Lesson Jesus and the Kingdom of God

3:   

I – Learning Outcomes:

At the end of this lesson, the students shall:

1. Explain how the Christians today understand the miracles of Jesus on its original meaning?
2. Resolve to do nothing out of selfishness following the invitation of Jesus as his disciples;
3. Commit to remain humble as Jesus did during his public ministry;
4. Differentiate the present and the future realities of Jesus’ mission;
5. Justify Jesus Kingdom works in the life of today’s missionaries;
6. Cite examples of one’s experiences of miracles.

II – Instructional Sequence

A. Share (Activity) 
Speed Sharing:
● Students share their experiences of what they consider miracles that happened in their lives. 

B. Hee (Individual Ponderings/Group Sharing)

d
Group Pondering:
● What are your concepts about miracles?
● What becomes of you after realizing that Jesus saves you?
● What contributions do you offer or have offered to the mission of the Church?

C. Understand Content  Discussion

JESUS AND THE KINGDOM OF GOD

I. THE CALL OF THE KINGDOM 

A. Israel’s hope for the Messiah:

The history of Israel, as perceived by the biblical writers, is one that revolves around the theme of Israel as a
kingdom. Yahweh God was King over all nations and His kingship will never end. The kings, specifically King David,
were God’s instrument for fulfilling his promises to make Israel a great nation. Out of the history and experience of
kingship arose the idea of the messianic kingdom. It would be a kingdom that God would use to accomplish his
covenantal promises: land, descendants, self-rule and self-identity. Such a kingdom would be:
a. a kingdom of peace and prosperity, 
b. a kingdom in which God’s law would be respected and followed, 
c. a kingdom in which the covenant would be faithfully kept; 
d. a kingdom where all enmity would disappear and 
e. a Kingdom when all living things would dwell in perfect harmony on earth. 
In Isaiah 11:6-9 one can find an idyllic view of this kingdom 

“Then the wolf shall be a guest of the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; the calf and the young lion shall browse
together, with a little child to guide them. The cow and the bear shall be neighbors, together their young shall rest; the lion shall
eat hay like the ox. The baby shall play by the cobra’s den, and the child shall lay his hand on the adder’s lair. There shall be no
harm or ruin on my entire holy mountain; for the earth shall be filled with knowledge of the Lord as the water covers the sea.”  

B. The Kingdom “upside down”

However, a closer look at the intensifying miseries and difficulties experienced by the Israelites people in their history
conveyed the message that the life’s realities were not in tune with what the Israelitic faith hoped for. The extreme
difficult conditions that lingered since time of old such as: the different foreign domination, the devastation of their
once fertile land where honey and milk flowed , the division and the dispersion of the once united community of
Yahweh (Qahal Yahweh), the loss of their identity as people and a race, heavy taxation and military servitude to the
dominating power were opposite to the promises of Yahweh for land, descendants, self-rule and self-identity. Israel’s
Faith perceived their miserable conditions as follows:
1. Injustice and oppression are consequences of their decision to break Yahweh’s covenant with them. 
2. Separations are results of their decision to rebel against the beautiful designs of Yahweh for their lives. 
3. As sinful people, Israelites cannot restore the communion with Yahweh destroyed by their sins
4. Yahweh would send Anointed One to usher salvation among their midst.   

For a thousand years, prophets announced the coming of the Anointed One of Yahweh or Messiah who would realize
the restoration of the covenantal promises of Yahweh. At the time of Jesus, the hope for the Messiah who would
deliver the people from the misery of colonial and pagan exploitation was a strong one. The people of Jesus
embraced a faith that the Reign of God would be established in their times to plunder the Reign of Satan that caused
their miseries, afflictions and suffering in their midst. This is the belief that shaped their culture and ran through the
veins of their society. They called this culture as the Reign of God Culture or the Kingdom of God Culture.   Kingdom
of God or Reign of God took its root from the Hebrew word “ Malkuth” or “Malkutha” in Aramaic which has two
meanings: Reign (Paghahari) and Kingdom (kaharian). The Kingdom of God and Reign of God are simply similar
terms and they are equivalent to the word Salvation in our language today. 

