Continuing through the Lord’s prayer we come to the following petition:

your kingdom come,

your will be done

on earth as it is in heaven.

Even though He knows what is best for us He gave us free will to do what we choose. Many times this gets us into trouble but without free will we would just be robots who mindlessly do what we are programmed to do. “your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” means to me that we are to always seek God’s will in everything we do. If we do this then His kingdom will indeed come to earth, at least in some degree. I know there are a lot of people who interpret these verses quite differently than I do. Some say this is just a statement that God’s will is done on earth AND in heaven. But to me that diminishes our responsibility for the bad things that happen on earth. I believe that the evil and self centeredness that are prominent on this earth are a result of us choosing things of the devil rather than God’s will being forced on us.

Someone also suggested that I add “in us” to the words so that they are “your kingdom come in us”. That is better than “to us” but I don’t think Jesus needs my help in rephrasing this prayer so I will leave it as is. So, let’s all constantly be seeking God’s will instead of our sinful desires and then a little more of God’s kingdom will reign on the earth. How do we seek God’s will? By spending time each day listening to the messages He engraved on our heart and studying the red letters of course.

The call to action: Through the power of the Holy Spirit we must always be seeking and doing God’s will on this earth. As Jesus taught us that primarily includes loving each other, including even our enemies, and caring for the least among us.