I.) The Future Kingdom of God in the Torah and the Prophets<\/p>\n
This hope first appeared in the Torah and the prophets, which both Christians and Muslims accept.\u00a0 It was usually voiced when Israel\u2019s leaders were corrupt and unjust, and when wars and fears of war spread through the nations.\u00a0 This hope included six main features.<\/p>\n
\u06f1\u066b) The Righteous King.\u00a0According to the prophet Isaiah, \u201cthe spirit of the Lord\u201d would rest on him,<\/p>\n
\u201cthe spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might,<\/p>\n
the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord….<\/p>\n
with righteousness he shall judge the poor,<\/p>\n
and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;<\/p>\n
he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth,<\/p>\n
and with the breath of his lips he will slay\u00a0wicked.\u201d (Isaiah 11: 2, 4; cf. 9:6-7, 32:1-2)<\/p>\n
This king was often called the Messiah, which comes from the word for \u201canoint,\u201d since kings were anointed when they began their reign<\/p>\n
\u06f2\u066b) The Kingdom of Justice and Peace.\u00a0This King would reign over a world where all people would live together in harmony, and would treat each other justly.\u00a0 At that time \u201cthe earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.\u201d (Habakkuk 2:14; Isaiah 11:9)\u00a0 The earth would yield abundant fruits for everyone.[1]<\/a><\/p>\n \u06f3\u066b) The Gathering of God\u2019s People.\u00a0The prophets often declared that Israel that would be conquered and taken captive into many foreign countries for their sins.\u00a0 Yet they added that God would eventually bring their descendants back.\u00a0 The hope for God\u2019s Kingdom began to include their return, along with many natives of those foreign lands.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the days to come….<\/p>\n Many peoples shall come and say, `Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord….<\/p>\n that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.\u2019 ….<\/p>\n God shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples;<\/p>\n they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks;<\/p>\n nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall the learn war any more.\u201d[\u06f2]<\/a><\/p>\n \u06f4\u066b) The Judgment of the Nations.\u00a0As the previous passage indicates, the gathering of God\u2019s people from all nations would be connected with God\u2019s judgment on all nations.\u00a0 This was often portrayed as a great battle, where God would wage some kind of war against disobedient nations.[3]<\/a><\/p>\n But would the Messiah fight for God at that time?\u00a0 While some texts in the Hebrew Scriptures picture this, the majority do not.[4]<\/a>\u00a0 For example, the prophet Isaiah, whom I recently quoted, prophesied that the Messiah would slay the wicked– but \u201cwith the breath of his lips\u201d (Isaiah 2:4).\u00a0 This passage seems to be figurative.\u00a0 However, since the Messiah would be a king, and since kings wage war, most people who embraced the Messianic hope before Jesus came assumed that the Messiah would be a warrior king.<\/p>\n \u06f5\u066b) The Outpouring of God\u2019s Spirit.\u00a0God would not only gather the people and establish justice and peace, but would also become more present among them than ever before:<\/p>\n \u201cI will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,<\/p>\n your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions.<\/p>\n Even on the male and female slaves, in those days, I will pour out my spirit.\u201d (Joel 2:28-29)<\/p>\n Notice that God\u2019s Spirit would come not simply to a few leaders, but to all people, including slaves, which implied that social inequality would be overcome.<\/p>\n Other prophets described this coming of God\u2019s Spirit as a renewal of peoples\u2019 hearts:<\/p>\n \u201cI will give them one heart, and put a new spirit within them;<\/p>\n I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh,<\/p>\n so that they may follow my statutes and keep my ordinances and obey them.\u201d<\/p>\n (Ezekiel 11:19-20, cf. 37:14, Jeremiah 31:31-34)<\/p>\n \u06f6\u066b) The Resurrection of the Dead.\u00a0In earthly life, numerous righteous people suffer while many unrighteous people prosper.\u00a0 If God is just and rewards people according to their deeds, this will have to happen after death.\u00a0 At the End time, then, \u201cmany of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.\u201d (Daniel 12:2)\u00a0 At that time, God will \u201cswallow up death forever!\u201d (Isaiah 25:7)\u00a0 The \u201cdead shall live, their corpses shall rise.\u00a0 O dwellers in the dust, awake and sing for joy!\u00a0 For your dew is a radiant dew, and the earth will give birth to those long dead.\u201d (Isaiah 26:19)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n II.) The\u00a0Future Kingdom of God and Jesus<\/p>\n When Jesus appeared, the land of Judah had been ruled by foreign empires for centuries.\u00a0 Hopes for a Messiah who would liberate the Jews from the current oppressor, the Roman Empire, ran high.\u00a0 Several Messianic pretenders had already declared war on the Romans, but had been terribly defeated.<\/p>\n Jesus\u2019 main message was: Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand![5]<\/a>\u00a0 His followers believed that he was the Messiah.\u00a0 But then something very unexpected occurred.\u00a0 Jesus never called his followers and legions of angels to fight the Romans.\u00a0 Instead, the Romans captured Jesus and, Christians believe, they crucified him.\u00a0 People at that time interpreted Jesus\u2019 crucifixion as God\u2019s judgment on him– as evidence that his Messianic claims were false, and that those who crucified him were in the right.<\/p>\n But several days later, other unexpected events occurred: Jesus\u2019 followers began seeing him and hearing him speak.