| And how does this relate to the kingdom? | |
| that when you're in the kingdom, you're exercising the fullness of the anointing of God. That's what I get from that. I feel like I'm missing something, but that's the essence of it, that Jesus was a man | |
| But he was acting like... He was manifesting the anointing of God in his flesh. And that's what the kingdom of God is about. Man manifesting the nature and the anointing of God in this world, in the flesh. That is the kingdom of God. That God is talking about in scripture. Including this chapter, I believe. And... | |
| So then verse 21 says, Luke 9:21. And he straightly charged them and commanded them to tell no one that thing. And the reason why... | |
| the reason is explained below verse 22 saying the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected of the elders and chief priests and scribes and be slain and be raised the third day so the Lord is saying hey the kingdom of God is not about riding someone God's coattails to gain a position of power and preeminence because if you're riding my coattails you're going to be severely disappointed because I'm going to end up dead | |
| I'm going to suffer many things, be rejected of the elders. In other words, the people of authority in this soul system. And I will be murdered. I'll be slain. But I will rise on the third day. So it's willing to go through the darkness of God. That's what he's saying to them. And he's saying, you need to taste death. In other words, deny yourself and die. Embrace death and taste it. | |
| And that's how the kingdom of God expands. That's what the kingdom of God entails. People being willing to die. It's not about gaining things in the natural. It's about things in the spirit. Okay. So verse 23, we already read through 23 through 27. So we'll skip that. That's the part that talks about | |
| If any man come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily and follow me. And, you know, whosoever shall lose his soul shall save it. Whoever tries to save his soul, in other words, keep his soul in power, will lose it. Okay. So then in verse 28, the verse that comes right after the verse we started with, like in Luke 9:27. | |
| The very next verse says, | |
| Behold, there talked with him two men, which were Moses and Elias, verse 31, who appeared in glory and spake of his decease, you know, his death, decease, I'm not sure how to pronounce it, but it's his death, D-E-C-E-A-S-E, not disease, but decease. And they spake of his death. | |
| which he should accomplish at Jerusalem. So they're talking about dying. Notice that Jesus was, was, um, their, their conversation was about him dying. And I had never realized that that's what they were talking about. And this is called the transfiguration, the famous transfiguration. So I had never realized that during this transfiguration event, that what the three of them were talking about is death. So strange. Um, | |
| But yeah, but it's just emphasizing Jesus was willing to taste death because he knew that's what the kingdom of God was about. And when you see that, then you're willing to taste death. And okay, so then verse 34, while he thus spake, there came a cloud and overshadowed them and they feared as they entered into the cloud. | |
| Verse 35, and there came a voice out of the cloud saying, this is my beloved son, hear him. And verse 36, and when the voice was passed, Jesus was found alone. And they kept it close and told no man in those days any of those things which they had seen. And the word seen, interestingly enough, is oral, the word for prophetic seeing. So they were seeing this prophetically. | |
| You know, it was literally happening in front of them, but they were seeing it with their prophetic eyes. They were seeing this is what the kingdom of God is about. About man bursting through and having the glory of God burst through his or her flesh. | |
| and manifesting the glory of God. That's what they were perceiving in that moment. And that's what the kingdom of God is about. It's not about a bigger church building. It's not about having more people in the church pews. It's not about a bigger ministry. It's not about more television time. It's not about more people carrying their Bibles on Sunday, you know, under their elbow. | |
| you know, using it as deodorant. That's not what the kingdom of God is about. It's about the manifesting of God's nature on earth. You're preaching the kingdom, you're expanding the kingdom of God, taking down the dominion of the soul so that the spirit may gain dominion and then man can manifest the glory of God through his flesh. | |
| That's what the kingdom of God is about. When you can see it prophetically, you understand that's what this is about. Okay, and then verse 37. And the reason, by the way, that they did not say anything to anyone about all of this is that if they had explained this to other people and they had... | |
| And these other people had taken it in the flesh. They would have taken it to mean, oh, Jesus is the Messiah. He's going to be the king of Israel. And they wouldn't have understood that Jesus was going to die. That would not have made sense to them. So they would have either ignored that or rejected the whole thing. Oh, that couldn't have happened because the Messiah can't die. The king of Israel cannot die. | |
| So it had to be understood in the spirit. And that's why you couldn't just blab it out to anybody. Because when you take things of the spirit and say it to people who take it in the flesh, you risk them completely corrupting what you have just shared with them. Yeah, okay. So it has to be done in the spirit. | |
| It doesn't mean that at some point you won't say something that they will corrupt. Because like Jesus said, you need to eat my flesh and drink my blood if you want to partake with me. And the people who listened to that, who heard that, caught it in the flesh. They couldn't understand. But Jesus did it on purpose to drive them away. Okay. All right. So then... | |
| Verse 37, Luke 9, | |
| only child verse thirty nine and lo a spirit taketh him and he suddenly crieth out and it teareth him that he foameth again and bruising him hardly departed from him verse forty and i besought thy disciples to cast him out and they could not | |
| And then verse 41, And Jesus answering said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long should I be with you and suffer you? Bring thy son hither. So the Lord is upset that the disciples are not manifesting the kingship of God, that there's something blocking them, and they're just like, there's something that they're not dying to. | |
