478. As concerns the kingdom of God, it is well known that at the time of the Messiah some supposed that the kingdom of God would came then, and with him---they not knowing that this his advent was for the sake of calling to his fold the scattered sheep; that is to say, of calling the Jews and gentiles to himself, and thus to his church; and not for the sake of then forming his kingdom as it is promised in his Word, both of the Old Testament and of the New. For when he came into the world, the Messiah preached scarcely anything else than this kingdom; nay, he openly said that it was to come-but in the last times; and the one thing contained in the prayers which he taught, as for instance in the Lord's prayer from beginning to end,2 was that this kingdom might come. Moreover, the Revelation of his apostle John treats of nothing else than the coming of this kingdom. This kingdom then is the subject of which we now speak, namely, that it will exist in the end of ages, when he will gather together both the living and the dead and will pass judgment upon every individual — which is the reason why this is called the Last Judgment. His kingdom may indeed be said to have come from earliest times, nay, from the time of Adam himself, and also from the time of Abraham and afterwards even to the present day; but this is said in a different sense, namely, as meaning that his church was to be formed, to which they were to be gathered who, as sons, will finally be the heirs of the kingdom. But the kingdom itself will come when the Son of Man comes anew; that is to say, the only-begotten Son of God, born a man of the Virgin Mary in the stem of David; for which reason he is called the root of Jesse [Isa. 11:1, 10]; he who, to the Jews is the Messiah whom they now expect, and to the Christians, is Jesus the Nazarene and Christ; that is, he who was born in Bethlehem and anointed King; his advent is the kingdom which is now shown to Jacob.
2 [Crossed off]: which involves nothing else than that they should be prepared for this kingdom.
