James K.A. Smith on Theocracy and Kingdom

Comment has just published a great piece (here) by James K.A. Smith offering ‘a caution for reactionary liberals who hear “theocracy” whenever Christians talk about “the kingdom.”’

He particularly has in his sights those who confuses dominionism (an understanding which thinks it’s our job to impose the kingdom here and now) ‘with the Christian political endeavour of an Abraham Kuyper’.

It’s not, he makes clear, that ‘the gospel is comfortably apolitical’. The language of the kingdom is ‘a reminder that Christianity is not just some privatized message of soul-rescue that we can comfortably fence off as “personal piety.”’ Still, ‘every time we pray “Thy kingdom come,” we are reminded it hasn’t arrived yet’.

Here, for me, is the killer paragraph:

‘[T]he arc of the biblical narrative includes a very important temporal pause button that the Dominionists ignore: we await the kingdom, we don’t impose it. In the meantime of our waiting, we hope to bear witness to our neighbours about these truths... not so we can “win” or “take over” or “have dominion” but because we believe these truths are gifts of insight into common human concern. We bring these insights to the table of public debate as a proposal to consider, not a fiat to be imposed. We hope to change things, but we see democracy as a gift for the saeculum and understand we need to persuade our neighbours. The biblical narrative teaches us to expect pluralism and difference in the meantime.’

Tim Chester on the Kingdom and the Cross

I’ve written some mini book reviews for EG, a quarterly publication from the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. I’ll post them individually here over the next week or so.

Tim Chester, Crown of Thorns: Connecting Kingdom and Cross (Fearn: Christian Focus, 2015).

The kingdom and the cross: what God has joined together, let no one separate. That’s the gist of this short but enormously valuable and timely book. Tim Chester helps us see that there are not two competing versions of the gospel – one focused on the kingdom with God’s plan to restore all things, the other focused on the cross with the offer of forgiveness for sin. Nor is the solution a delicate balance between the two dimensions, but a coordination ‘in which the cross is central to the gospel of the kingdom and the kingdom is central to the gospel of the cross’. Read this for a helpful exploration of the relationship between the kingdom announced by Jesus and the cross proclaimed by Paul, and for a wonderful reminder that the way of God’s rule is the way of the death and resurrection of the king.

More Videos from the Bible Project

The Bible Project continues to put together a series of helpful short videos, some of which introduce the structure and themes of biblical books, and others of which trace some major themes through the entire Bible.

Since I lost posted on this, several other Bible book videos have been made available (including on Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Song of Songs, and Mark), and a themed video on The Gospel of the Kingdom.

Check them out from here (click on ‘Videos’ or scroll down to the ‘Videos/Study Guides/Posters’ section) or see them all via YouTube here.

The Whole of Life for Christ (1): Whole-Life Gospel

I contributed today’s ‘Word for the Week’, a weekly email service provided by the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. It’s the first in a series introducing themes explored more fully in the book, The Whole of Life for Christ: Enriching Everyday Discipleship, written with Mark Greene.

How beautiful on the mountains

are the feet of those who bring good news,

who proclaim peace,

who bring good tidings,

who proclaim salvation,

who say to Zion,

‘Your God reigns!’

Isaiah 52:7

After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. ‘The time has come,’ he said. ‘The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!’

Mark 1:14-15

Many religions begin by telling people what they should do; Christianity begins with what God has done. And that, right there, is what the gospel is all about – not a set of good instructions or a piece of good advice, but the good news of what God himself has accomplished, for us and for the world, in Christ.

In the Roman Empire of the first century, heralds would spread the ‘good news’ of military victories or an emperor’s coming to the throne. But for Christians, the word ‘gospel’ also came loaded with Old Testament promises of salvation. Isaiah, in particular, declares the ‘good tidings’ of God coming in power, exercising his reign, saving his people, and establishing peace. Indeed, the closing chapters of his prophecy describe how God’s reign will be universal in its scope, embracing all nations, even renewing the whole cosmos. No wonder it’s described as ‘good news’!

It’s in this light that Mark describes Jesus preaching the ‘good news’ of the arrival of God’s reign – as the culmination of a story which reaches back into God’s dealings with his people. But as the account moves on, as Jesus walks the path to death and resurrection, it becomes clear that the promised salvation will come about through the servant promised by Isaiah who would suffer and die on behalf of others. Kingdom and cross are bound together in the gospel.

It’s often tempting to reduce the gospel to a personal transaction between me and God in which Jesus dies for me, I repent, and God forgives my sin. Certainly, the gospel is not less than that. But it’s much more, involving not only the rescue of men and women from judgment, but the renewal of God’s relationship with his people, and the restoration of creation itself. The good news of what God has done in Jesus carries zoom-lens implications for the redemption of individual sinners and wide-angle implications for the reconciliation of all things.

