The World Tomorrow. Ambassador College presents Garner Ted Armstrong, bringing you the plain truth about today's world news and the prophecies of the World Tomorrow.
And greeting friends around the world. This is Garner Ted Armstrong with the good news of the World Tomorrow.
A new president in the Soviet Union and election year in the United States. How would Jesus vote for president if Christ were on the Earth today? What would be his choice of a leader for the United States or for Britain or South Africa or for Australia or for that matter for any nation? What type of man would he support if any, what type of platform would he vote for? Would Jesus be inclined to be radical, conservative. Left? Right? How would Jesus vote for president?
Well, you know, if you have your name on the mailing list of the Plain Truth magazine, you will get the answer to that question in no uncertain terms because coming along now, an issue right around the corner is going to be an article by that title. How Would Jesus Vote for PRESIDENT? You need to write in for it and find out especially in this election year in the United States.
And so many are wondering and of course, right, in the midst of all the hullabaloo and the Bally who of the various conventions and of choosing the candidate for the presidency of the United States, even the press you up and around the world are all blankly interested. Well, it's time you asked the question, how would Jesus vote? Just what would be his opinion?
Because did you know the message of Jesus Christ in the Bible was vitally concerned with world government? You know, Jesus talked about government, about rulers, about leaders, about civil state, federal government. He talked about people ruling cities, about people over nations and people ruling the entirety of the world. His whole message was one of government of one of office of law, of authority and of how to administer government correctly and appropriately, Jesus likened himself to a person, a young nobleman or a king who went away into a far country to get for himself, a kingdom to be coronated and to come back to this earth and to administer and to rule and to apportion various position, the responsibility.
He said when he was called on trial for his life before pilot, pilot had asked him. Well, what is all this rumor they're claiming? You say you're trying to set yourself up as a king that you're some kind of a competitor against the government here, the Romans who have occupied our country and of our Jewish governors Jesus said, and you read of it in verse 36 of the 18th chapter of the book of John (John 18:36), My kingdom is not of this world. And that means the age of the society in the original Greek word. If my kingdom were of this world, he said that is if he were on this earth ruling and if it were his kingdom, his kind of government, he said, then would my servants fight that I should not be delivered to the Jews? But now is my kingdom not from hence, Pilate went on and said, are you a king? Then he's trying to accuse him, trying to get him to say something that would get him in so deep. Pilate could feel justified in what he knew he was about to allow to be done to Christ anyhow. So Pilate said, are you a king then? And Jesus answered, you say that I'm a king. That is the word came out of your mouth. Are you a king to this end, said Jesus Christ was I born and for this cause came I into the world.
Well, my friends, why did so many people think then by spiritualizing this all away that Jesus, yes, he's a king but he was sort of the king of heaven. Uh Remember the Negro spiritual song I've learned to sing it. Ride on King Jesus. They have pictures of Christ galloping around the heavens on a white horse. Oh yes. he rules, I guess. But well, doesn't he sort of rule in people's hearts? Every now and then, I hear somebody in a long drab, dull gray voice. Sometimes it's a woman, sometimes a man talking about how the Lord laid it upon her heart. So the Lord ruled her heart. So the Lord sort of revealed it to her heart. I hear people talking about how the Lord showed it to their hearts. I don't know how the Lord does that. I never do find that expression in the Bible. I never didn't figure out people can reason around that Jesus Christ on the one hand is ruling that there's not very much power and authority and a lot of people who will talk about the Lord showed it to my heart at the same time, do not think they need to obey Jesus Christ. They don't think they need to obey the 10 commandments of God that they need to take orders from Jesus when he says, do this, do the other, don't do that. They say yes Lord and they obey it. Does the Lord speak to your mind to your will, to your volition, to your impulses to your every waking moment or just to your heart?
Can you spiritualize away the statement of Jesus for this end, for this cause, this precise purpose was I born for this great reason, I came into the world? He said, to become a King.
