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Scripture Reading: Matt. 3:1-2; 4:17; 10:1, 7; Luke 10:1, 9, 11; 4:43; Matt. 24:14; Luke 17:20-21; John 3:3, 5; Mark 4:26-29; Acts 1:3; 8:12; 19:8; 20:25; 28:23, 30-31; Rom. 14:17; 1 Cor. 4:17, 20; 6:9-10; Gal. 5:21; Eph. 5:5; 2 Pet. 1:3, 11; Rev. 1:9
The Father’s plan, the Son’s redemption, and the Spirit’s application produce the believers, who are the components of the church. In Matthew 16:18-19 the Lord Jesus told Peter, “Upon this rock I will build My church, and...I will give to you the keys of the kingdom of the heavens” to open the doors of the kingdom. Peter used one key on the day of Pentecost to open the gate for the Jewish believers to enter the kingdom of the heavens (Acts 2:38-42); he used the other in the house of Cornelius to open the gate for the Gentile believers to enter the kingdom (10:34-48). In Matthew 16:18-19 these two terms, the church and the kingdom, are interchangeable. Where there is the church, surely there is the kingdom. If there is the kingdom, surely there is the church.
Since the kingdom is one of the most complicated subjects in the Bible, the chart on the following page will be a great help to our understanding. The first and last circles of the chart are colored golden yellow. Gold signifies God or what is divine. These two circles represent eternity past and eternity future. In between these two circles are four circles in time. Time is a bridge between the two ends of eternity. The bridge of time covers four dispensations: the dispensation before law, the dispensation of law from Moses to Christ, the dispensation of grace, and finally the dispensation of the kingdom. These dispensations bridge the two ends of eternity.
The circles entitled “The Dispensation before Law” and “The Dispensation of Law” are colored brown, signifying something earthly. The dispensation before law refers to the patriarchs and lasts from Adam to Moses. The dispensation of law refers to the Israelites, lasting from Moses to Christ. (Please notice the columns at the bottom of the chart with the verse references and explanations.) From Christ’s first coming to His second coming is the dispensation of grace. Then the Lord Jesus will return to set up His kingdom on this earth; this will be the kingdom of a thousand years, the millennium, the dispensation of the kingdom. The circles entitled “The Dispensation of Grace” and “The Dispensation of the Kingdom” are colored blue, signifying the kingdom of the heavens. Heaven is always signified by the color blue.
The last circle is colored golden yellow, but it is quite different from the golden yellow circle of eternity past. In eternity future is the New Jerusalem, which is a composition of all the saints from all the preceding dispensations. Some will be from the patriarchs, some from the Israelites, some from the church, and some also from the millennium. All the saints from these four dispensations will be gathered together as the ultimate consummation, the New Jerusalem. Around the New Jerusalem will be the purged nations as the peoples of the new heaven and the new earth.
The first blue circle of the chart is the church, which is composed of the real Christians. Within this blue circle is a broken circle also in blue. This circle signifies the overcoming believers, who are among the churches and belong to the churches. As Christians, our color is blue. We are heavenly. We are on earth, yet we are heavenly. An American, for example, may be in South Africa, but he is still an American. He is an American in South Africa. Today we are here on earth, but we are not an earthly people. We are the heavenly people.
God has chosen and regenerated millions of people, but not all will go along with God. These become the defeated believers. Some who have been regenerated do cooperate with God. These become the overcoming believers. Among the believers, then, there are two categories, the overcoming and the defeated. Much of the dispute concerning the rapture is due to the missing of this point. The overcoming believers will participate in the enjoyment of the millennial kingdom, but the defeated ones will miss the mark.
In 1 Corinthians 5:1-5 the apostle Paul deals with a brother who is involved in fornication with his father’s wife. This situation forced the apostle “to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord” (v. 5). His spirit, Paul says, will still be saved. Such a sinful person nonetheless was still a brother, chosen by God and regenerated. Paul commits such a one to Satan to be chastised, yet this person’s spirit will still be saved. When the Lord Jesus comes back to set up the kingdom, could such a defeated believer be a king along with the apostle Paul? It is not logical to believe so. Nevertheless, his spirit will be saved. This case shows that there is a real difference between the overcoming believers and the defeated ones.