On this understanding, a commitment to the gospel is significant for the whole of life. At home and at work, in the art gallery and the sports arena, in business and in politics, walking the dog and washing the dishes, there is no place the gospel does not touch with its implications because of the comprehensive nature of God’s saving work in Christ, his rule over every aspect of life.

Jeremy Treat on the Kingdom and the Cross

A while back, I posted (here) on Jeremy Treat’s excellent book, The Crucified King: Atonement and Kingdom in Biblical and Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2014).

The Gospel Coalition have posted a short piece by him – ‘Kingdom and Cross: What God Has Joined Together, Let Not Man Separate’ – which does a great job of summarising the overall gist of the book.

Here are some taster paragraphs:

‘The kingdom and the cross ultimately are held together by the Christ, the one who reigns over the kingdom and suffers on the cross. But Jesus is no generic superhero; he is the messiah, the promised one of the unfolding story of a gracious God who has covenanted with Israel to restore his broken creation. This grand story of redemption provides the proper framework for understanding the connection between the kingdom and the cross.’

‘In short, the kingdom and the cross are held together by the Christ – Israel’s messiah – who brings God’s reign on earth through his atoning death on the cross. The kingdom is the ultimate goal of the cross, and the cross is the means by which the kingdom comes. Jesus’ death is neither the failure of his messianic ministry nor simply the prelude to his royal glory, but the apex of his kingdom mission; the cross is the throne from which Jesus rules and establishes his kingdom.’

Centre for Public Christianity (November 2013)

Among other items, the latest newsletter from the Centre for Public Christianity contains a link to a wide-ranging three-part video interview (on ‘beauty, justice and the faith that enhances life’) with Tom Wright, and an audio interview with Michael Jensen on ‘the counter theologies of post-Christian society that today replace belief in God’.

Contract or Covenant?

[I contributed today’s ‘Word for the Week’, a weekly email service provided by the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. It’s the ninth in a series on Jesus’ parables.]

For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard... The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner.

Matthew 20:1-2, 9-11

A landowner hires five sets of workers at different times of the day. Those recruited at dawn are promised a day’s wage, and those hired subsequently are assured they will be paid ‘whatever is right’; but when settlement time arrives, all receive the same. Small wonder that the action of the landowner has often been likened to God’s goodness in welcoming all, regardless of merit, into the kingdom.

Another reading has gained traction in recent years which argues that parables like this one show how oppression serves the interests of a ruling class. In this case, the parable depicts two extremes of agrarian society: a ruthless landowner and desperate peasants who are in no position to bargain. Far from being generous, the owner exploits an unemployed workforce to meet his harvesting needs.

For sure, the situation and characters reflect the economic realities of Jesus’ day, realities he was not averse to criticising. Here, though, the introduction suggests the landowner represents something of how God rules. And it’s possible to see him positively, not as ruthless, nor even incompetent in calculating how many workers he’d need to recruit, but in being compassionate to those in need of employment. What’s more, the parable begins and ends with a reference to the last being first and the first being last (19:30; 20:16). Who is ‘last’ and ‘first’ is highlighted with the order in which the workers are employed and then paid, the structure of the parable reinforcing the message of reversal in its frame.

Our response to the parable probably has a lot to do with where we see our place in the line – near the front or at the back. That we instinctively sympathise with the aggrieved workers suggests the difficulty of detaching ourselves from the conviction that rewards should match service rendered. Then as now, the parable challenges our sense of entitlement.

It also spotlights the nature of our relationship to the master. Those hired first are given the wages they have earned; what is given to those hired last is based less on their rights than on the owner’s right to be generous – the difference between a contract and a covenant. The parable helps us examine how far our discipleship is governed by contractual obligations rather than covenantal service. In doing so, it reorientates us towards the gracious presence of the kingdom. This is the way God rules.

Not Always Front-Page News

[I contributed today’s ‘Word for the Week’, a weekly email service provided by the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. It’s the seventh in a series on Jesus’ parables.]

He told them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.’ He told them still another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into about sixty pounds of flour until it worked all through the dough.’

Matthew 13:31-33

Languishing in prison, John the Baptist began to wonder whether Jesus really was ‘the one to come’. Things hadn’t worked out as he’d expected. It was not easy to see how an itinerant preacher from an inconsequential village, with a small band of followers, could be the hopes of Israel.

We too might sometimes puzzle over where and how God is at work in the world today. Or perhaps we don’t feel big enough or strong enough or important enough to make a difference where we are. Or we’re painfully aware that the church doesn’t look too impressive in the grand scheme of things.

And yet, ‘whoever has ears, let them hear...’

Jesus compares God’s reign to a mustard seed, proverbial for its tininess, planted in a field, which becomes a bush big enough to provide shelter for birds. Then Jesus likens the kingdom to yeast mixed into a large lump of dough, working its way through the whole lot, yielding enough bread to feed over a hundred people.

