The Kingdom Is Not The Church
May 8th, 2007 by Sean
Recently I went to a church in Vermont where the preacher focused on the Scriptures leading up to Matthew 6.33 “seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.” As he progressed in the sermon it became apparent that he understood the kingdom of God to be one-to-one equivalent with the church/body of Christ. He even went to Mat 6.9-10 to show that “your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as in heaven” means that through the church God’s will is being done on earth. Often I hear from Christians the rhetoric of “building the kingdom,” “expanding God’s kingdom,” or “being kingdom oriented not local church focused,” etc. It would appear that the majority of Christianity believes that the kingdom of God is the church. I believe that this is probably the most wide-spread belief about the kingdom and therefore it is something to which we must have an answer.
1 Peter 3:15 but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence;
So I thought that today we could have a little exercise. Let’s try to list out as many verses and logical reasons why the kingdom is not the church but instead the reign of the messiah on earth when he comes in glory.
When the Son of man comes THEN he will sit on his glorious throne.
It is also at that time when the saints will inherit the Kingdom.
Doesn’t really make sense to say “Repent! Because the church is coming.”
(speaking about troubling times to come)
church for kingdom doesn’t make alot of sence there.
A text like this that makes conditions such as these seems to indicate that it is up to God who will enter or inherit the Kingdom. People can enter the church now of there own free will.
JP,
Matthew 11:11 I could say that Jesus is comparing the greatness of John the Baptist to what would come with the “church age.” This probably requires a dispensational perspective on things, but someone could say that being apart of the church and this period of time is, even if you are the smallest member of it, is still greater than the greatest things John the Baptist and others could do.
What do you think?
The other ones are pretty solid to me.
Also, Mark 10.15 does not necessarily imply that the kingdom is not the church. It could be read either way.
Out of all these Scriptures, so far, I’d say the two best are Rev 11.15 and Mat 25.31-34 because they both clearly place the coming of the kingdom at the last trumpet and the coming of Christ. Do we have more verses like these two?
(at the coming of the Son of Man)
Hello Sean,
I suppose the following scriptures from Col 1 do not quite fit your topic here?
Col 1:12-13
12 Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light:
13 Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:
Obviously, Paul, being a member of the church of the body of Christ, considered himself and the believers in the church to have been translated into the kingdom.
Unless one would like to now claim that there are several kingdoms in which God’s Son is king, I suppose it would be a good idea to not generally do away with “the church is not the kingdom” but instead give the topic some more attention to understand more accurately what Christ’s reign is all about.
Cheers,
Wolfgang
Dear all,
looking over the various verses given above by several folks, I’d suggest that you change the word “kingdom” in the translation and use “reign” instead …. and you should be able to recognize that those various scriptures can be understood quite different from the way most of you here seem to understand them, that is, “the kingdom” being a worldly political world empire with Jesus being sort of a political “emperor”, “ceasar” or “president” …
Cheers,
Wolfgang
Wolfgang?
how is reign different from kingdom in your mind?
(hopefully this won’t hijack the post’s topic too much)
-Victor
Wolfgang,
If you want to go as far as saying that ‘baselia’ means reign, then what do you say to Rev 11:15-17 where is says that “the reign of this world has become the reign of our Lord and His Christ…… and they have begun to reign”?
God begins to reign at the 7th trumpet. Has the 7th trumpet sounded yet?
Dustin
Acts 1:
4 And, being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me.
5 For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.
6 When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?
7 And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power.
8 But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
Notice that Jesus tells them they would receive the holy spirit “not many days hence.” Yet when they ask if he is going to restore the Kingdom to Israel, he tells them that the timing for that event is not revealed, but nevertheless they would receive the holy spirit and be witnesses. This is a clear illustration of the fact that Jesus taught of an intervening period during which we would be witnesses for the Kingdom, but the Kingdom would not be yet.
The few verses that seem to imply that the Kingdom is present today (including the ones from Colossians that Wolfgang mentioned) are referring to this “mystery of the Kingdom.” Jesus taught that there would be a period during which the Kingdom would be present in a hidden “seed” form, before it is revealed in all its power and glory at his return. For more detail see:
http://www.godskingdomfirst.net/KingdomCome.htm#mysteries
The doctrine of the trinity and the preaching of the Kingdom as the gospel have been on my mind for quite some time. Last Sunday, a friend, hearing me challenge the Sunday School teacher’s teaching regarding the trinity, afterwards pullled me aside and gave me the web site “restoration fellowship.” This has been a God-send, so to speak.
Clearly the present day teaching of easy-believism has left many who “professed” lost and confused as to what they actually believe. It is important to believe that Christ died and rose again, but to what purpose.
This week has been spent reading the volumes found in your web pages. Eye-opening would put it mildly.
Thanks for all your commentary.
Randy, thanks so much for stopping by - we love hearing stories of people coming to understanding concerning God. I hope you stick around