[0:00] giving it away. What does thy kingdom come mean? It's a big, big, big prayer. Huge. It's going to take us several hours to get through this today. But reel it in. No, no. I don't want to torture anybody. Take your Bibles out with me please and turn to the Gospel of Luke chapter 11. We're going to read the verses there and then we'll ask the Lord to come and open our hearts and minds to His truth and then we'll dig in.
[0:40] We're really going to dig into Scripture today. We're going to be a little bit different. We're not going to stay in one passage. Normally we stay in one passage and exegete. We're doing something different. We're walking through the Lord's Prayer. Line by line.
[0:57] And the reason we're doing that is so that we can digest it a little better. We can let it percolate. We can let it take a little bit more from it because Jesus is teaching us to pray this every day.
[1:11] And so we don't want it to be repetitious. We don't want it to be kind of mindless or degenerate into that. We want it to be fruitful and edifying. So that's why we're digging in a little deeper in each of these.
[1:23] So we come this morning to Thy Kingdom Come. So if you're able, please stand as I read from Luke chapter 11. We're just going to read the first four verses so we have the context.
[1:37] Gospel of Luke chapter 11 verse 1. Now Jesus was praying in a certain place. And when He finished, one of His disciples said to Him, Lord, teach us to pray as John taught His disciples.
[1:53] And He said to them, whenever you pray, say, ask, continually talk to the Father about Father, how would be your name?
[2:07] Your kingdom cause it to come. Give each day our, give us each day our daily bread.
[2:17] forgive us our sins for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us and lead us not into temptation.
[2:35] So it reads, let us pray. Father, open our eyes today. Send your spirit, cause your kingdom to come, Lord, so that the word might be sown and the word might be received and the seed might bear fruit.
[2:47] This we pray in Christ's name. Amen. Please be seated. I'm delighted here this morning to have my pain doctor with me over here. Lance with his wife, Linus.
[3:05] And he's my PT guy. So tomorrow morning, he'll probably cause me a lot of pain. His goal is to get me to scream and swear.
[3:18] No, no, no, no, no, not at all. No, he's very gentle, very kind. Great man. Wonderful to see you here today. So, in my seminary training, you know, way back, called seminary, cemetery, where they train pastors, right?
[3:38] They used to, and a few places still do. So, when I was there, I was taught that the kingdom was all future.
[3:52] And it was for when Christ returned and set up his thousand year kingdom on earth to reign. That was the perspective I was taught.
[4:03] it's a theology that is called dispensationalism. It's not a bad word. It's not bad. I love the people there. There's some wonderful, wonderful people and preachers. Some of the most famous preachers we know in America are dispensational.
[4:17] Chuck Swindoll, John MacArthur, David Jeremiah, there's all kinds of, a whole list of them. They're wonderful, wonderful people. They're just wrong on this. When it comes to the millennial and not millennial like the people but the millennium like the last thing in Revelation, I'm a pan-millennius.
[4:41] It'll all pan out. So I don't want to be hardcore on that stuff. But what I was taught was that Israel and the church were distinctly separate and the kingdom was for Israel, not for the church.
[4:58] And so when you come to something like this where Jesus says, pray thy kingdom come, does that only apply to Jews? Does that only mean I'm praying for that very future consummation when Christ returns?
[5:13] Is this prayer not applicable to today? Because Jesus says when he came preaching, he said the time is fulfilled, the kingdom is here.
[5:27] repent and believe in the gospel. Jesus also said, my kingdom is not of this world.
[5:39] If my kingdom were of this world, you'd know. The kingdom that Jesus talked about here, and he talks about it as we're going to see in the book of Luke, as the New Testament talks about, it's not called the kingdom of Israel.
[6:00] It's called the kingdom of God. It's called the kingdom in Matthew's gospel, which is very interesting, because Matthew was written to the Jewish people. There, it's described as the kingdom of heaven.
[6:15] Why? Because it's not earthly. Now, is there a return? Is there a absolutely yes? Is there a culmination?
[6:25] Yes. So, here in Luke 11, Jesus is teaching us how to pray, so we're walking through that. We come to this request, thy kingdom come.
[6:36] What is it? What are we praying when we prayed that? What's a kingdom anyway? What's a kingdom? That kingdom has a king.
[6:48] It has subjects, right? There's a reign, there's a dominion. Thy kingdom come. Oh, we're not tied down here. So, so I want to start this with a little context.
[7:01] Let's go back to the Old Testament. We're not going to look at everything there. I just want to look at some key points. What was the promise of God's kingdom? When God said a kingdom was coming, so when Jesus arrives and says the kingdom is here, what kingdom is he talking about?
[7:15] Because we know that the disciples in the first century expected what? What kind of kingdom did they expect? Earthly, right? They expected another David.
[7:26] They expected conquer Rome. They expected, right, set it up like David did. And the promise is connected to David, so I can understand why they went there.
