Kingdom of God

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The kingdom of God is: God's rule over the nations and people of the earth.

The definition above and content that follows represents a Christian view roughly derived from a partial-preterist conservative Baptist perspective. The view may be observed to be accurate, unique and controversial.

The kingdom of God represents a well misunderstood area of Christianity. Obscurity of meaning has existed for many years due to the historical wrong applications of the phrase. These wrong meanings include: the kingdom is the Church, the kingdom is within the hearts of Christians, and the kingdom is heaven.

Contents

Quick Description

1.The Kingdom of God is the condition where God rules over the nations of the earth. 2.The throne is in the heavens --which essentially means that the authority and edicts come from God. 3.The territory consists of the nations of the earth.

Development and Details of the Concept of the Kingdom of God

1. God's rule over the earth -- We see this in the sense of "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." (Matt 6:10 ) Such concept relates to the will of a king being executed within his country (i.e. the king rules in accord with his will --if he wields power to do so).

Psalms 2 provides a description of God installing His king to the dismay of the rulers of the nations. In this sense we see the ability and intent of God to rule over the nations.


Christ is the king. And to extend the quote, to give an understanding of a concept spoken so as to reveal only part of the nature of Christ Jesus' plans, Christ Jesus says that [His] kingdom is not of this world [but yet the kingdom power rules over nations in the earth]. Jesus reveals that the kingdom throne,authority and power don't exist among mankind but rather with God.


So scripture quickly reveals Christ as the king, the throne being supernatural or in the heavens, and the domain as being in the earth.

Isaiah 9:6-7 again reveal that the governments shall rest upon His shoulders.


Hence the Kingdom of God consists of God's subjection of the rulers of the nations to His will. The nations or the rulers of the nations essentially become the subjects of the kingdom (especially in the sense of being unwilling subjects, whereas the people in general would probably enjoy the benefit of liberty).

2. God's will -- The will of God can be understood to include the growth of love, peace, justice, and liberty. Other concepts may be included but probably would be derived or related to the listed aspects.


i)Love -- love your neighbor as yourself -- Of course the concept of love incorporates the concepts of benevolence, friendship, kindness and giving. The summary of the Law of Moses narrows down to "love the Lord your God" and "love your neighbor as yourself. The law of love places an obligation upon all people. Showing love is simply the right way to live.

Then an additional scripture shows a specific requirement upon nations. Matt 25 provides the judgment of nations which shows that nations shall be judged on how they treat the brethren of Jesus, "inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brothers, you did it to Me." (Matt 25:37-40)


ii) Peace -- Christ Jesus came as the Prince of Peace (Isa 9:6) --

This can be understood to mean the kingly authority that promotes or brings peace. Indeed this declaration indicates that the Messiah would establish a plan toward world peace. Such plan of peace comes not by publications handed out to kings, presidents and dictators. Rather the peace seems to come by making it harder for tyrants to exercise arbitrary power. Such concepts come from a synthesis of many verses and can only be presented in an extended article.

iii) Justice -- Micah 6:8 "love justice, mercy and walk humbly with your Lord" The Law of Moses taught justice. The law emphasized morality, love and fairness. Justice contrasts with revenge, fear, control, coersion and bias.

iv) Liberty -- Gal 5:1 "It was for freedom that Christ set you free." Gal 5:1 expresses liberty as applied to the Christian yet liberty when combined with love represents a quality that only provides benefit to people in general.

The Israelites, in the time before they requested a king, enjoyed liberty with God as the king. The example of liberty influenced the writings of the forefathers of America. The lack of government meant the Israelites had a liberty, but the liberty only occurred because there were also judges appointed over Israelite tribes of each tribe's own family. So law was combined with benevolent judges --judges concerned over the welfare of the community and the man on trial.


3. The Trial Run of the Kingdom The Israelites at the time of the judges seemed to operate as a microcosm of the Kingdom of God. This was a kingdom with no subjects per se since the people were only subjected when they selected to have a king selected from among men.