Outside the blue circle of the church are two dotted black circles. The first one indicates the appearance of the kingdom of the heavens. We call this appearance Christendom. There are genuine Christians and false ones. Among the real Christians are the overcoming ones and the defeated ones. The real and the nominal Christians make up what is termed Christendom. There is a difference between Christendom and the church as the Body of Christ. The Body of Christ as the genuine church comprises only the true believers. The nominal, false believers are not members of Christ’s Body. They are in Christendom, but they are not in the church.
The second dotted black circle, underneath “The Appearance of the Kingdom of the Heavens,” signifies the world, the nations. Among the nations is Christendom, composed of the real and false believers. The genuine Christians are the real members of the Body of Christ, which is the church. Among these genuine Christians there are the overcoming ones and the defeated ones. Among the nations is Christendom. Within Christendom is the church, a composition of the genuine Christians and not including the merely nominal ones. Among the real Christians are the overcomers. On this earth today there are these four categories of people — the worldly people, the nominal Christians, the real Christians, and the overcoming Christians.
God’s desire is to have a people who will go along with Him to overcome Satan and all the negative things. This is possible for us not in ourselves but by His full salvation. To overcome is to experience this full salvation. This salvation includes our spirit’s regeneration and our soul’s full transformation, issuing in our body’s transfiguration. To say this is easy, but to experience this needs much work of grace.
We have been regenerated in our spirit, and we are being transformed in our soul. Whether we overcome or are defeated depends upon the transformation of the soul. If we let the Triune God as the life-giving Spirit transform us day after day, we will be overcomers. Even now we are overcomers, because we are going along with the Triune God’s transforming work. As long as we are going along with His transforming work, we are overcomers. When we do not go along with His work in us, we are defeated. Whether we are overcomers or defeated ones depends on our attitude toward God’s transforming work.
The Triune God today is within us, working to transform our soul. He is renewing our mind, our will, and our emotion. There is no problem with our spirit; it has been regenerated. The problem is in our soul. God is concentrating His transforming work on our soul. What is our attitude? To obey God is to go along with His work of transformation. We are all here under His transforming work. When this work on our soul is completed, we will be fully matured. Then the Lord Jesus will return to redeem, transfigure, our body, and we will be in glory (Phil. 3:21).
The matter of the kingdom is very much related to our daily life. God’s transforming work is actually His exercising of His kingdom. Many Christians have been distracted by soulish pleasures. We may also be distracted from God’s economy by different forms of amusement, entertainment, or sports.
God the Spirit is working within us, trying to transform our thinking. For example, as a lover of Jesus, you know that you should not go to a dancing party. You may want to go, but the transforming Spirit is struggling within you. Something within you says that this is not the right thing for a lover of Jesus to do. Actually, that struggling within you is the working of the Holy Spirit to transform your mind (Rom. 12:2) concerning the matter of dancing. He also desires to transform your emotion in this matter. Your emotion should not be toward dancing but toward the New Jerusalem.
Do you cooperate with this transforming work? Sometimes the saints are defeated, and they go dancing. At that time they are defeated ones. However, you can take grace to cooperate with the indwelling Spirit and say, “Amen, Lord. I will follow You. I go along with Your move within me. Hallelujah! I will go to the church meeting.” This choice involves more than going to the meeting. It means that you are transformed in your mind concerning dancing. Your emotion is also transformed: rather than loving to dance, you love to go to the meeting. This transforming also involves your will because you determined not to go dancing. You said, “Satan, I will not go to such an evil thing. I will go to the church meeting.” By taking such a stand, your mind and your emotion and your will are all touched. To be touched in this way is to be transformed.
This illustrates how the Lord as the all-inclusive Spirit indwelling us is doing His transforming work. If you go along with it, you are an overcomer. Otherwise, you are a defeated one.
Within the first blue circle of the chart is the reality of the kingdom of the heavens. The overcoming believers are living in this reality. Outside the blue circle is the appearance of the kingdom of the heavens.
