Your Daily Bread
We invite you to participate with us in a daily devotional time called “Your Daily Bread.” These daily devotions will come to you via our podcast network. It is through these daily podcasts that we hope you use to allow God to minister to your daily need enabling you to walk each and every day in the spirit of Christ.
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Your Daily Bread
Kingdom of God
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Hello, my name is Paul, and I am the voiceover for a ministry provided to you by Jim Pug at God is Government called Your Daily Bread, taken from Christ's teaching of the Lord's Prayer in Matthew 6, verse 11. This is a daily devotion ministry focused not only on uplifting Scripture, but Scripture that will grow your spiritual connection with Christ. We hope that you receive these devotions to uplift you, encourage you, but most importantly, advance your knowledge base of the Holy Scriptures. Today's focused discussion will be on understanding the kingdom of God. In Christianity, the kingdom of God is the spiritual realm where God rules as king, or the fulfillment of God's will on earth. It is a central concept in the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament and is also referred to as the Kingdom of Heaven. Here are some characteristics of the Kingdom of God. Government. The Kingdom of God is a real government established by God, with Jesus Christ as its King. It has many similarities to human governments, but is superior in every way. Duration. Unlike human governments, the kingdom of God will never be brought to ruin. Subjects. Anyone who does what God requires can be a subject of the kingdom, regardless of their ancestry or birthplace. Laws. The laws of the kingdom of God raise the moral character of its subjects, and do more than just prohibit wrong behavior. Presence. The kingdom of God is present in the world, but is awaiting its fulfillment at the second coming of Christ. Manifestation. The kingdom of God comes to life when people of faith gather and call for God's help. Suppose someone asked you that question, what is the kingdom of God? How would you respond? The easy answer would be to note that a kingdom is that territory over which a king reigns. Since we understand that God is the creator of all things, the extent of his realm must be the whole world. Manifestly then, the kingdom of God is wherever God reigns, and since he reigns everywhere, the kingdom of God is everywhere. But I think my pastor was getting at something else. Certainly the New Testament gets at something else. We see this when John the Baptist comes out of the wilderness with his urgent announcement, repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand. We see it again when Jesus appears on the scene with the same pronouncement. If the kingdom of God consists of all of the universe over which God reigns, why would anyone announce that the kingdom of God was near or about to come to pass? Obviously, John the Baptist and Jesus meant something more about this concept of the kingdom of God. It is a kingdom that will be ruled by God's appointed Messiah, who will be not just the redeemer of his people, but their king. So when John speaks of the radical nearness of this breakthrough, the intrusion of the kingdom of God, he's speaking of this kingdom of the Messiah. At the end of Jesus' life, just as he was about to depart from this earth, his disciples had the opportunity to ask him one last question. They asked, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? Acts 1, 6b. I can easily imagine that Jesus might have been somewhat frustrated by this question. I would have expected him to say, How many times do I have to tell you, I'm not going to restore the kingdom to Israel? But that's not what he said. He gave a patient and gentle answer. He said, It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in his own authority, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. Acts 1, 7-8. What did he mean? What was he getting at? When Jesus told Pilate, My kingdom is not of this world, was he indicating that his kingdom was something spiritual that takes place in our hearts? Or was he speaking of something else? The whole Old Testament called attention, not to that it would simply appear in people's hearts, but to a kingdom that would break through into this world, a kingdom that would be ruled by God's anointed Messiah. For this reason, during his earthly ministry, Jesus made comments such as, If I cast out demons with the finger of God, surely the kingdom of God has come upon you. Similarly, when Jesus sent out seventy disciples on a preaching mission, he instructed them to tell impenitent cities that the kingdom of God has come near you, Luke 10, 11b. How could the kingdom be upon the people or near them? The kingdom of God was near to them, because the king of the kingdom was there. When he came, Jesus inaugurated God's kingdom. He didn't consummate it, but he started it. And when he ascended into heaven, he went there for his coronation, for his investiture as the King of kings and Lord of Lords. So Jesus' kingship is not something that remains in the future. Christ is king right this minute. He is in the seat of the highest cosmic authority. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to God's anointed Son, Matt 28.18. The kingdom of God is wherever God reigns, and since he reigns everywhere, the kingdom of God is everywhere. I looked at it and it said, Our citizenship is in heaven, Phil 3.20A. The guard was a Christian. He turned to his subordinates and said, Let these people alone. They're okay. They're Christians. As you can imagine, I said, Thank you, Lord. This man understood something about the kingdom of God, that our first place of citizenship is in the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God trumps every earthly kingdom. I'm a Christian first, an American second. I owe allegiance to the American flag, but I have a higher allegiance to Christ, because he is my king. So I had a dilemma. I didn't want to violate the law of the United States, and I didn't want to communicate that the kingdom of God is subordinate to a human government. So I solved the dilemma easily enough. I took both flags out of the church. We experience this conflict of kingdoms when Jesus tells us to pray, Your kingdom come. What does this mean? What are we praying for when we speak this petition? There is a logic that runs like a ribbon through the Lord's Prayer. Each of the petitions is connected to the others. The first petition Jesus taught us was, hallowed be your name, which is a plea that the name of God would be regarded as holy. Manifestly, unless and until the name of God is regarded as holy, his kingdom will not and cannot come to this world. But we who do regard his name as holy, then have the responsibility to make the kingdom of God manifest. John Calvin said, It is the task of the Church to make the invisible kingdom visible. We do that by living in such a way that we bear witness to the reality of the kingship of Christ, in our jobs, our families, our schools, and even our checkbooks. Because God in Christ is king over every one of these spheres of life. The only way the kingdom of God is going to be manifest in this world before Christ comes is if we manifest it by the way we live as citizens of heaven and subjects of the King. Thank you for joining us in this exploration of the Kingdom of God. Until next time, remember to keep the faith, stay strong, and continue to shine your light in the world. To hear these daily devotions of your daily bread, please log on to goddessgovernment.com. Goodbye, and may your faith always lead the way.
