By Dan & Brenda Cathcart
Moed
Ministries International
The video version of this teaching is available at:
The
scripture reading for this teaching is: Luke 17:20-37
To
what can the kingdom of God be compared?
This is an often-asked rhetorical question of the Master Yeshua. A central focus of His encounters with
pilgrims on the road as well as meetings with His followers, disciples and
detractors alike, is the coming of the Kingdom of God. Their expectations were many and varied. But
given the rampant corruption among the Jewish leadership along with the brutal
oppression of the Roman rulers, most Jewish people of the day were looking for
a conquering King to rise an army and physically defeat the Romans. Many looked to Yeshua to be this conquering
king!
In
the gospel of Luke, chapter seventeen, while on the road to Jerusalem from
where the Master was resting, across the Jordan where John was preaching and
baptizing, Yeshua further explained the kingdom of God and how it was to be
recognized.
Luke
17:20-21 NKJV 20 Now when He was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God
would come, He answered them and said, "The kingdom of God does not come
with observation; 21 "nor will they say, 'See here!' or 'See there!' For
indeed, the kingdom of God is within you."
Yeshua
was trying to convey to the pilgrims along the road, the exact nature of the
kingdom of God. But were his words
confusing to the listener? In saying that
the kingdom would not “come with observation,” was this in keeping with the
well-known scriptures about the Messiah and the kingdom of God? What does it mean that the kingdom of God is
within them? What is the true nature of
this kingdom?
Yeshua’s
answer to the inquiring Pharisees in verse 21 seems, at least on the surface to
contradict the descriptions of the Messianic kingdom in the scriptures as well
as widely accepted traditions among the Pharisaic schools. The prophet Joel
spoke of signs at the coming of the Messiah.
Joel
2:30-31 NKJV 30 "And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth:
Blood and fire and pillars of smoke. 31 The sun shall be turned into darkness,
And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the
LORD.
Is
Yeshua’s statement in verse 20 of Luke 17 consistent with the voices of the
prophets? Just a few verses later Yeshua said that the coming of the kingdom
would be like a flash of lightning.
Luke
17:24 NKJV 24 "For as the lightning that flashes out of one part under
heaven shines to the other part under heaven, so also the Son of Man will be in
His day.
Well,
lightning is certainly visible! What is
this kingdom of God that Yeshua speaks so often about in His parables and teachings? It is apparent in these varying descriptions
of the kingdom, that Yeshua is speaking of many different aspects of the
kingdom. All of these descriptions are
in keeping with His words and with the Torah and prophets.
As
we have described in previous teachings, Yeshua spoke of the kingdom in terms
of a mustard seed, which is among the smallest seeds and grows to become a very
large tree. He also compared it to a
small amount of leaven placed into three measures of flour.
First
Fruits of Zion in their work The Chronicles of the Messiah, quote a
commentary by Rabbi Lichtenstein on Luke 17:20
The
kingdom of God, with the coming of the Messiah the first time and in low level,
was not visible to the sight with great wonders, where everyone would
understand and take note of it. But the kingdom of God in the second coming of
the Messiah will come with power (Mark 9:1); and as it is written (in Luke
21:27; “They will see the son of man coming in great power and great glory.”[1]
With
Yeshua’s first coming, the process of establishing the kingdom of God had
begun. It didn’t come with a flash of
lightning and the sound of a great shofar.
Much like the Galilean fisherman who cast their trammel nets at night,
so the fish cannot see the nets, so too the kingdom of God “is at hand” in a
somewhat invisible way. Through the work
of the Messiah and the deeds of His disciples going forward through the
centuries since His first coming, the kingdom of God is still being established
in the world today. The net has been cast over the earth and the harvest is in
progress. The kingdom of God is at hand, but not yet visible or recognized
until the final redemption at His second coming.
The
seventeenth century theologian, Matthew Poole in his commentary on this verse, uses
a paraphrasing of Yeshua to explain the meaning:
“Men
have taken up a false notion of my kingdom, as if it were to be a secular
kingdom to be set up in the world, with a great deal of noise, and pomp, and
splendour, so as men may observe it and gaze upon its coming. But that which I
call my kingdom is not of this nature.”[2]
At
this time, Yeshua is speaking to a group of Pharisees, probably a group from
the Galilee region who, unlike the corrupt scribes and Pharisees in Jerusalem
and Judea, had come to respect and admire Yeshua of Nazareth as a gifted
teacher if not fully convinced of His Messiahship. In verse twenty-one, Yeshua
warns them to be on the lookout for false teachers and prophets proclaiming
that the Messiah is “here” or the Messiah is “there.”
Yeshua
often warned His followers about the rise of false Messiah’s and false
prophets.
Matthew
24:24 NKJV 24 "For false christs and false prophets will rise and show
great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.
And
Peter also warns his own followers:
2
Peter 2:1 NKJV 1 But there were also false prophets among the people, even as
there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive
heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift
destruction.
It
was not very long after the time of the original disciples that perhaps the
most infamous false prophet and Messiah arose.
