THE THEME OF THIS DEVOTION:
God is a God of order; His people are not amorphous but are structured according to his Divine Word—ultimately according to the Pattern of His Incarnate Son.
The Mystery of the Kingdom of God is the inward formation of each of God’s people by the engrafted, Divine Seed of the Word of God—Incarnate—first in Messiah Jesus, then as branch to Vine, in each of us who are in Him. (John 15) Whoever believes on the name of Yeshua the Messiah is baptized into Him (passes from death to life as expressed in baptism) and becomes engendered by the Spirit of God unto new life by means of faith in the living Word of God. (See Mark 4 with Titus 3 and Romans 6-8) This is what it is to be born again (John 3:3 seq.). This is the fulness of Psalm 2:7, “This day have I begotten thee” (HA YOM YA’LADe’TI—from “Yalad”: to beget, as a father a son: BDB 408). “THIS DAY”: the Day of the Proclamation of the Kingdom of God in the Messiah. (see Psalm 2—“Yet have I set My King on my Holy Hill of Zion”; cp. Mark 1:14-15 with Acts 20 and Revelation 21-22)
The Torah text that I have selected for this devotion on Divine Order is Numbers 33:1—
“These are the journeys of the children of Israel, which went forth out of the land of Egypt with their armies (STONE, “legions”) under the hand of Moses and Aaron.” (KJV)
The point is simple: there is no disarray in the people of God—we all are ordered in our places under the hand of the leadership which God gives to us. (see Hebrews 13:7-8, et al) As Paul wrote in Ephesians 4:11-13—
“And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers;
“For the perfecting of the saints (consecrated ones), for the work of the ministry (the ongoing functional working of the Body of Messiah), for the edifying of the body of Christ (the building up of the whole nation of the begotten of God)
“Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ…” The measure for us all is Jesus.
This is the point of 2 Peter 1:1-11—maturation into Messiah that we may be the abundant inheritors of the eternal Kingdom of God in Him.
Never let anyone lead you away from the unity of the Body of Christ. Our obedience to God is the outworking of our Lord’s own personal and faithful obedience to the Father’s will, for He is the Pattern of our obedience. And that outworking is always in a context of practical and holy relationships.