Three parables in Matthew 13 speak of the appearance of the kingdom of the heavens. The first is the parable of the wheat and the tares (vv. 24-30, 36-43). Wheat refers to genuine believers, tares to the false ones. The false ones are not in the church but in Christendom, the appearance of the kingdom. The second parable is the parable of the mustard seed (vv. 31-32). A mustard seed is an herb to produce food, but in this parable it grows into a tree, a lodge for birds, that is, for evil persons and things. The church, with its nature changed, became deeply rooted and settled in the earth. Outwardly flourishing, the great tree speaks of the enterprises of Christendom, which are the outward appearance of the kingdom of the heavens. The third parable is the parable of the leaven (v. 33), which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal. Bread that is leavened is easier to eat. Many Bible truths concerning Christ have been leavened by Christendom. These leavened teachings are easier for people to take.
The second blue circle on the chart is the manifestation of the kingdom of the heavens. This is the third aspect of the kingdom of the heavens.
To see these three aspects — the reality, the appearance, and the manifestation — will help us to understand the truth concerning the kingdom of the heavens in a proper way.
The kingdom is the ruling, the government, of God (Acts 26:18; Col. 1:13). Here God can exercise His authority for the fulfillment of His purpose (Matt. 6:13b). The Lord Jesus prayed in Matthew 6:10, “Your kingdom come; Your will be done.” If there is no kingdom, God has no way to accomplish His will. God needs a kingdom to accomplish His purpose.
The purposes in God’s creation of man can be seen in Genesis 1:26-28. First, God created man in His own image. This indicates that God’s intention was to express Himself through the man He had created. Second, God intended man to have dominion (to rule) over all created things for His kingdom.
The kingdom was first formed among the children of Israel. In Exodus 19:6 the Lord told the children of Israel that they would be unto Him a kingdom of priests. Israel was the kingdom of God in the Old Testament.
The kingdom was the first thing preached in the New Testament (Matt. 3:1-2; 4:17; Luke 9:1-2, 9:60; 10:1, 9, 11). John the Baptist, the first preacher of the New Testament age, told people, “Repent, for the kingdom of the heavens has drawn near.” The first item preached in the New Testament is the kingdom, not heaven.
Many Christians think that heaven and the kingdom are synonymous. They believe that to be in the kingdom is to be in heaven. Many think that when a Christian dies, his soul goes to the kingdom of the heavens. To them this means that it goes to heaven. This thought is not according to the divine revelation. Heaven is not the kingdom; neither is the kingdom of the heavens heaven.
In the New Testament the kingdom is preached as the gospel (Luke 4:43; Acts 8:12; Matt. 24:14; cf. Luke 18:29 and Mark 10:29). The kingdom is the gospel. In Luke 4:43 and Acts 8:12 the Greek word for preach is the verb form of gospel. The word used in these two verses means to preach something as the gospel. The Lord Jesus in Luke 4 and Philip in Acts 8 preached the kingdom as the gospel.
In Mark 10:29 the Lord referred to leaving all and following Him for the sake of the gospel. In Luke 18:29, however, the Lord spoke of leaving all and following Him for the sake of the kingdom of God. To leave all for the gospel means to leave all for the kingdom of God. Whatever we do for the kingdom of God is what we do for the gospel, because in God’s eyes the kingdom and the gospel are synonymous.
From Mark 10:17 and 23 we can see that to inherit eternal life is to enter into the kingdom. To receive eternal life is one thing; to inherit it is another. The New Testament makes the difference quite distinct, but many Christians do not notice this difference. When we believed in the Lord Jesus, we were regenerated and received eternal life. When we live by this life that we have received, this life becomes our inheritance for our enjoyment. We receive eternal life today, but to inherit, to enter into, eternal life is a matter of the coming age. Whether or not you inherit eternal life as your blessing depends upon whether you are an overcomer or a defeated one. To enter into eternal life, to inherit eternal life, means to enter into the kingdom, to inherit the kingdom.
All things which relate to the divine life have been granted to us for an entrance into the kingdom (2 Pet. 1:3, 11). Second Peter 1:3 says that “His divine power has granted to us all things which relate to life and godliness.” Verses 5 through 11 show us the development of the eternal life issuing in a rich entrance into the eternal kingdom. By the eternal life with its development we may enter into the kingdom.
The kingdom is related to the inner life and to the church life. John 3:3 and 5 tell us that we must be reborn to see the kingdom and to enter into the kingdom. To enter into the kingdom of God is a matter of the inner life. We need to be born again in order to have the divine life. When we have this life, we are in the kingdom. To receive the divine life is to enter into the kingdom of God.