In the early part of the second century of the common era, Rabbi Akiva
proclaimed that a prominent leader of the second Jewish revolt against Roman
rule, Shim’on bar Kosiva, commonly known as Bar Kochba, was the Messiah. This
ended in a terrible disaster for the Jewish people, resulting in the near total
exile of the Jewish population of Jerusalem.
With
the constant questions aimed at Yeshua and His kingdom, we get a clear picture
that the people were expecting the establishment of an earthly kingdom and the
reestablishment of the throne of David. In Luke seventeen verse twenty-one
Yeshua states that the kingdom of God is within you.
The
Greek word translated as “within you”, is number 1787 in the Strong’s Lexicon,
entos, meaning inside or within. The
Word Study Dictionary from AMG Publishing, further explains that the word is
always used in the sense of “something located in your heart or affections, not
external.”[3] Many English translations render this word as
“among you,” which indicates something external and would be a clear deviation
of the Greek meaning.
Yeshua
told the questioning group of Pharisees that the kingdom of God was not visible
because it was within them! And He was clearly internalizing their expectations
of the Messianic age. The prophets
indeed speak of an age when Messiah will reign, hearts will be transformed,
Israel will be cleansed of her sins, and a new covenant established with the
House of Israel and the House of Judah!
The
Pharisees understood the concept of an internalized submission to the rule and
reign of God. This is reflected in the
daily recitation of the Shema. The
Talmud comments on this:
“Why
is the first section of the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4-9, “Hear, O Israel, the LORD
is our God, the LORD in one…), recited before the second section (Deuteronomy
11:13-21, “It shall come about, if you listen obediently to my commandments
which I am commanding you today…)? Because a person should first accept upon
himself the yoke of the kingdom of heaven and then take upon himself the yoke
of the commandments.”[4]
Yeshua
was clearly pointing them to a kingdom which could be realized and entered into
here and now. The final redemption and
establishment of the physical kingdom of the Messiah spoken of so often by the
prophets was part two, and is yet to come!
In
the next verse, Yeshua turns His attention to His disciples:
Luke
17:22 NKJV 22 Then He said to the disciples, "The days will come when you
will desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it.
This
was a kind of warning to His disciples and followers. Although many were
beginning to understand that the kingdom of God was first a matter of the heart
and would later be established on the earth, the warning was of difficult days
ahead, not only for Himself, but for His disciples as well.
The
Master Yeshua gave them, and us, a clear warning to be vigilant and watch out
for false prophets and teachers who would take advantage of our desire for the
establishment of the physical Messianic age. When He does come again to
establish His earthly kingdom, there will be no doubt that He has arrived! But
before that can happen, Yeshua told them that He must suffer and be
rejected. He also told them what those
days before His earthly kingdom would be like:
Luke
17:25-30 NKJV 25 "But first He must suffer many things and be rejected by
this generation. 26 "And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also
in the days of the Son of Man: 27 "They ate, they drank, they married
wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark,
and the flood came and destroyed them all. 28 "Likewise as it was also in
the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted,
they built; 29 "but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire
and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. 30 "Even so will it be
in the day when the Son of Man is revealed.
Yeshua
compared the days leading up to the establishment of His earthly kingdom to the
days of the generations of Noah and that of Lot. The parallel passage in Matthew’s gospel gives
more detail:
Matthew
24:37-39 NKJV 37 "But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of
the Son of Man be. 38 "For as in the days before the flood, they were
eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah
entered the ark, 39 "and did not know until the flood came and took them
all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.
Noah
was considered a righteous man in the sight of God. He was busy in the task that God had assigned
him while those around him engaged in their everyday comings and goings. The
description of the time of Lot is much the same. When Yeshua returns for the
final redemption, people not in tune with God will be going about their daily
lives, just as they always have, and will be caught off guard. Yeshua was not
saying that eating, drinking, marrying and giving in marriage were bad or
sinful. He was just pointing out that in
addition to our concerns about our daily lives, that there are more imperative
things to take into consideration.
Yeshua’s
warning is very much like the warning given to Lot’s family, especially his
wife.
Luke
17:31-32 NKJV 31 "In that day, he who is on the housetop, and his goods
are in the house, let him not come down to take them away. And likewise the one
who is in the field, let him not turn back. 32 "Remember Lot's wife.
In
the book of Genesis, we read about what happened to Lot’s wife.
Genesis
19:17 NKJV 17 So it came to pass, when they had brought them outside, that he
said, "Escape for your life! Do not look behind you nor stay anywhere in
the plain. Escape to the mountains, lest you be destroyed."
The
skipping down to verse twenty six.
Genesis
19:26 NKJV 26 But his wife looked back behind him, and she became a pillar of
salt.
Yeshua’s
warning was to be prepared. Tribulations
and trouble were ahead and all who believe must prioritize their lives and be
ready on a moment’s notice. Remember Lot
and his family were nearly destroyed along with everyone else, not because they
were wicked, but because they were too attached to their lives in the city. Lot
and his family may not have engaged in the wicked indulgences of the city in
which they lived, but they didn’t sufficiently distance themselves from it
either.
