601. MAT 6:10. PRAYER FOR THE COMING OF GOD’S KINGDOM.
Mat_6:10. Prayer For The Coming Of God’s Kingdom.
By Rev. J. E. Beaumont, M. A.
"Thy kingdom come."’97Mat_6:10.
Man is a selfish being since his fall. So much does selfishness cleave to human nature, that many philosophers have affirmed, that every human action is the product of self-love. This principle is so inwoven with our nature, so intwined with the very essence of our being, that it can only be subverted by a principle mightier than itself; and no principle mightier than itself has ever been found, except the principle that the gospel makes known’97the principle of love: love to God. love to Christ. The gospel is the antidote to selfishness: its doctrines are all against selfishness; its facts are all opposed to selfishness; its precepts are all antagonists to selfishness; its very prayers are opposed to selfishness.
What a difference there is between the man that prays and the man that never prays; between the infidel and the believer! The infidel would environ and smother and crush what we call, what we believe, what we feel, to be the truth. Yes, he accuses us by our folly, our fanaticism, and our enthusiasm, of turning the world upside down. He scoffs, raves, and ridicules our grand, benevolent, majestic, heaven-planned enterprise. But how is it with the Christian’97with the believer’97with him to whom the kingdom of God has come with power? He longs for the diffusion of it; he prays that this kingdom may stretch far and wide. Observe,
I. The kingdom itself here referred to.
The phrase "kingdom of God" is, like some other New Testament phrases, employed with some variety of signification’97all the varieties, however, having a common relation. Sometimes the expression, "kingdom of God," implies the subjects of Christ’s sceptre’97the aggregate, the multitude of the "called, and faithful, and chosen;"’97that part of them that are on earth: then it is called the kingdom of Christ in the world. At other times, that part which has arrived already in heaven: and then it is called the kingdom of glory. In the passage before us, we are to understand that dominion, that holy dominion, which God is setting up in the human heart, in the human world, in and by the Messias: a kingdom of which all time, since its early dawn, hath been the duration, of which mankind are the subjects, cf which salvation is the object, of which the glory of the Triune God is the end.
1. This kingdom is not a worldly kingdom. And yet the Jews, among whom the Saviour dwelt when he was manifest in the flesh, expected such a kingdom at the hands of the Messias: and the apostles themselves were not free from this misleading, master delusion.
2. This kingdom is constituted in. the very person of the King himself. Christ, like others, has waded to his empire through blood; but he has waded to his empire through no blood but the blood of his own heart. He fell himself to exalt us.
3. This kingdom is a peaceable kingdom. It is a beneficent institution. Its attributes are righteousness, peace, benevolence, integrity, purity, justice, charity.
4. This kingdom admits of unlimited extension, of indefinite diffusion. This kingdom shall spread and grow: it shall go out in this direction, and go forth in that; it shall traverse that region, and pass over the other; it shall go "from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth,’97men shall be blessed in him: all nations shall call him blessed," Psa_72:8, Psa_72:17. The prophet Isaiah says, "The earth shall be full." Full! What is the meaning of full? "The earth shall be full." What! full? Yes, full; that is the word:’97"The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea," Isa_11:9.
5. This kingdom of Christ will be of long duration. Not like earthly kingdoms, which rise up, run forward, gain the zenith, and then decline, and their names pass away, and their memory is blotted out; not like these shall be the kingdom of Christ. This kingdom "lasts; like the sun, it shall stand."
6. The brightness of this kingdom is perpetually increasing. Oh! I rejoice to think’97I think it, I believe it’97that there is not an hour in any day, in which some straggling rebel is not coming in to Christ, kissing his sceptre, and devoting himself to his service. The number of Christ’s subjects is continually increasing; there is already a multitude before the throne that never can be withdrawn; and the successes that are going on upon earth are swelling that continually accumulating amount of the first-born that is in heaven. Let us point out,
II. Some grounds on which the pious may look and pray for the diffusion of this kingdom. Some of the grounds on which they may expect its universal diffusion.
