THE KINGDOM
LIFE HAS PURPOSE FOR BELIEVERS BECAUSE WE ARE LOVED BY GOD AND GIVEN RESPONSIBILITIES IN HIS KINGDOM
Jesus spoke of no topic more often than the Kingdom of Heaven -- what it is like, how one can enter it, and how one is to live in it. The terms Kingdom of God and Kingdom of Heaven are generally assumed to be interchangeable.
To begin to comprehend the reality of the Kingdom of God and man’s place in it, it is helpful to consider where the God of this kingdom “lives." The Bible teaches that God is omnipresent, which means he is present everywhere, in the universe, simultaneously. Paul, on Mars Hill told the Athenians, “God… is not far from each one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). It is from the space immediately around us that God watches, acts, and interacts with and in his creation.
The Bible does speak metaphorically of three heavens. The “first heaven” is the atmosphere and space around us where God, angels, and demons interact between each other and with people and nature. The “second heaven” is the sun, moon, stars and sky (the universe). The “third heaven” is where the dead in Christ live with God. Because we have traditionally confined God to the third heaven, we have mentally distanced him from an intimate involvement in the affairs of men and in our own personal lives in particular. Dallas Willard states, “The damage done to our practical faith in Christ and in his 'kingdom-at-hand,' by confusing heaven with a place in distant outer space, or even beyond space, is incalculable. Of course God is there too.” [1]
It is from this invisible kingdom around us, God through Christ rules the visible world in which we live. In particular, through the power of the Holy Spirit, he directs the affairs of each believer and the community of believers (the church). Christianity has traditionally put so much emphasis on the salvation of man, through Christ, that it has over looked a second, critically important reason for Christ’s life: To teach us more clearly than any Old Testament prophet had, what the invisible kingdom around us was like, how he planned to care for us in this life and in the next, and how we were to care for each other and his world in the meantime. That is the rest of the good news of the gospel!
Dallas Willard defines the Kingdom this way: “The Kingdom of Heaven is the range of God’s effective will – where what he wants done, is done."[2] Therefore, everything and everyone who obeys the will of God, whether by nature (as in the case of natural laws), or by choice (the free will of man regarding the moral laws), or by God’s influence (Pharaoh in Egypt) is under the authority of his kingdom. Even though God is sovereign over the entire universe, because of Satan and sin there are “pockets of resistance” or ignorance over which his rule is not yet complete, for reasons known only to him.
Not only does God have a kingdom, but he entrusts each believer with a “sub-kingdom”, or sphere of influence and responsibility, in his kingdom. In The Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren says, “Our time on earth, our energy, intelligence, opportunities, money and relationships are all gifts from God on loan to us. We are stewards of whatever God gives us, to be used for his glory, not ours. The first task God gave humans was to manage and take care of God’s 'stuff' on earth. That role has never been rescinded – it’s part of our purpose on earth today." [3]
Some believers are given great responsibilities, money, or influence “five talent Christians” (Matt. 25). Others are “one talent” Christians. It does not matter how many gifts we’ve been given, only what we do to bring God glory, with whatever gifts he has entrusted to us. In a very real sense, when we became part of the family of God, we joined the family business. The family business is to live out our lives on earth as Jesus instructed us, loving God and others more than anything else.
When I am obedient to the moral laws of God, the teachings of Jesus, and I'm using what he has given me for his glory, I bring the rule of God, or the will of God, to the piece of his kingdom he has entrusted to me. So when Jesus instructs us to pray, “May thy kingdom come”, we are not praying for it to come into existence. It has always been and will always be! Rather, we are praying for God's will to “be done on earth as it is in heaven”, in your life and my life as the redeemed of God on earth. So we have both individual responsibility and collective responsibility as the church, to fulfill our kingdom assignments. Lest we forget, Jesus reminds us time and time again that our sub-kingdoms are not something we rule over, but care for. Whenever and wherever this happens, the kingdom of God “comes”.
Having said that, the future Kingdom of Heaven, which Jesus also extensively described, will not be fully realized until Christ returns and establishes the future phase of his kingdom, personally ruling over everything. In the meantime, this life is a test, a trust, and a temporary assignment given to all believers. The good news of the kingdom which Jesus preached is that in spite of our rebelliousness, God loves us and sent his Son to die for us so that we can experience the truth and power of both his invisible and visible kingdom in our lifetime, even if it is only a shadow of the kingdom to come.
Acts 17:27, 28; Ps. 139:1-8; II Cor. 12:2; Eph. 4:10; Eph. 6:12; Mark 1:14; Mark 10:15; John 3:3, 5; Matt. 4:17; Matt. 5:19; Luke 17:20,21; Acts 1:3; Matt. 11:12; Col. 1:13; Daniel 4:17; Matt. 13:33; Matt. 13:23, 11, 12; Matt. 25:14-30; Luke 12:42-48; Gen. 1:28; Luke 11:20; Matt. 12:26, 28
- Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy, (New York: Harper San Francisco Publishers), p. 71.
- Willard, Divine Conspiracy, p. 25.
- Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Life (Grand Rapids: Zondervan).