[7:39] Jews of the first century, the disciples of Jesus, even after he'd risen from the dead, they're like, are you going to do it now? Are you going to do it now? Dudes. Okay, the Holy Spirit hadn't come yet, right?
[7:52] And Pentecost was the next chapter, so they hadn't, you know. But even them, understand that the Jews of the first century expected an earthly, physical kingdom.
[8:05] And Jesus didn't bring that. Did not bring that. In fact, didn't even talk about it that way. He talked about it as here. When I cast out demons, guess what?
[8:15] Kingdom's here. Why? Because the king has come and he's kicked out the other king. And he does that life by life by life. Every time he saves somebody, the kingdom has come.
[8:26] Because he's kicked out the tyrant and replaced the tyrant with himself. And that's kingdom come. That was his mission, to set captives free.
[8:40] So that kingdom. Okay, so let's look at the Old Testament. So three significant places. Exodus 19. Exodus 19 comes before Exodus 20. That's significant.
[8:51] Because in Exodus 20 is what? The Ten Commandments, right? So Exodus 19, God is setting it up with Moses saying, get ready, because I'm coming down on the mountain.
[9:03] So get ready. And he says to them in Exodus 19, 5, if you, speaking to Israel, if you will indeed obey my voice, in other words, I'm king, you obey.
[9:17] If you indeed will obey my voice and keep my covenant, the covenant is going to be expressed in chapter 20, those Ten Commandments. If you keep my covenant, you shall be my treasure possessing among all peoples, for all the earth is mine, and you shall be to me what?
[9:35] A kingdom of priests. A kingdom of what? A kingdom of priests. What kind of kingdom is coming? A kingdom of priests.
[9:46] By the way, did they keep the covenant? No, they didn't in the last couple of chapters. That's the whole point of the Old Testament. They couldn't keep it. Nobody can keep it. Nobody can obey. Nobody can even love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your ode.
[10:06] You can't do it. we're human. We're weak. Even David, David's our best shot, wasn't he?
[10:21] Well, there's Daniel. Except he said he's, okay. Joseph? No, no. So, so what happens?
[10:33] So they don't keep the covenant, God is still a faithful and slow to anger and a patient God. So he's their God. He's running things through judges.
[10:45] And then what do the people do? The people want a king. Because all the other nations have a king. They want a king. So God says to Samuel, don't, they're not rejecting you, they're rejecting me.
[10:59] Israel rejected God as their king. They want an earthly king. They want a substitute. They want something they can manage. This guy's too big. They want some human guy. So, so God gives them a really good looking guy, really tall, you know, huge, you know, king looking guy named Saul.
[11:17] How'd that work? Not so good. So then he gives them a run. A little redheaded guy, really good at slinging rocks. David.
[11:29] And, and David did pretty good for a while, didn't he? He did really good until the day he was supposed to go to war. He didn't go to war and he was on the roof of the palace and he checked out, oh, somebody bathing over there.
[11:47] I think I'll call her Bathsheba. No. And, and, and, and, from that moment, David fell hard.
[12:03] I mean, it was a different man. A different man. He, he broke at least half of the commandments within a few days. from faithful to absolute failure.
[12:19] So, in spite of that, God says to David, David's ready to die. God is, God didn't kill him. He deserved to die. God didn't kill him. God forgave him.
[12:29] But he told David through Samuel, 2 Samuel 7, he's, David, remember, David, it's the end of his life. He's, he's, he's established peace everywhere.
[12:40] He is king. He is king. Right? There's no enemies. And, and he is established. So, he wants to do something for God. He wants to build God a temple.
[12:51] They've been, they've been worshiping in a tent. Ever since they left Egypt, they've been worshiping in a tent. They're still in a tent. So, David's got this beautiful house that he built for himself. This beautiful palace.
[13:01] Right? And God's got a tent. So, David's like, I need to build God a house. And so, he goes to the prophet, and the prophet says, sounds good to me. I'll go to God.
[13:12] And God says, nope. Nope, your hands are too bloody. You're not building me a house, but I'll build you a house. I'll build you a house.
[13:23] In fact, what he promised in 2 Samuel 7 is, I will go through your offspring. I will raise up your offspring, your seed, singular, your seed that turns out to be the Messiah.
[13:37] Through your seed, I will raise up a house and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. So, there we go, kingdom again. Kingdom forever, an eternal kingdom.
[13:50] Not a, not a, so we know that Solomon, David's son, didn't fulfill that because his kingdom lasted 40 years and then Solomon, like daddy, wrecked it.
[14:03] And it just went downhill from there. So, promise of an eternal kingdom. Then we get to Daniel. Now we can talk a lot about Daniel, but Daniel mentions, remember his dream in chapter 2 of Daniel, he talks about he saw this great statue right at the head and the shoulders, the breastplate and the thighs and all this kind of stuff.
[14:25] And what does it mean? So Daniel interprets it, God gives him the interpretation. And it was actually the layers of the statue were four different kingdoms. The kingdoms went from Babylon to Persia to Greece to Rome.
