Biblical Kingdoms and Egypt

when our government is bombing another country. And he may not agree with that, but it's our government. And also recognize that a kingdom is a government. A kingdom is a form of government. And Scripture speaks to that. So I'm going to do a little review this morning because, believe it or not, Brother McCleskey and I started this class in April. We started this class in April talking about the kingdoms of the Bible. And during that time period, we had three ministers that came, preached here, taught Sunday school class. So we didn't, we didn't. And then we spent some time talking about the keys of the kingdom, which it could be a class within itself. And we took that time to talk about the keys of the kingdom because it's one of the characteristics of the kingdom and I really appreciate brother Barry teaching the class these last two Sundays these last two weeks with funeralizing my mother and then brother McCleskey was out was out as well he did a fine job and I'm just going to do a shameless plug for his website because every time he teaches a class here and also when he takes notes in classes he puts it out on the website okay and that's his website okay various bureau if you go here to Bible classes straight Elaine kingdoms of the Bible and this is the class these are all the classes that we've been teaching beginning back in April if you go to June 15th this is the class that he taught last Sunday All of the notes are here and a little quiz. And so in review for last week's class, I like how Brother Barry has just put it here for your review. Understanding the keys to the kingdom, the purpose of the keys, operating by the contract, God's word, the role of the Holy Spirit, living with the second birth, which is knowledge, faithfully using the keys, And then the final exhortation is to use the keys, multiply your gifts and multiply your talents. Understand what the laws of God are about. Barry, thank you so much for covering the class. And then I also needed some relief, a little relief on Friday. I played golf with he and Tyrone, and they felt so sorry for me, they let me beat them. I need to feel good about my game. So thank you again. So in review, because Brother McCleskey and I are going to get back on track, today I'm going to talk about the Kingdom of Egypt. See, as far as we can get in the class today, that's our challenge and always will be our challenge is trying to get through all the material in a class, but we spent time on talking about the keys of the kingdom. And I think that was of value to us and I want to share with you why. Going back to what we have on our posters, the Bible uses kingdom language because it reflects the cultural and historical context of the times when it was written. During those periods, kingdoms and monarchies were the dominant forms of government. The concept of a kingdom also helps convey important theological ideas about God's sovereignty, authority, the nature of his relationship with humanity. Referring to God as a king and his realm as a kingdom communicates the idea of divine rule justice and the promise of a future perfect kingdom under God's reign. God talks to us using kingdom language. Our challenge is we live in a form of government that does not look like a kingdom. See, you're getting political on me. You're getting political on me. used to not look like a kingdom. But we, you know, politics is politics. What's clear to me, Sister Janet, is man is man. There's nothing new under the sun. There's always been politicians like the one running our government. There's always been a power grab. We are living in very interesting times. We are living in very interesting times. So what's the responsibility of the kingdom of God, the church of Christ, during these times? And so we need to be clear about the kingdom of God and where our loyalty lies, which is why we're having this class. So a kingdom is a form of government. That's very important to understand. And I started the class talking about government. You know, the elephant in the room and what our government did yesterday. That's our government. But there is a spiritual government that we are a part of in Isaiah chapter 9 verse 6 and 7 speaks to that. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom. establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this, and we are a part of this government. The Church of Christ is a spiritual government. It's the kingdom of God, and we are a part of it. And there are characteristics of a kingdom, characteristics of this spiritual government that we are a part of, and we've been talking a little bit about it, which is why we spent time on the keys of the kingdom, because it is a characteristic of the government that we are a part of. So, characteristics of a kingdom. and brother Barry had this on his website. It was one of his questions. I'm going to see who remembers the characteristics of a kingdom. What is a characteristic of a kingdom? Every kingdom has a what? A ruler, a king, or a monarch. A king or a queen, right? Okay. What's another characteristic of a kingdom? You got a king. If you have a king, you have to have what? Subjects. Subjects, citizens who are under the authority of the king. Everybody good with that? Also in a king, another characteristic of a king is what? Region. Land. Mass. Territory. Land, mass. Realm of authority. We say territory, but it's really... its realm of authority. So you want to expand your territory, expand your realm of authority, grow your body, grow your group, grow your population, spread them out, expand your authority, expand your territory, expand your realm. Everybody with me? And what's another characteristic of a kingdom? Laws. Laws. And laws are what the citizens to use to live together, to operate by. Principles, precepts, keys, keys, law, which is why we did, as Brother Jones would say, we did a bird walk. We did a bird walk on the law aspect of it because keys is very important. The knowledge of the principles, precepts of God's word and how we apply it to our lives to be kingdom people, citizens of his kingdom. All right, another quiz. Matthew chapter 28, verse 18 through 20. Can anybody point out the various aspects of the characteristics of the kingdom in the Great Commission? If I say to you, verse 18, when Jesus said, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. That's a king statement, right? Would you agree with that? That's a king statement. Okay? Therefore, go. Who? Who's he talking to? He's talking to his subjects. He's talking to the citizens. Therefore, go. He's talking to the citizens. Okay? Therefore go and make disciples of all nations. Do what? That's the how and when you do that, what happens to his? Increase the realm. Expands his territory, grows the kingdom, expands the body, expands his realm of authority, expands his territory. Then he told us how to do it, Janet, and what did he say? How? Yeah, you did. No, you just said it. Baptizing. That's how you get them in the kingdom. Okay? You have to have the knowledge of the keys that he's given you. He's given you the keys. Now bring people into the kingdom. Okay, my kingdom is expanding. My territory is expanding. My realm is expanding. I have all authority in heaven and on earth, and I want to keep it growing. And then what does he say? Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And what is that? The law that he, the law of the commandments that he has given them, he wants to teach those. Exactly. And so that's the law. So you see in the Great Commission where you can identify the characteristics of the kingdom. We've been saying that and talking about that for years, but maybe never looked at it from a kingdom perspective. When we think about, okay, what are the characteristics of the kingdom? All of it's there in the Great Commission. The king, the citizens, the expansion of his realm, his territory. And then Jesus saying, I want you to... Follow my law. Okay? Observe my law. Brother McCleskey. I want y'all to help me out with this one, okay? I wanted to draw another dimension of the kingdom. Okay? Y'all help me with it. And I want to put a time on it. Put what? A time. A time. Yeah. A time. Expound on that, my brother. We know that this kingdom of God So what last forever and all other kingdoms will perish. If we look at the ancient kingdom as such, if we go back to the Old Testament, we see that this kingdom is going to last forever and never be destroyed. So I was just thinking, is that Can we call that a characteristic of, you say characteristic of a kingdom. But maybe this is, well, it could be a characteristic of a kingdom. Yeah. And some kingdoms last a pretty good time. For example, Britain, the British call themselves what? The United Kingdom, don't they? Because they've had their hands in everybody's business across the world. So I was just wondering, could we consider time I think we can consider it a characteristic of the spiritual kingdom, not the earthly kingdom. Because all great monarchs, all great kingdoms have gone down. We can look at the ones in scripture, the Neo-Persians, the Roman kingdoms during the time of Jesus, even though they're still Roman today, it's not what it was during Jesus' time. You know, the Babylonian kingdom, the Assyrian kingdom, all of those, those are time limited because they are earthly kingdoms. However, when we talk about the Lord's kingdom, you know, it was established and it will last throughout eternity. It will never end. So I think that's the, I don't think we can qualify the spiritual kingdom as far as time is concerned. We can't compare that. The physical kingdoms cannot be compared to the spiritual kingdom of God because God's kingdom will live forever. Will go on forever. Amen. Amen. Great point. Two hands. I think the important thing to remember in this is what Jesus said. He said this kingdom is not of this world. When we start looking at it, we should not expect the things that happen in this world to comply with the heavenly kingdom, the standards of the heavenly kingdom. So, you know, we have to kind of maintain the separation. And I have an analogy to kind of bring this home. There are several of them here who serve in the military. When you are in the military and you go to another country, you still conduct yourself as an American. You don't conduct yourself as a citizen of that country. Just like us, Christians, because we're in this world, we still conduct ourselves as Christians. Not because we just are in this temporary state. So we are part of the kingdom of heaven, so we need to conduct ourselves as citizens of heaven regardless of what the situation is that's going on in this particular state. The other thing is, we have to keep in mind, and I'm going to say this, I'm not going to go into detail, this stuff that happened this weekend, this started in 1978. I know because I was there. The thing is, is you have to kind of keep these kind of things focused in your mind and not allow it to affect you. Because this stuff can have a psychological effect on people. And you cannot let it really affect you. Don't let it pull you one way or the other. God's in control of this. So don't let it pull you one way or the other. We are citizens of the kingdom of heaven. We need to conduct ourselves that way and not allow the things that go on in this world to impact us so deeply that it would knock us off our path and knock us off where we should be. Very well said. I appreciate your perspective, having been a military man, having been over there, having known the history there, and having the dual citizenship. You got two feet on the ground here, yet you're a child of God. So you always keep what's going on over here in proper perspective. When you see that, you've already kind of worked it out in your mind. You know, because of your experience. I recognize that a lot of Christians, we see they dropping bombs. They dropping bombs. Oh, what are we going to do? Remember, you are part of a spiritual kingdom. And that's why we're having this class. Okay, so we don't forget who we are, where our loyalty lies, Okay, and understand that God is in control regardless of what's happened in there on the earth brother Chris question here Yeah, I will my understanding that point of exercise is focusing on Earth and Kingdom right now. He said we're gonna talk about Egypt and so I like what brother McCluskey said about acknowledging what we're going to see about all the earthly kingdoms that we talk about beginning with Egypt and other things. That there's a finite amount of time that they are in power. Regardless of how vast empire gets and everything like that. The standard is that no empire, no kingdom lasts, earthly kingdom lasts forever. Right. And what we try to do with the lessons that Brother McCleskey and I will be teaching is what's the takeaway from how God uses these earthly kingdoms to set the stage for this kingdom right here. In history, how did God use these earthly kingdoms to set the stage for the eternal kingdom? So we're really looking at the earthly kingdom perspective as God was planning for this earthly kingdom, this spiritual kingdom to be established. Okay? Yeah, I'm kind of piggybacking off of what Brother Pinkerton said earlier. That was part of my question too. When Christ was tempted by Satan, what was the first thing he said? It is written. That is to keep that focus. You know, we know that he dropped a bomb on someone, but instead of panicking, it is written. What's going to happen is going to happen. You need to stay most focused and in control. Amen. Amen. So that's an excellent point. All these are good points. Appreciate your comments. What we're going to do is start to talk again about the kingdoms of the Bible from a historical standpoint and how God used them. And what is our takeaway from these kingdoms? So we will always kind of look at these kingdoms. We may look at the king. We may look at the citizens. We may look at the realm of influence, the territory. We may look at the laws. So we needed to understand that a kingdom is a government. We want to look at these various governments and how God used them, okay, many different ways. We're going to look at