Saturday, November 16, 2019
The Kingdom of God is Not Within You
21 nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For, in fact, the kingdom of God is within you.”
- how I grew up seeing / reading Luke 17: 21
“The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you.”
- NRSV of Luke 17: 20-21
"In his teaching, preaching, and healing ministry, especially among the outcasts of society, Jesus demonstrated that God's salvation had come. He proclaimed that the kingdom of God had, in some real sense, arrived in his person (cf. Luke 17: 21)."
- Our Father Abraham: Jewish Roots of the Christian Faith, by Marvin R. Wilson (p. 181)
"Is the Kingdom of God Within You?", by Richard T. Ritenbaugh - CLICK HERE - is also interesting as a discussion of this verse.
This is a beautiful quote and summation from that link: "The original question posed by the Pharisees was, 'When is the Kingdom of God coming?' (verse 20)...His reply to the Pharisees is rather curt: 'You won't be able to discern the coming of the Kingdom because you haven't recognized that I am its chief representative, though I have been among you.'"
This difference between imagining the kingdom being "among us" in the very personhood / body of Christ (the church) rather than "within me" has huge implications for my discipleship and for how I relate to the church and the world. It means I don't show up to church as one of a voluntary collection of individuals to be entertained and lectured by God. Also, to gain "freedom" doesn't mean to access "the kingdom within" and thus gain freedom from my body or from exterior social constraints. Instead, as a disciple in the kingdom, I am learning to enact and embody kingdom love and faithfulness in relation to others.
Why do you think we tend to read the kingdom of God as being "within us" rather than "among us" in the person / body of Christ? We tend to do this, even though such a reading renders the context nearly unintelligible. I don't want to just blame poor translation, because I suspect that our modern, Romanticized image of ourselves as individuals contributed to the reification and legitimization of such translations.
Ritenbaugh also, however, then goes onto say that verses 22-37 are about the Second Coming. I don't readily agree, because:
1. The whole context (between verses (20 and 37) appears to be in reference to the bodily person of Jesus in their presence currently, and
2. That particular section that Ritenbaugh references (verses 22-37) is book ended by references to his death / disappearance from their "midst" (current NLT of verse 21) in verses 22 and 37.
22 Then he said to his disciples, “The time is coming when you will long to see the day when the Son of Man returns, but you won’t see it....37 “Where will this happen, Lord?” the disciples asked. Jesus replied, “Just as the gathering of vultures shows there is a carcass nearby, so these signs indicate that the end is near.”
So, with verses 22 and 37, it appears to me that Jesus is referencing the cross. This would also, of course and obviously, make sense of why Jesus tells the authorities that they won't be able to discern the coming of the kingdom. It is coming when they are seeking to kill him. Their role in the coming of the kingdom isn't exactly what they expect lol.
This difference between imagining verses 22-37 as being about the Second Coming rather than current events of the first century have huge implications for our discipleship. To start, it means that my discipleship isn't about, "within myself," believing the unbelievable or intellectually assenting to the supernatural. It's particularly not about "believing" such things as the Second Coming over against those secular heathens who deny things that can't be observed in natural history. It means I don't hold, grasp, or carry "within" myself "the truth" that I then impart to, nor over and against, others.
The story being told is of both the Pharisees and disciples encountering a God who blows their expectations and hopes out of the water for something not only possible and unexpected but never even conceived or imagined in the first place. I am one of those disciples living that same story, whose image of himself and of God is continually being remade and re-shaped in ways of love, grace, and truth that I never before could have even imagined. Who I thought was beautiful is continually being made into someone unimaginably more beautiful! As a community of God's people, we share, carry, and bear this beautiful image "among" those who are "in our midst."
Why do you think we tend to, by default, read the rest of the chapter (v. 22 on) as though it's referencing the Second Coming? I think I was anachronistically projecting my own position in history onto / into the story.
*Image taken from a Facebook page HERE.
- how I grew up seeing / reading Luke 17: 21
“The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you.”
- NRSV of Luke 17: 20-21
"In his teaching, preaching, and healing ministry, especially among the outcasts of society, Jesus demonstrated that God's salvation had come. He proclaimed that the kingdom of God had, in some real sense, arrived in his person (cf. Luke 17: 21)."
- Our Father Abraham: Jewish Roots of the Christian Faith, by Marvin R. Wilson (p. 181)
"Is the Kingdom of God Within You?", by Richard T. Ritenbaugh - CLICK HERE - is also interesting as a discussion of this verse.
This is a beautiful quote and summation from that link: "The original question posed by the Pharisees was, 'When is the Kingdom of God coming?' (verse 20)...His reply to the Pharisees is rather curt: 'You won't be able to discern the coming of the Kingdom because you haven't recognized that I am its chief representative, though I have been among you.'"
This difference between imagining the kingdom being "among us" in the very personhood / body of Christ (the church) rather than "within me" has huge implications for my discipleship and for how I relate to the church and the world. It means I don't show up to church as one of a voluntary collection of individuals to be entertained and lectured by God. Also, to gain "freedom" doesn't mean to access "the kingdom within" and thus gain freedom from my body or from exterior social constraints. Instead, as a disciple in the kingdom, I am learning to enact and embody kingdom love and faithfulness in relation to others.
Why do you think we tend to read the kingdom of God as being "within us" rather than "among us" in the person / body of Christ? We tend to do this, even though such a reading renders the context nearly unintelligible. I don't want to just blame poor translation, because I suspect that our modern, Romanticized image of ourselves as individuals contributed to the reification and legitimization of such translations.
Ritenbaugh also, however, then goes onto say that verses 22-37 are about the Second Coming. I don't readily agree, because:
1. The whole context (between verses (20 and 37) appears to be in reference to the bodily person of Jesus in their presence currently, and
2. That particular section that Ritenbaugh references (verses 22-37) is book ended by references to his death / disappearance from their "midst" (current NLT of verse 21) in verses 22 and 37.
22 Then he said to his disciples, “The time is coming when you will long to see the day when the Son of Man returns, but you won’t see it....37 “Where will this happen, Lord?” the disciples asked. Jesus replied, “Just as the gathering of vultures shows there is a carcass nearby, so these signs indicate that the end is near.”
So, with verses 22 and 37, it appears to me that Jesus is referencing the cross. This would also, of course and obviously, make sense of why Jesus tells the authorities that they won't be able to discern the coming of the kingdom. It is coming when they are seeking to kill him. Their role in the coming of the kingdom isn't exactly what they expect lol.
This difference between imagining verses 22-37 as being about the Second Coming rather than current events of the first century have huge implications for our discipleship. To start, it means that my discipleship isn't about, "within myself," believing the unbelievable or intellectually assenting to the supernatural. It's particularly not about "believing" such things as the Second Coming over against those secular heathens who deny things that can't be observed in natural history. It means I don't hold, grasp, or carry "within" myself "the truth" that I then impart to, nor over and against, others.
The story being told is of both the Pharisees and disciples encountering a God who blows their expectations and hopes out of the water for something not only possible and unexpected but never even conceived or imagined in the first place. I am one of those disciples living that same story, whose image of himself and of God is continually being remade and re-shaped in ways of love, grace, and truth that I never before could have even imagined. Who I thought was beautiful is continually being made into someone unimaginably more beautiful! As a community of God's people, we share, carry, and bear this beautiful image "among" those who are "in our midst."
Why do you think we tend to, by default, read the rest of the chapter (v. 22 on) as though it's referencing the Second Coming? I think I was anachronistically projecting my own position in history onto / into the story.
*Image taken from a Facebook page HERE.
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