Category Archives: Kingdom of God

We Christians in this present age are to live the life of another age.  We now have that life of the age to come—eternal life—in seed form, and the more we fall into the ground and die as the original Seed Himself fell into the ground and died, the more do we sow unto eternal life, the more do we release that eternal life to break forth.  Christ and His apostles demonstrated that we are to be totally sold out to this, totally given over to this, and ever wary of the traps and snares that would rob us of it.  When we end up living a merely natural earthly life and are captivated by what John calls “the pride of life,” just living a worldly life enjoying earthly and worldly pleasures, we end up the greatest of all losers.  Jesus time and again warned that those who love their lives in this age would end up losing it.

But at the same time He promised that those who in this age lose their life for His sake and the Gospel’s… will find it.

This is clear.  The lot of those who in this age take up their cross and follow Jesus—our lot will be suffering and persecution in this age.  We Christians in western lands very deeply need an awakening in this area.  This is what the Christian life and walk is all about.  “Yea, and all they who will live godly in this present age shall suffer persecution” (Tit. 2.12).  Even so.  But in the midst of it we have the assurance that the eternal life we now have in seed form will burst into fruit… later.

“…Verily I say unto you, there is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake land the gospel’s, but he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the age to come life eternal” (Mk. 10.29,30).

What is Jesus talking about here?  I believe it can be summed up by saying that whatever losses we suffer from an earthly perspective are more than made up by the family of God we are now born into, and the house of God we now become a part of—even though we are also granted a portion of their sufferings.  But while that is our lot here, we have the wondrous promise: “…and in the age to come life eternal.”

What is life, then?  All that this present world has to offer?  That is not real life.  “A man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth” (Luke 12.15).  In fact Jesus said, “Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood ye have no life in you.”

That is quite the statement.  According to Jesus, it is only eternal life that is real life.  Jesus said, “Whoso eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath eternal life…”  That is real life—partaking of Christ, eating His flesh, drinking His blood.

But what are the implications of eating His flesh and drinking His blood?  This is surely to partake of His sufferings, as He showed the disciples when He broke the bread and passed around the cup during the Last Supper.  To eat His flesh and drink His blood—this is the “fellowship of His sufferings.”

But what is the ultimate lot then, or the one who eats His flesh and drinks His blood? “He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life, and I will raise him up in the last day” (Jn. 6.53,54).

How deeply we in our land, and in our day, need an awakening to this realization.  This is what the Christian life and walk is all about in this age—the fellowship of the sufferings of Jesus Christ.  It is our calling to live in this age according to the order of an age to come, to live the Life of the ages here in this present life.  And this is going to mean trouble for us in this world, for it means conflict with this world.  For these two ages are diametrically opposed to one another.  While living in this age, we are to be nourished by the passions of the life of the ages—not by those of the flesh.  We are to be feeding on eternal things, heavenly things—even Christ Himself—and not earthly sensual things.  We don’t underestimate the power of temptation.  But let us know that God has the grace we need to overcome it all.  “In the world ye shall have tribulation,” Jesus said.  “But be of good cheer: I have overcome the world.”  He overcame the world so that by His Spirit we too could overcome the world.  And so when the pull of the world is strong and we are tempted to give ourselves to the pursuit of diverse lusts and pleasures and fill our lives with earthly things of one sort or another, let us earnestly seek to lift up our eyes to eternal realities, and to Him that dwelleth in the Heavens—and take up our cross!

Think of the beauty of the Life that the Son of God manifested when He walked right here on the ground in sandals—the Life of the ages, manifested in this present evil age.  He was a totally different kind of Man.  He was a spiritual, a heavenly Man.  He dwelt in a heavenly realm even while He was here on earth.  By His Spirit we can do the same.  The Son of God manifested in this age the Life of the ages.

He was crucified for it.

But if this was the lot of my Master, what shall my lot then be?  Let me weigh this soberly.  My beloved Master was crucified by a world absolutely at enmity against God.  Can I then live as its friend?

Two ages met in the Cross of Christ.  Two spirits—the spirit of this age, and the Spirit that is of God—met at the battle line, and the one destroyed the other.  Apparently it was the spirit of this age who triumphed.  But no.  In the Cross of Christ, two princes strove for control.  Two gods contended for worship.  And when the Son of God on the Cross with arms outstretched and head bowed worshipped His Father to the end, that other god was utterly vanquished.   That other prince was deposed.

