KINGDOM OVERVIEW 2 of 2

III. THE MEDIATORIAL KINGDOM IN THE TEACHING OF CHRIST

We come now over a period of four hundred years to the Mediatorial Kingdom in the teaching of Christ. I need scarcely remind you that the Gospels open with the announcement of a Kingdom. It is announced by angels, anticipated by the Magi, preached by John the Baptist, Christ Himself, the Twelve Apostles, and the Seventy. Very strong expres­sions are used to indicate the proximity of this Kingdom. As to its power, the Kingdom is "come upon" men. As to its Ruler, the Kingdom is "in the midst" of them. As to its complete establishment, the Kingdom is near "at hand". This is the very heart of our Lord's teaching.

Now the question naturally arises, what is the relation of this Kingdom announced by our Lord to the Kingdom set forth by the Old Testament prophets? To this question about three general answers have been made:

(1) The "Spiritual" view: that Christ took certain spiritual elements from the Old Testament prophets, dropped the physical and political aspects, and added some original ideas of His own.

(2) The critical view: that Jesus at first held the radical political and social notions of Old Testament prophecy, some of which were current among the Jews of His day: but later in the face of opposition He grew discouraged and changed His message. As to the exact nature of the change they are not wholly agreed.

(3) The Biblical view: that the Kingdom announced by our Lord was identical with that of the Old Testament prophets. I have named this third view the Biblical view because it is supported by the New Testament literature, taken at its face value, which, by the way, is the only material anyone has on the question.

That the Kingdom announced by Christ as "at hand" was identical with the Kingdom of Old Testament prophecy is very evident. The very name "Kingdom of Heaven", so often upon the lips of Jesus, was derived from Daniel 7:13-14, per­haps the clearest delineation of the Kingdom in the Old Testament. In support of His proclamation of the Kingdom, our Lord constantly appealed to the Old Testament prophets; and He characterizes two hesitant disciples as "foolish" because they have failed to believe "in all that the prophets have spoken". The closest search of the Gospel record will discover no passage in which Christ even intimates that His conception of the Kingdom is different from that of the prophets. If the prophets were wrong in any respect, how simple to say so. But there is nothing. Furthermore, the very events attending the appearance of the Messianic King demonstrate a literal identity of the two. Take but two examples: Micah had declared that the King who was "to be ruler in Israel would be born in Bethlehem”. And Zechariah, looking down through the centuries, sees Zion's King riding up to Jerusalem "upon an ass, even upon a colt the foal of an ass". Do I need to remind you that these aspects came to pass as predicted, and no legitimate criticism has been able to remove them from the literary and historical records?

Furthermore, in the works and teaching of Christ may be found every aspect of the prophetic Kingdom. It is basically spiritual; so much so that "Except a man be born anew" he cannot even see the Kingdom of God. Its ethical aspect is fully set forth in the Sermon on the Mount. (And it surprises some to know that there is very little absolutely new in this sermon, but nearly all may be found in the Old Testament at least in germ. The Beatitudes are transported almost bodily.) The correction of social evils appears in Christ's forecast of the establishment of His Kingdom when all such evils shall be sternly gathered out by supernatural agency. The ecclesiastical nature of His kingdom is recognized when He whips the money-changers out of the temple. Why not simply ignore the temple if, as some say, that God is done with Israel and the theocratic idea? On the contrary, as the Mediatorial Priest-King, He lays claim to the Jewish temple, and quotes a prophecy of the Kingdom in defense of His action, "My house shall be, called a house of prayer for all nations". Even the political aspect of the prophetic kingdom is assigned an important place in Matthew 25, (a passage often wrongly associated with the final judgment of the dead of which it says absolutely nothing) but which presents Christ's own description of Himself sitting upon a throne of glory judging between living nations on earth, in accord­ance with Isaiah's vision. As to the physical aspects of His Kingdom, read the New Testament record of blind men that saw, lame that walked, deaf that heard, lepers that were cleansed; read the record of multitudes fed by supernatural pow­er; read the records of deliverance from the hazards of wind and storm and vio­lence.

And this brings me to a passage so important that it must be quoted. John the Baptist is in prison for rebuking the immorality of an earthly ruler, strange situation for the forerunner of the great King who, according to the prophets, would correct all such injustices. Did John's faith waver? Probably so, for he sends word to Jesus, asking wistfully, "Art Thou He that cometh, or look we for another?" The answer of Jesus furnishes the infallible key to the interpretation of prophets and the relation of His own message to their vision of the Kingdom. "Go and tell John the things which ye hear and see: the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised, and the poor have good tidings preached to them." Such an answer was worth a thousand verbal affirmations. To John it proved that Jesus was the Messianic King of Old Testament prophecy. And to us it should prove what to John needed no proof, namely, that when the Kingdom comes it will be a literal king­dom, identical with the vision of the Old Testament prophets. But to this answer sent back to John in the Roman prison, our Lord adds a special word, a word intended to guard his mind against all future doubts. "Blessed is he," said Jesus, “Whosoever shall find no occasion of stumbling in Me". For Christ already knew from the rising tide of opposition that He would be rejected and the full establishment of His Kingdom long postponed; and John must die. (He walked bravely; I am sure, into the valley of the shadow with this last assurance of His Lord, the King.)

