A King on Trial
It is one of the great scenes of all Scripture. The Lord of glory, bound and beaten, stands before a Roman governor, and the question on the table is a question of kingship. “Art thou the King of the Jews?” Pilate asks, for he had been told that this Man claimed a throne, and to a Roman official the claim of a rival king meant sedition, rebellion, the sword. Pilate was thinking of crowns and armies and territory. He could conceive of no other kind of kingdom. And into that confusion the Lord Jesus spoke words that have shaped the understanding of His people ever since:
Notice that the Lord does not deny that He has a kingdom. He affirms it — twice He calls it “my kingdom.” He is a King, and His reign is no fiction. What He denies is that His kingdom is of this world, that it derives its origin, its character, and its methods from the present fallen order. His kingdom is real, but it is of another sort entirely — and the proof He offers is telling: if it were a worldly kingdom, His servants would be fighting to prevent His arrest, as the servants of any earthly king would. The absence of the sword is the evidence of the kingdom’s heavenly nature. Let us trace, from the whole of Scripture, what kind of kingdom this is.
Its Origin Is Heavenly, Not Earthly
“Now is my kingdom not from hence,” the Lord said — not from here, not arising out of this world’s soil. Earthly kingdoms rise by conquest, inheritance, election, or revolution; they are built up from below by the will and power of men. Christ’s kingdom descends from above. It was given to Him by the Father: “I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me” (Luke 22:29). Daniel saw it in vision — a stone “cut out without hands” that struck the image of the world’s empires and became a mountain filling the whole earth, “a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed” (Daniel 2:44). The phrase “without hands” is the signature of God’s own working, apart from human agency. This kingdom is not the achievement of man but the gift of God.
Its Nature Is Spiritual, Not Material
Because its origin is heavenly, its nature is spiritual. It is not a matter of food and drink, borders and banners, but of righteousness wrought within:
When the Pharisees demanded to know when the kingdom would come, expecting some visible, datable, political event, the Lord answered that they were looking in the wrong place entirely: “The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:20–21). It does not arrive with the pomp and spectacle that announces an earthly monarch. It comes quietly, inwardly, taking up its throne in the hearts of men. This is why one cannot point to it on a map or count its citizens in a census. Its territory is the redeemed heart.
Its Entrance Is by New Birth, Not Natural Descent
One does not enter this kingdom by being born into the right nation, family, or church, nor by any work or worthiness of the flesh. There is only one door, and the Lord stated it with the strongest solemnity to Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews who assumed his lineage secured him a place:
A spiritual kingdom must have spiritual subjects, and a man dead in sin cannot so much as see it, let alone enter it, until he is born from above by the sovereign work of the Spirit. The new birth is the naturalization of a citizen of heaven. This is why flesh and blood, status and pedigree, count for nothing here. “That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”
Its Weapons Are Not Carnal
Christ’s servants did not fight at His arrest, and the principle holds for the whole age of the kingdom’s present advance. The kingdom does not spread by the sword, by political coercion, or by the machinery of the state. Its warfare is of another kind:
The strongholds this kingdom pulls down are not fortresses of stone but of the mind — “imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God.” Its weapons are the preaching of the gospel, the Word of God, prayer, the Spirit’s power, and the patient suffering of the saints. When the church has reached for the sword and the throne to advance Christ’s cause — as it has done in dark ages past — it has betrayed the very nature of the kingdom it claimed to serve. The kingdom that was not defended by the sword is not extended by it either.
Its King Reigns Now, From Heaven
Let no one suppose that because the kingdom is spiritual it is therefore feeble or merely future. Its King is reigning at this very hour. He is risen, ascended, and seated at the right hand of God, and the apostolic preaching is emphatic that He now reigns: “He must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet” (1 Corinthians 15:25). All authority in heaven and earth has been given to Him (Matthew 28:18). He holds the keys of death and hell. He adds to His kingdom daily those that are being saved, and no power of earth or hell can pluck them from His hand or halt the building of His church. The kingdom is hidden to the natural eye, but it is the most real and the most powerful government in the universe.
Yet It Will Be Revealed in Glory
The kingdom that came the first time without observation will not always remain hidden. The same Christ who stood meekly before Pilate will return visibly, and every eye shall see Him. The kingdoms of this world — the very kind Pilate served — are destined to give way: “The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever” (Revelation 11:15). What is now received by faith will then be seen by sight. The stone cut without hands will fill the whole earth. The spiritual kingdom and the visible glory are not two kingdoms but one, in two stages — the reign of grace now, the reign of glory then.
What This Means for the Christian
Several things follow, and they are intensely practical. First, the believer is to set his affection on things above, for his “conversation” — his citizenship — “is in heaven” (Philippians 3:20). He is a stranger and pilgrim here, holding the things of this world loosely. Second, he renders to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s (Matthew 22:21); he honors earthly authority in its proper sphere without ever confusing it with the kingdom of Christ or expecting any government to do the work that only the gospel can do. Third, he does not despair when the world rages or grow giddy when earthly powers seem friendly, for his hope was never anchored in any nation, party, or prince. And fourth, he labors and prays, “Thy kingdom come,” longing for the day when the King appears and the kingdom now received within is revealed without, in power and great glory.
Let the men of this world build their kingdoms of dust, which rise and crumble in their season. The servant of Christ belongs to a kingdom that cannot be shaken, ruled by a King who cannot be moved, secured by a power that cannot be broken. “Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:32).