How To Enter The Kingdom Of Heaven – Matthew 7:21-23

God With Us

Do you call Jesus Lord?

Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.“ –Matthew 7:21.

That word says is an interesting word. It is the Greek word légō and by Jesus using that word here He means that these people who are calling Him Lord assume they will enter the kingdom of heaven.

Jesus was saying these people have made their final opinion that they will enter the kingdom of heaven, but that is just a personal conclusion, it is not the truth.

These people call Jesus Lord, but what does that mean? The Greek word is kýrios, and by these people calling Jesus Lord, they are saying He has complete ownership over them. He has full rights to do whatever He pleases with them.

There are a few variations of kýrios, but this one here means the Trinity, Yahweh, but specifically talking about Jesus, and how He represents the Trinity to Christians.

The first time this word Lord is used in the Gospels is Matthew 1:20, But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for the Child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.”

The second time this word Lord is used in the Gospels is very important because this is when we are told Jesus is Lord, the Word of God who spoke through the Old Testament prophets.

Matthew 1:22-23, Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet: “BEHOLD, THE VIRGIN SHALL BE WITH CHILD AND SHALL BEAR A SON, AND THEY SHALL CALL HIS NAME IMMANUEL,” which translated means, “GOD WITH US.”

And this word for GOD is the Greek word theós, meaning the Creator and owner of all things. Specifically this word means Yahweh, it is the same Greek word for the Hebrew word Yhvh, the proper name of the God of Israel.  So, Immanuel means YAHWEH WITH US, that is the proper name of Jesus.

But, does everyone who calls Jesus Lord know what Yahweh with us means?

What is the Kingdom of Heaven?

Kingdom of Heaven, this is a play on words by Jesus. Kingdom is the Greek word basileía, and it is consistently used to mean the rule of Jesus in the hearts of His believers, but it also means His rule in different stages of reality.

Some scholars have defined this word Kingdom as “now but not yet,” or “here but still future.” The words faith and kingdom are very closely related in the New Testament, they mean almost the exact same thing.

What this word Kingdom specifically means is Jesus now working in the hearts of His believers by the power of the Holy Spirit, but also in the future when Jesus sets up His Kingdom on earth beginning at His Millennial Reign.

In the New Testament, the phrase Kingdom of Heaven is used about half as much as the phrase Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God refers to the entire Kingdom of God throughout everywhere, while the Kingdom of Heaven refers to the Kingdom in the hearts of Jesus’ disciples.

Furthermore, Kingdom of Heaven refers to the Kingdom manifesting in and through Jesus’ disciples as the Holy Spirit magnifies God through us and Jesus extends the privilege of His rule to us who receive the truth and who are in full submission to the will of God.

Many people assume because they can cast out demons and/or miracles are being worked through them that Jesus is extending the privilege of His rule to them now, but that is not the truth.

What is the will of the Father?

Jesus said only those who do the will of His Father who is in heaven will enter the kingdom of heaven. So, what is the will of His Father?

That word will is the Greek word thélēma, and it refers to God’s desire, ending with His hope that every person will make the correct choice. God’s desire cannot be altered, it is forever the same; unchanging, but His desire is never forced upon anyone.

Any religion that forces conversion is not from God. Forcing people to convert is already happening in the world, and it will happen in greater measure, eventually covering every part of the world.

Jesus talked about this happening in the future when He gave John the Book of Revelation in about 95 AD. The specific religion Jesus talked about is already here, it has been here for a while now.

Somewhere around 50 AD, Paul wrote in Galatians 1:8-9, But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed!

This word accursed is the Greek word anáthema, and it is a divine curse, a curse from God Himself, destruction in judgement, and anáthema is the curse Jesus took for us at the cross.

What Paul was saying is the true Gospel of Jesus Christ, which is Yahweh came down to earth from Heaven in a human body called Jesus to put His curse we deserve on Himself, is the only Way to salvation. Any other way will put God’s curse on you and you will end up in the lake of fire.

This specific religion Jesus talked about to John around 95 AD is in Revelation 20:4, and this religion will practice forced conversion. It always has and it always will. “And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus and because of the word of God…”

How do we get into the will of God?

Paul wrote, “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.” –Romans 12:2.

Jesus talked about the Kingdom in the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew 6:10, and He said the exact same word we have already defined that He used for Kingdom in Matthew 7:21.

Jesus was teaching His Disciples how to pray to the Father. He said, “Your kingdom come. Your will be done, On earth as it is in heaven.” –Matthew 6:10. This is how we get into the will of the Father, by Jesus working through us by the power of the Holy Spirit.

But, this is always a choice, we are out of the will of the Father if we practice Christianity to make someone else happy or if we practice Christianity out of fear of hell. We must practice Christianity out of love for Jesus.

Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” –John 14:15. That word love is agapáō, and it refers to a believer preferring to live through Christ, embracing His will, choosing His choices, and obeying them by the power of the Holy Spirit.

What this word love means to a believer is actively doing what the Lord prefers, living life the way God says to live life, with Him, by His power and direction, choosing to let Jesus work through us. That is what it means to be in God’s will.

Just believing in God and doing whatever a person wants to do is living life outside the will of God. Even if Jesus is working through us, but we are living life under our own will which goes against God’s will, that is called practicing lawlessness.