| Um, and that's why he's, notice he gets angry. He says, oh, faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you and suffer you and put up with you? This is the Jesus of love and compassion that the church preaches. But notice at that moment how he was speaking because, um, | |
| He was speaking in the spirit. He was not speaking like a pastor. He was speaking like a male spirit, apostolically and prophetically speaking. And then verse 42 says, And as he was yet a coming, the devil threw him down and tear him. And Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit and healed the child. | |
| and delivered him again to his father. So the thing is, Jesus was expecting the disciples to have been able to do this. Otherwise, why would he have said what he said? So that means the kingdom of God is not about Jesus doing everything. It's about you being able to do what Jesus does. That's the kingdom of God expanding. And when you see it prophetically, | |
| then you'll be willing to taste death. When you see all of this, we're talking about like different little things about the kingdom of God, what it represents. It's about man manifesting the nature of God, not God doing everything for us. As long as we're in a pastoral state where we are being fed | |
| Then in a state of, oh, we need to be fed by God because we're weak little sinners saved by grace. As long as you're in that state, there's no kingdom of God going on there. Nothing. There's nothing of that. Because the soul is continuing to prevail. When we treat people like that and expect that of people, when pastors do that, they are thinking with their soul, not their spirit. | |
| And there's no kingdom of God there. Okay. And then verse 43, and they were all amazed at the mighty power of God. And the word power was translated from, well, it's from Megalayotes. And frankly, I'd never seen that word before. I don't recall it. | |
| And it comes from Megaleos, which means magnificent, excellent, splendid, wonderful. So, yeah, it has to do with Megas, which means great. So I would dare say the mighty power is a horrible mistranslation because there's nothing about power here. It's about greatness. So it should have said, and they were all amazed at the greatness of God. | |
| And why is it important that it's great that it's not power? Power is prophetic. | |
| Dunamis' power is prophetic. Greatness is evangelistic. We've said this before. Evangelists, in the literal sense, tend to be. It doesn't mean that it always is the case, but there's a tendency for evangelists to be taller than normal. Tall people tend to be evangelistic. So greatness has to do with evangelistic because they're giants. They're conquerors. Strong men that take down the strong men of the enemy. | |
| So they were all amazed at the greatness of God. So it's the evangelistic conquering ability of God. That's what they were amazed at. Because this whole chapter is about kingdom and evangelistic conquest. They were amazed at the evangelistic conquest greatness of God. But while they were... | |
| But while they wondered everyone at all the things which Jesus did, he said unto his disciples, verse 44, let these sayings sink down into your ears. Notice he's like, let this get through your thick head. Let this sink down into your ears. | |
| And just like for crying out loud, allow this to get into you because you're rejecting it. The son of man, he says, shall be delivered into the hands of men. The son of man has to taste death in order for the kingdom of God to expand. | |
| And then verse 45, but they understood not this saying, and it was hid from them, that they perceived it not, and they feared to ask him of that saying. So the Lord just said, let it sink down into your ears. And they still wouldn't get it. | |
| Why? Because there was a part of them that didn't want to accept that idea. Why? Because they thought the Messiah is going to become the king of Israel, is going to redeem the nation of Israel from the oppression of the Romans and make Israel great again. | |
| That's what they were expecting following Jesus. And then there would be people in positions of power because they had been the ones who followed the one who became king. So in their heads, having the king that they're following die didn't sound like good news. | |
| That's why they couldn't accept it. It does not make any sense. And the interesting thing is that they didn't even ask him. Well, you know, it's easy for me to say because, you know, hindsight is 20-20, as they always say. And it's easy for us to say it because we've seen the end of the story. But I'll be frank, if I was there, I don't know, maybe I wouldn't have, but | |
| I think I just could not have kept it to myself. And I would have said, Lord, maybe I would have waited for a moment when he was by himself and gone and asked him, Lord Jesus, I don't understand. Master, I don't understand what you're saying about you being delivered. Aren't you the Messiah? Aren't you the one who's going to be king of Israel and rule the earth, as Psalm 2 says? | |
| How can you be delivered into the hands of men? And I think Jesus would have maybe scolded me. I don't know. But I think he would have appreciated that I was willing to ask him. And then he would have told me. Maybe I still wouldn't have gotten it. But I would have had a hard time just not knowing. | |
| what he meant. And I think if I had asked him, he would have started talking to me about Psalm 69 and Psalm 22 and Psalm 89, I think, and the Messianic Psalms that talk about the Messiah suffering. And then he would have said, this is necessary for the kingdom of God to expand. | |
| the Messiah has to die. And then he would have pointed me to Daniel when it says that after all these things, the Messiah will be cut off or the prince will be cut off. And I said, oh, that's why Daniel said that. And then I might have begun to understand there's a price to pay. And the more I'm willing to taste death, the more the kingdom of God | |
| will, uh, will expand through me. Uh, but I don't know. Uh, I wasn't there, so I can't, can't know what I would have done, but I feel that that's kind of the sequence of events that might've happened. Um, okay. So verse 46, Luke nine says, then there arose a reasoning among them, which of them should be greatest. Uh, | |
| And in verse 47, And Jesus, perceiving the thought of their heart, took a child and set him by him. Verse 48, And said unto them, Whosoever shall receive this child in my name receiveth me. And whosoever shall receive me receiveth him that sent me. For he that is least among you, the same shall be great. So see, the thing is, they didn't understand kingdom. Just like... | |
| you know, like the guy that we saw at the end of the chapter that said, I will follow you wherever you go. And then Jesus said to him, | |
