The kingdom - Chambers, Oswald
1. The prevailing characteristics of the kingdom
Who shall ascend into the hill of the l ord? And who shall stand in his holy place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart. . . . (psalm 24:34 RV)
The prevailing characteristics of the kingdom jesus represents are moral characteristics. There must be an alteration in me before i can be in the kingdom, or the kingdom can be in me, and that can only be by means of an inner crisis, viz. , regeneration. There must be something outside me which will alter me on the inside. Forgiveness is a miracle, because in forgiving a man god imparts to him the power to be exactly the opposite of what he has been: god transmutes the sinner who sinned into the saint who does not sin, consequently the only true repentant man is the holy man.
To-day we are in danger of being caught up by the lure of wrong roads to the kingdom things must be worked out at once, we cannot wait, there must be results immediately. If to benefit mankind is the whole purpose of god, quicker results could be produced apart from the redemption, because the redemption works appallingly slowly, according to our human standards. If all that is necessary is this hand-to-mouth business there is no need for all the teaching of Jesus, no need for patience until gods purposes are fully worked out. To look on the precepts of the sermon on the mount as referring to a future dispensation is to rob the cross of its meaning. If Jesus Christ cannot alter me now, so that the alteration shows externally in my home life, in my business life, when is he going to alter me? What is going to transform me so that i can love my enemies, can pray for those that persecute me, if i cannot do it now? No suffering or discipline on my part will make me any different; the only thing that will make me different is being born again into the kingdom of god. To look for death to make me holy is to make out that death, which is the last enemy, is going to do what the atonement cannot do. The cross of christ alone makes me holy, and it does so the second i am willing to let it.
The kingdom of god is latent in the cross, but don’t spiritualise the kingdom into vagueness, and dont materialise it into non-spirituality. The essential foundation of the kingdom is the spiritual aspect, and this is apt to be forgotten. In this dispensation the emphasis is on the kingdom within, but in another dispensation there is to be an external manifestation of the kingdom. To say that the kingdom is going to be brought in by the earth being swept clean through wars and cataclysms is not true; you cannot introduce the kingdom in that way, it is impossible. Nothing can bring in the kingdom saving the redemption, which works in personal lives through the cross and in no other way.
2. The power of the kingdom in present
circumstances (Luke 22:2427)
And he said unto them, the kings of the gentiles have lordship over them; . . . But ye shall not be so. (Luke 22:2526 RV ) naturally we think of a kingdom as being ruled and governed by superiors the kings of the gentiles have lordship over them; . . . But ye shall not be so. The central meaning of the kingdom is my personal relationship to my lord. These words of Jesus reveal his mind regarding the kingdom, and they also reveal the disciples mind and there arose also a contention among them, which of them should be accounted the greatest (RV). If the disciples idea is the right one, our lords idea of the kingdom is an impossibility. We have to interpret Jesus christs idea of the kingdom from his nature, not from our own. One individual set over against another must insist on obedience, but in the kingdom Jesus represents that is never the way to freedom; in his kingdom absolute obedience is the only way to personal emancipation. Our use of the word obedience is that of an inferior submitting to a superior, in the new testament the word is used as between equals (cf. Hebrews 5:8). Our lord never takes means to make us obey him; when we do obey it is through a oneness of spirit with him. The reason things are found difficult is because
We base everything on our natural independence, our natural morality and uprightness. Our lord bases his kingdom on none of these things but on the poverty of spirit which is willing to receive blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:3). In the higher christian life move- ments9 the cross as the centre of the heart of god and as the centre of our personal experience, is apt to be ignored; it is, you must pray more, you must give up this and that; anything but the need to be born again into a totally new kingdom and to enter into a oneness of spirit with Jesus christ. We have so insisted on the individual aspect that we have lost sight of the oneness jesus prayed forthat they may be one, even as we are one. It is a fundamental relationship, and we don’t think on fundamental lines, but only on the line of practical efficiency.
The christian life is stamped all through with impossibility, human nature cannot come anywhere near what Jesus christ demands, and any rational being facing his demands honestly, says, it cant be done, apart from a miracle. Exactly. In our modern conception of Christianity there is no miracle, the emphasis is put not on the regenerating power of the cross, but on individual consecrations, individual fasting and prayer, individual devotion. It is simply individualism veneered over with religious phraseology. There is no need for the cross of Christ for all that kind of thing. The only entrance into the kingdom is the cross; then when we are born again by means of the cross and are in the kingdom of god, we have to live out its laws. It is not that we take the precepts of the sermon on the mount and try to live them out literally, but that as we abide in Christ we live out its precepts unconsciously. Being in the kingdom, we are fit now to live out its laws, and we obey Jesus Christs commands because of our love for him.
Too often the kingdom is thought of as some- thing to which jesus is not at all necessary. He does not stand in relation to it where the new testament places him, viz. , as king. It is not natural to us to think of jesus as king; in the new testament it is the most natural view. We are much more inclined to think of him in a sentimental way as saviour and sympathising friend; in the new testament there is something much more vigorous. He is saviour in order that he might be king. If i am going to be of any use to Jesus Christ i must spend a great deal of time with him as my lord and master, then he can reveal himself through me to others. Christianity is not being spent in the service of men, but being spent out in the service of my lord. What we hear about to-day is devotion to causes; the kingdom can never be established externally as a cause.
My kingdom is not of this world . . . ( john 18:36)you can have no notion of my kingdom from the kingdoms of this world. It is the duty of any upright man to oppose wrong, but Jesus Christ did not come to enable us to do that. He came to put within us a new spirit, to make us members of his kingdom while we are in this world not against the world, and not of it, but in the world, exhibiting an otherworldly spirit. The popular evangelical idea that we are to be against the world in the sense of a pitched battle with it, is simply an expression of the spirit of the world dressed up in a religious guise. Our lord was not against the world in that sense; he submitted to its providential order of tyranny, but there was no compromise in his spirit, and the model of the Christians spirit is Christ himself. There is a religious cult which courts persecution. Jesus said, blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, . . . For my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad. It is by our spiritual choices that we maintain a right relation to the world. When a man ceases conflicting the world by spiritual choices, he succumbs to it and becomes part of the world that needs saving instead of being a saviour in the world.