One other point should be noticed: the fact that John and Christ begin their preaching of the Kingdom "at hand" with no formal explanation of its char­acter proves that they assumed their hearers would know what Kingdom they were talking about. Why this assumption? The answer should be obvious: Israel had the prophets, read and taught in every synagogue. If the conception of Jesus had differed from the prophets, then a formal explanation was essential at the very beginning. But there is none. This lack of explanation has caused much specu­lation and disagreement among modern students. It should send us to the Old Testament!

Perhaps I should guard what I have said by explaining that while our Lord follows the Old Testament pattern in the proclamation of His Kingdom, He unfolds and interprets the utterances of the prophets. Thus meanings become fuller and richer. There is no mere slavish repetition of words and phrases. Furthermore, it is certain that He emphasized the spiritual and ethical aspects of the Old Testament picture. Why? Because the Jewish teachers had neglected these aspects which are the foundation of the Kingdom, and were concentrating almost wholly upon the political side. And like all preachers of the Word, Christ fought His battles over neglected truth. Today, were He standing in some pulpits, He might stress the other side.

In His own teaching, Christ and the Kingdom which He proclaimed were insep­arably connected. The Kingdom was "at hand" because the King was present. With­out the King there could be no Kingdom. To reject the King is to reject the Kingdom. And this brings us to a most significant fact, namely, that the Good News of the Kingdom was announced to Israel alone. Even down to the work of the Seventy, the disciples were expressly forbidden to enter into any "way of the Gentiles" of any "city of the Samaritans". More than one expositor has stumbled over the ultimatum of Christ, "I was not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel". The only adequate explanation is to see, what our Lord under­stood clearly, the contingent nature of His message of the Kingdom. To put the matter in a word: the immediate and complete establishment of His Kingdom depended upon the attitude of the nation of Israel, to whom pertained the divine promises and covenants. (Not that the favor of God terminated upon this nation, but that through them the covenanted blessings of the Mediatorial Kingdom would flow through them to the world of nations.)

That our Lord clearly understood the contingent nature of His Kingdom message is plain from His evaluation of John the Baptist and his meteoric career. Every intelligent Jew knew that the final word of the final Old Testament prophet predicted the appearance of Elijah as the precursor to the establishment of the Kingdom. And Jesus declares, in Matthew 11, concerning John, "If ye are willing to receive him, this is Elijah that is to come". Still later, when historical events have demonstrated the certainty of His rejection and death at the hands of the Jewish nation, our Lord again refers to John, but now the die is cast, "Elijah indeed cometh, and shall restore all things," He assures the disciples; but He adds, "I say unto you that Elijah is come already, and they knew him not". I do not hesitate to say that you have here the key to one of the most puzzling prob­lems of New Testament eschatology in relation to the Kingdom: The immediate establishment of the Mediatorial Kingdom on earth was contingent upon the attitude of Israel and still is. Those who fail to see this can make nothing out of certain portions of Christ's teaching.

It should be understood clearly that when I speak of contingency I refer to the human aspect of the matter. Our Lord was not caught by surprise. There are evidences in His very earliest words (recalled and recorded by the latest Gospel writer, as you might expect, knowing the historical sequence) which show that Christ saw His final rejection and Death. Furthermore, His ministry met with opposition from the beginning; even His popularity with the common people is only sporadic; the rulers were against Him from the start. This tide of opposi­tion grew steadily to a definite crisis, and can be easily traced in each of the Gospel records. It reaches this crisis when His miraculous credentials are not only denied validity, but are actually attributed to the powers of Evil, Very shortly afterward, having gathered His disciples about Him and having heard their adverse reports as to the public reaction toward His claims, we read: "From that time began Jesus to show unto His disciples, that He must go to Jerusalem. . suffer. . . and be killed".

We come now to a large and important body of material which may be termed His preparatory teaching in view of the certainty of His rejection by the nation of Israel. He outlines in a remarkable series of parables the future of the Kingdom in the mystery form which it will assume during the period of Israel's rejection. And the parabolic form of teaching, according to Jesus, is a divine judgment upon a people which has rejected a simple form of teaching. Further­more, He announces now for the first time the building of a new thing, The Church, something wholly unforeseen by the prophets. At the same time, in the clearest terms He reassures His followers that the Kingdom has not been abandoned, its es­tablishment on earth is but only postponed, and He carefully prepares them for the delay which will ensue before its ultimate establishment. On their way to Jerusalem, because His disciples still "supposed that the Kingdom of God was immediately to appear", He outlines the course of events in a parable: A nobleman goes into a far country; there He receives a Kingdom; then He returns; reckons with His servants who have been put to work during His absence; and suppresses all who rebel against His Kingdom and rule. This is the divine program, according to the Messiah.

