Your Kingdom Come, Your Will Be Done
Your Kingdom Come, Your Will Be Done
Your Kingdom Come, Your Will Be Done
The Kingdom of God is harder to define than we might think. We are taught by experience to think of the kingdoms in geographic and political terms, but Jesus teaches something different about the Kingdom of God. Luke 17:20-21 says “Being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them, “The kingdom of God is not coming in ways that can be observed, 21 nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There!’ for behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you.”
There will come a time when the Kingdom of God is geographical and political but it is not this time, nor this age, but when the Lord returns and establishes His Kingdom in the new heavens and earth.
Which leads me a good definition of the Kingdom of God: The Kingdom of God is nothing other than the new heavens and earth which is yet to come, and yet which has already started breaking into this prescient age. Jesus rising from the dead is a new creation reality. It’s the true beginning of the creation. Something of this new creation is begun in our lives also in our salvation from sin and in our regeneration. The Holy Spirit is a deposit guaranteeing what is to come (Eph 1:14), and has a taste of the powers of the age to come (Heb 6:5). So we can become citizens of the Kingdom of God now, even though the Kingdom of God hasn’t yet fully been realized.
So how do we pray “your Kingdom come”? There are three ways we can and would pray for this.
We should pray that the Kingdom would go out from us through evangelism and conversions, because this is what’s actually necessary for the kingdom to advance. The kingdom doesn't advance through unbelievers becoming more moral or adopting or agreeing with aspects of the law of God. It advances through entry into the kingdom and submission to the king.
Secondly, we should pray that the kingdom comes down upon us in consummation through the return of the king and the establishment of his kingdom.
Third, we should pray that the kingdom grows within us through conformity to the king
Here is where the next phrase becomes all important - “your will be done”. Jesus taught us to pray this when he himself prayed it in the garden. There he gave himself over to God’s will, which is what we must also do.
But there is a major difference between his prayer and ours. He was giving himself over to God’s wrath, but when we pray “your will be done” we are actually giving ourselves over to God’s mercy. Because Jesus took all the wrath, for us to hand ourselves over to the will of God is a good and happy thing to do. We can have confidence in God’s will for us, that it will be for our good, because Jesus handed himself over to God’s wrath on our behalf.
Bible Text: Matthew 6:10 | Preacher: Ian Goodman | Series: The Lord’s prayer | The Kingdom of God is harder to define than we might think. We are taught by experience to think of the kingdoms in geographic and political terms, but Jesus teaches something different about the Kingdom of God. Luke 17:20-21 says “Being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them, “The kingdom of God is not coming in ways that can be observed, 21 nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There!’ for behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you.”
There will come a time when the Kingdom of God is geographical and political but it is not this time, nor this age, but when the Lord returns and establishes His Kingdom in the new heavens and earth.
Which leads me a good definition of the Kingdom of God: The Kingdom of God is nothing other than the new heavens and earth which is yet to come, and yet which has already started breaking into this prescient age. Jesus rising from the dead is a new creation reality. It’s the true beginning of the creation. Something of this new creation is begun in our lives also in our salvation from sin and in our regeneration. The Holy Spirit is a deposit guaranteeing what is to come (Eph 1:14), and has a taste of the powers of the age to come (Heb 6:5). So we can become citizens of the Kingdom of God now, even though the Kingdom of God hasn’t yet fully been realized.
So how do we pray “your Kingdom come”? There are three ways we can and would pray for this.
We should pray that the Kingdom would go out from us through evangelism and conversions, because this is what’s actually necessary for the kingdom to advance. The kingdom doesn’t advance through unbelievers becoming more moral or adopting or agreeing with aspects of the law of God. It advances through entry into the kingdom and submission to the king.
Secondly, we should pray that the kingdom comes down upon us in consummation through the return of the king and the establishment of his kingdom.
Third, we should pray that the kingdom grows within us through conformity to the king
Here is where the next phrase becomes all important – “your will be done”. Jesus taught us to pray this when he himself prayed it in the garden. There he gave himself over to God’s will, which is what we must also do.
But there is a major difference between his prayer and ours. He was giving himself over to God’s wrath, but when we pray “your will be done” we are actually giving ourselves over to God’s mercy. Because Jesus took all the wrath, for us to hand ourselves over to the will of God is a good and happy thing to do. We can have confidence in God’s will for us, that it will be for our good, because Jesus handed himself over to God’s wrath on our behalf.