Repent, what does that really mean, and what does "the kingdom of heaven is at hand" mean for believers today? On this special edition of The Smith and Rowland Show Podcast, Alan Smith and Jeff Rowland take a hard look at repentance, unbelief, revival, and the literal meaning of the kingdom message preached by John the Baptist, Jesus, and the apostles. They also wrestle with a big question, if Scripture says the kingdom is at hand, how much of God's glory can a believer experience right now?

Repent of What? The Kingdom of Heaven Is at Hand

A lot of Christians hear the words "repent" and "the kingdom of heaven is at hand," but still wonder what those phrases mean in daily life. If the kingdom is truly near, then that should change how you read Scripture, how you understand revival, and how you respond to unbelief.

In this episode of The Smith and Rowland Show, Alan Smith and Jeff Rowland press into that question with humor, sharp Bible talk, and a strong case for reading God's promises plainly. Their discussion moves from light banter to a serious claim: repentance is a turn from unbelief to belief, and the kingdom is still at hand for believers now.

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A special edition that opens with jokes and lands on weighty truth

The conversation starts the way many Smith and Rowland episodes do, with humor that sounds casual but keeps the energy up. Jeff jokes that it is a "special edition" because he is there, then riffs on being called "special" as a kid in church when he was asked to sing. That sets the tone for a few minutes of back-and-forth that is light, silly, and unmistakably theirs.

Then comes the mock sponsor segment. Peanut butter gets the spotlight, and the joke spirals fast. At the made-up peanut butter conference, peanut butter has split with jelly over end-times doctrine. Peanut butter is "premillennial," jelly is "postmillennial," and nobody is getting along. There are breakout sessions, theological disputes, and even a complaint about bananas. The punchline is simple and funny: peanut butter says it can stand alone.

That opening matters because it clears room for what follows. Alan and Jeff are not trying to sound polished or distant. They are talking like men who know each other well, laugh easily, and still care about handling Scripture with seriousness. Once the jokes settle, they move straight into the real issue, revival, apostasy, repentance, and the meaning of the kingdom message preached by John the Baptist and Jesus.

The shift is quick, but it does not feel forced. Their point is that the church can laugh without losing gravity. In fact, the humor makes the harder discussion easier to hear. What begins with peanut butter and church stories turns into a sober question for believers: if we are living in an age of apostasy, can we still expect the reality of God's kingdom to break in with power?

Can revival happen during an age of apostasy?

Alan and Jeff say yes, and that conviction drives the whole episode. They do not deny apostasy. In fact, they lean into it. They refer back to Jude and to the many biblical warnings about falling away in the last days. Their view is that Scripture speaks too often and too clearly about last-days unbelief to brush it aside.

Still, they refuse to let apostasy have the final word.

Alan brings up recent talk around Israel, Gaza, Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu, and past discussions about whether current events could line up with prophecy. He raises two possibilities, and then leaves room for a third:

1. Events in Israel could open the door to revival and gospel preaching.
2. They could move history toward the kind of world arrangement seen in Daniel and Revelation.
3. They could do both at the same time.

That matters because their argument is not narrow. They are not saying prophecy only points to political outcomes. They are also asking whether the church has forgotten how near the kingdom is. If God is still at work in history, then believers should not assume they are stuck waiting in spiritual weakness.

The heart of the discussion is simple: apostasy in the world does not cancel the nearness of the kingdom for the believer.

From there, the conversation turns to God's promise to reveal His glory in the earth. They connect that idea to Moses, then to John the Baptist, then to Jesus. The point is not to reduce God's glory to one moment in history. Christ's first coming revealed God's glory without question. Yet they argue that God's glory was not exhausted there. Every encounter with the Spirit gives a touch of that glory now, and Revelation 21 points to its full arrival in the future.

So the issue becomes more personal. If God's glory is coming to the earth in its fullness, can believers taste that glory in part even now? Alan and Jeff answer yes, and they tie that answer to faith, repentance, and the nearness of Christ's kingdom.

