Let Your Kingdom Come

Let Your Kingdom Come

Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Matthew 6:10

We shouldn’t pray, “Dear Father, let us come into your kingdom,”as though it’s a place to which we travel. Instead, we pray, “Your kingdom come.” For if we’re to receive it at all, God’s grace and his kingdom with all its virtues must come to us. We will never be able to go to him. In the same way, Christ came to us—from heaven down to earth. We didn’t go up to him from earth to heaven.

Another mistake of those who pray the Lord’s Prayer is that they think only about their eternal happiness. They understand the kingdom of God to mean nothing but joy and pleasure in heaven. Thinking from an earthly, physical perspective and fearing hell, they seek only their own benefit and advantage in heaven. These people don’t realize that God’s kingdom is nothing but godliness, chastity, purity, gentleness, tenderness, and kindness. His kingdom is full of every virtue and grace. They don’t know that God must have his way and that he alone lives and reigns in us. This should be our first and foremost desire. We are saved only when God reigns in us, and we become his kingdom.

We don’t have to seek or ask for joy, happiness, or anything else we may desire. Rather, all of this comes along with God’s kingdom. So to help us avoid wanting what is false and selfish, Christ tells us to seek first God’s kingdom itself, not the fruits of the kingdom. But those who seek the fruits of God’s kingdom seek the back end of God’s kingdom. They seek the last part first, and the first part they value only because of its ultimate benefits.