Egypt and Egypt's interesting significance in history. And we started talking about this, Brother McCleskey began this class talking about Egypt. So I'm going to do a quick review of what he talked about and I'm going to ask Brother McCleskey to chime in. and just fill in the gaps from when he taught the class. Ancient Egypt is one of the world's earliest and longest lasting civilizations known for its incredible achievements in architecture, art, and culture. The history is typically divided in several periods. You have this period that they call prehistoric Egypt, before the formation of the first dynasties. prehistoric communities existed along the Nile River. And Brother McCleskey, you spoke a little bit about that region, the Fertile Crescent, and that region and the prosperity there. Can you say a little bit about that area and what you mentioned in the last class that you taught? I wish I could. You know, we talked about the origin of civilization, I think that was one of the things. And we talked about there were, it's just not one place. One place that was, there were several places we considered the origin of civilization. I think we had a slide on that, I don't know if we got that far in there. And Egypt was one of them. The federal crescent, Western Civilization, you know, that's around Mesopotamia? Yes. Where Iraq is right now. That was also for a long time considered the origin of civilization. But there were other places in the world So that was one of the things that came from that research that I did. Egypt was one of those. And of course, when we look in the scriptures, we almost see that God had a certain role for Egypt because Egypt comes up to life. And that's what I'm going to talk about today. I'm going to show some stories in scripture where God saved his people through Egypt, okay? Through Egypt because if there was prosperity there, it was a part of the fertile crescent, okay? And so the first period of prehistoric Egypt before the formation of the first dynasties, okay? They existed along the early dynastic period from 3100 to 2686 BC. This period marks the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh, Namur, and also known as the Old Kingdom from 2686 to 2181, known as the Age of the Pyramids. This period saw the construction of the famous periods of Giza. You know that, right? That was during that period that they called the Old Kingdom. Then we have a period that they call the Middle Kingdom or the Bronze Kingdom. from 2055 to 1650. This era is characterized by stability, prosperity, and trade. And the scriptures that I'm going to talk about today occurred based on scholarly and the historical information that we've gleaned occurred in this Middle Kingdom period, okay? The New Kingdom, 1550 to 1070 BC, often considered the height of ancient Egyptian civilization. This period includes famous pharaohs like King Tut or Tutankhamun and Ramses II. Late period and the Ptolemaic dynasty from 664 to 30 BC After a series of invasions and foreign rule, Egypt was conquered by Alexander the Great and later ruled by the Ptolemaic dynasty ending with Cleopatra. So these are the different periods of Egypt's reign and the time times associated with that and today I want to spend a little time talking about Abraham and Sarah and their story in Genesis chapter 12 verse 10 through 20. So if you have your Bible and we turn there together Genesis chapter 12 verse 10 through 20. Now this event occurred sometime around 2000 to 1800 BC. It's important to note the exact historical timeframe is subject to interpretation. debate among scholars. So we don't know exactly, we can't pinpoint exactly when this event happened, but it's in this period. So we can say it occurred in the Middle Kingdom time period. And what do we know about the Middle Kingdom time period? That this was an era characterized by what? Stability, prosperity, and what? Trade. And trade. So people were going to Egypt because it was a prosperous kingdom, prosperous country, and folks traded there. Now look what happened with Abram that caused him to go to Egypt. God uses governments and countries to save his people. This says, now there was a what? There was a famine. It was a famine in the land. And Abram went down to Egypt to live there for a while because the famine was severe. He was about to enter Egypt and he said to his wife, Sarah, I know what a beautiful woman you are. When the Egyptians see you, they will say, this is his wife. Then they will kill me, but will let you live. Say you are my sister so that I will be treated well for your sake. and my life will be spared because of you." When Abram came to Egypt, the Egyptians saw Zariah and was a beautiful woman. And when Pharaoh's officials saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh, which was the king, and she was taken into his palace. He treated Abram well for her sake, and Abram required sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, male and female servants, and camels. But the Lord inflicted serious diseases on Pharaoh and his household because of Abram's wife, Sarai. So Pharaoh summoned Abram, what have you done to me? Why didn't you tell me she was your wife? Why did you say she was my sister? So that I took her to be my wife. Now then, here is your wife. Take her and go. Then Pharaoh gave orders about Abram to his men, and they sent him on his way with his wife and everything he had. Now my takeaway from this, there's some teaching in here about Abram's behavior with his wife. I want to focus on how God used Egypt to save him from the famine. Because of Egypt's prosperity because Egypt was known for trade God Abram go to Egypt for a while because there was severe famine in the land Okay, that's a key takeaway of this story and how God used this kingdom of Egypt during this time of the Middle Kingdom to Because it was a period of prosperity and trade in Egypt. So Abram went there with his wife. Now the story with his wife and Pharaoh shows Pharaoh was in total control. He was the king. Okay? All right? And a king establishes the law. That's his realm of authority. He saw this beautiful woman. He had the authority to take her as his wife because he was what? He was the king. There's a sidebar here because he was also teaching Abraham and he was teaching us. Because if you want to add a little narrative in here, it could be God saying to Abraham, saying, why would you do this? Didn't you trust me? Because God had this in control from the beginning. It was in his plan from the beginning. God was protecting Abraham and Sarah in Egypt. Abraham was with his own plan. God ended up finishing it in the end anyway. But it's a situation where if God is sending you somewhere or sending you in a way or God chose you to do something, trust him to bring it to completion. Because that's what happened in the end. God ended that situation that Abram got himself into and brought it to completion. And not only did Abram... survive, he prospered. Not because of his will and his actions, but because of God's will and God's actions. Amen. So there's a little bit of sidebar there. That's