| uh foxes have have holes um birds have nests but the son of man doesn't have where to lay his head saying you will not be received in this world you will not become a person of eminence and great uh earthly authority within the current soul system uh you're going to suffer rejection and persecution um so in other words uh this kingdom | |
| The kingdom of God is not of this world, cannot be included in this world system. And the disciples were not understanding that. They thought, oh, you know, which of us is going to be greater? And they were thinking of the kingdom of God in human terms, like kingdoms of this world and this soul system. Okay, so then... | |
| And then that's why the Lord said, whosoever receives this child in my name receives me. And what did he mean by that? That in a child, he's saying, whoever receives this child in my name receives me. So that's saying, if you as a child, what is a child? A person that doesn't seem to have much. | |
| importance. You know, it's like when a child comes and asks a question and it's a meeting of adults, usually the parents say, hey, son, this is an adult conversation amongst adults. Please don't interrupt when adults are talking. Please go back and play your games. So the child here represents someone that doesn't seem important to other people, that looks small. | |
| And powerless and irrelevant. But that child here is representing someone manifesting the nature of God and saying that child is coming in my name. Then it's like I am coming when he's coming to a place. I hope that makes sense. So the child, you are the child. | |
| You look powerless, you look irrelevant. You don't have to be renowned and be recognized as great. And whoever recognizes the greatness of God in you, that person has recognized God. That person is honoring God, honoring Jesus. And whoever honors Jesus honors the Father. So the kingdom of God is about people who seem unimportant, | |
| Manifesting the nature of God. And whoever receives them receives God. Whoever rejects them rejects God. I hope that makes sense. Okay. It's people manifesting the authority of God. Even when they seem unimportant quote unquote. In the natural realm. So then verse 49 says. | |
| And John answered and said, Master, we saw one casting out devils in thy name, and we forbade him, because he followeth not with us. And Jesus said unto him, verse 50, Forbid him not, for he that is not against us is for us. So the question is, why did the disciples... | |
| feel concerned that there was someone casting out devils in Jesus' name because they went and said, you can't do that. Why did they say that? Because this person was exercising the authority of Jesus without being part of the clan, part of the gang, part of the group, part of the cabal, part of the elite group. | |
| And because the disciples were thinking in terms of human power, they said, no, we can't have someone else exercising the nature and the power of God if he's not one of us, because that kind of undermines our value. He has to belong to us and submit to us, submit to our structures, our rules, our understanding. | |
| we can't have a rogue person doing things on his own. And that's how pastors think. That's why they can't say, oh, you can't be a lone ranger. If you're going to do ministerial work, you need to be ordained. You need to have some letter of authorization by a pastor because you cannot be going rogue and doing things on your own. And what did Jesus say? Forbid him not, for he that is not against us is for us. | |
| So he was saying, that person that you were forbidding was one of us. And you didn't realize it because he was manifesting the spirit that you are to be manifesting. So he's part of the same spirit. So the kingdom of God is not about organization. It's not about following structure and protocol and procedure. It's about the spirit being released spiritually. | |
| and people being free to manifest the Spirit. And then verse 51, Luke 9, And it came to pass when the time was come that he should be received up, he steadfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem. Verse 52, And sent messengers before his face, and they went and entered into a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him. And verse 53, | |
| Yeah, Luke 9:53 says, and they did not receive him because his face was as though he would go to Jerusalem. So notice Jesus had just been talking about receiving a child. Whoever receives this child in my name receives me. And whoever receives me receives the one who sent me. In other words, the father. | |
| And here we have a group of people that did not want to receive him. And why? Because he was on his way to Jerusalem. And Jerusalem was like a rival place. The Samaritans and the Jews did not get along. And Jerusalem was like the enemy of the Samaritans. So they were seeing things in terms of political views. | |
| playmaking. You know, Jesus is, oh, he's going to Jerusalem. That means that he's siding with our enemy. So we don't want him around because they didn't understand what the kingdom of God was about. It's about things in the spirit. And they were not willing to die to the hatred of the Jews. | |
| They were thinking in terms of soulish coalition, soulish alliances, because the soul is, as we've said before, the Canaanite spirit promotes this vulcanization of people being divided by ethnic groups, by things of soul identity. And these people said, we are Samaritans. And because we're Samaritans, we hate the Jews, we hate Jerusalem. | |
| So anyone who is aligning themselves with Jerusalem is an enemy of ours because he's against our identity. So they didn't want to die to their Samaritan soul identity. They didn't want to taste death. And that's why they rejected the kingdom of God coming amongst them. Okay. So... | |
| All right, so then verse 54, and when his disciples, James and John, saw this, they said... | |
| They said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven and consume them even as Elias did? Why did they think like that? Because they were thinking in human military terms. We're conquering. Jesus is about to go to Jerusalem to become king of Israel and king of the world because he's the Messiah. | |
| And we have these people who are not aligning themselves with us, so we're going to throw fire at them. So you could say, oh, they were thinking about judgment because these people had rejected the Son of God, but they were not thinking about raining fire on the Samaritans because of judgment. They were not offended that they had | |
| that they had rejected the Son of God. That was not what they were upset about. They were upset that they were seeing Jesus as a military conqueror, if that makes sense. And that's what was wrong about their request. And the other thing that people miss is if Jesus was the lovey-dovey, hippie, compassionate, he was very compassionate, not | |
