As believers in Christ we are the increase of Christ and we cooperate with Him to propagate the resurrected, ascended, and all-inclusive Christ as the development of the kingdom of God on earth.
This week we focus on the matter of the development of the kingdom of God.
In Matt. 5 the Lord Jesus began to teach concerning the constitution of the kingdom of the heavens, which is a particular section of the eternal kingdom of God, and the first word He said is, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of the heavens.
This indicates that, regarding the kingdom of God, we need to be poor in spirit, emptied and unloaded of anything that would occupy us, so that we may receive the Lord’s fresh new speaking concerning His kingdom.
If we are to have a spiritual understanding of the kingdom and participate in the development of the kingdom, we need to let go of anything occupying out spirit, not having confidence in what we have seen or we know.
The Lord has shown us much concerning His kingdom, but we cannot say that we have a thorough understanding of every aspect of the kingdom of God.
We need to have our inner being stretched, our heart to be enlarged, and our mind to be delivered from its smallness, so that we may have a genuine spiritual understanding of the development of the kingdom of God.
The kingdom of God is a mystery; in Mark 4, after the Lord spoke the parable of the kingdom seed, the disciples asked Him to show them what is the meaning of this parable, and the Lord told them, The kingdom of God is a mystery, but to you it has been given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God.
This means that our natural man and our natural concept cannot grasp the concept of the kingdom of God; it can only understand that the kingdom is a vast territory filled with people ruled over by a person with authority, a king or an emperor.
The kingdom of God is a mystery because the nature and the character of the kingdom are absolutely divine, and the elements through which the kingdom is brought forth are the divine life and the divine light; therefore, we need a revelation to understand the kingdom of God.
Seeing what is the Kingdom of God and what is the Development of the Kingdom of God
Why is it that God wants a kingdom on earth? The Lord Jesus instructed us to pray for the kingdom to come on earth and for His will to be done on earth.
But why does God need a kingdom among men? God wants and needs a kingdom because He needs a realm where His will is carried out, where His will is done.
God needs on earth a group of people that would become a realm which enables Him to do whatever is in His heart and carry out His will on the earth.
God needs a kingdom to deal with the satanic kingdom, to defeat His enemy, to abolish the kingdom of Satan, and to utterly subdue the principle of rebellion.
In this light, what is the kingdom of God? The kingdom of God is for the executing of God’s authority; in His kingdom God can exercise His authority.
When the Lord Jesus was resurrected, He said, All authority in heaven and earth was given to me… – today we are in the kingdom of God in reality in the church life, and in the developing reality if the Lord can exercise His authority over us.
The kingdom of God is the ruling, the reigning of God with all its blessings and enjoyment. With the Lord’s ruling and reigning there’s not only the exercise of authority, but an unfathomable and inexhaustible blessing, and a marvellous enjoyment.
This is why Paul referred to “the kingdom of the Son of His love”. The love that God has for His Son extends to the many sons as the reproduction of the firstborn Son, and the atmosphere in God’s kingdom is love, full of light and love.
The kingdom of God is the realm in which God exercises His authority so that He may express His glory for the fulfilment of His purpose. The kingdom of God is a realm where God exercises His authority not as dictator or a tyrant but to express His glory.
In this kingdom there’s no glory for any of the citizens – only God gets all the glory. When we consider the development of the kingdom of God, we need to realize that the Christ we are propagating – the resurrected, ascended, and all-inclusive Christ – is Himself the kingdom, so we are propagating Christ as the development of the kingdom of God.
The development of the kingdom of God as the kingdom of the divine life is the spreading of Christ as life to His believers to form a realm in which God rules in His life.
The development of the kingdom of God as the spreading of Christ as life has many aspects, as seen in the book of Acts. The development of the kingdom of God is being added to the Lord (Acts 5:11).
Because Christ Himself is the kingdom of God (see Matt. 17:20-21) who came, was crucified, resurrected, became a life-giving Spirit, and in resurrection He’s still the kingdom!
As such a One He enters into us not only as life, as the Spirit, or as the King, but also as the kingdom; when we’re regenerated, we are born anew, born from above, born of water and the Spirit, so that we are added to the Lord, the unique Person who is the kingdom of God.
In a second stage of the development of the kingdom of God, we see that the Lord sows Himself through His word as the seed of the kingdom into the soil of our heart.
When our heart is a good earth, an honest heart, the seed will sprout, grow, and develop inside of us, and this seed will develop and increase in all our inward parts, our soul, and our heart, to become a realm in which the Lord rules in life.
According to Rom. 14:17, the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit; according to the context, the church is the kingdom of God today in its reality and practicality.
The kingdom spreads not only inside the individual believers, but when there’s a local church, the kingdom is expanding!
And even more, when we in the local churches are being built up in the kingdom of God as typified by the city of God, we are built up to represent the Lord, to exercise His authority to bind and loose, and to become the increase of Christ in His administration.
