The Messianic Kingdom in the Gospels
The kingdom of God
is a crucial topic in the Scriptures. The phrase “kingdom of God” is used only
eight times in the book of Acts—at the beginning several times and then at the very
end where we are reminded that as the church grew they continued to teach the
doctrines related to the kingdom of God. We have to understand what this really
means because it looks in some of these passages as if what is being talked
about is something that came when Jesus came and is somehow operational now. It
looks that way but it is not that way. Because it looks that way there are
those who believe that we are in some form of the kingdom now or in a different
kind of kingdom than what Jesus originally offered, or we are in some sort of
spiritual kingdom, and the implications of taking those views, how they work
themselves out in terms of how people approach social problems, political
problems, church problems or even the spiritual life are dramatic. But a lot of
this comes back to understanding the kingdom of God.
There is an expectation among
the Jewish people that increases through the second and first centuries BC. By the time
of the period around the birth of Jesus, according to Josephus and others,
there was this expectation that the Messiah was coming. This was probably
fueled by the prophecies of Daniel chapter nine and Daniel’s seventieth week.
They understood the countdown from their return to the land after the decree
from Artaxerxes to Nehemiah and so there was an expectation that something was
going to happen. This is what the Magi who were Parthian king makers were
expecting. They were descendants of Magi at the time of Daniel and they
understood the coming of the Messiah. That is why they were watching for Him
when Jesus was born. There was all of this Old Testament expectation of the
kingdom and at the time of John the Baptist and the time of Jesus there was
this developing expectation of the approaching time of the Messiah.
We get something like that
today. Every few years we have somebody who says Jesus is coming back and gives
us a date (which they always get wrong). We live in an age of expectation. We
look out at things that are happening on the international scene, things in terms
of technology and growth of knowledge, and the greatest of all signs that Israel is back in the land. They are there waiting for
something—looking for peace and there is no peace. Isaiah 11:11 says that God would bring them back from all the
nations of the earth a second time. That return is what occurs just before the
kingdom is established, so if that is the second return what is the first
return? The first return has to be viewed as what we have seen since the first
return in the 1880s, the first mass immigration of Jews back to the Holy Land,
because for the Tribulation period to begin there has to be a nation in the
land, a nation that will enter into a peace treaty with this person called the
Antichrist. So the fact that there is a nation Israel there now is prophetically significant. Does that
mean Jesus is coming back next week, next year, next decade? No, it just means
that God has once again brought together a set of circumstances that make it
seem as if things are close. They look that way from the human perspective, and
they may be.
The expectation in the first century BC revolved
around the fact that the Jews had this expectation of a kingdom and that the
Messiah was going to come and give them this kingdom. Their understanding of
this had been distorted so that they though the Messiah was going to come and
give them political victory over Rome. They failed to understand that there were two
different aspects that the Old Testament taught about the Messiah. One was that
He would come and suffer, that He would be rejected (Isaiah 53), and other
passages that taught that He would come and rule victoriously. They focused on
the kingdom passages and interpreted them in a literal manner, but they failed
to be consistent and did not interpret the suffering passages in a literal
manner. So when John the Baptist and then Jesus showed up they had a message.
They didn’t explain it, they just said the kingdom of God
is at hand (near). They didn’t have to explain that because everybody knew what
they were talking about: this literal kingdom that would be led by the
descendant of David, ruling from David’s throne in Jerusalem, that there would be this new glorious temple, and
that all of the nations would be under their political dominion.
When we get into the New
Testament it is interesting to see how this phrase “kingdom” was utilized in
the Gospels. Not all of these relate to the kingdom of God,
the term is used a few other ways in other contexts; but for the most part they
relate to the kingdom. Notice the proportion. Matthew uses the word “kingdom”
55 times in 53 verses; Mark uses the word 20 times in 18 verses; Luke uses the
term 46 times in 44 verses; John only uses the term five times in three verses;
Acts uses it eight times in eight verses but it is critical to understand Acts
because the book is bracketed with references at the beginning and at the end.
Paul uses it 14 times in 14 verses; all but two are clearly in the future. The
remainder of the writers—James, Peter, 1 John, 2 John, Jude—only use the word
“kingdom” five times. Revelation uses it 9 times in 9 verses, a couple of times
to refer to the kingdom of the beast but mostly related to the kingdoms of man
and the coming of the Son of Man to establish His kingdom. Obviously there is a
huge emphasis in the Gospels. We have to remember that Matthew, Mark and Luke
are very similar, almost synonymous which is why they are called the synoptic
Gospels. John is very different. Why would Matthew, Mark and Luke talk about
the kingdom so much and John say almost nothing? When did John write the Gospel
of John? Very late, after the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70 when the offer of the kingdom was no longer at the
forefront. The Synoptics were all written before the fall of Jerusalem and so
there is an emphasis there on that message that John the Baptist, Jesus and the
disciples had offering the kingdom to Israel.
