here.<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
The “kingdom of God” is a surprisingly important thing in the ministry of Jesus.\u00a0 I haven’t done the counting myself, but I read somewhere that Jesus spoke as much or more about the kingdom of God than He did about anything else.\u00a0 Yet, you don’t seem to hear much preaching or teaching on the subject.\u00a0 It gets bogged down on esoterica.\u00a0 From a worldview perspective, however, it’s central and straightforward.<\/p>\n
1) Teachings of the kingdom of God sometimes appear contradictory<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nOne of the sources of controversy in the study of the words of Jesus is the meaning of His statements about the Kingdom of God.<\/p>\n
In some places, it seems like the Kingdom is present in our time on earth. In chapter 12 of the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus cast demons from a blind man, curing him.\u00a0 The establishment religious officials claimed that Jesus could do this because He was in league with the demons — they were following orders because He was boss.\u00a0 Jesus replied, saying:<\/p>\n
… Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and any city or house divided against itself will not stand.\u00a0 If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself; how then will his kingdom stand?\u00a0 If I by Beelzebulb\u00a0 cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? For this reason they will be your judges.\u00a0 But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.<\/em><\/p>\nSo, here, Jesus is saying that the kingdom has arrived.\u00a0 The Gospel of Luke notes of Jesus:<\/p>\n
Now having been questioned by the Pharisees as to when the kingdom of God was coming, He answered them and said, \u201cThe kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed; nor will they say, \u2018Look, here it is!\u2019 or, \u2018There it is!\u2019 For behold, the kingdom of God is in your midst.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nIn other places, it seems like its some sort of future construction. In the Revelation of John, there is an implication that the kingdom of God is established upon His return and victory:<\/p>\n
Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, \u201cThe kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nSimilarly in Book of Daniel,<\/p>\n
And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever.<\/em><\/p>\nIn some areas it sounds like a physical place, particularly when discussed in prophecy.\u00a0 During Jesus ministry, He specifically notes that it is not physical, but something else.<\/p>\n
When He was arrested, Jesus responds to Pilate in the Gospel of John:<\/p>\n
So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him,\u00a0\u201cAre you the King of the Jews?\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n Jesus answered,\u00a0\u201cDo you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?\u201d<\/span><\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/em><\/p>\nPilate answered, \u201cAm I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\nJesus answered,\u00a0\u201cMy kingdom\u00a0is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world,\u00a0my servants would have been fighting, that\u00a0I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.\u201d<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\nThen Pilate said to him, \u201cSo you are a king?\u201d Jesus answered,\u00a0\u201cYou say that I am a king.\u00a0For this purpose I was born and for this purpose\u00a0I have come into the world\u2014to bear witness to the truth.\u00a0Everyone who is\u00a0of the truth\u00a0listens to my voice.\u201d<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\nPilate said to him, \u201cWhat is truth?\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\nThat’s what happens when a transcendentalist talks to a postmodernist.\u00a0 The first lives in a fungible reality, and the second believes in fungible truth.\u00a0 But the bottom line is that the kingdom is “not of this world,” but is also “in your midst.” It began existing when Jesus started His ministry, yet will not be established until the end of days.\u00a0 What is up with that?<\/p>\n
2) Most of the issues resolve if one views the kingdom of God as an internal one.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n2.1) The current kingdom of God is the Christian worldview<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nHere’s what I think.\u00a0 I think it has to do with building a worldview, and then instantiating it.\u00a0 If you think of the Kingdom of God as that model of reality that is approximated by the Christian worldview, then everything Jesus says about it makes perfect sense.\u00a0 The Kingdom of God is the world we Christians live in because we construct it through faith.\u00a0 As we work together, we work to make it an external reality as well.<\/p>\n
1) You can’t enter into the kingdom of heaven without being born again.\u00a0 Of course not, since being born again can be defined, at least in part, of abandoning your old worldview and accepting the validity of (and building) the Christian worldview.<\/p>\n
