Defining the Kingdom – Part 1

As we’ve said many times, Matthew is written to the Jewish nation. They are the focus and all the words that Jesus spoke; He preached to and taught the Jew under the Mosaic law. This is mentioned many times throughout the book.

There’re only two exceptions. One is in Matthew 8 verse 5 to 13 where Jesus heals the servant of the Roman centurion and Matthew 15 verses 21 to 28 where He heals the Canaanite woman who displayed great faith.

Other than those exceptions it was all to Jews and was primarily about this coming Kingdom.

This in no way means that this book, along the majority of the books of the Bible that were written to the Jewish nation, are not for us, the Church today. They absolutely are for us, they’re just not to us.

As we look deeper into this mysterious Kingdom that was continually presented by Jesus and was spoken about time and again by the Old Testament prophets, we’re going to look nowhere but God’s Word. This means we’ll be jumping around the whole bible.

Now, I’ve found that if I listen to someone like a teacher or commentator speaking the Word of God it has an impact. However, when I follow those spoken words in the bible itself or on one of my bible apps, the impact seems even greater somehow.

Because of this and because we’re going to be using a lot of scripture, I’ve made a series of videos to match the commentary so that the words themselves can be seen. The videos are available underneath the list of audio episodes as each one is completed and also as separate articles in the Articles section of the Why God website.

Now, I don’t know about you but personally I’ve never encountered and in depth teaching on the Kingdom in all my many years as a Christian.

Of course, I’d heard of it but there was always a mystery surrounding it and it always seemed to me to be sort of mixed in with the Body of Christ somehow, a sort of spiritual Kingdom. And that’s exactly what the Jehovah’s Witnesses say about it, that it’s a quote, “spiritual kingdom”.

I really don’t know why there’s not much discussion on it because the whole bible focuses on it.

God has been setting up a physical and visible Kingdom on this earth ever since the fall of man transferred his God given dominion over that creation, that we see in Genesis 1:26 – 28, to Satan who was from then until today the prince or the god of this world as we see in John 12:31, John 14:30, 2 Corinthians 4:4 and in many other places.

All the way through the Old Testament, and especially in the writings of the Prophets, this Kingdom, this thousand-year reign of Christ on the earth, which will then go on into eternity, is set before us.

Now this may be a surprise but there’s more Scripture on this subject than on any other subject in the Bible.

Everything’s moving to the day when Christ will return, not just to end everything but to establish this earthly kingdom, with flesh and blood people, with animals, children, and homes. And beauty far beyond our current ability to describe.

It’s a truly wonderful, uplifting, and joyous study.

The Kingdom!

Through the Bible we have a number of phrases relating to the Kingdom.

We have the Kingdom, The Kingdom of God, The Kingdom of Christ, The Kingdom of His dear Son, and the Kingdom of heaven, and in the old testament there’s more including the Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of my father.

The phrase, The Kingdom of Heaven, is only found in the Gospel of Matthew and it occurs here 32 times. The word Kingdom by itself occurs 50 times and Kingdom of God 3 times in Matthew.

Then, we also have the Body of Christ, the Church.

Are they all the same thing?

Many theologians and Bible scholars think they are, and it’s put a confusing veil over these phrases and all that’s succeeded in doing is to make what’s very simple complicated.

So, if these terms don’t all refer to the same thing what do they mean?

My friends, a correct interpretation of these terms, is vital to understanding this Gospel of Matthew and also the whole Bible.

Now, here’s where we need to be clear!

The Kingdom of God, The Kingdom of Heaven, and the Body of Christ, are not all the same thing.

If we don’t see that a lot of confusion will surround our quest to understand the Bible.

We’ll see all this from scripture as we go on, but The Kingdom of God is the overall, overriding area of God’s Sovereignty and influence.

It includes everything in heaven. It includes the angelic hosts. It includes the believers from day one to the end of time. It includes everything relating to the Word of God.

When we talk about spiritual things, we’re talking about things that have to do with the Kingdom of God.

The Kingdom of Heaven, simply stated, is the reign of the heavens over the earth.

This is that earthly Kingdom over which Christ will rule and reign over in the future from David’s throne in Jerusalem.