In the face of certain rejection He leaves nothing in the prophetic program undone, but goes to Jerusalem and offers Himself finally and officially in exact accordance with Old Testament prophecy; The triumphal entry, celebrated by Christ­endom for the most part without understanding, was an event of tremendous import, fulfilling to the very day the most important time prediction of the Old Testament. Weeping over the city in divine compassion, because it "Knew not the time of its  visitation", our Lord turns to His disciples and privately unfolds the prophetic  program more fully, revealing the parenthesis of time which will intervene before His return to establish the Kingdom, but leaving its length undetermined for rea­sons which will appear later. He also forewarns the disciples of changed conditions which they will soon face. Under His immediate supervision they had gone out with­out scrip or purse and lacked nothing; but now when they go adequate material pro­vision must be made. The supernatural effects in the physical world, properly associated with the Kingdom, will recede into the background during the age of the Church; He also reveals more completely various details related to His Sec­ond Coming; There is a great wealth of material here which I cannot touch, ex­cept to say that His disciples are to "be faithful" during His absence, "prepared" and "watchful" for His return;

One of the striking facts is that during the death trials He continues calmly to urge, more clearly than ever before, His claims to be the Mediatorial King of Old Testament prophecy; Before Pilate, before the Sanhedrin, His testimony is unwavering; I take but one passage: Angered by His silence under accusation, the High Priest placed Him under oath to answer whether He is "the Messiah, the Son of God". His answer is memorable, "Thou hast said; furthermore, I say unto you that Henceforth ye shall see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming on the clouds of Heaven". The unmistakable reference is to the great­est Kingdom prophecy of the Old Testament, and He applies it to Himself; The High Priest, better schooled than some of our modern theologians, understood His claim, rent his clothing, and ordered Him to death for blasphemy; Even on the Cross, He exercises the royal prerogatives which He claimed, by opening the doors of Para­dise to a thief who prayed, "Lord, remember me when Thou comest into Thy Kingdom".

Why was Jesus rejected by Israel when He offered to them the Kingdom for which they longed? I offer six reasons merely as suggestive:

(1) The high spiritual requirements He laid down as essential for entrance into that Kingdom.

(2) His refusal to set up a Kingdom merely social and political in character;

(3) His denunciation of the rationalism and ritualism of the current religion;

(4) His arraignment of the ruling classes.

(5) His association with "sinners".

(6) His exalted claims for Himself.

This last, however, would have been no stum­bling block if Christ had given them their fleshly desires; The world will deify anybody who will give them what they want; But they will send to a Cross of shame the true God who asks them to receive what they do not want;

Do not make the mistake of the late Dr. Frank Crane, who blamed all this on the ruling class; Luke speaks of three classes who demanded Christ's death; the rulers, the priests, and the people. It was a combination of civil, relig­ious and democratic authority. And the "people" here was not merely a Jerusalem mob; it was the Passover season, and leading Jews from all the known world were present. The crowd was disappointed in its "hero". Great things materially had been expected from Him, and the applause turns suddenly to vicious anger when He apparently fails, helpless in the hands of His enemies. Nothing could be truer psychologically. The late President Wilson could tell you something about this curious reaction of crowds,

IV. THE MEDIATORIAL KINGDOM IN THE PERIOD COVERED BY THE ACTS

This must be passed over in a few sentences; In spite of all His teaching, the disciples had failed to harmonize the fact of His Death with their hopes concerning the Kingdom. "We had hoped," they say, "that this was He would redeem Israel". The solution of their problem was His Resurrection, as He reminds two of them on the way to Emmaus; "Behooved it not the Christ to suffer these things, and (after that) to enter into His glory". This would have been clear to them had they not been "slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken".