The message of Jesus Christ had to do with government. It's called the Gospel of the Kingdom of God. And the Kingdom of God is a literal kingdom. It has a King, it has a definite territory, it's defined in the Bible. It has subjects, it has a whole system of law, executive, judiciary, legislative, the whole pattern of how it's all to be performed and carried out of how it to be set up and administered is absolutely from one point to the other, from beginning to end from Genesis to Revelation all through the Bible. It's all laid out.
The Bible is a handbook of the outline of the schedule of Almighty God and how he's going to rule the nations of this earth. How he's going to take over on this earth and to give us the good life. That's what party platforms are concerned about, pensions and the ages and guaranteed wages and all kinds of security for people. We want security. We want guaranteed minimum wages, we want all kinds of health benefits. We want conservation, we want this, we want that. We want to get, we want to have, we want to accumulate, we want to get the good life for ourselves. We don't seem to know how to get it, but the message of Jesus Christ had to do with how to get it over in the 19th chapter of the book of Luke.
He likened himself to that young nobleman. Let's turn to that in your own Bible and read it for yourself with your own eyes and see exactly what Jesus said. And don't forget, as you turn to Luke 19, how in the beginning chapters of that same book of Luke, the angel said to his mother before Jesus was ever born, that he was coming to this earth to inherit the throne of his father David and of his kingdom said that angel there shall be no end. But people say, oh, that's right. There's no end to it. You find Christians everywhere when the Lord rules in their hearts, that sort of uh doesn't match what the Bible says does it really?
Does the Lord rule in people's hearts. Well, then if that's true, is there one Lord, one faith? And if that's true, why doesn't the Lord, if he rules in all their hearts rule the same way in each heart than he does in every other heart? If he rules in hearts, why doesn't Jesus rule deliberately? Literally just like he says, he's going to now either Jesus failed and the Bible doesn't mean what it says and it shot through with error. Or else a lot of people are maybe honestly mistaken. It's one of the other my friends.
A lot of people are either deluded and misled and obviously mistaken or else the Bible is in gross and dark error because the Kingdom of God is not set up in the hearts of men. It just isn't, read I Corinthians 15 and verse 50 where it says (I Corinthians 15:50), flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God is the inheritance of a Christian. The kingdom of God is the governing ruling family of God into which every Christian is to be born by a resurrection from the dead or by an instantaneous change at the time of the second coming of Jesus Christ.
The kingdom of God is going to rule on this earth for 1000 years and then on into eternity. That's what the Kingdom of God is. It has a King, a government. Now Jesus said in chapter 19, the book of Luke in verse 11 (Luke 19:11), here's a parable. You might have heard about it before I heard it referred to, especially on this program, you have and by the way, write in for this article on, Just What is the Kingdom of God?, while I'm on the subject.
Write in for that article and find out many people think it's the church. Some think it's many people in different churches. Some think it's sort of set up in the hearts of men, which is a misinterpretation of one idea that they get out of a chapter of Luke where Jesus was talking to a bunch of conniving, thieving, lying, cheating, hard bitten, carnal minded, stiff neck Pharisees. And he turned to those Pharisees who are plotting his murder. And he said, using a Greek word, the Kingdom of God is among you, not within you.
It wasn't within them. How could anyone in his right mind in possession of his faculties and his senses? Begin to think Jesus turned to those Pharisees and says, bless your little bitty old hearts. The Kingdom of God is right there in your little old heart. It's right inside "your little bitty hearts" the way this one western singer says it once in a while. Did Jesus say that to those murder plotting Pharisees who were trying to kill him turn around and say to them, the Kingdom of God is in your heart.