God's glory moves through the whole Bible, from Genesis to Revelation 21

Alan makes a sweeping point that frames the episode well. He argues that Genesis 1 and Revelation 21 belong together. In his reading, God created the earth with a purpose that reaches its visible climax in the New Jerusalem coming down from God out of heaven.

That means the Bible does not end with souls floating away to a distant heaven forever. It ends with heaven coming down to earth. The prayer Jesus taught, "Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven," finds its full answer there. The kingdom is not less real than the world you can see. It is more real, and one day it will fill the earth openly.

That is why Revelation 21 matters so much in their discussion. They see it as the great visible display of God's glory on the earth. Jesus is central to that glory, of course. Yet they also stress that redeemed believers are caught up in it. If the New Jerusalem comes down and the people of God belong there, then redemption is not a vague religious feeling. It is headed toward a concrete end.

Jeff pushes the point with a helpful phrase. Salvation now is part of the glory, but it is also a kind of foretaste. The full thing has not arrived yet. There are "tokens" of glory now, and total redemption later. Even their humor slips back in here, with another peanut butter joke, but the doctrine stays clear. Present salvation is real, present encounters with God are real, and yet the final revelation of glory still lies ahead.

Alan also folds in a private joke about God "building an army." Beneath the joke is a serious idea. During this age of grace, God is forming a people. He is shaping them for the kingdom, for faithfulness, and for what is still to come. That does not reduce God's plan to human effort. It means history is moving somewhere, and believers are part of that movement.

What John and Jesus meant by "the kingdom of heaven is at hand"

This is the center of the episode. Alan and Jeff argue that John the Baptist meant what he said, and Jesus meant the same thing when He repeated it. "Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand" was not empty religious language. In their view, it referred to a kingdom that is near in every sense, spiritual, natural, and supernatural.

They agree that the kingdom is in the believer's heart. They do not deny that at all. Yet they reject the idea that this is all the phrase can mean. For them, the kingdom also points to a real King, a real reign, and a real fulfillment on the earth. That is why they keep returning to Revelation 21. If the kingdom only means an inward feeling, then many plain biblical promises lose their force.

Alan presses the phrase "at hand" in a practical way. If something is at hand, it is within reach. It is near enough to take hold of. Therefore, when John and Jesus preached that message, they were not calling people to vague religious reflection. They were calling them to respond to a kingdom that was pressing in on them.

This becomes sharper when they bring in Israel's unbelief. John preached, and the Jews rejected his message. Jesus preached the same message, and they rejected Him as well. Alan compares that rejection to Israel in the wilderness. God had promises before them, but unbelief kept them from entering in. The problem was not that God's promise failed. The problem was that people would not believe it.

The kingdom can be at hand and still be missed.

That line runs through the whole episode. Jesus wept over Jerusalem because they missed their visitation. In other words, nearness did not guarantee reception. The kingdom stood before them in the King Himself, and many still refused Him.

The age of grace does not cancel earlier promises

Jeff raises an issue that sits behind a lot of church debate. If we are now in the dispensation of grace, does that mean the promises connected to John's message and Jesus' message have been set aside, redefined, or emptied of their plain meaning?

Their answer is no.

They push back hard against the habit of treating plain promises as though they become symbolic whenever they are difficult to fit into a system. Jeff jokes that half of Christendom seems able to turn anything into layers of spiritual cake. The humor lands because the concern is real. Once every clear text can become an allegory, certainty disappears.

For them, the right question is not whether grace changes everything into metaphor. The right question is whether grace opens our eyes to what God has been saying all along. If Scripture says the kingdom is at hand, then believers should take that seriously.

Why they reject allegorical readings of prophecy

A major part of the episode is a sustained critique of allegorical interpretation. Alan and Jeff are not arguing that the Bible contains no symbols. Revelation plainly does. Their point is that symbols still point to realities, and Scripture should not be drained of its plain meaning whenever a text speaks too clearly about the future.

They bring Revelation 21 to the center again. John sees the New Jerusalem coming down from God out of heaven, "prepared as a bride adorned for her husband." Alan notes that many Christians casually say, "We are the bride of Christ," but he insists that Revelation 21 directly identifies the New Jerusalem as "the bride, the Lamb's wife." Believers belong to Christ and belong to that city, but the text itself names the city.