Christ does not reign over the earth today as I’m sure you’re all aware. All things are upheld by Him or else the universe would simply collapse but He’s not ruling over the physical earth.

The Kingdom of Heaven is in the Kingdom of God, but it’s not the entire Kingdom of God.

The Church, The Body of Christ, is not the Kingdom of God. Nor is it the Kingdom of Heaven. The Body of Christ is the called out believers who have believed the Gospel of Salvation and trust in the completed work of Jesus Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection.

It includes you and I as believers today.

It’s just like Brisbane is a permanent part Queensland and Queensland is a part Australia, but Brisbane is not Queensland and Queensland is not Australia.

Same with the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of Heaven, and the Body of Christ.

The Body of Christ, The Church, is in the Kingdom of God but it’s not the kingdom of God, just as the Kingdom of Heaven is not the Kingdom of God but it’s in the Kingdom of God.

We’ll see that more as we go on.

A very simple way of looking at it is to draw a large circle and call it the Kingdom of God.

That represents the whole of God’s Sovereignty and influence. It includes everything in heaven. It includes the angelic hosts. It includes the believers from day one to the end of time. It includes everything relating to the Word of God. It includes the Body of Christ. It includes you and I as believers today. As we’ve already said, when we talk about spiritual things, we’re talking about things that have to do with the Kingdom of God.

Now, if we draw another circle inside the main circle of the Kingdom of God, we have the Kingdom of Heaven.

So, this is the reign of the heavens over the earth and it’s inside the all-encompassing Kingdom of God.  This is that earthly Kingdom over which Christ will rule and reign from David’s throne in Jerusalem.

So, we then draw another circle inside our main circle representing the Kingdom of God. This one represents the Body of Christ. This is that present day Body of called out of believers. Every true believer becomes a member of the Body of Christ. Now, the Body of Christ is also in that all-encompassing Kingdom of God. If we wanted to get a truer image we could overlap the Kingdom of Heaven circle with the Body of Christ circle because as we’ll see they have a great influence on each other.

Now today, our number one priority is not to fill the Kingdom as many churches and their pastors and teachers tell us.

We’re working today to fill the Body of Christ! When the Body of Christ is full, and God knows the exact number, we’re out of here! It’s just that simple! We’re going to be snatched up, raptured to meet the Lord and to forever be with Him!

Now some might say why is it that this term the Kingdom of Heaven is only spoken of in Matthew, and we don’t hear the term anywhere else in the bible?

To understand that we need to be aware that each of the four Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, present the same Lord, Jesus Christ, but each presents Him in a unique way.

Matthew presents Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, the long prophesied King, who fulfills all of the Old Testament prophecies and covenants and heralds in the long promised Kingdom of Heaven. Matthew is written for the religious man.

Mark Portrays Jesus as the suffering Son of God, who offers himself as a sacrifice for sins. Mark’s Gospel is brief and blunt and very like the tough, hard Romans who ruled Judea at the time. Mark is written for the strong man.

Luke Presents Jesus as the Savior of all people, who brings salvation to all nations and people groups. Luke is written for the Thinking Man.

John Portrays Jesus as the eternal Son of God, the image of God the Father, who came to bring eternal life to all who believe. John is written for the wretched man who’s aware of His sin nature and is also aware that he can do nothing himself to change it.

Each Gospel has its own unique theme, but they all form one Gospel and they all present the same Jesus.

Again, the Kingdom of Heaven and its reign of the heavens over the earth and the King who rules it is the great theme of this Gospel of Matthew. The One Who’s going to establish that Kingdom on the earth is the Lord Jesus.

The three major discourses, or speeches if you like, in the Gospel of Matthew all concern the Kingdom.

You have the so called sermon on the mount which is the law of the Kingdom of Heaven and it’s probably only a partial list.

Then we have the Mystery Parables in Matthew 13 that concern the Kingdom. The Lord said the Kingdom is like a Sower, and the Kingdom is like a mustard seed and so on.

And then we have the great Olivet discourse which looks forward to the establishment of the Kingdom here on this earth. This is so important for us to see.

So, let’s start our scripture journey through these Kingdoms at Matthew chapter 6. The verse we want is verse 33, but let’s go back to verse 28 to get the flavour of what Jesus is saying to His listeners, who are, of course, Jews still under the Old Testament dispensation or age.

