Art Thou a King?

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 24, 1902

“UNTO Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father.”

To know the place that God designed, and still designs, that we, his children, shall fill, and to receive the grace of Christ in order that we may fill that place, is the sum and substance of Christianity. He has called us “unto his kingdom and glory.”

He has washed us from our sins, and made us kings and priests unto God and his Father. We know that “the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.” The work of the devil through sin has been to make us something else than kings and priests—slaves. God designed that we should be kings, but Satan’s work is to make us slaves. The gospel is the good news of deliverance. It says to the prisoners, “Go forth;” and to those in darkness, “Show yourselves.” It is the freedom, the liberty, wherewith Christ makes us free. And because of that freedom and liberty, and through it, we are restored to the place and to the power that belong to us. The place is that of kings and priests, and the power is kingly power,—the power to rule.

If we had ever seen ourselves in the place that belongs to every one of us, we would understand what has been lost through sin. There is only One who has ever occupied that place in the earth, and that is Jesus Christ. In the second chapter of the epistle to the Hebrews we see the place that belongs to man. Beginning with the fifth verse, we read, “For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come, whereof we speak. But one in a certain place testified, saying, What is man, that thou art mindful of him? or the son of man, that thou visitest him? Thou madest him a little lower than the angels; thou crownedst him with glory and honor, and didst set him over the works of thy hands.” Thus he was made king over all. But continuing, we read, “But now we see not yet all things put under him.” This is a complete reversal of God’s way. But while we do not now see man where God placed him, yet we do see Jesus, just as man was, made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death. We see him crowned with honor and glory; and because he was thus crowned, he tasted death for every man.

In the place where God placed the first Adam we see Jesus Christ, the second Adam. He was a king because of his character. When Jesus was here as a man, he was making clear to all the universe what God’s real purpose was and still is for us. Where we see Jesus as a man on the earth, with everything in subjection to him, we see clearly what God’s will is for us; and that which gave him that place was the fact that he was without sin. He “did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth.” Because he was righteous in character, he could take the place of a king, although he was a man. When the storm arose, he could say, “Peace, be still,” and it was so. The devils obeyed his voice, and he was ruler over disease, for at his word or touch it left.

Now we who were made in the image of God are not really men as God looks upon men, unless we are free from the power of sin. True manhood is freedom from sin, and true kingship is kingship of character, and it is revealed first of all in a person’s own experience. In the first chapter of Genesis man is put in a king’s place by virtue of what he was made to be. “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion.” That is the place of a king, and the last chapter of Revelation puts him there again: “And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light: and they shall reign forever and ever.” In the beginning man was given dominion, and at the close of the gospel work, man is in his place again; but between the two there is the experience of sin and the gospel work. What sin has wrought, the gospel of Christ can undo, and restore. And if that gospel is received for what it really is, the restoring life of God, it will put every one in his place again, and he will be a king, and will reign with Christ.

The crown of honor and glory that man had in the beginning was lost, and so we read in Rom. 3:23, “All have sinned, and come short of [or lack] the glory of God.” That is the crown gone. The gospel is the good news of the restoration of that crown through faith in Jesus Christ—the restoration of the character of God, which constitutes the crown.

To-day a king among men is one who is waited upon—has many servants to do his bidding, and an army to enforce his word. It does not seem to enter into the minds of men that the one who is in a high position is put there to serve others. How contrary all this is from God’s idea of true kingship. In Matt. 20:20 and onward is given the account of the mother of Zebedee’s children coming to Jesus, and asking that her two sons might sit one on either side of him in his kingdom. Jesus replied, “Ye know not what ye ask.” They did not understand what it meant to be a king with Jesus, because they did not understand the nature of his character. Then Jesus asked them if they were able to be baptized with the baptism that he was baptized with; and when the answer was that they were able, he told them that they should drink of his cup, and be baptized with his baptism, but that to sit on his right hand or on his left was not his to give, but it should be given to them “for whom it is prepared of my Father.” “And when the ten heard it, they were moved with indignation against the two brethren. But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; and whosoever shall be chief among you, let him be your servant: even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.”

The Son of God is the example of what it means to be greatest. “Whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister.” This is just what Christ was, when he was a man among men; and in this he was revealing the character of the King of the universe. God serves every creature he has made, even those creatures that are so small that we are obliged to use a microscope to find them; and the greatness of his kingship lies in the fact that he is able to serve the smallest. “Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing.” He ministers to all.

The place in which he put man was at the head of all created beings on this earth, and with the authority he gave him ability to serve “every living thing that moveth upon the earth.” His kingship consisted in the fact that he was able to render such a service to the creatures that God had made,—not independently of God, but standing between all living things and God to minister God’s gifts to them.

God asks us to be his servants, not because he needs any man to serve him. He is not worshiped with men’s hands, “seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things.” But he has given to man the privilege of occupying a kingly place with him as his servant, that he may receive the gifts of God to minister them to others. This is the character of God, and it is all summed up in one statement,—“God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” And receiving that life gives one the place of king. The very first place where that kingly life is shown is in one’s own character—his daily experience. He cannot be king over others until he is first king over himself. So the gospel is the gospel of kingship of character in Jesus Christ,—self-control, not by one’s self, but through Christ who overcomes. Instead of being a servant of sin, he is made king; instead of being beneath, he is to be above.

The estimate placed upon such a service by the world is far different from the way that God regards it; for man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks upon the heart. As history shows, many of the kings have been more distinguished by their vices than by their virtues, and they have been recognized more by the outward adorning than by the inward. But the meek and quiet spirit is in the sight of God of great price.