Oh my friends, let's be wise. Let's be circumspect. Let's understand the Bible. Jesus as a representative, as an ambassador, an arm boy, as the one who was qualifying by overthrowing the president world ruler who was described in your Bible as a great fallen Archangel, the one who was qualifying by proving a man. Yes, a man can obey the laws of God and do it perfectly. The one who was qualifying on this earth to become its ruler, who was the advanced emissary of that kingdom said I, that's his meaning. That was his intent as a representative of that government. I am here among you. The Kingdom of God is embodied in me the way I think the way I feel, the way I act, my message that I brought from God the Father. He wasn't saying the Kingdom of God was in the hearts of a lot of murder plotting Pharisees of that day.
Write for this article on, Just what is the Kingdom of God?, and prove it yourself. It's a kingdom. What's the Kingdom of Great Britain and a lot of hearts of people somewhere else. Well no, I don't think the British people look at it that way. They don't figure it's just on the cereal, something set up in somebody's heart. They figure it's an actual kingdom. It has a queen on its own right now. Government buildings, parliament and all the rest. It's quite an empire. The sun is setting on that once proud empire today. But nevertheless, everybody knows it's a literal kingdom.
Now, notice verse 11. Let's let the Bible say what it means and means what it says. Let's not try to alter, change it, correct it, delete from it, add to it or argue against it. The Bible is the word of God and you can prove it when you write for these booklets, Does God Exist? And Proof of the Bible. Chapter 19, the book of Luke verse 11 (Luke 19:11). And as they heard these things he added and spoke a parable because he was near to Jerusalem because they thought notice that in verse 11, they thought that the Kingdom of God should immediately appear. Now, a lot of people think that today a lot of folks have gone underground with their canned fruits and vegetables waiting for Christ to come. A lot of others stood on the front yards one time in Chicago looking up to heaven waiting for Christ to come. Others used to set dates and then figure it didn't happen on earth. After all it happened up in heaven.
A lot of people have figured Christ is going to come. Why people have walked the street corners with placards, flee from the raft to come. I imagine ever since, maybe just before the flood. Well, that's happened all the time. Sometimes things did happen like during the days of Noah and sometimes things didn't happen. But that's because men have misinterpreted and men haven't understood. And that's because most people are deluded. Your Bible says so.
Now, can you believe that scripture that says over there in Revelation 12 and verse nine (Revelation 12:9), that the devil, that great dragon that is defined there in, and that of course, is merely sort of symbolic language that great dragon is described as, but that the devil. And there is a literal devil has deceived all nations on this earth that there is a great cloud of religious darkness and confusion all over this world. And it is amazing how people can get so absolutely excited? There are three things they can get really excited about, that's politics, religion and their diet, only people can get alarmed about those things.
But nevertheless, they back there, just like a lot of folks today thought the Kingdom of God was immediately going to appear. So because they were diluted. And because they thought this Jesus gave them this parable. He said, therefore, verse 12, a certain noble man went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and to return, he called his 10 servants and delivered them £10. That's the British monetary standard about $2.80 or 81 cents and said unto them occupy.
Now this would be per pound, this would be about $28. And in other words, here, the £10 total and said, occupy that is get busy, buy, sell trade, barter, invest, occupy till I come. But his citizens went on. Jesus hated him and sent a message after him saying, we will not have this man to reign over us. Does that sound like anything you've heard of lately? That's the message a lot of people send up to God today. They say God, I won't obey your 10 commandments. I will not have or listen to or hear about a Jesus Christ. He's going to be a ruling Christ, a law abiding law administering Christ.
I remember reading one little tract and there are such things where a man said, he just couldn't think about a Jesus Christ coming back as a conquering king that he had to think of a Jesus Christ coming back as a humble lovable carpenter of Nazareth with his long brown locks and so on. Well, that's too bad. That's kind of tough. You know, can't even think of Christ the way he really is. Look at the 19th chapter of Revelation, John was supposed to be the Apostle Jesus loved. That's what he said and Jesus said it. He was the one that Jesus turned to Peter and said now, what's it to you? If I decide this one is going to stay for a lot longer? What if I decided he should abide until I come again? What's that to you, Peter?