a great sidebar. I have another sidebar. Let's go with it. And that is Pharaoh was smart enough to know That what was plaguing my people and my house and my kingdom was the fact that I went after a man's wife and that there was a God There was a God somewhere. He may not know what God was, but there's a God somewhere who was taking care of this man. So not only am I going to let you go, I'm not going to harm you, and I'm going to let you take everything I gave you and go because my arms are too short to box with your God. I like that. You got some more? Let's put some more meat on this bone. But I was wondering, how did you know that Pharaoh knew that there was a God that sent him there? Because I look at his actions. I'm looking at his actions in verse 18. Yeah, he is frightening. That he knew that whoever was governing Moses was... was too much for him and so he was protecting Moses. I'm sorry, Abram, I'm sorry. He said he was protecting Abram. So that's my takeaway anyway. - You know, and he says, "What have you done to me? "I've been inflicted with serious diseases. "Something not right. "Something not right. "What have you done to me? "Why didn't you tell me she was your wife?" I mean, he's thinking. Okay, why didn't you tell me she was your wife? And he didn't get mad enough in the opposite direction to kill her. You know what I'm saying? He's not only letting her go, he's letting her take everything I've given you too. Take it all or just go. Just go. And I like what Brother Pinkerton said. You know, God don't need us to help. We're always trying to help. I know I do. I'm always trying to help God. And I get in trouble. I'm always, you know, one of my favorites. It's an anchor scripture for me because I need it. Because I'm always trying to help God. And I just had to just work with this with Brother Pinkerton. And that is Proverbs chapter 3, verse 5 and 6. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. and what lean not in your own understanding don't even don't try to figure out you know what we're gonna do we're gonna tell them you my sister don't don't lean on your own understanding you're gonna get yourself in trouble i do i get myself in trouble you know could that could that be the biggest thing especially if you know that the lord back then the lord gave you command doubt would probably be the biggest sin when you say that that's why the scripture says trust in the lord right don't doubt trust in the lord two hands back there uh brother thomas yeah i would see another angle too though so okay um you know that's a beautiful i see the church today is probably although the payment in the land today he said Yes, excellent point. Excellent point, Brother McCleskey. And so that's the thing that I think we should be thinking about. God is going to fulfill his purpose. His word is going to go out to the world. It won't return to him fully, but it will achieve the purpose of which he intended for it to happen. So God, you know, the way I view Egypt, you know, as a kingdom, God blessed Egypt. And he used Egypt. He used other kingdoms too. And when I think about this, why didn't he start it out up in what, Iran? Is that where it was? Nah, Heria. That's right. Then it came down and wandered into the Palestine region. But then it went to Egypt. That seems like a pretty good distance to go to me. But God had fixed Egypt with prosperity like we were talking about. They were prosperous. So we have to see the divine hand in this. But as we go through the scriptures, we don't see Egypt. Because God has a plan. And that's... God has a plan. And when we study God's word, we... I mean, we have this vantage point today in 2025 where we can study in class and see the plan and what are the takeaways. Why did Abram go from the Ur of Chaldees, okay, from the Ur of Chaldees to Egypt? Because it was a part of God's plan. It was a part of God's plan. Now, if we start asking the question, well, why Egypt? Then you're going to start having smoke coming from your brains. God's ways are so much higher than our ways. I'm not even going to ask that question. Why Egypt? It was because Egypt. It's because God wanted it to be Egypt. But Egypt has a prominent place. And so we're talking about how Egypt... influence certain stories in the Bible. Brother Pinkerton, and that's the last question. Just kind of take back on everything you said. Just rolling it forward. That's what Philippians 1-6 is telling us. God has a plan. He's going to bring it to completion. And you can apply that to everything that's going on today. God has started a work in you. God has started something in you. Guess what? God to bring it to completion is in God's hands. Therefore, we can trust in him. And no matter what we do, as long as we're trusting in him, then his plan, his will, is going to play out regardless. We don't have to worry about, as Abraham mentioned, he shouldn't have worried about what he saw or what was happening or what he thought. He should have just trusted God that God was going to bring it to completion. God promised him that he was going to make him, you know, father of a great nation. He was going to do all this. It hasn't happened yet. Therefore, God still had a plan. Therefore, he didn't have to watch and see what was going on right then, right there, what was happening around him. It didn't matter. What mattered, what was most important, was God's will and God's plan was still in play. And that's what he should have trusted in. And that's what we need to be today. God's will and God's plan is still in play. We need to trust God. That's what the message here is from us. And excellent point. And this class... We're going to look at God's plan in Scripture with a kingdom perspective. That's what makes this class a little different. We're going to look at God's plan with a kingdom perspective. How did he use Egypt? What's the takeaway from it? How did he use the Babylonian Empire? How did he use the Roman Empire to accomplish his plan of salvation for humanity? And now we're a part of that kingdom, which is why we spent some time talking about the keys. Brother Barry did such a fine job last Sunday because now we are a part of this eternal kingdom. Okay? And this Holy Spirit that we have is like a passport, Brother Pinkerton. We got dual citizenship. You've been on foreign soil, but you had that U.S. passport. You said, I'm not from here. My home is some other place. Chris, last comment. My son is filling the role of his mother. Let me know our class has gotten to an end. This is what I want you to do before next Sunday. We ought to talk about Joseph, okay? And Joseph being sold into slavery, into Egypt, okay? Here, he was sold When the media night merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for 20 shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him where? To Egypt. And then we're going to talk about Joseph being in Egypt, his time in Egypt, how God used Joseph and his time in Egypt to save Israel. His family. Okay? To save his family. So read this story, and this is where we're going to pick up next Sunday. Let's close with a word.