What
do we see in the Gospels? We see that the kingdom is announced by angels. In
Luke chapter one there is the announcement to Zacharias, the father of John the
Baptist, that his wife Elizabeth, who is barren, is going to have a baby. Then
the second part of the chapter is the announcement to Mary that she is going to
have a baby, and that her baby is going to be like no other baby that has ever
come into human history. Luke 1:16 NASB “Luke 1:16 “And he will turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God. [17] It is he
who will go {as a forerunner} before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, TO
TURN THE HEARTS OF THE FATHERS BACK TO THE CHILDREN, and the disobedient to the attitude of
the righteous, so as to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” This is a
quote from Malachi 4:5, 6 NASB “Behold, I am going to send you
Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the LORD. He will restore the hearts of the
fathers to {their} children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so
that I will not come and smite the land with a curse.” When the angel quotes
these verses to John’s father, Zacharias, he understands what that means: that
this is talking about his Old Testament predecessor who will announce the
Messiah. So it is clearly related to the coming of the kingdom. There has to be
Elijah to announce the King and then the Kings comes with the great and dreadful
day of the Lord, and then the kingdom comes. So there is an announcement by
angels to Zacharias and to Mary.
Luke 1:30-33
NASB “The angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have
found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a
son, and you shall name Him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son
of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father
David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will
have no end.” So He is going to be the King; He is the expected Davidic King.
So the angels announce to Zacharias and to Mary that their children, John and
Jesus, will be directly related to this kingdom.
This kingdom
is anticipated by the Magi. Remember that Matthew is the Gospel written to the
Jewish people to explain that Jesus is the Messiah.
Matt 2:1, 2 NASB
“Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king,
magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, Where is He who has been born
King of the Jews? For we saw His star in the east and have come to worship
Him.” They were looking for a king. Herod doesn’t say: It’s me. All of a sudden
he realizes who they are looking for. There is a messianic expectation. Even
pagan wicked, paranoid Herod understood that they were looking for this
messianic king, they weren’t looking for him, and he is scared to death.
Earlier in Herod’s reign he had been run out of Judea by a Parthian invasion. Now these
Parthian king makers were coming and were looking for a king, and it is not
him. His paranoia is really going nuts here. [4] “Gathering together all the
chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah
was to be born. [5] “They said to him, “In Bethlehem of Judea; for this is what
has been written by the prophet: [6] ‘AND YOU, BETHLEHEM, LAND OF JUDAH, ARE BY
NO MEANS LEAST AMONG THE LEADERS OF JUDAH; FOR OUT OF YOU SHALL COME FORTH A
RULER WHO WILL SHEPHERD MY PEOPLE ISRAEL.’” So when Herod finds out he is going to send his troops down
there to slaughter all of the babies. They understood that the Bible was
supposed to be interpreted literally.
Then when
Jesus and John the Baptist grow up John comes out and is making proclamation in
the wilderness of Judea, what is his message? Matthew 3:2 NASB
“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” It is this kingdom that is
announced by John the Baptist and then it is proclaimed by the Lord Himself.
They use the same word [“at hand”], engizo
[e)ggizw]—“is near” is a verb. Matthew 4:17 NASB “From that time Jesus
began to preach and say, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.’”
Jesus’ message wasn’t new, it was the same as John’s. Matthew 4:23 NASB “Jesus was going
throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and
proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom…” “Gospel” just means good news, and the
good news was that the kingdom was at hand. We have to understand what “at hand
means.” This word engizo is an
important one for us to understand and to recognize. It is a Greek word that
means something is either near in time or near in space. According to the New
International Dictionary of New Testament Theology it means something is
approaching. Arndt and Gingrich say the same thing but add that it means
something is growing closer to a reference point. That reference point is the
establishment of the kingdom.
The kingdom
message was something that Jesus also gave to the twelve apostles. Matthew
10:5, 6 NASB “These twelve Jesus sent out after instructing them:
‘Do not go in {the} way of {the} Gentiles, and do not enter {any} city of the
Samaritans; but rather go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.’” He didn’t send them to the Gentiles;
He just sent them to the house of Israel because that is the group to whom the
kingdom in the Old Testament was promised. Another thing we should notice is
that this verbiage comes right out of the Old Testament.
engizo was
used in the LXX and several times it is used in Isaiah to talk about the fact
God’s coming was near in terms of the kingdom. Isaiah 56:1 NASB
“Thus says the LORD, ‘Preserve
justice and do righteousness, For My salvation is about to come [engizo] And My righteousness to be revealed.’” So this word had a
significance within the interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures; they knew that
the kingdom was coming, near, approaching. Jesus and John use the same
terminology right out of the Old Testament.
Later Jesus
sent out seventy of His disciples, Luke 10:1-9, only to the house of Israel and the house of Judah, and they were to heal. That was one of
the signs that the kingdom was here. There would be healing, the blind would
see, the lame would walk. When Jesus came and performed these miracles it
wasn’t because He was just a good person. He was selectively performing these miracles
as His credentials to show that He was the Messiah.