| but not in the way that the church understands it. But if he was this compassionate, quote-unquote, lovey-dovey, hippie, let's all get along, let's love each other type of person, do you think the disciples would have even dared to go ask him about raining fire on the Samaritans? If you think about it, it doesn't make sense. | |
| And you say, oh, well, because they were, they didn't know what they were doing. They were brazen people. Well, a few verses ago, we just read that when Jesus said, you know, I'll be delivered into the hands of men, they didn't perceive it in verse 45. And they fear to ask him of that saying. So it's not like they didn't have any respect for Jesus. They were afraid of him in some areas. When it came to the question about, you know, what does it mean that he has to be delivered into the hands of men? They were afraid to ask him. | |
| But they had no fear whatsoever in asking him, should we rain fire, pray for fire to rain down on them, just like Elijah did. That means that they knew that to Jesus that was not, that saying something like that was not in and of itself offensive to him. That he was okay with violence. | |
| Spiritual violence. I hope I'm making sense. Like if you know someone who is very pacifistic, he's a pacifist, you know, is against wars and things like that. You don't go ask him. You don't talk to him about violent things because, you know, he's not going to embrace them. You know, it's like asking a vegetarian, do you want a Big Mac? | |
| If you know he's a vegetarian, you're not going to offer him a Big Mac. So that just shows you that Yeshua was instilling upon them what we might call a violent nature, a nature of violence in the spirit. | |
| But the problem is that they were aware of that, and that's why they were not afraid of asking him this very strong question. But the problem is their motivation was wrong. Their violence was motivated by the wrong thing. | |
| It's not because they wanted to expand the kingdom of God. It's because they were seeing Jesus as some sort of political king, and the Samaritans had become political enemies or military enemies that needed to be taken down, literally. So the answer that the Lord gave in verse 55, here it says, I'm going to read the verse the way I'm seeing it right now, but I think there's something here that needs to be changed here. | |
| Let me confirm, but I'll read the verse first. Luke 9:55. But he turned and rebuked them and said, Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. And then verse 56. Here it says, I think this is wrong, but I'm going to read what it says here. For the Son of Man has not come to destroy men's lives, but to save. And they went to another village. | |
| Now, the reason why I'm hesitant to read this is that I'm going to read from the English Standard Version right now, Luke 9:55 and 56. I'm going to read verse 54 as well. | |
| And when his disciples James and John saw it, they said, Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them? There's a footnote here in the English Standard Version that says, some manuscripts add as Elijah did. So apparently those words may not have been in the original text. Then verse 55, this is what verse 55 says in the ESV, the English Standard Version. But he turned and rebuked them. | |
| That's all. And the footnote here says, some manuscripts add, and he said, you do not know what manner of spirit you're of. And then verse 56, for the son of man came not to destroy people's lives, but to save them. | |
| And then verse 56 here in the ESV says, and they went on to another village. So in other words, the second part of verse 55 and the first part of verse 56 are not in the original text. I would dare say, that's why it says here, some manuscripts add this. Why would some have it and others not have it? | |
| And what I believe in my heart is that in the original text, it was just straightforward, but some people felt the need to clarify. So they started adding extra words there. But that's why I only take what's in all the manuscripts. I feel that people didn't understand | |
| See, the pastors just pounce on this passage to talk about, oh, you don't pray judgment over people. You pray love and understanding because Jesus didn't come to destroy. He came to save. So they turn it into this cheesy argument about love and compassion and understanding. And that's not what God was talking about here at all. | |
| He was talking about the problem of the disciples thinking of Jesus as some sort of earthly king. And the Samaritans became earthly enemies of an earthly king. You know, it's like in the old days if a conqueror came and said, I'm taking your city. And the city says, hell no. | |
| then the conquerors would say, well, I'll take exact my revenge on them and wipe out the city because if they had surrendered, I would have spared their lives. That's how conquerors in the natural realm talk. And that's how they were talking and that's how they were thinking. That's why he rebuked them. But... So... | |
| So if you read the whole chapter, you can see that it fits into the context of the thing about this. You're not in this. The kingdom of God is not about gaining something like riding the coattails of God to gain a position of preeminence in the world system. | |
| And that's what this is about. And when you read it like that, when you read the rest of the chapter and you get that sense, then you get to this verse, this part of the chapter, you go, oh, the disciples were thinking of Jesus as some sort of military conqueror, earthly military conqueror. And, okay. Okay. | |
| All right, so, and then the Lord said, well, and it's interesting that the Lord did not curse Samaria. And notice that, that was very interesting. They did not, he did not curse Samaria, at least openly here. Remember what he said about Chorazim, I think is the name of the place, and he talked about other places, Kapernaum, and saying, curse it or you, because if what was done in you had been done in Sodom, Sodom would still be standing. | |
| and your judgment shall be worse than the judgment over Sodom. And remember when Jesus sent the disciples, if we read earlier in Luke 9, we read it already. He said, verse 5, and whoever they do not receive you, when you leave that town, shake off the dust from your feet as a testimony against them. So that means that | |
| it's not like Jesus said, oh, just love them and understand them. He said, wipe the dust off your sandals. It's a sign of judgment. And even he, after having said that to them, didn't curse Samaria. And I feel in my heart there's more here. Their motivation was not so much that they rejected Jesus just for Jesus being Jesus. | |