In Matthew 16:18-19 the Lord said that He will build His church and then that He would give to Peter the keys of the kingdom of the heavens. These verses show that the kingdom is for the church. Romans 14:17 says, “The kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.” Romans 14 is a chapter on how to receive the weaker ones in the church life. When Paul mentions the kingdom of God in this chapter, he is referring to the church life. The church life is the kingdom of God today. The church life, the kingdom of God, is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.
The all-inclusive Christ has been sown into His believers as the seed of the kingdom (Matt. 13:3; Mark 4:26). The Lord Himself is within the believers as the King, the seed. Jesus is the King; we are the “dom”! The kingdom is the expression, or the extension, of the King. The King is the seed, and the church is the extension, the “dom.” The King’s spreading within the believers as the seed is the kingdom (vv. 26-29). The kingdom was sown in the Gospels by the Lord Jesus in the midst of the Jews and within the Lord’s disciples (Luke 17:20-21). The kingdom is something inward. We cannot observe it outwardly. The Lord Jesus said that the kingdom was not observable.
This kingdom was manifested to Peter, James, and John (Matt. 16:28—17:2). When the Lord sowed the seed of the kingdom in the midst of the Jews and within His believers, the Jews could not discern it. One day, however, three disciples went up to a mountain with the Lord Jesus. On the mountain Jesus was transfigured. His transfiguration was the manifestation of the kingdom. The kingdom is Jesus Christ Himself sown into us and growing in us until one day there will be the manifestation of the kingdom.
In Acts the kingdom was taught by the Lord after His resurrection. Acts 1:3 tells us that He was with the disciples for forty days, “speaking the things concerning the kingdom of God.”
The kingdom was also preached by the apostles. In Acts 8:12 Philip preached “the gospel of the kingdom of God.” Paul also preached the kingdom of God (19:8; 20:25; 28:23, 31). The last two verses of Acts tell us that Paul “remained two whole years in his own rented dwelling and welcomed all those who came to him, proclaiming the kingdom of God.”
Some Bible teachers believe that the kingdom has been suspended due to the rejection of the Jews. They believe that this is not the kingdom age but the church age and that the kingdom will come later on. This teaching is incorrect. As we have seen, the church actually is the kingdom. Even in this age, the church age, the age of grace, the kingdom is here. This is clear from the many references to the kingdom in the book of Acts.
We can also see the kingdom in the Epistles. The Epistles tell us that the believers have been transferred into the kingdom (Col. 1:13; Heb. 12:28). Also in the Epistles the kingdom is the church life (Rom. 14:17).
First Corinthians 4:17 and 20 also show us that the kingdom is the church life. Verse 17 says, “I have sent Timothy to you...who will remind you of my ways which are in Christ, even as I teach everywhere in every church.” Verses 18 through 20 say, “Now some have become puffed up as though I were not coming to you. But I will come to you shortly, if the Lord wills, and I will ascertain not the speech of those who are puffed up but the power. For the kingdom of God is not in speech but in power.” These verses show that the kingdom of God is the church everywhere, and the church everywhere is the kingdom. The kingdom is here because the church is here.
Also in the Epistles some of the believers were the apostle’s fellow workers for the kingdom of God (Col. 4:11). Paul and his fellow workers were working for the kingdom. This means that they were working for the church. To work for the church is to work for the kingdom, so the church is the kingdom. The church people will also inherit the kingdom (1 Cor. 6:9-10; 15:50; Gal. 5:21; Eph. 5:5; James 2:5; 1 Thes. 2:12; 2 Pet. 1:11).
The kingdom is also seen in the book of Revelation. John says that he was a fellow partaker with the believers in the “kingdom and endurance in Jesus” (1:9). If the kingdom is something for the future, then the endurance must also be for the future. If the endurance is here today, then the kingdom must also be present today. The mentioning of endurance in Revelation 1:9 indicates that the kingdom in which John was is not something yet to come. It is here right now; we are partakers with John in the present kingdom.
This present kingdom will come in its full manifestation after the great tribulation (12:10). Then, finally, the kingdom of the world will become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ in the millennium (11:15). This is a brief sketch of the teaching in the New Testament concerning the kingdom from the Gospels to the end of Revelation.