He loved John. John speaks about love all the way through. 1st, 2nd, third John and John in the gospel of John writes a great deal about love and about the life of Christ. John is the one and the only one of the gospel writers who include the entirety of the Lord's prayer. And I mean, the prayer Jesus prayed on the night before he was crucified all the words of it. Now did John mean what he said then in the Book of Revelations, the very purpose, the express reason for which Jesus had preserved him and caused him to remain alive.
Up until the time of the turn of the first century was to receive that great prophecy of the Book of Revelation which tells about Jesus Christ of Nazareth, coming back as a ruling, conquering King to administer the government of God. Too bad some folks can't think of Jesus as a returning King. And of course, if we figure religion is for us to just package up in a way, we do, that's appealing to us, so to fabricate and manufacture for ourselves. And we'll decide just what kind of religion we're going to take for ourselves.
Well, of course, that's our privilege. God must just get away with that. But, you know, God does not let us decide what is the true religion. You can decide what is your religion, all you want. Of course. But you can't decide what is God's religion. God already has that laid out. Now, God's religion is the true religion. If you have one that is yours and it's not God's and of course, that's yours. And you're welcome to it.
That's one of our great, I guess you could call it a privilege. It's certainly a freedom. It's certainly a liberty. I don't know if it's exactly a privilege. But the religion of God is the truth of God that is revealed in the Bible. And Jesus everywhere pictured himself my friends as a returning conquering ruling King. He came the first time as the humble carpenter of Nazareth to preach the gospel, as a forerunner, as a message to train and to teach his disciples to carry that same message into all the four corners of the world down through every successive generation. Until such time as Jesus Christ did return to this earth.
I notice that then he called these 10 servants, but the servant said, we will not have this man to reign over us. So the attitude is one of hostility toward authority, a resentment toward Christ as a conquering King, a Ruler. And yet notice in Revelations 2:26 and 3:21 how Jesus said, to him that overcomes will he grant to sit with him in his throne which is on this earth? Remember he's going to inherit the thorn of his father David and that to him will be given a rod of iron that with it. He should rule the nations and they, he said shall be broken to shivers, splintered, smashed in some cases.
Now, don't you get the feeling that way about Laos and Vietnam? And sometimes like the little old lady I described in years gone by, she sat in her living room with a rocking chair and a great big globe of the world. And she had this newspaper in her hands and great big mallet. And here were all these trouble spots. All you know, Laos Viet Man, various of the nations in Africa, Cuba. Here was something happening maybe over the divided city of Berlin again or something in the Jew-Arab crisis or something else.
But some trouble spots are guaranteed to be winking away like a little minor brushfire and threatening to break out into a huge worldwide war at about any given time, that you know. True to Christ's predictions. We would be living in a time of wars and rumors of wars which we are.
So this little old lady would take her great big globe and she would quickly look up this spot where she had been reading this trouble spot on the world and she'd give it a great big rap with that mallet. And here was this old battered beat up Misshapen Globe. Well, she pretty much evidence of frustration with a lot of people. They look around the world, they like to solve the problems of the world. You've heard about the drunk on the barstool that solves all the world's problems in a couple of hours.
He's so adamant about his opinions. You've heard about the guy in a barber's chair, the fellow lounging on the courthouse steps around the corner of the drugstore counter. It solve world problems. If you want to know who ought to be president, he can tell you if you want to know all about World Bank. Well, he knows and on and on it goes, a lot of people have ideas about how they'd like to do this or that to some countries.
A lot of people would like to send about 10 million planes and, and 10 million soldiers and 60,000 ships or so over there and completely surround on these nations and just crush them good. Well, now, you know, the way to get a child to obey is making obey and the way you have to sometimes make a child obey is a little different than just arguing with him and reasoning with him. And of course, people can do that to train dogs for dog shows, but they can't do it with the infinitely more precious, infinitely more intelligent mind of their own little child.