[14:40] And so in that fourth kingdom, David is saying, excuse me, Daniel, in chapter Daniel 2, 44, it says in the days of those kings, which was the fourth kingdom, which was Rome.
[14:54] In the days of that king, the kings of Rome, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed. Again, it'll be a kingdom that's a forever kingdom.
[15:05] It's a kingdom that's eternal. In the days of Rome. What happened in the days of Rome? What offspring of David was born in the day, you know, who's the son of David?
[15:18] Jesus, the Christ, setting up a kingdom. Oh, did he set up a kingdom? God said he would. So let's look at this, okay?
[15:31] So now we're going to turn to the New Testament. We're going to do something different here, okay? We're going to do sometimes to understand the word, we go to context, sometimes we go to the meaning of the word, sometimes we look at the usage of the word, we do a word study, so that's what we're going to do today, we're going to trace the word kingdom.
[15:54] We're not going to look at every use, we don't have time for that. We wouldn't even have time for Matthew to do that. Alright, so we're just going to trace some of the references to kingdom, and I would challenge you to, if you wanted to explore further, get your, well, we've got apps for that now, I'd probably do that, push a button and it happens.
[16:17] Back in my day, so that's what we're going to do. So I want to break it into three parts. What I found was three, you could kind of break it into three.
[16:30] the purpose of the kingdom. Why the kingdom? Why? Then the people of the kingdom, because several verses talk about the kind of people that belong to this kingdom.
[16:42] The people, and then the power. There's absolute power to this kingdom. It's dominion, right? It's kingship. It's reigning. How does God do that? Okay, so, it's purpose.
[16:55] First of all, let me summarize it this way. The purpose of the kingdom of God is to rescue captives from Satan's domain and transfer them into the kingdom of his son by means of the gospel.
[17:08] He has a mouthful in it. That's why you want to get the notes. Cheap notes that are over there. I'm stealing that basically from Colossians 1.
[17:20] The purpose of the kingdom is to rescue captives of Satan's domain, right? So he's coming into Satan's kingdom and taking captives out of Satan's kingdom and transferring them into the kingdom of Christ.
[17:35] And he does that by means of the gospel. That's my summary of its purpose. So let's do some walking through Luke. Got your Bibles? Yes.
[17:46] You ready to do this? Remember sword drills? Remember that? Anybody do sword drills? Not very many. Okay. Chapter 4.
[17:56] The end of chapter 4 of Luke. We're just going to look through Luke and then a little bit in Acts. Luke 4 43. So the end of chapter the end of chapter 4 of Luke.
[18:09] Jesus has gone through his temptation. He's just started his ministry. Right? He starts to preach. He summarizes his ministry this way in Luke 4 43.
[18:20] He said to them, I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God. There's the phrase. The good news of the kingdom of God.
[18:32] To other towns as well for I was sent for this purpose. I was sent for this purpose to preach the good news of the kingdom of God. What I want you to notice from that reference is that the good news or the gospel and the kingdom are connected.
[18:49] The kingdom in other words whatever the kingdom is it has something to do with the gospel. It has something to do with the preaching message of Jesus. Okay? It's a good news of the kingdom.
[19:01] That's for now. Okay? So then go on. Then over to chapter 9. Luke chapter 9 verse 2. Remember he he starts to send out the 12 the apostles.
[19:15] He's chosen 12 apostles. Now he's going to send them out to preach. Chapter 9 verse 2. Well verse 1. He called the 12 together gave them power and authority over all demons and to cure diseases.
[19:30] And he sent them out to proclaim what? To proclaim the kingdom of God. And to heal. So he sends them out to preach the same message. So Jesus preaches the message about the gospel of the kingdom.
[19:42] and his followers do as well. So go on. Chapter 16. What else do we have in Luke? Chapter 16. Verse 16.
[19:52] What about the kingdom? How else is it used? Here's an interesting statement. Luke 16. 16. The law of the prophets were until John. Since then the good news the gospel of the kingdom of God is preached.
[20:07] And everyone forces his way into it. That's very significant. Jesus is saying there's a change. Up until John the Baptist was law and prophet.
[20:20] Old Testament. Law and prophet. Up until John. John was the last of that Old Testament prophet age. Since then Jesus says up to John.
[20:33] Since then now it's gospel of the kingdom. So whatever gospel of the kingdom is it's a change. It's from old to new.
[20:44] It's something new. Okay. We glean that from that. There's a connection. Now on Acts. Can you go to Acts? Acts chapter 1. Just a few references here.
[20:57] Four references or so in Acts. This is interesting. So this is after Jesus has died and raised. Acts chapter 1. Jesus is now raised.
[21:07] He's about to ascend. He's been with them for 40 days. Watch what Luke says. Luke is the writer of the book of Acts. So Acts chapter 1 verse 3.
[21:18] What does he say? He says that Jesus presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs. Appearing to them during 40 days and speaking about what?
