Q. “Zeta.” How are we to understand the “kingdom of God” in Luke 13? Is the kingdom of God corruptible; if not, what are we to understand by the “leaven”?
A. It is here the kingdom as left to the responsibility of, and taken up in profession by man — not, of course, the kingdom established by God in power, which works through righteousness. The “fig tree,” emblematic of the Jewish nation, was doing harm to all around; the name of God was blasphemed amongst the Gentiles through them. It cumbered the ground, and would be cut down. Jesus had sought fruit from it in the three years of His ministry, and found none. His intercession on the cross brought the answer in a fresh offer by the Holy Spirit sent down at Pentecost. This offer we have in Acts 3. This was met by the imprisonment of the apostles and the martyrdom of Stephen. Then all closed — it was “cut down.” “This year also,” was this fresh grace from God (see Acts 2-7, passim). Another tree takes its place (Luke 13:18, 1918Then said he, Unto what is the kingdom of God like? and whereunto shall I resemble it? 19It is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and cast into his garden; and it grew, and waxed a great tree; and the fowls of the air lodged in the branches of it. (Luke 13:18‑19)); but is taken up by man in responsibility, and thus it would become a great sheltering power; while God wrought out His own counsels.
“Leaven” is not used in Scripture as typical of what is good; but there are different uses of it, and possibly different shades of meaning. In 1 Corinthians 5:88Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. (1 Corinthians 5:8), we find “old leaven,” and “leaven of malice and wickedness” distinguished. It would seem that old creation is the thought in the first-named clause, and the fruits of it in the second. Now the old creation in itself is not evil; but man having fallen, it has become different in state to what God had made. Evil came in, and what was perfectly good fell. The gradual and sure cropping up of the old creation in Christianity is manifest and allowed. The Church was set in the power of a new creation by the ascended Lord, through the Holy Spirit. She was to display its virtues while in the old. The workings of the old man and flesh soon began, and so displaced the place of the new: flesh took the place of Spirit. Thus the old creation — fallen, and under sin — worked like leaven, and will do so till all is leavened, — till the Lord removes those who remain of his people, and nothing remains but the old man — the old creation, fallen, and yet professing Christianity, and in responsibility that which owns, or had owned, God’s authority, His kingdom here on earth. Everything within the sphere of the kingdom in profession has this tendency. Every appeal in a religious way to man in nature, music, architecture, painting, sculpture; that which arouses the senses, gratifies the tastes of the natural man, is that which makes, so to speak, the leaven to rise. So also in sensational preaching — popular, and suited to gather the crowd. This leaven works in a hidden way at first, “till all is leavened” — till old creation replaces the new; till Antichrist replaces Christ. Then comes the judgment.
“The leaven of malice and wickedness” would be rather the evil fruits of the old creation, as fallen from God. “It is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.”
Words of Truth, New Series 1:216-218.