“Now is the judgment of this world: now is the prince of this world cast out.”  Let us be assured that what God accomplished in the Cross of Christ we shall yet see completely fulfilled in this troubled little planet of ours—through you and me.  You and I have a part in that.  Jesus said that in His going away, He would send the Comforter to us. “And when He is come He will convict the world concerning sin, and concerning righteousness, and concerning judgment. Concerning sin, because they believe not on Me, concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and ye see me no more, and concerning judgment, because the Prince of this world is (has been) judged” (Jn. 16. 8-11).  So, we have a part in this.  This is our calling in this present evil world.  Not to live here seeking to gain all it has to offer—whether in goods or in honours.  But rather to be those in whom the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, can make manifest that ancient conviction of the Cross, and cause that ancient judgment to be completely meted out.

Two spirits.  Two gods.  Two kingdoms.  Two ages.  We in this age are not to be conformed to this age, but to be transformed by the renewing of our minds.  As we do this, and live now according to the age to come, it will certainly cost us our lives in this world.  But great shall be our reward in the age which is to come—a reward that is not just for our own benefit, if you understand what I am saying.

Oh that our eyes might be opened, then, to see that it is the age to come that is the important one!  How earthbound we are at times!  Our belly cleaveth to the dust, as the psalmist mourned.  Yet the writer of Hebrews tells us, “For not to angels did he subject the world to come, of which we speak” (Heb. 1.5).  Here, for world he uses yet another word, oikoumenen, meaning habitable world, the home of mankind.  And so we have a little glimpse here.  There is more before us, far more, than there is behind us.  There is much more to come in the purposes to God.  The age to come will involve a world inhabited by men.  And God is preparing some in this age to whom the world to come shall be subjected; and they shall rule over it in light as the powers of darkness have done in this present age of darkness.  It is a very great honour, this, a very high calling… though it means a very deep cross.  Let us take up that cross, beloved!  How long shall our fellow man be held in bondage of darkness? Do we love our Lord enough—and our fellow man—to take up our cross?  Oh, how blinded we are at times, and live on such a low plain, a merely temporal and earthly plain.  Eternal and heavenly verities are dim and distant things to us.  Instead we covet our neighbour’s beautiful property… or our brother’s blessing.

Beloved, these things ought not so to be.

Dear Lord, anoint our eyes with eyesalve that we might see!  You paid for us a debt we could not pay ourselves, and because of this, our salvation is not merely our own.  We are debtors to all men.  Keep us focused, then, on eternal realities, lest our lives, which are but a vapour, which are but for a moment, be lived in vain.  Keep us centred on your will… which we know will always result in footsteps on an eternal pathway, regardless what earthly circumstances we find ourselves in.  Keep us mindful of the coming age, dear Lord, and wary of this present one in which we live, as it is written, “Love not the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone should love the world, the love of the Father is not in him, because all that is in the world, the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, and the pride of life is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever” (1 Jn. 2. 15-17).

And so help us nurture the faith, dear Lord Jesus Christ, that sees Him who is invisible, that looks not upon the things that are seen, the things that are temporal, but on the things that are unseen—eternal things.  Help us, Lord—we need your grace in this—to not be deceived by a world that is fleeting, transient, temporary.  Help us to take you seriously, and in this world take up our Cross, and follow you.  For we believe Your words, dear Lord, when you say, “He that loves his life shall lose it, but he that hates his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal” (Jn. 12.25).  Amen.

Carrying on with what we were talking about last time, we are so used to thinking that the way our world is… this is the way it will always be.  But that is not so.  Do we believe this?  This world as we know it is just an age… “this present evil age” (Gal. 1.4).  And it is an age that is drawing to a close.  Another age is coming.  Those with vision can already see its glow on the horizon.

And so we read of “the children of this age” (which is darkness) and then of “the children of light” (Lk. 16.8).  These are the children of the age to come.  Paul called them “the children of the day.”  What a fascinating thought!  The children of the day!  The Day has not yet come, that age has not yet come… but its children are here already!  For God is impatient for the Day!  “Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness” (1 Thes. 5.5).  In other words, right here in this age, right here in the darkness of this present age, God scatters like seed the children of Light, the children of the Day, like the stars strewn across the heavens.  “Do all things without murmurings and disputings: that ye may be blameless and harmless, the children of God, without blame, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world” (Phil. 2.15).  That is what we are supposed to be all about, fellow Christian—lights in the world!  Do you know, there is absolutely no light in this world, none at all, none whatever; this world is completely pitch black… apart from the Light of the world—Jesus Christ Himself—shining forth in you and me.