[21:30] The kingdom. Again. He's still talking about the kingdom. For 40 days. And after he raised from the dead. He's talking about the kingdom. It must be important. And if it was only something future why would he spend all this time talking about it?
[21:48] I don't want to beat up on that. Okay. He's still talking about it. Go over to chapter 8. Acts chapter 8. Philip.
[21:59] Philip gets saved. And Philip starts preaching. Acts chapter 8 verse 12. When they believed Philip as he preached the good news about the kingdom of God in the name of Jesus Christ they were baptized both men and women.
[22:14] How were people saved? They were saved because Philip preached the gospel the good news about the kingdom of God. So whatever the kingdom is it is something to do with the gospel and it is something about how people get saved.
[22:30] And notice it's connected there's a connection between the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ. Well yeah there's a connection because he's the king of the kingdom. Okay.
[22:42] So quickly move on Acts chapter 19. Who else talks about the kingdom of God? Paul. Paul. Acts chapter 19 verse 8.
[22:55] Is that what I got? Yeah. So Paul enters the synagogue and for three months spoke boldly reasoning and persuading them about the kingdom of God.
[23:06] For three months. Three months Paul's subject in the synagogue was the kingdom of God. Why? If the kingdom doesn't even relate to today if the kingdom is all about God's consummation at the end why would he spend so much time on it?
[23:22] Because it was about today. It's how people got it. The kingdom is about the gospel itself. The kingdom is the gospel itself.
[23:34] And then again at the end of Acts chapter 28 again Paul just spending all this time talking about the kingdom of God. Acts 28 verse 23. When they had appointed a day for him talking about Paul they came to him at his lodging in greater numbers.
[23:51] From morning until evening he, Paul expounded to them testifying to the kingdom of God and trying to convince them about Jesus both from the law of Moses and from the prophets.
[24:05] Again that's the subject. The kingdom is huge. Can you see that? It is what they preach. It is good news of the kingdom of God.
[24:17] It is the central to their message. It's what they keep preaching. It's what Jesus has his followers preach. It's what Stephen preaches. it's what Paul spends days on.
[24:28] Months. Expounding. Why? Why would that be so? Because in the first century the Jews had a certain expectation of kingdom.
[24:40] Did they not? They expected now. Even his disciples. Now? Are you setting it up? Now? Guys.
[24:51] It's not the time. For the kind of kingdom that you expect. But for the kind of kingdom I'm bringing, wait 10 more days.
[25:03] Right? You've been with them 40 days. Pentecost 50 days, right? So 10 more days. Wait 10 more days. And it's coming. It's coming with real power. And it's going to change everything.
[25:16] And suddenly all that stuff you don't get, you're going to get. Well, mostly. Essentially, that's why Jesus could be so patient with them, right?
[25:29] They didn't get it. The three and a half to four years Jesus was with them. Do you get it yet, guys? Oh, yeah, yeah, we got it. You connected the dots. No.
[25:41] Why could he be so patient? Why didn't he get frustrated? Because he knew the spirit was coming. Okay? He knew the spirit was coming. So, what is this prayer?
[25:55] So, just kind of looking at those references we got, what is this prayer about? What is the kingdom about? The kingdom is about the preaching of the gospel. So, then, that means on one level, this prayer, thy kingdom come, is a prayer for the preaching of the gospel.
[26:12] For the good news of God's reign. God's name. I ask the question, why is the kingdom so central to the gospel? Why is it about the good news of the kingdom? Why is kingdom and gospel so connected?
[26:27] How is it that this kingdom comes? Well, listen to how Paul describes it in Colossians 1. And this is a prayer. This is the end of a prayer Paul is praying for these Colossians.
[26:40] the end of the prayer is giving thanks. He says, giving thanks to the Father who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in life.
[26:53] Remember that? Remember we looked at that and we talked about who father is? Who's the father? One of the things the father does is he qualifies us to share in the inheritance of the saints, which means that we must be saints if we're qualified to share in the inheritance.
[27:08] So that's future. how did he do that? How come we are qualified? How does the father suddenly make us qualified who are not qualified? He explains that.
[27:21] For he delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom. Transferred us to the kingdom.
[27:33] That's not future. That's something he's already done. he transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved son in whom we have redemption and forgiveness of sins.
[27:46] So what we see here about the kingdom is it something that's already and not yet. It's already in the sense that we've already been transferred into it. We already are in it.
[27:58] But there's a not yet part of it that there's an inheritance still coming. We haven't got that. We have bits of it. We got a little piece of it. We got the Holy Spirit. But we don't have that whole you know when we all get to heaven part.
[28:13] We don't have that yet. So it's an already and not yet. So see how the kingdom works? Here he brings it and we get parts of it but we don't have the whole thing yet. But it has come.
[28:26] And so we can pray. We can pray for the kingdom. Praying for the kingdom means praying about the gospel. And it means praying that God would rescue captives from Satan to transfer them into his own kingdom.
