How the Kingdom Comes

*Bid war and faction cease
Bring in the reign of peace:

LordJesUf cornel
Set every captive free;
Let all men brothers be;
Heal eartKs long malady:

Lord quielUt, come /

* Assert thy right divine;
(Xer all the nations shine:

Lord Jesut corns!
Then earth Uke heaven shall sing
With hallelujahs ring
And hail her rightful King:

Lordt quickly come / ‘*

loto tie !&tngtiom Corner

HE answers to some prayers come at once. Even while we are speaking to God the thing we ask for is laid in our hands. The answers to other prayers, however, are delayed. Sometimes the delay is for the schooling of the suppliants faith, or for the discipline of patience. Sometimes the answer is one which in its very nature could not be given at once. If in the early summer, as the first buds are appearing, one kneel in his orchard and pray that his trees may bring forth abundant and luscious fruit, his prayer could not be answered till the later summer or autumn. Fruits must have time to ripen.

Then there are prayers whose answers may begin to come at once, but cannot be granted in [87]

Cbe (Solum StLte of ]|^ta?er

fulness and completeness at any one time because the blessings that are sought are progressive and can be given only gradually. The prayer, “Thy kingdom come,’’ belongs to this class. It was not a sudden coming of the heavenly kingdom to earth that was in the mind of Christ when he gave this prayer to his disciples. He did not mean that they should ask for the letting down of the throne of glory from amid the splendors of heaven to some locality on earth.

The petition contemplates the ultimate bringing of all human hearts and lives under the divine sway. But the subjugation is a moral one. It is not such submission to Christ as King as takes place when one nation is conquered by another in war. The conquests of this kingdom are not made by force; they are moral conquests and are made by love. “Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power,’’ ran the ancient word of hope. Human hearts are sovereign; this is part of the divine image in [88]

^ota) the IKingDom Comes

man. Every one is lord of his own life. Grod is strong enough to destroy the universe. There are no massive gates or doors he could not rend open. But no hand, not even the omnipotent hand of God, will ever force the door of a human heart. The yielding must be voluntary. It must be a yielding of love. Not until men love God can they be in the kingdom of heaven. “If ye love me,’’ said the Master,” keep my commandments.’’

The coming of the kingdom of God must therefore be gradual. One by one men accept Christ and become his subjects. Then in those who do take his yoke the surrender cannot be made fully and perfectly in a moment, but must be progressive. They go on from strength to strength. The inner man is renewed day by day. Jesus calls us to him to learn of him, and the learning takes all our life. Thus it is that the prayer, “Thy kingdom come,” has been receiving its answer every day since it began to be oflfered. The spiritual sway [89]

Cl)e iSoIDen (Sate of ltapet

of Christ in this worid has been extending continually. Especially in recent years has its pro-. gress been wonderful. The work of Christian missions during the nineteenth century has been stupendous.

No doubt it seems to many even now that the answer to the petition has scarcely begun to come. Still is the world full of violence and strife. The great Christian nations yet resort to war for the settlement of their disputes. Wrong and injustice prevail. The poor are oppressed. The weak are crushed. Foul sins stain the story of daily life even in communities where Christian civilization has done the most for the uplifting of society. When we look abroad and see the evil that still exists, we are apt to ask whether, after all, the world is any better than it was when Jesus taught his disciples to offer this petition. Yet this question is easily set at rest. The prayer has been wondrously answered already.

“If God,” says Maurice, “had not heard this [90]

^otD ttie l&msDom Comes

prayer, going up &om tens of thousands in all ages, the earth would have been a den of robbers.*” We do not know fix)m what depths of depravity this pleading, offered continually by loyal hearts, has saved the world. Nor do we begin to realize what Christianity has wrought in the world, in the countries where it has had power. If we would know how far this prayer has been answered, in what measure light has conquered darkness, to what extent the kingdom of God has advanced among men, we have but to study the world as it was in Christ’s day and compare with this the condition of society in the countries where Christianity has produced its best fruits. Or we need but to contrast, for example, the civilization of England and the United States with the debasement of the worst heathen lands, to see that the world is immeasurably better than it was at the beginning of the Christian era. Still, however, even the best and holiest parts of the earth are far from the perfect realization [91]

Cl)e ^ointn <Sate of ptapet

of the blessing sought in this petition. Everywhere sin still abounds, and wrong, injustice, crime, and cruelty are found among men. Even in the purest church and in the sweetest home the kingdom of God is not yet fully come. The prayer in large measure has yet to be answered, for it will be answered perfectly only when the life of heaven shall rule without hindrance or resistance in the society of earth; when truth, righteousness, and love shall prevail everywhere. Until then we should never cease to breathe to our Father the petition, “Thy kingdom come.*”

