The long-awaited kingdom of heaven was coming. The disciples had heard John the Baptist announce its approach (Matt 3:1–2). They had listened when Jesus confirmed this message as he preached the gospel of the kingdom (Matt 4:17, 23; 9:35). Jesus had taught them the ethics of the new age in his Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5–7).
The Lord had shown them what God would do to the apostate Jews. He would cast them into outer darkness as the kingdom arrived (Matt 8:11–12). He had commissioned them to preach the kingdom’s nearness to Israel in the interim (Matt 10:7). They would not finish their mission before the Son of Man came (Matt 10:23).
The kingdom would bring an age of great glory. The least person in it would be greater than the greatest Old Testament prophet (Matt 11:11). Jesus’s miracles proved that this glory-age had arrived (Matt 12:28). He would bind the strong man (i.e., Satan) and spoil him of his goods (i.e., the nations; Matt 12:29). Woe to the man who attributed Jesus’s works through the Holy Spirit to Satan. That man would not receive forgiveness in the Mosaic age or in the messianic (kingdom) age “about to come” (Matt 12:32).1
The Lord had told stories (or parables) to explain the transition between these two ages (Matt 13). He had linked his building of the church to Peter’s use of the keys of the kingdom (Matt 16:18–19). Jesus had said he would return in his kingdom before some in his generation died (Matt 16:27–28).
Three of the disciples—Peter, James, and John—had seen a vision of Christ’s glory (Matt 17:1–8). The vision showed the Mosaic-age would soon end. Its law (Moses) and prophets (Elijah) would disappear. The messianic age—the time of Christ’s parousia (presence) with his churches—would remain (cp. 2 Pet 1:16).
The disciples had never known such glory as was about to come. Their sacred Scriptures described the past splendor of Israel’s kingdom. That was in the days of David and Solomon. Tradition told them of other heroes like the Maccabees. But they had known nothing but humiliating subjugation to the Romans. They were eager to see the kingdom.
We can understand their excitement. Things were about to change. They wanted to know how things would operate in the new age. So, they came “unto Jesus, saying, Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” (Matt 18:1).
Jesus answered their question (Matt 18:3–20). He did so in a way that shows three characteristics of kingdom citizenship.
Qualifications for Kingdom Citizenship
First, the coming kingdom would comprise only persons who had humbled themselves. Here are Jesus’s words:
Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. (Matt 18:3–4; emphasis added)2
Jesus was saying,
unless ye learn to entertain an humble, and modest opinion of yourselves, are not envious at one another, and drop all contentions about primacy and pre-eminence, and all your ambitious views of one being greater than another, in a vainly expected temporal kingdom; things which are not to be found in little children, though not free from sin in other respects, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.3
God had not required this humility for entrance into the Mosaic-age kingdom. He had rebuked pride (e.g., Ps 10:2, 4) and commended humility (e.g., Ps 9:10). But modesty was not required to enter that kingdom. One entered it through meeting other requirements. These included natural birth, circumcision of the flesh, etc.
Entrance into the coming kingdom depended on spiritual qualifications: a birth from God (John 1:12–13); circumcision of the heart (Rom 2:29); etc. God would grant these qualifications to his elect people. They would depend on him and not boast of their achievements. They would not desire places of honor. Instead, they would desire God’s glory and long for spiritual fellowship with him and his people.
Those who humbled themselves would be greatest in the kingdom (Matt 18:4). They would prosper in “the Gospel church-state.”4
But doesn’t being like a child make one vulnerable?
Warning Against Offenses
Second, God would protect his (apparently) vulnerable children in the kingdom. Isaiah had foretold this protection. God had promised to
create upon every dwelling place of mount Zion, and upon her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night: for upon all the glory shall be a defence. And there shall be a tabernacle for a shadow in the daytime from the heat, and for a place of refuge, and for a covert from storm and from rain. (Isa 4:5–6)
He would protect those in “every particular church of Christ in Gospel times.”5
Jesus gave an extended warning about this protection (Matt 18:6–14). He began by saying, “whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea” (Matt 18:6). He ended with comforting words. “It is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish” (Matt 18:14).
