(030) 今日灵粮 Spiritual FOOD TODAY：教会与神国或天国的关系 The Relationship Between the Church and the Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Heaven

(030) 今日灵粮 Spiritual FOOD TODAY：教会与神国或天国的关系 The Relationship Between the Church and the Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Heaven

《SCRIPTURE 经文》：施洗约翰下监以後，耶稣来到加利利，宣传神的福音，说：日期满了，神的国近了。你们当悔改，信福音！ After John, the Baptist was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. “The time has come,” he said. “The Kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”. (马可福音 Mark 1:14-15)

《SHARING 分享》: 今天我们要分享的圣经主题是马可福音 1:14-15，耶稣在那里宣告神的好消息，说： “日期到了，神的国近了。你们要悔改，信这好消息！” 耶稣救恩的好消息是，神赦免人类的罪，赐永生给那些相信耶稣是他们个人救主，为我们流血死在十字架上，复活升天，等候祂的再来接我们到天国，一劳永逸地战胜罪的死刑的人。这个好消息也被世人称为救恩的福音。正是这位牧师兼神学家乔治·艾尔登·拉德在他的《新约神学》一书中总结了我们这次分享的主题 “教会与神国或天国的关系”。他说：“国度主要是神动态的统治或王权，统治的领域由此衍生而来。”在圣经的习语中，国度并不等同于它的臣民。他们是进入国度、生活在国度之下、受国度统治的神的子民。教会是国度的社群，但绝不是国度本身。耶稣的门徒和我们这些跟随者属于国度，因为国度属于我们；但我们不是国度。国度是神的统治；教会是人的社会。“

因此，托德·斯泰尔斯牧师在他的讲道 “为什么神的国度不只是教会” 中引用了上述的片段，劝诫我们要认识到神的国度和教会之间存在着密切的联系。当教会传扬神国度的福音时，人们就会进入教会，开始在生活中体验神统治的祝福。神的国度通过教会显现，因此神未来的统治进入了我们的现在。而且，拉德在书中继续说，教会不是天国，因为耶稣和早期基督徒所传讲的是天国近了，而不是教会近了，他们所传讲的是天国的好消息，而不是教会的好消息。因此，当教会被赋予天国的钥匙时，我们可以认为教会是天国的守护者。这是为了向我们信徒表明，信徒拥有通往永生的天国的钥匙，就像耶稣在马太福音 16:19 中似乎向我们信徒解释的那样，这也是他向心爱的使徒彼得解释的。

荷兰神学家、圣经学者赫尔曼·里德博斯也写过关于 “教会与天国的关系” 的文章。他简洁地将教会定义为 “通过传福音而团结在一个社区中的人们”。换句话说，教会是神的子民，通过宣讲神的话语和圣灵而被召集起来，成为一个独立的聚集组织。虽然耶稣在马太福音 16:18 和 18:17 中提到 “教会” 这个词时并不常用，但用里德博斯的话来说，教会的概念是 “耶稣传道和自我启示中非常重要的元素” 。

所以，我们必须永远记住神所说的话，以及祂的儿子耶稣通过祂的福音在圣经中教导和传达给我们的话。祈祷神赐予我们所有人认识到我们的主和救主耶稣在路加福音 17:20-21 中对我们说的话，说 “神的国就在你们心里” 。换句话说，神的国度已经存在于人们的心中，正如我们在地上教会中已经在赞美和感谢神的存在，荣耀他的慈爱和圣名一样，这不仅仅是因为我们相信我们的主和救世主耶稣基督 “第二次降临” 的未来事件，正如使徒保罗在帖撒罗尼迦前书 4:17 中写给教会的书信中所设想的那样，表达了教会最终会被提进入天国的愿景。

The theme of the Scripture that we are going to share in 今日灵粮 Spiritual FOOD TODAY is Mark 1:14-15, where Jesus proclaimed the good news of God, saying, "The time has come, and the Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in this good news!" The good news of Jesus' salvation is that God forgives the sins of mankind and grants eternal life to those who believe that Jesus is their personal Savior, shed His blood and died on the cross for us, and resurrected to heaven, waiting for His second coming to take us to the Kingdom of Heaven, thus defeating the death penalty of sin once and for all. This good news is also called the gospel of salvation by the world. It was this pastor and theologian George Eldon Ladd who summarized the theme of our sharing, "The Relationship between the Church and the Kingdom of God or Heaven," in his book - A Theology of the New Testament. He said, "The Kingdom is primarily the dynamic rule or Kingship of God, from which the realm of rule is derived." In the biblical idiom, the Kingdom is not equivalent to its subjects. They are the people of God who enter the Kingdom, live under the Kingdom, and are ruled by it. The Church is the community of the Kingdom, but never the Kingdom itself. Jesus’ disciples and we as His followers belong to the Kingdom because the Kingdom belongs to us; but we are not the Kingdom. The Kingdom is God’s reign; the Church is the society of men.”

Thus, Rev. Todd Stiles, in his sermon “Why is the Kingdom of God Not Just the Church”, quoted the above passage, exhorting us to recognize that there is a close connection between the Kingdom of God and the Church. When the Church preaches the Good News of the Kingdom of God, people will enter the Church and begin to experience the blessings of God’s reign in their lives. The Kingdom of God is manifested through the Church, and thus God’s future reign enters our present. Therefore, Ladd goes on to say in his book that the Church is not the Kingdom of Heaven, because what Jesus and the early Christians preached was that the Kingdom of God was near, not that the Church was near, and what they preached was the good news of the Kingdom of Heaven, not the good news of the Church. Therefore, when the Church is given the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, we can think of the Church as the guardian of the Kingdom of Heaven. This is meant to show us believers that believers have the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven to eternal life, just as Jesus seems to explain to us believers in Matthew 16:19, which is what He explained to the beloved Apostle Peter.

Herman Ridderbos, a Dutch theologian and Bible scholar, has also written about the “Relationship of the Church to the Kingdom of Heaven.” He succinctly defines the church as “people united in a community through the preaching of the gospel.” In other words, the church is the people of God, called out as a separate gathering organization by the preaching of the Word of God and the Holy Spirit. Although Jesus did not use the word “church” often when he mentioned it in Matthew 16:18 and Matthew 18:17, the concept of the church is, in Ridderbos’ words, “a very important element in Jesus’ ministry and self-revelation.”

So, we must always remember what God has said and what His Son Jesus has taught and communicated to us in the Bible through His Gospel. Pray that God will grant us all to recognize the words our Lord and Savior Jesus expressed to us in Luke 17:20-21, saying that “the Kingdom of God is within you.” In other words, the Kingdom of God already exists in the hearts and minds of people, as we in the churches of the earthly congregation, are already praising and thanking God for His presence and glorifying His loving grace and holy name, not just because we believe in the future event of the “Second Coming” of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, as envisioned by the Apostle Paul in his letter to the church in 1 Thessalonians 4:17, expressing the vision of the church’s ultimate rapture into the Kingdom of God in heaven.

(030) Whisper Web transfers this sharing from Dr. John King 张皇卿博士 on “今日灵粮 Spiritual FOOD TODAY” at 分享自脸书网站：www.facebook.com/johnking9999 和 and 维克斯网站：johnking9999.wixsite.com/website Edmonton, AB, Canada Friday 02 14. 2025.