Underlying so much that’s troubling today is a perennially problematic characteristic: willfulness. 

It’s easy to see the consequences of human will in global problems, such as authoritarian leaders clinging violently to power or a government imposing religious views by diktat. What’s often less obvious to us is willfulness in ourselves. How often do our words and actions deviate from the profound humility of Jesus’ example by saying, in effect, “My will be done”? 

Yet the spiritual antidote to this is always at hand in the prayer known today as the Lord’s Prayer that Jesus shared with his followers. It is directed to the infinite intelligence that is God, the divine Mind of us all, and includes the declaration, “Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10, emphasis added). This shows us that if we want to experience the undivided harmony of God’s ever-present kingdom referenced earlier in the prayer, we have to play our part. We must be willing to submit to God’s will instead of insisting on what claims to be our own.