We know that the Day is at hand, inexorably the Sun of Righteousness shall arise; that Day is no more stoppable than the rising of the sun.  And so what do we do?  We just sleep through the night, we just sleep till morning?  No! says Paul.  For “we are not of the night, nor of the darkness.  Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober.  For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night.”

We are not of the night.  We are children of Light, of the Day!  And so what do we do?  We put on the armour of light for a battle!  The outcome of the battle is certain, yes—as absolutely certain as the victory of our Lord Jesus Christ at Calvary.  But the battle must be engaged!  And it appears that the Prince of darkness and his hosts of darkness are not meeting with much resistance in this present hour.  Many of the soldiers of Light are fast asleep on their watch, their armour forgotten on the ground.  Let us awaken and take up our armour!  We who are children of the day—let us engage the battle!  The night is far spent, the Day is at hand! Let us put on the armour of Light and engage the battle!

Let us not be deceived!  Let us guard against the temptation to lay down the armour and live for this present evil age—its attractions, its pleasures, its comforts.  That is deception.  Or, on the other hand—and this too is deception—to end up choked by its cares.  Yes, the seed of the word is planted in our lives in this age.  But what about the weeds that are growing as well?  We are told of two kinds of weeds that choke out the word of truth so that these lives produce only sickly, spindly plants.  “And he who among the thorns was sown, this is he who hears the word, and the care of this age and the deceit of riches choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful” (Mt. 13.22).  The care of this age—that’s how the original Greek reads, gathering together all the cares of this age into one beguiling care.

And so the two classes of weeds: care—the burden and care of life in this world, and then the deceitfulness of riches, both of which can prevent the fruitful harvest of the word God has planted in our lives.  We can be beguiled by both.

Paul warns those that are rich in this present age to be mindful not to be deceived by their riches.  “Charge them that are rich in this present age that they be not high minded, nor trust in the uncertainty of riches…” (1 Tim. 6.17).  This can be a great snare, so much so that Jesus warned that those who are rich enter the kingdom only with great difficulty.  They have it easy in this present age, and it becomes a snare to them.  It beguiles them. They’re inclined to sink their whole lives into what is but fleeting and transitory—as multitudes in our affluent western world are doing.  And so Paul goes on, warning them to put their trust not in the uncertainty of riches, but “in the living God, who gives us richly all things for enjoyment…” (so it’s not wrong to enjoy in moderation these things from the hand of God; only let them not be a snare to us, and our destruction) “…to do good, to be rich in good works, liberal in distributing, ready to communicate (to share) treasuring up for themselves a good foundation for the future, that they may lay hold of eternal life.”

Here again we see the contrast.  Rich in this world… or rich in good works, and in giving, in sharing, and in this way laying a foundation in this life that shall rise a beautiful edifice in the life to come.

And so that’s what this present life and age is for.  Let us not be deceived.  All that this present age has to offer is but temporal, transitory, and will one day be gone forever—and our lives with it… if that is all we have lived for.  “The world passeth away, and the lust (the desire) thereof…” says the apostle John, adding—and let it be this that we sink our whole lives into—“he that doeth the will of God abideth forever” (1 Jn. 2.17).

Let us be wise, then.  Do we believe these things?  Only if we are acting on them.  If we believe these things, we are sowing the seeds of eternal life while we are in this present world, this present evil age.  We are laying the foundation of eternal life in this present life instead of building a magnificent edifice for ourselves in what is but, for us, a camping spot.  If we recognize that we are not at home here, we are not putting our roots down too deeply.  We live as strangers and sojourners here, pilgrims with no continuing city, who “seek one to come” (Heb. 13.14).

Beloved, let us lay this to heart.  “Only one life: ’twill soon be passed…”  It is heart rending that so many out there in the world spend their precious lives on the fleeting pleasures and interests of this present world.  But how much more tragic when you and I do the same.  For where, then, is the Light of the world?  How many of us Christians have been blinded by the trinkets of this present life—its pleasures and comforts, its honours and glory.  Paul mourned for Demas whom he said had forsaken him, “having loved this present age” (2 Tim. 4.10).  What a tragic, tragic loss—not only to himself but to others—when a Christian sells the eternal for the temporary.