| They were rejecting him because notice he said they didn't receive him because they did not believe in him or they thought he was crazy or they thought he was some weird man, some false prophet. No, they didn't reject him because of any of that. They rejected him because they found out that he was going to Jerusalem. That's the only reason why they rejected him. And that's why Jesus' reaction to them was different. | |
| And I would dare say that it's almost like I have some thoughts in my heart and I will say them very quickly. And this might not be of the Lord, but I think it is. I just felt a testimony right now in my being. Um, | |
| that even if this is not completely true, there's a kernel of truth in it. I pray that the Lord will give you discernment to remove what is not of him. But this is what it got in my heart, that Jesus was not completely angry at the Samaritans because he understood that the Samaritans knew that there was something wrong with Jerusalem. Um... | |
| In fact, Jerusalem was the place where they were about to kill Jesus. So there was something wrong with the Jews and with Jerusalem. And that's why he was not so upset at the Samaritans because they were partially right. There was something evil in Jerusalem. | |
| And something evil about the Jews and the Jews were constantly belittling the Samaritans. Remember the parable of the Samaritans that was Jesus, amongst many things, confronting the Jews for belittling the Samaritans so much and seeing them as second class people. | |
| So it's like they were mistaking Jesus going to Jerusalem as Jesus certifying his approval and his alliance with Jerusalem. I hope that makes sense. | |
| They thought Jesus, by going to Jerusalem, was validating Jerusalem. And that's why they rejected him. Because they said in their hearts, there's something wrong with Jerusalem and the Jews. And God was saying the same thing. But they misunderstood what Jesus was doing because they didn't understand that Jesus was going to Jerusalem not to validate Jerusalem, but to show how evil Jerusalem was and to be murdered there. Because he was going to taste death so that the kingdom of God could expand. | |
| So that we could be saved and the kingdom of God could be expanded on earth. They didn't understand that he had to die. They thought that he was going to Jerusalem to become king or become allied with the powers that be in Jerusalem. And that's why they rejected him. Because they knew there was something wrong. There was something rotten in Jerusalem. Something rotten in Denmark. In this case, Denmark was Jerusalem. | |
| And that's why Jesus did not reject them. And notice, and the thing that hit me as I was asking the Lord just now, is this of you or not, is verse 54 when it said, and when his disciples... | |
| And notice here, very curious. God says, and when his disciples, James and John saw it. He mentions the two by name, James and John. But he mentions James first. And when I saw James, it's like God sent me to Acts 15. | |
| And James, the leader of the church in Jerusalem, the one that we've talked about in the videos on Song of Songs, chapter 3, verses 6 through 11, the spirit of Solomon, how James was infected with the spirit of Solomon, the spirit of elitism, the thought, amongst other things, that the Jews were slightly better than the Gentiles. And that's why James died in Jerusalem. | |
| He didn't die willingly, just like the Lord Jesus. He died because he just would not leave Jerusalem, and the Jews ended up killing him. And that death did not glorify God because it was a death in stubbornness, unwilling to leave Jerusalem because he didn't want to believe that the Jews had rejected God and that God had rejected the Jews and that he needed to preach to the Gentiles. | |
| So James, when I saw the name James in Luke 9:54, James and John saw it and they said, they were the ones who objected. They were the ones who said, let fire come down from heaven. It's like God was saying, the spirit that was in James of Acts 15, that James... | |
| The James of Galatians 2, I think it is, the evil James of Acts 21. When you read Acts 21, James is mentioned there something evil that he did there. And James was glorifying the Jews. He kept glorifying the Jews over the Gentiles. | |
| And that's why he was prompted to do this because he hated the Samaritans. There was a hatred, a Jewish hatred against the Samaritans. I hope that makes sense. The same disdain that made the Samaritans believe that there was something wrong with the Jews. | |
| and Jerusalem, and that's why they rejected Jesus. I hope I'm making sense. It's like they were reinforcing the very thing the Samaritans were upset about, that there was something wrong in Jerusalem, and why is Jesus going to Jerusalem? They thought Jesus was going there to validate Jerusalem, but he was going there to be killed by them because Jesus and the Samaritans and God knew how evil Jerusalem was. | |
| They just misunderstood Jesus' intentions because they did not fully comprehend, it didn't get through their thick skull either, that Jesus had to die. If they had understood that, they would have known, oh, Jesus is going to Jerusalem to be killed by those evil Jews and will receive him. | |
| And that's why Jesus' reaction towards the Samaritans was partially muted. I hope I'm making sense. He didn't say, oh, wonderful, they rejected me. No, but he understood why they were rejecting him. And they were partially right. But they were wrong in the sense that they didn't understand that Jesus had to die. And if Jesus wanted to enter Samaria, | |
| a Samaritan's village. Why not? You know? Okay. Um, then verse, and then verse 57 is the end of, of the chapter, uh, that we just read already of 57 through 62. Um, so I pray that, um, I, I'm not sure if it's, uh, it feels like we went around in circles to some extent, but I pray that some of the principles, um, | |
| went through. First, God wants us to taste death, but sometimes we will not be willing to taste death until we can prophetically see what the kingdom of God is about. And the kingdom of God, as we saw, is about people manifesting the nature of God, manifesting His glory, | |
| And doing supernatural things the way that Jesus himself would do. I'm just going through, for example, the beginning of the chapter talked about the 12 going and doing healings in different places, expanding the kingship of God and bringing healing to the land. | |
| And then Herod feeling threatened by that as the kingdom expands, the kings of this earth will feel threatened and perplexed by what you're doing. And you'll be doing it outside their realm. And that's why they won't even know who you are. | |
