Definitions of the kingdom of God

"Clear and compelling" or shallow and superficial?  Most definitions of the kingdom of God have been shallow and superficial in that they have skirted the difficult issues of justice and oppression.

One theologian surveyed all the theological literature on the kingdom of God that had been written during the last century and he concluded that theology lacked a "clear and compelling" understanding of the biblical kingdom of God.  I personally asked hundreds of persons who came to the Perkins Center in Mississippi from all over the United States---from Presbyterian to Pentecostal, from Mennonite to Methodist.  No one, no group, including a group of Afro American pastors from New Jersey, provided a clear and compelling definition of the kingdom of God.

John Perkins commented that it often seemed like this was the first time that most of these people had given any serious thought to the kingdom of God.  The kingdom of God should be a top priority in any person's theology, not an after thought.

John Lewis, when a black teenager in Alabama, heard a radio sermon on "the beloved community" (King's term for the kingdom of God).  ONE clear and compelling sermon on the kingdom gave Lewis his life's direction.  A few years later, Rev. James Lawson trained Lewis and others how to implement the kingdom in the segregated South.  Read The Children.

The following are a variety of definitions of the kingdom of God; you choose your favorite definition:

1.  Jesus Christ:  justice.  "Set your mind on God's kingdom and his justice above                                                           everything  else."  Mt. 6:33, NEB.  

                                           I believe this is Jesus' summary of Isaiah's

                                           Messianic passages beginning with 9:7 and ending with 61:1-4

                                           NRSV.

2.  Billy Graham:  justice for all.  Add the kingdom of God as justice for all to the Cross and

                                                   Resurrection gospel.

3.  Pledge of Allegiance:  liberty and justice for all.

4.  Sabbatical/ Jubilee laws:  cancel debts, free slaves, restore land.  These God-designed 

                                               for Hebrew society, Hebrew economics, addressed three keys

                                               for any economic system---capital, labor and finance.

5.  Isaiah:  Jubilee justice that releases the oppressed poor.  61:1-4, NRSV.

6.  Luke:   Jubilee justice that releases the oppressed poor.  Luke 4:18-19, NIV.

7.  Isaiah:  justice/shalom or justice/peace.  9:7, NIV

8.  Paul:  justice, shalom and joy (also power and wisdom) in the Holy Spirit.  Rom. 14:17.

9.  Noble:  Jubilee justice releases the oppressed poor; then justice rebuilds, repairs

                  damaged oppressed communities.  Implied:  Christian Community Development

                  and long term partnerships.

10.  Noble's second definition:  When the Spirit, kingdom and justice are combined, then

                                                  the oppressed poor can be released.