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Spirit, CITY AND KINGDOM                                                           Viv Grigg

                                            excerpted from Transformative Revival


The Kingdom of God is the highest good.  The idea of God is the highest and most comprehensive conception in philosophy; the idea of the Kingdom of God is the highest and broadest idea in sociology and ethics.                           Rauschenbusch[1]

 

Methodology

This chapter utilises the theme of the Kingdom of God,  defining theological frameworks for the goals of transformation of the city if the Spirit is to fully in her.  It begins with exploration of the pneumatological nature of the Kingdom, then relates holistic Kingdom themes to nine issues of postmodernism in the previous chapter.

The City of God and the Kingdom

In the process of seeking a biblical theme that will move evangelicals to see the Cosmic Christ, and despite attempts to use the ‘City of God’ as a replacement for the ‘Kingdom of God’ to mobilise the churches into social transformation, I have eventually been forced back to the Kingdom as the central integrating theme that subsumes the city of God.[2] 

The ultimate reign of God is integrally connected with the coming of the city of God in the final chapters of Revelations.

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.

      I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride, beautifully dressed for her husband.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them.  They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God” (Rev 21:1-3).

The new world order, ‘a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and earth had passed away,’ precedes then includes the centrality of the holy city.  As in Genesis, so in the revelation of the eternal Kingdom, environmental structure precedes life-forms.

Kingdom of Shekinah Glory

This quotation above by John, from Isa 65:17, is not of a creation ex nihilo, but a transformation.  It is renewal, for he goes on, in verse 5, ‘Behold I make all things new.’  The Kingdom involves a renewal of creation, a transformation of world and universal orders.  In reference, perhaps, to the waters of primeval chaos of Genesis 1, he states, ‘there was no longer any sea,’ and the transformation of chaos is complete.[3]

Then is voiced a grand climax, for the crowning of the creator, his taking up his reign, his Kingship, has to do with his presence with the created social creature, ‘The dwelling of God, (or the tabernacle, or tent Gk: skene) is with humanity.’

This is an allusion to the Hebrew shekinah, God’s immanence both in the world and among people.  The shekinah of the Jews is more or less the same as the Holy Spirit in Christian circles (Quispel, 1979:111).

It is an echo[4] of the promise of Ezek 37:27, ‘My dwelling place shall be with them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people’ (see Ezek 34:30; 36:28; Zech 2:11a; Lev 26:11-12).  Paul links this dwelling of God among people to believers being the temple of the living God, the temple of the Spirit of God. [5]    

 The linkage of people to city is perhaps a reflection on Ps 46:4, where the phrase ‘city of God’ is parallel to ‘dwelling place of the most high’ (Aune, 1998:1122). 

The Kingdom of God has consistently recurred throughout history as an integrating theme. It is this theme of the Kingdom of God which most recently has enabled breakthroughs for evangelicals in their involvement in transformation.[7]

The theme is a global biblical theme, evident in the Genesis accounts,[8] but the terminology begins during the monarchy of David (Ps 45:6; 103:19; 145:11).  It was the central theme in Jesus’ teaching.  Paul is last heard of in Rome, ‘preaching the Kingdom of God’ (Acts 28:31).  The end of the book is about the return of the King to bring his reign.  Perhaps indicating its power, is its history as the theme underlying much of Calvin’s work and as discussed earlier, much of the liberal social gospel movement earlier this century.  It recurs uncannily in almost every generation of theologians and apostles.

This theme, is developed in the belief that the scriptures are a unity.[9]  While there is differentiation as to God’s activity at different phases of redemption history or expressed in different narratives, this does not mean that God changes in personality, style or fundamentals.  God’s interventions at every phase of redemption history are consistent.  The discontinuities at the incarnation, the cross, and the parousia, are subject to the continuities of his nature.

But a further step is needed beyond the culturally limited,[10] Kingdom of God evangelical theologies such as Bright (1953) Ladd (1974) or Yoder’s more socially aware (but still very American) Anabaptist perspective (1972).  Their understanding of the Kingdom is very spiritual.  Moving to a more comprehensive biblical understanding of the nature of the Kingdom of God as involving the socio-economic, spiritual and political is needed.

Charles Van Engen, reflecting on Glasser’s Kingdom and Mission (1993) (which in turn draws on Ladd (1959; 1974), Oscar Cullman and others), indicates four things the theme of the Kingdom of God has done for missiology:

The Kingdom of God concept broadens missiological reflection beyond a predominantly individualised and vertical understanding of salvation to a holistic view of the interaction of the church and world.

