The Local Church and the Kingdom

The Kingdom—A Brief Overview

In the midst of universal chaos and lawlessness, God intends to establish His kingdom, a realm where God rules and exercises His authority absolutely, and where God's will is carried out unhindered. The kingdom was God's intention in Genesis 1:26, when God created man in His image in order that man might express God and represent God by exercising dominion over all creation, especially over the creeping serpent Satan, who took the lead to exalt himself in rebellion against God’s authority and God's kingdom (Isa. 14, Ezek. 28). However, when man fell into sin and joined Satan in rising up in rebellion against God (Gen. 6:5, 11:4), God turned from rebellious humankind to call the nation of Israel out of the fallen Adamic race to be His kingdom (Gen. 12:1-3, Exo. 19:6). Nevertheless, the Bible records that Israel failed God time and again (Matt. 23:37), culminating in their rejection of the sent Savior, Christ (Acts 7:51-52). In the New Testament age, the Lord has turned once again, this time to the church, specifically to the local churches—the practical, visible expression of His mystical universal Body—to execute His heavenly will, to bind and loose on earth what He has bound and loosed in the heavens (Matt. 18:18). We will show from the Word and through the ministry of Witness lee concerning the local churches, that today, God intends that the local churches represent His authority as the practical kingdom of the heavens on earth (Rom. 14:17). The proper local churches today constitute a realm where Christ rules and reigns, albeit inwardly and invisibly.

To be sure, the fullness of the kingdom of the heavens will be openly manifested in the next age when the Lord Jesus returns, when Christ comes visibly to the earth as the King of all earthly kings to outwardly rule and establish His righteous reign. He will then manifestly and decisively defeat Antichrist, the man of lawlessness (Rev. 19:20), overthrowing all worldly kingdoms to establish the eternal and unshakable kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ (Rev. 11:15), where His overcoming believers will reign with Him for a thousand years (Rev. 20:4, 6). (Here's a helpful diagram on biblical eschatology by Witness Lee found in the Recovery Version study bible.) Yet even from the beginning of the New Testament, the kingdom of the heavens had already come in its intrinsic spiritual reality, not “with observation” (Luke 17:20-21)—i.e., not visibly—with the initial coming of Christ. Christ sowed Himself as the seed of the kingdom into His believers (Matt. 13:19; John. 12:24), and the kingdom is now growing imperceptibly yet steadily in the local churches (1 Cor. 3:9). In fact, the intrinsic content and reality of the kingdom is Christ Himself. Thus, the presence of Christ is the actuality of the kingdom (Luke 17:21), and the presence of Christ in a local church is the actuality of the kingdom in that local church (Matt. 18:17-18, 20). For now, suffice it to say that to live in the reality of the kingdom in the local church today is simply to live Christ (Phil. 1:21) under the ruling of the divine life in the local church life.

Our living today in the local churches must therefore be in the reality of the kingdom and for the kingdom. The local churches do not exist for the sake of mere religious congregation. The local churches must fulfill the higher calling of exhibiting the practical reality of the kingdom of the heavens in this age, in order to usher in its manifestation in the coming age of fullness. The kingdom was God’s goal in creation (Gen. 1:26), in choosing Israel (Exo. 19:6), and in calling the believers (1 Thes. 2:12). The kingdom is the immediate object of the Lord's prayer (Matt. 6:10) and the foremost proclamation of the New Testament ministry (Matt. 3:2); the preaching of the gospel of the kingdom (Matt. 24:14) is in fact what consummates the church age and ushers in the kingdom age.

God has used Witness Lee, a faithful minister of Christ in the last century, to raise up more than two thousand local churches across the globe. The ministry of Witness Lee has not merely educated believers concerning the truths of the kingdom of the heavens, but even more significantly, has also motivated them, to live in all gravity in the reality of the kingdom in today’s local churches. Witness Lee realized that God’s purpose is not merely to raise up congregations; God desires to reign in His kingdom. For this purpose, Witnesss Lee tells us, God must have His kingdom today, at least in miniature, among the believers in the local churches. The purpose of this Website is to show, in particular through the writings of Witness Lee, that God intends the local churches to be the practicality of the kingdom of God in this age; that the believers who live a proper local church life are living in the reality of the kingdom, and that the invisible reality of the kingdom lived out in each local church in this age will usher in its visible manifestation in the next age. Much of the material here is derived from an excellent book authored by Witness Lee, The Kingdom.

A. The Church and the Local Churches as the Kingdom of God in the New Testament

B. The Reality of the Kingdom in the Local Church

C. The Organic Development of the Kingdom in the Local Church

The Kingdom—A Brief Overview

The Church and the Local Churches as the Kingdom

Reality of the Kingdom in the Local Church

Its Organic Development in the Local Church

Bibliography

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