Some scholars have defined keeping His commandments this way, “The only part of God we will ever know is the part we obey.”

Jesus goes on to say starting in John 14:16, about Him praying to the Father and the Father sending the Holy Spirit. Jesus said they already know the Spirit of truth because He is already with them and will be in them.

Now, was Jesus talking about Himself here? The point is, if you want to know God, you must first love Him by preferring His Ways.

Becoming born again and having the Spirit of God live inside you is not the same thing as God baptizing you with the Holy Spirit and you receiving the power of God.

After Jesus rose from the dead, before He ascended back to the Father and before the Father poured out His Spirit in the upper room, Jesus told His disciples many things.

Acts 1:4-5, Gathering them together, He commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the Father had promised, “Which,” He said, “you heard of from Me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” 

On That Day.

Jesus said, “Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’“–Matthew 7:22.

What does Jesus mean, on that day?

We already know Jesus is talking about people entering or not entering the kingdom of heaven, and we have already defined two stages of the kingdom of heaven.

The first stage of people entering the kingdom of heaven is when we choose to let Jesus work through us by the power of the Holy Spirit, and the second stage is Jesus ruling earth during the Millennial Reign, and Him sharing His ruling power with us.

The first stage is how we live our lives while on earth and the second stage is our reward for how we lived our lives on earth. It is never too late to change how you live your life on earth.

The Millennial Reign is going to be awesome! We will live on earth for 1000 years in the same type of body Jesus received after His resurrection, our glorified bodies.

We will move at the speed of thought and we will be able to eat and walk through walls, just like Jesus did after He resurrected.

We don’t need to worry about the Antichrist and all that, we just need to worry about ourselves and control ourselves. All this stuff out in the world right now, all the evil out there, it is already defeated.

We are living in the time Jesus has already seen. Jesus is merely waiting for us to catch up to the time when He will catch us up so He can end time and we can really begin to live life.

All that is going on in Israel right now, all that is supposed to be happening, and the specific religion Jesus talked about in Revelation, that religion is going to keep fighting Israel until it leads to Armageddon and Jesus finally comes back and stops that war in Revelation 19. All of it is in the Bible already, we expect it all to happen.

God already told us in Joel 3:2, He told us that He is who causes Armageddon because they divided up His land, Israel, and they scattered His people among the nations. We expect a two state solution eventually.

God said, “I will gather all the nations And bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat. Then I will enter into judgment with them there On behalf of My people and My inheritance, Israel, Whom they have scattered among the nations; And they have divided up My land.”

The Millennial Reign starts in Revelation 20, where Satan is bound up in prison for the entire 1000 years while we rule and reign with Jesus without the influence of Satan or his demons on the earth.

We will be in our glorified bodies, but there will be regular humans also on the earth, that is who we will rule over. There are going to be people who survive the Tribulation and the Antichrist and they did not take the mark of the beast, but they were not martyred either, somehow they survived it all.

The curse will be lifted from the earth during the Millennial Reign and people will start to live a long time again, just like Adam lived a long time. All the animals will turn herbivores again and all of them will be nice to each other. Little kids will even play with poisonous snakes and nothing will happen to them.

But, Jesus said not everyone who claims to be a Christian will enter the Millennial Reign, the kingdom of heaven.

Those people will cry on that day the Millennial Reign starts. they will beg Jesus, saying they prophesied in His name, which means they were “prophets,” or at least they were people with an ear to hear God.

These people even cast out demons, so they were either believers acting under the power of the Holy Spirit or they were in ministry, or both.

These people even performed miracles under the power of the Holy Spirit, but something lacked in their lives.

Were these people merely religious? Were these people frauds? False teachers? False prophets? What were these people?

I never knew you.

When talking about these people, Jesus said He will say, “And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.’“ –Matthew 7:23.

Declare is the word homologéō, and it means Jesus will speak His conclusion to them, He will confess their sin, which is He never knew them.

Knew is the word ginōskō, and it is the same word Mary used in Luke 1:34, when she asked the angel Gabriel how she could be pregnant because she never knew a man. This word means to intimately know someone through personal experience.

So, Jesus never knew these people, He never had an intimate personal relationship with them. They may have gotten their education through religion only, but they were never filled with the Holy Spirit.

Perhaps God worked miracles through them to get other people saved but these people themselves were never saved. Maybe they never truly believed, but God glorified His Great Name Himself despite these people’s lack of faith. Maybe all of the above.

Jesus said He will say, “DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.’“ Here lies the answer, lawlessness.

What is Lawlessness?

Lawlessness is the Greek word anomía, and it means total disregard for God’s law, doing whatever you want to do apart from the will of God. Superimposing your will over the will of God.

Lawlessness means being wicked, doing what God calls evil, sinning, practicing sin instead of practicing holiness. It is, if God tells you to do something, either by the power of the Holy Spirit or through His written word and you choose to do whatever you want instead, that is being lawless, not having the Holy Spirit.

Jude wrote about these people:

But you, beloved, ought to remember the words that were spoken beforehand by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ, that they were saying to you, “In the last time there will be mockers, following after their own ungodly lusts.” These are the ones who cause divisions, worldly-minded, devoid of the Spirit. But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life. And have mercy on some, who are doubting; save others, snatching them out of the fire; and on some have mercy with fear, hating even the garment polluted by the flesh.