Luke 17:20,21 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

The kingdom of God cometh not, &c.— While Jesus was in Ephraim, (John 11:54.) the Pharisees asked him, when the kingdom of God, by which they meant the Messiah's kingdom, was to commence? They had very grand notions of the extent of the Messiah's kingdom, the number of his subjects, the strength of his armies, the pomp and eclat of his court; and were eager to have that glorious empire speedily erected; or, being inveterate enemies of our Lord, they might ask the question in derision, because every thing about Jesus was so unlike to the Messiah whom they expected. To correct their mistaken notions, our Lord tells them, that the Messiah's kingdom does not consist in any pompous outward form of government, to be erected in this or that particular country with the terror of arms and the confusion of war; but that it consists in the subjection of men's wills, and in the conformity of their minds, to the law of God, to be effected by a new dispensation of religion which was already begun: accordingly, they were not to seek for it in this or that place, saying, Lo here! or Lo there! for the kingdom of God, the new dispensation of religion, productive of thedominion of righteousness in men's minds, was already begun among them, being preached by Christ and his apostles, and confirmed by innumerable miracles. The phrase εντος υμων, signifies more properly among you, than within you, as we render it; for it is certain that our Lord could not properly say, that the kingdom of God was in the Pharisees, to whom he spoke, whose temper was entirely alienated from the nature and design of it.