The Kingdom of God Is Within You

When will the kingdom come? Good question. Why are you waiting for it? Another good question. What do you expect it to be? The questions continue. Most Bible students want the answer to the first question without ever questioning their assumptions involved in the other ones. Advent is ending and Christmas is approaching. It is good to ask what we expect Christmas to be. Why? Because what we expect has a lot to do with mistakes we make.

The Kingdom Outside

One way to view the kingdom of God is assume it exists separate from us. We can argue that the kingdom is not here now. We are waiting for it. Or it may be present near us in some way. The NRSV translates Luke 17:21 this way, “For in fact the kingdom of God is among you.” The 2011 edition of the ever-updating NIV says the kingdom of God is “in your midst.” But these are late 20th century or early 21st century translations. The King James version and the 1901 American Standard Version translates the Greek word entos as within rather than the more modern among. English translations of the text bears witness to the confusion.

Are we waiting for the kingdom of God to arrive? Or must we search for it? The shepherds from Luke are waiting, even though they don’t realize it, for the birth of the Messiah. The Magi in Matthew seek for the newly born King of the Jews. So in some sense we can view the kingdom as a reorganization of the world outside of ourselves. But how can the Kingdom be among us or near us when the world has not been reorganized?

What Do We Expect?

Jesus asked his followers, “What did you go out in the wilderness to see?” (Luke 24-26) He questions the possible expectations> Who would go out into the wilderness to see someone in soft and fine clothing? No one. People do not go to the wilderness to find that. The people looked for a prophet John the Baptist. What did they find? A prophet. This Messianic rant is a response to Jesus himself being questioned by John the Baptist.

What did John expect? Certainly it was not to be in prison awaiting execution. But persecution and martyrdom was faced by all the major prophets. It was likely to happen to him. Jesus warns his followers about their expectations.

Who expected the Messiah to be born in a barn with a manger for a basinet? The Magi didn’t. They went to Jerusalem to ask Herod. In the same way, the shepherds were flummoxed to learn the Messiah was in a place to which they had easy access. It is all too amazing.

The Kingdom Within

Jesus said something unexpected and amazing. The Kingdom of God is within the person asking the question. And who asked the question? The Pharisees. It does not sound right that Jesus would claim the kingdom was within his detractors. Therefore  translators say the kingdom must have been somewhere near them. Then again, what do we expect Jesus to say? Let’s look at the other place the word is used in the New Testament.

The word entos is found in Matthew 23:26. “You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup, so that the outside may be clean.” The word is used in practically all Greek literature including the Septuagint as “inside.” And notice in this context the person being addressed is a Pharisee. Jesus tells a scribe in Mark 12:34 that he is “not far from the kingdom of God.” The scribe knows the two greatest commandments. So being “not far” is a matter of degree rather than proximity. St. Paul makes similar statements. This is not some quirk of Luke.

How We Find It

The Magi stop following the star the saw in the East and go to Herod. When they do this, they can’t find the one born to be King of the Jews. We miss the kingdom within us when we fail to “clean the inside of the cup,” so to speak. The shepherds receive a gift from angels that reminds them of their own worthiness. We find the kingdom of God when we look for the Divine. We find the kingdom of God when we honestly examine who we are. And we find it by seeing the gift belongs to everyone even our detractors.