After Jesus Christ had been raised to life and taken to heaven, the Apostle Peter was preaching to the people in Jerusalem.
Repent therefore, and turn back, that your sins may be blotted out, that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Christ appointed for you, Jesus, whom heaven must receive until the time for restoring all the things about which God spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets long ago (Acts 3:19–21).
The Things to Be Restored
What were the ‘things’ Peter spoke about, that are to be restored when Christ comes again?
It was the establishment of the Kingdom of God, under the reign of the Messiah —this was what the Jews of Peter’s day understood to be the message of the holy prophets.
We see this earlier in the Acts record, before Jesus ascended to heaven, when his disciples asked him, ‘Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?’ (Acts 1:6).
The disciples were especially keen to see the fulfilment of this promise, because Jesus had told them: ‘Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel’ (Matthew 19:28). We know that this was on their minds, because on another occasion they were arguing amongst themselves about who was the greatest (Luke 9:46)!
But Jesus told them that the Kingdom was not going to happen there and then. In fact, he did not know when it would be—only God knew (Acts 1:7). The Gospel had to be preached to all nations first, in order to prepare a people who will live in the Kingdom. Before he went to heaven, Jesus commanded his disciples, ‘Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned’ (Mark 16:15–16).
The First Kingdom of God
When the nation of Israel first arrived in the Promised Land of Canaan, they had no monarchy. They were governed by their leader Joshua, and after him, a series of Judges. One of these was Gideon, who led the people to victory over an occupying enemy. The people wanted to make Gideon their king.
Then the men of Israel said to Gideon, “Rule over us, you and your son and your grandson also, for you have saved us from the hand of Midian.” Gideon said to them, “I will not rule over you, and my son will not rule over you; the Lord will rule over you” (Judges 8:22–23).
This was the first time the people of Israel asked for a king, so that they would be like the nations around them. But Gideon was clear—God was their King. They were to be a theocracy, not a monarchy.
The last Judge was the prophet Samuel. Again the people asked him to give them a king so they could be like the nations around them (1 Samuel 8:4–5). Samuel was not happy with this request and he prayed to God about it. ‘And the Lord said to Samuel, “Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them”’ (v. 7).
Their first king was Saul. He proved to be a failure and fell out of favour with God because of his disobedience (1 Samuel 15:22–28). Then God selected a better king, David (1 Samuel 16:1). He was a godly man and ruled Israel as a good king. He wrote many songs which we find in the Bible in the Book of Psalms. He was succeeded by his son Solomon. All this while, we are told that this was not the kingdom of men but God’s Kingdom:
Then Solomon sat on the throne of the Lord as king in place of David his father. And he prospered, and all Israel obeyed him
(1 Chronicles 29:23).
When he had achieved peace in the kingdom, David wanted to build a temple for God in Jerusalem. God told him that it was his son who would build the temple (2 Samuel 7). The temple was built by Solomon. But God’s promise in 2 Samuel 7 extends further forward into the future. He told David, ‘Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me. Your throne shall be established forever’ (v. 16). This did not happen in Solomon’s time.
The kingdom was ruled by human kings. Many of them were godless and the kingdom went into decline. Eventually the kingdom and God’s temple were destroyed by the Babylonians, and many Israelites were taken into captivity, including their last king Zedekiah. The prophet Ezekiel told Zedekiah:
And you, O profane wicked one, prince of Israel, whose day has come, the time of your final punishment, thus says the Lord God: Remove the turban and take off the crown. Things shall not remain as they are. Exalt that which is low, and bring low that which is exalted. A ruin, ruin, ruin I will make it. This also shall not be, until he comes, the one to whom judgment belongs, and I will give it to him (Ezekiel 21:25–27).
Waiting For the King
King Zedekiah was removed and the land of Israel lay desolate for 70 years, as foretold by the prophet Jeremiah (Jeremiah 25:11–12). Then in the time of Ezra and Nehemiah a remnant of Jews returned from Babylonian captivity to rebuild the temple and the city of Jerusalem.
Ezekiel told Zedekiah that there would be no king again ‘until he comes, the one to whom judgment belongs’. There never has been a king of Israel since. (In the time of Jesus, Herod was called king, but he was not a Jew and he only ruled a part of the land under the Roman domination).
Who was the one of whom Ezekiel spoke, ‘the one to whom judgment belongs, and I will give it to him’? It was of course Jesus Christ. As the angel Gabriel said to Jesus’ mother Mary, ‘He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David’ (Luke 1:32).
But as we have seen, Christ’s mission the first time he was on earth was not to set up the Kingdom. It was to tell people that it was coming: ‘I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God… for I was sent for this purpose’ (Luke 4:43). His mission was to preach righteousness, the forgiveness of sins and reconciliation to God, through faith in his name; and to offer himself as a perfect sacrifice to God, to take away the sins of the world (John 1:29).
We have seen that the disciples expected Jesus to ‘restore the kingdom to Israel’ (Acts 1:6). There was more than the kingdom of Israel to be restored, as we shall see.
The Cleansing of the Earth
Jesus told several parables that described the judgement that will happen on his return, when he comes to establish God’s Kingdom and restore the world.
The parable of the weeds was one such parable (Matthew 13:24–30 and 36–43). A farmer sowed good seed in his field, but his enemy secretly sowed weeds in among the seed. At the harvest, the crop was gathered in but the weeds were burnt. The weeds are the wicked (v. 38) who will be rejected from the Kingdom (v. 42). ‘Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father’ (v. 43). Another parable of the judgement is the parable of the sheep and goats (Matthew 25:31–46).
Jesus said, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. Do not marvel at this, for an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment’ (John 5:25–29).
The prophet Daniel spoke of the same thing (Daniel 12:2).
Restoration of the Natural World
There is also the promise in the Bible that the natural world will be restored to how it was when God created it. When Adam and Eve brought the curse upon themselves and their descendants, the world itself was cursed as well (Genesis 3:17–19). In the Kingdom, the curse upon humans will be lifted and also the curse on the earth:
For the Lord comforts Zion; he comforts all her waste places and makes her wilderness like Eden, her desert like the garden of the Lord; joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the voice of song (Isaiah 51:3).
The animal kingdom will be transformed: ‘The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them’ (Isaiah 11:6).
There will be no more war: ‘He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide disputes for many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore’ (Isaiah 2:4).
These are some details we are given. The wonders of God’s glorious Kingdom will be beyond anything we can imagine. The Apostle Paul said about this time, ‘What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him’ (1 Corinthians 2:9).
The time is coming when all things will be restored. Do you want to be there?
Grahame A Cooper
