The Kingdom and this Age
Jim from Australia asks:
I have a question about the phrase the “Kingdom of God.” I know that the Millennium Kingdom is still to come. But many people and preachers talk about we need to reach people for the kingdom. Is it wrong to use that terminology in the church age, or am I just being picky?
Ray Pritchard’s answer
It helps to remember that the word “kingdom” has more than one meaning. It implies a King and realm over which he rules and a group of people who are subject to his rule. And it implies also a society over which the King reigns. When Jesus taught us to pray, “Your Kingdom Come” in the Lord’s Prayer, he was asking us to pray for the coming Kingdom of Christ and also that the followers of the King might live by Kingdom values in this present age.
I have no problem with the concept of reaching people ’for the kingdom’ as long as that doesn’t cancel the promise of a coming, literal Kingdom reign of Christ on the earth. To me it’s not “either-or” but “both-and.” The Kingdom is present in the heart of every believer, but the Kingdom itself has not come and will not come in its fullest sense until Jesus himself returns to the earth.
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