Old Testament passages have suggested to some that the tree refers to God’s sovereignty which provides shelter for the nations, the ‘birds’. Others have not been slow to point out the permeating influence of the yeast. But beyond these finer points of possible significance, what unites both parables is a striking contrast – between a tiny seed and a full-grown plant, between a small amount of yeast and a large lump of dough. The essential element is not the greatness of God’s reign or the transformation it will bring – neither of which would be doubted by Jesus’ hearers – so much as that what it will one day bring will be out of all proportion to its seemingly unimpressive, easily overlooked presence now.

For us, as for the first disciples, it’s an encouragement that God is at work – even if we don’t always see it as clearly as we’d like to. Indeed, something about the images Jesus uses reinforces the apparently ‘ordinary’ mode by which God’s reign is present – not always in an overwhelming display of cosmic strength, but no less significant for that. Jesus anticipates the powerful intervention of God in the fulness of time, but he also teaches that God’s liberating sovereignty and love is already present, with disciples called to live now in the light of that coming reign.

Mystery and Blessing

[I contributed today’s ‘Word for the Week’, a weekly email service provided by the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. It’s the sixth in a series on Jesus’ parables. Somewhat foolishly perhaps, I chose the passage about why Jesus speaks in parables, and I fear the reflections below are barely adequate for the issues involved.]

The disciples came to him and asked, ‘Why do you speak to the people in parables?’ He replied, ‘The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them... But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear.’

Matthew 13:10-11, 16

How, we might ask, does God exercise his kingly power in the world? And Jesus responds with stories of a farmer sowing seed, of yeast in a lump of dough, of treasure hidden in a field, of a net full of fish, of a man hiring workers for his vineyard, of a wedding banquet, of ten bridesmaids... Puzzled? Jesus’ parables are bound up with his announcement that God has begun to exercise his longed-for reign on earth – but it’s not always easy to see the links. Even the disciples found it difficult to draw the dots between the one and the other.

Jesus’ parables are often thought to be down-to-earth stories illustrating points which people would readily understand. But in many cases, instead of making the message clearer, they appear to make it harder to get! And there lies the challenge: implicit in every parable is a question – are your ears and eyes open to what God is doing?

Jesus’ answer to the disciples’ question gives us a clue – maybe even the key – to what’s happening when he teaches in parables. The disciples are distinguished from the crowds not by their instant and intuitive understanding of the parables, but by their seeking of explanations, and by having the ‘secrets of the kingdom’ revealed to them. So it is that they are ‘blessed’, says Jesus, not because they are cleverer than others, or more deserving than others, but because God has given to them what he has not given to others – just as God granted Daniel access to the divine ‘mystery’ that the Babylonian sages were unable to understand.

In this case, the disciples witness God fulfilling his promises of salvation, even though it’s not happening like most people thought it would or should. One day God’s rule will embrace the whole earth, but he is already at work in unexpected ways – and each of the parables in Matthew 13 illustrates something of this tension between the ‘already’ and the ‘not yet’ of God’s reign.

For us too comes the challenge and incredible privilege of discerning God at work in the everyday, perhaps in quiet and unanticipated ways. Now as then – for those blessed with eyes to see and ears to hear – it’s possible to detect the extraordinary in the ordinary. Where will you see evidence of his reign today?

Russell D. Moore on Life After Death

Russell D. Moore, ‘A Purpose-Driven Cosmos: Why Jesus Doesn’t Promise Us an “Afterlife”’, Christianity Today (27 February 2012).

The gospel of the kingdom, says Russell Moore, doesn’t shy away from questions about the inevitability of our own deaths or the seeming meaninglessness of the cosmos, ‘but our preaching tends to swerve around the answers it gives’:

‘Often we Christians start our gospel proclamation with triumph over sin. Fair enough: The gospel of Christ is indeed the reversal of sin, and of death and hell. But without a broader context, such teaching can treat Christ as a means to an end, a step from the alpha of Eden to the omega of heaven. In a truly Christian vision of the kingdom of God, though, Jesus of Nazareth isn’t a hoop we jump through to extend our lives into eternity. Jesus is the kingdom of God in person. As such, he is the meaning of life, the goal of history, and the pattern of the future. The gospel of the kingdom starts and ends with the announcement that God has made Jesus the emperor – and that he plans to bend the cosmos to fit Jesus’ agenda, not the other way around.’

In line with work published more fully elsewhere, Moore writes about the ‘already’ and the ‘not yet’ of the kingdom of heaven, a necessary tension which ‘seeks to avoid bringing the kingdom too near (in utopianism or political gospels) or keeping it too far (in prophecy-chart fixations or withdrawal from society)’.

