Luke 17:21 Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.
This has always been a point of contention exactly what Jesus meant by "within you". Some say within you means within the group and some say it is within the individual. Like Tevia I say they are both right.Within is from entos and appears only twice in the Bible. The other place is Matthew 23:26 "[Thou] blind Pharisee, cleanse first that [which is] within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also"
King David was a Messiah. He was the Mashiyach which means anointed as Christ means anointed. Jesus was hailed as the highest son of David and heir to the throne. Since the Kingdom is a dominion of individual rights it is also a kingdom of individual responsibility. If you need something you cannot compel your neighbor to provide it or hire a government that forces people to provide you with what you desire. In God's Government you make your applications to Him. You produce what you need or fall upon the charity of others. You do not covet what is your neighbors
Luke 11:2 And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth.
God vs. Government
http://www.hisholychurch.info/study/gods/gvg.htm
In denying the kingdom of God there is no more repeated verse than:
Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence.John 18:36
In today's society when someone says the word world we might picture a blue planetary globe hanging marble like in the blackness of space as photographed from the moon but when the
gospel was preached the perceptions and viewpoints of men had not reached such astronomical heights. There are five different words in the New Testament that are translated into the single English
word 'world'.
Which one was used here?
Was it the word aeon?
'Aion' means an unbroken age and is far more often translated into variations of the word age.
Another Greek word used is 'oikoumene' which originally meant "the portion of the earth inhabited by the Greeks, in distinction from the lands of the barbarians" it commonly has to do with
inhabited places including Israel. Kind of a home town world. But it does not mean planet..
The word 'ge' is also translated world once but is translated earth about 188 times, land 42, ground 18, country 2. This is the closest word to meaning planet earth that you
will find in the text. If you were to say I am from the United States you would not be using the word. If you said you went all over the continent or even the whole planet and have seen its mountains
and valleys, deserts and rich farmland, then the word 'ge' might be appropriate. But 'ge' is not the word used to demonstrate Jesus statement about his kingdom not being of this world.
And there is the word 'erets' from an unused root probably meaning to be firm; It is translated land 1543, earth 712, country 140, ground 98, world 4, way 3, common 1, field 1, nations
1, for a total of 2504. It means 1) land, earth, soil.
So, what word did the author use to describe the world that Jesus Kingdom was not in?
The word 'world' in John 18:361is translated from the word 'kosmos' which means "an apt and harmonious arrangement or constitution, order, government." It probably came from the word komizo meaning "to care for, take care of, provide for" or "carry off what is one's own," which is what governments and the organized systems of men like Nimrod, Pharaoh, Caesar and social Democracies do.
http://www.hisholychurch.info/sermon/world.HTM
Everyone and every Church that says the kingdom of God is not at hand and we should go under the authority of other kingdoms and government like the gentiles, who exercise authority one over the other, while we are just waiting for Jesus to establish the kingdom is really the anti Christ.
1