Prayer – Day 18
Gloria: For Yours is the kingdom …
Um(Imi)bhalo weBhayibheli
1 iziKronike 29
We began our prayer praising God, acknowledging him as Father and honouring his holy name and now we return to praise as we acclaim the authority, power and glory of God. The well-known verse previously included in the Lord’s Prayer which we all recall, “For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory for ever”, is omitted from most modern translations of the Bible since later manuscripts discovered after the King James Version was translated, do not include these words. However, I took the liberty of quoting a verse from 1 Chronicles, which dovetails perfectly with the Lord’s Prayer.
In this verse God calls us to praise him. He even commands it. Why? Not because he needs our praise, but because we need to praise him. It reminds us of God’s greatness and of his glory. It alters our perspective and changes our attitude. Praise should be where we begin and end with God.
In the closing portion of this prayer we are reminded to acknowledge that God has exclusive ownership of “the kingdom, the power, the glory, for ever.” These things can be said of God and of no one else.