“It may be said that during Jesus’ ministry the Kingdom of God is spoken of always as a future event. It is expected, prayed for and hoped for. But it is never said explicitly to have arrived, not even at the Last Supper. What is present is the agent of God, Jesus. But because the agent of the Kingdom is present and active through his teaching and mighty works, the Kingdom of God may also be said to be potentially present…Its arrival in its own right is depicted as a future event” (Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels [A Compendium of Contemporary Biblical Scholarship], IVP, 1992, “Kingdom of God,” p. 425).
Since the Good News/Gospel offered by Jesus for our belief has to do with the Kingdom of God, it follows that the term Kingdom of God must be defined. Without a definition, how can one “repent and believe the Gospel of the Kingdom” (Mark 1:14, 15)? You cannot believe in a Gospel about a Kingdom which remains a vague concept.
A widespread confusion exists in the churchgoing community about what Jesus meant by the Kingdom. The quotation above from the Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels is immensely helpful as establishing the fact attested by Matthew, Mark and Luke that Jesus thought of the Kingdom as the great event of the future. He urges his disciples to keep praying “Thy Kingdom come!” This does not mean “Thy Kingdom spread”! You do not pray for the Kingdom to come, if it has already come. Note, too, that Joseph of Arimathea, who was a Christian disciple, was still waiting for the Kingdom of God after the death of Jesus (Mark 15:43). The Kingdom of God is the great hope for the future to be realized only by the return of Jesus to reign on earth.
... The vast majority of the Kingdom texts in Jesus’ teaching unmistakably point to the future intervention of God at the future coming of Jesus. The Kingdom of God is the objective of the Christian faith. Loss of this simple fact is responsible for a great deal of confusion amongst Bible readers.
Here are two key verses: “When the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his throne of glory…In the regeneration, [when the world is reborn] when the Son of man sits on the throne of his glory, you too will sit on twelve thrones to administer the twelve tribes of Israel” (Matt. 25:31; 19:28).
These sayings combine to give us a clear vision of the second coming of Jesus and his subsequent session on his throne, ruling in company with the apostles. Jesus foresaw a reconstitution of the tribes of Israel. This “concrete” expectation of divine government coming to the earth — the Kingdom of God/Heaven — is fundamental to any understanding of the Bible. Replacing the constant Kingdom language of Jesus with “heaven” (which Jesus never offered as the Christian goal) confuses the New Testament and suppresses the words of Jesus.
The above post was taken from here.
