Your kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom, one that has already been inaugurated by Your entrance into the world and Your ascension into heaven after suffering death, throwing the old order into disarray as Your Kingdom is shown to be that which will reign forever and ever, unlike all kingdoms before it and those that exist today. As believers whose eyes are set on His eternal reign, we see You not as a theoretical king or merely a future King but a present King, whose eternal political agenda confronts and upends all of our agendas at different levels. You humble all rulers, you humble all peoples and in the end You will appear in blazing glory to consummate Your reign with Your people, bring judgment, and establish the final order in the new heavens and new earth, where you are the great, forever and final political authority in the heavens and the earth. At present He rules in heaven, in the end He will rule visibly. Lord may we not lose sight of that.
Tag: BCP
It was during the course of reading the Daily Office readings for today that I read Psalm 77. Asaph has a struggle of confidence in the Lord within his heart causing him to waver, displayed here (man, have I been here before):
Psalm 77:4–9
You hold my eyelids open;
I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
I consider the days of old,
the years long ago.
I said, “Let me remember my song in the night;
let me meditate in my heart.”
Then my spirit made a diligent search:
“Will the Lord spurn forever,
and never again be favorable?
Has his steadfast love forever ceased?
Are his promises at an end for all time?
Has God forgotten to be gracious?
Has he in anger shut up his compassion?” Selah (ESV)
Lord this is the day! The day in which all the hopes of the saints from ages past were waiting for, the first fruits of resurrection life coming to pass. And yet this was the moment that people at that time didn’t see coming: that the crucified Messiah, who suffered and died in such a horrible manner, would rise in glorious triumph by the power of the Spirit over all His enemies: Satan, death, sin and hell. This is the moment, the great day in which Your glory burst forth to show in no uncertain terms, that You have won the victory, defeated death, defeated the work of Satan that began in the garden ages ago; that You in fact did conquer our sin, absorbing in Yourself our due penalty, taking it with You to the grave; It is Finished! This is the day that You did indeed crush Satan’s head along with all his works; and this is the moment that all of Your promises of resurrection life and new creation began. Lord because of our union with You by faith, we see in Your resurrection, our resurrection. Because we’re united to You, everything that is true of You is ours, and in this moment in particular we are raised with You both now and will be raised in fullness and completion on the Last Day. Your resurrection life is also our power over sin at the present time, in the already and the not yet in which we live. Through Your resurrection is also our justification, just as Your glory and righteousness and justice was vindicated and You were displayed to be the righteous King over all. Lord we worship You not just as a crucified King, but also as the great conquering, victorious, warrior, Savior, King who will rule the nations with an iron scepter at His second coming, who we will get to spend eternity with and even get to share in Your glory forever! You have risen indeed King Jesus!
O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens and when we gaze upon them, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what are we Lord that you are mindful of us? What are we that you care for us enough to condescend to us? You the King of kings becoming a Servant of servants?
Something worse than famine and drought (from today’s Advent readings in the Book of Common Prayer Lectionary):
[11] “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord GOD,
“when I will send a famine on the land—
not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water,
but of hearing the words of the LORD.
[12] They shall wander from sea to sea,
and from north to east;
they shall run to and fro, to seek the word of the LORD,
but they shall not find it.
Amos 8:11-12 ESV