Q. 61. What do we pray for in the second petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “your kingdom come”?

• WSC 102
• Heidelberg Catechism 123

Satan’s kingdom. “The god of this world,” Satan, “has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Corinthians 4:4). We pray that God, by his almighty power, would drive back the darkness and hasten Satan’s final defeat (Revelation 20:10).

Kingdom of grace. The kingdom of God is God’s saving reign. In its present form, this kingdom is characterized by God graciously bringing sinners under the Lordship of Jesus Christ by drawing them to faith and repentance through the Holy Spirit: “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son” (Colossians 1:13).

Brought into it, and kept. “If we ask that the kingdom of God may come to us, the meaning of our request is this: I would be a stranger to corruption and liberated from death; would that I were freed from the shackles of sin and that death no longer lorded it over me. Let us no more be tyrannized by evil so that the adversary may not prevail against me and make me his captive through sin. But may your kingdom come to me, so that the passions which still rule me so mercilessly may depart from me, or rather may be altogether annihilated” (Gregory of Nyssa, The Lord’s Prayer 3). It is as if we pray, “Rule us by your Word and Spirit in such a way that more and more we submit to you. Preserve your church and make it grow. Destroy the devil’s work; destroy every force which revolts against you and every conspiracy against your holy Word. Do this until your kingdom fully comes, when you will be all in all” (Heidelberg Catechism 123).

Kingdom of glory. The kingdom in its present form will someday give way to God’s everlasting kingdom on earth (see Q. 35). It is as if we pray, “May your kingdom of grace come quickly, and swallow up all the kingdoms of the earth: may all mankind, receiving you, O Christ, for their king, truly believing in your name, be filled with righteousness, and peace, and joy; with holiness and happiness, till they are removed hence into your kingdom of glory, to reign with you for ever and ever” (Wesley, Notes on the Bible, Matthew 6:10).