[28:40] So this is an evangelistic prayer. When you pray this I have a target I call it a hit list target list right? I got names on this list of people who aren't saved that I'm praying this prayer for.
[28:56] I'm praying that God will open their eyes that he will take them out of Satan's hold and bring them into his kingdom that he would change them right?
[29:06] I'm praying this for them. So what we're learning is the kingdom is not what was expected. It's a kingdom of God, a kingdom of heaven, not a kingdom of earth.
[29:21] It's an eternal kingdom. It's bigger, it's vast, it's ongoing, it continues to grow. So that's the purpose of the kingdom. And the purpose is to rescue captives and bring them into the kingdom of his son.
[29:36] So who are the people? The people, the kingdom comes to people who are broken, dependent, and powerless.
[29:50] The kingdom belongs to those kind of people, to the poor, to the broken, to the dependent, to the powerless. So, another quick reference, just four more, and then we're on our way.
[30:11] So over to Luke chapter 6 verse 20. Jesus preached his sermon, remember he preaches the beatitudes. What's the first beatitude? We call it beatitude, but it's really about blessed are.
[30:23] Blessed are the poor. Why? Why are they blessed? For to them belongs the kingdom. not will belong, belongs to.
[30:35] They're already in it. The people who belong in the kingdom are people who are poor, and the word for poor means not just getting by and just need a little help, God helps those who help themselves kind of thing, kind of, you know, no.
[30:49] God doesn't help those who help themselves, God helps those who can't help themselves. God helps the broken, God helps those who are absolutely powerless, those who recognize in themselves that they can't fix themselves.
[31:04] People who recognize I can fix myself for a little while, but I can't fix it. I really can't. I really can't. So the kingdom belongs to those who surrender to God, who are absolutely dependent on him.
[31:20] chapter 12, Luke chapter 12, verse 31, another reference to the kingdom. Lots of references to the kingdom. So he's talking about people anxious about the things, about food and clothing and those kind of things.
[31:36] He says in Luke 12, 31, instead, seek first his kingdom and all these things will be added to you. Right? It's like the reference in Matthew, don't be anxious, but seek ye first the kingdom of God.
[31:50] All those things, all those needs will be added to you. So the people of the kingdom are people who trust God to provide for them. They're not being anxious.
[32:02] They learn to overcome anxiety by trusting in God. That's not easy, by the way, because it's the first natural inclination that we have is to get anxious. So how do you do that?
[32:15] Well, you need help. Again, chapter 18, Luke 18, 16 and 17, he talks about children. Jesus called the children to him and saying, let the children come to me and do not hinder them for to such belongs the kingdom of God.
[32:32] The kingdom of God belongs to people who are like little children. Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.
[32:44] In fact, you can't even get into the kingdom unless you're like a little child. Well, what does that mean? What's a little child? What's a little child?
[32:56] We got a little child. What's a little child? I won't embarrass you. I won't embarrass you. Don't worry. I just did. I'm sorry. What is that?
[33:06] How do we come like a little child? What's a little child? Innocent. Innocent? Did you say innocent? Have you had a little child? No. No.
[33:18] More innocent than you? Absolutely. More innocent than me? Absolutely. But innocent absolutely? No. Needy. I mean, a one and a half, two year old will tell you, will show you.
[33:31] They start perfecting the sin nature. So what's a child? What's a little child? What does he mean by a little child? How do you enter like a little child? So if I have to be innocent to enter, I haven't got a chance.
[33:43] Needy. Dependent. Absolutely dependent. They can't do it. They may try. And they can do some things. Absolutely. Little children can do a lot of things. But at the end of the day, they're dependent.
[33:57] They need mom and dad. Usually mom more than dad. Is that? I don't know. No? They got dad with them today, so that's good. And in our home, it was usually mom.
[34:12] She was they figured out early on she's smarter and could fix things. Dad's kind of like, huh? So then one more reference in Luke, back to chapter 8, what kind of people are in this kingdom.
[34:32] He tells the parable of the sower in Luke chapter 8. The parable of the sower. Remember, the sower went out to sow. He sows this even different kinds of ground. Different things happen. So, verse 9, after he tells the parable, his disciples come to him and ask him, what does it mean?
[34:48] They don't get it. And Jesus said to them, to you it has been given, to you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, the mysteries of the kingdom are given to you.
[35:04] But for others, so there's two classes of people here that hear Jesus. There are those that are given and then there are those who don't get it. For others, they are in parables, so that seeing they may not see and hearing they may not understand.
[35:21] Remember, the purpose that Jesus started teaching in parables was not to reveal truth more easily, it was to hide truth. This is what he just said. So that all they get, the people that don't really perceive, that don't get revelation from God, all they get is the parable.
[35:38] So the parable of the sower, all they get is an agricultural lesson. That's all they get. But when Jesus explains what the parable of the sower is, what does he tell them?
