Today we look at
more ideas on “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
This is what I had
written:
God’s will is Jesus Christ. Jesus is the embodiment of
God’s will. If you want to know God’s will, study Jesus. Jesus was love,
compassion, obedience, service, sacrifice, and faithfulness. Jesus was firm in
His statements, kind in His mercy, goal-oriented in His life. Jesus died so
that the will of His Father would be done. Can we expect to do any less than to
die to self in order to have God and His will reign in our lives? Jesus is our
model: study Jesus and we will be studying God’s will.
The Bible tells us:
John 12:49-50, 18: For I have not spoken on my own authority; the Father who
sent me has himself given me commandment what to say and what to speak. And I know that his commandment is eternal life. What I say,
therefore, I say as the Father has bidden me.” He who speaks
on his own authority seeks his own glory; but he who seeks the glory of him who
sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood.
John 5:19,30: Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do
nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing; for whatever
he does, that the Son does likewise. 30 “I can do
nothing on my own authority; as I hear, I judge; and my judgment is just,
because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.
John 14:8-12: Philip said to him,
“Lord, show us the Father, and we shall be satisfied.”Jesus said to him, “Have
I been with you so long, and yet you do not know me, Philip? He who has seen me
has seen the Father; how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe
that I am in the Father and the Father in me? The words that I say to you I do
not speak on my own authority; but the Father who dwells in me does his
works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me; or else
believe me for the sake of the works themselves “Truly, truly, I say to
you, he who believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works
than these will he do, because I go to the Father.
We turn now to Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI for our
commentary today. He writes in his excellent book, Jesus of Nazareth (Ignatius Press, 2007): “Now, when Jesus speaks
to us of God’s will and of heaven, the place where God’s will is fulfilled, the
core of what he says is again connected to his mission. At Jacob's well, he says to the disciples who bring him food: ‘My food is to do the
will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work ‘(John 4:36). What he means
is that his oneness with the Father’s will is the foundation of his life. The
unity of his will with the Father’s will is the core of his very being. Above
all, though, what we hear in this petition of the Our Father is an echo of
Jesus’ own passionate struggle in dialogue with his Father on the Mount of
Olives: ‘My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless,
not as I will, but as thou wilt’ – ‘My Father, if this cannot pass unless I
drink it, thy will be done’ (Matthew 26:39, 42)…. Jesus gives us a glimpse into
his human soul and its ‘becoming one’ with the will of God…. And in this light
we now understand that Jesus is ‘heaven’ in the deepest and truest sense of the
word – he in whom and through whom God’s will is wholly done. Looking at him we
realize that, left to ourselves we can never be completely just: the
gravitational pull of our own will constantly pulls us away from God’s will and
turns us into mere ‘earth’. But he accepts us, he draws us up to himself, into
himself, and in communion with him we too learn God’s will. Thus, what we are
ultimately praying for in this third petition of the Our Father is that we come
closer and closer to him, so that God’s will can conquer the downward pull of
our selfishness and make us capable of the lofty height to which we are called.
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