An Atheistic Bible Study Of The Gospel Kingdom Of God

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A theme used by Jesus more than most in the Gospels is ‘The Kingdom Of God’ (occassionally the Kingdom Of Heaven). This is not the heavenly Paradise the righteous dead will go too after Judgement Day but a promise that God will directly take charge of the World, overthrowing Roman rule and manifesting himself directly to the living who follow him. The main problem with this Millennial prophesy is that Jesus promises the Apostles it will happen in their lifetimes. Mark’s Gospel states that the Apostles will see the Kingdom before they die. Oops. Much of his Ministry was concerned with getting people to repent urgently because its arrival could be imminent. Over 2,000 years later various churches within Christianity still claim the Kingdom’s dawning is just round the corner. Jesus wanted the promised Kingdom to be a secret among his closest, most trusted followers, but Judas revealed the Kingdom teachings to the Sadducees while betraying Jesus in the lead up to the crucifixion. Jesus sometimes seems to regard his own presence as the beginning of the Kingdom, saying to the Scribe-critics that they won’t even know it is here unless they have faith in him. Many of the parables are seen as containing cryptic references to the Kingdom, a seed so small that only the trained eye can see it. Jesus saw his teachings as the seed that would one day grow into the tree. The suddenly rising Kingdom will effectively turn the Earth into an extension to Heaven, a new Eden. This Kingdom is the Earth promised to the meek, weak and humble. The biggest contradiction to this is the entire Book Of Revelation which destroys all life on Earth and sets up the souls of the dead for Judgement. The Apostles and other close followers of Jesus were to behave as if the Kingdom had already arrived, in effect they were behaving like a modern New Age hippy commune. The rich were expected to surrender their income, and their families were to be abandoned, Jesus states that to see the Kingdom, a follower has to be ‘born again’, a phrase that inspired the rise of the many born again Christian evangelical movements and cults of the 20th century. Born again ceremonies usually involve baptism, and like John The Baptist, Jesus conducted many baptisms. The Kingdom is seen at times as an inner state of mind, rather than a physical change to the landscape, rather like the finale to Thor Ragnorak where Thor leads the survivors of the Norse Apocalypse to a new Asgard on Earth, seeing it as their feelings rather than a material place. The Kingdom will not mean a life of plenty and hedonistic debauchery but a life of austerity, humility and prayer. Christians themselves are vague on what the Kingdom means, be it a time of religious revivalism, the Second Coming, a post-Apocalypse utopia, a return to working miracles or God himself being so visible that doubting his existence would become impossible. For atheists, there is no Kingdom, now or to come. Life I what we make it. Arthur Chappell