Meanwhile, he says, every aspect of my life – my relationships, job, family, suffering – ‘is an internship for the eschaton, preparing me in some way to rule with Christ’. Moreover the world around us isn’t just a temporary environment, but part of our future inheritance in Christ.

We are betrayed, Moore notes, in how we speak about the ‘afterlife’ – as that which happens after we’ve lived our lives:

‘The kingdom, then, is like a high-school reunion in which middle-aged people stand around and remember the “good old days.” But Jesus doesn’t promise an “afterlife.” He promises us life – and that everlasting... For too long, we’ve called unbelievers to “invite Jesus into your life.” Jesus doesn’t want to be in your life. Your life’s a wreck. Jesus calls you into his life. And his life isn’t boring or purposeless or static.’

Winn Griffin on God’s Epic Adventure

Winn Griffin, God’s EPIC Adventure. The Story Before the Story: All You Know Is All You Know But All You Know Isn’t Enough (Harmon Digital Press, 2011).

A good friend has drawn my attention to the fact that the Kindle edition of the above book is currently available for £0.77 via Amazon UK (though I don’t know whether this price is fixed or temporary).

I’ve not yet looked at it closely enough, but I’m confident the book will be worth checking out. It looks like a follow-up of sorts to his earlier and excellent large-format workbook, God’s EPIC Adventure: Changing Our Culture by the Story We Live and Tell (Woodinville: Harmon Press, 2007).

Anyway, for the moment, here’s the product description:

‘The Story Before the Story is a straight forward presentation, which provides the reader of Scripture a simple but compelling introduction to reading Scripture as a story. This book interacts with four important concepts: foundationalism, fragmentation, story, and kingdom. Reading with a foundationalism concept without knowing it leads to a reduction of the text into principles, which produces patchwork followers of Jesus. The author believes that reading fragmentively produces fragmented lives in the followers of Jesus. Reading Scripture as a story is the antidote to foundationalism and fragmentation. Kingdom theology is the glue for the reader that holds the story together. This book is an invitation to read Scripture with both eyes open because all you know is all you know, but all you know isn’t enough.’

Equip to Disciple Issue Four (2011)

The fourth 2011 issue of Equip to Disciple is online here (5.6 MB pdf), with its usual assortment of articles and reviews (in amongst slightly too many adverts for my liking, but I’m glad if it helps pay the way for the publication).

Most significantly, the editor, Charles Dunahoo, contributes the second installment in an ongoing series on the kingdom, this one asking the question: ‘Should the church separate, identify, transform or... effectively be salt and light in the world?’

Equip to Disciple Issues Two and Three (2011)

The second and third 2011 issues of Equip to Disciple are online here (6 MB pdf) and here (3.7 MB pdf) respectively, carrying their usual assortment of brief articles and reviews (in amongst a pile of adverts).

I’ve been particularly interested in the article on the kingdom (the first of two parts) in Issue 3, in which the editor, Charles Dunahoo, addresses issues related to the so-called ‘two kingdoms’ approach to the church and culture. (The same issue also carries a review of David VanDrunen’s recent book, Living in God’s Two Kingdoms.)

Dunahoo advocates a ‘one kingdom model’:

‘We take the position... that the kingdom, which predates the church, now has the church at the heart of the kingdom. The kingdom is one and the church is part of that kingdom with the special assignment to make disciples for the purpose of worshipping and serving God in his Kingdom... While the church’s role is not to transform culture or society, as it disciples its people to live with a biblically reformed world and life view, their witness and influence will make an impact on the culture, not by embracing it, but by living a Christlike life in every area of life’ (9).

Chris Smith on Scot McKnight and Alan Hirsch on the Church-Kingdom Relationship

Alan Hirsch and Lance Ford, Right Here, Right Now: Everyday Mission for Everyday People (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2011).

Scot McKnight, One.Life: Jesus Calls, We Follow (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011).

These two books are near the top of my ‘to read’ pile.

For the moment, over at Englewood Review of Books, Chris Smith looks at them (here), particularly on what they say about the relationship between God’s universal reign and the local church.

His brief summary is that ‘Alan Hirsch is making the appeal that we need to loosen up the correlation between kingdom and church, while Scot McKnight is calling for a stronger correlation between kingdom and church’.

After some excerpts from Hirsch and McKnight (and some further elaboration from an interview with McKnight), Smith suggests they ‘are each framing their remarks about church and kingdom in response to two very different problems that emerge as we seek to embody a church-kingdom relationship’, and he hopes there might be a synergy between their two responses:

‘Scot is in essence addressing the problem of individualism, and our tendency to narrate the kingdom through our own individualized lens rather than through our commitment to and the discernment of the local church community... Alan, on the other hand, is addressing the problem of narrow-mindedness, the perspective that God’s kingdom is manifested only in the local church community.’

