Church: Reformed Baptist Church of Franconia | Text: Matthew 3:1 | Date: February 26, 2017 | Speaker: Fred Zaspel

something that I really don’t like, but I think is probably true nonetheless, and it was this: that there is a very small difference between a long sermon and a hostage situation. You can imagine I didn’t like it. I have been enormously encouraged by your interest in these things that we have been studying lately, and all week long I’ve been working so hard on this to go through this morning, and I think I can fit it all in. I think I’ve been pushing it a little bit lately. I know it’s been a little longer. But I’ve been pushing it, and this morning I got to looking at it, and I don’t think I can fit it all in. And I said, “Kim,” and she comes in—my wife comes in—and I explain the problem. And she’s always one to give some helpful counsel. And so she said, “Boy, I’m glad I’m not the one keeping the nursery this morning.”

So I think all of that to say, you children with the questions in the bulletin, you parents with them, don’t be frustrated if you don’t see the answers to all of those questions. I may not get past the first one today. You might be able to answer the first one and then the last two. We might get to do that, but the ones in between, I think I’m just going to give up on. But we are dealing with the question still of salvation now and not yet. And today the specific subject with that is the kingdom of God.

If you will take your Bibles and turn to Matthew chapter three. Matthew chapter three. And I’ll begin reading with verse one.

In those days, John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Now John wore a garment of camel’s hair and a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. And then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him, and they were baptized by him in the river of Jordan, confessing their sins. But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit in keeping with repentance, and do not presume to say to yourselves, We have Abraham as our father, for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree, therefore, that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.

Then chapter 4, beginning with verse 17.

From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. While walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew, his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And he said to them, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. Immediately they left their nets and followed him. And going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James, the son of Zebedee, and John, his brother, in the boat with Zebedee, their father, mending their nets. And he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him. And he went throughout all Galilee teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people.

Let’s bow together for prayer. Our father, this is a huge theme that we take up this morning, the Kingdom of God, and it’s a very important one. We ask that you would give us ears to hear, give us a heart and a mind to understand, and through it give us a heart of deep gratitude and praise for the Lord Jesus, our King. We ask in His name. Amen.

The Biblical View Of History

Well, we have been exploring the idea of the biblical view of history with regard to God’s saving purpose. And we saw that in large strokes, the biblical view of history is that of two ages. Of course, before that there was creation in its unfallen state, and before that there’s what we call “before the ages”—eternity past, we call it.

But the biblical view of history is that, generally speaking, of two ages. There is this present age and there’s the age to come. This present age is called “this present evil age.” It is this age marked by the fall, marked by the consequent curse and judgment. It is marked then by suffering and death. And it is marked by injustice and sin and rebellion against God. And so sometimes it takes up the language of “the world” or “this age.” This age that is in rebellion against God and its fallen condition and under condemnation from God.

Looking ahead to the end of this age, the Bible presents us with the happy prospect of the age to come. And in the age to come, all that is marked by this present evil age will be reversed. And so instead of sin, there will be righteousness. Instead of a curse, there will be blessing. Instead of suffering and death, there will be joy and resurrection. There is righteousness. It is the time of the outpouring of God’s spirit. It is the time of God’s Messiah. It’s the time of God’s kingdom. It is that time when God breaks into history and fixes the whole mess that we have messed up by human sin.

So these two ages, this is God’s saving purpose. Fallen in Adam, but in the age to come, it will all be made right, and God’s created order will be brought to its original intent. Now what divides these two ages—and we see this all through the Old Testament—what divides these two ages is this great event of the coming of God. And we have this coming of God theme throughout the Old Testament: that God will break into history, and he will take things into his own hands, as it were. And we find language like that, that he lays bare his mighty arm; he will go to work himself. And this will be not our day; this will be the day of the Lord. And in his day, He will fix all that we have messed up by human sin. In that day, in the age to come, God will break into history and right all that has been made so wrong by our sin. The two ages, then, of redemptive history—this present evil age and the age to come—are marked and set apart by the coming of God.

