Kingdom Announcement (Again)
Thy kingdom come Matthew 6:10
Come – We know that God’s Kingdom is not a physical place. The Greek word basileia is about reign and rule, not palaces and courtyards. God’s Kingdom is revealed wherever His servants and citizens live according to His government. But what does it mean to pray, “Your Kingdom come?” Hasn’t it already arrived when we observe Torah or act in accordance with His character? Why pray for it to show up later?
The verb here is eltheto. It is an imperative (a command) in the aorist tense (that means it is a fait accompli, something that happened once for all time in the past). Now, this is quite unusual. When we pray these words, we don’t think of commanding something that has already occurred. We think we are asking (not telling) for God to complete His plans in the future. This isn’t the only odd thing about this phrase, as we will see.
While the idea of a coming Kingdom is quite common in the New Testament, it is almost entirely absent in the Old Testament. There is no corresponding phrase “thy kingdom come” anywhere in the Hebrew Scriptures. And while the idea of the Kingdom (basileia) is found throughout the New Testament, the “coming” of the Kingdom is found only here, in this model prayer. And the “coming of the Kingdom” isn’t found anywhere at all outside the three synoptic gospels. This should tell us that Jesus is saying something very unusual. His instruction about prayer incorporates a concept that is unique to Him. What can He mean?
First, we notice that the biblical idea of “days” is not like our Greek idea. Days in the Bible do not come in regular sequence. We think in terms of a constant repetition of the pattern of days, but the Bible treats days as “events,” not unnoticed succession. In the Bible, days are the interruption of God’s kairos (pregnant moments) into our chronos (regular sequence). So, the day of the Lord is not a scheduled time on the calendar. Neither are the times when God acts in history. And His return will be just as unscheduled as any other divine appointment. God doesn’t seem to work according to clock time (chronos). That means when we pray “Thy kingdom come,” we are not asking for God to arrive on a particular day of the week. Instead, we are recognizing that God’s kingdom is the interruptive force in creation. He breaks into our lives. God brings into being His Kingdom in ways that we can neither schedule nor control.
In this sense, God’s time is not from eternity to eternity. It is from age to age. That is to say, it is from one event of God’s breaking into the world to the next event of God’s interruption. Lohmeyer says, “the predominant idea everywhere is not that of an empty, merely fleeting, time, but of an experienced time, or, more exactly, a historically filled time which is in fact expressed in the ‘coming’.” This is what the rabbis call renewal. In other words, Jesus is telling us that one of the opening thoughts of prayer is the conscious awareness of God filling our time with His arrival. It is the experience of His breaking into our routine and discovering renewal. We find that the Kingdom has already arrived when we turn our thoughts to the God who is already at work among us. In other words, even though we were not aware of God’s Kingdom, it was already here. It was simply hidden in our preoccupation with time marching on. We didn’t see Him because we were blind to His interruptions. Now, all that must change.
Why is this phrase a command and not a wish? Because it is about asking God to reveal to us what is already here. “Let it be revealed in its arrival.” Open our eyes, Father, so that we might see that You are coming in every pregnant moment. Establish for us a permanent awareness of Your handiwork and presence. Let us be interrupted!
Your Kingdom come.
Topical Index: Kingdom, eletheo, basileia, kairos, chronos, time, age, Matthew 6:10
How is this understanding of the coming of His Kingdom any different than His coming (in terms of His “second” coming)? And is there a difference between the terms His coming and His revealing or revelation?
I get the distinct sense when I pray this prayer that I am operating from the point of my granted sovereignty to grant His sovereignty not only back into my own life, but, to the extent that I am in the proper position to supplicate the cause of the world around me (which I believe is to the extent that I am properly, through His life in me, operating from the position of servant to that world), to grant His sovereignty back over this fallen world again.
I get the sense that I am given authority to operate in this world to the extent that I have submitted to being a servant to the needs of it. And from that authority to serve in my life that I have given back to Him is the extent that His authority is re-established through me. Not that He did not have it all before, but it wasn’t THROUGH ME until I gave that willingness to serve back to Him to fill. (Would that be “fatten” (“bereyshit”) in a sense?)
When I read this the word pregnant stood out. Pregnant moments. There are times when an overwhelming thought life or situation feels as though it is going to swallow me whole, and usually it is troubling times of wrestling with my wants and my way, wrestling with trying to be obedient to the will of my Father and not my self.
It seems that when these times reach a peak, but, I am never quite sure when this peak is there is a sudden release and the struggle seems to disappear and it feels as if it never even existed.
Aha, thy kingdom came!
