billy-brown 2

It is apparent that there are many that suggest that there shall be an "literal physical earthly reign of Christ" in our future and so on. In particular, there is a notion that the "Kingdom" will be "restored to Israel" at some point per Acts 1 and so on.

And so, it seems useful to address this directly--and with a bit of detail . . .

First of all, let's go the appropriate passage from Acts 1:

Acts 1
1The first account I composed, Theophilus, about all that Jesus began to do and teach,
2until the day when He was taken up to heaven, after He had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen.
3To these He also presented Himself alive after His suffering, by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days and speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God.
4Gathering them together, He commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the Father had promised, “Which,” He said, “you heard of from Me;
5for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”
6So when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, “Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?”
7He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority;
8but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth.”
9And after He had said these things, He was lifted up while they were looking on, and a cloud received Him out of their sight.
10And as they were gazing intently into the sky while He was going, behold, two men in white clothing stood beside them.
11They also said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven.”

OK.

Now, who asked the question of Acts 1:6? The disciples did.

Yep.

And so, was this question an appropriate one from the disciples?

No.

Why?

Well, because of Jesus' answer to the question in Acts 1:7-8. Notice that Jesus' answer is connected directly to His mission command of witness for the anointed disciples--and not a "restoration of a Kingdom to Israel" at all. And besides all this, Jesus had provided the following already to the leaders in Jerusalem--as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew:

Matthew 21
33“Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who PLANTED A VINEYARD AND PUT A WALL AROUND IT AND DUG A WINE PRESS IN IT, AND BUILT A TOWER, and rented it out to vine-growers and went on a journey.
34“When the harvest time approached, he sent his slaves to the vine-growers to receive his produce.
35“The vine-growers took his slaves and beat one, and killed another, and stoned a third.
36“Again he sent another group of slaves larger than the first; and they did the same thing to them.
37“But afterward he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’
38“But when the vine-growers saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance.’
39“They took him, and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
40“Therefore when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vine-growers?”
41They said to Him, “He will bring those wretches to a wretched end, and will rent out the vineyard to other vine-growers who will pay him the proceeds at the proper seasons.”
42Jesus said to them, “Did you never read in the Scriptures,
‘THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED,
THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone;
THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD,
AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES’?

43“Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it.
44“And he who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will scatter him like dust.”
45When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables, they understood that He was speaking about them.

Yep.

Indeed, the chief priests and Pharisees had rejected Jesus, and had the Kingdom taken from them already. And so, the disciples were asking a question that could not at all be answered in the affirmative by Jesus.

That's right.

And so, how do people "produce the fruit" of the Kingdom--as suggested by Jesus in Matthew 21:42:43?

Well, they have to enter the Kingdom of God by believing the Gospel that was to be preached by the anointed disciples--and by command of Jesus in Acts 1:7-8:

Acts 1
7He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority;
8but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth.”

In other words, the disciples asked Jesus a question in Acts 1:6 that revealed their lack of understanding of the nature of the Kingdom of God. Indeed, it is clear that all who believe the Gospel that was preached by the anointed disciples of that day (as well as others who preach the Gospel today and so on) are transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of the Son of God--and receive forgiveness of sins as well:

Col. 1
13For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son,
14in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

And so, if those who believe the Gospel are not in the Kingdom of God right now, then Col. 1:13-14 has to be called into question.

Really.

Also, we have the following from Jesus:

Matt. 6
7“And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words.
8“So do not be like them; for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him.

9“Pray, then, in this way:
‘Our Father who is in heaven,
Hallowed be Your name.

10‘Your kingdom come.
Your will be done,
On earth as it is in heaven.

Now, what could Matt. 6:10 be indicating? It could not be dealing with a "literal physical earthly reign of Christ" in our future in any manner, because Jesus has said already in John 18 that His Kingdom

John 18
36 . . . is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence.

--and we know that Jesus' servants did not fight that day, yes?

(Indeed, Jesus' servants did not fight . . .)

Thus, we have to assume that the phrase "thy Kingdom come" is mapped simply to a parallel concept of "the will of God being done on earth" indeed--this is what Jesus is asking in His prayer.

And that is what we must ask also of the Father daily in prayer, yes? We do know that God's will is done definitely in heaven, yes?

Finally, let's look at the verses below--from Daniel 2:

Dan. 2
31 “You, O king, were looking and behold, there was a single great statue; that statue, which was large and of extraordinary splendor, was standing in front of you, and its appearance was awesome.
32 “The head of that statue was made of fine gold, its breast and its arms of silver, its belly and its thighs of bronze,
33 its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of clay.
34 “You continued looking until a stone was cut out without hands, and it struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay and crushed them.
35 “Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver and the gold were crushed all at the same time and became like chaff from the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away so that not a trace of them was found. But the stone that struck the statue became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.

Now, there are 4 "earthly kingdoms" represented in the passage above: how did any person become a member of any of the "earthly" kingdoms represented in these verses?

Well, they had to be "born" within the dominion of those lands.

And so, how does one become a member of the "stone kingdom" of the verses above?"

Well, Jesus said it best, yes?

John 3
1 Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews;
2 this man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You have come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.”
3 Jesus answered and said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
4 Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born, can he?”
5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.

And Peter wrote the following also apropos being "born again" and so on:

I Pet. 1
22 Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart,
23 for you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is, through the living and enduring word of God.
24 For,
“ALL FLESH IS LIKE GRASS,
AND ALL ITS GLORY LIKE THE FLOWER OF GRASS.
THE GRASS WITHERS,
AND THE FLOWER FALLS OFF,
25 BUT THE WORD OF THE LORD ENDURES FOREVER.”
And this is the word which was preached to you.

And therefore, the Kingdom of God is indeed in the world today--but not of the world today--as suggested below:

John 17 (from Jesus' prayer)
13“But now I come to You; and these things I speak in the world so that they may have My joy made full in themselves.
14“I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.
15“I do not ask You to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one.
16“They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.
17“Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth.
18“As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.
19“For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth.
20“I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word;
21that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me.

Yep . . .