After the resurrection of Jesus, He appeared to groups of His disciples—sometimes numbering as many as 500 at a time—over a period of 40 days, showing them that He was truly alive and no longer dead. Furthermore, we read in Acts 1:3 that He taught them what “the Kingdom of God” truly signifies.
In light of what we have been exploring recently, we could put it this way: Jesus came to teach us that “the Kingdom of God”—which lies at the very heart of the Gospel, or Good News—cannot simply mean that people can go to heaven! On the contrary, the Kingdom of God *is* the heart of the Gospel!
Throughout His three-year public ministry, His disciples heard Jesus proclaim the Good News of God’s Kingdom. They also witnessed Him demonstrating what this Kingdom looks like, and what it looks like when people live according to it—that is, according to the Way of the Kingdom.
Through faith, they came to realize that His identity as the Messiah—the Promised King—also meant that He is the King of the Kingdom of God.
Naturally, during those three years spent with Jesus, His disciples did not fully grasp the enormity of the Kingdom of God, nor its complete scope and all its perfect dimensions. God the Spirit would teach them this progressively, after taking up residence within each of Jesus’ followers.
Certainly, they also failed to understand that the Kingdom of God serves as the ultimate answer to humanity’s profound distress and all its needs.
Indeed, in their lack of understanding, they reduced the Kingdom, attempting to fit it into the framework of their own perspective as Jewish nationalists. And so, in Acts 1:6, we hear them ask Jesus: “Lord, are You going to restore the kingdom to Israel at this time?”
Just as Jesus’ disciples back then reduced the Kingdom of God to matters concerning the Jewish people, the church today continues to portray the Kingdom of God in such a way that, for most people, it has come to seem entirely insignificant.
Let me ask you: When was the last time you heard something in a sermon about the Kingdom of God that took your breath away and made you shiver with sheer excitement?
Looking at it from a broader perspective, I see how, within Roman Catholicism, it has been reduced to a pathetic form of humanism. Indeed, even within Protestantism—and other denominations—the concept has faded into something completely different from what Jesus taught us about it.
Can you believe that, even today, in certain circles of faith, it is proclaimed as a form of nationalism—focused solely on a specific country and its people—or even twisted into a kind of racism? This can range from the exaltation of the Jewish people and a “return to our Jewish roots” movement, to the opposite extreme, such as what we hear these days within British-Israelism circles.
It is no wonder that modern people today view the church (note the use of a lowercase ‘c’) as completely irrelevant—and even as part of the problem of our times! How can they take the church (with a lowercase ‘c’) seriously when they see, all around them, these fragmented “little kingdoms” that call themselves “church”—places where the Kingdom of God and the authority of the King of that Kingdom no longer even apply where it matters most!
Dare I say it? What is being proclaimed as the gospel in many parts of this church (with a lowercase ‘c’) has long since ceased to be what Jesus commanded us to proclaim!
The Good News that Jesus proclaimed is the Kingdom of God; yet, we have diluted it into something we believe would be palatable and acceptable to our current era and the prevailing discourse around us. And, to make matters worse, we then teach this to “new converts” and to our own children!
In this way, Catholicism serves up its own variant of religion to every nation it reaches.
The Anglicans, too, export their own variant wherever they go.
Then we see the Presbyterians, Methodists, Baptists, Pentecostals, and Charismatics—along with thousands of other “churches”—peddling their diluted “gospel,” stamped with their own specific ecclesiastical “brand,” to a starving world—all of this devoid of the true message of the Kingdom!
Indeed—would you believe it?—we even hear Jehovah’s Witnesses proclaiming a kingdom, yet one without the true King: Jesus Christ, God incarnate!
Yet, all around us lies a world that yearns for peace, lasting joy, and a true zest for life. Everywhere, people are staggering, crushed to the point of tears by demonic systems and all their stifling measures of control. And the Church—the true Church—which holds the real answer and solution in the Good News of the Kingdom, is so confused; it offers no answers that possess any eternal value.
Yet, the King of the Kingdom has given us this command:
“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you shall be My witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)
“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son...”