Glasser’s Kingdom missiology breaks the impasse between evangelism and social action that has plagued evangelicals.

Kingdom-of-God missiology creates the possibility of new conversation among evangelicals, representatives of the conciliar movement, Roman Catholics, Orthodox, Pentecostals and charismatic.

Glasser’s own personal pilgrimage made him deeply aware of the social, and political implications of the Kingdom of God that challenges all governments, all forms of racism, and all social structures that would seek to deify themselves.

Glasser, veteran missionary theologian, in his habit of browsing through the social issues of the Old Testament and reflecting on them in the light of the Kingdom of God, extended the themes to the social and economic and political issues of the world.  Independently Dyrness (1991(83)), working in Manila, and Bellingham in Bangladesh and India (1987), have grappled with relating the Kingdom to the social realities of poverty and oppression.  The most lucid evangelical statements I have read are in Howard Snyder’s A Kingdom Manifesto (1997).  Two decades of theological conferencing by Chris Sugden and Vinay Samuel and the Transformation network produced Mission as Transformation (Samuel, 1999), with several chapters on the Kingdom. 

This chapter extends some broad brush strokes an expanded Kingdom theology into the post-modern urban context.  Nevertheless, the evangelical understandings lack the comprehensiveness of social gospel conceptualisations of the Kingdom by earler evangelists linked to the World Council of Churches and liberal social gospel theology, such as Rauschenbusch of US soup kitchens (1907/1968); Kagawa of Japan(1929; 1934); E. Stanley Jones in India (1972); Niebuhr of the US (1937/1988) or Ragaz of Switzerland (Bock, 1984) or of various Catholic reflections on social issues (Scherer 1992;  O’Brian 1992;  Fabros, 1983).

Diagram : The Kingdom of God as Integrating Biblical Theme

 Diagram 22 indicates eternal consistencies of the Kingdom (and covenants), and its social, spiritual and economic principles.  These are contrasted with the phase differences in the relationship of the Kingdom of God to humanity in the Old Testament, the New Testament and after the parousia. In the Old Testament he intervenes but does not dwell. The New Covenant is of an indwelling God.  After the judgment he will rule the earth.

Continuity and Discontinuity of Kingdom and Spirit

A broad overview of the Kingdom is needed as it is expanded into its socio-economic-political dimensions under the Old Covenant, New Covenant and into the future. 

In the Old Testament, the reign of God was acknowledged and frequently he intervened in situations, applying the social, economic and political principles of his Kingdom (first part of above diagram).  Yet the presence of God was not with humankind, his Spirit did not dwell with men and women.  Thus in the times of Samson and the judges, he exercised his rule as the Spirit came upon chosen individuals for the duration of each crisis.  Then Isaiah, in the servant psalms, prophesies of the Servant of the Lord who would exercise his ministry through the eternal anointing of the Spirit (Isa 42:1-14; 61:1-3).

This is what differentiates the New Testament from the Old - the small baby in a little manger in an insignificant town, surrounded by a host of angels, shepherds and wise men.  The King has come!  The Kingdom of God has invaded the Kingdom of the ruler of this world.  The Kingdom is now in the midst of us!  First in the Christ, and then in Christ’s body, the Spirit now dwells among humanity!

In the Old Testament, the King intervened in the life of Israel.  Now he has invaded!  Emmanuel, God with us!  His strategy?  Throughout the whole world he has set up small bands of men and women (churches) who are at warfare against Satan, the current ruler of this age.  In these guerrilla units the values of the Kingdom are demonstrated (2nd part of above diagram).

Stronstad (1984) indicates the centrality of the anointing of the Spirit on Christ expanded into the outpouring of the Spirit on the charismatic first church, as the integrating centre of the Kingdom used by Luke in the 2 volume Luke-Acts story.

The Holy Spirit as First Fruits of a Future Kingdom

Yet the teaching of the scriptures is that the Kingdom is also still to come.  Half of the parables of the Kingdom are of a present Kingdom and half of a future Kingdom.[11]  Jesus came the first time, humbly, quietly as foretold in the four servant psalms of Isaiah not as judge but as servant.  He brought his Kingdom into the world.  One day he will return again, to break the Kingdoms of this world and establish the rule of his Kingdom forever (Dan 2:31-35, third part of above diagram).

So we enjoy a taste of its blessings here.  We ‘have tasted of the powers of the age to come’ (Heb 6:5), through the Holy Spirit who lives within us.  That is a power and conflict-related experience:

‘But if I cast out spirits by the finger of God, then the Kingdom of God is come to you’ (Luke 11:20).

