The Growth and Spread of Christ within Us for the Kingdom of God

In Matthew 6:10 Jesus taught His disciples to pray, saying, “Your kingdom come; Your will be done, as in heaven, so also on earth.” We may be very familiar with this prayer, but we also need to know what the kingdom and God’s will are.

“In one sense, the kingdom is the sphere in which God exercises His authority. However, to speak of the kingdom only in this sense is not adequate. We may illustrate the nature of the kingdom by considering the animal kingdom. The animal kingdom is not merely a realm or a sphere. We may say that it is the totality of the animal life with all its activities. Without the animal life, there would be no animal kingdom. Likewise, the kingdom of God is the totality of the divine life with all its activities. According to Luke 17:21-24 , the kingdom of God is Christ Himself. However, it is not Christ alone, because Christ as the kingdom has spread into us. When Christ as the kingdom spreads into people, He is enlarged and expanded…Thus, Christ plus the church is the kingdom of God. The kingdom is not merely a dispensation or even a sphere in which God exercises His kingship. The kingdom is the spread, expansion, and enlargement of Christ.”