C. Jesus, the Proclaimer of the Kingdom of God

Now there seemed to be a new ground for hope.  The moment of God has come, the moment of Salvation has
arrived, the “Kairos” (in Greek “an opportune moment”) has happened. Somewhere, somehow, a savior (in Greek
“Soter”) would come as God had promised through the prophets of Old.  This new hope of peace seemed the ideal
time for it.  Expectancy of the Messiah electrified the air of the Jewish faith and culture.  The call to usher the
Kingdom of God became intense especially when Jesus witnessed the people living in darkness and longing to be
liberated from religio-cultural, economic and political injustice and oppression. 

In the synagogues, where the common Jews gathered on Sabbath and expressed their faith and communal life, they
had sung out the plaintive plea: “May your Kingdom be established soon in our day.” This plea was lodged in the
hearts of the first century Jews who intensely and deeply hoped for the Anointed one of Yahweh, the Messiah, to
come. To this plea, Jesus responded as He began His ministry, “The time is fulfilled the Reign of God/Kingdom of
God is at Hand!” (Mk.1:14-15) What is the meaning of this? Incidentally, for Jesus and this Jewish culture, the final
and definitive salvation is launched. The coming of the Reign-Kingdom of God is now under way.
 The Reign-Kingdom of God is at the heart of the preaching of Jesus. It is the life purpose or mission of the Messiah.
It is found on the lips of Jesus when He began the Ministry. Rausch (2005) writes that Jesus himself may well have
been the first person to use the phrase “Kingdom of God” but its root lies deep in the Old Testament. The “Reign-
Kingdom of God” is a general name for Salvation in the Gospel. As fundamental image of Jesus in the Gospel, the
Savior has launched and proclaimed “Salvation.”  He did not use the word Salvation in His Ministry but instead in His
Ministry but use His term based on the language and culture of His own people and that is the “Reign of God” or
“Kingdom of God”.

Jesus engages in a whole range of activities which concretizes the content and meaning of the Reign-Kingdom of
God. His preaching and his activity, His message and His ministry are inseparable. As Jesus proclaim, the Reign-
Kingdom of God is here and now and it would be in the life-here-after. It has two realities, namely: The Present and
The Future. The present reality refers to the experience of God’s loving mercy in the here and now as the humanity,
the world and history exuded the presence of the merciful and saving God. The future reality denotes the experience
of God’s total saving action into its fullness in the life-here-after of humanity, world and history. 

II. SERVING THE KINGDOM

The “Reign of God or Kingdom of God” appeared as the generic name for the mission of Salvation. In the Gospel,
this is the most beautiful word that people of Jesus’ time wished to listen. It became as the central theme of Jesus’
public proclamation.  The “Kingdom of God” is Good News for a nation which had been pinned down by the
oppressive forces of evil in the structure of their society.

Jesus serves what a Messiah was expected to deliver. He accounted clearly when the disciples of John came and
asked Him, “The blind can see, the lame can walk, the dumb can talk, those who suffer dreaded skin diseases are
made clean, the deaf hear, the dead are brought back to life and the Good News is preached to the poor.” (Matthew
11:5-6

A. "The kingdom of God is at hand"

In general sense, the whole life story of Jesus is a proclamation of the Kingdom of God. But in specific sense, this
section focuses the life and mission of the pre-crucifixion Jesus which can be put in this one sentence from Mark
1:14-15. “Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the Gospel of God and saying; the time is fulfilled, the kingdom of
God is at hand.” In this sentence is expressed the whole historical message of Jesus and His Original Mission. The
one single focus was Reign-Kingdom of God, the announcement of Salvation and the Biblical generic term for the
work of the Messiah. “Reform your lives and believe the Gospel” is a moral response of the hearer or the action of
the believer, thus it is not the term of Salvation in the Gospel.