\u00a0 What could these appearances mean?[6]<\/a>\u00a0 The way that Jesus\u2019 followers interpreted them, and several events that followed, is extremely important for understanding the Christian hope for God\u2019s Kingdom.\u00a0 Jesus\u2019 followers came to believe that through those later events, the Kingdom of God had\u00a0already<\/em>\u00a0come to earth–\u00a0not yet<\/em>\u00a0in a complete, final way, but still in a very important sense.\u00a0 To explain this, let me indicate how those six features anticipated in the Torah and the prophets occurred in these events.<\/p>\n \u06f1\u066b) The Resurrection of the Dead.\u00a0Jesus\u2019 followers understood his appearances to mean that the resurrection of the dead, which was expected at the End of history, had already occurred– yet in a very unexpected fashion.\u00a0 They had expected that all humans would arise at the same time.\u00a0 Yet only one person, Jesus, had risen.\u00a0 The rest would not rise until he returned.<\/p>\n To express this, Jesus\u2019 early followers called his resurrection \u201cthe firstfruits,\u201d[\u06f7]<\/a>\u00a0and the future resurrection of everyone the full harvest.\u00a0 A harvest begins when the first grapes or ears of grain are ripe.\u00a0 Yet that harvest continues until everything ripens and is harvested.\u00a0 So if Jesus\u2019 resurrection is \u201cthe firstfruits,\u201d his resurrection and the final resurrection are not really two separate events.\u00a0 They are\u00a0the beginning and end of one event<\/em>: the resurrection which many generations hoped for when God\u2019s Kingdom finally came.<\/p>\n \u06f2\u066b) The Righteous King.\u00a0When Jesus was crucified, it seemed that God was judging him for making false claims to be the Messiah.\u00a0 But when God raised Jesus from the dead, his early followers believed, this verdict was reversed.\u00a0 Jesus\u2019 resurrection showed that God favored him, and that he was the long awaited righteous King.\u00a0 However, he was a very different kind of King than they expected.\u00a0 He was not a warrior, who killed his enemies, but a Messiah who taught people to love their enemies, and not to resist them violently, even if their enemies wanted to kill them.<\/p>\n \u06f3\u066b) The Judgment of the Nations.\u00a0When Jesus\u2019 enemies killed him, it seemed\u00a0they were in the right and had God\u2019s favor.\u00a0 But when Jesus was raised, this verdict also was reversed.\u00a0 Now those who had crucified him were guilty of killing God\u2019s Messiah.\u00a0 The Romans and Israel\u2019s religious leaders played the main role in this crime, and the crowds who supported this were Jewish.\u00a0 Western Christianity has often blamed the Jews for Jesus\u2019 death, and persecuted them horribly.\u00a0 But this is not the true Christian understanding of who killed Jesus.<\/p>\n Christians believe that all people, in all places and times, have sinned, and are under God\u2019s judgment.\u00a0 Although some people seem to be better than others on the surface, they all, in the deepest sense, oppose God, and are God\u2019s enemies.\u00a0 Christians believe that if they had been in Jerusalem in Jesus\u2019 time, they would have participated in his crucifixion in some way.\u00a0 If you ask a Christian, \u201cWho killed Jesus?\u201d the honest answer would be \u201cI did.\u00a0 Although I was not actually there, I have committed the same kinds of sins as those who killed Jesus.\u201d[\u06f8]<\/a>\u00a0 If all people participate in Jesus\u2019 death in this way, then everyone, not only the people in Jerusalem at that time, is guilty of his death, and is judged guilty by his resurrection.\u00a0 This is how God\u2019s judgment of all nations, expected at history\u2019s End, was executed in Jesus\u2019 death and resurrection.<\/p>\n This means that Jesus\u2019 death cannot be blamed on any one race or people more than on others.\u00a0 It also means that Christians, who claim to be saved through Jesus\u2019 death, cannot deserve salvation more than others.\u00a0 People receive this salvation not because they are better than others, but only when they repent and confess that, if anything, they are worse than others.\u00a0 Consequently, Jesus\u2019 true Church, or those who receive the benefits of his death, cannot belong to any one, superior nation.\u00a0 If most Americans claim to be Christians, this does not make America closer to God than other peoples.\u00a0 It only makes Americans who call themselves Christians more responsible to live as Jesus taught, and more guilty if they do not.<\/p>\n \u06f4\u066b) The Kingdom of Justice and Peace.\u00a0Jesus was the righteous king, who promoted righteous laws and social behaviors.\u00a0 His teachings were designed to create a new kind of social group.\u00a0 In Jesus\u2019 time, rich people were valued much more highly than poor people; similarly, men were valued over women, Jews over Gentiles (non-Jews), and strict religious people over unreligious people.\u00a0 But Jesus\u2019 teachings \u201creversed\u201d these ways of evaluating people..<\/p>\n Jesus sharply criticized wealth and showed special concern for the poor.\u00a0 Jesus valued and welcomed women, Gentiles and unreligious people in remarkable ways. \u00a0He did not mean that rich and poor social classes should literally exchange places, as in some versions of Marxism.\u00a0 Jesus meant that wealthy people should give up their quest for and dependence on wealth, so that all people could share the riches of the earth.\u00a0 Similarly, he meant that women and men, Gentiles and Jews, and religious and non-religious people should not change places, but develop fruitful and just relationships with each other.\u00a0 In this way God\u2019s Kingdom, expected at the End of history, would become present in some real sense.<\/p>\n