It’s
not an easy thing to separate ourselves from the things we have worked so hard
to gain and maintain. Lot’s wife could not help but look back, and the results
were disastrous for her.
Yeshua
further warns His followers by giving examples.
Luke
17:33-37 NKJV 33 "Whoever seeks to save his life will lose it, and whoever
loses his life will preserve it. 34 "I tell you, in that night there will
be two men in one bed: the one will be taken and the other will be left. 35
"Two women will be grinding together: the one will be taken and the other
left. 36 "Two men will be in the field: the one will be taken and the
other left." 37 And they answered and said to Him, "Where,
Lord?" So He said to them, "Wherever the body is, there the eagles
will be gathered together."
This
passage is, for the most part, terribly misunderstood by the Christian
church. The church teaching that one
person taken and another left behind as a description of the “rapture” where
believers are swept up from the earth at Yeshua’s return is misleading at best.
Brenda
and I did a teaching on this, which is available in Vol. 1 of our Bible study
series, “Shadows of the Messiah in the Torah”. The key to understanding the words of Yeshua
in this passage and its parallel found in Matthew’s gospel, is a careful
understanding of the Greek.
Although our English translations seem to indicate one group of
people are taken and the other group left, the original Greek words convey a
slightly different message. The English word “taken” is translated from the
Greek word paralambano, #3880 in Strong’s Greek Dictionary, it means to receive
near. And the word translated as “left” is from the Greek word aphiemi, #863
meaning to send forth. So one person will be received near, and the other will not
be left behind, but will be sent away! Neither one really stays behind!
The apostles asked where, where will they be sent? Yeshua’s answer
says they will be sent to the place where the eagles are gathered. The eagle is
a carrion bird as well as a bird of prey. They will gather together at the site
of many dead bodies.
Yeshua uses the phrase “depart from me” in several of His parables
when talking about those who are lawless or who work iniquity. He uses “depart
from me” in Matthew chapter seven when He talks about a tree producing good
fruit, also in Matthew twenty five when He talks about separating those who
fed, clothed, and visited the brethren in prison from those who did not, and in
the parable of the talents, Yeshua sends away those He does not know.
We are reminded of the story of the rich man and Lazarus which we
studied just a couple of weeks ago, where, upon their deaths, Lazarus is
received to Abraham’s bosom and the unnamed rich man is exiled to a place of
weeping and gnashing of teeth.
The Apostle John also writes about this event in Revelation when
God gathers the carrion birds to feast on dead flesh. I certainly don’t want to
be where the dead bodies are! It sounds like it’s the unrighteous who are
indeed sent away.
Revelation 19:17-18 NKJV 17 Then I saw an angel standing in the
sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the birds that fly in the
midst of heaven, "Come and gather together for the supper of the great
God, 18 "that you may eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of captains, the
flesh of mighty men, the flesh of horses and of those who sit on them, and the
flesh of all people, free and slave, both small and great."
And skipping down to verse 21.
Revelation
19:21 NKJV 21 And the rest were killed with the sword which proceeded from the
mouth of Him who sat on the horse. And all the birds were filled with their
flesh.
We
need to listen carefully to the words of our Master about the nature of the
kingdom of God. We need to understand
that His kingdom is a kingdom, that is not around us, but is within us, realizing
that we can take hold of His kingdom today!
We can take hold of the beginnings of the great harvest that is yet to
come. But we must also remember to
prepare ourselves by being vigilant, hiding His teaching in our hearts and
sharing the gospel message when we walk on the road, when we lay down and when
we rise up. Let the kingdom of God be a
part of our lives each and every day, and be ready to answer His call, either
to drop everything and embark of a mission at his calling, leaving our present
lives behind, or answering the sound of the Great Shofar at the final
redemption.
Study Questions:
1. Compare the “Be Attitudes” (Matthew 5:1-10)
with the concept of the kingdom of heaven being within you.
2. Some ancient manuscripts/translations of
Isaiah 54:9, including the Qumran Isaiah scroll, render the verse as “as it was
in the days of Noah” instead of as in most modern translations “…as the waters
of Noah…” How do Yeshua’s words in Luke
17:26 refer to this verse and the overall passage in Isaiah 54:4-10?
3. How do we heed Yeshua’s warning about false
christs and false prophets? How are we
to discern between the imposters and the real thing? Support you answer with scripture.
4. Yeshua told other parables about receiving
some and casting out others. How does
the timing of receiving and casting out relate to each other?
© 2018 Moed Ministries
International. All rights reserved
[1]
Lichtenstein, Commentary on the New Testament, on Luke 17:20 as quoted by FFOZ
[2]
Matthew Pool, A Commentary on the Holy Bible
[3]
The Word Study Dictionary; New Testament. AMG Pub. Page 594
[4] M.
Berachot 2:2