That claim matters because it shows how quickly church language can move past the wording of Scripture. Alan even jokes about how strange it always felt, as a man, to hear himself called a bride. The humor is not the point. The point is precision. If the text says the city is the bride, then readers should not flatten that into something else without reason.

A literal reading keeps the story whole

Jeff asks a strong question. If people say the kingdom only means something inward and non-literal, then what do they do with Revelation 21? To keep continuity, they would have to say that it has already happened or that it means something entirely symbolic. He says that approach turns his brain to mush, because it asks readers to stop following the plain sense of the text.

The contrast they draw is simple:

They also make an interesting point from Revelation 4. If elders are seated in heaven, then they are seated somewhere. A seat assumes reality. Jeff says our earthly seats are copies, while the original is in heaven. He extends that to the larger biblical pattern. God made the world with heaven in view. Jesus taught us to pray for earth to reflect heaven. Believers are called to bear the image of Christ. Copies imply an original, and an original must be real.

That is why they say a fully allegorical reading breaks down. If you keep pulling Scripture away from concrete reality, you eventually threaten the reality of Jesus Himself. Their view is that the Bible reads best when its words are taken plainly, unless the text itself clearly demands a symbol.

Repentance, unbelief, and revival in the believer's life now

The most searching part of the episode comes when they define repentance. Alan and Jeff argue that in the gospel sense, repentance is first a turn from unbelief to belief. They draw that from John 3. The dividing line is belief in the Son. "He that believeth not is condemned already." Therefore, the sin that keeps a person lost is unbelief.

That does not mean sin is unimportant. Their point is narrower and sharper. A person enters salvation by turning from unbelief and trusting Christ. Then they extend that same logic into the Christian life. If unbelief kept Israel out of the promised land, and unbelief keeps people from entering God's rest, then unbelief still chokes faith now.

That is where revival enters the picture. They ask how much of the kingdom's glory a believer can experience now. Their answer is tied to faith. Jesus said, "According to your faith be it unto you." So, in their view, the measure of present kingdom experience is closely tied to whether people believe God's kingdom is truly near.

Jeff shares a story from childhood that gives the discussion warmth. He remembers hearing his father and grandfather talk about Enoch. His grandfather pictured Enoch walking with God so closely that God finally said, in effect, "You're closer to me than you are to earth. Come on home." That story is not offered as exegesis of every detail. It is offered as a picture of what life with God can become, so near, so full, so shaped by faith that heaven feels closer than the world.

Faith still overcomes in a Laodicean age

Alan does not pretend the times are easy. He mentions the Laodicean church, rich, self-satisfied, blind to its condition. Yet even there, Revelation gives promises "to him that overcometh." That means overcoming is still possible.

Jeff ties that back to the kingdom being at hand. If Christ's presence is near, then victory is near too. A believer can still lay hold of grace, joy, endurance, and even revival in an age marked by coldness. The world may turn against the church. Circumstances may become severe. Even then, they insist, the nearness of Christ does not disappear.

Their line about revival is strong and memorable: the greater the cost, the greater the revival. They also add that revival keeps costing after it comes. In other words, real awakening is not a brief emotional surge. It changes how a person lives, believes, and endures.

This is where the episode lands with force. Repentance is not only a message for the lost. It is also a message for believers who have drifted into unbelief about the power of God, the nearness of Christ, and the possibility of present victory. If the kingdom is at hand, then hopelessness is a lie believers should stop agreeing with.

John's message still stands

Alan and Jeff never soften the old message. They say John was right when he preached it, Jesus was right when He repeated it, and the church still needs it now. The kingdom of heaven is at hand is not dead language from another age. It is a living word that confronts unbelief and calls people to faith.

The deepest takeaway from the episode is not complicated. A believer can live in dark times without surrendering to darkness. Apostasy may spread, but Christ is still near, His kingdom is still real, and unbelief still keeps people from entering what God has set before them.

That leaves one pressing question in the heart. If the kingdom is at hand, will you treat it as near enough to believe?