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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: "Extending God's Kingdom"
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Komensky
Shipmate
# 8675
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Posted
I keep hearing this expression in some churches, but I'm not sure what it means. I'm a little worried that it implies Kingdom Now theology behind it. I saw it in relation to a youth group at a local church: the youth group "is designed to spark our young
people into radical lifestyle for Jesus and extending God's Kingdom here in our city."
Can we really extend God's Kingdom? I'm not sure I understand this construction and/or if I'm making unfair assumptions about the Kingdom Now theology that may lay behind it.
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"The English are not very spiritual people, so they invented cricket to give them some idea of eternity." - George Bernard Shaw
Posts: 1784 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2004
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Snags
Utterly socially unrealistic
# 15351
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Posted
I'll put my hand up to using it as an expression, and I'm definitely not a Kingdom Now/Dominion person!
I'll also put my hand up to being slightly uncomfortable when I use it, as I'm aware it's a vague and potentially misleading phrase. As you say, how can one extend God's Kingdom when he's already king of the whole lot anyway.
So, all of that said, in the context I've heard it/used it for want of a better phrase, it's more about consciously doing things in line with "Kingdom values" (woohoo, another ambiguous phrase), or doing something that makes concrete what we already hold as a theological position. For me it's very much in the context of Tom Wright's "How Christ became King" which is more in the "now and not yet" camp, and focusing the mind on the 'now' element whist anticipating the 'not yet'. Which is all a bit woolly too, really, and crystalises why it's a buzz phrase I'll be dropping ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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Vain witterings :-: Vain pretentions :-: The Dog's Blog(locks)
Posts: 1399 | From: just north of That London | Registered: Dec 2009
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
I just think that it's one of those buzz-phrases, Komensky, with very little 'Kingdom Now' about it ... although there will be elements of that in those groups influenced by Wimber's approach ... signs and wonders seen as part and parcel of the extension of the Kingdom.
To be honest, I prefer that approach to the one sometimes found in AoG and other Pentecostal and neo-pentecostal circles that healing and so on is somehow 'in the atonement' and we should therefore be able to expect - or even 'command' it - on tap.
Mostly, in the context you're talking about it's short-hand for churches getting involved with evangelism (sometimes social action) and things that might draw people 'into the Kingdom' - including, but not exclusively, the whole signs and wonders gambit.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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fletcher christian
Mutinous Seadog
# 13919
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Posted
What's Kingdom Now?
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'God is love insaturable, love impossible to describe'
Staretz Silouan
Posts: 5235 | From: a prefecture | Registered: Jul 2008
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South Coast Kevin
Shipmate
# 16130
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Posted
I really like the idea that God's kingdom simply means the extent to which God's will is done. I first came across this view in Dallas Willard's book 'The Divine Conspiracy', though he may have been borrowing from others, I don't know.
So extending God's kingdom means increasing the area in which things are how God wants them to be, perhaps summed up by Jesus' words in Luke 4:18-19 (paraphrased because I should be working) - 'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, to preach good news, proclaim sight for the blind, release from oppression...' If we're involved in doing those kinds of things then we're extending God's kingdom, as I understand it.
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My blog - wondering about Christianity in the 21st century, chess, music, politics and other bits and bobs.
Posts: 3309 | From: The south coast (of England) | Registered: Jan 2011
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Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
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Posted
It's used loads in the SA: it means both the work of the Kingdom - ie greater work done in the community and the lives of others, and also extending the kingdom, God's reign in people's lives 'soul by soul'
If the Great Commission is about making disciples, then extending the kingdom is just that
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"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
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Raptor Eye
Shipmate
# 16649
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Posted
I prefer 'growing' God's kingdom as I see it as an organic realm, being grown here on earth by everyone who serves God. This ties in with the teaching of Jesus, particularly the kingdom of God is like....parables, eg of the mustard seed and yeast, and those that speak of fruitfulness.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
Posts: 4359 | From: The United Kingdom | Registered: Sep 2011
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Snags
Utterly socially unrealistic
# 15351
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Posted
Phew, others have expressed it better than me (not hard).
It's probably also worth pointing out that the "extending" is perhaps more in the sense of "extending the hand of friendship" rather than in the sense of making bigger than it already was. An offering, a reaching out, a practical action etc.
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Vain witterings :-: Vain pretentions :-: The Dog's Blog(locks)
Posts: 1399 | From: just north of That London | Registered: Dec 2009
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Fletcher Christian, 'Kingdom Now' is a short-hand term for a rather over-realised approach to eschatology where God's 'Kingdom rule' can be established here in increasing measure before the Parousia.
In simple terms its a kind of charismatic version of the more Calvinist 'Dominion Theology' - it has theocratic overtones and an emphasis on spiritual authority - some of these folk would have a fairly 'realised' concept of apostles, prophets and so on ... but it's a bit different to the UK restorationism of the 1970s - 90s - although similar terminology is used.
There's a wikipedia article here - usual caveats apply: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominion_Theology
It's possible to detect elements of 'Kingdom Now' theology (if it is a theology ... ![[Razz]](tongue.gif) ) in some charismatic quarters - even if they don't fully sign up to the whole package. The charismatic scene is eclectic like that and adopts a pick'n'mix approach.
In my experience, most UK charismatics would see 'extending the kingdom' in the way that Mudfrog has articulated it from a Salvationist perspective - but with a few added bells and whistles.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Circuit Rider
Ship's Itinerant
# 13088
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
I prefer 'growing' God's kingdom as I see it as an organic realm, being grown here on earth by everyone who serves God. This ties in with the teaching of Jesus, particularly the kingdom of God is like....parables, eg of the mustard seed and yeast, and those that speak of fruitfulness.
I have used the phrase "extending the kingdom" but I think you have a better reference point, especially with the examples you cite.
I have studied and pondered the concept of kingdom for years, actually first prompted to focus on it by "kingdom now" teaching in the 1980s. Before that I had been led to think of the kingdom more on eschatological terms, entirely as a future event. But Jesus is clear that the kingdom is "now" as much as future and that we are to grow it.
In fact, I have come to view the Church as the agency or embassy of the kingdom of God in the world, charged with representing Jesus Christ. It has a view of the restored world in mind, and works in present time to bring as much of that as possible into present reality. I think that the works to be tried by fire (gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble) are actually those things with which we occupy ourselves through church. Those that remain into the perfected world were works of and for the kingdom; our own pet projects done for sentimental purposes will not. Extending or growing the kingdom concerns itself with doing more of those things that will remain.
Before Christ I think Israel was intended to be the agent of the kingdom. But Jesus removed that in Matthew 21:43, giving it to a nation bearing the fruits thereof. He had already given the keys to the kingdom to Peter and spoke of building his church.
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I felt my heart strangely warmed ... and realised I had spilt hot coffee all over myself.
Posts: 715 | From: Somewhere in the Heart of Dixie | Registered: Oct 2007
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