2) The kingdom of God is in the midst of you. (Luke 17)\u00a0 Because this is a shared worldview, members of the family of God share it, and live in that world, distinct from the dominant worldview of common culture. This population that lives in the Christian worldview also lives in the midst of that common culture.<\/p>\n
3) “For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit<\/em>.” (Romans 14) ” — The joy and righteousness that is derived from living in a coherent, Christ-centered worldview is the goal, not concrete issues of dominion.<\/p>\n4) My kingdom is not of this world..<\/em>”\u00a0 (John 18:36) —\u00a0 Again, the kingdom is not a physical land, but a worldview.\u00a0 But because it influences everything you see, do, and feel, it becomes the lens through which you experience this world — and the more your worldview is correct, from a Christian perspective, the more your experience of this world becomes like that you will experience when it is finally instantiated (as I discuss below).\u00a0 Thus, the more your worldview is correctly Christian, the more you experience the “taste” of the instantiated kingdom of God.<\/p>\n5) “Therefore do not be anxious, saying, \u2018What shall we eat?\u2019 or \u2018What shall we drink?\u2019 or \u2018What shall we wear?\u2019<\/span><\/span>\u00a0 For\u00a0the Gentiles seek after all these things, and\u00a0your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/em> But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.<\/em>” (Matthew 6)\u00a0 — The shared Christian worldview can have significant practical benefits (as described in part in my second post on this subject).\u00a0 More important, however, as previously discussed, rather than providing a way of avoiding the inevitabilities of life, it provides a way to experience them in a transcendent manner.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\nThere is also a flipping of the secular position.\u00a0 From the secular position, the development of a robust worldview is a tool for success in life in the physical world.\u00a0 For a Christian (particularly a mystic), the opposite is true.\u00a0 Our existence in the real world, and the physical support we receive, is important only to allow us to develop our Christian worldview. This is why martyrdom is (ideally) not a problem, and why material success is not emphasized — and why so-called prosperity gospel is so dangerous.\u00a0 Our material well-being is important only to the degree that it allows us to work effectively in our Christian worldview development — instantiating the kingdom of God as best we can in our lives.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n6) \u201cThe time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.<\/em>\u201d (John the Baptist talking about the arrival of Jesus — Mark 1) — Jesus detailed the construction of, and provided the tools to build, the Christian worldview upon His arrival.\u00a0 Until that time, it’s structure was not available.<\/p>\n7) “Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexualit<\/em>y,” (1 Corinthians 6) — The construction and embrace of the Christian worldview will demand that people live according to the “natural laws” of that world, not those of the material world.\u00a0 Because every person’s construction will be flawed and to some degree incomplete, we will always break those laws, but we will not *deny* them, and we will not actively make efforts to consistently overcome them.<\/p>\n8) \u201cBlessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven<\/em>.”\u00a0 (Matthew 5) — Just as construction of this worldview demands certain “natural laws” as mentioned above, so it will dictate certain attitudes and the place of the believer in that worldview.\u00a0 One of the demands of the Christian worldview is selflessness.\u00a0 To be able to fully construct the Christian worldview, it is necessary to adopt a perspective that facilitates it.\u00a0 It is also necessary to recognize that, however hard we try, our worldview will not be perfect, and we must not make the mistake of believing it is.<\/p>\n9) “\u201cBlessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven<\/em>.” (Matthew 5)\u00a0 — One of the features of a well-constructed worldview is that it is resistant to challenge — it is not built on cognitive sand.\u00a0 But, as they say, “no pain, no gain.”\u00a0 Like most things, it is improved and made stronger by successfully overcoming challenges.\u00a0 Nietzsche may have said “That which does not kill me makes me stronger,” but for a Christian, death in the face of persecution represents the final victory of the Christian worldview over the test of the physical world.\u00a0 Death does make you stronger. A Christian who chooses martyrdom has made it to the point that the Christian worldview is of greater value to him or her than life itself. Death as a martyr is not a victory over physical death, but it is a victory over the death of the “self.” Because this is an ultimate test of the worldview and the ultimate expression of “mortality saliency,” it is no surprise that many Christians whose worldview is not as firmly constructed will abandon the worldview rather than annihilation of the self.