The Question That Won't Go Away

There's a particular question that has echoed through human history, appearing in different forms across cultures and centuries. Sometimes it's phrased philosophically: "What is the good life?" Sometimes religiously: "How do I please God?" Sometimes more desperately: "What must I do to be saved?"

But perhaps the most illuminating version, the one that cuts through our modern abstractions and ancient pieties alike, is the question a rich young ruler once posed to Jesus (YHWShA): "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" Or, as Matthew's Gospel renders it more directly: "What must I do to enter the Kingdom of Heaven?"

Now, one might think this question has been answered so many times, in so many ways, that there's nothing left to say about it. The libraries of the world, after all, groan under the weight of theological treatises, pastoral guides, and devotional manuals all claiming to point the way. And many of them, no doubt, contain genuine wisdom.

But here's what we often miss. We read this exchange as if it's asking a timeless spiritual question, applicable to any culture or context. We treat "eternal life" as if everyone knows what it means. We assume the ruler is asking about heaven after death, about getting his soul saved.

That's not quite right. And the distance between what we think he's asking and what he's actually asking matters more than we might imagine.

What a First-Century Jew Was Really Asking

The rich young ruler wasn't asking an abstract theological question. He was asking a deeply Jewish one, rooted in the hopes and expectations of Second Temple Judaism. When he spoke of "eternal life," he didn't mean what most modern Christians think of when we use that phrase. He wasn't asking how to ensure his soul would float off to heaven when he died.

He was asking about vindication. About being counted among the righteous when God (YHWH) finally acted to restore Israel. About participating in the resurrection when it occurred, about having a place in the age to come.

This was the burning question of his world. Would he be among those vindicated when the Messiah came? When God renewed the covenant? When the new age dawned and the old age passed away? The Pharisees debated it constantly. The Essenes at Qumran organized their entire community around preparing for it. The question assumed Jewish eschatological categories, not Greek philosophical ones about immortal souls.

And here's what makes the encounter so remarkable. The young man is asking Jesus how to be ready for something in the future, how to position himself for the coming Kingdom. But Jesus's entire ministry has been announcing that the future has arrived. The Kingdom isn't merely coming. It's here. In him.

That's the collision happening in this story, and we miss it if we rush too quickly to make it about our personal salvation.

The Kingdom as Present Reality

One of the most persistent misunderstandings about Jesus's message is that he was simply announcing a future Kingdom, a far-off divine intervention that would set everything right someday. Read the Gospels carefully, though, and you'll find something far more radical. Jesus wasn't just promising that the Kingdom would come. He was demonstrating that it had already arrived.

Consider his healings. In the worldview of Second Temple Judaism, sickness and demon possession were signs of the old age, the present evil age, the time when Satan and the powers held sway. The age to come would be marked by healing, by the defeat of demons, by the restoration of creation. When Jesus healed the sick and cast out demons, he wasn't just being compassionate. He was enacting the Kingdom, showing that the new age had broken into the old.

Or consider his table fellowship with sinners and tax collectors. This wasn't merely a nice gesture of inclusivity. It was a prophetic sign that Israel was being reconstituted, that the renewed people of God were being gathered around him. The Messiah was hosting the messianic banquet. Now. Not in some distant future.

This is why Jesus could say things like "the kingdom of God is in the midst of you" (Luke 17:21). Not "will be." Is. Present tense. The rich young ruler was asking how to prepare for a future event. Jesus was inviting him to participate in a present reality.

But there's more. The Kingdom wasn't just arriving in Jesus's ministry. It was arriving specifically through what he was about to do in Jerusalem.

Through Death to Life

Picture a Bible study where someone raises the question: Why did Jesus tell the rich young ruler to sell everything and follow him? The quick answer often given is straightforward. Jesus was testing his commitment, showing him that he loved money more than God. And there's truth in that, as far as it goes.

But it doesn't go far enough. Jesus wasn't just testing the man's commitment. He was inviting him on a journey. The same journey Jesus himself was about to take. To Jerusalem. To the cross. Through death to resurrection life.

Here's what the early Christians understood, what the Gospel writers want us to see: Jesus opened the Kingdom not by offering good advice or moral teaching, but by going through death and coming out the other side. He fought the decisive battle against the powers that held creation in bondage. Sin, death, Satan, the present evil age itself. And on Easter morning, he emerged victorious, launching the new creation.

