The Jerusalem of this earth ended up being a car-crash, because it was ruled by men like Herod who worked in direct-opposition to the true Kingdom, and so a better Jerusalem has been necessary. And what we read in the book of Revelation is that that better Jerusalem does exist; it is in heaven; and one day it is coming down; and that is what we are working towards; that is what we praying, when we pray ‘your Kingdom come’.
And so, in a sense, what we’re doing is we’re going back to one of the exercises that we did at the beginning of our series on the Lord’s Prayer, which was what we think about when we say those words “in heaven”…
We are to think about heaven; we are to think about the third heaven; and we are to go to wonderful passages like Revelation chapter 21 to help us do that, where we have descriptions of what this Kingdom of heaven is like…
And it really is wonderful; it really is beautiful.
[Read Revelation chapter 21].
Isn’t that amazing? Isn’t that wonderful? Does that not give you hope? Does that not give you perspective? That this first heaven and this first earth that we’re on right now—all that we see right now—it’s all going to pass away; all the Kingdoms of this world in all their splendour will come to nothing, and the holy city—the new Jerusalem—will come down out of heaven and we will hear a loud voice from the throne announcing the very, very good news which is that God will be with us! He will dwell with us, just like we had predicted for us in the Tabernacle (which was in itself another Jerusalem that came down from heaven, a multimedia-presentation of this ultimate reality), that we will be his people and he will be our God, he himself will be with us.
It will inaugurate a time when all this pain and persecution and all these tears—that we’ve already talked about as markers of the Kingdom—the tears will be wiped from our eyes, and death will be gone, mourning will be gone, all of the old Kingdoms will be gone, and this is good news, because Jesus is making everything new…
This is who he is, he is the Alpha and the Omega—he’s the beginning and the end—he’s the one who gives drink for free to those who are thirsty.
And—remember—this is a Kingdom made-up of people who lack. People have nothing.
And yet, there are others who seek their own way, who choose the way of cowardice, and unbelief, vileness, and murder, who choose sexual-power, or seek to unleash power in any way they can, through the occult or idolatry. These are people who reject the true Kingdom. These are people who do not like the way of the true King. Be in no doubt…
They will be destroyed.
And yet, for those who choose to worship the Lamb—the crucified Christ—to those who become part of this wedding, to those who make up the bride of Christ—the bride of the lamb—will get to go into this city that’a coming down from heaven; the city that shines with the glory of God; the city that is led by those simple men that Jesus chose… those humble fisherman and tax-collectors; and those messed-up boys who were born to Jacob.
We will have the Lord God Almighty—the Father—with us and his Son, the Lamb…
They will be our temple, and we won’t even need the sun in the sky, because Jesus will be our light.
And here’s what we read about the Kings of this earth who will join us—because some of the kings of this earth do worship the true King—but they will no longer seek to be their own light, but will walk by his light, and they’ll bring their splendour in to the Kingdom.
And there’ll be no need to shut the gates of this city because there will be no fear of attack (which is a characteristic of the true Kingdom on this earth); because nothing impure will ever come into this Kingdom; because we’ve all been baptised and washed—just as our King showed us the way. All so, that we would have our names written in the Lamb’s book of life—the roll-call of this Kingdom.
I hope that we will remember that this prayer ‘Your Kingdom Come’ will be answered; that Jesus is coming soon.
And as we wait, we pray these words of Revelation chapter 22… ‘come Lord Jesus’ or as it’s put in the Lord’s Prayer, ‘Let your Kingdom come’.
Yes, come Lord Jesus!
His reply is, “Yes, I am coming soon.”
Amen! Come Lord Jesus!
The grace of the Lord Jesus be with God’s people!