Now when we come to the New Testament, this coming of God theme is picked up in a couple of different ways, but primarily what we see is it’s taken up in the theme of the coming of Christ. This is the doctrine of the incarnation. This is God breaking into history. This is the coming of God, the dawning of the day of the Lord. But now as the story plays out, we find that there is not one, but two comings of Christ. He came, and he will come again. He has come, he has ascended into glory, taken his seat on the throne of heaven, and he will come again.

The two comings of Christ. And with the two comings of Christ, the age to come that’s anticipated in the coming of God—in the two comings of Christ, we have what we saw the last couple of times: the overlap of the ages. The age to come is still to come. But the age to come has dawned in the coming of Christ himself. And so in his first coming, Christ came and his saving work was accomplished. And in his resurrection and in his ascension, he has taken the throne. He has entered into the age to come. And that age to come then, the word that we’ve used, has been inaugurated. Big terms, remember: inaugurated eschatology. End times have been inaugurated. The age to come has been brought forward. The future has been brought into the present. There’s still the future, but there’s a dawning of it in the first coming of Christ. And then in the second coming of Christ, in his return, at the end of this present evil age, then the blessings of the age to come will be brought to consummation.

Some analogies that have been used have been that of D-Day and V-E Day. I think I’ve mentioned that here before. One famous scholar in the last century made that famous in one of his books. In World War II, when the Allied troops landed in Normandy, anybody reading the big scene could see once they’d established themselves there, the war is over. Well, it wasn’t. They had a couple of years yet of fighting to do, and a lot of fighting to do, and some big fights. But because of the beachhead that they had established and the strength that they’d established in Europe at that time, and because of the limitations that placed on Hitler and the Nazi regime, because of the lack now of materiel, the dwindling of the upper brass in the military and so on, it was only a matter of time before the war was over. And finally the war was over and it was celebrated in Victory in Europe Day—VE Day. D-Day and VE Day. And that’s a helpful analogy to the two comings of Christ. He has come and he has accomplished his redemption, and the full outworking of it all will be brought in the age to come in his second coming. But what we’ve been emphasizing then is that in this age, the age to come has dawned and we have been brought to enjoy the blessings of the age to come ahead of time.

The Theme Of The Kingdom Of God

That, in broad strokes, is the biblical outlook regarding God’s saving purpose. Now, it might not be surprising, then, to find that the Bible, in fact, not only presents it in those kinds of terms, which it does, but it also tracks out that story. Remember, we’ve been emphasizing that the Bible is a story. It has a beginning and an end and a plot, and it’s working its way through. The Bible works out that story under the rubric of a number of different themes that are completely intertwined and yet traceable distinctly.

So we have, for example, creation is a theme that we find beginning, of course, in Genesis 1 and running through to the end of the book of Revelation—from creation to new creation. Man created in the image of God; that image fallen is another theme. And yet that image restored in Christ and restored finally in the age to come. The theme of temple or the presence of God: that God established his presence with man in the beginning, that presence was lost and forfeited by human sin, and yet that presence is re-established in the coming of Christ, first, and in the coming of Christ, second. To come, the presence of God reestablished, the coming of the temple, the church as the temple, heaven, the eternal state, the new heavens and the new earth as the temple of God and the dwelling place restored. So there’s paradise lost, there’s paradise regained. There’s temple, the presence of God withdrawn, and the presence of God coming again.

There’s also the theme of rest or Sabbath. In a sense established then in Genesis chapter 2, God’s rest is mentioned. That rest intended for humanity to share in and enjoy but forfeited is reestablished in Christ and finally in the end fully established in our rest in glory. Exodus is another theme that tracks that story: God’s redemptive work in bringing his people out of bondage and out of sin and out of slavery. Exile and return is another one of those themes. Eternal life is another one of those themes: life forfeited by sin and life restored in resurrection in Christ. Righteousness is another one of those themes that tracks the whole story; that man was created upright, fallen into unrighteousness and under condemnation, and yet righteousness restored in Christ, and finally in the age to come, God vindicating his people.

All of these kinds of themes are traceable distinctly, and I think that when we take up this series again in April, we might track out a couple of them. But all of these we can trace out as distinct themes running through the Bible, and yet they are so intertwined. We see with each of them distinctly and with all of them together, it’s tracking out this great theme of God’s promise to restore his fallen and cursed creation through Christ in the age to come. And that age to come has dawned in the first coming of Christ and we’ve begun early in Christ ahead of time to enjoy the blessings of the age to come.