when our government is bombing another country. And he may not agree with that, but it's our government. And also recognize that a kingdom is a government.

A kingdom is a form of government. And Scripture speaks to that. So I'm going to do a little review this morning because, believe it or not, Brother McCleskey and I started this class in April.

We started this class in April talking about the kingdoms of the Bible. And during that time period, we had three ministers that came, preached here, taught Sunday school class. So we didn't, we didn't.

And then we spent some time talking about the keys of the kingdom, which it could be a class within itself. And we took that time to talk about the keys of the kingdom because it's one of the characteristics of the kingdom and I really appreciate brother Barry teaching the class these last two Sundays these last two weeks with funeralizing my mother and then brother McCleskey was out was out as well he did a fine job and I'm just going to do a shameless plug for his website because every time he teaches a class here and also when he takes notes in classes he puts it out on the website okay and that's his website okay various bureau if you go here to Bible classes straight Elaine kingdoms of the Bible and this is the class these are all the classes that we've been teaching beginning back in April if you go to June 15th this is the class that he taught last Sunday All of the notes are here and a little quiz. And so in review for last week's class, I like how Brother Barry has just put it here for your review. Understanding the keys to the kingdom, the purpose of the keys, operating by the contract, God's word, the role of the Holy Spirit, living with the second birth, which is knowledge, faithfully using the keys, And then the final exhortation is to use the keys, multiply your gifts and multiply your talents.

Understand what the laws of God are about. Barry, thank you so much for covering the class. And then I also needed some relief, a little relief on Friday.

I played golf with he and Tyrone, and they felt so sorry for me, they let me beat them. I need to feel good about my game. So thank you again. So in review, because Brother McCleskey and I are going to get back on track, today I'm going to talk about the Kingdom of Egypt.

See, as far as we can get in the class today, that's our challenge and always will be our challenge is trying to get through all the material in a class, but we spent time on talking about the keys of the kingdom. And I think that was of value to us and I want to share with you why. Going back to what we have on our posters, the Bible uses kingdom language because it reflects the cultural and historical context of the times when it was written.

During those periods, kingdoms and monarchies were the dominant forms of government. The concept of a kingdom also helps convey important theological ideas about God's sovereignty, authority, the nature of his relationship with humanity. Referring to God as a king and his realm as a kingdom communicates the idea of divine rule justice and the promise of a future perfect kingdom under God's reign. God talks to us using kingdom language. Our challenge is we live in a form of government that does not look like a kingdom.

See, you're getting political on me. You're getting political on me. used to not look like a kingdom. But we, you know, politics is politics.

What's clear to me, Sister Janet, is man is man. There's nothing new under the sun. There's always been politicians like the one running our government. There's always been a power grab.

We are living in very interesting times. We are living in very interesting times. So what's the responsibility of the kingdom of God, the church of Christ, during these times? And so we need to be clear about the kingdom of God and where our loyalty lies, which is why we're having this class. So a kingdom is a form of government.

That's very important to understand. And I started the class talking about government. You know, the elephant in the room and what our government did yesterday. That's our government. But there is a spiritual government that we are a part of in Isaiah chapter 9 verse 6 and 7 speaks to that.

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom.

establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this, and we are a part of this government. The Church of Christ is a spiritual government.

It's the kingdom of God, and we are a part of it. And there are characteristics of a kingdom, characteristics of this spiritual government that we are a part of, and we've been talking a little bit about it, which is why we spent time on the keys of the kingdom, because it is a characteristic of the government that we are a part of. So, characteristics of a kingdom. and brother Barry had this on his website.

It was one of his questions. I'm going to see who remembers the characteristics of a kingdom. What is a characteristic of a kingdom? Every kingdom has a what? A ruler, a king, or a monarch.

A king or a queen, right? Okay. What's another characteristic of a kingdom?

You got a king. If you have a king, you have to have what? Subjects.

Subjects, citizens who are under the authority of the king. Everybody good with that? Also in a king, another characteristic of a king is what? Region. Land.

Mass. Territory. Land, mass.

Realm of authority. We say territory, but it's really... its realm of authority. So you want to expand your territory, expand your realm of authority, grow your body, grow your group, grow your population, spread them out, expand your authority, expand your territory, expand your realm. Everybody with me?

And what's another characteristic of a kingdom? Laws. Laws. And laws are what the citizens to use to live together, to operate by. Principles, precepts, keys, keys, law, which is why we did, as Brother Jones would say, we did a bird walk.

We did a bird walk on the law aspect of it because keys is very important. The knowledge of the principles, precepts of God's word and how we apply it to our lives to be kingdom people, citizens of his kingdom. All right, another quiz. Matthew chapter 28, verse 18 through 20. Can anybody point out the various aspects of the characteristics of the kingdom in the Great Commission?

If I say to you, verse 18, when Jesus said, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. That's a king statement, right? Would you agree with that? That's a king statement.

Okay? Therefore, go. Who?

Who's he talking to? He's talking to his subjects. He's talking to the citizens.

Therefore, go. He's talking to the citizens. Okay?

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations. Do what? That's the how and when you do that, what happens to his? Increase the realm.

Expands his territory, grows the kingdom, expands the body, expands his realm of authority, expands his territory. Then he told us how to do it, Janet, and what did he say? How? Yeah, you did. No, you just said it.

Baptizing. That's how you get them in the kingdom. Okay? You have to have the knowledge of the keys that he's given you.

He's given you the keys. Now bring people into the kingdom. Okay, my kingdom is expanding.

My territory is expanding. My realm is expanding. I have all authority in heaven and on earth, and I want to keep it growing. And then what does he say?

Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And what is that? The law that he, the law of the commandments that he has given them, he wants to teach those.

Exactly. And so that's the law. So you see in the Great Commission where you can identify the characteristics of the kingdom.

