Your kingdom come
Photo by Steve Sharp on Unsplash
Our Father in heaven,
Hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come.
Your will be done,
On earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
As we also have forgiven our debtors.
And do not bring us to the time of trial,
But rescue us from the evil one.
(From the “the Lord’s Prayer” in the Gospel of Matthew 6:9-13)
Your kingdom come.
“We don’t need to pray this anymore because…the kingdom has come!”
So said some teachers in the Christian circles in which I grew up. They meant that the kingdom of God came with the church in Acts 2:37-47.
I’m not here to argue with them if that it what they still believe.
I do believe the kingdom of God gently gestates in the church of Christ, yet I keep praying–with Jesus–for the kingdom to come “as the lightning comes from the east and flashes as far as the west” (Gospel of Matthew 24:27).
I keep praying for the sun to be darkened, for the moon to not give its light, for the stars to fall from heaven, and for the powers of heaven to be shaken. For all of the tribes of earth to see Christ the King coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory (Gospel of Matthew 24:29-31).
For when these things happen, those who have been beaten down, conned, exploited, oppressed, and used up by the kingdoms of this world will stand up and raise their heads, because their redemption–the total and universal reign of God–is drawing near (see Gospel of Luke 21:28).
Every morning when I pray the Lord’s prayer with my son, images flash through my mind when I come to the line about “your kingdom come.”
Images of what happens when the “powers and principalities” crowd out the kingdom of God. Or, worse, claim to be agents of God’s kingdom who misuse the “sword of justice” to conquer and exploit the powerless and weak, the “least of these” among whom the Christ dwells (see Gospel of Matthew 25:40-45).
Even the best of our church leaders, corporate heads, government officials, journalists, scholars, and social influencers fail and succumb to the temptations of power.
The power that is available and attainable in academic fields, cultures, economies, governments, media, and societies is not of God; it is of the dominion of man. Therefore it as corruptible and fallible as man.
But the power of the kingdom of God is not of man, not of this world. It is incorruptible. It is the “saving power for everyone” (see Romans 1:16).
The power that concentrates in any nation of earth is exclusive; it is not for everyone. Indeed, it is not even for all citizens of the nation, but only those who, by their cunning, amass the most power for themselves.
But the power that animates, characterizes, and sustains the kingdom of God is inclusive. It is for everyone, but first of all those who have no power in the kingdoms of earth. It is for the aliens, the homeless, the poor, the prisoners, the untouchables, the weak, the weird. It is for the victims of exploitation, oppression, and violence. In the kingdom of God, “the last will be first and the first will be last” (Gospel of Matthew 20:16).
So, in a world where kings and kingdoms give us air pollution and moral pollution, arms races and pandemics, abortion and migrant family separation, cheap junk and unaffordable necessities, clergy sex abuse and clergy hero worship, Gaza and Ukraine, gooning and doomscrolling, Sandy Hook and Uvalde, Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump, “woke” and MAGA, I pray to God: Your kingdom come!