Through the Spirit’s power we experience a foretaste of future blessings.  At times, the Spirit restores our bodies through healings, though usually we have to wait for his coming when we will receive new bodies (1 Cor 15:50).  He gives us power over the evil one by his Spirit, but ‘Satan is not yet cast into the place prepared for him.’  At times we see clearly, as the Spirit of Truth guides us, but mostly we ‘see in a mirror, darkly.’ ‘On that day we will see him as he is.’  This imperfection means that much of what we do is incomplete, a sign of the fullness of the future Kingdom.[12]

Diagram : Spiritual-Economic-Socio-Political Kingdom

 

Diagram 2 indicates three sets of relationships between King, people and the created order within the Genesis account.  The obedient human response to the King is known as discipleship.  The first two relationships, God-human, God-human-land are those of authority.  The human-human relationships are primarily of equality.

Discipleship, Response to the Kingdom

Discipleship, our human response to the Kingdom, is a significant theme among evangelicals, an extension of evangelistic motifs, and needs reinterpreting from truncated perspectives to its fullness if we are to understand the fullness of the Kingdom. The diagram above, in a new way, expands discipleship from classic evangelical holiness motifs to its fuller meaning spiritually, economically and socio-politically.  Foundational aspects of each of these three arenas and their relationship to the work of the Spirit, are examined next. 

First though, an examination of what is commonly known as discipleship, the human ‘spiritual’ response to acknowledge the King, to acknowledge the Lordship of Christ.  Jesus left behind him the indwelling Holy Spirit in the believer, the incarnate presence of God as against his being wholly other.  Indeed we cannot enter the Kingdom unless we are born again of the Spirit (John 3:1-16).  Jesus did not leave us comfortless, but promised the Holy Spirit.  The book of the Acts of the Holy Spirit, clearly demonstrates the centrality of the work of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit advances the Kingdom. 

Paul speaks of it as ‘this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory’ (Col 1:28).  But that hope is defined in Isaiah much more broadly than the simple indwelling of the Spirit as companion and comforter.  The hope is defined as ‘justice for the nations,’ established through the anointing of the Spirit (Isa 42:1-4).[13]  Jesus tells us to seek his Kingdom and his justice above all else, as the first principle of discipleship. 

Kingdom people are also expansively proclamative.  Because the word was God, the communication of his being in person, we become communicating people as we enter into his being - with both word and deed being part of that communication.  Similarly, whenever the Holy Spirit falls on people, there is communication.  Jesus came preaching, ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand, repent and believe the gospel’. 

He came living it, ruling over creation, both working as a carpenter for 30 years and as God, for as he went about preaching he ‘went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil’.  This he did in the ‘power of the Spirit’.  Mark 3:14 tells us quite simply that the twelve were ‘to be with him and to be sent out to preach the Kingdom of God’.  That preaching is essentially pneumatological.  It would be accompanied by the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit with signs following.  At Pentecost, it was a multiplication of languages, so that all heard in their own language.

More than speech is the communication of character.  The fruit of the Spirit is such to make men and women agents of transformation by their very being.  They have presence because of the presence of the Spirit.

Discipleship as Methodology or the Fruit of the Spirit

The Navigators, beginning as a highly influential university movement, grew rapidly in New Zealand as a significant renewal movement that has magnificently sustained the faith of thousands in fundamentalist and evangelical churches, while largely operating outside of church structure.  They developed from the American evangelical centre represented by Billy Graham.  Their theology builds off proof texts to develop discipleship themes in individualistic terminology.[14] As pietist descendants of Wesley they have defined discipleship as the centrality of Christ, disciplines of quiet time, prayer, Bible Study, obedience and proclamation.

As one indebted to this movement for the sustaining of these disciplines over 37 years, I would affirm these are a powerful basis for sustained spirituality.  But they involve limitations.

Holistic Discipleship 

The first steps to move from the rigidity of such disciplines to the fullness of discipleship is an understanding that Jesus defines the disciplines of the Christian life as the character qualities in his manifesto in the sermon in the mount (meekness, poverty of Spirit, purity of heart and so on).  Paul, the apostle, devotes the majority of his teaching, not to religious methods, but to character issues.  The second, is an understanding that these are the work of the Spirit.  Thirdly, in Luke 14:26-33, Jesus himself defines discipleship in economic and social terms (Grigg 1981; 1990(84)).  For discipleship, the response to the Kingdom, is not simply a spiritual relationship with God (part 1 of the diagram).