God acted as king in determining the law and in leading in battle but not as a king who puts people into virtual slavery.

In the same way, the kingdom of God focuses on limiting the power of earth-based rulers rather than on managing and controlling people. Justice exists along with liberty. The people start to enjoy freedom in a manner as if the government both did not exist and was not needed.


4. Start of the Kingdom -- Consider the verses "Behold the Kingdom of God is in your midst" Luke 17:20-21 and "Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand" Matt 3:2 and "A stone cut without hands struck the feet" Dan 2:45

The kingdom had to start at a time surrounding the generation contemporary to Jesus' ministry. The Kingdom of God had to start out of the midst of the Roman Empire before her collapse. The kingdom seemed to have started in connection with the destruction of Jerusalem in 70AD. ("The kingdom shall be taken from you and given to another people." --This did not mean that the Israelites were losing their position as subjects, but rather they were losing their position to inherit the kingdom.)


5. Ever Increasing Kingdom -- " Of the increase of his government and of peace there shall be no end" Isa 9:7 The Parables of the Mysteries of the Kingdom in Matt 13 provide that the kingdom shall start small and unnoticed. Then the kingdom would grow until finally people see that the kingdom is here. People, and even Christians, have not noticed the existence of the Kingdom of God because of the small beginning of the kingdom and for lack of knowledge of the signs of the kingdom's existence.


6. The Manner of Rule -- First note that the Church does not have a role in the rulership of the kingdom of God --at least in the current phase -- the phase until God receives the kingdom from Christ Jesus.

The Mysteries of the Kingdom in Matt 13 show that a hidden element causes the growth of the kingdom. The parables seem to indicate that the hidden element essentially is the Word of God. For brevity, the Word of God is Jesus Himself and His influence of the people in the world to desire liberty. This influence in part comes from the Christian scriptures inspiring writers and philosophers to investigate concepts of liberty. John Locke would seem to be one of the more obvious writers so influenced. As more and more people throughout the world get a desire for liberty, the rulers of the world find increased difficulty to rule tyrannically. So, the manner of rule consists of the ever increasing power or influence of the people resulting in the moderation of the power of rulers. The rule comes through an indirect path from God upon the rulers of the nations. If God's will is being followed, then the kingdom of God exists in the same proportion.


Summary

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Review of Concept The Kingdom of God differs in design from any earth-based kingdom hence our concepts derived from our knowledge of earth-based kingdoms must be stretched and extropolated to gain a perspective of this new kind of kingdom. Also, Jesus Christ saw fit to present the description of the kingdom through parables that delayed the understanding of the nature of the kingdom to those who could decipher the meaning (almost like a time-release capsule). Hence we could expect to have difficulty in understanding and explaining the details of the kingdom.
Note again that neither the Church (the believers in totale) nor any church organization has any specified role in bringing about the kingdom of God. The only participation is to ask "Thy Kingdom come." Matthew 6:10


List of Standard Features of a Kingdom


1)Ruler: Christ Jesus Dan 7:13-14

2)Domain: the earth. all peoples, all nations, all languages Dan 7:13-14

3)Objectives: peace, love, justice, liberty

4)Subjects: the rulers of the nations Ps 2

5)Method of subjection: freedom planted in the hearts of more and more people. The rulers are subject to the limits caused by people who will not accept tyranny.

6)Year of Origination: 70AD (approx) Dan 2:44 (those kings, in the textual context, involved the empires of Babylon, Mede-Persia,Greece,Rome)


Additional Analysis of Kingdom of God


Related Topics

-Mikewhitney 16:29, 12 Jan 2006 (EST)

Required Attribution

Kingdom of God: A Short Summary by Mike Whitney, a California Citizen http://www.BibleReexamined.com Copyright(c)2006,2008. Usage permitted in accord with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License.

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