| Because, you know, when kings are fighting kings in the earthly realm, they know each other. Because they know King so-and-so is coming against me with his army. Oh, I will counter with my army. So you see them coming. You see the guy. You see the crown. You see everything. But in the spirit, it's a different thing. Because the kingdom of God is different. You have to see it prophetically. Okay. Okay. | |
| And then the next part of the chapter talks about Jesus feeding the 5,000 after having asked the disciples to feed them. You feed them. You give them food. And then the disciples acting in faith, little by little, serving the food and all that. | |
| Okay, and then in the leftovers were 12 pieces, 12 baskets of broken pieces is a figure. The leftover from the manifestation of God's nature is the kingship of God being established, the government of God being established in the place. And then the next part of the chapter talks about Jesus asking, who do you think people are? | |
| Who do people think that I am? And then Peter answers, you are the Messiah of God. You're the manifestation of God in the flesh. | |
| So again, the kingship of God is about the Son of Man, which is Jesus and you and me, son or daughter of man, obviously, if you're a woman. But the Son of Man manifesting the nature of God and manifesting the anointing of God. Messiah means the anointed one. Christ means the anointed one. So then the next part of the verse talks about Jesus saying, | |
| foretelling his death, saying, the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes. In other words, the world system will reject you. If you're in the kingdom of God trying to expand yourself visibly in a human, earthly way, you don't know what the kingdom of God is. And that's why you will be unwilling to taste death. And then... | |
| And then the next part of Luke talks about taking up our cross, denying ourselves and following him. And then the verse that we started with Luke 9:27. But I tell you truly, there is some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God, until they horao, until they prophetically see the kingdom of God. | |
| And some are standing, like saying, I will not die, I will not die, like standing, you know, because when you die, you fall flat, you know, horizontal. But when you're standing, you're vertical, you're saying, I'm not dying. But the only way that some people will understand that they need to die is when they finally understand, prophetically see what the kingdom of God is. | |
| And then the next portion of the chapter is about the transfiguration. Again, the manifestation of Jesus, the manifestation of God in the flesh. And that involves you and me. When you and I are manifesting God in the flesh, doing the things Jesus himself would be doing if he was in the flesh, you know, the types of things. | |
| then the kingdom of God is here. If people are in a state of dependence where they expect everything to be done for them, then there is no kingdom of God there. | |
| Then the next part of the verse is about when Jesus heals the kid with an unclean spirit and the disciples could not cast out the spirit. So Jesus got upset because he was expecting them to manifest the nature of God on earth because that's what the kingdom of God is about. And then the next verse, | |
| um and then the next section is about again jesus foretelling his death that the son of man will be delivered into the hands of men and jesus said let these words sink into your ears i get it through your thick skulls but they were afraid to ask him and then uh then the question of who is the greatest uh uh | |
| amongst themselves arguing again because they kept thinking of the kingdom of God as something political something earthly within this soul system and Jesus said no you have to be like a child like someone small and if you come in my name those who receive you are receiving me and those who receive me are receiving the father so this again God in the flesh manifesting himself through people who don't look threatening and | |
| on the outside. And then | |
| And then the next section is about the guy who was casting out demons in Jesus' name. He did not have a membership. He did not have a card, a membership card as part of the Jesus and the Disciples Club. And they were upset about that because they were seeing things in terms of political, human political perspective. And Jesus said, no, my kingdom is not about that. It's about people manifesting | |
| my power and my glory in their flesh. And so again, it's about what the kingdom of God is about. And that's why Jesus said, do not stop him for the one who is not against you is for you. And, um, | |
| And he wasn't doing it with authorization, with a letter saying that he's covered by Pastor Jesus or anything like that. He was free to do it in the spirit. And Jesus was enabling him to do it in the spirit. That's what the kingdom of God is about. | |
| So places where everything is, oh, you have to have a covering, the covering of your pasture for this, that, the other. There's no kingdom of God there. This verse is showing it very clearly, this passage. This whole chapter is about the kingdom of God. | |
| Um, okay. And then the, um, and then the next part was a Samaritan village that rejects Jesus. And, um, and, and we just talked about that. Uh, the disciples again, seeing it as a power play and, and James who represents by his name, this is not the same James of Acts 15. They had just, they just happened to share the same name. James, this is the James, um, was the brother of John. The other one was the half brother of Jesus. Um, | |
| But the thing is, the fact that it's the same name just shows. James and John were speaking from a spirit of Jewish hatred and a Jewish sense of supremacy over the Samaritans, of superiority. | |
| And they resented the Samaritans talking like that because they also perceived that the Samaritans rejected Jerusalem. And they said, how dare the Samaritans reject Jerusalem, our great and wonderful Jewish city, our Jewish capital. | |
| The city of David, how dare they think of Jerusalem like that? But Jesus on the inside was saying, Jerusalem is an evil place and they're about to kill me. But the disciples didn't understand that because when they were going to Jerusalem, they thought maybe Jesus was going to get crowned king. He was finally going to become king of Israel. So they didn't see Jerusalem in the same negative light. But again, it's about the kingdom of God. | |
| uh, requiring you tasting death, being willing to die. Um, and James and John were not willing to die to their Jewishness, if that makes sense. Uh, so they, they, they could not fully expand the kingdom of God with that Jewish thing inside of them. Um, and then the final part is, you know, uh, the final section here, they have a title, the cost of following Jesus. Um, | |