And that's kind of a strange thing. But Jesus Christ of Nazareth promises people are going to ultimately have authority over cities over nations. Now, what's wrong with that authority? Well, when you read of the sensational case of child beating, what you're reading of is a case of an extreme and a total misuse of authority on the part of a poorly equipped, ill trained irresponsible parent who has committed a great evil and a tremendous sin.
So because most human beings are not yet able, not yet capable to correctly and to judiciously and with great equality and a sense of mercy and real righteousness, not able to objectively administer authority. But because there are these great abuses of the administrative authority. So have we finally evolved a huge system of the constant check and balance of the rule by the majority? And it's a good thing when we're living in a society where man's nature runs rampant, it's a good thing we've got all those checks and balances for the time being. That's why under any earthly system, that's why in the hands of a man, any dictatorship is going to be rotten and evil and wrong. A lot of things get accomplished, highways, bridges, dams, hydroelectric projects, great huge monuments, apartment buildings, various slums out on and on.
You might have seen the movies about Mussolini out with a spade in his hand and a tin hat on his head. And, oh, yes, he did a lot of things. And today when you go to Rome, the cab driver will tell you Mussolini did this. Mussolini did that. Mussolini did the other thing. You go to Germany, Hitler built the Autobahns. Hitler did this. He instituted the other.
Yes, they get a lot of things done. They can cut through a lot of red tape and they just do it and people go out and they do it. But the trouble is that kind of authority in the hands of a man who is not capable, who is not wise, who is not filled with mercy, who doesn't have the love of God in his mind is going to be abused, it's going to be misused and it's finally going to come toppling down.
But when you get that kind of authority in the hands of a person who is a member of the very family of God, let's say this. Let's just prove to you briefly what I mean. Would you feel that kind of authority were safe in the hands of Christ? If Jesus Christ were to come over here and maybe appear in one of the conventions? And of course, I don't know if most people would go along with his religion.
I think maybe he'd be crucified again if he weren't awfully careful. But nevertheless, would you feel that with the tremendous love, the mercy, the, the absolutely perfect sense of equality and justice, all the tremendous laws and the, well mallees, but all of the great standards and the ethics and all the rest of the high morality, the absolute perfection of Jesus Christ with his character, the kind of character he had.
Do you think that kind of authority would be safe with him? My friendship better because he's already got it. That's the kind of authority he has. He's got ultimate positive, absolute authority.
He's away in that far country as that young nobleman being coronated in that tense right now, awaiting as your Bible says, until his enemies on made his footstool. Now we here are the citizens. He said, occupy and most of us have been sending up to heaven a message. We will not have this man to rule over us. That's the argument today. Law of God. Gone away. Now, Jesus said, no, no, it isn't either. He said, you do not think, don't you think said Jesus Christ think not said Jesus that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets. I'm not come to destroy but to fulfill.
So people say, I think he came to do away with the law makes you wanna wanna say it doesn't make much difference what people think does it? People think all kinds of things. Some people think they're Napoleon. But my friends, what we think doesn't change the truth of God. The idea is the opinions of human beings do not change the truth of God. Let God be true or every man is a liar. That's what your Bible says.
Now notice in verse 15 of the 19th chapter of Luke (Luke 19:15-16), and it came to pass that when he was returned, having received the kingdom. Now this goes on ahead in the prophecy to the return of Jesus Christ. And he commanded these servants to be called to him and to whom he had given the money that he might know how much every man had gained by trading then came the first saying, Lord by pound has gained £10. That was an absolute tremendous 10 times over increase, a terrific accomplishment.
And he said unto him verse 17 (Luke 19:17), well, thou good servant because you have been faithful. But notice the next words, because you have been faithful in a very little, have thou authority over 10 cities. The present Mayor of Los Angeles Sam Yorty he's got his hands full. Pretty good size job. Of course, he doesn't have absolute authority over the city. There are an awful lot of people in the city council. As a matter of fact, they're pretty sure he shouldn't have.
