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Kingdoms now and then

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“Hal-le-lu-jah! Hal-le-lu-jah!”

The majestic strains of Handel’s chorus stir the hearts of many this time of year, as choirs perform The Messiah in venues from Charlottetown to Winnipeg to Victoria. The music is familiar, the words inspired.

The kingdom of this world is become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and of His Christ! And he shall reign for ever and ever! King of Kings and Lord of Lords… forever and ever, forever and ever! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

The words are from Revelation 11:15, the shout of heavenly voices following the last trumpet. The end has come, the judgment is at hand, and the Lord God Almighty, the One who is and who was – and is now here – is beginning his eternal reign. The kingdom of God has fully come, brought about by God’s Messiah, the lion of Judah and the slain Lamb, and he will reign for ever and ever. This is certainly a vision worthy of a majestic hallelujah!

These words should still echo in our thoughts as we keep reading through the next scene in Revelation’s drama, a vision more closely connected with the Advent season. In Revelation 12, a “woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head” (v. 1) gives birth to “a son, a male child, who ‘will rule all the nations with an iron sceptre’” (v. 5).

This is a vision of Jesus’ birth, but it is unlike any cozy crèche or children’s Christmas play. For standing in front of the woman, waiting to devour her child, is “an enormous red dragon” (v. 3) – “that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray” (v. 9).

Kingdom come

This strange nativity story is then recast as a cosmic battle between a heavenly army and the devil’s hordes. The result of this other-worldly warfare? Satan is expelled from heaven down to earth, and now vents his fury on humankind. But Satan’s is not the only agenda in the world in view of the coming of God’s Messiah; through Jesus, God’s kingdom has been established on earth: Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Messiah. For the accuser of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. They triumphed over him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death (12:10–11).

In the space of two chapters, in two consecutive scenes, we hear two distinct kingdom cries. From Revelation 12, a cry from the past: “The Messiah has been born, God’s kingdom has come!” From Revelation 11, a cry from the future: “The end of all things is here, God’s kingdom has come!” And in between these two kingdom visions, caught between the now of God’s kingdom already come and the not yet of God’s kingdom still to be fulfilled, is the full fury of all that stands against God and God’s saving sovereignty, a fury vented on all humanity and all creation, the followers of Jesus bearing the brunt of its destructive force.

Through these parallel visions, one thing is clear: The kingdoms of this world – all our self-serving, other-dominating, creation-destroying “kingdoms” – are not the kingdom of God.

This might seem obvious when we think of oppressive regimes on the other side of the world; these “kingdoms of the world” clearly do not reflect the kingdom of God. But this observation has tremendous relevance closer to home as well. In what ways do Western nations become purveyors of oppression and injustice through our all-consuming economic systems and all-encompassing foreign policies?

Or – let’s bring this even closer – how does each of us create our own little kingdoms in our spheres of life, coercing and manipulating others in order to establish our personal will? In none of these ways – whether globally, regionally, or personally – are the “kingdoms of this world” the “kingdom of God,” God’s self-giving and other-embracing and all-restoring vision for humanity and all creation.

God’s kingdom in the world

But the converse also needs to be emphasized: The kingdom of God – the kingdom already planted by Jesus in the soil of this world, the kingdom growing toward its harvest at Jesus’ return, the kingdom vision to which Jesus’ followers owe their ultimate allegiance – is not the kingdoms of this world.

Caught between “the kingdom of God is among us” (Matthew 12:28) and “may God’s kingdom come” (Matthew 6:10), we are called to follow Jesus in bringing God’s kingdom vision to the world. We are called to live out the story of the crucified and resurrected Jesus, to bring resurrection life, kingdom life, to the world through our suffering love for the other in the footsteps of Jesus. Or, in Revelation’s words, we are called to testify to the “blood of the Lamb,” slain to redeem the world from its destructive sin and deep death, and we are to do so through our words – “the word of their testimony” – and our self-giving actions – “they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.”

A saviour is born, who is Christ the Lord. Hallelujah! God is king!

Even so, come Lord Jesus. Hallelujah! God is king!

Michael Pahl is a theology professor at Cedarville University in Ohio. Prior to this appointment, he served as pastor at Lendrum MB Church, Edmonton. He is the author of The Beginning and the End: Rereading Genesis’s Stories and Revelation’s Visions (Cascade, 2011).
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Revelation 11:15, 12:10-11
(link to BibleGateway.com)

The kingdom of this world is become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and of His Christ! And he shall reign for ever and ever! King of Kings and Lord of Lords… forever and ever, forever and ever! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Messiah. For the accuser of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. They triumphed over him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.

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