Matthew 6:28-33 and it’s, of course, Jesus Himself speaking,

“So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin. 

and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 

Now if God so clothes the grass of the field (the lilies), which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, (or it just disappear) will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 

“Therefore, do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 

For after all these things the Gentiles seek.

For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 

But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 

Now, the casual reader usually doesn’t recognise this, but see, He’s talking to Jews, and He’s using those outside Gentiles as an example of how they are not to be. So, He says, “Don’t be like those Gentiles. Be different.”

Notice the words “your heavenly Father…”

The Gentiles couldn’t say that. The Gentiles didn’t call God their Father. The only gods they had were the idols and the pagan, mythological gods, and goddesses. They didn’t know the God of the Bible, and this points out that fact.

Then Jesus says, “For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.” 

And here’s what we’re building up to.

Instead of being concerned about earthly, material, and physical things they’re told to, “seek first the kingdom of God”.

Now this doesn’t mean to sit and do nothing but take some sort of spiritual trip. You still have to work and make a living. But it’s about priorities. Jesus says here that the first priority should be to “seek the kingdom of God.”

Again, so we can avoid confusion, we’ll point out that the Kingdom of God is the whole sphere of God’s Sovereignty over which He’s in total control. This includes the heavens, the angelic hosts, all believers from day one until the end of time and anything concerning the Word of God. It’s all concerning the Kingdom of God because it’s under His Sovereign grace and control. Anything under God’s Sovereign control is in the Kingdom of God.

Now to understand the term “Kingdom of Heaven” which as we’ve said is entirely in Matthew, we should understand how this Kingdom of Heaven can sometimes be referred to as the Kingdom of God, because it is; it’s within that circle of God’s influence.

Let’s look at an example. Let’s go to Acts 1:2-3.

This is the Lord Jesus meeting with the Eleven after His resurrection. Judas is no longer with them. He’s committed suicide after betraying Jesus.

This is at the end of the forty days of His being with the Eleven just before He ascends back to His Glory in heaven.

Acts 1:2-3,

…until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen, 

to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. 

But all right, what kingdom were these Eleven interested in? The earthly Kingdom of Heaven that Christ was one day going to set up!

So here the “Kingdom of God” is a reference to the earthly Kingdom of Heaven, even though it’s called the Kingdom of God.

How can we say that?

Let’s go to verse 6 in this same chapter.

Acts 1:6,

“Therefore, when they had come together, (That’s Jesus and the Eleven.) they asked Him, saying, “Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?”

What kingdom are they talking about? The earthly Kingdom! That earthly Kingdom that’s been promised ever since, the call of Abraham. The day that would come when God the Son, the Messiah of Israel, would return to the planet and establish His throne in Jerusalem on Mount Zion, and would rule over an earthly Kingdom.

The Church in general seems to be unaware of all this.

But this is the whole Bible has everything moving to the day when Christ will return, not just to end everything but to establish an earthly kingdom, with flesh and blood people, with animals, kids, children, and homes.

It’s going to be like Heaven, because Satan’s bound, so there’s no sin and no death.

It’ll be a glorious earthly Kingdom. That’s the Kingdom of Heaven.

It’s absolutely in the Kingdom of God because it’s in God’s Sovereignty.

Whenever we see the term ‘the Kingdom of God,’ we should look at it in the text in which it’s located.

Is it talking about the earthly Kingdom, or it is talking about that invisible sphere of God’s influence. It’s not that hard to do.

Now, let’s go back to the Old Testament and see how this earthly Kingdom unfolds.

There seems to be a great lack of understanding amongst Christians of this earthly Kingdom over which Christ will rule and reign as King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

However, the Old Testament is full of it. That’s what Israel was looking for.

We’ll start at Daniel chapter 2 and verse 31 and the prophet Daniel’s addressing King Nebuchadnezzar about his dream.

Daniel says to Nebuchadnezzar,

“You, O king, were watching; and behold, a great image (or a likeness)! This great image, whose splendour was excellent (or frightening, or terrifying), stood before you; and its form was awesome (or frightening).

