Jurisdiction

What is Jurisdiction?  It is latin and comes from two words “Juris” and “Diction”

The definition of JURIS [Latin, Of right; of law.]

And DICTION, noun [Latin , to speak.] Expression of ideas by words; style; manner of expression.

I will be using the Young’s Literal Translation of the Bible for the following verses to demonstrate what it means to have Jurisdiction.

Luke 12:29-32 (YLT)

²⁹ `And ye -- seek not what ye may eat, or what ye may drink, and be not in suspense,

³⁰ for all these things do the nations of the world seek after, and your Father hath known that ye have need of these things;

³¹ but, seek ye the reign of God, and all these things shall be added to you.

³² `Fear not, little flock, because your Father did delight to give you the reign;

This gives a totally different understanding of what Jesus died to give us, He didn’t just give us a place to go and live eternally when we die, He gave us the right to reign in Him here and now.  Verses 29-31 are all written in the present tense, not the future tense.  Our (Juris-Diction) or right to speak is based solely on the fact of Christ’s provision for us as provided by His sacrifice on the cross.  Jesus gave us the right to stand before Father, standing in His righteousness, and declare that our desire is the right to claim our reign as Sons and Daughters of the King of Glory and receive that gracious gift. 

So if Jurisdiction is a matter of law, then we also must recognize that Jesus fulfilled all the requirements of the law, and made a public spectacle of the law and its defeat over Him.  It is through that fulfillment of the Law that we stand in Jesus’ right to reign, we reign in Him and enjoin in His victory which now becomes our victory over the law.

1 John 4:4-6 (YLT)

⁴ Ye ― of God ye are, little children, and ye have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you, than he who is in the world.

⁵ They ― of the world they are; because of this from the world they speak, and the world doth hear them;

⁶ we ― of God we are; he who is knowing God doth hear us; he who is not of God, doth not hear us; from this we know the spirit of the truth, and the spirit of the error.

(This type of old world speaking reminds me of Yoda the Jedi master in Star Wars.)

There are some that have taken the gospel of reigning in Christ a bit too far, believing that we should exercise our right to reign over others, this is not the case.  We must reign first over our own minds and bodies and then over our physical circumstances.  Jesus paid the price for each man and woman to reign and to be free from the power or right of sin and death to speak into and to have control over our lives.  We overcome the world by reigning in and because of Christ!

The right to reign is provisional, we cannot add to it, or take away from it, it is a free gift.  We reign as Kings and Priests over our own minds and bodies as well as our own affairs as we recognize that we are also a servant to others just as Jesus is.  Jesus is the perfect example of a servant King.  He never used His power, position or rule to lord it over anyone else, instead He used His reign to demonstrate the love of God and allowed that to characterize His life and how He interacted with others.  This provisional reign is grounded in the understanding that Jesus is coming back to receive His Kingdom (His reign) from us who have learned to reign and serve in and through Him.

 Revelation 5:9-10 (YLT)

⁹ and they sing a new song, saying, `Worthy art thou to take the scroll, and to open the seals of it, because thou wast slain, and didst redeem us to God in thy blood, out of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation,

¹⁰ and didst make us to our God kings and priests, and we shall reign upon the earth.'

We have an amazing right which was given to us by the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus, the right to declare or speak our reign over sin, death, sickness, or anything which opposes the freedom and the love of God has for us and others.  That is Jurisdiction.  We can extend that reign into areas of darkness around us and declare what is right and true with great confidence.  It may not always be well received, but it does set up a standard or stronghold by which our enemy (Satan) cannot cross.

So what does this realistically look like?  How do we practically exercise our reign in Jesus?  The book of Jude addresses this matter very well

Jude 1:20-21 (NKJV)

²⁰ But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, ²¹ keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.

Jude addresses the matter of building yourself up by ‘praying in the Holy Spirit and keeping ourselves in the love of God.’  Readdressing the matter of praying in the Holy Spirit from a previous post, we must remain vigilant like Paul who said in 1 Corinthians 14:

1 Corinthians 14:5 (YLT)

⁵ and I wish you all to speak with tongues, and more that ye may prophecy, for greater is he who is prophesying than he who is speaking with tongues, except one may interpret, that the assembly may receive edification.

And

1 Corinthians 14:18-19 (NKJV)

¹⁸ I thank my God I speak with tongues more than you all; ¹⁹ yet in the church I would rather speak five words with my understanding, that I may teach others also, than ten thousand words in a tongue.

Praying in the Holy Spirit is a weighty matter, it is what fills us and prepares us spiritually for what God has for us to do.  We can then stand in the legitimate jurisdiction or right standing of reigning in Christ and taking hold of all that has been afforded to us by His suffering and proclaim our present victories that have been won at the cross.

Romans 8:16-17 (NKJV)

¹⁶ The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, ¹⁷ and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.

Please realize here that this is not a ‘name it and claim it gospel’ I am preaching here, but a gospel which requires our participation by our surrender to the authority and mastery of Jesus Christ, and our willingness to be clothed in His righteousness.  Like Jude said in verse 20, building ourselves up and praying in the spirit is an action, these are not nouns, but verbs.   We actively pray in the Holy Spirit to build ourselves up so that we know for a surety that we are God’s children, and that we are indeed inheritors of the promises.

Jurisdiction in our case is the right to speak over anything that is contrary to the purposes of God, and to declare the power and might of our Savior who defeated hell and death, and brought us life and victory.  This is the truth in which we reign!



Jesus is our Bridegroom preparing us as His bride to reign in Him, and when He returns we will joyously give him our crowns and be right by His side amid all of the chaos and confusion of this world.  
It truly is a divine romance! ☺

Jude 1:24-25 (NKJV)

²⁴ Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling,

And to present you faultless

Before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy,

²⁵ To God our Savior,

Who alone is wise,

Be glory and majesty,

Dominion and power,

Both now and forever.

Amen.

Stephen Barnett
God is good all the time―all the time God is good!

Divine Romance

Words and Music by Phil Wickham

The fullness of Your grace is here with me

The richness of Your beauty's all I see

The brightness of Your glory has arrived

In Your presence God, I'm completely satisfied

     Chorus:

For You I sing I dance

Rejoice in this divine romance

Lift my heart and my hands

To show my love, to show my love

A deep deep flood, an Ocean flows from You

Of deep deep love, yeah it's filling up the room

Your innocent blood, has washed my guilty life

In Your presence God I'm completely satisfied

     Chorus (Repeats)

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The lyrics displayed here are copyrighted by the respective artist(s) and are demonstrated for educational purposes only and not for profit.