The phrases, “the kingdom,” “the kingdom of heaven,” etc., have primary
reference to that throne and kingdom to which the Lord Jesus was
exalted, when he rose from the dead, and was set at the Father’s right
hand. It is that militant kingdom of the Son of man, the establishment
of which Daniel saw in vision; the law of which is, “conquering and to
conquer” (Rev. vi, 2); and the history of which is that “he must reign,
till he hath put all enemies under his feet.”—1 Cor. xv, 25. The phrase
is sometimes used to express the efficiency of Christ’s saving sceptre
in the hearts of believers, as when Jesus says,—“The kingdom of God is
within you.”—Luke xvii, 21. It is applied to the visible church, as
being that society which by public covenant and profession owns Christ
as her King and his Word as her supreme law. So, it is used to designate
the millennial dispensation, when “the Lord shall be King over all the
earth,” when “there shall be one Lord, and his name one.”—Zech. xiv, 9.
Its duration is by Paul said to be, until “he shall have put down all
rule, and all authority and power. For he must reign till he hath put
all enemies under his feet.” “Then cometh the end, when he shall have
delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father.”—1 Cor. xv, 24-28. Of
this end and change of administration Jesus says, “Then shall the
righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.”—Matt.
xiii, 43. Of it, he teaches us to pray,—“Thy kingdom come.”
Thus, in all the variety of connection in which it occurs, the phrase in
question derives its propriety and significance from that dominion with
which man was endowed in his creation, that royalty which is enjoyed in
the throne and sceptre of the Son of man,—its authority that of God the
Father,—its extent the whole universe of God,—its object the
manifestation of the glory of the divine perfections, and the rectifying
of the disorders introduced by Satan,—and its end, that work
accomplished and the sceptre resigned to the Father, “that God may be
all in all.”
His coronation and kingdom were the consummation of triumph for the Seed
of the woman; toward which, from the beginning, the Spirit of prophecy
ever pointed and hastened with ardent desire. Its realization begun with
the ascension and the day of Pentecost,—its full meaning of grace, of
wrath and of glory, will only then be fully realized in fruition, in
that day when the mighty angel shall, with uplifted hand, proclaim the
end of the mystery with the end of time. Of its significance, I will now
attempt an indication.
Sin is, in its very existence, an insult to the holiness and sovereignty
of God. Its unclean and evil aspect is a disgust and abomination in his
sight, and a pollution and deformity on the fair face of his creation.
In its first beginning by Satan, it was an immediate assault upon the
very throne in heaven. Its introduction into the world was a Satanic
device to mock God’s proclaimed purpose of favor to man, and to insult
His love by rendering its object unworthy of His regard, and loathsome
to His holiness. At the creation of man, God had said, “Let us make man
in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the
fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle and
over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the
earth.”—Gen. i, 26. In the eighth Psalm, this decree is anew rehearsed.
(Psa. viii, 4-8.) Again, in the epistle to the Hebrews, Paul transcribes
it from the Psalmist, and expounds it. “For unto the angels hath he not
put in subjection the world to come whereof we speak. But one,” that is,
the Psalmist, “in a certain place testified, saying, What is man, that
thou art mindful of him, or the Son of man that thou visitest him? Thou
madest him a little lower than the angels; thou crownedst him with glory
and honor, and didst set him over the works of thy hands; thou hast put
all things in subjection under his feet.”—Heb. ii, 5-8. From this
language of the Psalmist, Paul proceeds to argue the extent of the
dominion thus given to man. He insists, (1) that the decree is
unlimited. “In that he put _all_ in subjection under him, he left
nothing that is not put under him;” (2) that man does not now have such
dominion. “_Now_, we see _not yet_ all things put under him;” (3) that
the decree is already fulfilled in the throne which Christ now fills.
“But we see Jesus crowned with glory and honor;” (4) that to that same
glory the Father is now “bringing many sons,” the brethren of Christ and
co-heirs with him of the kingdom. Vs. 10.
In another place, Paul completes the view, in this direction. “For he
must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy
that shall be destroyed is death. For he hath put all things under his
feet. But when he saith, All things are put under him, it is manifest
that He is excepted which did put all things under him.”—1 Cor. xv,
25-27. It is a legal and common sense rule of interpretation, as to
deeds of grant or conveyance, that an exception on one point proves the
intention of the grant to be otherwise unlimited. So it is here. The
apostle, in excepting God the Father from the grant of dominion to the
Son of man, leaves all else in the universe under his subjection. It
thus appears that, in the decree of man’s creation, a dominion was
assigned him which in the purpose of God comprehended all the power
which Jesus, the Son of man, now exercises, over the whole creation of
God.