I. We are warranted in such an expectation, I may say, from all analogy. Why does the moon spread her horns? Why, it is to fill them. Why does the sun rise above the horizon? It is that he may go on his march upward and onward till he gains his meridian altitude, and pours his vertical glory on the world below. Why is the corn deposited in the soil? It is that it may unwrap, that it may unfold itself’97that, of that single seed, there may come a tree, the branches of which are for a lodgment of the birds, and a shadow for the beasts of the earth. Why does the rill steal silently from under the sod, wend its way among the grass and the pebbles, following its course onward and onward, enlarging its channel, rendering the fissure wider and wider for itself,’97till, at last, that little rill becomes a mighty river, bearing on its bosom the riches of a nation, and feeding with its irrigations a nation’s agriculture?
When shall the kingdom of Christ have no boundaries? Shall it always be in a state of minority? Shall Satan usurp all? Why, it is impossible that it should remain so. Christ must reign. Take it in the vigorous language of the apostle, in that passage in his first epistle to the Corinthians, where he says, 1Co_15:25, "He must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet."
2. Again, We are led to the same conclusion from the symbolical events of Jewish history. Look, for a moment, at Egypt, and see the contest that went on between Moses and Aaron, and the magicians of Egypt. Moses was triumphant. So, in the contest between light and darkness, between truth and falsehood, between revelation and idolatry’97light, truth, and revelation, shall win the day. So with respect to Dagon and the ark of the Lord. The idol being brought in juxtaposition with the ark of God, the ark retained its place, but the idol fell down prostrate, and was broken in pieces, 1 Sam. v.; and so, surely, every other idol shall be prostrated before our Immanuel. Passing from individual cases, take the general case’97I mean, the contest about the land of Canaan; and as sure as the children of Israel took possession of that land according to the promise of God to their fathers, so surely the last stronghold of idolatry shall yield to the sceptre of Christ, and the whole earth shall be filled with his glory.
3. I might say, that moral proportion requires that the kingdom of God should become thus glorious. Christ must "see of the travail of his soul:" and oh! how millennially must his kingdom come, before his philanthropic, heart shall say, "Enough! enough! that is all I look for: stop! stop! I shed my blood for no more!" We know that Jesus Christ, by the grace of God, tasted death for every man, Heb_2:9; and, having poured out his soul as an offering for the whole race, vast indeed must be his triumphs before he can say, "Enough! that is all: that completes the whole!"
4. When we think of the energy which is employed in the diffusion of this kingdom, our hopes rise, and our expectations rise.
III. Point out some of the encouraging intimations which we have of the coming of this kingdom of Christ.
1. Look at the facilities which there are for it. There never were such facilities since the apostles’ time. We have colonies, great flourishing colonies, all over the globe, which are so many focal points whence the light is to radiate in every direction beyond them. We have swift-winged messengers to carry our missionaries and our Bibles to more distant lands; and, of all the ships that have left our shores, none surely have ever left them with more interest than those which have gone forth, manned with missionaries, and freighted with Bibles: shiploads of instrumentality with which to put back the frontier of idolatry.
2. Besides the facilities for effort, there is, I think, rather more union of effort than there has been for ages.
3. Then, again, the success of effort is also a most encouraging circumstance.
Application
1. I cannot suppose that all, in this immense assembly, are yet the real, voluntary subjects and followers of the Lord Jesus Christ:’97to that part of the congregation, therefore, I address myself. You, my fellow-sinners, are not far from the kingdom of Christ: yes, you are not far from it: you have heard the gospel. Oh! that this night the kingdom of God may come to you.
2. You who are the subjects of the kingdom of Christ, bear with me while I address one word to you. You have grace’97seek for more grace: the reality and the experience of grace are one thing’97the abundance of its communications is another. Oh, that great grace may rest on you all! Amen.
Autor: JABEZ BURNS