B. The proclamation of the kingdom of God

The proclamation of the Kingdom of God is the major work of the Messiah.  What did the Kingdom mean in the
proclamation of Jesus? Jesus did not explain it but its meaning emerges from His words and illustrated in His deeds.
What is clear in the proclamation of Jesus is that the Kingdom of God is . . .
a. an experience not a place
b. both a present and future reality
c. a call for Immediate response
d. a truth that emerged from the Son of God 
The whole life of Jesus is an unfolding proclamation of the Kingdom of God. Throughout the Ministry of Jesus, He
unfolded images of the Kingdom of God. In broad strokes, this section wishes to outline some of the features or
images or blessings of the Kingdom of God as Jesus proclaimed:

1. Kingdom of God in the Beatitudes (Mt. 5:3-12 and Luke 6:20-23)

The Beatitudes comes from Latin “Beatus or Beatitudo” which means “Made happy.” In the ministry of Jesus,
Beatitudes is a form of speech used by Jesus to proclaim the happiness or blessedness of one or more persons in
certain circumstances or under certain conditions. It is considered as a blazing introduction to Jesus’ Sermon on the
Mount. It serves as the platform of Jesus’ ministry where we can find what Jesus stands for until death. It captured
the natural desire for happiness (CCC 1718) of his people who, for a long time, are living in miseries. As a goldmine
and treasure chest of the Christian Faith, the Beatitudes proclaimed the Salvation for the specific expectant
beneficiaries as the table below suggests.   

First Part:(Expectant of salvation) Second Part: Kingdom of God in the Beatitudes is an experience of. . .
(terms/images of
Salvation)
1. Blessed are You Poor/poor in - for yours is the  a. Justice and  Deliverance  Good News to
Spirit                     kingdom of Liberation    from poverty and the Poor (Anawim)
God/Heaven oppression
1. Blessed are the Hungry - for they shall be Satisfaction from hunger (both physical and moral)
(and the thirsty)       filled
1. Blessed are those who - for you will laugh/will Laughter and Joy, relief from physical pain, cultural and social
mourn/weep              be comforted rejection 
1. Blessed are the Meek - for they will inherit Inheriting the bounty of the earth deprived from them
the earth
1. Blessed are the Merciful - for they will receive Being merciful, a justice with a heart 
the mercy
1. Blessed are the pure in - for they shall see Seeing the presence of God in the primordial of life not in the
heart God luxuries, comfort and conveniences of life
1. Blessed are the - for they shall be Being Sons and Daughters of God
peacemakers called children of
God
1. Blessed are the - for theirs is  a. Justice and  deliverance  good news to
persecuted the kingdom of Liberation,  from poverty and the poor.
Heaven oppression
(Ananwim)

The CFC # 745 emphatically confirms, “The blessings of the Kingdom are promised to the poor and the powerless; to
the gentle and the afflicted; to those who seek eagerly for righteousness beyond external observance; to the
compassionate and the pure hearted; to those who turn from violence and seek reconciliation. To these Jesus promises
a unique type of happiness: to inherit God’s Kingdom, to possess the earth, to be a child of God, to receive mercy, to
see God.” 

1. Kingdom of God in the Miracles

Miracle is from the Greek “ Dunameis or Dynamis” which means force energy or act of power which in turn related to
“Simeon” signs or “Ergon” activity or work. The Miracles of Jesus are wonderful signs of the power or force which
God exercises or works in less obvious ways all the time. It is something that showed more clearly God’s power over
this world, history and humanity which is ruled over with different forms of evils, such as:
 1. the cosmic demonic powers of evil. (Catechism for Filipino Catholic #495)
2. the enslaving, oppressive forces in the socio-economic and political areas. (CFC #496-98)
3. the absurdity and meaningless of life. (CFC # 499)

Jesus manifested the divine power of His Father naturally flowing through His love and mercy to those in dire need
for God’s saving power: the lowly, 
The suffering, needy or expectant Kingdom of God means an experience of . . .
believer  
The Sick,  Healing from sickness, relief from physical and social pains
The Possessed Casting out Evil, being liberated from possession of evil. 
The groaning nature Power over nature, living in harmony with nature
The Dead Power over death 

Jesus performed miracles for the purpose that His followers will
1. imitate Him
2. see the signs of Father’s compassion
3. experience the signs of the Kingdom
4. respond the call to Faith
Jesus’ miracles show that he was so close to God. That God’s creative life flowed out to heal and liberate those who
came in contact with him.  His success in moldering not only sickness and possession but also nature and death
reveals his vocation to destroy Satan’s hold over humanity and re-establish God’s life.

