The Baptist Catechism

    A Commentary on the Shorter Catechism (1883), Alexander Whyte

    Question 102

    Thy kingdom come—It is a common saying that experience is the best schoolmaster. And that proverb is proved true even in the present instance, where the scholars are inquiring disciples, and the schoolmaster is the Truth Himself. For there was no lesson among all the lessons that were set the disciples to learn that they approached with a slower heart and a more shut understanding than just this very matter of the coming of the kingdom of God. The kingdom of David was the first stage in the development and manifestation of the kingdom of God on the earth. And in spite of all their Master could say and do, this exhausted and abolished sense was still the sense in which the disciples insisted in offering their daily prayer: “Our Father which art in heaven. . . . Let the domination of Cæsar be broken, and let the ruined kingdom of David be restored.” But experience taught even those slow-hearted disciples how great a prayer they had all unknown to themselves been uttering when they said, “Thy kingdom come” (Rom. viii. 26, 27). “No idea comes so markedly into the foreground in the teaching of our Lord, according to the first three Gospels, as that of the kingdom of God or kingdom of heaven, which had been of old foretold by the prophets, and was expected by the contemporaries of Jesus. The gospel which He proclaims is the gospel of the kingdom, and the kingdom itself is a religious-moral institution, which—boundless in extent, and everlasting in duration, in its design to unite, sanctify, and save humanity—embraces heaven and earth” (Oosterzee). (See Professor Lindsay’s Mark, p. 63.)

    “The kingdom of God among men is nothing else than a restoration to a happy life; or, in other words, it is true and everlasting happiness” (Calvin).

    we pray that Satan’s kingdom may be destroyed—“His great competitor, Christ, acknowledgeth Satan to have a kingdom (Matt. xii. 26). Yea, and he had the start with his kingdom in this world before Christ came into it” (Goodwin). “But, methinks, I see by this, that Satan will use any means to keep the soul from Christ; he loveth not an awakened frame of spirit: security, blindness, darkness, and error is the very kingdom and habitation of the wicked one” (Grace Abounding, 162). The various steps in the destruction of Satan’s kingdom in the soul are excellently set forth in Answers 31, 35, and 36.

    The kingdom of grace advanced—Paul speaks of the kingdom of God as a reign of grace, and the Catechism here follows his example. The kingdom of grace is advanced with the conversion of every sinner and the sanctification of every believer, and with the spread of the gospel in heathen lands. This clause is fully expanded in the Larger Catechism.

    ourselves and others brought into it—We are brought into this kingdom by being born again and effectually called. That was a most startling utterance that Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, a prince of the house of David, heard from the lips of David’s son: “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” For this is as much as to say, No antiquity or nobility of descent, no amount of personal worth, no sacramental sealing, no ecclesiastical rank or office, no attainments in sacred learning, and no fulfilment of sacred service,—nothing that any man can of himself be or do will admit him into the kingdom of heaven. It is only what God does for him, and in him, that capacitates and enfranchises any man as a citizen of the kingdom of heaven. Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?

    and kept in it—“Holy Father, keep through Thine own name those whom Thou hast given me. . . . While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Thy name, and none of them is lost. . . . I pray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil” (Our Lord’s Prayer).

    “Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time” (Peter). “I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed to Him against that day” (Paul).

    and that the kingdom of glory may be hastened. This is the prayer of those who “look for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.” They who offer this prayer with the spirit and with the understanding also know as they offer it that God hath appointed the day when that glory shall dawn, and they know that neither prayer nor effort will literally hasten it. But they pray in holy impatience because they are “looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God.” “He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.”

    Uses

    1. There must be many things in the constitution and administration of such a kingdom that the subjects of it cannot comprehend. There must be many counsels between the Father and the Son that we cannot fathom. But it is our loyalty and no small part of our obedience to believe that what we know not now we shall know hereafter. And in every dispensation of His rule the disciples and subjects of Jesus Christ can quiet and comfort their hearts, saying, He is our Lawgiver, He is our King, and He will save us.
    2. “Every man falls either under the kingdom of Christ or under the kingdom of Satan; and we ourselves do this hour, this moment, actually stand members either of the one or of the other; there is not a third kingdom, as there is not a third place to go to” (Goodwin).
    3. It is the King’s command, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God.” Let then the young seek it first, as Solomon sought first, and before all else, a wise and an understanding heart. Let all, old and young, seek the kingdom of heaven, as the five virgins in the parable of the kingdom sought for the oil; only, let us seek it more wisely and earlier than they. And lest we awake to seek it too late, let us arise and seek it now. Now, while as yet it is said by the King Himself, Knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
    4. “I had great longings for the advancement of Christ’s kingdom in the world; and my secret prayers used to be in great part taken up with it. If I heard the least hint of anything that happened in any part of the world, that appeared, in some respect or other, to have a favourable aspect on the interests of Christ’s kingdom, my soul eagerly catched at it, and it would much animate and refresh me. I used to be eager to read public news-letters mainly for that end, to see if I could not find some news favourable to the interest of religion in the world” (Jonathan Edwards’ Personal Narrative of his Youth).

    Questions

    1. Derive Theocracy and Christendom.
    2. Derive, fill up, and explain the saying: There are two kings and two kingdoms in Scotland.
    3. Collect Scriptures in which Satan is spoken of as a king.
    4. In Dr. Hodge’s section on the Nature of Christ’s Kingdom, he says that it is spiritual, Catholic, absolute, temporary. Explain these positions, and prove them from Scripture.