Scot McKnight on Jesus vs. Paul

Christianity Today carries a long-ish piece by Scot McKnight (beginning here) on the perennially-vexing question of the relationship between Jesus and Paul on ‘the gospel’

He begins:

‘Many biblical scholars and lay Christians have noted that Jesus preached almost exclusively about the kingdom of heaven, while Paul highlighted justification by faith—and not vice versa. Some conclude that they preached two different gospels. Others argue that really they both preached justification; still others say it's all about the kingdom. What gives?’

He notes that his own early experience of reading the gospels as they are ‘filtered through Paul's theology’ is not unusual for evangelicals, and he also thinks the Reformation and the Great Awakenings and revivals of the 18th and 19th centuries largely led to a ‘Paul-shaped movement through and through’. And yet, increasingly, he says, there is an ‘unmistakeable shift among many evangelicals from a Pauline-centered theology to a Jesus-shaped kingdom vision’.

‘It is not exaggerating to say that evangelicalism is facing a crisis about the relationship of Jesus to Paul, and that many today are choosing sides. I meet many young, thinking evangelicals whose “first language” is Jesus and the kingdom. Yet despite the trend, perhaps in reaction to it, many look to Paul and justification by faith as their first language. Those addicted to kingdom language struggle to make Paul fit, while those addicted to Paul’s theological terms struggle to make Jesus fit.’

According to McKnight, attempts to make the one fit the other only end up reducing the gospel – either it gets equated with the kingdom or it becomes a synonym for justification by faith.

Instead, leaning on 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 (in which, McKnight notes, there is not a word about ‘kingdom’ or ‘justification’), he says:

‘The gospel is first and foremost about Jesus. Or, to put it theologically, it's about Christology. Behind or underneath both kingdom and justification is the gospel, and the gospel is the saving story of Jesus that completes Israel’s story. “To gospel” is to tell a story about Jesus as the Messiah, as the Lord, as the Son of God, as the Savior.’

After some more elaboration of this point, he concludes:

‘My contention, then, is simple: If we begin with kingdom, we have to twist Paul into shape to fit a kingdom vision. If we being with justification, we have to twist Jesus into shape to fit justification. But if we begin with gospel, and if we understand gospel as Paul does in 1 Corinthians 15:1-11, then we will find what unifies Jesus and Paul – that both witness to Jesus as the center of God’s story.’

David Naugle on Kingdom Living: Developing a Biblical View of Life

The Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview recently came to the end of a 17-part series by David Naugle on ‘Kingdom Living: Developing a Biblical View of Life’ (see below for the individual entries and his summaries).

Naugle has written more fully on worldview in a number of places, but these 17 short articles provide an uncomplicated introduction to the three essential themes of creation, fall, and redemption that he sees at the heart of the biblical worldview.

Such a worldview, he notes in the first article in the series, takes the whole of Scripture into consideration – from Genesis to Revelation. It also provides a way of tackling the problem of dualism, what Naugle refers to as ‘the tendency to divide life itself up into airtight compartments of the sacred and the secular’, leading to a ‘false, fragmented approach to Christianity’ which ‘hands huge chunks of life over to the kingdom of darkness’.

‘In place of this sinister dualism, a Biblically-based worldview offers a fresh, motivating vision of wholeness. It embraces the entirety of life. It redefines the nature of sacred and secular in terms of obedience and disobedience respectively. It brings the totality of life under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Christianity is concerned about the whole person, the whole of life, and the whole world! For God is not a God of dualism, but of unity, integrity, and completeness.’

1. Introduction to the Christian Worldview
Every human being is shaped by his or her worldview. For Christians, understanding the worldview one holds is especially critical because a biblical worldview is shaped by Jesus Christ himself.

2. Where On Earth Are We?
Every human being is shaped by his or her worldview. One of the critical elements of the biblical worldview is that God created the heavens and the earth. Christians must understand the origins, nature, and purpose of the universe in which they live.

3. Who On Earth Are We?
Every human being is shaped by his or her worldview. Christians cling to a biblical worldview that explains the origin and purpose of the human species.

4. Why Are We Here?
Human beings are shaped by their worldviews. The biblical worldview holds that God created human beings, and that he did so for specific purposes. Understanding these reasons is critical for Christian living.

5. Man, Woman, Marriage
The biblical account of God creating man and woman provides unique and intimate insight concerning the purpose God has ordained for humankind. Humans were created in the image of God, a fact that carries highly significant ramifications for all theaters of life, particularly concerning human understanding of spirituality and marriage.

6. Humpty Dumpty: What’s Gone Wrong?
As in the famous nursery rhyme Humpty Dumpty, humanity has had a great fall. With the entrance of sin into the world through Adam and Eve, the plans God had for his creations were shattered like poor Humpty Dumpty. Fortunately for humanity, however, God provides a way for us to be put together again.

