The Kingdom and the Church

The Kingdom and the Church examines one governing relationship: the kingdom of God and the church. Stephen Kaung’s burden is that the church cannot be understood or built rightly without a vision of God’s kingdom and of Christ as King. The four messages move through a deliberate progression: the kingdom is one with the church, the kingdom is bigger than the church, the kingdom builds the church, and the church brings in the kingdom. Rather than treating kingdom teaching and church teaching as separate subjects, Kaung shows how the two belong together in God’s purpose.

Matthew 16:17–19 is a foundational passage because Christ speaks of building His church and immediately gives the keys of the kingdom of the heavens. For Kaung, the church must live under the rule of the King if it is to be built according to God. The kingdom is not merely a future age or a doctrinal category; it expresses God’s authority, rule, and will. Seeing the kingdom therefore means recognizing the King and yielding to His government. This addresses a basic question behind the book: why can there be much Christian activity and yet so little genuine building of the church? Kaung’s answer is that God’s people need to see the kingdom and submit to the King.

At the same time, the kingdom is bigger than the church. Ephesians 3:1–6 and Matthew 13:10–17 help Kaung distinguish the scope of God’s kingdom from the church while preserving their intimate relationship. The church is not the whole of the kingdom, yet it is the sphere in which the heavenly rule should be expressed in the present age. This protects the reader from collapsing the two ideas into a single undifferentiated concept.

The third movement explains how the kingdom builds the church. Passages such as 1 Peter 2:5, Ephesians 2:20–22, 1 Corinthians 3:11–15, and Matthew 16:18–19 supply the building imagery. The church is God’s spiritual house and cannot be built by natural preference or human arrangement. The authority of the kingdom, the foundation of Christ, and material suitable to God’s building govern the process. In this sense, kingdom reality is practical: God’s rule must operate in His people for the church to become what He intends.

The final movement turns the relationship around and asks how the church brings in the kingdom. Revelation 12:10–11 is especially important: the coming of God’s kingdom is connected with a people who overcome the accuser through the blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony, and a life not held for self. Matthew 28:18–20 and the prayer “Thy kingdom come” in Matthew 6 also place the church under Christ’s authority and commission. The church does not create the kingdom; it stands under the victorious authority of Christ and cooperates with God’s will so that His rule may be manifested.

The book therefore serves readers asking what the kingdom of God has to do with church life, why Christ’s kingship matters to the building of the church, how the church should express God’s rule now, and what responsibility the church bears toward the coming kingdom. Its central concern is not church technique but spiritual government: seeing the King, accepting the kingdom, being built as the church under that rule, and becoming a people through whom God’s kingdom can be expressed and brought in.