We've been saying that and talking about that for years, but maybe never looked at it from a kingdom perspective. When we think about, okay, what are the characteristics of the kingdom? All of it's there in the Great Commission.

The king, the citizens, the expansion of his realm, his territory. And then Jesus saying, I want you to... Follow my law. Okay? Observe my law.

Brother McCleskey. I want y'all to help me out with this one, okay? I wanted to draw another dimension of the kingdom.

Okay? Y'all help me with it. And I want to put a time on it.

Put what? A time. A time.

Yeah. A time. Expound on that, my brother. We know that this kingdom of God So what last forever and all other kingdoms will perish. If we look at the ancient kingdom as such, if we go back to the Old Testament, we see that this kingdom is going to last forever and never be destroyed.

So I was just thinking, is that Can we call that a characteristic of, you say characteristic of a kingdom. But maybe this is, well, it could be a characteristic of a kingdom. Yeah.

And some kingdoms last a pretty good time. For example, Britain, the British call themselves what? The United Kingdom, don't they?

Because they've had their hands in everybody's business across the world. So I was just wondering, could we consider time I think we can consider it a characteristic of the spiritual kingdom, not the earthly kingdom. Because all great monarchs, all great kingdoms have gone down. We can look at the ones in scripture, the Neo-Persians, the Roman kingdoms during the time of Jesus, even though they're still Roman today, it's not what it was during Jesus' time. You know, the Babylonian kingdom, the Assyrian kingdom, all of those, those are time limited because they are earthly kingdoms.

However, when we talk about the Lord's kingdom, you know, it was established and it will last throughout eternity. It will never end. So I think that's the, I don't think we can qualify the spiritual kingdom as far as time is concerned.

We can't compare that. The physical kingdoms cannot be compared to the spiritual kingdom of God because God's kingdom will live forever. Will go on forever.

Amen. Amen. Great point.

Two hands. I think the important thing to remember in this is what Jesus said. He said this kingdom is not of this world. When we start looking at it, we should not expect the things that happen in this world to comply with the heavenly kingdom, the standards of the heavenly kingdom.

So, you know, we have to kind of maintain the separation. And I have an analogy to kind of bring this home. There are several of them here who serve in the military. When you are in the military and you go to another country, you still conduct yourself as an American. You don't conduct yourself as a citizen of that country.

Just like us, Christians, because we're in this world, we still conduct ourselves as Christians. Not because we just are in this temporary state. So we are part of the kingdom of heaven, so we need to conduct ourselves as citizens of heaven regardless of what the situation is that's going on in this particular state.

The other thing is, we have to keep in mind, and I'm going to say this, I'm not going to go into detail, this stuff that happened this weekend, this started in 1978. I know because I was there. The thing is, is you have to kind of keep these kind of things focused in your mind and not allow it to affect you. Because this stuff can have a psychological effect on people.

And you cannot let it really affect you. Don't let it pull you one way or the other. God's in control of this.

So don't let it pull you one way or the other. We are citizens of the kingdom of heaven. We need to conduct ourselves that way and not allow the things that go on in this world to impact us so deeply that it would knock us off our path and knock us off where we should be. Very well said. I appreciate your perspective, having been a military man, having been over there, having known the history there, and having the dual citizenship.

You got two feet on the ground here, yet you're a child of God. So you always keep what's going on over here in proper perspective. When you see that, you've already kind of worked it out in your mind. You know, because of your experience. I recognize that a lot of Christians, we see they dropping bombs.

They dropping bombs. Oh, what are we going to do? Remember, you are part of a spiritual kingdom.

And that's why we're having this class. Okay, so we don't forget who we are, where our loyalty lies, Okay, and understand that God is in control regardless of what's happened in there on the earth brother Chris question here Yeah, I will my understanding that point of exercise is focusing on Earth and Kingdom right now. He said we're gonna talk about Egypt and so I like what brother McCluskey said about acknowledging what we're going to see about all the earthly kingdoms that we talk about beginning with Egypt and other things. That there's a finite amount of time that they are in power.

Regardless of how vast empire gets and everything like that. The standard is that no empire, no kingdom lasts, earthly kingdom lasts forever. Right.

And what we try to do with the lessons that Brother McCleskey and I will be teaching is what's the takeaway from how God uses these earthly kingdoms to set the stage for this kingdom right here. In history, how did God use these earthly kingdoms to set the stage for the eternal kingdom? So we're really looking at the earthly kingdom perspective as God was planning for this earthly kingdom, this spiritual kingdom to be established. Okay? Yeah, I'm kind of piggybacking off of what Brother Pinkerton said earlier.

That was part of my question too. When Christ was tempted by Satan, what was the first thing he said? It is written. That is to keep that focus.

You know, we know that he dropped a bomb on someone, but instead of panicking, it is written. What's going to happen is going to happen. You need to stay most focused and in control. Amen. Amen.

So that's an excellent point. All these are good points. Appreciate your comments.

What we're going to do is start to talk again about the kingdoms of the Bible from a historical standpoint and how God used them. And what is our takeaway from these kingdoms? So we will always kind of look at these kingdoms.

We may look at the king. We may look at the citizens. We may look at the realm of influence, the territory.

We may look at the laws. So we needed to understand that a kingdom is a government. We want to look at these various governments and how God used them, okay, many different ways.

We're going to look at Egypt and Egypt's interesting significance in history. And we started talking about this, Brother McCleskey began this class talking about Egypt. So I'm going to do a quick review of what he talked about and I'm going to ask Brother McCleskey to chime in. and just fill in the gaps from when he taught the class.