| And I've been reading from the English Standard Version for a while. I didn't switch back to the King James. I'm sorry if I'm causing confusion with that. But the thing is that the final part is about some people saying, oh, I want to follow you. And Jesus is saying, foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests. In other words, if you're following me to become more important and you're not willing to die to yourself, | |
| Then you can't follow me. The other one saying, let me bury my father. And Jesus saying, let the dead bury the dead. Be willing to die to your father, to that soul attachment that you have to him. And proclaim the kingdom of God. And the other one said, let me say farewell to my family, to everyone at home. | |
| And Jesus is again saying, whoever looks back, puts his hand to the plow and looks back, is not fit for the kingdom of God. And again, being willing to die to something that is precious to you in order to do God's will. And that's how you expand the kingdom. And the final thing I wanted to say, because this audio work ran much longer than I actually expected. We thought it would be very short because I didn't have much understanding. Um, | |
| But the other final thing is, why does God refer to this as tasting death? Why not saying dying? Why does he use the word taste? | |
| Taste is one of the five senses, and we've shared on the website and in some recordings that the five senses are connected to the five ministries. Seeing, the sense of sight, is connected to the apostolic because you judge with your eyes. You look at something and see whether it's good or bad. | |
| The sense of hearing is connected to the prophetic. Because when you hear, you see things that you can't see with your natural eyes. You know, like you can hear someone talking behind a wall. You can't see the person, but you can hear them. So that means moving in the realm of the invisible, in the realm of things you can't see, which is prophetic. And then touching, the sense of touching, | |
| is connected to the pastoral, you know, because the pastors are touchy feeling and, and, and, and, and, and soothing someone, you know, like, like touching them and, and, and caressing, uh, you know, their, their shoulders or, or, uh, you know, just trying to kind of comfort the person. You do it with your hands, you do it with the sense of touch and that's very pastoral. And then the sense of, um, um, uh, the sense of smell is connected to the teacher because, um, | |
| The sense of smell is connected to memory and the teachers are connected to memory, to looking back, looking backwards and remembering things from the past. | |
| And the smell, the sense of smell kind of reminds you of things of the past. And also smell is used to evaluate things sometimes. If some food is stale, like a carton of milk in the freezer, when you take it out and you're not sure if it's still good, you smell it. And you put it to the test through your smell kind of thing. And teachers are connected with testing. | |
| And there are other things there, but the thing is that the sense of smell is connected to the teacher. So that leaves a sense of taste. And the only ministry left is the ministry of evangelists. And evangelists and taste are related. It makes sense because... | |
| You taste victory. Evangelists are conquerors. Conquering is related to victory. That's why people talk about the taste of victory, how sweet victory tastes. When you're eating something, you're conquering it. | |
| And your sense of taste is enjoying what you are overcoming and swallowing up into you, if that makes sense. And also, when you lose, it feels bitter. It's like the bitterness of defeat. It's a bitter taste. It leaves a bitter taste in your mouth. So taste is connected to the evangelistic endowment. And so... | |
| And evangelistic has to do with conquering and conquering has to do with kingdom. So when Jesus says taste death, he's saying embrace death. Allow yourself to die in order to conquer it. | |
| And that's why in 1 Corinthians, I guess the final thing we were going to say because the audio has run very long. Let me see if I can find it. | |
| It's in 1 Corinthians 15:54. 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. | |
| Verse 55, O death, where is thy sting? O grave, or Sheol, where is thy victory? Verse 56, The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. Verse 57, But thanks be to God. | |
| which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. But notice death being swallowed up in victory. Victory, that means conquering. That means evangelistic conquest. That means kingdom. So when you taste death, when you swallow death, then when you swallow up death to die, you conquer it. | |
| It's like you allow yourself to be defeated by death, and in allowing yourself to be defeated and dying, you end up conquering death. I hope that makes sense. Like, you know, like the Jews thought, if we kill him, we'll have victory over him. And Jesus said, okay, kill me. And him allowing himself to be conquered and killed by the Jews, he ended up conquering them. Yeah. | |
| and defeating them, and defeating death, more importantly. So when you taste death, when you're willing to embrace death, then you are going to be defeated by it, but then you'll end up conquering death. That's why God talks about it as tasting death. It is allowing yourself to die with death | |
| The intent of defeating death. I hope that makes sense. So you're not just dying like you're not being nihilistic and bracing death. Oh, I can't take it anymore. So I'm just going to let death kill me. No, you're saying, oh, I'm going to let death kill me in order to kill death. I'm going to let death defeat me in order to defeat death. Because once I die, then I will resurrect and I will defeat death. | |
| God will do something in you and you'll conquer death. You'll have power over death. | |
| In the name of Jesus. So, okay, so I believe that's all we have to say. Thank you very much for listening, and I pray in the name of Jesus that these words will enable us to understand what the kingdom of God is about and that we may see it prophetically and we may be willing to taste death in order to conquer death. In the name of Jesus, amen. |
The discourse begins with a reflection on how the speaker received a specific scriptural prompt. After seeking clarity from the Lord, the verse Luke 9:27 "bubbled up" from within, leading to a meditation on its profound and often misunderstood meaning. Despite acknowledging a limited personal understanding, the speaker expresses a desire to meditate on this word so that it may deposit a true understanding in the hearts of listeners, enabling them to do His will.
