The Conflict Between Two Kingdoms Ttaly

Many Christians are sadly focussing on religion and themselves, drawing on humanism to mould a “Jesus” and a “church”, which may be accepted by the world. In the process, values which are foreign to the Kingdom of God are accepted in some churches and even protected in the name of eclectism, relativism, ecumenism, and many other poisoning “isms”.

Sometimes the church seems more preoccupied with fostering members to find happiness and success, than with equipping committed disciples for the work of ministry and building up the body of Messiah (see Eph. 4, 12) aligned with the needs of the Kingdom of Heaven.

In so doing, often Christians miss the point that it is not about them, but about God and his Kingdom, as if Jesus never stated, that we are to seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all that we need will be added to us.

Therefore, as the world is falling apart and evil is spreading more and more violently, Christianity is rapidly risking to become one of the many religions humanity can offer to individuals to feel better.

The fact is that we are facing an objective peak of the universal conflict which openly started 2.000 years ago between the Kingdom of God and the kingdom of satan, who is also called the devil.

In a war there is no time to find out how to be happy. What matters is on which side we are on, how well trained we are to fight such a war, how ready we are to face difficulties of any kind, and what are we doing to advance the Kingdom of God.

Using an euphemism, the rest is philosophy.

Jesus explained that there is a conflict between two kingdoms and the New Testament offers us some principles about this:

• Satan rules over a kingdom, which is “this world” (John 12:31). He is the ruler of a realm of rulerships with various areas and descending orders of authority, which is at work in all those who are proud and rebellious against God.

• God has His Kingdom, called the Kingdom of Heaven and of God, whose nature is righteousness, peace joy and whose reality on the earth is the Holy Spirit dwelling in all those who are trustfully faithful to Jesus. In God’s Kingdom there is no place for rebellion against the Spirit of the King (Mt. 12:31).

• Therefore, there are kingdoms in conflict: the devil is a strong ruler, Jesus is the sovereign king and stronger, and men can decide whom to be ruled by, satan or God, and on whose side to stand during their earthly life.

Having first explained such principles, the Lord made known his strategy as follows: “I came to attack satan and overcome him; he is a strong ruler, but I am stronger than he. I take away his armor, in which he trusts, and divide his spoil. I do that casting demons (evil spiritual entities of the kingdom of darkness) out of people by the Spirit of God. It is the Holy Spirit that does it through me”.

The shrinking of the kingdom of satan occurs when it loses territory (i.e., control of individuals, ethnicities, geographical areas) due to the conquering action of the stronger authority and power of the Kingdom of God (see Mt. 12:25-29). When a territory is delivered from the enemy it is occupied by the Kingdom of God.

In other words, God came in our midst as a man, defeated the enemy, transferred those who are faithful to Jesus into the Kingdom of His beloved Son (Col. 1:13) and gave them the kingdom with good pleasure (see Lk. 12:32). God promises that he will soon crush satan under their feet

(Ro. 16:20) and that the earth shall be assigned forever to the ruling of his saints (2 Tim. 2:12; Rev. 5:10; Rev. 20:6; Rev. 22:5) together with Jesus, their King and God.

Don’t we know that Jesus has become our life and lives it in us by his Spirit? Therefore, he keeps doing what he was doing before he physically left the planet: doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil (Acts 10:38) and destroying the works of the devil (1 John 3:8). It is the Holy Spirit who keeps doing all this through us, just as he did it through Jesus.

Let’s then consider how in this conflict:

• There is no room for neutrality. The Lord clearly stated that whoever is not with him is against him, and whoever does not gather with him scatters (see Mt. 12:30).

• There is no room for passivity. The Messiah clearly instructed us to:

- GO, REACH all ethnicities to make them disciples (Mt. 28).

- as you go, PREACH the good news of the Kingdom of God to any human beings (Mk. 16).

- SERVE and LOVE one another as he loved us (John 13-15).

- Wait to BE BAPTIZED IN THE HOLY SPIRIT before going, for that’s how the Kingdom of Heaven comes upon us and empowers us to give testimony of Jesus (Lk 24 and Acts 1).

• There is no room for fear. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to the risen Messiah,Yeshua, the King of kings, the Lord of lords. He did something amazing. He set aside the old proud and rebellious man (the record of our debt) nailing it to the cross. By doing so he disarmed the rulers and authorities (the spiritual powers of the kingdom of darkness) and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in himself, i.e., on the cross (Col. 2:14-15).

- continues on page 10