The Kingdom of God

    “And when he was demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should come, he answered them and said, The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you. And he said unto the disciples, The days will come, when ye shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of man, and ye shall not see it. And they shall say to you, See here; or, see there: go not after them, nor follow them. For as the lightning, that lighteneth out of the one part under heaven, shineth unto the other part under heaven; so shall also the Son of man be in his day. But first must he suffer many things, and be rejected of this generation” (Luke 17:20-25).

    Almost everything you hear preachers say or read from the writings of men about the kingdom of God is totally false. All the popular books about the coming of the Kingdom of God and the end of the world promote nothing but carnal notions about future things. Almost everything to be found in the notes of reference Bibles and study Bibles about prophetic things is false. Obviously, I have not read them all; but I have read a few, and I have not yet read even one that sets forth the teaching of holy scripture about the kingdom of God. I urge you to ignore such religious tomfoolery.⁷

    And if what I have to say to you in this study is not verified by the Word of God, count what I say as nothing more than religious tomfoolery. I will go further than that. If what I have to say to you in this message is not exactly what God says in his Word about his Kingdom, ignore me and count what I say as nothing more than religious tomfoolery.

    Let us look at these six verses line by line, praying that God the Holy Spirit will be our Teacher.

    First, we read that our Lord Jesus was “demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should come” (v. 20). Everything the Pharisees asked our Lord was asked with an evil motive. They never asked anything that they might learn, but only that they might accuse the Lord Jesus of some evil by twisting his words, or deride our Saviour’s doctrine.

    But here, they went even further; they “demanded” him! What arrogance! What presumption! What hellishness of heart is exposed when sinful men dare to demand anything from the God of Glory! Yet, those who made this demand pretended to be the only true worshippers of God!

    The word translated “demanded” means “accosted” or “interrogated”. All the Jews, including the Pharisees, were looking for the coming of the Kingdom of God. They were looking for the promised Messiah to come and establish his Kingdom on earth, making them the rulers over all the world.

    But this demand has the tone of derision in it. It is as if they said, “You tell us you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the King. If that is true, where is the kingdom? Do you really expect anyone to believe that such a poor, common man, a man known to keep company with sinners is the Christ of God? How long do you expect us to wait for this kingdom of yours to appear?”

    Our Lord Jesus seized the occasion given him by their derision to teach his own disciples some blessed gospel truths.

    First, he says, “The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation” (v. 20). I can almost picture the puzzled look of utter disbelief upon the faces of those ignorant Pharisees. Our Lord answered these fools according to their folly, only to make them more ignorant, only to give them greater confusion.

    Yet, he was at the same time teaching his own disciples who were in the crowd that day, and teaching his disciples of all future days. How Peter, James, and John must have perked up their ears. Mary Magdalene, I am sure, came to a dead silence. “The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation.” What does that mean? It means that the Kingdom of God is not at all like any earthly kingdom.

    Its coming cannot be observed by the eye, by observing signs, marking dates, measuring time, or checking off fulfilled prophecy. Its presence cannot be observed by carnal means, because it is not carnal, but spiritual. Those who expect to observe anything of this kind are sure to be disappointed. They wait and watch in vain for a carnal, material kingdom that will never come, just as the Pharisees did. The Lord Jesus says, “The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation.” These three things, at least, are meant by his words.

    The kingdom of God does not come with pomp and pageantry. It does not come with an outward show of any kind. In fact, the translation given in the margin of your Bible is, “The Kingdom of God cometh not with outward show.”

    The kingdom of God does not come in such a way that men can observe it. God’s Kingdom is a kingdom no one can see, except he be born again. It is a kingdom none can enter, but by the new birth (John 3:3, 5). No one can discern anything at all about this Kingdom, except those who are taught of God and have the mind of Christ (John 3:1-8; 1 Corinthians 2:12-16).

    Our Lord’s words in verse 20 also mean, perhaps primarily so that the Kingdom of God does not come by the observation of religious laws, ceremonies, traditions, and ordinances.

    The kingdom of God does not come by observing holy days and doing holy things. You do not get into the Kingdom of God by receiving imaginary sacraments and doing imaginary good works. The kingdom of God is not a matter of religious rites and taboos (Romans 14:17; Colossians 2:20-23). The fact is if you and I see something that so greatly impresses our eyes, our natural senses, and/or our feelings that we are by what we see inclined to think, “Surely, the Kingdom of God is here”, we are wrong, dead wrong. Look at the first line of verse 21 and see if that is not precisely what the Master tells us.

    “Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there” (v. 21). What does that mean? Really, it is just an amplification of what our Lord has just declared, “The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation.” Many in those days, in the days immediately following our Lord’s earthly ministry, and at various times throughout the past 2000 years have said that this or the other false prophet is the Christ. Many have said the Kingdom of God will appear here or there, at this or that time.

    Our Lord warns us to ignore such claims, no matter who makes them, no matter how convincing their arguments, no matter how many follow them.

    But there is more to the warning than that. We live in a day of mega-churches, super-churches, and crystal cathedrals. Every year at Christmas and Easter every major television network broadcasts the idolatrous splendour of Rome and his “unholiness” the pope. Televangelists bedazzle millions with their religious crusades, great works, and miracles. And we are all prone to marvel at the great whore Babylon, and the riches, crowds, and magnificence of free-will, works religion. We tend to think, “Surely, this must be God’s work and God’s Kingdom. All these people cannot be wrong.”