Well, all of that is the big picture, and I try to do that always at the beginning of the message, and I’ve told you a hundred times. Now, if you fall asleep, you got the whole sermon, and it’s the same again today. That’s what we’re talking about. Only today, what we’re going to do is track that out under the theme of the kingdom of God.

The kingdom of God. That God is king over his creation is a virtual given in the scriptures. He made it. It’s his. He rules over it. Now the biblical writers assert that, but it’s also a given throughout the scriptures. He’s the creator, so of course God is the ruler over all of creation. And we find in Genesis chapter 1 that God creates mankind, and in the narrative in Genesis 1 and 2, with a recap of it, we find man—humanity—presented as the crown of creation. There are many ways that Moses bears that out in Genesis 1 and 2.

And the bottom line of it all is that man is created as a vice-regent. Humanity is intended to be a vice-regent of God, ruling over his creation in his stead. We are to image his rule in the created order. So: “Be fruitful and multiply. Rule over the earth. Exercise dominion over everything.” This is humanity’s intention: to reflect God’s rule over the created order. And of course that rule was forfeited. We forsook our high calling in Adam. We rebelled against our king and fell under a curse. And God immediately makes a promise that a champion will come and take up the cause himself. The seed of the woman will come. And he will take up this cause himself, and that champion will defeat the tempter. And the implication is then that he will take up where Adam failed. And that theme is taken up in the New Testament as well, particularly in Hebrews chapter 2, where Jesus is seen as that last Adam who succeeds in exercising dominion where Adam had failed.

Now at this point we have a bit of a split in the kingdom of God theme in the scriptures. There’s a sense in which God is king over all that we’ve already mentioned and that remains in place. God is the creator. He is the sovereign over all things and there is not one speck of anything in this entire universe that is outside of God’s control. He reigns over all things. He’s universal king. But now because of sin, there’s another aspect to the kingdom theme that we find running all through the Bible, and that is the restoration of God’s kingdom. That is because man is now in rebellion against God, God is bringing about his kingdom, that is in bringing about willing subjects in his kingdom to display his glory in the earth, to restore them to the honor that was given to Adam before he failed and before he rebelled.

And so there’s this outworking of the kingdom of God theme. God reigns over all and God is set about in his universal rule to reestablish his rule with willing subjects giving him the honor that he deserves. We see some reflections of that running through the Old Testament then. We see a hint of it in the promise to Abraham and the Abrahamic Covenant where God says that kings will come from you. We find a real flashpoint of this theme in Genesis chapter 49 and verse 10 where Jacob tells us that it is the descendant of Judah who will hold the scepter to reign over all of their enemies.

But all of this comes to a real focal point in a passage that Pastor Greg read from this morning earlier, and that is 2 Samuel 7 in the Davidic Covenant. Here the messianic hope begins big time. David says to Nathan the prophet, “I will build a house for God.” Nathan says, “That’s a good idea.” He goes home and hears from God, “That’s not a good idea.” And he comes back to David and says, “You’re not going to build a house for God. He’s going to build a house for you.” And the intended pun is: you’re going to build a real temple for God? No. But God is going to build a “house”—that is a dynasty—for you, and your son will reign on the throne forever. There’s a little bit of tension built in because if your son disobeys, I’ll punish him with the rod of the nations. But for that righteous son, he will reign forever.

The promise then is born that a Davidic son, a Davidic descendant, will reign on David’s throne, and here the messianic hope is born. And that comes to focus throughout the Psalms, throughout the prophets, and it’s expanded and advanced in many different kinds of ways, that David’s son will come to rule. He will come and take David’s throne and exercise dominion. And it will be a kingdom characterized by righteousness. It will be a kingdom that will be universal. It’ll be a kingdom that is characterized by peace. And David’s son will reign not just over Israel, but he’ll reign over the whole world and exercise God’s rule in a way that man was intended to rule.

