On Earth As It Is In Heaven!

Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Matthew 6:10

Or it could be said something like this, “May your will be done on earth as it is being done right at this very moment in the heavenly realm.” Heaven is a realm - not a place! 

Our comprehension here is strengthened when we understand that the Greek word translated as kingdom is basileia which more properly means rule or realm.  As N.T. Wright says the church has been lulled “into ignoring the real meaning... of ‘heaven’ (which is not a place within our universe at all, but God’s place, intersecting with our world in all sorts of ways). The Christian Celts would call these intersections “thin places” or where heaven comes near to earth.

This truth is the key that will release the church to a fervency of realized expectation. But we must put the key in the door if we expect it to open. Once having opened we will get a vision of a panorama of sovereign design and purpose that will possess our hearts with a relentless grip.

Yet it seems that modern evangelicalism has left the key hanging on the wall. Could it be that there is a fear of losing control if the heavenly realm breaks into our present realities?

The key is revelation - telling God what He has told us to tell Him. “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will have been loosed in heaven." Matthew 16:19 There is a nuance of tense in this translation that is extremely significant. It is not that which we bind or loose on earth that will then be bound or loosed in heaven (the common misconception) - it is that which has already been bound or loosed in heaven that will then be bound or loosed in the earth.

It Is not our will that is ratified in heaven - it is His will that is ratified on the earth. “God also bearing witness with them, both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to His own will.” Hebrews 2:4  Indeed, everything that He has ordained has already been finished from the foundation of the earth (Hebrews 4:3). And thus His church is inexorably drawn into this vortex of sovereign will and design. This is the diligence of the Sabbath rest of God - entering into that which He has already set in motion and will bring to fulfillment.

“Many of us have treated the will of God as if it’s unknown or unknowable… God has not kept his desires secret: He wants the reality of heaven to invade this rebel-torn world, to transform it, to bring it under His headship.” Bill Johnson 

“For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.” Matthew 6:13