[35:50] What's the secrets that he reveals? Well, the sower is the son of man, the seed is the word of God. There's different kinds of hearts upon which this seed lands, and there's different obstacles to different people, and there's only one, there's only one that falls on good soil that actually grows and bears fruit.
[36:13] That's a huge lesson. So only some are given that understanding. So who are the ones in the kingdom of God? Well, they're broken people, they seek first God's kingdom, they enter like children, and to them are given the revelation of the secrets, the deeper mysteries.
[36:34] Why, by the way, in that context, why did the disciples get that? Why doesn't anybody else get that? Why did the disciples get it? They had some insight, absolutely, they had some insight to do something.
[36:50] What did they do? They asked. They asked. Most people don't ask. Oh, that was a nice sermon. I don't know.
[37:00] They came up to Jesus and said, I don't get it. Explain it. Oh. All through Jesus' ministry, there are those who were outsiders and those who were insiders.
[37:12] The insiders kept asking. They admitted when they don't get it. And the ones who ask, receive. Okay?
[37:27] So, what are we praying for? In terms of the people of the kingdom, we're praying for people who are broken. We're praying for people who surrender, who have humility, who recognize they can't fix themselves.
[37:40] Right? Revelation 1.6 says that God has made us a kingdom priest to his God and Father. A kingdom of priests. Does that sound familiar?
[37:51] Did we reach that somewhere? Way back in Exodus? Wait a minute. Kingdom of priests there. Wait, Revelation, kingdom of priests. Wait a minute. Have we come full circle?
[38:03] They were going to be a kingdom of priests if they could just keep the covenant, but they couldn't. We are made a kingdom of priests. Why? Because we've been because he did it for us.
[38:15] And we believed upon him and he applied that to us. We become a kingdom of priests. What is a kingdom of priests? Isn't that weird? Priests. Not kingdom of warriors, kingdom of priests.
[38:26] Priests serve God, right? What do priests do? They serve God. But who else do they serve? On behalf of people.
[38:39] So if Israel was going to be a kingdom of priests, which means not just one tribe of priests, all of them that kept the covenant were going to be a kingdom of priests, who were they going to serve besides God?
[38:50] Who else were they going to serve? the nations. The nations. Because if Israel's obeying, they're the priests. So they're going to serve the nations.
[39:02] And now God has made us a kingdom of priests. Who do we serve? We serve God and we bring people to God, right?
[39:14] One another. One another, absolutely. But it's also who we are, a light in the world. We're representatives of God to people.
[39:28] Finally, John 3 talks about the kind of people going to the kingdom. John 3. Remember Nicodemus comes to Jesus, wants to question him and talks about this whole new birth thing.
[39:40] So John 3, Jesus answered Nicodemus, said, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. He can't see the kingdom of God. He can't understand, he can't comprehend it.
[39:53] And then a couple of verses later, after Nicodemus says, well, you've got to go back into your mothers, that doesn't make any sense. John 3, 5, Jesus says again, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.
[40:12] So without the rebirth of the spirit, unless you're born of the spirit, you cannot see, understand, grasp the kingdom, or enter into the kingdom.
[40:24] But being born again, fork of the spirit. So finally, one last area of the kingdom. I don't know how I'm doing for time. We're all right?
[40:36] We've got another hour? Just teasing. I hope I'm teasing. One more area, power. So the purpose of the kingdom, to rescue captives, right, and bring them into Christ's kingdom.
[40:51] The people of the kingdom are the broken, the dependent, the powerless, people who are only helped by the spirit of God. And then the power of the kingdom. So here, I think what we pray in terms of praying, thy kingdom come, we pray for his power.
[41:07] We pray for the reign of Christ by the working of the Holy Spirit in and through us. We pray for the reign of Christ, the kingdom of Christ to come to us by means of the working of the Holy Spirit in and through our lives.
[41:27] Okay, so here's how Paul summarizes the kingdom. This is my favorite description of the kingdom of God, Romans 14, 17. The kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of the righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.
[41:48] Wow. It's not just this physical thing. It's not this physical experience. It's a spiritual experience of power. It's the righteousness in the Holy Spirit.
[41:59] It's the peace in the Holy Spirit. It's the joy in the Holy Spirit. So if I pray, thy kingdom come, I come and if I need, say I need peace, say I'm anxious, I don't have peace.
[42:11] Think I could pray thy kingdom come? Thy kingdom come by means of your Holy Spirit to give me peace. Thy kingdom come by means of the Holy Spirit to give me joy.
[42:23] And by all means, thy kingdom come by means of the Holy Spirit so that I might do works of righteousness. Because the kingdom is not about something we do or we produce.
[42:35] if you hear preaching that says you got to do, you got to measure up, you've got to produce, you must produce, you must produce the fruit.
[42:49] Remember we talked about producing fruit and bearing fruit? Who bears fruit? How do we bear the fruit of the Holy Spirit? I mean, we bear the fruit, right?