Now, you’ve got to use a little imagination. Nebuchadnezzar sees a huge likeness of a man, probably a military type and it was a frightening image even for the great King Nebuchadnezzar.

Now to Daniel 2:32-33,

This image’s head was of fine gold, its chest (or his shoulder area) and arms of silver, its belly (or his torso) and thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of clay.

Now, do you get the picture?

We’ve included this image in our video presentation of this episode.

So, Nebuchadnezzar sees this massive statue probably in the likeness of a military figure, with a head of gold, a chest of silver, a belly of brass, legs of iron, and feet of iron and clay.

Now, we know from the rest of Scripture that it was a prophecy of the Gentile Empires that would be coming down through history starting with Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian Empire in 606 BC. Then came the Medes and the Persians. They were overrun by the Greeks, and the Greeks in turn were defeated by the Romans.

So, here are the four empires of prophecy, and then the feet of iron and clay would be what we’re seeing in Europe today, a Revived Roman Empire.

So, in this amazing prophetic incident we have Gentile history, coming down from 606 BC up to the time of Christ and beyond when the Roman Empire disappeared.

But now, 1900 years later, here it comes back on the scene in the form of the European Union.

Now, let’s go on to Daniels Verse 34 where Daniel tells Nebuchadnezzar that in his dream he saw this huge image, standing there in front of him.

Daniel 2:34

“You watched while a stone was cut out without hands, which struck the image on its feet of iron and clay and broke them in pieces.”

Now, there’s only one power that could cut out a stone without the use of human hands. God’s power.

Who is the ‘stone’ that all of Scripture talks about?

Jesus Christ. So, you see here we have in prophecy the coming of Jesus Christ, who is going to literally crush every scrap of these Gentile Empires.

Daniel makes a detailed interpretation of what the dream means going right down to verse 45 but we’ve short circuited this for now.

Now, why does the stone strike the feet?

Because that’s the empire that’ll be ruling at the Second Coming of the stone, Christ.

So, at the Second Coming of Christ He’ll strike the empire that’s visible and operating at that time, which’ll be the revived Roman Empire coming out of Europe and the Mediterranean area.

That stone in this image is a symbol of Christ, and it is symbolism, but it’s a literal fact that as that stone strikes the feet, the revived Roman Empire, it’s going to crush the iron and the clay that those feet are made of.

Then, in verse 35, the legs and then the brass and then the silver and the gold will collapse together. In other words, that whole consortium of Gentile Empires will collapse.

Daniel 2:34-35 Daniel speaking to Nebuchadnezzar,

You watched while a stone was cut out without hands, which struck the image on its feet of iron and clay and broke them in pieces. 

Then the iron, the clay, the bronze (That’s all the way up now to the Greek Empire), the silver (the Medo Persian Empire), and the gold (the Ancient Babylonian Empire) were crushed together and became like chaff from the summer threshing floors; the wind carried them away so that no trace of them was found. (What is chaff? It just blows away and disappears.) And the stone that struck the image (Christ at His Second Coming) became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.

So, Christ sets up a kingdom and filled the whole earth.

How do we know the mountain refers to the Kingdom?

Verse 44 tells us,

And in the days of these kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people; it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. 

Daniel gives Nebuchadnezzar a detailed interpretation of the image but as we’ve said we’ve summarised it here for the purpose of this study.

Now, if we slip over to flip over to Daniel chapter 7, we see Daniel’s own vision of the same dream, but instead of metals, he has carnivorous animals, but the end result is the same.

We’re establishing that there’s an earthly Kingdom coming over which Christ will rule and reign.

Daniel 7:13-14 Daniel speaking,

“I was watching in the night visions, And behold, One like the Son of Man (No question that this is none other than Jesus Christ), Coming with the clouds of heaven! He came to the Ancient of Days (He comes before the Father), And they brought Him near before Him. 

Then to Him (the Son) was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, That all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him. (Now, don’t miss the rest of the verse.) His dominion (that’s His rule, His Kingship) is an everlasting dominion, Which shall not pass away, And His kingdom (is going to be) the one Which shall not be destroyed.

Now, the Old Testament doesn’t give us a time frame like the New Testament does, but it is going to be a thousand year reign of Christ.

Until the next episode, part 2 of Defining the Kingdom may God bless and keep you.