And so we have this great theme of the messianic hope. I’m tempted to look at some verses, but I think we will go too long if I do that. But think in terms of Psalm 2, Psalm 110, where God promises, seeing the nations in rebellion against him, that his son has been established—the King, David’s son—has been established on the throne and he will accomplish his rule. And he calls the nations then to “kiss the son,” the language used in the Psalms. Kiss the son lest he be angry with you. Make peace with him now before it is too late because he will surely carry out all of his rule. You find it in the famous Christmas prophecies, like Isaiah chapter 9: “The government will be on his shoulders. His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Prince of Peace.”

All of these kinds of themes run together in the Psalms and are picked up in various ways. Sometimes, particularly in Jeremiah and Ezekiel, you find the Davidic focus. David will come to rule. David will reign over my people. I will send David, or I will send David’s son. All of this echoing 2 Samuel chapter 7, that the Davidic king will come and rule just as God has promised. And all of that points ahead to the end times when God then reestablishes his rule.

And you have that theme running with it as well. Not only will David’s son reign, but God himself will break into history and reign and take the controls of the governments of the world and so on. And all of this looks to the age to come when God breaks into history and he brings it to its intended purpose—the kingdom of God breaking into history. The apocalyptic literature in the Old Testament and the book of Revelation are famous for this and the graphic ways that it presents God breaking in and taking the controls of the world and so on. All of that is looking ahead to the end time when God comes to reign in the person of David’s son.

The Kingdom At Hand

Well, all of that is just in broad sketch, the background of it all. And I think we can scarcely begin to appreciate how stunning, how stunning it would have been when those in first century Palestine heard John the Baptist: “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” This is what they would think, all of this, of this coming of God and David’s son. And then the prophet bursts on the scene with this great announcement. And we find in all of the gospels that record it, that there’s this great excitement. There’s hints of it here in Matthew as well. People from the area and all around the region came to hear John with his great excitement that the kingdom of God is coming. It’s here. Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

I think we can just scarcely begin to imagine how stunning that was. This was a time of excitement. And we have it not only from the New Testament and the Gospels themselves, but from extra literature, Jewish literature of the time, that there was this high anticipation of the coming of Messiah. David’s son would come, and then finally it’s going to be right. And there’s already this sense of anticipation, and now the prophet bursts on the scene and says, “He’s here.” And he introduces Jesus. And then as we read in chapter 4, Jesus begins to preach the same thing: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” We find it later in Matthew chapter 4: Jesus went through all of Galilee proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom.

Now, one very prominent aspect of this kingdom theme—and it’s one that John the Baptist himself emphasized—one prominent aspect of this kingdom theme is that of the judgment of God against all of his enemies, against all of the unrighteous, that God would come and not only establish his kingdom, but in establishing his kingdom, he will destroy all of those who are opposed to him, and his enemies will be condemned. John the Baptist speaks of it in graphic terms. He’ll come and he’ll baptize with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand. Graphic language. Christ taking up humanity and sifting the wheat from the chaff and the grain falls to the ground. The chaff blows away over here and he takes all the grain and he gathers them into his barn, his kingdom. And then he gathers up the chaff and he throws it in the fire.

The judgment aspect of the kingdom is prominent in all of these, in so many of these kingdom passages. The day of the Lord, coming with his judgment, coming in vengeance against his enemies. Then we come to Matthew chapter 11. All of this is proclaimed for us in the Old Testament. John the Baptist repeats it. It’s echoed when we come to Jesus preaching the same thing: “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. You must repent or you’ll be caught up in that judgment aspect of his coming.”

When we come to Matthew chapter 11, we find John the Baptist in prison. We read about it earlier this morning from the Gospel of Mark. John the Baptist is in prison; eventually he’ll lose his head. This doesn’t look like what I expected. And we have in Matthew chapter 11 a picture of John the Baptist in which he’s—it may be too much to say this—but he’s almost, can we say, disappointed with Jesus? This is not what I expected. The good guys are going to win now, not the bad guys. And now the bad guy has me, the prophet of the Messiah, in prison. And so John is confused. And so he sends this delegation to go ask Jesus, “Are you the one who’s to come or not?” And Jesus responds by citing passages from Isaiah, identifying what the Messiah would be like and the miracles that he would perform. And he says, “You go back and tell John what you’ve seen.”

