Subtitle: If the Kingdom of God is here, why are the Romans still here also?

Jesus’s preaching on the Kingdom of God was absolutely surprising to the original audience. Many of his parables were such that they taught about some aspect of the Kingdom that was against the common conception of what the Kingdom was supposed to look like. In this brief series, I will be looking at some of those misconceptions.

“Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and saying, ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.’”
Mark 1:14-15

At the beginning of his ministry, Jesus made a surprising announcement: The time has been fulfilled, the Kingdom of God is at hand. One of the first questions that pops into my mind here is, what does Mark mean when he claims that Jesus is proclaiming the Gospel? Certainly, this would make the most sense post-resurrection, if we understand “gospel” here to mean the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. But here we find Jesus proclaiming the gospel (“good news”) at the beginning of his ministry- before he has even introduced the ideas of his death and resurrection. Furthermore, Mark doesn’t even try to explain what he means by “gospel.” This is because Mark assumes that his readers would understand what he means, apparently on their knowledge of the Old Testament. Yet, we don’t find any particular usage of “gospel” in the Old Testament. What gives, Mark? Well, actually, there is a hint given.

If we look at what the text is telling us, we notice that the participle translated here as “saying” (legon) is giving us the content of his preaching, and that content is thus: “God’s Kingdom is here.” The Old Testament is full of the fact that God reigns over his creation. In some way, God’s reign over creation takes an amazing twist with the coming of Christ. The reign of God, specifically in the coming of Christ, then, is good news. And this is where we find our first surprise to the original audience: “If God’s kingdom has arrived like we’ve been waiting for, why are we still oppressed by the Romans?”

Here’s some background. A few centuries before Christ’s birth, the Jewish people were greatly oppressed by the Greeks, most notably under Antiochus IV. The Jews made a great mistake in enlisting the help of the Romans to defeat them. The Romans did defeat the Greeks, but they also took that next step they are so well known for- occupying the lands of the people they “help.” For centuries, the Jews were being ruled over by the Romans- and fell under severe oppression yet again.

Here’s the cliff notes version of what happens next: The Jews begin to consider the idea of the messiah and the kingdom of God in light of this occupation, and believed that the messiah would rescue them militarily- through a revolution. So here comes this guy saying the Kingdom is here- yet, the heads of the Romans were still on their shoulders (if you will).

The issue here is that the Jews were only considering the idea of the kingdom superficially. No, when Jesus came, he did not stop the occupation under the Romans. In fact, he died under them as a criminal (more on this in another post). What he did do, however, was go deeper than the problem with the Romans. He did not come to stop the occupation of the Romans itself, but to destroy and crush the head of the root of oppression: sin. The Kingdom of God did not come to destroy the Romans, but to destroy the power that laid behind them- the head of the serpent would soon be crushed. The time had been fulfilled.  It did not come with military might, yet it disarmed even the greatest of war-mongers.

Next: What’s Politics Got to Do with it? (Got to Do with it?)