Ancient Egypt is one of the world's earliest and longest lasting civilizations known for its incredible achievements in architecture, art, and culture. The history is typically divided in several periods. You have this period that they call prehistoric Egypt, before the formation of the first dynasties.

prehistoric communities existed along the Nile River. And Brother McCleskey, you spoke a little bit about that region, the Fertile Crescent, and that region and the prosperity there. Can you say a little bit about that area and what you mentioned in the last class that you taught? I wish I could.

You know, we talked about the origin of civilization, I think that was one of the things. And we talked about there were, it's just not one place. One place that was, there were several places we considered the origin of civilization.

I think we had a slide on that, I don't know if we got that far in there. And Egypt was one of them. The federal crescent, Western Civilization, you know, that's around Mesopotamia?

Yes. Where Iraq is right now. That was also for a long time considered the origin of civilization.

But there were other places in the world So that was one of the things that came from that research that I did. Egypt was one of those. And of course, when we look in the scriptures, we almost see that God had a certain role for Egypt because Egypt comes up to life.

And that's what I'm going to talk about today. I'm going to show some stories in scripture where God saved his people through Egypt, okay? Through Egypt because if there was prosperity there, it was a part of the fertile crescent, okay?

And so the first period of prehistoric Egypt before the formation of the first dynasties, okay? They existed along the early dynastic period from 3100 to 2686 BC. This period marks the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh, Namur, and also known as the Old Kingdom from 2686 to 2181, known as the Age of the Pyramids. This period saw the construction of the famous periods of Giza.

You know that, right? That was during that period that they called the Old Kingdom. Then we have a period that they call the Middle Kingdom or the Bronze Kingdom.

from 2055 to 1650. This era is characterized by stability, prosperity, and trade. And the scriptures that I'm going to talk about today occurred based on scholarly and the historical information that we've gleaned occurred in this Middle Kingdom period, okay? The New Kingdom, 1550 to 1070 BC, often considered the height of ancient Egyptian civilization. This period includes famous pharaohs like King Tut or Tutankhamun and Ramses II. Late period and the Ptolemaic dynasty from 664 to 30 BC After a series of invasions and foreign rule, Egypt was conquered by Alexander the Great and later ruled by the Ptolemaic dynasty ending with Cleopatra.

So these are the different periods of Egypt's reign and the time times associated with that and today I want to spend a little time talking about Abraham and Sarah and their story in Genesis chapter 12 verse 10 through 20. So if you have your Bible and we turn there together Genesis chapter 12 verse 10 through 20. Now this event occurred sometime around 2000 to 1800 BC. It's important to note the exact historical timeframe is subject to interpretation. debate among scholars.

So we don't know exactly, we can't pinpoint exactly when this event happened, but it's in this period. So we can say it occurred in the Middle Kingdom time period. And what do we know about the Middle Kingdom time period?

That this was an era characterized by what? Stability, prosperity, and what? Trade. And trade. So people were going to Egypt because it was a prosperous kingdom, prosperous country, and folks traded there.

Now look what happened with Abram that caused him to go to Egypt. God uses governments and countries to save his people. This says, now there was a what?

There was a famine. It was a famine in the land. And Abram went down to Egypt to live there for a while because the famine was severe. He was about to enter Egypt and he said to his wife, Sarah, I know what a beautiful woman you are. When the Egyptians see you, they will say, this is his wife.

Then they will kill me, but will let you live. Say you are my sister so that I will be treated well for your sake. and my life will be spared because of you." When Abram came to Egypt, the Egyptians saw Zariah and was a beautiful woman. And when Pharaoh's officials saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh, which was the king, and she was taken into his palace. He treated Abram well for her sake, and Abram required sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, male and female servants, and camels. But the Lord inflicted serious diseases on Pharaoh and his household because of Abram's wife, Sarai. So Pharaoh summoned Abram, what have you done to me? Why didn't you tell me she was your wife? Why did you say she was my sister? So that I took her to be my wife. Now then, here is your wife. Take her and go. Then Pharaoh gave orders about Abram to his men, and they sent him on his way with his wife and everything he had. Now my takeaway from this, there's some teaching in here about Abram's behavior with his wife. I want to focus on how God used Egypt to save him from the famine. Because of Egypt's prosperity because Egypt was known for trade God Abram go to Egypt for a while because there was severe famine in the land Okay, that's a key takeaway of this story and how God used this kingdom of Egypt during this time of the Middle Kingdom to Because it was a period of prosperity and trade in Egypt. So Abram went there with his wife. Now the story with his wife and Pharaoh shows Pharaoh was in total control. He was the king. Okay? All right? And a king establishes the law. That's his realm of authority. He saw this beautiful woman. He had the authority to take her as his wife because he was what? He was the king. There's a sidebar here because he was also teaching Abraham and he was teaching us. Because if you want to add a little narrative in here, it could be God saying to Abraham, saying, why would you do this? Didn't you trust me? Because God had this in control from the beginning. It was in his plan from the beginning. God was protecting Abraham and Sarah in Egypt. Abraham was with his own plan. God ended up finishing it in the end anyway. But it's a situation where if God is sending you somewhere or sending you in a way or God chose you to do something, trust him to bring it to completion. Because that's what happened in the end. God ended that situation that Abram got himself into and brought it to completion. And not only did Abram... survive, he prospered. Not because of his will and his actions, but because of God's will and God's actions. Amen. So there's a little bit of sidebar there. That's a great sidebar. I have another sidebar. Let's go with it. And that is Pharaoh was smart enough to know That what was plaguing my people and my house and my kingdom was the fact that I went after a man's wife and that there was a God There was a God somewhere. He may not know what God was, but there's a God somewhere who was taking care of this man. So not only am I going to let you go, I'm not going to harm you, and I'm going to let you take everything I gave you and go because my arms are too short to box with your God. I like that. You got some more? Let's put some more meat on this bone. But I was wondering, how did you know that Pharaoh knew that there was a God that sent him there? Because I look at his actions. I'm looking at his actions in verse 18. Yeah, he is frightening. That he knew that whoever was governing Moses was... was too much for him and so he was protecting Moses. I'm sorry, Abram, I'm sorry. He said he was protecting Abram. So that's my takeaway anyway. - You know, and he says, "What have you done to me? "I've been inflicted with serious diseases. "Something not right. "Something not right. "What have you done to me?