7. The Spread and Escalation of Sin (Genesis 4-11)
The opening chapters of Genesis provide the framework for understanding the rest of Scripture, and, indeed, the rest of human history. The sin of Adam and Eve resulted in the distortion of a good creation, as demonstrated through the stories found in Genesis 4-11.

8. The Fall in the New Testament: Jesus and Paul
Naugle discusses the New Testament depiction of sin as revealed in the teachings of Jesus and Paul.

9. A Theology of Creation and the Fall
Only through the lens of a biblical worldview can one pursue Kingdom living. In order to develop a biblical worldview, one must first determine an orthodox theology of creation and the fall.

10. Introduction to the Covenants
The overarching story of the Christian Bible is the story of redemption. The book of Genesis describes the creation of the world by God, the fall and distortion of this creation through the sin of mankind, and the subsequent promise God makes to redeem his creation – which he does! The biblical covenants illustrate the gracious, faithful, and loving character of God.

11. The Covenants with Noah and Abraham
Human beings are sinful; the biblical accounts of the flood and the Tower of Babel illustrate this sad fact. In his mercy, however, God has been working since the fall to redeem his creation. Part of how he accomplishes this goal is through covenants formed with Noah and Abraham.

12. Sinai, Davidic, and New Covenants
Since the entrance of sin into the world, God has been working to restore his creation. This process of redemption has been achieved through covenants, such as the ones made at Sinai and with David and culminating with the New Covenant of Jesus Christ.

13. Jesus Christ and the Kingdom of God
The Old Testament ends with a note of expectation: the people were waiting for the kingdom of God. Finally, John the Baptist announced the arrival of the Lamb of God and the kingdom of heaven.

14. Redemption in John and Paul
In the books of the New Testament, there is theological diversity. What unifies the theology of the New Testament is the redemptive work of Jesus Christ.

15. Ethics and Eschatology
Christian faith is rooted in the belief that Jesus Christ came as a human being and that he will come again as an eschatological judge and king. This belief informs how Christians live their lives.

16. Christianity and Culture
Christians must determine how they are to live in the world, despite the deep divide between the Christian community and the secular world. While Scripture warns against worldliness, it also exhorts believers to engage the culture rather than retreat from it. Different Christian traditions have approached this problem in different ways.

17. Redeeming Vocation
Lay Christian believers often feel as though they are second class citizens in the Kingdom of God compared to those who serve as missionaries or pastors. This spiritual dualism is one of the things that the Protestant Reformers worked to correct, and we must again work to return to a biblical understanding of vocation.

Mark L. Bailey on the Kingdom in Matthew 13

Mark L. Bailey, The Doctrine of the Kingdom in Matthew 13’, Bibliotheca Sacra 156 (1999), 443-51.

Mark Bailey concludes his last article in a series of eight on Matthew 13 with a series of helpful ‘applicational principles’ (though not all of them to be given equal weight, in my opinion):

1. Not everyone will respond to the message of the kingdom, and not all who do respond are equally fruitful.

2. Satan is personally active in seeking to prevent people from receiving the message of God’s kingdom.

3. Both external pressures and internal distractions hinder the proper appropriation of the Word of God.

4. God desires that people hear, understand, and apply the truth of His Word in order to be fruitful for Him.

5. The hearers of the Word are at least partially responsible for the level of productivity in their lives.

6. Jesus’ followers should realize that Satan sends his representatives into the world to masquerade as sons of the kingdom to disrupt and hinder the work of Christ.

7. Believers need to be realistic about the presence of hypocrites, but believers should not assume the role reserved for Jesus by seeking to judge others.

8. Servants of the Lord need to wait patiently for Jesus to judge and separate the wicked from the righteous.

9. People should decide to be followers of Christ in light of the impending judgment which will determine their eternal destiny.

10. God has promised the righteous a glorious future in the shared reign of the Son and the Father in the next phase of the kingdom, Jesus’ rule on earth.

11. The success of God’s work cannot be fully evaluated until the time of the judgment.

12. Messiah has come in humility and will one day reign in sovereignty.

13. The work of the Spirit authenticates the ministry of Jesus Christ.

14. Jesus’ disciples need to depend on the invisible yet powerfully transforming work of the Holy Spirit.

15. The kingdom of heaven should be the highest priority of anyone who finds it.

16. No sacrifice is too great in light of the value of the kingdom.

17. The joy of participating in the kingdom should motivate Jesus’ followers to make whatever sacrifice is necessary.

18. Discipleship calls for wholehearted dedication to God’s kingdom purposes.

19. Participation in God’s kingdom is not restricted to any single race.

20. Jesus places a high priority on evangelism to all classes and cultures.

21. The need to evangelize the world is motivated by the reality of future judgment.

22. God’s judgment will be based on inner character rather than cultural backgrounds.

Jonathan T. Pennington on Matthew 13

Jonathan T. Pennington, ‘Matthew 13 and the Function of the Parables in the First Gospel’, Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 13.3 (2009), 12-20.