    That is exactly what the Apostle John did when he saw it (Revelation 17:4-8). But such marvelling is but marvelling at a gorgeously arrayed harlot, whose sole mission is the everlasting destruction of immortal souls, a harlot who deserves to be and shall be destroyed. Babylon religion is so potent to natural sense that all those whose names are not written in the Book of Life are intoxicated by the wine of her fornications.

    Now, watch the Lord’s next words in the latter part of verse 21. “Behold, the kingdom of God is within you.” The word “within” might be translated, as it is in the margin of your Bible, “among”. In that case our Lord’s words here mean that the Kingdom of God is already here, in your midst. He and his disciples were among them. That is certainly true, the Kingdom of God is already in the earth. God’s Church is his Kingdom. Yet, the word used by our translators conveys our Lord’s doctrine accurately. “Behold, the kingdom of God is within you.”

    It is a spiritual kingdom not a carnal kingdom, a heavenly kingdom not an earthly kingdom, an inward kingdom not an outward kingdom. It lies not in outward things, “but in righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost” (Romans 14:17). The Kingdom of God is established in the hearts of chosen, redeemed sinners by the omnipotent grace of King Jesus. It is established by the binding and dispossession of Satan, the strong man armed, and the overthrow of the old man, sin, with its deceitful lusts, from the throne. The Kingdom of God has its seat in the inward parts, the inner man. It does not lie in words, in an outward profession of religion. It is oil in the vessel of the heart, and is distinct from the lamp of a visible profession. It does not lie in external works and duties; but it is an inward principle of godliness in the soul, or spirit of man, produced there by the Spirit of God. The kingdom of God is a kingdom governed by grace. In this kingdom grace reigns through righteousness, unto eternal life by Jesus Christ the King. Christ Jesus, as the King of saints, dwells and reigns in his people.

    In verses 22 and 23 our Lord turns to his disciples. He warns us here of a time of great trouble. The time he is talking about is not any specific day, but any day in which the words of these two verses are applicable.

    “And he said unto the disciples, The days will come, when ye shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of man, and ye shall not see it” (v. 22). The “days” to which our Lord refers are the whole gospel age, the days of God’s church in this world, from the time of our Saviour’s death to the time of his second coming.

    How often those disciples who heard these words must have echoed them! How often they must have pined for Christ’s physical presence with them again! How often they must have thought to themselves, “How I wish I had paid more attention! How I wish I had not neglected the opportunities I had! What sweet hours and days of blessed communion and instruction they were”!

    But, I am confident that our Lord’s words here were not spoken for those disciples alone. They were spoken for us. They are applicable to us. “The days of the Son of man” are those times and seasons when the Son of man meets with, instructs, comforts, and blesses his people, by making himself known to us, by taking the things of God and showing them to us. They are our days of public worship in the house of God under the ministry of the gospel. It is here where the Lord Jesus promises that he will meet with his people (Matthew 18:20).

    When God’s saints are deprived of these days, by reason of persecution, or sickness, or providence, then they learn to value them highly. Once they are gone, they are treasured. Let us, as John Gill admonished, “prize, make use of, and improve such days and opportunities, whilst we have them. We know not how soon our teachers may be removed into corners, when we shall wish in vain for them; and seasons of hearing them, as is here suggested. Sad it is to know the worth of gospel opportunities, by the want of them”!

    Yet, even when such times come, even when we are placed in circumstances in which we have no place of worship, no one to preach the gospel to us, no sweet times of fellowship in God’s house with Zion’s pilgrims, should such ever come to pass, we must not chase after the bubbles of religious excitement. We must not follow those who follow false christs (v. 23).

    In verse 24 our Saviour speaks of his day and of his coming in his day without warning, without signs, suddenly and speedily, like a bolt of lightning. “For as the lightning, that lighteneth out of the one part under heaven, shineth unto the other part under heaven; so shall also the Son of man be in his day.”

    Certainly, this is applicable to our Lord’s glorious, second advent. But the opening word of the verse, “for”, seems to me to give it a direct connection to our Lord’s words in verse 22, “ye shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of man”, and our Lord’s warning not to follow false christs in verses 22 and 23. You see, the days of the Son of man are those days in which our Saviour comes to us in mercy, love, and grace, and makes himself known to us. Whatever that day is, it is his day, the day of the Lord, and it always comes unexpectedly, like a bolt of lightning (Isaiah 12:1-6). Oh, what a day that day is! When Christ comes to save his own by power of his grace, when he comes to revive his languishing ones, when he comes to call his ransomed at their appointed hour of death, when he comes in his glorious second advent, whenever Christ comes to his own, it is his day; and it is glorious!

    But, before our Saviour can come to any sinner in saving mercy, before he could ascend to his throne in Glory as our Mediator, before he could come again without sin unto salvation, something else must happen. He must suffer and die as our sin-atoning Substitute, by the hands of wicked men, according to the purpose of God, for the satisfaction of Divine justice, that the Lord our God might be “a just God and a Saviour” (v. 25; Isaiah 45:20; Matthew 16:21; Mark 8:31; 9:12; Luke 9:22; 22:7; 24:7, 44; John 3:14; 12:32).

    Before he could come to us in grace, with the blessings of redemption, grace, and salvation, the Lord Jesus had to suffer and die as our Substitute, put away our sins by the sacrifice of himself, rise from the dead, and ascend to his throne as the King of Glory, as our Saviour King. Thank God, he did!