Your Kingdom Come
Notes
Transcript
Hearing those words from the book of First Samuel, we might draw parallels to our world and our time. Who is it that we believe is really in control? Is it our government? Is it our community? Is it ourselves? Who is it that reigns over us?
In their time Israel wanted a king like other countries had. By the time we get to the New Testament the Roman empire was controlling much of the known world. Caesar was seen not only as the ruler but as a God.
Kingdom is something we don’t understand very well in our country.
As we gather today we have to recognize that tomorrow our nation takes pause to remember. To remember all of those who have paid the ultimate price serving our country. Memorial Day is the day we remember those who have died protecting the freedoms we enjoy. As we come to our Scripture today it speaks to Kingdom, something that our country has avoided since its foundation.
It is said that in the early days of our country that they sought to make George Washington our first president, king. Yet one of the placards from that time read:
We Serve No Sovereign Here
We Serve No Sovereign Here
This statement from our history might make it difficult to understand the meaning of Kingdom. Though there are many who still take great interest in royals, like those of the nation we declared our independence from across the pond. Even there today the royal family is in reality a figure head than it is a soverignty.
So we have difficulty understanding sovereignty. In a sovereignty the people are subjects of the sovereign. The sovereign is in control of everything within their Kingdom.
We heard from God in our reading this morning in Isaiah 46:9-10
remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me,
declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,’
This is a very central concept in our faith.
God is in control.
When everything seems chaotic, when life is hard, when the storms come, in the midst of all of it we remember God is the one in control.
Though we may say we believe this in our hearts, much like Israel did in its own history. There came a time when Israel was no longer satisfied to have God as their King. They wanted to have a king like the countries around them. You may remember Samuel was the prophet at the time, and they came to him and said, 1 Sam 8:5
and said to him, “Behold, you are old and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now appoint for us a king to judge us like all the nations.”
At this point Samuel was not happy with their desire, and so he goes to God and God says to him, 1Sam 8:7
“Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them.
The world, and many we know have rejected God. In so rejecting we reject God being in control. In our portion of the prayer Jesus taught his disciples we will be looking at this morning, Jesus is very pointedly reminding us of God’s sovereignty. We pray Your Kingdom Come - Your sovereign rule come.
As we come to consider the Lord’s Prayer, it opens with Jesus inviting us to pray “Our Father” - putting us immediately into a community and not just any community, but into a family - Jesus’ family with God as the father! We also learned last week about bearing the family name as we pray “Hallowed be your Name.” It is not just God who is holy, but the very Name of God should be held in high esteem as well.
Today we’re focusing on the next phrase: Matthew 6:10
Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Jesus is reminding us of God’s sovereignty.
Your kingdom come, …
God is in control. Not us. More specifically, each one of us can say, “not me.”
It’s a reminder of where we are to take all of our concerns, all of our petitions, and who it is that we strive to be. It is a reminder of God’s sovereignty.
And it is a foreshadowing of sorts of what we see predicted in Revelation with the coming together of a new heaven and a new earth.
Continuing on in the prayer…
Your kingdom come, your will be done, …
This is a statement of humility. It matches Jesus prayer in the garden in those final hours of his life. We talked about it as we took our journey from Gethsemane to Golgotha. In Gethsemane Jesus prays while facing his pending arrest, trial, and crucifixion,
And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.”
There it is, even Jesus the second person in the trinity submits to the will of the Father.
People will say to live as a Christian is to follow in Jesus’ footsteps, we can learn a lot right here as Jesus prayed, “not as I will, but as you will.”
Peter Marshall was a presbyterian pastor from Scotland that came to the United States and became chaplain of the U.S. Senate. In one of his sermons he speaks of Martin Luther’s prayer for a dear friend:
In 1540 Luther’s great friend and assistant, Friedrich Myconius, became sick and was expected to die within a short time. On his bed he wrote a loving farewell note to Luther with a trembling hand. Luther received the letter and sent back a reply: “I command thee in the name of God to live because I still have need of thee in the work of reforming the church…. The Lord will never let me hear that thou art dead, but will permit thee to survive me. For this I am praying, this is my will, and may my will be done, because I seek only to glorify the name of God.”
Although Myconius had already lost the ability to speak when Luther’s letter came, he recovered completely and lived six more years to survive Luther himself by two months.
I love that story because it speaks of the boldness with which we can pray. In my own life I’ve sought to pray with boldness but often feel as if I hedge my bets so to speak. I pray If it be your will, rather than praying with confidence that the purpose of my prayer is to glorify God.
I’ve shared before praying for Jason, a young man with Cerebral Palsy. We were at camp and the speaker invited us to ask each person in our group “What do you want Jesus to do for you?” Jason had been confined to a wheel chair most of his life. He said simply and powerfully: “I want to walk.” Praying for him brought about a crisis of faith to our leadership team. We asked ourselves, “How do you pray for something you don’t think will ever happen?”
A little more than a year later I visited that church again and Jason was there. He walked into the room. It still gets me. I hear Jesus’ words, “O ye of little faith.”
What’s the lesson here? What is Jesus trying to teach us in this prayer?
Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
I think it comes in that last section - on earth as it is in heaven.
The way that the world can learn what the Kingdom of God is like is that you and I as Christians live our lives with the confidence that God is in control. That we live our lives with the confidence that God is sovereign. That we live our lives seeking God’s will and in submission to God’s will.
In an interview regarding the sovereignty of God, Pastor and author John Piper shared two key truths to take away.
First, the sovereignty of God is governed by his wisdom.
Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!
Everything that is impossible for us to understand is governed by the deepest divine wisdom. God is not whimsically causing things to happen, but in His total wisdom.
Second, His sovereignty is governed by his justice and mercy.
Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the Lord is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him.
There is no injustice on God’s part. God never, ever wrongs anyone, that’s outside his nature.
The ultimate aim of God’s will is that God be glorified.
Those are powerful conclusions and help us when we are wondering how to direct our prayers. all of it is to the glory of God. AMEN.