Well, it’s not long before we catch on that this dimension of the kingdom—this dimension of judgment and God destroying his enemies—that’s not yet in focus. In fact, in Matthew chapter 17, we find what must have been a very confusing statement for the disciples. Jesus says to them, “The son of man must suffer.” Now you remember that “son of man” language, does that ring a bell? That is just an enormously famous messianic prophecy from the book of Daniel. Daniel chapter 11, the son of man is the one who’ll come riding on the clouds and stands before the God of heaven and he receives the keys of the kingdom; he exercises God’s rule. He’s a messianic figure. And now he says the son of man must suffer. And I’m sure that had the disciples scratching their heads.

But what’s clear now is that whatever all of that means is that this aspect of the coming of the kingdom of God—this aspect of judgment—is not yet in focus. But rather, the redemptive aspect of the kingdom is in focus. The world is in captivity to Satan, and it needs to be rescued. And in order to rescue the world from Satan’s dominion, the sin question must be addressed. And so we have not only this kingship theme growing in the Gospels in a generic way, reflecting the Old Testament teaching in that respect, but we find particularly when we get to the passion narratives and passion week of Jesus’ suffering, this kingdom theme and king theme crops up again. Pilate asked Jesus, “Are you the king?” “Yeah.” Jesus is on the cross. And you remember the dying thief? “Remember me when you come in your kingdom.” How in the world do you see him at that point as a king? And then, just to put the final touch on it, Pilate has inscribed a card, a note, a sign to put above Jesus’ head on the cross: “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.”

And all of this kingdom and king theme comes rushing now in the passion narratives. And what we find as it’s filled out then through the rest of the New Testament is that indeed is how Jesus became king. This strange working, this strange twist—but if humanity is in captivity of Satan, and if humanity is in the captivity of sin, that must be addressed. And the only way for that to be done is to send a champion who will, in their place, bear the curse and the judgment that they deserve. And so the champion comes, the long-promised king comes, and he stands in the place of his people, and he bears their sin and takes their curse, and there secures his kingdom and secures people for his kingdom and rescues them, and as Paul will say, they’re transferred out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of his dear son.

And we have a theme that was really much more prominent in the early church theologians than is prominent today, and that is of Christ reigning from the cross. So far from being an object of pity on the cross as he is in so much of Roman Catholic art, for example, we are to see him as reigning and there establishing his kingdom. And in this great display of weakness and suffering is an expression of his power and his strength in establishing his kingdom. And then he rises from the dead and we hear him saying, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go there and make disciples of all the nations.” Bring them here to acknowledge my kingship and my rule. And the job of the church ever since is to take this gospel of the kingdom and to announce Jesus is king. He has established his rights through his successful accomplishing of his work and his death, resurrection and ascension. God has installed him as king and he reigns over all.

And salvation then begins to be described in terms of kingdom language: transferred out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of his dear son. Jesus goes to the cross saying, “Now is this prince of this world cast out.” John uses language of Jesus going to the cross being “lifted up” and “glorified” on the cross—strange kind of language. But there we see Jesus establishing his kingship on the cross and then in his resurrection declaring that that work was finished and complete and accepted by God and God now has given him rights to rule and to carry out his purpose of salvation and judgment. And so Jesus can pray on the eve of his crucifixion to his father, “You have given me authority over all flesh, over all flesh, so that—so that I may give eternal life to as many as you have given me.” He now has the rights to save through his work. And so he begins, the church itself then begins to proclaim this gospel of the kingdom, proclaiming the kingdom of God. The book of Acts in a way unfolds this for us. It just kind of pulls back the curtain and we see from God’s standpoint, from heaven’s standpoint, the expansion of the kingdom of God as the gospel of the kingdom is taken to the world. In fact, the last verse of the book of Acts ends with that theme: that the apostle Paul went about preaching the kingdom. And so the kingdom has come.

Moral Requirements For This Kingdom

But this king not only rescues us from our sin in terms of judgment, this king not only defeats his enemies and our enemy, but this king also subdues us. It subdues our own sin. The gospel promises not only acceptance with God in a legal sense, although it does that. But it also promises that it will transform us, it’ll change us. And so we find that, not surprising, there are moral requirements for this kingdom. “Repent. Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” God won’t have you in your sin. We find John the Baptist preaching, “Repent.” Jesus preaching, “Repent.”