[43:02] Who produces the fruit? The Spirit. Vine and the branch. You're just the branch. You don't produce any fruit. Apart from me you can do nothing, right?
[43:13] So in the kingdom of God we talk about the power of the Holy Spirit we're talking about the Spirit working through you. Not me muscling up and manning it out.
[43:26] That's me. Apart from me you do nothing. Well you might be doing something but of no value in the kingdom. second.
[43:38] Hebrews 12 28. How do we respond when we experience this kingdom that has come to us? The writer of Hebrews says therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom.
[43:48] Let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom. In other words we've already received it. It's not future. Some aspect of the kingdom we've already received. Let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom.
[44:00] What kind of a kingdom? A kingdom that cannot be shaken. What do you think it would be like in this day and time in the political culture that we're in to have an unshakable kingdom?
[44:20] Right? Who are you voting for? Who are you voting for? Who are you trusting in?
[44:31] Oh, that's a different question. I'm going to vote for who I pray about and who I struggle about and who I look and get informed about.
[44:48] But who I trust in? I like to say, oh, Jeremy gave, when we left church camp, Jeremy gave me a hat. You know what the hat said?
[45:00] My king is on his throne. Where did you get that? Do they make that? Because I've been saying that for a long time. Maybe somebody else said that.
[45:12] When it comes to this tribulation in the world, I like to say out in public, my king is on his throne. Because people will look at you and go, what?
[45:23] Unless they're a Christian, then they'll go, you're a Christian, aren't you? Only a Christian is going to understand my king is on his throne. By the way, getting to, our next verse is 1 Corinthians 15, 24, 25.
[45:41] Again, he's going to talk about kingdom in terms of already and not yet. It's now and future. So Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, then comes the end. When he, Jesus Christ, delivers the kingdom to God the Father, after destroying every rule and every authority and power, for he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.
[46:06] See it? Right now, what is he doing? He is reigning. Right now, he is putting every enemy in his time under his feet.
[46:19] That's why I like to say my king is on his throne. He's in control. He's doing what he needs to do, what he wants to do. What the Father calls him to do in the right time.
[46:32] And when he's done putting all his enemies under his feet, he delivers the king. Then it's done. Then it's done. So what do we pray?
[46:46] We pray for Christ's rule in the world. We pray that Christ would change hearts. We pray Christ will remove enemies. We pray that Christ will disarm Satan. What does it mean that he's reigning right now?
[46:57] What do we ask him to do? This becomes a really big prayer, doesn't it? If it's about him reigning in heaven, what enemies would we like Christ to take out? Do you think we could pray that?
[47:10] Yeah. He's reigning. Now, he may say, oh, I'm getting to it. But we certainly pray that. That can be a really big prayer. One last verse.
[47:21] Verses. Revelation 12. Got to go to Revelation. No, we're going to talk about kingdom. You got to go to Revelation, right? Revelation 12. By the way, the book of Revelation chapter 12 starts when in history?
[47:33] Anybody remember? Remember we did a study of Revelation. It starts out in chapter 12 talking about the birth of a child who is from the tribe of Israel.
[47:46] And this child is a king. So, Revelation chapter 12 starts at first century Israel. Okay?
[47:57] It's not far future. Revelation is going back. It talks about in that, in Revelation chapter 12, that the child is born. The dragon member is trying to swallow up this child to kill this child.
[48:10] The child escapes. And then the child ascends to God. Okay? When does Jesus do that? Acts chapter 1. He does it in...
[48:21] What? No, not a kind of... No, he does it in Acts chapter 1. He's with them 40 days, and then he ascends.
[48:34] 40 days after... No, never mind. I got real curious about what day of the week it was, because, you know, he raised on the Sunday, 40 days, I think was then that he ascended, would have been like what we call a Thursday.
[48:48] Why does that matter, Bill? I don't know. I don't know why I brought that up. It doesn't matter. So, he ascends. Back to Revelation chapter 12, he ascends. Soon as he ascends, Revelation 12 says there's war in heaven.
[49:01] Right? The angels with Michael and the angels with the dragon, and the dragon's defeated, and they're cast down, right? So, here we come to Revelation 12 verse 9.
[49:11] The great dragon was thrown down. The ancient serpent who was called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world. He was thrown down to the earth. When?
[49:23] In the context of Revelation 12, when was he thrown down? After the sun ascended to heaven. As soon as Christ ascended and took his throne, guess what?
[49:35] Satan's out. No more before God in heaven. No more accusing the saints. He had access till then. Now he does it. Now he's thrown down to earth. That's the way I understand it.
[49:47] I think that makes the best sense of Revelation 12. So, the dragon's thrown down. Why do I say that? He's thrown down to the earth, and his angels are thrown down with him.
[49:58] And then I heard a loud voice in heaven saying, now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come.
[50:09] When did the kingdom come? According to my interpretation. Soon as Christ ascended. And that was already there when Christ was there because wherever the king is, that's where the kingdom is.
