Is the Church the Kingdom of God?
Is the Kingdom merely an emotional feeling inside your heart?
Here is the Bible answer — God's answer — made plain!
PERHAPS no subject excites more curiosity — and creates more confusion than that of the "Kingdom of God."
Many differing ideas have been taught concerning God's kingdom. Here is an example:
"By Christians everywhere working together to bring peace, tolerance, and brotherly love, the kingdom of God may at last be established in the hearts of all mankind." Have you heard this kind of talk?
Probably you have, because these vague, spiritual-sounding ideas about the kingdom of God are widespread.
Is the kingdom of God something you can really understand? Or must it remain buried in a mire of nebulous, spiritual-sounding phraseology, or couched in vague, hazy theories about physical empires or churches?
How can you KNOW what it is?
Jude exhorts everyone who earnestly desires the real, plain truth that, "It was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that you should earnestly contend for the faith which was ONCE DELIVERED UNTO THE SAINTS" (Jude 3).
The kingdom of God cannot be understood by laboratory tests, nor through the physical sciences! Neither can it be understood by reading the writings of men about the Bible, or listening to the vague ideas of mere men!
WHAT ABOUT IT? Do you really know what the BIBLE says about the kingdom of God, or have you, like thousands of others, just taken for granted what is taught today? Most of you have been hearing a vague, sentimental gospel which DENIES the message Jesus Christ brought from the Father about a soon-coming world-ruling kingdom — the kingdom of God!
Let's begin getting back to the faith ONCE delivered! Let's search the Scriptures and PROVE all things!
What Is a Kingdom?
The same people who just glibly accept nebulous ideas about the actual kingdom of God all know what is meant when one speaks of, for example, "the United Kingdom." We immediately visualize Great Britain — a literal, actual government of one of this world's great nations. Is Great Britain REAL? Is it something that is just "set up in your heart," or some hazy, unrealistic "spiritual" term?
OF COURSE NOT!
And neither is the kingdom — THE GOVERNMENT — of God a hazy, unrealistic spiritual term!
Primarily, any kingdom is a GOVERNMENT — a nation and the government which rules it. And especially in this Biblical sense, there is the DUAL meaning of the nation, or that which is governed — the citizens or subjects — and the GOVERNMENT by which the citizens are ruled! Often, in the Bible usage, a Kingdom is a family from a single parent grown into a NATION.
Four things are necessary to constitute a KINGDOM: 1) the territory, with its specific location and definite boundary lines, of 2) a KING or supreme ruler or governing agent, ruling over 3) SUBJECTS or citizens within that territorial jurisdiction, with 4) LAWS and a form of GOVERNMENT. If we leave out any of these vital requisites, we do not have, and cannot believe, the true gospel for this time!
The Territory of the Kingdom
Let's go through the subject step by step, point by point, proving the truth from the Bible, and not carelessly assuming what seems to be acceptable.
Any kingdom, as has already been explained, must occupy a certain given TERRITORY. It must govern its subjects within a marked boundary which constitutes the limits of that kingdom.
Many try to "spiritualize away" the real meaning of the kingdom of God — in spite of the gripping fact of the chaotic times in which we live, and of the prophesied doom of this present world by God's intervention in human affairs! The "kingdom of God" is used as a sort of catch-all phrase to define the state of idealism which men hope to attain some day through their OWN efforts. Many believe that the churches will someday "evangelize" the entire world, or will unite into a common group — and this, they feel, would become the "kingdom of God."
ALL OF THESE CONCEPTIONS DEPEND UPON MAN'S INGENUITY!
Luke writes: "The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached"(Luke 16:16). The Gospel Christ brought as a messenger from God the Father was the message of the coming KINGDOM (government — rule) of God! (John 14:24)
WHERE did Christ say this kingdom would be?
Jesus likened himself to a certain nobleman who went into a far country to RECEIVE for himself a kingdom and to return (Luke 19:12). He very plainly told His disciples He would COME AGAIN, ". . that where I am, there ye may be also" (John 14:3). Where is Christ going to be? Notice Acts 1:10-11. The angels said to the disciples, "Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven."
