The Case for Christendom (pt. 4)
"How much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him?"
Today I present my fourth thesis in the Case for Christendom. If you missed it, here’s the third installment:
Thesis 4 - The kingdom will come on earth as in heaven
When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them how to pray, his response was not merely to give them some standard petitions.“Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” is not merely a request. It is a desire, a longing, a hope.
Now ask yourself: if Jesus told his disciples to pray that God’s kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven, might this be a prayer that his Father is ready and willing to answer? Might it be the very purpose for which he keeps his children on earth instead of zapping them up to heaven? Did he give us a false hope? Did he teach us to pray for something the Father doesn’t intend to give?
The very center of the gospel message Jesus preached was “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matt. 4:17). He had a burning zeal to “preach the gospel of the kingdom of God” (Luke 4:43), and his ministry is described as “teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people” (Matt. 4:23).
Jesus announced that the kingdom was near, but he had not yet been enthroned. His was a two-part enthronement. First, upon the cross where he donned a crown of thorns. Secondly, in his ascension to the Father’s right hand where he rules over history until every one of his enemies has been subdued, after which he will return in glory.
Many believers fail to recognize the reality of this second enthronement and give exclusive attention to the first. Such believers are all cross and no resurrection, no ascension. But the gospel proclaims that Jesus both died and rose again and is seated at the Father’s right hand. His rising again was not merely proof that God accepted his sacrifice. Rather his rising again was the beginning of the new creation, and his ascension was his receiving authority to bring this new creation about. It was not as though Christ could conquer death in this world and then not forever alter the nature of this world. True, up until Calvary the world had been descending into death. But Jesus’s death exhausted Death of its power, and in his resurrection began the long, slow, yet very sure process of reversing death and, lo! the actual coming of God’s kingdom on earth as in heaven.
This was the apostolic expectation because it’s how Jesus taught his disciples to pray.
Not an escape to heaven.
Not merely a final future coming of the kingdom, though that is the fullness of our hope.
But rather, like Christ said, the slow, steady, inescapable growth of the kingdom on earth as in heaven until the whole lump of dough—politics and civil orders included—is leavened. Call this what you will. I call it Christendom.
To be continued…