And a lot of [inaudible] sometimes it's a little different than the mayor's office. This would be like a, a city state of ancient times except even far more so, this is an absolute monarchy of a sub king over a city who is under maybe a state ruler who is under a national ruler. But this person was given absolute and total authority over 10 cities. In this picture, this parable, that Jesus gave his prediction of his, that lays out and outlines exactly what he's doing here below.
And that means over all the city departments. Oh boy, think of the red tape you can cut through with that kind of authority. Think of the things you could get done. That is, I mean, if the person at the head is qualified, if the person at the head is a Spirit Being, God himself, Christ himself, a member of the God family think of the things you can get done.
You know, more of all these hodgepodge of beating our guns and griping about this and that going around in circles and getting things accomplished so slowly and so laboriously. And since that's great huge strain, all kinds of problems, the whole thing could sure get done quickly that way. He said, because you have been faithful in a very little, have thy authority over 10 cities.
And the second came saying, Lord thy pound has gained £5 verse 18, the 19th chapter of Luke (Luke 19:18). And he said likewise to him, be thou also over five cities. And another came saying, Lord, here is your pound which I have kept laid up in a napkin.
Now, this person had been standing there saying, "I'm glad it was all settled long ago." He'd been thinking to himself once saved always saved, sure, glad I made it. Or maybe he was like the old lady who came to the evangelistic campaign and the impassioned plea of the minister got more and more frantic and beat the perspiration ran down his forhead and he was shouting and screaming and jumping up and down, pouring water out of a pitcher and claiming to have holy oil on his hands. And you sweat too. If you worked that hard and inviting everybody to come up and get saved. And somebody next to her said, "granny, aren't you coming down the aisle with it?" She says, "no, no. Let me see if I can. I think maybe I think I do recall and I did get saved back there. It seems to me it was over in an old Pot Hunky or some place when I was about 14." You know, I think you get the picture. Here was the person that had the pound laid up in a napkin. No growth, no overcoming, no development, no additional knowledge. It was all settled long ago. Thought that once settled, always settled, there was no question about really believing the Bible and the apostle Paul, for example, who said that he was fearful, he had the beat and to do his own body lest, he said, after preaching to others, I myself should be found to cast away and no belief in the statements of Christ who said himself to him that overcome, not to him that says, "I accept you, I believe on you and just sits there." But to him that overcome will I grant to sit with me in my throne. This person kept his pounds and Jesus said out of your own mouth, I will judge you. And he said, "why didn't you at least give my money into the bank?" Verse 23 (Luke 19:23), at my coming, I might have required mine own with usury? That is with interest.
And then he said in verse 26 (Luke 19:26), unto everyone which has, shall be given, that is to him that improves, overcomes, grows, develops rounds out and grows and develops in his character, the very character of Christ inside of a human being and from him, it has not even that which he has shall be taken away from him. But those mine enemies verse 27 (Luke 19:27), which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither and slay before me. That's what Jesus says. Now that's a great part of the gospel right there. Do you believe it? Jesus said, repent and believe the gospel. A lot of people believe on Christ, but they're not willing to believe Him. Believe what he said.
Write for these articles and booklets. I've announced, you'll be glad you got them, you'll be glad to read them. You will be quite enlightening. Does God Exist? The Proof of the Bible, write also for this article on, Just What is the Kingdom of God? and write for this booklet on The Plain Truth About Child Rearing and get your name on the mailing list of the Plain Truth magazine. And you'll receive this article coming in the next couple of issues on, How Would Jesus Vote For President? Now, they're all free of charge. There is absolutely no price, no request for money, no follow-up of any kind. Send your request to Herbert W Armstrong Box 111 Pasadena, California. That's Herbert W Armstrong Box 111 Pasadena, California. Be sure to list the call letters of your station until next time, this is Garner Ted Armstrong saying goodbye, friends.
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