1. Kingdom of God in the Parables

The word Parable comes to us from the Latin “Parabola” which means “comparison”. This “parabola” is also from the
Greek word “parabole,” which means “placing beside a comparison”.  Jesus told stories to bring about the reality of
the Kingdom of God. It took his followers a long time to understand what Jesus meant by the Kingdom in the
Parables.  Jesus taught that the Kingdom is not a nation or a state.  Jesus said to Pilate, “My Kingdom does not
belong to this world…  My Kingdom is not here.”  

The Parables of Jesus represent the highest development of this narrative form as they appear in the three Synoptic
Gospels.  In the Parables Jesus focused the common life of listeners and drew them into recognizing God’s presence
therein.  Jesus taught the people that God was their Father, not in competition with them.  Then he was not calling
them out of their own humanity, but rather making their own creative human efforts possible of his divine presence.
(CFC # 482)

Jesus' invitation to enter his kingdom comes in the form of parables, a characteristic feature of his teaching. Through
his parables he invites people to the feast of the kingdom, but he also asks for a radical choice: to gain the kingdom,
one must give everything. Words are not enough, deeds are required. The parables are like mirrors for man: will he
be hard soil or good earth for the word? What use has he made of the talents he has received? Jesus and the
presence of the kingdom in this world are secretly at the heart of the parables. One must enter the kingdom, that is,
become a disciple of Christ, in order to "know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven". For those who stay "outside",
everything remains enigmatic. CCC546

Jesus meant that His Kingdom is an experience of God’s goodness, justice and truth winning out over the
kingdom of Satan and his evil deeds.  This victory brings peace to the world. (CFC # 479-480).  The Kingdom is
invisible and mysterious. The Reign of God is something in the future – like a seed, still growing.  The Kingdom is the
coming of the final blessings of the final and definitive salvation for the New World and human history. The Kingdom
of God begins secretly in each heart, as noiselessly as a mustard seed dropping into the ground. This kingdom calls
on us today to change our heart and to bear and keep the Word of God.  Only we, in the secret of our mind, can
respond to Jesus and the Father in love and trust.

1. Kingdom of God as Future Reality.

What is the ultimate destiny of Man, of the World and of History? In the life here-after, the features of the Kingdom of
God come to what humanity, world and history intend to become that is to be in communion with the Source of
existence. In the work of total salvation, Jesus ushers the fulfillment of this destiny. The biblical religion taught about
three images of future reality of the Reign-Kingdom of God manifested in the teaching of Jesus in the Gospel,
namely: Resurrection of the Dead, New Heaven and New earth, new and different history.

a. As Resurrection of the Dead

So precious is the human person in the heart of God that He did not intend man to go into garbage and wither. God
design man to be in communion with Him. This design of life is spelled out in the belief of Resurrection of the Dead. 

Resurrection is from Latin “Resurrectio” literally means the return to life of the dead person or the raising again from
the dead.  It therefore means more than simple resuscitation, for resuscitation implies that the person was only
apparently, not actually dead. The New Testament pictures the Reign-Kingdom of God at the close of history as a
time when human kind will experience its victory over death.  There will be a resurrection of the dead.  The dead
person will live again. This is a belief that began to emerge clearly in Jewish tradition from 200 B.C.E. onwards ( see
2 Mac. 7:4, 14, 23, Daniel 12:2-3 ). This is the belief that those who had been vanquished by death will one day
vanquish death itself.  Those who had died will live again. Those who lie in sleep of death will be awakened to life.
The human kind is ultimately destined for resurrection of the total self, total person, total life which takes from a
Hebrew word “NEPHESH” which means life, person, being or self.