Luke 17:20 NASB
“Now having been questioned by the Pharisees as to when the kingdom of God was
coming, He answered them and said, ‘The kingdom of God is not coming with signs
to be observed; [21] nor will they say, ‘Look, here {it is!}’ or, ‘There {it
is!}’ For behold, the kingdom of God is in your midst.’” Again we have a confrontation set up with the
Pharisees. About twelve different times in the Gospel of Luke the Pharisees
come up and start questioning Jesus. They are trying to create tension; they
are just causing trouble because Jesus doesn’t agree with their interpretation.
They want a kingdom on their terms and Jesus is saying He is giving them the
kingdom God promised. The modern psycho-babble interpretation of “the kingdom of God is in your midst” is that the kingdom of God is in everybody. Every body has this
little divine light. Genesis 1:26 and 27 doesn’t say God put a spark of
divinity in anybody, it says He created us to represent Him to be in His image
and likeness. That is not the same thing; you can’t read a spark of divinity
into that. What Jesus is saying here is not that the kingdom of God is “in you.” First of all, let’s just
think about the context. To whom is Jesus talking? He’s talking to the
Pharisees. Do they have a warm fuzzy relationship or do they have animosity? It
is animosity. Jesus is not going to look at His opposition and say, the kingdom of God is in you. He never said that to His
disciples, and they were the good guys.
We have to
understand what Jesus meant when He said “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed.”
What He meant by that is that He is talking to them in terms of what is going
on in their culture. They are looking for the kingdom. And they are looking for
the signs of the times. The Pharisees are looking for signs and they keep
asking Jesus for signs. Jesus is saying the kingdom is not going to come by
observing signs. That is not the issue. They are looking for signs and ignoring
who they are talking to, the one the signs would point to. What Jesus is saying
here is that the kingdom is not going to come by looking at all these different
signs.
“For behold,
the kingdom of God is in you/in your midst.” The Greek word
is entos [e)ntoj] can mean within something but it also
has the idea of among you. And it is important that the “you” there isn’t
singular. Jesus is talking to “you all”—second person plural pronoun. He is
saying the kingdom of God is something related to all of them. So what He is saying here is
that the kingdom of God is “in your midst,” or as some think that it has the
idea of being “before you” such as in Isaiah 45:14 where there is a similar use
of the Greek terminology. It can’t mean that Jesus is inside them because
nowhere else is the kingdom viewed as some internal principle in the Scripture.
What Jesus is saying in Luke 17:21 is that the kingdom of God is in your midst, it is being offered to
you. The kingdom of God is before you because the King is in your presence.
Luke 11:20 NASB “But if I cast out demons
by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.” Here again there is a
conflict with the Pharisees. Jesus has cast out a demon and they are saying He didn’t
do it in the power of God, but that He did it by being empowered by Satan. This
is that climactic event when the Pharisees accused Him of really being the tool
and pawn of Satan and that He isn’t the Messiah. This is the climax of the
offer of the kingdom and after this it is not offered anymore. “…then the kingdom of God has come upon you.” This uses the Greek
word which means to be close at hand or has arrived. And it has arrived in
terms of the presence of the King.
Luke 11:2-23
NASB “When a strong {man,} fully armed, guards his own house, his
possessions are undisturbed. But when someone stronger than he attacks him and
overpowers him, he takes away from him all his armor on which he had relied and
distributes his plunder. He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does
not gather with Me, scatters.” What Jesus is pointing out here is that when Israel is merely relying upon a strong man then
that strength is incapable of providing the protection that only God can
provide, and they will be despoiled if they do not accept Jesus as the Messiah.
All of that
is background. Jesus died, was buried, and rose from the dead. What is the
first question we really see the apostles start to ask? Acts 1:6 NASB
“So when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, ‘Lord, is it at
this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?’” It is the same kingdom. Then in Acts
chapter two Peter starts to talk about the events that immediately precede the
coming of the kingdom, which is the Joel 2:28-30 passage which talks about the
day of the Lord. He quotes from Joel 2 and says, “This is like what Joel said,”
and then he connects these ideas together in his message to the Jewish people
on the day of Pentecost. Now the issue is whether the Jews will accept the
offer of the kingdom and the command, then, in 2:38 was to repent. There will be a much more
overt offer of the kingdom in Peter’s next message in Acts chapter three.
When we get
to the New Testament the point is that the kingdom is coming, it is future, it
hasn’t been established. What God is doing in this age is calling out people
from among the Jews and the Gentiles to be the citizens of the kingdom that He
establishes in the future. So what we see in the Gospels in terms of this offer
of the kingdom and its rejection is that this is now taking us forward in time.
Right now God is calling out a people that will be the aristocracy that will
rule in the kingdom, and so the kingdom is not now existing on the earth, but
only in the sense that God is selecting and preparing a people that are going
to be the spiritual nucleus and leadership of the established kingdom when that
comes. That is the mystery right now, it was not anticipated in the Old
Testament that there would be this delay of the kingdom.
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