WAS PAUL A KINGDOM PREACHER?

Pastor Art Watkins of Coden Bible Church (Coden, Alabama)

October 8, 2015

I read a post on Face Book recently of a misguided woman who condemned the evangelist Billy Sunday because according to her he was a “kingdom preacher” and because he was a “kingdom preacher” she said he did not “rightly divide the word of truth”. So according to this woman anyone who preaches the kingdom of God today is bad, because they are not “rightly dividing the word of truth”’. If this is true, Paul did not rightly divide the word of truth and he was a bad man, because he preached the kingdom of God from the beginning to the end of his ministry.

Read it for yourself.

----Acts 14:22: Confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.

----Acts 19:8: And he went into the synagogue, and spake boldly for the space of three months, disputing and persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God.

----Acts 20:25: And now, behold, I know that ye all, among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of God, shall see my face no more.

----Acts 28:23: And when they had appointed him a day, there came many to him into his lodging; to whom he expounded and testified the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus, both out of the law of Moses, and out of the prophets, from morning till evening.

----Acts 28:30-31 And Paul dwelt two whole years in his own hired house, and received all that came in unto him, Preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ, with all confidence, no man forbidding him.

After reading these verses do you get the impression Paul was a “kingdom preacher”? Of course he was for the simple reason the kingdom of God is the inheritance of the church as well as all believers in the Bible. This is why he preached the kingdom of God at the same time he preached the gospel of grace in Acts 20:24-25.

So this woman who condemned Billy Sunday also condemned Paul also. She did it in ignorance, because as a hyper dispensationalist she bought into the lie that the kingdom of God belongs to Israel only and not the church. And when confronted with verses like these she is forced to either ignore them or reject them. She took the word of some preacher who taught her that if you preach the kingdom of God like Paul you are not rightly dividing the word of truth. But anyone who says Paul did not preach the kingdom of God is not a right divider at all; they are blind Bible choppers.