[50:22] So when Christ is there, he's casting out demons. Kingdom's coming, kingdom's coming, kingdom's coming. The power of the kingdom's there. But as soon as he ascends to heaven, ten days later, he sends the Holy Spirit.
[50:32] And what happens? Power explodes. Power explodes. And you walk through the book of Acts, you still see, you see lots of power happening.
[50:51] You see demons cast out again just like Christ did. You see Satan overcome in different ways. miracles. And then as you travel through Acts, it doesn't highlight so much the miracles as the transformations that happen in lives that happen over time.
[51:10] So it kind of normalizes the end of Acts. Not that there aren't still miracles and absolutely they're still casting out of demons. There's a casting out of demons every time someone is saved.
[51:27] My point is simply that the kingdom's already here. And so to pray that kingdom come does not mean I'm looking for something far off. That one's still coming.
[51:39] But it does mean there's something I'm praying for right now that's supernaturally significant. It is a purpose. It's a prayer that I can pray for people who are lost.
[51:51] For my target list, for people that don't know Christ, I'm praying that they are born again. I'm praying that God would open their eyes. I'm praying that they would be people who are broken and surrendered and recognized.
[52:04] I pray on my hit list, I pray for people that they would recognize, that God would cause them to recognize they'd come to the end of themselves. That they would see emptiness apart from Him.
[52:16] Because until people come to that, they're not going to bow their knee. Because they're going to fight, just like I did. They're going to fight and push away the Lord, even though they know He's absolutely true.
[52:31] So, praying thy kingdom come. Here's a quick summary. Praying thy kingdom come is to pray for the preaching of the gospel, for the deliverance of captives from darkness, for God to draw them to Himself.
[52:44] For God to open the door for the Word. Remember the parable of the sower. For God to open the door for the Word, to sow His seed in the hearts. And then to reveal, right? To some He reveals.
[52:54] To open their eyes and reveal. On another level, praying thy kingdom come is to pray for people in a certain way. Pray that their hearts would be receptive, that they would be those broken people, that they would recognize they're broken and can't fix themselves.
[53:11] That they would surrender and become truly repentant. Not just regretful, but repentant. And then my favorite level of this is that thy kingdom come is to pray for the power and work of the Holy Spirit.
[53:34] That not only that I would experience righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit, but for others to experience righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. Do you know anybody among us?
[53:44] Anyone and others here that aren't experiencing the peace and the joy of the righteousness? Some of you are looking at me going, only Him. Yes, please.
[53:59] This is where I add a bunch of prayers. When I pray through the Lord's Prayer, this is the biggest category for me, thy kingdom come. It's the biggest category for me because it's huge.
[54:11] It's praying for losses, praying for people who are struggling. It's praying for me. It's praying for you. I also pray about revival.
[54:22] There's a lot of people struggling with depression, discouragement, despair. I've got a hit list on that one too, by the way. So I'm praying for God's revival in their lives.
[54:36] Like we sang just before, creating me a clean heart, renew in me a right spirit. Because my spirit's not right. Renew in me a right spirit.
[54:47] Sustain me with the willing spirit. Because why? Because my spirit's not willing. So Paul talks about that as doing... Do the willing and the working within me for your good pleasure.
[55:04] Philippians 2, 13, I believe. There's times... Not times. Times I feel more acutely that I need God to do the doing.
[55:15] Because I can't do the doing. My spirit's not right. Right? My soul... My soul is all kinds of in turmoil. My heart's off. So renew a right spirit within me.
[55:28] Create in me a clean heart. Restore to me the joy of thy salvation. I love that we sang that today. I think that's an application prayer of thy kingdom come.
[55:45] And then there's that huge part of this prayer that recognizes that yeah, we have kingdom here already. but there's an aspect of kingdom that's not yet. There's a huge aspect of kingdom that's yet to come.
[55:59] We live in a world that is absent of a real king. A good king. And so praying for that king to come and make everything right.
[56:10] Right? There's that aspect as well. Alright, I'm out of notes. How we doing? Oh my gosh. Alright.
[56:21] Thank you. My king, I hope that this grabs you. I don't expect it. If this is new to you, I don't expect you to kind of take all of it in.
[56:32] Just take a little bit of it. Grab a piece that you can handle that makes sense. And when you pray, make that part of your thing. And then if that starts to lose its freshness, go back to your notes and find another aspect that you can apply to this because it's huge.
[56:51] But man, man, is it a way to pray? I mean, there's so much confidence in praying this. Because it's Jesus saying this.
[57:05] These are the branches I want you to pray about. It's the name of God and the kingdom of God. Next week we'll get to the will of God. I know it's not in Luke 11, so we'll jump over.
[57:20] Okay. Father, help us today to follow your ways. Help us to grasp. I pray, Father, that some nuggets will stay. I know there was a lot today.
[57:35] But cause your people, Lord, to cause your truth to impress on your people in the manner you want it to do. In Christ's name we pray.
[57:45] Amen.