Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

§ 12.6 The Kingdom of God
Satan's power decisively (finally?) broken. It is difficult to think of a note of such
persistence and variety having ever been absent from the memories of Jesus'
preaching and teaching. On the contrary, this note of kingdom already come, of
God's (eschatological) rule already active in the present, must have been characteristic
of the Jesus tradition from the first. And that can only be because it was
characteristic of Jesus' preaching and teaching.
a. In Summary
12.6. Solving the Riddle
The motif of 'the kingdom of God/heaven' spoke (and speaks) of at least two
things fundamental to any quest of Jesus. (1) The Jesus tradition bears clear testimony
to the centrality of the kingship of God in Jesus' preaching. That God
was 'king', with all the implications of absolute sovereignty and power which
the very title encapsulated, was also axiomatic in Jesus' framework of understanding
and fundamental to his message. Jesus was evidently quite certain that
what God does/has done/will do is of far greater importance than anything contrived
on earth — a quantum leap of perspective to a different plane of motivation.
For him it was all-important to align individual and societal goals by that
reference point.
(2) Jesus was certain that God had a purpose for his creation which was
unfolding, indeed, was reaching towards its climax, and that his own mission
was an expression of that purpose and a vital agency towards its fulfilment. We
have only begun to unpack these two dimensions of Jesus' kingdom talk, and
the following chapters will continue the process, focusing particularly on the
immediate implications for discipleship (How then should those who responded
to his message of the kingdom henceforth live?) and for Jesus' own
role in the kingdom and its coming. 387 In this chapter we have had to be content
to outline the background to Jesus' usage, to sketch its most immediate
features (leaving aside the often complementary talk of the Son of Man), and
to focus attention on what has been the main question raised (the kingdom as
present/future).
In sum, we can assume that the basic reference of what appears to have
been his most characteristic phrase, 'the kingdom of God', was given by the traditional
language of Jewish devotion. However, he is not remembered as talking
about God as 'king' or worshipping God as 'king of the universe'. All his re-
387. A useful survey of recent debate may be found in D. C. Duling, 'Kingdom of God,
Kingdom of Heaven', ABD 4.56-69 (here 62-65).
465