We desire also in this prayer that the kingdom of God may come in our own individual life with more and more power. Indeed this is the sense in which the prayer should be made first of all. The part of the world for whose surrender to God we are immediately responsible is that which is in ourself. Our prayer for the coming of the kingdom in other lives is not sincere and can have no power with God if we do [92]

^otD tt)e I&inffDom Comes

not seek to have it come in our own life. Joan of Arc, when asked what was the secret of the victoriousness and unconquerableness of her white banner, answered, “I send it forth against the enemy, and then I follow it myself When we send out the white banner of such a prayer as this we should be careful to follow it with our own life.

While we ask that the kingdom of God may come in us we should make sure that its coming be not hindered, but in every way promoted, in us. This means that we should leave oiu* sins, oiu* grasping and greed, our jealousy, oiu* resentment, our selfishness and pride, and whatsoever in us is unlovely and unholy, and that we let into oiu* life whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honorable, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely. The kingdom of Grod can have its perfect realization in us only in heaven. But it must begin in us here or we shall never find ourself [93]

Cl)e (Somen «ate of prapet

ready for heaven. Jesus said that he that believeth on him hath eternal life. The present tense contains a wonderful revealing — that the life of heaven begins in the heart of every follower of Christ the moment he becomes a true Christian. It may begin in a very feeble way — only a desire, a resolve, a decision of surrender, yet it is a germ of the life of Christ; it is a little seed of heaven planted in a heart; it is life, eternal life. “The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till it was all leavened.*” This little germ of eternal life, hid in a heart, will work its way through the life till the whole being has been assimilated to itself. The kingdom of heaven is come in us, therefore, only in the measure in which our life has come under the sway of its spirit.

There never is a day, therefore, for any of us when we do not still need to pray this prayer. Who of us has yet let the kingdom of God come in him as it might have come, as it may [94]

^otD tfyt SUngliom Come0

yet come? Who of us is ready now to have this kingdom rule in him absolutely, yielding to God’s sway every part of his being, bringing into subjection to Christ every thought, feeling, desire, and affection? That is the way to the highest possibilities of grace. We do not know what Grod could make of us, what he could accomplish through us, if only we would offer this prayer out of our deepest heart, and then follow it with the complete devotement of our life — body, soul, and spirit — to him. Whatever there may be disheartening to those who pray this prayer day and night, because of the delay of the answer, we know that ultimately the triumph will be complete, that the kingdom of God will come in full and glorious power, and that all men will jrield to its blessed sway, when “the kingdom of the world is become the kingdom of our Lord, and of his Christ: and he shall reign for ever and ever.*” There is a series of parables in which our Lord called his friends to faithfulness in watching [95]

C&e ^oinm 4^ate of ltaper

for his coming. When he will come no one can know. It may be in the morning; it may be at noonday; it may be in the evening. He would have us always ready, that his coming may never surprise us. It is not the watching of idle gazing that will please him, but the watching of diligence and faithfulness in duty. If we but keep ourself in the love of Gk)d, and do well our allotted tasks as they come to our hands, we shall do our part in bringing the kingdom of heaven in its power and shall be ready to welcome the King whenever he may come. If the Lord should come in the morning As I go about 9?ty npork, The little things and the quiet things

Thai a servant cannot shirk,
Though nobody ever sees them,

And only the dear Lord cares That they always are done in the Ught of the sun, Would he take me unawares?

^^Ifmy Lord should come at noonday.
The time of the dust and heat,
[96]

^oto tbt SUn0Dom Come?

When the glare is white and the air is sHU And the hoof -heats sound in the street;

If my dear Lord came at noondiof,
And smiled in my tired eyes,

Would it not be sweet his look to meet? Would he take me by surprise?

“If the Lord came hither at evening.

In thejragrant dew and dusk,
When the world drops off its mantle

Of daylight like a husk.
And flowers in wonderful beauty.

And we fold our hands and rest, Would his touch of my hand, his low command.

Bring me unhopedfor zest?

Why do I ask and question?

He is ever conung to me.
Morning and noon and evening.

If I have but eyes to see.
And the daily load grows lighter.

The daily cares grow sweet. For the Master is near, the Master is here,

I have only to sit at his feet”

[97]