Planting Churches among the City's Poor - Volume 1

P ART II: T HEOLOGICAL AND M ISSIOLOGICAL P RINCIPLES AND I NSIGHTS • 111

The Kingdom of God Church Planting in a Universe at War Rev. Dr. Don L. Davis

The Kingdom of God Has Come upon You But Jesus knew their thoughts, and said to them: “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every city or house divided against itself will not stand. And if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand? And if I cast out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore they shall be your judges. But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, surely the Kingdom of God has come upon you. Or else how can one enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man? And then he will plunder his house. He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters abroad.” ~ Matthew 12.25-30

I. God’s Kingdom Rule (i.e., the Kingdom of God) Has Been Contested and Challenged.

A. The Triune God as Sovereign Lord over the heavens and the earth

1. As the Maker and Sustainer of all things

Isa. 40.21-31 (ESV) – Do you not know? Do you not hear? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them like a tent to dwell in; who brings princes to nothing, and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness. Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth, when he blows on them, and they wither, and the tempest carries them off like stubble. To whom then will you compare me, that I should be like him? says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes on high and see: who created these? He who brings out their host by number, calling them all by name, by the greatness of his might, and because he is strong in power not one is missing. Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, “My way is hidden from the Lord, and my right is disregarded by my God”? Have you not known?