\u00a0 It is no wonder that these martyrs have a distinct crown at the Judgement of Saints; it is a test that many, if not most, of us would fail — and one that none of us can be certain of until and unless it happens.<\/p>\nOnce again, refer to Hagakure and bushido.\u00a0 The samurai lives by being “already dead,” and through the antemortem obliteration of self, establishes his psychic identity that transcends death within the worldview determined by honor and duty.\u00a0 The Christian is the samurai of faith, but in the opposite sense — through the embrace of eternal life in Jesus Christ, he or she establishes a psychic identity that transcends the threat of physical annihilation, within the worldview determined by duty and service to the Lord Jesus.\u00a0 The samurai is “already dead” regardless of whether that physical annihilation has actually happened,\u00a0 but we are eternally alive, regardless of whether or not that physical annihilation has happened.<\/p>\n
10) Jesus told the crowd another story. \u201cHere is what the kingdom of heaven is like,\u201d he said. \u201cA man planted good seed in his field.\u00a0<\/em><\/span>But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came. The enemy planted weeds among the wheat and then went away.\u00a0<\/span> The wheat began to grow and form grain. At the same time, weeds appeared.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/sup>\u201cThe owner\u2019s slaves came to him. They said, \u2018Sir, didn\u2019t you plant good seed in your field? Then where did the weeds come from?\u2019<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/sup>\u201c\u2009\u2018An enemy did this,\u2019 he replied.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n\u201cThe slaves asked him, \u2018Do you want us to go and pull up the weeds?\u2019<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n\u201c\u2009\u2018No,\u2019 the owner answered. \u2018While you are pulling up the weeds, you might pull up the wheat with them.\u00a0<\/span><\/em> Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the workers what to do. Here is what I will say to them. First collect the weeds. Tie them in bundles to be burned. Then gather the wheat. Bring it into my storeroom.\u2019<\/em>\u2009\u201d
\n<\/span><\/p>\n(Matt 13)<\/p>\n
There are those who construct a “real” Christian worldview and and those, such as the nominal Christians and apostates described in my previous post who construct worldviews that only appear to be truly Christian.\u00a0 Eventually, many of these false Christians worldviews will become evident, either because of the behavior of the person or because he or she abandons it.\u00a0 But it may not become evident for years, and at any given time, they may seem no different than someone who is faithfully building his or her worldview. Because even the faithful worldviews are works in progress, and may involve failures, false starts, and faulty construction, there are no real “litmus” tests for being a Christian other than the few simple axioms of the Christian — which may be falsely affirmed.\u00a0 It is only when that worldview meets a final test — in this life or the next, that its true structure can be revealed.<\/p>\n
11) And said, \u201cTruly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven”<\/em> (Matt 18) — Abandoning a mature non-Christian worldview means abandoning that maturity.\u00a0 It is replaced by a new but largely unformed Christian worldview.\u00a0 This new but incomplete and primitive Christian worldview is functionally like the incomplete and primitive worldview one has as a child.\u00a0 And, like a child, a new convert must be guided, taught, and brought into maturity.<\/p>\n12) And he said, \u201cWith what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when sown on the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth, yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade<\/em>.\u201d ( Matt 5) — When we begin our life’s journey as a Christian, the worldview we start with is pretty insubstantial, unless we’ve been raised in the church.\u00a0 But, as we mature as Christians, that worldview becomes more substantial, and can deal with anything we come across in life.<\/p>\n… and there are many more places where the kingdom of God is mentioned, of course.\u00a0 All of them, I believe, are consistent with this view. It also explains why the kingdom message was so important to Jesus.<\/p>\n
2.2) The coming kingdom of God is an instantiation of the current one<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nThe only fly in the ointment, for me, are the mentions of the concrete kingdom mentioned in prophesy.\u00a0 So what about this fire and brimstone and thrones and real kingdom stuff?<\/p>\n