The church as the house of God is the increase of Christ in life (typified by the temple in the Old Testament, which was recovered in Ezra and Zechariah); the church also is the city of God (represented by the city, as recovered through Nehemiah and Zerubbabel).
Lord Jesus, unveil us to see the mystery of the kingdom of God and participate in propagating Christ as the development of the kingdom of God. Thank You Lord for transferring us out of the authority of darkness and into the kingdom of the Son of God’s love to be under God’s reigning with all its blessings and enjoyment. Lord, grow in us as the seed of the kingdom until our inward parts become a realm in which the Lord rules in life. Build us up together with the saints, Lord, so that we may become part of the development of the kingdom of God in the church and through the church!
Seeing how in Acts the Believers are Spreading Christ as the Development of the Kingdom of God
The Gospel of Luke is a narrative of the ministry of the incarnated Jesus as a record of the incarnated Jesus on earth; it ends with the Lord’s ascension into heaven (Luke 24:51), and this is what the book of Acts begins with.
The book of Acts is a record of the succeeding ministry of the resurrected and ascended Christ in heaven carried out through His believers on earth. In the Gospels we see how the Lord Jesus carried out His ministry on earth, and He sowed Himself as the seed of the kingdom into His believers; however, there was no church that was yet built up.
In Acts we see the Lord’s ministry in heaven, and His disciples cooperate with Him to carry out His ministry on earth to spread Him as the development of the kingdom of God for the building up of the church (Matt. 16:18) throughout the entire world to constitute His Body, His fullness (Eph. 1:23), to express Him, even the fullness of God (3:19) for God’s expression.
As we today are in the continuation of the book of Acts, we are here to propagate Christ as the development of the kingdom of God for the building up of the church as the Body of Christ.
When the Body of Christ is sufficiently built up today, the Bride of Christ will be prepared, and Christ will return secretly to rapture His overcomers, His bride.
When the ascended Christ, the Head, determines that the maturing overcoming ones in the churches have brought forth the reality of the Body, this will equal the preparation of the bride, and the Lord will return.
Then there will be three and half years of great tribulation, and the wedding feast starts; then there will be the bridal warrior coming with Christ at Armageddon to deal with the enemy, and Christ with His corporate warrior-bride will become the smiting stone to strike the toes of the great human image and eliminate the human government. Wow!
And this stone will fill the whole earth to become a great mountain, the kingdom of God.
It is crucial for us today to cooperate with the Lord for the building up of the Body as the full development of the kingdom of God, then the Bride, the army, the stone, the mountain will take place, and the age will be changed.
In Acts we see that the kingdom as God’s reign in the sense of life goes in parallel with the church; the kingdom and the church are frequently mentioned together. Many verses speak of the kingdom (Acts 1:3; 8:12; 14:22; 19:8; 20:25; 28:23, 31), and many other verses speak of the church (5:11; 8:1, 3; 9:31; 11:22, 26; 12:1, 5; 13:1; 14:23, 27; 15:3-4, 22, 41; 16:5; 18:22; 20:17, 28).
The Lord Jesus trained His disciples after His resurrection and before His ascension, speaking to them the things concerning the kingdom of God.
Then in the book of Acts the church is brought in; there was the church in Jerusalem (see Acts 8:1), and the kingdom was preached. Acts show us that the kingdom and the church are a pair, for the kingdom goes in parallel with the church.
We can say that the church life is intimately related to the kingdom because the kingdom is the life pulse of the church.
Lord Jesus, thank You for bringing us into the kingdom of God in as the realm of the divine life. Thank You for coming into us as the kingdom of God at our regeneration to make us part of the development of the kingdom of God. Lord, we want to cooperate with You today to spread Christ as the development of the kingdom of God for the building up of the church as the Body of Christ. Amen, Lord, show us that the kingdom is the life pulse of the church, and keep us cooperating with You for the spreading of Your kingdom in us and through us!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by James Lee for this week, and portions from, The Conclusion of the New Testament, msg. 240 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Propagating the Resurrected, Ascended, and All-inclusive Christ as the Development of the Kingdom of God (2018 fall ITERO), week 8, The Development of the Kingdom of God.
- Hymns on this topic:
# Jesus the kingdom has come into us, / Reigning and shining He’s all glorious, / Christ as the seed is the King who has come, / Into our spirit His kingdom He’s sown. / O let Him grow, O let Him grow; / His kingdom life be all we know. / Jesus, the kingdom is sown into us; / Jesus, the kingdom, O how glorious! (Hymns #1301)
# The Church’s seed is nought but Christ Himself / Sown into human hearts as life, thereby / Growing as wheat, producing flour fine / For bread both God and man to satisfy. (Hymns #829)
# God’s kingdom is God’s reigning, / His glory to maintain; / It is His sovereign ruling, / His order to sustain. / He exercises fully / His own authority / Within His kingdom ever / And to eternity. (Hymns #941)
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