Monday, March 23, 2009

The Nations for Your Inheritance

Ask of Me, and I will give You
The nations for Your inheritance,
And the ends of the earth for Your possession
(Psalm 2:8)
This is the promise of God to Messiah: Ask of Me and I will give you the nations for Your inheritance. But it is a promise made all to His people:
He has declared to His people the power of His works,
In giving them the heritage of the nations.
(Psalm 11:6)
The reference here is to the land of the Canaanite nations that He gave to Israel, but the application is much greater: God is interested in gathering in the nations themselves, in the days of Messiah. This is richly portrayed in the prophet Isaiah:
Now it shall come to pass in that latter days
That the mountain of the LORD’s house
Shall be established on the top of the mountains,
And shall be exalted above the hills
And all nations shall flow to it.
Many people shall come and say,
“Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD,
To the house of the God of Jacob;
He will teach us His ways,
And we shall walk in His paths.”
(Isaiah 2:2-3)

In that day there shall be a root of Jesse,
Who shall stand as a banner to the people;
For the Gentiles [nations] shall seek Him,
And His resting place shall be glorious.
(Isaiah 11:9)

Also the sons of the foreigner
Who join themselves to the LORD, to serve Him,
And to love the name of the LORD, to be His servants —
Everyone who keeps from defiling the Sabbath,
And holds fast My covenant —
Even them I will bring to My holy mountain,
And make them joyful in My house of prayer.
Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices
Will be accepted on My altar;
For My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations.
(Isaiah 56:6-7)
This is the inheritance of nations promised Messiah, and through Him, for His people. For we are joint-heirs with Him:
The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs — heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ [Messiah], if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together. (Romans 8:16-17)
“Joint-heirs” means that whatever He inherits, we inherit with Him. If He has the nations for His inheritance, then so do we. All those who know the Lord Jesus Christ, whether they be from among the Jews or the Gentiles (nations), partake of this inheritance with Him. Indeed, we are the inheritance, we belong to each other as well as to Him.

Years ago, I was praying in Psalm 2 (my habit is to pray through the Psalms each month) and I was moved by verse 8: “Ask of Me and I will give you the nations for Your inheritance.” Realizing that those who know Jesus are joint-heirs with Him, I desired to know this inheritance in a deeper way. So I went for it. I asked God, “Lord, give me the nations for my inheritance.”

The next thing I knew, I was on the worldwide web with a ministry home page. It has since grown and now we have many blogs and articles on Christian prayer and Biblical faith that are accessible through the world. Over the years, our pages have received many visitors from the nations. Some have emailed us to tell us how our ministry has blessed them. As I have often said, it really is a worldwide web. I consider that God has indeed answered my prayer, and is continually enlarging our inheritance. Thanks be to God.

God has created an inheritance for Jesus Messiah and all who receive Him.

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous2:51 PM

    Regarding the Worldwide Web,
    This is really from the Lord who actually invented the Internet and the World Wide Web.
    In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
    Hallelujah !

    ReplyDelete
  2. Amazingly upon reading and studying Ps 2 this morning I experience the same and got the same revelation that we are joint heirs with Jesus the Anointed. Thank you for the wonderful work you are doing in God's harvest.

    ReplyDelete