What will resurrect, The Soul or the Body? Resurrection from the dead is not only of the soul but for the total human
being to experience newness of life. It is the coming back to life of the total person, a renewed total self, transformed
total being who will be living in the new world, meaning a NEW HUMAN BEING LIVES AGAIN IN A NEW MODE OF
EXISTENCE. It is the total person who will live again at the end time. This total person cannot be harmed anymore
by any form of evil in this world.

When would Resurrection happen?  Resurrection will only happen on the Last Day. Resurrection does happen right
after a person dies, it happens on the final and definitive Salvation. “This is the will of the Father that whoever sees
the Son and believes in Him shall live with eternal life; and I will raise him up on the last day.” (John 6:40) “I know
that he will rise in the resurrection, at the last day.” (John11:24).

If resurrection happens only on the last day, what happen to the person right after death? Where will the person go?
These questions commonly lodge in the minds of the believers and even non-believers of the Resurrection. These
were even given answers by the paranormal science. The Gospels attest that those who lie in the sleep of death will
one day reawaken. The person lies in sleep of death in the “bosom of the earth” and will joyfully wait for the final day
of the resurrection. 

b. As New Heaven and New Earth

The heaven and earth are Biblical formula used to refer to the world or the universe in the language of the scientific
people today.  In the key word, new heaven and new earth is also equivalent to NEW WORLD OR NEW UNIVERSE
or the Transformed Earth in the end time. The Semitic culture in Jesus’ time envisaged of God as NEW WORLD as
another image of the future reality of the Kingdom of God. 

All of us have witnessed if not have been victims of the demonic powers or evils experienced by the cosmic world.  In
Jesus, the concern of the human person should also be a concern of the home of this person.  The creation must
also be saved; it must be set free from everything that imprisons it. Nature has been subjected to meaninglessness,
abuses, pains, sickness and even death.  This must not be neglected by Jesus’ work of total Salvation.  This must
also be a Christian truth. “Creation itself will be set free from its enslavement to decay ad it too will obtain the glorious
liberty that we humans will enjoy as children of God.”

Romans 8:19-23, though couched in language that needs to be clarified, is precious.  It is saying that human persons
are heading towards the new creation.  It is also explicating that creation itself will experience Total Salvation. It is not
only humans which had the privilege to be saved but also the mountains, the forests, the rivers, the trees, the birds,
the bio-diversity.  The whole creation, human and nature – longs for total Salvation. According to the Biblical
Religion, the Profiles of the New Heaven and New Earth will be as follows:
1. The universe where there is Justice
2. A world where all things new
3. Rebirth of the Universe
4. Universal restoration of all things
5. Unity of all things in heaven, on earth and under the earth

c. As New and Different History

Jewish people looked at history in two epochs, namely: this Age and the Age to come. This Age refers to the
presently on-going history of Israel and humanity.  It is a history characterized by pain, suffering, wars, sin, hunger,
sorrows, oppression, and death. A history governed by evil. The Age to come refers to the future history that would
come in the end. It is a history when there will be no more pains, no more sickness, no more hatred, no more sorrows
and no more death. This is a history when Life triumphs and God is all in all.

Jesus perceived history as the same with humans and nature which longs for salvation.  He heard the history
groaning in pain of injustices, oppression, miseries and extinction. It longed to experience total salvation like the
humans and earth. As the New Testament passages pointed out, the salvation or Reign-Kingdom of God for Jesus
and the New Testament people is not about the souls seeing God in heaven.  Rather it is a new history for people, in
possession of justice, peace, life and other concrete blessings for the human family.  Typically, it is from down here to
up there.  Rather, it is from the old history to a new history on this earth. This Earth will undergo transformation and
together with this transformation process of the earth, the old history will banish and a new history shall be shaped
up. 

This biblical idea of an age-to-come is one of the new and refreshing bits of learning we can embrace in our search
for true image of Jesus and his work of Salvation which he called Reign-Kingdom of God.  It provides a whole new
dimension to the understanding of ultimate salvation.  It teaches us that the total salvation, which Jesus started in his
ministry, will finally and definitively culminates in a new and different history for nature and humankind, collectively
and individually.

