The gospel of Matthew records how Jesus went up to Jerusalem for the final time, knowing that a horrible fate awaited him. At just this moment, the mother of John & James (accompanied by her sons) approached Jesus with a very cheeky request: “Grant that one of these two sons of mine may sit at your right and the other at your left in your kingdom.” (Matthew 20:21) Mark’s account has James & John directly petitioning Jesus: “Let one of us sit at your right and the other at your left in your glory.” (Mark 10:37)
To put it mildly, this scene puts a bad taste in our mouths. Unsurprisingly, the other disciples “were indignant with the two brothers.” However, the scriptures make it clear that James & John (along with Peter) were among the three closest followers of Jesus. So it makes sense that these two brothers would expect positions of honor when Jesus was enthroned as the king of the Jews.
Jesus responded very cryptically: “…to sit at my right or left is not for me to grant. These places belong to those for whom they have been prepared by my Father.” What was Jesus talking about? Who are the mysterious figures for whom God the Father had prepared a place at Jesus’ side?
In the last blog, we focused on Jesus’ words in Matthew 16:28: “Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.” Many Christians have been unnecessarily confused by this text. The gospel writers did not intend to leave us guessing. After all, the term gospel in the ancient world had a very specific meaning. The gospel (euangelion) meant that a mighty king (like Caesar Augustus) had come to power, establishing a kingdom which promised to bring about times of peace & prosperity. For people who often endured bloodshed, injustice & poverty, this would be good news indeed.
The gospels make it wonderfully clear that Jesus had been enthroned as the world’s true Lord and King. They describe how Jesus rode triumphantly into the royal city of Jerusalem. He was the king who came to Zion mounted on a donkey, just as the prophet Zechariah had said. When Jesus was brought before Caiaphas, the High Priest demanded to know whether Jesus truly claimed to be the Messiah. Our Lord obliged, using the language of the prophet Daniel to emphatically affirm his royal claim.
When Jesus was handed over to be crucified, the Roman soldiers place a purple robe on his shoulders & a crown of thorns upon his head. He was given a staff as a royal scepter. Albeit in mockery, the soldiers knelt before him & hailed him as the king of the Jews. In the end, Jesus was enthroned upon a blood-soaked cross. Above his head, the titulus confirmed his title: “This is Jesus, the king of the Jews.”
Matthew adds: “Two rebels were crucified with him, one on his right and one on his left.” (Matthew 27:28) Here we discover the answer to our question. Jesus had said that when he was enthroned in glory as Israel’s king, there would indeed be those who would sit at his right & left hand. But it wouldn’t be James & John. Nor would even Jesus himself grant these positions. It turns out that God the Father already had a couple of candidates in mind: two anonymous rebels were assigned to sit beside Jesus when he assumed the throne. They were hardly loyal followers: “the rebels who were crucified with him also heaped insults on him.” (Matthew 27:44) (Only Luke described how one criminal acknowledged Jesus as king.)
This little detail further confirms what we’ve already demonstrated: the crucifixion was the moment when Jesus came into his kingdom. Of course, the resurrection is closely related in meaning, for a dead king moldering in the grave is no king at all. By raising Jesus from the dead, God stunningly vindicated Jesus’ claim to be the Messiah. Caiaphas & the Sanhedrin had condemned Jesus as a false Messiah who deceived the people of Israel. This unjust verdict was spectacularly overturned by God the righteous judge, who always gets the last word.
We might even add the ascension to the events which inaugurated the kingdom of God. The first Christians uniformly believed that Jesus had been taken into heaven, where he was seated at the right hand of God Almighty. As the Apostle Peter would later write: “…Jesus the Messiah, who has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand – with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him.”
Despite the clarity afforded by the scriptures, many Christians find it difficult to grasp that God’s kingdom is a present reality and not just a future hope. After all, our present world is filled with disease, violence, poverty & misery. How can we meaningfully claim that Jesus is the Messiah when the world over which he is supposedly reigning is still so full of evil?
Many Jews reject Jesus’ claim to be the Messiah on precisely these grounds. In the last blog, we noted the basic Jewish understanding of history: there was the present age and the age to come. During the present age, dark forces had corrupted God’s world. But one day the Messiah would come to usher in the age to come. This great king of Israel would be God’s agent in establishing his kingdom over all the earth. The wicked would be destroyed; righteousness & justice would prevail forever.
Jesus and his followers accepted this basic framework. But the Christian innovation was that the present age would overlap the age to come. In other words, in the person of Jesus the Messiah, God’s glorious future has come to meet us in the present. The followers of Jesus saw that their Lord, through his death & resurrection, had inaugurated God’s kingdom. But the final consummation of the kingdom – the moment when the creation was completely cleansed of evil – was still in the future.
The book of Acts nicely illustrates how Jesus’ own disciples struggled to grasp this concept. Luke writes of how, after his resurrection, Jesus appeared to his apostles “over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God.” (Acts 1:3) The apostles asked, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6) Clearly, the disciples had the old framework in their minds. Now that Jesus had been raised from the dead (they thought), the age to come would arrive in full! Jesus would destroy his enemies & the righteous would inherit the world!
But God’s kingdom plans are clearly not our kingdom plans. The Old Testament scriptures had hinted that the kingdom would not arrive all at once. Jesus himself had often addressed this subject. He compared God’s kingdom to a mustard seed which begins as the “smallest of all seeds” yet eventually becomes “the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.” Or the kingdom was like a little yeast that a woman mixed into a large amount of flour “until it worked all through the dough.” Both parables emphasize that the kingdom will start very small but over time will grow dramatically.
But why would God act in such a way? Why does he allow evil & rebellion to persist? It takes only a little reflection to find the answer. Because of his great love, God desires to bring all people into his glorious kingdom. If God simply swept away wickedness, there would be no opportunity for repentance. As the Apostle Paul wrote: “Or do you show contempt for the riches of [God’s] kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?”
Many people fail completely to see how God’s kingdom has already transformed the world in which we live. There are currently about 2.6 billion Christians, roughly 30% of the world’s total population. Granted, not everyone counted as a Christians has genuine loyalty to Jesus. Nonetheless, the fact remains that the followers of King Jesus unquestionably constitute “a great multitude”!
In the book of Revelation, John the Seer recounts a grand vision of God’s people: “After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb.” (Revelation 7:9) John wrote these words around AD 90. Sociologist Rodney Stark estimates that there were only about 6,000 Christians at this time, representing a miniscule 0.01% of the population of the Roman Empire! Modern Christians read this text with the benefit of hindsight. We forget the daring nature of John’s prophecy. John foresaw that one day this tiny band of persecuted Christians would become a massive worldwide community!
Far too many Christians have a very pessimistic understanding of history, often the result of flawed theologies. It’s well-worth reflecting on the fact that – when we step back and look at the broad scope of history – we see the amazing growth of God’s kingdom. This reality should fill us with wonder & gratitude for what God has done. It should also give us hope for the future and inspire us to get about the business of our Lord: gathering yet more people into his eternal kingdom.
Great blog Joel!
Great blog Joel!