The Kingdom is not abandoned, but in answer to their inquiry as to when the Kingdom would be restored to Israel, He tells them that the time element is to remain hidden, but there is no indication that it may not come within their life­time; (We tend to read 2000 years into these passages.) Peter's sermon on the Day of Pentecost suggests that the Day of the Lord may be near at hand, and argues the right of Jesus to the Davidic throne; The effect was startling; three thousand are convinced, and their so-called communism suggests they were expecting the great social changes of the Kingdom immediately; But the key to the Book of Acts is in the third chapter where Peter speaking from the Temple Porch, with all the authority, makes to the nation of Israel an official re-offer of that Kingdom. The words are unmis­takable; the rejection and crucifixion of the King has not utterly lost for Israel her opportunity. If they will repent and turn again, their sins will be blotted, and Christ will be sent from heaven to restore all things spoken by the Old Testament prophets. And, to confirm the bona fide character of the re-offer of the Kingdom, you will find early in the Acts period many of the miraculous signs and wonders which were associated with our Lord's own original offer of the Kingdom. This is the best explanation of why you find some things in the Book of Acts which are not duplicated today; I do not mean to suggest that there is no miracles in the present age, but that they are of a different character, not great public demonstrations designed to compel belief, as in the Acts period; The very Greek terms indicate the character of these miracles; they are "signs" to a nation which by divine prophetic sanction had a right to demand signs;

But even the "signs" fail to convince, for the problem was spiritual and moral rather than intellectual, and throughout the book of Acts we can trace the same growth of Jewish opposition moving to a definite crisis of official rejection as in the ministry of Christ. It came, not in Jerusalem, but in the great metro­polis of Rome where Paul, now a political prisoner, gathers the wealthy and influential Jewish leaders into "his own hired house" in great numbers, to whom he spoke for an entire day, "testifying the Kingdom of God, and persuading them concerning Jesus". But there is no agreement, and the Apostle turns to the Gen­tiles finally and definitely. The Jewish die is cast, their holy city is shortly destroyed, they are scattered throughout the nations, a homeless people, until they are ready to receive their rightful King as He comes from heaven to save them in their last great extremity;

V. THE MEDIATORIAL KINGDOM DURING THE PRESENT CHRISTIAN ERA

Does the Mediatorial Kingdom exist in any sense during the present age, and what is the relation of the Church to it? And I refer now to the spiritual Body of Christ, the true Church, not that abnormal thing called Christendom; This Body of true believers is the Royal Family, the spiritual aristocracy, of the coming Kingdom; The Kingdom now exists on earth, therefore, but only in the sense that God is selecting and preparing this people who are to be the spiritual nucleus of the established Kingdom; Thus, as Christian believers, we actually enter the Kingdom before its manifestation.

This peculiar aspect of the Kingdom is set forth by our Lord in a series of parables which refer to the "mysteries" of the Kingdom; We learn that the present phase is to be a period of seed-sowing, of mysterious growth, mixed growth, and abnormal growth; a period of spreading error; a period which will come to the crisis of a harvest; yet out of this period, even apart from the harvest, will come a pearl of great price, the Church, and a treasure; the remnant of Israel purified and regenerated; Thus at present while God is gathering a spiritual nucleus for the coming Kingdom, those who are called "sons of the Kingdom", He is also permitting a parallel development of evil in the world; and both shall be brought to a harvest when good and bad will be separated, and the Kingdom established on earth in power and righteousness, at the Second Coming of the Mediatorial King;

VI. THE MEDIATORIAL KINGDOM DURING THE COMING AGE

The "age to come", as our Lord liked to call it, will be ushered in by the exercise of His immediate power and authority; He has all power now; He will take this power and use it to the full when He returns. The age-long silence of God, the taunt of unbelief, will be broken by the translation and resurrection of the Church; by the unloosing of judgment long withheld; by the visible and personal presence of the Mediatorial King; and by the complete establishment of His Kingdom on earth for a period specified by our Lord as a "1000 years". The New Testament description of this period is very brief with few details; Why?

            The Old Testament prophets had fully revealed these details, and the reader is presumed to know them; It is sufficient to say that during this period every aspect of the Mediatorial Kingdom as set forth in Old Testament prophecy is real­ized upon earth, truly the "Golden Age" of the world. Children are born, life goes on, men work and play, but under ideal conditions. The period closes with a brief rebellion of unsaved humanity, and the last judgment; its subjects are the "dead", not the living. And it is my conviction, based upon a study of the New Testament, that none will appear before that "Great White Throne" except those who have chosen death rather than life. The Christian does not belong to the "dead", and he cannot come into judgment for sin.

When the last enemy is put down by our Lord as the Mediatorial King, when even death is abolished and complete harmony is established, then the purpose of the Mediatorial Kingdom will be fulfilled. Then the Son will deliver up the Kingdom to God to be merged in the eternal Kingdom, thus being perpetuated forever, but no longer as a distinct entity. This does not mean the end of our Lord's rule. He only ceases to rule as the Mediatorial King. But as the Only Begotten Son, very God of very God, He shares with the Father the throne of the eternal Kingdom. In the final city of God, center of a redeemed new heaven and earth, there is but one throne, "the throne of God and of the Lamb".

"And his servants shall serve Him, and they shall see His face, And there shall be night no more; and they need no light of lamp, neither light of sun, for the Lord God shall give them light; and they shall reign unto the ages of the ages".