The Eschatological Reign of Christ as an Objective for Missions

Abstract

There has been much dispute about the millennial reign of Christ, yet Jesus spoke as if the kingdom of God was among his listeners and thus also among us, rather than in the distant future. If the kingdom reign of Christ is now in our world, what implications then should this have on missions? We examine the background and approach to missions in the various eschatological perspectives, namely, (1) postmillennialism, (2) premillennialism, and (3) amillennialism to discover how each of these views approaches the call to missions. A study of Luke 17:20-21 reveals the present reality of Christ’s kingdom. This paper has three methodological steps, the first is an exploration of history and historical theology for three of the primary eschatological views, the second is a biblical study from Luke 17:20-21, and the third makes a proposal for the objective for missions, grounded in the findings of this research project, namely that mission has an eschatological focus, and more specifically that the amillennial view forms one of the best foundations to proclaim the kingdom of God, which is imperative for a full-bodied praxis for missions.