Jesus Christ is going to return — LITERALLY — TO THIS EARTH!
The Prophet Daniel writes of the stone (Christ) which was cut out without hands, and smote the image (which represents the four successive world-dominating kingdoms down through history) upon the feet. The feet were representing the last world-ruling kingdom to exist, at which time Jesus Christ is to RETURN to this earth! ". . . and the stone that smote the image became a great MOUNTAIN, and filled the whole earth"! (Dan. 2:35)
God speaks of a kingdom as a MOUNTAIN in the Bible. Notice Micah 4:1.
God's kingdom, God's NATION, will finally fill the whole earth! This stands proved — your Bible says so!
Christ's Return to Earth
When Jesus Christ comes to this earth, He will bring His reward with Him (Rev. 22:12), and will render to every man according to his works! Many cite I Thes. 4:16-17 to infer the elect shall return to heaven with Christ. Notice, "For the Lord himself shall DESCEND {come down) FROM heaven . . . and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them . . ." WHERE? Into heaven? No! NOTICE: " . . . in the clouds, to meet the Lord IN THE AIR: and so shall we ever be with the Lord." He is coming with CLOUDS (Rev. 1:7). Clouds, the AIR, are physical earthly compositions of certain gases and vapors. They are a PART of this earth's atmosphere!
The Bible tells us what takes place immediately after Christ gathers His elect, "And his feet shall stand IN THAT DAY upon the mount of Olives . . ." (Zech. 14:4).
If a friend of yours is coming to your home, and you go out to MEET that person, wouldn't it be STRANGE if you were to then accompany that friend back where he came from? Of course it would! When you go to MEET someone, you accompany him back to his destination — your home! The elect will MEET Christ in the AIR (this earth's atmosphere) and then accompany Him To the Mount of Olives!
Is that not enough proof? Notice Rev. 20:4, "and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. . . ." Wherever Christ is — there are the saints also, living and reigning, GOVERNING, with Christ for a thousand years! "And we shall reign ON THE EARTH" (Rev. 5:10).
"But in the LAST DAYS it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the house of the Lord [Eternal] shall be established in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall flow unto it.
"And many nations shall come, and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, and to the house of the God of Jacob . . . And the Lord [Eternal] shall reign OVER them, IN MOUNT ZION from henceforth, even forever" (Micah 4:1-2, 7).
God's kingdom is going to be set up, LITERALLY, on this earth! Jesus Christ is going to return, LITERALLY, to this earth!
This EARTH IS the TERRITORY that will be occupied by the kingdom of God!
Its King or Supreme Ruler
At Christ's return, He will come as KING OF KINGS, and Lord of Lords, to put down the stiff-necked rebellion of sinning mankind who want their own way (Rev. 19:16). Christ said to His disciples, ". . . ALL POWER is given unto me in heaven and in earth" (Matt. 28:18). Christ came to this earth to QUALIFY as its future ruler, to DEPOSE Satan the Devil by withstanding him in the greatest contest ever fought! Notice Matt. 4:1-11. Jesus had fasted forty days and forty nights, and Satan played on His emotions, on His human nature. Christ WON that great battle! He said:"GET THEE HENCE, SATAN!" Christ was the One in command, He was the One in authority — and the devil OBEYED that authority!
Jesus, by crying out to God constantly, with tears, was able to resist the human nature, the desire of the flesh (Heb. 5:7). He was tempted in EVERY POINT like as we are, yet without sin! (Heb. 4:15)
By living a life of PERFECTION, without sin, Christ condemned sin in the flesh (Rom. 8:3) and disqualified Satan, the author of sin, or lawbreaking (John 8:44). Christ revealed Satan as the god Of THIS WORLD (II Cor. 4:4) who actually has a kingdom! (Matt. 12:26) Satan is the present ruler of this world, soon to be removed at the literal return of Christ.
Christ triumphed in the great day-to-day BATTLE He fought to become your Savior and mine! He qualified to become the very One to RULE this earth. HE will be the KING of God's coming kingdom (Zech. 14:9).