My personal opinion is that the kingdom of God established by the Christian worldview is not just a model of the world we live in now, but a predictive model of the physical kingdom of God that will establish. We live in a “virtual” kingdom of God, but we will eventually live in an instantiated one.\u00a0 By necessity, because we are fallible creatures with limited and inaccurate knowledge, limited intellects, and limited experience, all of our worldviews are wrong in many places.\u00a0 Once again, we “see thought a glass darkly,” and our approximations of the “true” Christian worldview will never reach the mark.\u00a0 But Jesus will instantiate that model — and it will be perfect.\u00a0 Thus, we as Christians build our own kingdoms of God that approximate the one that will be made real by God.<\/p>\n
This provides an explanation of one of the more troubling verses that seems to mix the model and the reality, when Jesus tells his disciples, “And he said to them, \u201cTruly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power.<\/em>\u201d\u00a0 (Mark 9) –\u00a0 Obviously, He cannot be saying that He will come to establish the physical kingdom in the first century AD. But what He could mean is the Pentecost, when the faithful are truly filled with the Holy Spirit, which provides empowerment and the most powerful experiential component of the Christian worldview.<\/p>\nThis is one of the more common interpretations of this, and not novel to me — but it makes sense within this worldview theology.\u00a0 Another common interpretation, for instance, is that He meant the Transfiguration, which would occur a few days later.\u00a0 And that could be.\u00a0 But I’ll choose to run with the worldview thing for now.<\/p>\n
Consider the Pentecost.\u00a0 Here you have a group of people who have been studying at Jesus’ feet and under His direct tutelage learning how to build this new kind of worldview.\u00a0 And then the rug is pulled out from under it all with His death.\u00a0 He returns, but they still are uncertain and don’t know where things are going — the worldview is either in abeyance, or reconstruction.\u00a0 But, what does He do?\u00a0 He sends the Holy Spirit to provide direction and support.\u00a0 Imagine being one of the disciples at Pentecost and immediately afterwards — it was a complete game-changer for them, and I have little doubt it resulted in a radical change in their worldview – and involved the infusion of profound power associated with the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 Thus, the coming of the kingdom of god with great power may represent the reconstruction of the new Christian worldview using the power of the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 It seems to me that these first generation Christians may have experienced the closest thing to full instantiation of the kingdom that could be experienced before the Second Coming.<\/p>\n
There are a number of kingdom of God scriptures that imply a physical kingdom of God, both in the Old Testament and New Testament.\u00a0 Thus, in Daniel 7, the prophet writes:<\/p>\n
And the kingdom and the dominion and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High; their kingdom shall be an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey them.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\nand in Revelations 11,<\/p>\n
Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, \u201cThe kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.<\/em><\/p>\nClearly these do not speak of the kingdom on earth that Jesus mentioned as already present. I believe that it is a physical instantiation of it.<\/p>\n
Perhaps the best secular analogy would be the statements by proponents of socialism, which is a very similar situation.\u00a0 The socialist worldview is detailed and has deep structure.\u00a0 There are benefits to having a socialist worldview, and it has important implications towards the socialists everyday life.\u00a0 However, it is an idealized system.\u00a0 It is one thing to work towards that idealized system and incorporate its values into your daily life.\u00a0 It is another thing to try to instantiate it in the real world.\u00a0 For socialism, every time it has been attempted, it has created a hell on earth, and betrays every one of its alleged goals.\u00a0 It is reasonable to ask why this is so.\u00a0 My personal belief is that it because of two things:\u00a0 human nature and the inherent problem of top-down organization.<\/p>\n
Socialism believes in the perfectibility of man. A person is the product of upbringing and programming, and if only we could program him or her correctly, he or she would become the perfect socialist.\u00a0 Thus, in every socialist or communist experiment, there is a planned period in which this restructuring of people and society must occur.\u00a0 This is sometimes called the “dictatorship of the proletariat.”\u00a0 It is accompanied by destruction of the previous cultures icons and structures, and rebuilding from a new beginning.\u00a0 This period has variously been called the “Reign of Terror,” “Killing Fields,” “Cultural Revolution,” etc. But it never works, because human nature is innate, not just a social construct.\u00a0 All this accomplishes in real terms is death, horror, and corruption.\u00a0 More important, people are not naturally as altruistic as socialists believe, and they can’t be programmed to be that way.\u00a0 Thus, people will maximize their own benefits.\u00a0 If socialists don’t want to pay on the basis of merit or accomplishment, then workers will do the minimum they can do, and will have no “ownership” of their jobs.\u00a0 As the old joke went in the Soviet Union “We pretend to work, and the government pretends to pay us.”<\/p>\n