The Gospel of Mark 10:17-30 is offering fascinating and pertinent word of this dimension of this new history like:
a. inherit eternal life (vv. 17,30) 
b. enter the Kingdom of God (vv. 23, 24, 25)
c. to be saved (v. 26)
d. age-to-come (v. 30)
 With these four expressions, none of them means going to heaven after death, rather, from the context, it is clear that
these four expressions are practical synonyms and refers to a new world, a new history for a new community.  It
would be the age when people will participate and experience justice, compassion, truth and peace.  

In particular:
Eternal Life is a favorite Graeco-Roman Christianity expression which is superficially understood as the life of
Beatific vision for the soul in Heaven. But Biblically speaking, it means fullness of life with resurrection, banquet,
justice, joy, experiencing God in a new earth at the end of time.
Salvation Biblically speaking is entering the kingdom of God and experiencing fullness of life.

Thus, Reign-Kingdom of God as a new and different History, is the same as Salvation, fullness of life in the age-to-
come, where you and every human being, having vanquished death, will participate in a new history of life-giving
justice, peace, harmony, unity, joy and the like.

III. THE SPIRIT AND THE KINGDOM OF GOD

St. Luke’s Gospel introduces the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry stating: “Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit
to Galilee” (Lk 4:14; cf. CCC 714). There, in his home town of Nazareth, Jesus laid out his whole messianic program:
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because He has anointed me.
He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor,
to proclaim liberty to captives,
Recovery of sight to the blind
and release to prisoners,
To announce a year of favor from the Lord (Lk 4:18f).

The Kingdom of God cannot be understood without the Holy Spirit. The relationship of the Spirit and the Kingdom of God is
inseparable from each other. This universal outpouring of the Spirit was to take place through the promised Messiah. Thus,
Peter proclaimed in his Pentecostal discourse: “Exalted at God’s right hand, Jesus first received the promised Holy Spirit
from the Father, then poured this Spirit out on us” (Acts 2:33). So did the prophetic promise of the Spirit’s outpouring find
its perfect fulfillment in the life, Death and Resurrection of Christ Jesus, our Lord and Savior. 

Thus, did Jesus inaugurate his public ministry in the power of the Spirit, as the prophet Isaiah had foretold of the
Messiah (cf. Is 61:1-2). Jesus’ empowerment by the Spirit is recorded in two preceding incidents and confirmed in a
third: 
First, at his baptism by John the Baptist in the Jordan, Jesus was “anointed” by the Spirit, who “descended on him in
visible form like a dove” (Lk 3:22).
Second, immediately after his baptism, “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, was conducted by the Spirit into the desert for
forty days, where he overcame the devil’s temptation, no doubt in the power of the Spirit who was in him (cf. Lk
4:1-2, 14).
Third, confirming these two experiences was Jesus’ Transfiguration. “His clothes became dazzling white.  A cloud
came, overshadowing them, and out of the cloud a voice: ‘This is my beloved Son. Listen to him’” (Mk 9:2-3, 7).
The cloud traditionally symbolized the presence or Spirit of the Lord. Jesus’ very identity, then, is marked by his
two unique relations: to God who addressed Jesus as “Beloved Son,” and to the Spirit who transfigured Jesus. *

A. Joint Mission of Christ and the Spirit

So closely do Christ and the Spirit work together that we can rightfully speak of the “joint mission of the Son and of
the Spirit” (cf. CCC 689, 702, 727). When the Father sends His Word, He always sends His Breath: there occurs a
joint mission in which the Son and the Holy Spirit are distinct but inseparable. It is Christ who appears as the visible
Image of the invisible God, but it is the Holy Spirit who reveals him. The knowledge of the “mysteries of the Reign of
God” of which Christ is the fullness, is “given” (Mt 13:11) in the gift of the Holy Spirit (cf. CCC 729). Christ gives the
form and content of salvation, while the Spirit makes present and extends this new life.

The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father and the Son, the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity. As “Giver of Life,” the Spirit
vivifies the Church, our sacramental and moral life, and our resurrection to life everlasting. “The love of God has been
poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given us” (Rom 5:5).