We tend to want to subdue and control the people around us. You notice it says there let them have dominion. It didn't say have dominion over people; have dominion over the works of God's hands, not people. So we see there, now I want to just have a quick look through some scriptures. I'm not going to look all these up. What I want to do is I want to show you very clearly that throughout the Bible the emphasis is on the kingdom of God. Now if I just tell you that it's hard for you to kind of grasp - yeah, yeah, yeah. So what I want to do is quickly just give a few scriptures, and I want to show you that without exception the Bible is always about the kingdom. It's always about the kingdom of God. Now you see most times people think of - they just think 'church'. But church and kingdom are quite different, and the message Jesus came was primarily about kingdom. The church is the people who are part of the royal family, have given their lives to Christ, been born again, and positioned to now fulfil the original mandate; subdue the earth and have dominion.
So the purpose you have and we have corporately and individually is that we would advance God's purpose, whether it be in art or finance, or business or education, or the media, whatever it is. Of course what's happened is when people got religious they then withdrew from the world, so the church now on the whole has withdrawn from the world and that's the influence of religion, see? God came to - His idea is a kingdom where we go out and we actually influence the world and change the world around us, whether it be the environment, whether it be in the health area, whether education, whatever it is. That's why young people, I'm all behind you pursuing being trained and developing your skills to the best you possibly can. Serving God is done in the marketplace best by developing our skills what God has entrusted with us. It's an entrustment.
Now let me just give you a few scriptures, just so you can see - I want to put them under three headings; number one, just under Jesus' ministry and I'm just going to quote the scriptures. We'll put them up on the screen if you've got them there, just start to pop them up and I want to just show you just how everywhere - and once you've seen this everywhere you'll look you'll see nothing but this. If you were to read through the gospels again what you'll see over and over and over is Jesus' emphasis on the kingdom. So the beginning of Jesus' ministry, Matthew 4:17 and Jesus began to preach saying repent for the kingdom is at hand. See, in Matthew 4:23 and Jesus, this is His preaching and He preached the kingdom of God and healed all who were sick. He preached. What did He preach about? He preached the kingdom of God, and what did He do? He healed the sick. Why did He heal the sick and cast out demons? Because that's all part of the kingdom of God coming into the earth.
You see sickness was never God's plan, so the kingdom is about God's protocol, God's life, God's values. God values healing and wholeness, so when the kingdom is preached it's so the power of God might come into the earth, might have healings, see? Then you see His teaching in Matthew 5:3, the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus gathered them all together and guess what He began to teach about? He began to teach about - oh ho ho, goodness me - about the kingdom of God. You know what the Sermon on the Mount is about? It's about all the protocols, values and the way the kingdom operates, and so He says well you've heard people say this, but this is actually how the kingdom operates, so He goes through and His main teaching there is all about the kingdom of God. It's all about the kingdom of God. He's teaching about the kingdom, His priority.
In Matthew 6:33 He said seek first the kingdom of God - so what did Jesus say is a priority? The kingdom of God. When the disciples said teach us to pray guess what Jesus taught them to pray? Matthew 6:10, Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come. In case you didn't understand what that meant, They will or value in life and protocols and ways be in the earth like they are in heaven - in case we didn't understand it, see? And Jesus' prayer, so then His parables, how many all know the parables Jesus spoke? Jesus told lots of stories at parables. You will find almost without exception He said the kingdom of heaven is like; Matthew 13:24, it says the kingdom of heaven is like a sower went out to sow, and He has all these parables. Matthew 13:31, more parables. He had about a half a dozen parables there of the kingdom. The kingdom of heaven's like a household. The kingdom of heaven's like a man cast out a net. The kingdom of heaven's like a man who found a pearl in the field, or treasure in a field, the pearl of great price.