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Matthew 4

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1 Then Jesus was sent by the Spirit into the waste land to be tested by the Evil One.

2 And after going without food for forty days and forty nights, he was in need of it.

3 And the Evil One came and said to him, If you are the Son of God, give the word for these stones to become bread.

4 But he made answer and said, It is in the Writings, Bread is not man's only need, but every word which comes out of the mouth of God.

5 Then the Evil One took him to the holy town; and he put him on the highest point of the Temple and said to him,

6 If you are the Son of God, let yourself go down; for it is in the Writings, He will give his angels care over you; and, In their hands they will keep you up, so that your foot may not be crushed against a stone.

7 Jesus said to him, Again it is in the Writings, You may not put the Lord your God to the test.

8 Again, the Evil One took him up to a very high mountain, and let him see all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them;

9 And he said to him, All these things will I give you, if you will go down on your face and give me worship.

10 Then said Jesus to him, Away, Satan: for it is in the Writings, Give worship to the Lord your God and be his servant only.

11 Then the Evil One went away from him, and angels came and took care of him.

12 Now when it came to his ears that John had been put in prison, he went away to Galilee;

13 And going away from Nazareth, he came and made his living-place in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the country of Zebulun and Naphtali:

14 So that the word of the prophet Isaiah might come true,

15 The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, by the way of the sea, the other side of Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles,

16 The people who were in the dark saw a great light, and to those in the land of the shade of death did the dawn come up.

17 From that time Jesus went about preaching and saying, Let your hearts be turned from sin, for the kingdom of heaven is near.

18 And when he was walking by the sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, whose other name was Peter, and Andrew, his brother, who were putting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen.

19 And he said to them, Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.

20 And straight away they let go the nets and went after him.

21 And going on from there he saw two other brothers, James, the son of Zebedee, and John, his brother, in the boat with their father, stitching up their nets; and he said, Come.

22 And they went straight from the boat and their father and came after him.

23 And Jesus went about in all Galilee, teaching in their Synagogues and preaching the good news of the kingdom, and making well those who were ill with any disease among the people.

24 And news of him went out through all Syria; and they took to him all who were ill with different diseases and pains, those having evil spirits and those who were off their heads, and those who had no power of moving. And he made them well.

25 And there went after him great numbers from Galilee and Decapolis and Jerusalem and Judaea and from the other side of Jordan.

   

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Apocalypse Revealed # 749

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749. 17:17 "For God has put it into their hearts to carry out His purpose, and to be of one mind and give their kingdom to the beast." This symbolizes a judgment among Protestants from the Lord that they should utterly repudiate and renounce the Roman Catholic religion and expunge and eradicate it in themselves, and a unanimous judgment that they should acknowledge the Word and found the church on it.

Since the harlot symbolizes the Roman Catholic religion, and the ten horns that will hate the harlot symbolize Protestants, as in nos. 746-748 above, it is apparent that carrying out God's purpose means symbolically that they judged and concluded that they should utterly repudiated and renounce the Roman Catholic religion and expunge and eradicate it in themselves, as in no. 748 above. And it is apparent as well that to be of one mind and give their kingdom to the beast means, symbolically, to unanimously judge and conclude that they should acknowledge the Word and found the church on it. The beast symbolizes the Word, as it has everywhere before (see no. 723), and their kingdom symbolizes the church and government over it, about which we will say more here below. That God put it into their hearts means symbolically that their judgments came from the Lord.

[2] That a kingdom symbolizes the church can be seen from the following passages:

The children of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness. (Matthew 8:12)

...the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom... (Matthew 13:38)

Someone who hears the Word of the kingdom, and does not heed it... (Matthew 13:19)

...the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it. (Matthew 21:43)

No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God. (Luke 9:62)

Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. (Matthew 6:10)

Jesus, John the Baptist, and the disciples preached that the kingdom of God was at hand (Matthew 3:2; 4:17; 10:7, Luke 10:11; 16:16), and they preached also the gospel of the kingdom (Matthew 4:23; 9:35; 24:14, Luke 8:1).

If I cast out demons by the finger of God, surely the kingdom of God has come to you. (Luke 11:20)

And so on in many other passages where the kingdom of God is mentioned.

So, too, in the following:

...if you will... obey My voice and keep My covenant... you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests... (Exodus 19:5-6)

You, O tower of the flock, the ascent of the daughter of Zion, to you shall return... the former kingdom..., the kingdom of the daughter of Jerusalem. (Micah 4:8)

The saints... shall (afterward) receive the kingdom, and establish the kingdom..., even forever... (Daniel 7:18, cf. 7:22)

The kingdom and dominion, and the majesty of the kingdoms under all the heavens, shall be given to the people of the saints...(whose) kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall worship and obey Him. (Daniel 7:27)

To (the Son of Man) was given... a kingdom (which shall not be destroyed), and all peoples, nations, and languages shall worship Him. (Daniel 7:14)

And so on elsewhere.

A kingdom symbolizes the church because the Lord's kingdom exists in heaven and on earth, and His kingdom on earth is the church. That, too, is why the Lord is called King of kings.

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.