At a missiological level, the most powerful way I have found to move people to this understanding has been via Kingdom incarnation. Jesus’ first step of discipleship, his incarnation, is a historically central socio-economic-political subversive act, not simply a spiritual act.  Luke 2, reflects the Jewish understanding of the prophets in their denunciation of social sins.  The magnificat tells us how the incarnation places the locus of economic theory at the point of uplift of the poor.  The incarnation was a profound social act, placing the issue of identification or solidarity with the poor central to social action, and defining the locus of Christian mission as to the poor.  The incarnation was a profound political act, defining the nature of godly politics as politics that serves the least important of society (Grigg, 1992a).

Any person filled with the Holy Spirit, will tend to emulate these preferences in theologies of justice and transformation. 

This  supernaturally happens.  Jonathon Edwards, the revivalist in his post-Great Awakening Religious Affections (1742), answers the question, where does one look for true signs of revival?  His answer - in those who seek to relieve the poor.  As indicated in the diachronic survey, historically this has subverted existent economic, social and power structures towards good.

Kingdom incarnation confronts the powers.  The mission of the preached word becomes central to any expansion of discipleship into its socio-economic political dimensions.  He not only preached the presence of the Kingdom, he demonstrated that Satan’s works were destroyed (Matt 12:28).  When the disciples came back enthusiastic because even the demons were subject to them he tells them ‘I saw Satan fall like lighting from Heaven’ (Luke 10:18).  Finally he ‘triumphed over Satan in death.’  Satan was rendered inoperative (1 Cor 15:26; Heb 2:14).  Thus spiritual warfare themes are integrally related to our understanding of the nature of the Kingdom and the clash of this Kingdom with the Kingdoms of this world, their economics, societal issues, and political issues.

Transformational theology is thus an expansion of discipleship, Kingdom oriented, incarnational, justice and character focused, proclamative in its central thrust and involves ongoing power confrontation with the Kingdoms of this world (Samuel, 1999: xvi).

Discipleship as Communal

Discipleship is also communal, not simply individualistic. Jesus’ commission was ‘to disciple the nations’.  Not the individuals, but to bring the nations (ta ethne = peoples) under his authority.  Since the 1980’s, Youth With a Mission (YWAM), a Pentecostal short term youth training mission, has become the biggest mission in New Zealand.  It popularised Kuyper’s theology (1998a, 1998b)  as the ‘7 mind moulders’, looking at issues of how to affect the mindset of a nation or city.  Kuyper, a Christian theologian who became the prime minister of Holland early this century, did extensive thinking on the ‘spheres’ of Christian influence, building off Calvin’s work.  He, in turn, built from an Augustinian framework.  An underlying concept is that ‘discipling the nations’ involves bringing not just individuals but nations under the reign of the Kingdom of God.

The New Kingdom Order and the New World Order

The Kingdom of God is here, yet not fully realised.  Until it is fully realised there will exist two different Kingdoms.

The one, is a Kingdom of this world, symbolised through the scriptures and in their great climax, as Babylon, a great religious-political-economic conglomerate (Rev 17-19), that has grown out of the rebellion of humanity - its nature is that of oppression, exploitation and unrighteousness.  It is, at heart, a massive world-wide market place, eventually dominated by a single lawless authority (2 Thes 2:3-12),[23] in the midst of an increasingly lawless world.

The other is a Kingdom of the Spirit…

For the Kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit (Rom 14:17).

…yet a Kingdom that profoundly transforms economics, social relationships, and political issues. 

Our role and call - we are to disciple the nations, which involves a discipling of the structures relating them to the demands of the King.  We should work with all our energy to see, ‘Thy kingdom come!  Thy will be done on earth as in heaven!’ as much as is presently possible.  This should not only be in individual lives but in the social order of our nation and globe.  This is the content of preparation for the second coming, for this gospel of the Kingdom must be preached to every people, not just as simple ‘Four Spiritual Laws’,[25] and a sinner’s prayer, but as the gospel of the King who fills all in all and is all in all. 

References


[1](1916:59).

[2]In his Kingdom Manifesto, Howard Snyder demonstrates this poetically with a chapter on the ‘City of the King’ (1997).

[3]This theme has been extensively developed from the Pentateuch through the writings and prophets.  Von Rad [, 1962 #1003: 234-41] demonstrates that an important aspect of P’s theology is the notion of the deity’s presence as represented by his ‘glory’ (cf. Exod 16:10; 24:16,17; 40:34-38; Num 17:7).  Van Seters adds, ‘P especially has combined the concept of the glory with J’s use of the pillar of cloud and fire as a vanguard and gives it the same association with the Tent of the Meeting.  It is the divine presence that both accompanies the people and dwells in the Tabernacle as the focal point of the cult’ [Van Seters, 1999 #1306: 187-8].

