On the Lord's Prayer 13

There follows in the prayer: "Your kingdom come." We ask that the kingdom of God be made present to us, just as we ask that his name be hallowed in us. For when does God not reign, or when does that begin with him which always has been and never ceases to be? We ask that our kingdom come, promised us by God, won by Christ's blood and passion, so that we who were formerly servants in the world may afterwards reign under Christ's rule, as he himself promises and says: "Come, blessed of my Father, receive the kingdom that has been prepared for you from the beginning of the world." But Christ himself too, dearest brothers, can be the kingdom of God, whom we long daily to come, whose coming we desire to be made present to us quickly. For since he is himself the resurrection, because in him we rise again, so too he can be understood as the kingdom of God, because in him we are to reign. And rightly do we ask for the kingdom of God, that is, the heavenly kingdom, because there is also an earthly kingdom. But he who has already renounced the world is greater than its honours and its kingdom. And therefore he who dedicates himself to God and Christ desires not earthly but heavenly kingdoms. But there is need of continual prayer and petition, lest we fall away from the heavenly kingdom, as the Jews, to whom it had first been promised, fell away, as the Lord makes plain and proves: "Many," he says, "will come from the east and the west and will recline with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. But the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into the outer darkness: there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." He shows that the Jews were formerly sons of the kingdom, when they continued also to be sons of God; after the name of Father ceased for them, the kingdom ceased too. And therefore we Christians, who in prayer have begun to call God Father, pray also that the kingdom of God may come to us.