catapult magazine

What if we think of kingdom building in terms of cultivation? Cultivating is not just stewardship, but a working in the fields with that which God has given, a sowing of seeds that will make for a great harvest.

Without wanting to sound too Aristotelian, we could say that the kingdom, then, is both the fully grown tree (the kingdom that is to come) and the seed (the kingdom here and now). I think I may be pushing the mustard seed parable in the wrong direction with this, though. All I’m really trying to say is that the term “kingdom building” might be acceptable if we understood it not as a result of our labor, but as the task of the kingdom to which we are called, a building of the kingdom toward the kingdom. Though I don’t object to the “building of the kingdom” terminology, it might be less confusing (and more Biblical?), however, to speak the language of cultivation.

c’mon people, doesn’t the bible start with a garden and end with a city? :)

I’d argue that both building and nurturing fit under the larger envelope of sheltering. A home can provide comfort. I still don’t understnad (and maybe I’m a bit thick headed on this one, how you could argue that either one is better than the other. Food and shelter are both elemental needs.

Having said that, amen to Dan.

That is a very good point, Dan. The question would be, then, how does the process from garden to city take place? Is that a product of our work or God’s? a blend of the two? I am curious to hear how others might respond to this.

Yes, the story does begin in a garden and end (rather continue) in a city. But, the city seems to desend from another place. It is Gods work from the beginning not ours. Unlike God who builds something from nothing, we simply enter into what God has already created. This is how the story began and this is how the story continues and this is how the story will move on forever. God’s people being perfectly sustained by what God creates for us.