The second thing that drives socialism is the belief that society can best be managed though a top-down system run by the intellectual elite.\u00a0 However, this has never been the case, for real and practical reasons (for a good description, see Thomas Sowell’s “Intellectuals and Society<\/a>“).\u00a0 This is why nature primarily uses bottom-up self-organization, and why top down organization is always sub-optimal when building a culture. Socialists in leadership positions will become corrupt and autocratic.\u00a0 It will become a police state.\u00a0 Every time.<\/p>\nThus, while socialist values and ideals may be attractive, the instantiation of them in the real world always ends in tragedy.\u00a0 Socialists keep trying to do it, saying that “it just hasn’t been done right, yet.”\u00a0 But it will never be done right, because of the reasons noted above.<\/p>\n
I believe the same is true of religious society.\u00a0 The kingdom of God represents a worldview and ideal that has profound benefits, and as an ideal it is a wonderful way to build an individual life.\u00a0 The values encoded into the kingdom of God are stunningly good.\u00a0 However, the instantiation of that world view into a civil structure always ends up with problems.\u00a0 The problems are not nearly as bad as those associated with instantiation of socialist ideals, but they derive from the same problems — human nature and the arrogance and narcissism of the elites.\u00a0 In general, instantiations of Christian religious governments have not been as bad as socialist ones, but they have not been models of success.\u00a0 The American ideal of a secular government with a religious culture seems to have worked reasonably well, but it takes both the religious culture and the secular government.\u00a0 As John Adams said, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”<\/em> The secular government with a secular culture drifts into authoritarianism and state socialism.\u00a0 The religious government with secular culture is unsustainable.\u00a0 The religious government with religious culture also drifts into authoritarianism.\u00a0 The unique combination of a secular government and religious culture creates a tension that avoids the worst of both worlds.<\/p>\nSo, like socialism, it is not possible to truly instantiate the kingdom of God until Jesus returns.\u00a0 At that time both impediments will be removed.\u00a0 Human nature will be changed.\u00a0 With our new bodies will come new minds, freed from the bondage of sin, and no longer slaves to our base natures.\u00a0 That removes the first problem.\u00a0 The new kingdom will have Jesus Christ as an autocrat, but in contrast to autocrats on this earth, he will be the perfect “benign dictator.” It is the perfect instantiation of that ideal — and it will mesh correctly with the “new man” that is the result of our perfection after judgment.\u00a0 The model of the kingdom of God we build in our minds, and partially instantiate in the church and elsewhere, will become fully instantiated.<\/p>\n
3) This idea of world building allows a different interpretation of the Judgment of Saints.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nThis also allows a different view of the idea of salvation “as though by fire” in the Revelation of John. At the judgment of the saints, each of us will present our lives in terms of how well we lived and constructed a Christian worldview.\u00a0 All of those parts and connections of those worldviews that are not in accord with the “real” kingdom of God will be destroyed.\u00a0 Some folk will still have much of their worldview (and thus their identity) intact, while other’s internal worlds (and self-identity) will be in shambles.\u00a0 Those foundational bits will still be there, but the edifice of their lives will be otherwise destroyed.<\/p>\n
In the next post — the role of the church in worldview construction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Worldview and the Kingdom of God This is the third of a series of posts about a theology of worldview…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,54],"tags":[11,9,16,6,10],"class_list":["post-392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","category-worldview-and-faith","tag-church","tag-faith","tag-kingdom-of-god","tag-religion","tag-worldview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=392"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":402,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392\/revisions\/402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.forensicpath.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}