Before looking more specifically at Matthew 13 itself, Pennington considers the place of Jesus’ parables in his ministry more generally. He draws here on the work of N.T. Wright, noting that ‘several of Jesus’ parables are quite close to apocalyptic discourse, with a strange story interpreted so that its secret symbols may be understood by those with ears to hear’. The disciples ‘play the role of seers with Jesus as both revealer and interpreter of the mystery. And inevitably, this mystery is about the story of Israel and God’s coming work and judgment’ (13).

‘Jesus’ parables are not merely ways of communicating information about the coming kingdom but much more radically, they are a retelling and retooling of the very story of the OT, now centered and consummated in Jesus himself… The parables are not simply teaching or informing or making a moral or religious point. They are instead the vehicle for the paradoxical and dangerous campaign which Jesus was undertaking, namely a redefinition of the people of God and a reorientation of the grand story of Israel’s hope’ (13).

This is important for Matthew 13 too, where the separation at the end-time harvest ‘is not based on ethnic Israel identity but faith-response in Jesus’ (13).

Matthew 13 is a ‘lodestar’ for understanding parables in Matthew, because it is one of Matthew’s five major blocks of teaching, it stands apart from the other discourses in containing only parables, it contains two explicit quotations from the Old Testament related to why Jesus teaches in parables, and it is placed at a crucial turning point in the narrative (see 14).

The discourse itself is intricately structured. There are seven parables, leading off with the four soils (13:1-9). After a conversation with the disciples on why Jesus speaks in parables, containing a quotation from the Old Testament (13:10-17), comes an explanation of the four soils (13:18-23).

Then, the remaining parables come in two sets of three. The longish parable of the wheat and the weeds (13:24-30) is followed by two shorter parables (mustard seed, leaven, 13:31-33). With 13:34 comes a transition in the chapter and another quotation from the Old Testament (13:35), after which comes an explanation of the wheat and the weeds (13:36-43). These are parables of ‘spreading or growth’ (15).

The next three parables are in reverse to what has gone before, with two shorter ones (treasure, pearl, 13:44-46) followed by a longer one of the net with an explanation (13:47-50).

The first four parables have a ‘farming’ theme, while the last three have a ‘merchant/business’ theme (15). The second and the seventh parables both ‘describe a mixed group of good and bad’ (16), both are explained by Jesus, and both are about separation at the end of the age.

Pennington holds that three threads run through the entire chapter: the sower, the secret, and the separation (see 16-18).

The sower
It is apparent that the first parable ‘is not primarily an exhortation to be fruit-bearing ourselves but is rather an explanation of the mixed reception to Jesus’ kingdom message’ (16). The parable describes what happens when the seed is sown.

The secret
The disciples do not know what to make of the parable of the sower (13:10), and Jesus’ answer ‘is as shocking as his parable is vague’, for he is teaching in parables ‘not to reveal the truth of God to all, but to conceal’ (17).

‘So, even though our tendency in Christian understanding is to think of Jesus’ parables as evidence of his down-to-earth, relating-to-the-people teaching style, in reality they are just the opposite.’ The shift from the plain style in the Sermon on the Mount to parabolic teaching comes after the opposition in chapter 12, when Jesus ‘changes his teaching style to this prophetic double-functioning mode so that he can simultaneously judge and proclaim’ (17).

The separation
Jesus’ parables themselves separate those with understanding from those without, a theme which ‘goes through all three of the major parables here in chapter 13’ (17). ‘The Great Separation is already occurring according to how one responds to Jesus and his message. All who follow Jesus are the holy remnant whom God has graciously preserved even in the midst of His justified judgment’ (18).

•••

‘Jesus’ parabolic teaching is a sowing of the Word in the world. This Word from God is simultaneously a message of judgment on the unbelieving and a word of hope and blessing for the believing. The Word both reveals and conceals and in the process it performs a great separation of all people (cf. Heb 4:12), based on their response to the Son, the Incarnate Word’ (18).

Word for the Week: Whole Life, Whole Bible (30/50) – His Ministry of Healing: In Word and Deed

‘Word for the Week: Whole Life, Whole Bible’, from London Institute for Contemporary Christianity, is a series of fifty emails designed to look at the main milestones of the biblical story, seeking to show how whole-life discipleship is woven through Scripture as a whole, from beginning to end. Here is the thirtieth of the fifty emails.

Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people. News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed; and he healed them. Large crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea and the region across the Jordan followed him.
Matthew 4:23-25

Matthew summarises here what he describes more fully elsewhere, and what the other gospel writers also make clear – that the story of Jesus cannot be presented without telling of his acts of power and compassion, of healing and transformation.

