You Don’t Have A Kingdom If You Don’t Have A King

Eric M. Rodes

We, too, have longed and do long for the Kingdom of God, and dark days heighten the longing. Of course, tongue-tied as we are in the language of faith, we would never put it that way. We would speak of an end to war and fear, a community of nations, the triumph of justice and brotherhood, a moral world order. But there is small difference, in the stuff of it, between what we long for and the hope of ancient Israel that God’s people would one day be established under his rule to live out its days in peace and plenty. We earnestly desire the Kingdom of God, although we do not know by what name to call it. With but a recollection of a parent’s recollection of a grandparent’s faith in that Kingdom, we desire it because we cannot help doing so.¹

I’m certain that you can’t help but notice all the talk lately about world peace. Just this past week, our president, Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. The 24-hour news cycle seems to be stuck on the Afghanistan channel. Everywhere I turn these days I hear terms like “bi-lateral talks”, “diplomacy”, and “open dialogue.” It seems that the whole world is up in arms about world peace. The human condition cries out for a change. In our hearts, most human beings have a desire for a better, more peaceful world.

In the above quote from Dr. John Bright, we see that these desires are good desires. Human beings, by their design, desire the blessings that the Kingdom of God has promised. But we don’t know how to attain it. We make plans and have our agendas, but at the end of the day, we are no closer to fulfilling this vision of peace than we were in the beginning. The United Nations was formed in an attempt to bring about this very vision of a universal brotherhood, and a moral world order. I have been told that there is a plaque at the U.N. headquarters in New York that reads the following:

They will beat their swords into plowshares

and their spears into pruning hooks.

Nation will not take up sword against nation,

nor will they train for war anymore.

This is an admirable goal. In fact, these lines are from Micah 4:3. These lines are part of the vision of God’s Kingdom, the future hope of Israel and the world. The desire for the Kingdom has been given to us by God, and proclaimed throughout all of Scripture. It is not a bad thing for the world leaders to catch hold of this vision and seek to live by it.

However, there is a problem not so much in what is said on that plaque at the U.N., but in what is not said.

Micah 4:1-3

¹In the last days

the mountain of the Lord’s temple will be established

as chief among the mountains;

it will be raised above the hills,

and peoples will stream to it.

² Many nations will come and say,

“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,

to the house of the God of Jacob.

He will teach us his ways,

so that we may walk in his paths.”

The law will go out from Zion,

the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

³ He will judge between many peoples

and will settle disputes for strong nations far and wide.

They will beat their swords into plowshares

and their spears into pruning hooks.

Nation will not take up sword against nation,

nor will they train for war anymore.

The vision of God’s Kingdom will only be brought to completion because there is a King, and his name is Jesus Christ. There will be peace on Earth only when Jesus rules from Zion, and rules in the hearts of all people.

The basic and continuing problem with humanity is that we reject our Creator as our King. We want all the promises that he gives us, but we don’t want him. This is demonstrated clearly through the Israelite experience of the Old Testament, and is the precise reason why we need a Savior. We can not worship and obey our Creator fully because our hearts are blackened. We are in rebellion, and as a Creation, it is our desire to prove that we don’t really need our Creator. We want to prove that we can accomplish all that God has for us, and we can do it without his input into our lives. That is simply not possible.

God has great things in mind for us. He has a great, beautiful vision in mind for this world, but we will never experience it without Jesus Christ. He is the key that opens the gates to the Kingdom of God. Each one of us is being invited into that Kingdom. We are being invited to see what the King will do. Our continued caution to our world and ourselves is that we must put the King on the throne of our lives first, and subsequently on the throne of this world. Only then will we see the beauty of the Kingdom revealed. There is no Kingdom if there is no King.