And then we find in Matthew chapter 5, Jesus laying out the charter of his kingdom. And if you want to look at it quickly, you’ll see this is what my kingdom is like, Jesus says. Matthew 5 verse 2: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” I haven’t come for those who are strutting, for those who are full of themselves and think they deserve it. I’ve come for those who are full of poverty of spirit. “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs”—and there is some emphasis on that, that’s intended—”Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs and theirs only is the kingdom of heaven.” This is what my people are like. First of all, they are marked by poverty of spirit. They recognize that they are brought into this kingdom by grace, through a work of the king himself and not through anything that they have contributed.

Verse four: “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, they shall be satisfied,” and on and on. This is what my kingdom people are like. This is what characterizes my kingdom. It’s not just people who have been rescued from sin—it is that—but they’ve been rescued from sin and its implications in their own life as well. And they are marked by poverty of spirit, dependence upon the king, hungering and thirsting after righteousness.

And you can go on through the Sermon on the Mount. And he, one after another, itemizes: this is what my kingdom is like. This is what my kingdom people are like. They’re like salt in the earth, holding back the decay (verses 13 and following). They’re like light in the world, exposing the darkness. Verse 21 and following: they’re not only people who are not angry and harbor grudges and are vindictive, but they’re people who don’t murder either. They not only not murder, but they don’t have it in their hearts to murder. In verses 27 and following: not only are they people who do not commit adultery, they are people who have worked hard to quell lust as well. Verses 31 and following: my people are those who when they marry, they stay married. Verse 33 and following: my people are those kinds of people who when they say yes, they mean yes, and when they say no, they mean no. They keep their word. And verses 38 and following: they’re not vengeful. They don’t retaliate. They actually turn a cheek. In verses 43 and following: they not only love their best friends and their family—anybody can do that—they love their enemies.

And on through it, chapter 6: they don’t give in a hypocritical way, give so as to get, and they don’t fast in a way to put on a display of piety. This is what my people are like. They’re men and women of prayer. And when they fast (verses 16 and following), they don’t do it for show. They do it out of earnest concerns of their hearts. And verses 19 and following: they lay up treasures in heaven. Verses 25 and following: they are humbly dependent upon the king and they seek kingdom interests. Chapter seven: there’s no hypocritical judging. They remember that they are ones who have been forgiven as well. And on and on it goes. It’s summed up in chapter seven, verses 12 and following. These are people who treat others like they would be treated. This is what my kingdom is like. This is what my people are like.

Mysteries Of The Kingdom

We get to chapter 13. We find this worked out in terms of the “mysteries of the kingdom” and these parables that Jesus tells. This must have been strange for the disciples to hear this. This is a new twist. After all, it is a mystery of the kingdom. They’re expecting this bombastic breaking into history of God, and everything’s gonna be set, and that’s that. And now Jesus begins to speak of the mystery of the kingdom.

The kingdom is like this: a guy goes out with the seed, which is the word of God—the seed of the gospel of the kingdom—and he throws it, and he sows the seed everywhere. Some people hear it, some don’t. Some of the seed falls on the wayside, birds take it away, and that’s that. Some falls on stony ground and it has a shallow earth and it grows and looks good and now sun came up, gone. Others begin to show some semblance of response and the thorns grow up around it, choke it out. Cares of this life, “this age,” cares of this age, choke it out. But there are some who the seed falls on good ground and it bears fruit.

Or if you like, he tells another, the parable of the weeds (verses 24 and following). He’s got this field of grain and the enemies come and they sow weeds into it. Should we go and try to pull up the weeds? No, no, wait to the end. But for now—and this was unexpected—let them both grow. And in this world, the kingdom of God has broken in. But they both grow, the weeds and the wheat.

Or, verses 31 and following: the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, just a tiny little seed. And you plant it in the ground, it becomes a really big bush. And that’s what the kingdom of God is like now. It’s here, and it’s growing in an almost imperceptible way.

Verses 44 and following: the kingdom of heaven is like a hidden treasure, or it’s like a pearl of great price. A man sees the worth of it and he sells everything off so that he can have it.