The ancient world had its fair share of ‘healers’, but Jesus was different – and people knew it. Not only does the list of those healed emphasise the authority of Jesus over all kinds of sickness, but his healings are a sign that, after years of seeming silence, God’s saving rule is now beginning to dawn in Israel. In words and in works, Jesus is proclaiming nothing less than the arrival of God’s reign, announcing and enacting the presence and power of the kingdom – bringing sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, mobility to the lame, even life to the dead.

In the exorcisms, individuals oppressed in different ways are freed, signalling a defeat for the powers of darkness. Their deliverance – not by any magical means, but by a rebuke and a command – mark the presence of the kingdom. Where those with skin diseases of various kinds are socially ostracised, Jesus breaks taboos in stepping outside the ‘circle of purity’ in order to rescue them, not only making them whole but reintegrating them into the community. All of which shows that the works of the kingdom are not just an exercise of bare power but an expression of covenant love – bringing liberation and renewal, touching the whole of our lives, reconstituting the people of God.

In his ‘nature miracles’ too, Jesus demonstrates the good news he proclaims, that God’s rule over all creation – not just Israel – is being exercised. His works reveal in advance something of God’s purposes for the restoration of the whole created order, offering us glimpses of a renewed cosmos from which the powers of darkness will be ejected, when sickness and pain will be no more, and God’s creation will be restored to its original harmony.

Within the context of the gospels – and as the letters will make clear – the victory is bound up with the work he will do on the cross and in his resurrection. Meanwhile, as we look forward to the final redemption that will come to every part of creation, we delight that no area of the world is beyond God’s reach, no aspect of life is exempt from his rule.

For further reflection and action:

1. Read about some of Jesus’ works of healing and deliverance in Matthew 8-9.

2. Jesus proclaimed the coming of the kingdom not only with words but with deeds of power. How far can we be faithful to his teaching without acknowledging the place of healing and casting out demons? Dare we exclude the possibility of miracles today?

3. Even so, God normally works in normal ways through normal means. Reflect on the everyday, ‘normal’ ways you see God at work in your own life and in the lives of others.

Word for the Week: Whole Life, Whole Bible (28/50) – His Proclamation of the Kingdom: The Lord Reigns

‘Word for the Week: Whole Life, Whole Bible’, from London Institute for Contemporary Christianity, is a series of fifty emails designed to look at the main milestones of the biblical story, seeking to show how whole-life discipleship is woven through Scripture as a whole, from beginning to end. Here is the twenty-eighth of the fifty emails, this one written by Helen Parry.

After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. ‘The time has come,’ he said. ‘The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!’
Mark 1:14-15

What was Jesus talking about? What is the kingdom of God, or the kingdom of heaven (Jesus appears to have used the phrases interchangeably)? Is it present or future? Spiritual or temporal?

In fact, it is all of the above. All four uses of the phrase are implied in Jesus’ teaching. And in all four senses the kingdom was inaugurated by Jesus.

When God broke into human life, incarnating the eternal Word in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, a new era dawned. The impossible became possible. ‘The kingdom of God has come near’ (or ‘is at hand’), Jesus said, and ‘the kingdom of God is among you’.

The kingdom of God is essentially the rule of God. So whenever Jesus exercised the authority of God he was putting down a marker for the kingdom. ‘If I drive out demons by the Spirit of God,’ he argued, ‘then the kingdom of God has come upon you’ (Matthew 12:28). Such events were a foretaste of the victory that Jesus won over Satan by his death and resurrection, when, ‘having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross’ (Colossians 2:15).

The final establishment of the kingdom, of course, awaits Jesus’ return, when ‘he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power’ (1 Corinthians 15:24).

So where does this leave us, living as we do between Jesus’ resurrection and his final triumph? To the extent that we allow Jesus to reign over our lives, to that extent the kingdom has come; and to the extent that we allow Jesus to reign in the Church, to that extent the kingdom has come. But it is also true that as we proclaim and live out the values of the kingdom, the values of the world are challenged, the boundaries of the kingdom of darkness are pushed back. We are, as Jesus said, ‘the light of the world’ (Matthew 5:14).

Proclaim and live out – a double challenge. In an age desperately in need of values to live by, we are called to speak up for the values of the kingdom – for integrity, commitment, truthfulness and compassion. But we can all, also, submitting to Christ’s rule in our lives, live by these values, and even in the smallest way seek to change the culture of our workplaces or our community.

Helen Parry

For further reflection and action:

1. ‘Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven’ (Matthew 6:10). What might it mean for you, in your particular situation, to pray this prayer today?

2. As a citizen of the kingdom, an ambassador for Christ, where is your ‘front line’ (the place where you spend most of your time in an ordinary week)? How – at this point – can you seek to challenge prevailing attitudes and ways of doing things, and seek to recommend kingdom values?