The central verse, Luke 9:27, states: "But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the kingdom of God." This verse has long puzzled believers. If the audience members had all passed away two millennia ago, does this imply the Kingdom has already come, or was it a prediction of a future event? The speaker notes the tension between Jesus' teaching that the "Kingdom of God is within you" and this verse, which seems to point toward a future manifestation.
A critical warning is issued against interpreting this verse through the lens of "eschatological parrots"—those who attempt to use it as a literal prediction of end-times events. Such interpretations often result in nonsense that fails to edify the spirit. To find the true meaning, one must strip away the idea of literal chronological prediction and look at the linguistic structure.
The key lies in the phrasing. If Jesus were merely predicting that some people would live to see a historical event, he would have used more natural phrasing. Instead, he uses the word "till" (translated from the Greek eos). Using a modern analogy, if one says, "You won't win the championship until you get a solid third baseman," it implies that the acquisition of the third baseman is the trigger that allows the win to happen. Therefore, the verse implies that for some, the act of "tasting death" is contingent upon "seeing the Kingdom of God."
The speaker suggests that "tasting death" is not about literal biological expiration but something much deeper. The emphasis is not on the timing of death, but on the trigger of seeing the Kingdom.
To understand what "tasting death" means, one must look at the immediate context of Luke chapter 9. Four verses prior (Luke 9:23), Jesus instructs: "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me." Here, "death" refers to spiritual death—the death of the soul (the psuche) to its own dominion so that the spirit may rule.
The term "standing" (histemi) implies being established or firmly planted. The speaker interprets "some standing here" as those who are spiritually "standing firm" in their soul, refusing to surrender or die to themselves. They will not experience this necessary spiritual death until they "see" (horao) the Kingdom.
A linguistic distinction is made between two Greek words for seeing: Eido (mental knowledge/understanding) and Horao (prophetic perception/beholding). While Eido is about gaining information for the mind, Horao is an abstract, prophetic perception involving the emotions and the spirit. Therefore, the verse suggests that once a person prophetically perceives the true nature of the Kingdom, they will realize they must die to their soul to enter it.
This explains why many resist the Kingdom; they try to view it through "Girgashite eyes" (the physical/orderly mind) or "Canaanite eyes" (the emotional/social soul). They want visible churches, hierarchies, and emotionalism, but the Kingdom is a spiritual reality that requires the surrender of the soul's control.
A study of the Greek words for "taste" (geouomai) and "death" (thanatos) reveals they appear together only five times in Scripture. The first three occurrences—Matthew 16:28, Mark 9:1, and Luke 9:27—are variations of the same theme, focusing on different aspects:
The fourth occurrence is in John 8:52, where the Jews misunderstand Jesus' words through a literal, physical lens. However, referencing Abraham, the speaker notes that Abraham "saw" (horao) the day prophetically and was willing to "die" to his own desires (as with Isaac), allowing the spirit to be dominant.
The fifth and final occurrence is Hebrews 2:9: "Jesus... tasted death for every man." This establishes that Jesus initiated the process. He tasted death so that we might join Him in tasting death—dying to ourselves to allow His life to flow through us.
The end of Luke 9 illustrates the practical difficulty of this "death." Through three different would-be followers, Jesus demonstrates the cost:
These examples highlight that the Kingdom is not a system of earthly eminence, but a realm of spiritual surrender.
The speaker notes that "Kingdom of God" appears seven times in this chapter. There is a strong connection between the "evangelistic endowment" and the gift of healing. To expand the Kingdom is to manifest God's nature, bringing wholeness and restoration to things that are broken or corrupt.
The Kingdom is not a physical descent of a king from the sky, but the manifestation of God's nature through His people on earth. This expansion can even cause "earthly kings" (like Herod) to feel perplexed and threatened, as the spiritual realm begins to encroach on the natural.
In the feeding of the 5,000, the disciples are called to be "activators" rather than passive "sheep." By denying their natural understanding and acting in faith, they participated in a supernatural expansion of the Kingdom. The twelve leftover baskets represent the establishment of God's government.
The speaker concludes by connecting the "five senses" to the five ministries. "Taste" is linked to the ministry of the Evangelist. Just as one tastes victory in battle, the evangelist tastes the conquest of the Kingdom.
Drawing from 1 Corinthians 15, the speaker explains the mystery: death is "swallowed up in victory." To "taste death" means to intentionally allow oneself to be "defeated" by death (dying to self) in order to ultimately conquer and defeat death itself. By embracing the death of the soul, the believer achieves the victory of the spirit.
The final prayer is for listeners to prophetically see the Kingdom, to be willing to taste death, and to ultimately conquer death through the name of Jesus. Amen.