Between these two statements, Jesus used the same imagery (Matt 18:8–9) he used about adultery (Matt 5:28–30). Offending one of God’s kingdom-children was egregious, as much so as breaking the seventh commandment (Exod 20:14).
To offend means “to entice to sin,” or “to cause to fall away.”6 Without forgiveness, this sin precludes life and results in everlasting fire (Matt 18:8–9).
But Jesus provided a practical solution for these offenses.
Resolution of Offenses
Third, God would provide a method to resolve offenses against his children (Matt 18:15–35). That resolution would involve the local church.
Our previous posts defined the kingdom. “‘The kingdom of heaven’ refers to Christ’s reign over his messianic-age church.”7 Scripture refers to particular local churches as “the church” by synecdoché. Each congregation represents the whole.8
Jesus’s method for resolving offenses shows this kingdom-church relationship (Matt 18:15–20). It contains a series of steps. In the first, the offended brother goes to the offender in private to seek reconciliation. If that is unsuccessful, he takes two or three witnesses. If that, too, fails, he must “tell it unto the church.”
The church serves as the final arbiter of kingdom offenses. If the offender refuses to abide by its decision, the church must use the keys of the kingdom. It must consider the offender “as an heathen man and a publican.” Jesus assures the church of his presence when it makes such judgments (Matt 18:20). This is one way the church declares who is in the kingdom and who is not.9
Peter seems to have thought through the process Jesus outlined. As he contemplated the first step—brother talking to brother—a question arose in his mind. “Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?” (Matt 18:21).
This question prompted Jesus’s famous answer. “I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven” (Matt 18:22). Church trials of brother-on-brother offenses should be rare. Seventy-times-seven forgiveness at the first step will resolve most offenses.
Jesus gave a parable about forgiveness in the kingdom. He meant forgiveness in “the Gospel church-state, or the church of Christ under the Gospel dispensation, and the methods of God’s dealings in it”10 (Matt 18:23–35). The parable’s main lesson is clear. Persons in the messianic-age kingdom would forgive for one tremendous reason. Through his Son, God has forgiven them for all their sins.
Conclusion
The flow of this chapter (Matt 18) reinforces inmillennialism. The messianic-age kingdom was on the near horizon. This prompted the disciples to ask a question: who would be greatest in the kingdom?
Jesus answered. The great ones in the kingdom would be those who humble themselves the most (Matt 18:1–6). Offenses against these humble, child-like kingdom citizens must come, but God would protect them (Matt 18:7–14). His method of resolving offenses against them involved the church (Matt 18:15–20).
All this conforms to the inmillennial prophetic model. It also illustrates our definition of God’s messianic-age church kingdom.
Jesus made another interesting point here: to enter the kingdom is to enter life. A comparison of Matt 18:3 with Matt 18:8 shows this. This relationship between the kingdom and eternal life will appear again in the next chapter (e.g., Matt 19:23–24, 29). Lord willing, we will discuss it further in our next post.
Footnotes
- Kenneth S. Wuest, Expanded Translation of the Greek New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1961), 30.
- The image in this post is Jesus Christ with the Children by Carl Bloch (1834–1890). This file (here) is in the public domain (PD-US).
- John Gill, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, 9 vols. (1809–1810; repr., Paris, AR: The Baptist Standard Bearer, 1989), 7:200.
- Gill, “Exposition,” 7:201.
- Gill, “Exposition,” 5:25.
- Joseph Thayer and James Strong, Thayer’s Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament: Coded With Strong’s Concordance Numbers (Milford, MI: Mott Media, 1982), 576.
- See our post Meditations in Matthew Sixteen: Church and Kingdom.
- See our post Meditations in Matthew Sixteen: Building the Church.
- See Jonathan Leeman, Church Membership (Wheaton: Crossway, 2012), 61.
- Gill, “Exposition,” 7:207.