This is not metaphor. This is not spiritual poetry. This is what the earliest Christians staked their lives on. When Paul writes that Jesus "disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him" (Colossians 2:15), he's describing a cosmic victory as real as any military conquest. More real, in fact, because it dealt with the actual enemies: not Rome or any human empire, but the dark powers behind all empires.

The resurrection wasn't just God's vindication of Jesus, though it was that. It wasn't just proof that Jesus was right, though it demonstrated that as well. The resurrection was the launch of God's new creation, the first day of the new age, the beginning of the world's renewal.

And here's the crucial point: eternal life, entering the Kingdom, participating in God's future, all of that depends on being united with Jesus in his death and resurrection. Not as abstract theology, but as lived reality. Paul's language is blunt: we are crucified with Christ, buried with him, raised with him. This is how we enter the Kingdom. Through him. Through what he accomplished.

The narrow gate Jesus speaks of in Matthew 7:13-14 isn't arbitrary difficulty. It's the cross. And the way that leads to life is the path Jesus walked: through death to resurrection.

A Different King, A Different Kingdom

Now, we need to be clear about something that Jesus's first hearers would have understood immediately, but that we easily miss. When Jesus proclaimed the Kingdom of Heaven, he was using politically charged language. Dangerously so.

The Roman Empire claimed to bring peace, prosperity, and divine blessing to the world. Caesar was hailed as son of god, savior, lord. The good news (evangelion) of Caesar's reign was proclaimed throughout the empire. Rome insisted it was establishing God's kingdom on earth through military might, efficient administration, and the pax Romana.

Jesus showed up in a Roman-occupied territory and announced a different Kingdom. One not established by violence but by self-giving love. One not maintained by military power but by the power of the Spirit. One that didn't demand worship of Caesar but allegiance to a different Lord entirely.

This is why he was crucified. Not because he taught people to be nice or to have good thoughts. The Romans didn't crucify people for that. He was crucified because "Kingdom of Heaven" was seditious language, because calling anyone other than Caesar "Lord" was treason, because gathering a renewed Israel around himself threatened the Roman-Jewish power arrangements.

And here's where things get particularly relevant for those of us trying to follow Jesus in contemporary Western culture. We've domesticated this language. We've made "Kingdom of God" into a synonym for heaven after death, or church membership, or personal spirituality. We've drained it of its political punch.

But that's not what it meant then, and it's not what it should mean now. The Kingdom Jesus proclaimed and inaugurated isn't Democrat or Republican, left or right. It's not any human political program. It's something far more radical: it's the claim that there is one true King, that his Kingdom operates by different rules than earthly kingdoms, and that our ultimate allegiance belongs to him, not to any nation, party, or ideology.

I've watched both American political parties try to baptize their platforms with religious language, claiming God's blessing on their agendas. Growing up in religious environments where certain politics seemed almost synonymous with faithful Christianity, then later encountering different circles where prophetic declarations about America's divine destiny flowed freely, the pattern becomes clear. Both sides do the same thing, just with different vocabulary.

That's the problem. The Kingdom of Heaven isn't a political program we can adopt or a cultural agenda we can champion. It's a reality that relativizes all our politics, that calls into question all our tribal loyalties, that demands we pledge allegiance to a Kingdom that transcends and judges every earthly kingdom.

So when we ask, "What must I do to enter the Kingdom of Heaven?" we're asking, among other things: How do I live as a citizen of that Kingdom while residing in these earthly ones? How do I maintain allegiance to Jesus when Caesar (whatever form Caesar takes in my context) demands loyalty? How do I participate in God's new creation while the old age continues around me?

Between the Times

Which brings us to a crucial reality we must grapple with. The Kingdom has come. Jesus defeated the powers. The resurrection launched the new creation. But look around. The old age persists. Death still reigns. Evil still flourishes. Creation still groans.

The early Christians had a way of describing this tension. They lived, they said, between the times. Between the inauguration and the consummation. Between D-Day and V-Day, if you will. The decisive battle had been won on the cross and vindicated in the resurrection. But the war continued. Victory was certain, but not yet complete.

This is where the Church comes in. Not as an optional add-on to individual salvation, but as the community called into being by the Spirit to implement Jesus's victory, to be the place where the Kingdom is taking visible form even now, to serve as the advance guard of the new creation.