There’s the parable of the fishnet in verses 47 and following. And here we come to what it’s going to be like at the end, where you gather in the fish, at the close of the age, and the angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

And so in verse 51, Jesus asks the disciples, “Do you get it? You understand all that?” And I always have wondered if they were fudging a little bit when they said yes. This isn’t what we were expecting. But here the kingdom of God has come in and is growing in a secret way. Those who belong to Christ are in the kingdom and you can see it by the way they live. They’re like that. They’re kingdom people. There’s this counterculture going on. But it is still this present evil age.

Well, how do you get to be in the kingdom? Well clearly it’s through the redemptive work of Christ which provided for us a real change, a real change of who we are. And so Jesus says to Nicodemus, “Except you be born again, you cannot see the kingdom of God.” But God wonderfully by his spirit comes and transforms who we are to bring us into the kingdom and make us kingdom subjects—the kingdom of God now.

And yet, and yet, John the Baptist was not wrong. The kingdom will come; the kingdom of God will come in its full dimensions. The king will come with a winnowing fork in his hand to separate the wheat from the chaff, and the chaff will be burned. All of that will happen, and so all of this teaching that we have of the kingdom now—”the kingdom of God is among you”—at the same time, we are taught to pray, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” There’s not the full expression of the kingdom yet, and so we pray for it still to come.

Jesus says in the end of Matthew chapter 7, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven.” It’s pointing to the kingdom in the end. When the kingdom comes in its fullness, not everyone who claims my name will have it, will be allowed to enter. And then, of course, famously, in Matthew chapter 24 and 25, Jesus speaks of the coming of the kingdom in its fullness. Chapter 25, verses 31 and following, we have a climax of it:

When the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne.

There’s the kingdom theme.

Before him will be gathered all the nations and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats and he will place the sheep on his right but the goats on the left. Then the king will say to those on the left, come you who are blessed by my father inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

And so there will be this great separation in the end when Christ will come. A separation of humanity, and those who are his will enter into the joys of the kingdom. Those who are not his will be destroyed. And that prophecy of the Old Testament that John the Baptist repeated still stands. In his first coming, in the first coming of God, He accomplished the redemption. In his second coming, it will all be brought to fruition. Kingdom now and kingdom not yet.

And of course, all of that comes to a full-blown picture for us in the book of Revelation: “The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our God and of his Christ. And he will reign forever and ever.”

Westminster Shorter Catechism, question number 26, asks, “How does Christ execute the office of king?” Answer: “Christ executes the office of a king in subduing us to himself, in ruling and defending us, and in restraining and conquering his—all his—and our enemies.” That really says it all, doesn’t it? Kingdom now, kingdom not yet.

Jesus is coming and of course all of this, all of this teaching regarding the kingdom of God and Jesus as king—all of this shaped the witness of the early church. Their message was not that embarrassingly weak message that we’ve heard for a couple of generations now: “Make Jesus your king.” Their announcement was much better than that: “Jesus is king.” You may not have learned yet to bow before him, but you will one day, and that is what makes this gospel so urgent. He will come and he will have his winnowing fork in his hand and he will separate the chaff from the wheat, and those who have opposed him will be condemned forever.

But he has, in the meantime, offered terms of peace. He has offered himself in place of sinners and has taken the judgment to himself. He alone has the right and the authority to save and to judge. And if you would be saved, you must, you must, you must come and bow before him today because one day you surely will. Jesus is King. Now and not yet. And the happy prospect of those of us who belong to Christ is we will, we will enter into the joys of his kingdom and in fact we already have. And the anticipation is that that kingdom will come in its fullness. The happy prospect of the believer is that of Jesus’ return to come in his glory when every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that he is Lord. Amen.

Let’s bow for prayer. Our Father, we thank you for this great theme. We thank you for this great king who is ours. We’re thankful that he is king, that he has established himself as king, that you have seated him on the throne, that he reigns over all now, that he is carrying out this great kingdom program, that he has brought us into it, and that he is coming again. This is our blessed hope. Lord, we ask that you will keep us faithful until then, proclaiming this great gospel of the kingdom. In his name we ask, amen.