The Kingdom

Matthew 4:17 From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."


17 Ἀπὸ τότε ἤρξατο ὁ Ἰησοῦς κηρύσσειν καὶ λέγειν· μετανοεῖτε· ἤγγικεν γὰρ ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν.

There is a lot of talk about "kingdom" in the circles in which I run.  What is the "kingdom?"  Some focus more on an upcoming thousand-year reign of Christ on the earth with the saints.  I have a hard time seeing that in Jesus' statement here.  Very literally you could translate μετανοεῖτε· ἤγγικεν γὰρ ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν as "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near."  The verb ἤγγικεν is in the perfect, so that generally has an aspect of "has come near" since the word means "to come near."

There are those who would then take this passage and say that there is a near/far aspect to what Jesus is saying. But it seems to me that taking this verse in its obvious sense it would mean that Jesus is telling the Jews that all of the Old Testament prophecies about the kingdom are currently being fulfilled.  And, in fact, in a few years you will see it all come together with my death, burial, and resurrection.

That seems to be the simplest sense of the text.  Maybe I'm applying Occam's Razor too closely to it, but I think that is a good rule of thumb for hermeneutics.  Jesus is telling His listeners that He represents the kingdom of heaven.  It is fulfilled in Him.

What does that mean for us?  It means that we need to repent and believe.  Jesus is sitting on the throne in heaven.  He has inaugurated the kingdom of heaven.  It means that we need to give Him the worship He is due.  We can't simply acknowledge Him as someone who can save us.  We need to acknowledge Him as Lord.