When Ignatius of Antioch was led through Asia Minor on his way to martyrdom in Rome (around 110 AD), he wrote letters to the churches. He wasn't debating fine points of theology. He was encouraging communities of Kingdom citizens to stay faithful under pressure. To embody a different way of being human. To show that Jesus's victory over death was real by how they lived together and how they faced their own deaths.

Or consider Irenaeus in the late second century, confronting Gnostic teachers who claimed special knowledge was necessary for salvation. His response wasn't merely intellectual, though he certainly deployed careful argument. His response was to point to the churches, scattered throughout the world, all telling the same story, all practicing the same baptism, all gathering around the same table. The Kingdom wasn't secret knowledge for an elite few. It was public truth embodied in communities.

This is what we're invited into. Not solitary spiritual achievement, but participation in a people. The Body of Christ. The community being shaped by the Spirit to reflect the life of the age to come even in the midst of the present age.

The Path Forward

So what must we do to enter this Kingdom? To participate in this new creation? To walk this narrow path?

Jesus's answer to the rich young ruler was specific to that man's situation. He needed to release his grip on wealth because wealth had a grip on him. But underneath the specific instruction lay a deeper pattern, one that applies to all of us.

First, recognize that the Torah (God's instruction, God's wisdom) finds its fulfillment in Jesus himself. He's not abolishing it. He's embodying it. He is what the Law was pointing toward all along. When he says, "Follow me," he's inviting us to walk the Torah-shaped life that he walked. Not as external rule-keeping, but as the natural expression of Kingdom life.

Second, understand that this isn't something we do alone. The rich young ruler went away sad, we're told. He couldn't make the leap. But others did. They formed communities. They learned to share possessions. They discovered that what seems impossible individually becomes possible in the Spirit-filled community.

Third, grasp that this is about resurrection. Jesus didn't just teach about the Kingdom. He went through death and out the other side, forging a path where there was none. Entering the Kingdom means being joined to him in that death and resurrection. Not as metaphor, but as reality. The old self dies. The new self rises. It happens in baptism. It happens daily. It will happen fully at the final resurrection.

Fourth, remember that we're between the times. We won't experience the fullness of Kingdom life until the new creation is complete. But we can taste it now. We can embody it in our communities. We can be signposts pointing toward God's future.

And fifth, understand that seeking this Kingdom means accepting that it's bigger than any of our partisan allegiances, more demanding than any of our cultural preferences, more radical than any of our political programs. It calls everything into question. And it promises everything in return.

The Choice Before Us

I began with a question: "What must I do to enter the Kingdom of Heaven?" And what I've suggested is that the question, properly understood within its first-century Jewish context, opens onto something far richer and stranger than most of us imagined.

The Kingdom isn't a distant destination we're trying to reach through right beliefs or good behavior. It's a present reality launched through Jesus's death and resurrection, a new creation breaking into the old, a different way of being human that we're invited to participate in now.

The path is narrow because it leads through the cross. The gate is small because it requires dying to our own sovereignty, our own tribal identities, our own carefully constructed kingdoms. But on the other side is life. Real life. Resurrection life. The life of the age to come, begun now and promised in fullness when God renews all things.

Across different expressions of Christian faith, from liturgical traditions to charismatic movements and beyond, I've encountered many who claimed to have the definitive answer to this question. Some were sincere but mistaken, confusing their cultural preferences with Kingdom values. Others were wolves, using religious authority for personal gain. But a few, thank God, were the real thing: fellow travelers on the narrow path, humble enough to know they hadn't arrived, faithful enough to keep pointing toward the risen Jesus.

The difference, I've found, lies here: the true guides know they're still being transformed. They understand that the Kingdom's depths exceed anyone's full comprehension. They're not offering a system you can master or a formula you can apply. They're inviting you to know a person, to follow a Lord, to join a community of resurrection people.

So here's the invitation. Don't settle for domesticated religion or tribal politics baptized with Christian language. Seek the one who is himself the Way, the Truth, and the Life (John 14:6). Join the community where his resurrection life is taking form. Be willing to die to your old loyalties and rise to new ones.

The Kingdom has come in Jesus. It's coming in fullness when he returns. And in the meantime, it's here, among us, wherever people gather in his name and live by the power of his resurrection.

That's worth seeking. That's worth every obstacle, every false teacher avoided, every narrow gate entered, every hard question asked.

Perhaps it's time. The gate is open. The risen Jesus beckons.