[4]In the field of intertextuality, the concept of ‘allusion’ and ‘echo’ are most useful for study of passages in Revelation.  There are few direct quotations of Old Testament passages in the over 473 verses in Revelations that are directly related to Old Testament passages (Moyise, 1995).

[5]Moltmann examines the relationship of the Holy Spirit and Shekinah in detail [, 1991 #1345: 47-51].

[6]Osborne identifies thirteen that have been popularised this century (1991).

[7]See various discussions on the Kingdom perspective of Glasser (particularly McQuilken) and their influence on evangelicals in Van Engen (1993).  McQuilken debates whether such a theme can replace the centrality of Christ and the cross as central for evangelicals.  Mission as Transformation (Samuel, 1999) includes a number of chapters that cover the emergence of this theme over the last twenty years.

[8]Beasley-Murray, British Biblical Scholar, in his comprehensive Jesus and the Kingdom of God, begins the theme by examining OT theophany (1986).  He points out that while the terminology Kingdom occurs only nine times and King as it refers to the Lord only 41 times, the emphasis on the ruling activity of God occurs from the time of the patriarchs on (18).

[9]This follows Daniel Fuller’s scenario that moved beyond the popular classifications of dispensationalism to lay a foundation for unity within a canonical (evangelical) view of the scriptures (1992).

[10]Middle class, economically secure, politically stable, highly educated, white American.

[11]Beasley-Murray (1986) documents these extensively.  This duality is the central thesis of Ladd’s Kingdom theology that has influenced so many other evangelical theologians in their progressions from fundamentalism to a holistic gospel (1959; 1974).  Snyder indicates it as one of six polarities one must deal with when understanding the Kingdom of God (1999).

[12]A dialogue of international evangelical, charismatic and Pentecostal theologians was developed in three consultations in 1998, 1990 and 1994 concerning the relationship of evangelism, justice and the work of the Spirit.  Key themes are summarised in Samuel and Sugden (1999).

[13]Waldron Scott, for example, clearly defined for evangelicals the centrality of justice as goal (1980), based on exegeses of the Servant Psalms.  His work was not accepted as a central theme in the Laussanne documents or evangelical movement as a whole.

[14]The Navigators international director has worked extensively to a broadening of their theology  (Peterson, 1992). This literalist exegetical method, linked to a commitment to reductionist discipling methodology, has made it difficult to move to adequate engagement with the rapidly changing socio-cultural context.

[15]Definition after Dyrness (1991(83), as he seeks to relate the Kingdom to third world social issues.  Intervention is a social work/ community development phrase.

[16]Darragh gives a theological analysis of the range of ways we can relate to the earth (2000: 150).

[17]Few theological studies can match Hengel’s Property and Riches in the Early Church (1974), for an exegesis and theology of this tension.

[18]These are summarised in The Protestant Work Ethic and the Rise of Capitalism (Weber, 1980).

[19]Rauschenbush makes this theme of the Value of Human Life, along with the Solidarity of the Human Family and the importance of Standing with the People as the cornerstones of the Social Principles of Jesus (1916).

[20]See Snyder (1997) for an integrated theology.

[21]Evangelical educator, Mouw, wrestles with this in Uncommon Decency (1992).

[22]Expanded in Darragh (2000: 133).

[23]Carriker has an extensive exegesis of the apocalyptic issues in this passage (1993).

[24]Not only evangelicals but also the leadership of the social gospel movement rejected this.  H. Richard Neibuhr came to regard Rauschenbusch’s moral theology as a form of ‘culture Protestantism’ that too closely identifies the Gospel with selected cultural movements and goals.  ‘Rauschenbush remained captive to the liberal impulse to equate God and God’s purposes to values accepted as absolute prior to revelation, such as the common good of humanity.  His Social Gospel therefore tended toward an anthropocentric and utilitarian religion that values faith in God as a means to other ends, such as economic and political reform’ (Ottati, 1991: xxv).

[25]A popular small tract presentation of the gospel, developed by Campus Crusade for Christ.

[26]Development of this issue is beyond this study but is part of the fruit of this thesis in multiethnic yearly huis co-ordinated by New Covenant International Bible School and Vision for Auckland/Urban Leadership.  (For the wider discussion see Mouw 1993; Newbigin 1989; Greenway 1989; Yu 1995; Villafane 1993; Cohen 1958; Littell 1962; Hiebert, 1993).

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© Viv Grigg & Urban Leadership Foundationand other materials © by various contributors & Urban Leadership Foundation,  for The Encarnacao Training Commission.  Last modified: July 2010