I heard of a vision someone had of a vending machine—the kind you put a coin in and turn the handle… and out comes some little item—a trinket, or some peanuts.  In the vision, a man was putting his whole life into the slot in the vending machine.  And out came a little trinket.

Beloved, whatever this world has to offer—all that it has to offer—let us not be beguiled.  It is all but a trinket compared with the true, eternal riches.  Let us not pay with our lives for a trinket.

I am still grieving the deaths of these young people the news has been telling us about.  I am mourning for them, hurting with their hurting families.  When this kind of thing happens you can hear very loudly the travail pains of a groaning creation.  And it causes a groaning in me as well.  How long, Lord?  I remember the dark ages of my own life, and now it grieves me deeply that so many spend their lives in such peril… and for such emptiness.  Yet where is the Light that would enable them to see this?  I remember when the Light rescued me… and now, in an hour when the darkness is far more intense, where is the Light of the world?  I feel like our churches are failing this present generation.  I feel like I am failing this generation.  Multitudes around us—like these young people who died so young and so tragically—they live their lives in this world as though this present world with all its pleasures and pastimes, with all its joys and toys, is all there is to live for.

And that is not so!  The Bible speaks much of two ages: this age—and the age to come.  The Greek word is aion, usually translated age, meaning, simply, an era or period of time.

Sometimes aion is used interchangeably with the word kosmos, the Greek for world.  Kosmos means order or arrangement.  We get our English words cosmos and cosmetics from it, both of which speak of an order, an adorning, an arrangement.

And so we read in Eph. 2.2 of “the age of this world,” where the two words are used together.  The aion of this kosmos.  “And you being dead in offences and sins, in which once ye walked according to the age of this world, according to the ruler of the authority of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the sons of the disobedience…”

So we see that this present order—this arrangement of things in the world as we know it—is an age.  It is not going to be here forever, it is just an age: it’s called “this present evil age” (Gal. 1.4).  It is ruled over by a spirit, and its dominant feature is evil.  Or as we read in another place, darkness.  The primary characteristic of this age is darkness.  We read of “the world rulers (the cosmocrats) of the darkness of this age” (Eph. 6.12).

And we read of “the god of this age” (2 Cor. 4.4).  And we read of “the wisdom of this age” which God hath made foolishness, and we read of “the princes of this age,” and of another Wisdom which if the princes of this age had known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory (1 Cor. 2.6).

And, intertwined through all this, we read of another age to come—with another world, another order.  In fact we read of ages to come (Eph. 2.7), but in the main we see these two ages — the present one, and the age to come.

And we see also—and this ought to encourage you and me, while at the same time challenging us—God is not just stoically waiting for this coming new order, the age to come.  He is not just passively waiting for things to run their natural course.  He is deeply pained with the evil of this present age beyond our ability to comprehend.  And so even now in this present age He plants the seeds of the coming one.  In this present age He births children who actually pertain to the age to come.  They are here now in this present age… but living for another age.  And it is actually through these children of light that the present age of evil and darkness will be completely shut down, the colossal defeat it suffered at the Cross of Christ being fully and finally executed.

When God brought His first begotten Son into the world the demons cried out in surprise, “Have you come to torment us before the time?”  They knew their time, their doom, would come some inevitable day away down the ages somewhere… or so they thought.  Here it was right in their face!  Here suddenly in a very early hour is this Man saying, “NOW is the judgment of this world (this kosmos); now is the prince of this world cast out” (Jn. 12.31).  Like the morning star before the dawning of the day, here is this Man who pertains to an entirely different age; here He is on the scene, revealing in this age the Life of that age, even eternal life.  And the demons cringed in fear.

A Man from Another Age entered this present evil age some two thousand years ago, inaugurating a new age—the age of the Kingdom of God.  By this Man falling into the ground and dying, God planted the Seed of that coming age in this age, and ever since it has been growing, growing, growing to fullness.  That kingdom will yet come to fruition, will come in fullness.  It has seen great resistance over the centuries, and at times great setbacks.  But the inevitable harvest will come.

The harvest,” we read, “is the end of the age” (Mt. 13.39).  I believe we are there now.  In the end of the age the reapers come forth, and there is a great separation of wheat from tares, and on the threshing floor of God, much wind, and fire, and sifting of the wheat.  Oh, how we need this just now!  I find great comfort in this, and, in a very dark hour, great hope.  “Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom of their Father.”

Hasten this great work of Yours, dear Lord Jesus Christ, this separating, purifying work—that the Light might shine purely in the darkness again!