"Why didn't you tell me she was your wife?" I mean, he's thinking. Okay, why didn't you tell me she was your wife? And he didn't get mad enough in the opposite direction to kill her. You know what I'm saying?

He's not only letting her go, he's letting her take everything I've given you too. Take it all or just go. Just go.

And I like what Brother Pinkerton said. You know, God don't need us to help. We're always trying to help.

I know I do. I'm always trying to help God. And I get in trouble.

I'm always, you know, one of my favorites. It's an anchor scripture for me because I need it. Because I'm always trying to help God.

And I just had to just work with this with Brother Pinkerton. And that is Proverbs chapter 3, verse 5 and 6. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. and what lean not in your own understanding don't even don't try to figure out you know what we're gonna do we're gonna tell them you my sister don't don't lean on your own understanding you're gonna get yourself in trouble i do i get myself in trouble you know could that could that be the biggest thing especially if you know that the lord back then the lord gave you command doubt would probably be the biggest sin when you say that that's why the scripture says trust in the lord right don't doubt trust in the lord two hands back there uh brother thomas yeah i would see another angle too though so okay um you know that's a beautiful i see the church today is probably although the payment in the land today he said Yes, excellent point. Excellent point, Brother McCleskey. And so that's the thing that I think we should be thinking about.

God is going to fulfill his purpose. His word is going to go out to the world. It won't return to him fully, but it will achieve the purpose of which he intended for it to happen.

So God, you know, the way I view Egypt, you know, as a kingdom, God blessed Egypt. And he used Egypt. He used other kingdoms too.

And when I think about this, why didn't he start it out up in what, Iran? Is that where it was? Nah, Heria. That's right.

Then it came down and wandered into the Palestine region. But then it went to Egypt. That seems like a pretty good distance to go to me.

But God had fixed Egypt with prosperity like we were talking about. They were prosperous. So we have to see the divine hand in this. But as we go through the scriptures, we don't see Egypt.

Because God has a plan. And that's... God has a plan. And when we study God's word, we...

I mean, we have this vantage point today in 2025 where we can study in class and see the plan and what are the takeaways. Why did Abram go from the Ur of Chaldees, okay, from the Ur of Chaldees to Egypt? Because it was a part of God's plan.

It was a part of God's plan. Now, if we start asking the question, well, why Egypt? Then you're going to start having smoke coming from your brains. God's ways are so much higher than our ways. I'm not even going to ask that question.

Why Egypt? It was because Egypt. It's because God wanted it to be Egypt. But Egypt has a prominent place.

And so we're talking about how Egypt... influence certain stories in the Bible. Brother Pinkerton, and that's the last question.

Just kind of take back on everything you said. Just rolling it forward. That's what Philippians 1-6 is telling us. God has a plan. He's going to bring it to completion.

And you can apply that to everything that's going on today. God has started a work in you. God has started something in you. Guess what?

God to bring it to completion is in God's hands. Therefore, we can trust in him. And no matter what we do, as long as we're trusting in him, then his plan, his will, is going to play out regardless. We don't have to worry about, as Abraham mentioned, he shouldn't have worried about what he saw or what was happening or what he thought.

He should have just trusted God that God was going to bring it to completion. God promised him that he was going to make him, you know, father of a great nation. He was going to do all this.

It hasn't happened yet. Therefore, God still had a plan. Therefore, he didn't have to watch and see what was going on right then, right there, what was happening around him.

It didn't matter. What mattered, what was most important, was God's will and God's plan was still in play. And that's what he should have trusted in. And that's what we need to be today. God's will and God's plan is still in play.

We need to trust God. That's what the message here is from us. And excellent point. And this class...

We're going to look at God's plan in Scripture with a kingdom perspective. That's what makes this class a little different. We're going to look at God's plan with a kingdom perspective.

How did he use Egypt? What's the takeaway from it? How did he use the Babylonian Empire? How did he use the Roman Empire to accomplish his plan of salvation for humanity? And now we're a part of that kingdom, which is why we spent some time talking about the keys.

Brother Barry did such a fine job last Sunday because now we are a part of this eternal kingdom. Okay? And this Holy Spirit that we have is like a passport, Brother Pinkerton. We got dual citizenship.

You've been on foreign soil, but you had that U.S. passport. You said, I'm not from here. My home is some other place. Chris, last comment. My son is filling the role of his mother.

Let me know our class has gotten to an end. This is what I want you to do before next Sunday. We ought to talk about Joseph, okay? And Joseph being sold into slavery, into Egypt, okay?

Here, he was sold When the media night merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for 20 shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him where? To Egypt. And then we're going to talk about Joseph being in Egypt, his time in Egypt, how God used Joseph and his time in Egypt to save Israel. His family.

Okay? To save his family. So read this story, and this is where we're going to pick up next Sunday.

Let's close with a word.

Transcript for:Biblical Kingdoms and Egypt

Transcript for:
Biblical Kingdoms and Egypt