How far this extent of the purpose of God was understood by Satan, we
are not informed. But it is evident from the whole tenor of the
Scriptures that the fulfillment of this decree was the subject on which
the serpent joined issue with God, in the seduction of our first
parents, and his policy toward our race. The issue thus on trial since
the foundation of the world is this: Shall God fulfill his announced
purpose, by exalting man to the promised throne? Shall he, thereby,
vindicate his own wisdom, sovereignty, truth, and grace, and reveal and
glorify all his perfections? Or, shall Satan triumph over God and man,
thwarting God’s decree, through man’s ruin and bondage? Shall he succeed
in the impious attempt to array the very attributes of God against each
other, so that his justice and holiness shall forbid the performance of
the purpose which his sovereign love determined and his wisdom and truth
proclaimed? This has been the problem of the ages: This, the question
which has roused intensest interest in all heaven’s hosts, “Which things
the angels desire to look into.”—1 Pet. i, 12. This is the key to the
fact, that, amid the scenes of human sin and ruin which fill the pages
of God’s word, the doctrine of the kingdom gradually dominates amid the
gloom, looming up into proportions of grandeur which overshadow earth
and heaven. “I beheld,” says Daniel, “till the thrones were cast down,
and the Ancient of days did sit; whose garment was white as snow, and
the hair of his head like the pure wool; his throne was like the fiery
flame, and his wheels as burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came
forth from before him; thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten
thousand times ten thousand stood before Him.... I saw in the night
visions, and behold one like the Son of man came with the clouds of
heaven and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before
him. And there was given him dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all
people, nations, and languages should serve him. His dominion is an
everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that
which shall not be destroyed.”—Dan. vii, 9-14.
At length, the fullness of time drew nigh when the mystery of the ages
should be disclosed, and the promised kingdom given to the Son of man.
John came, the herald of its advent, crying, “The kingdom of heaven is
at hand.”—Matt. iii, 2. Soon, Jesus himself went forth uttering the same
announcement, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”—Ib. iv,
17, 23. And lest his voice should fail to reach every ear, he shortly
sent the twelve, and then the seventy, to fill the land with the cry.
“As ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand.”—Ib. x, 7;
Luke x, 9.
But before the kingdom could be established, before the Son of man might
assume the crown, there was a work for him to do. That crown might not
be a gift of God’s arbitrary grace—a mere assertion of purpose
unchanged. It must be a reward of manifest and glorious merit. Nay, not
even so is it to be a gratuitous endowment; but as a trophy won by
battle and conquest is it to be received and worn. The Seed of the
woman—the Son of man—must give proof, in presence of all intelligences,
both holy and apostate, of his worthiness of that favor which God, from
the beginning, so openly bestowed. He must display the mystery of a man
walking in the flesh among men, in the glory of a spotless and
untarnished righteousness, amid the reign of abounding sin. He must be
seen—this glorious man—taking upon his mighty shoulders the vast incubus
of the curse, with which Satan’s malicious fraud had burdened the world,
and bearing it away to a land not inhabited. He must meet the great
enemy himself, whose impious challenge has raised the issue of the
fitness of God’s choice, and man’s competence to reign—the enemy who, in
insolent contempt of God’s purpose, has chosen this earth as the seat of
his own empire, and here usurped dominion over man. He must subdue
Satan, break his scepter and lead him captive in the train of his
triumph, before he may claim and assume the kingdom and the glory.
Satan saw, with dread the coming of the champion, and proposed a
compromise.—“Behold the kingdoms of the world and their glory! Do homage
to me, and all shall be thine!”—Matt. iv, 8, 9. It needs not to trace
the manner of the triumphs of the carpenter’s son, ending in the
resurrection from the guarded sepulcher, and ascension to the throne in
heaven. As the time of the kingdom came to be immediately at hand, he
entered Jerusalem, amid the exultant Hosannas of his followers,
proclaiming him the King of Israel. He was betrayed and brought to the
council. And when the high-priest adjured him whether he was the Son of
God, his answer, whilst attesting that blessed fact, held up to equal
prominence his royalty as the Son of man.—“Thou hast said; nevertheless,
I say unto you, hereafter shall ye see the _Son_ of _Man_, sitting on
the right hand of power and coming in the clouds of heaven.”—Matt. xxvi,
63, 64. And so, they crucified him, with the accusation written in
letters of Hebrew and Greek and Latin,—“THE KING OF THE JEWS.”
He had already foretold his apostles that they should live to see his
kingdom established with power. On the morning of his resurrection, he
said to Mary, “Touch me not, for I am not yet ascended to my Father. But
go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father and your
Father, and to my God and your God.”—John xx, 17. The word, “I ascend”
(properly, “I am ascending”), indicates his immediate ascension and
reception of the throne, on the very day of the resurrection. And it is
worthy of notice that John who relates this does not mention that
subsequent public ascension which was made in the presence of the
apostles, as Christ’s official witnesses. He had already recorded the
essential fact. Between these two events, the first and the final
ascension, on the occasion of one of his appearances to his disciples,
he expressly told them that he was now already in possession of the
throne. He “came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me
in heaven and in earth.”—Matt. xxviii, 17, 18. On the day of Pentecost,
Peter testified of the supreme authority now vested in Him. “Let all the
house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus whom
ye crucified, both lord and Christ.”—Acts ii, 36. Paul more fully states
the extent of his dominion. God “raised him from the dead and set him at
his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality,
and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not
only in this world, but also in that which is to come; and hath put all
things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to
the church, which is his body, the fullness of him that filleth all in
all.”—Eph. i, 20-23.