I tend to think in terms of accepting what has already disrupted my life
For example, when I returned from Hawaii with my family
My dog Max had contracted kennel cough from the Red Rover kennel
In a great deal of discomfort Max now gags and vomits a white mucus
Wherever he goes in my apt
I was primarily concerned with the surgery on his right paw
But that has now taken second place to his sickness
Not to mention the vet bills
Thy Kingdom come is a way of accepting God’s will
Divinely Interrupted
“Thy Kingdom come..” (Matthew 6.10)
Say.. – whose kingdom is it anyway? Mine? or his? or hers? or yours? No. It is His kingdom. His rule. His reign. God is Sovereign and Yeshua HaMashiach (the Son) is LORD. Christ is the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven. Christ, as the Son of Man, Christ our Example and Exemplar, Christ, the Second Adam, was to His very last breath, submitted and yielded and obedient to the will of the Father.
Life Interrupted? – The Divine Surprise. He came to me.
~ but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, (the Second Adam) He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross, the tslav, the execution stake. For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the Name which is above every name.. ~ (Philippians 2.7-9)
~ For you know the grace of our LORD Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich ~ (2 Corinthians 8:9)
~ For He has made Him, who knew no sin, to be sin for us; that we might be made the righteousness of God *in Him.* ~
In this (very Kairos) moment, I will ask again. Who was it WE rejected? Who was it WE spit upon? Who was it who was “crowned” with a crown of thorns upon His head? Who was it that was beaten and literally shredded to pieces, so much so that He could no longer be recognized as being a man?
May I? Only with your permission..
~ For the message about the execution-stake is nonsense to those in the process of being destroyed, but to us in the process of being saved it is the power of God ~
This is the ultimate “Divine Interruption.” It is the cross of the Christ, the Chosen One. O, the cross! Selah!
~ For this cause came I into the world. ~
Yes, He knew. He knew all about it and yet, (another Kairos moment)..- He chose the nails. And (another Kairos moment)- It was not the nails that held Him to the Tree. It was Love. ~ For God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself ~ Oh, listen!!
~ not charging men’s transgressions to their account, and..(??) – He has entrusted to us the Message of this reconciliation! (another Kairos moment!)
What is this Message? Is it in you? Don’t you want to tell the entire world the “good news?” This is the gospel! This is the “Good News!” Oh, may there be tidings of great joy which shall be to all people, – the (long-promised) Messiah has come. Hosanna, to the King!
~ Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and endowed with salvation, humble, and mounted on a donkey, even on a colt, the foal of a donkey. I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the horse from Jerusalem; and the bow of war will be cut off. and He will speak peace to the nations; and His dominion will be from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth.…~ (Zechariah 9.9)
~ When they had approached Jerusalem and had come to Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, then Yeshua sent two of His talmudim, saying to them, “Go into the village opposite you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied there and a colt with her; untie them and bring them to Me.…”
There just so happened (?) to be a donkey tied there?- and a colt with her? How did He know this? – (surprise, surprise..- another Kairos moment)
O, the cross! O such LOVE. YES!! God SO LOVED.. (benevolence towards another at cost to myself) O the cost of Calvary!!- (another Kairos moment).
And O, the price!! The price that was paid to redeem, to restore, to renew us.. The price? The cost? The worth? – The value?- It was blood. Blood, both Human and Divine. It was the blood of a Lamb. Oh, Calvary! Oh, the cross! The Lamb is worthy!
…When He had taken the book, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each one holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are You to take the book and to break its seals; for You were slain, and purchased for God with Your blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. “You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth… (Revelation 5.9)
~ He has put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear the LORD and put their trust in Him ~ (Psalm 40:3)
Blessed is the Name of the LORD. His Name is YHWH is Salvation. His Name is wonderful!
Aren’t these Hebraic parallelisms?
Hallowed be Your Name.
Your kingdom come.
Your will be done
We hallow the Name with obedience and profane with disobedience. Your kingdom come, Your will be done is a call for His reign in us, obedience.
YHWH’s Kingdom has already come, WHEN, as in now, TODAY if we hear His voice, to allow His rule and sovereignty in our lives;
When, we so desire to have a heart change/circumcision, with the understanding of how evil and dark our old nature is.
Blessed are the ears that hear.
ABBA break into our lives, and send disruptions in our thoughts, schedules and plans. Amein! Shalom!
His kingdom is a-new within us
who believe and follow Him.
It’s not “See here!” or “See there!”.
But “within you”. Lk 17:21
Paul wrote about his a-newness:
“God. . . called me through His grace
to reveal His Son in me.” Gal 1:16
“IN ME.”
“WITHIN YOU.”
Skip,
It is my understanding that we are praying “Thy Kingdom Come” for YaHushua to come to earth and split the mount of olives (Zechariah 14:4) and setup His kingdom on earth in the millennium (the last day) and His
will and desire be done as it is in shamayim (heaven).
Shalom.
Tom