For-thine-is-the-kingdom
Short answer: The phrase for thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever belongs to the doxology that closes the Lord's Prayer in many Christian traditions. It is not found in the earliest manuscripts of Matthew 6:9-13, where the prayer ends with deliver us from evil, but it was likely drawn from David's prayer in 1 Chronicles 29:11 and used very early in Christian worship. The phrase is not a magical formula or a claim that our prayers force God to act. It is a declaration of trust: the one we address as Father already holds all authority, all strength, and all honor, and he always will. Praying it is an act of surrender and confidence, not a technique for getting what we want.
The Prayer Jesus Actually Taught in Matthew 6:9-13
Matthew 6:9-13 records Jesus teaching his disciples to pray after warning them against praying like the hypocrites who loved to be seen, and like the Gentiles who thought they would be heard for their many words. He gave them a short, orderly model. The prayer begins with the address, Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy. It moves to the petition, May your Kingdom come. May your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. Then it asks for daily bread, forgiveness, and deliverance from temptation and evil.
The prayer is brief on purpose. Jesus did not give it as a script to be recited without thought, nor as a checklist to be lengthened into a performance. It is a pattern that shapes desire. Before a single request is made, the one praying has already named God as Father and placed his name, his kingdom, and his will first. That order matters. When a believer prays this way, the requests that follow are no longer the center of gravity. They are brought into a life already oriented toward God.
Note also who is addressed. The prayer is not addressed to an impersonal force or a distant ruler. It is addressed to a Father who is in heaven. That combination of nearness and transcendence holds the whole prayer together. He is close enough to be called Father, and high enough to be trusted with the kingdom. Everything that follows, including the closing word about the kingdom, rests on that relationship.
Where the Closing Line Comes From
The phrase for thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever echoes the prayer David prayed in 1 Chronicles 29:10-13. David blessed Yahweh before the whole assembly and said, Yours, Yahweh, is the greatness, the power, the glory, the victory, and the majesty! The language of power and glory belongs to God alone, and David offered it publicly as an act of worship, not a private sentiment. Early Christian congregations borrowed this kind of doxology and attached it to the Lord's Prayer.
That is why the line appears in some Bibles and not in others. The earliest Greek manuscripts of Matthew 6 do not contain it. It entered the text through liturgical use and was copied into later manuscripts, then into the Textus Receptus and the King James Version. Translations based on older manuscripts, like the World English Bible, leave it out of the main text or note it in a footnote. This is not a scandal. It is the ordinary way the church's worship and the church's Scripture have related to one another.
Because the line is not original to Matthew, some Christians omit it entirely, while others continue to pray it as a beloved and theologically sound response. Both approaches can honor Scripture. What matters is that no one treats the phrase as though it were a magical addition that makes a prayer effective, or as though its absence makes a prayer incomplete. The Father hears his children whether or not they close with David's words.
What It Means to Say Thine Is the Kingdom
To say thine is the kingdom is to confess that God's reign is not a future hope we must manufacture. It is a present reality and an eternal one. Daniel 4:34-35 records Nebuchadnezzar, after his humbling, blessing the Most High and declaring that his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom from generation to generation. The most powerful king of his age learned that his own throne was a borrowed thing. God's was not.
This is why the petition may your Kingdom come and the doxology for thine is the kingdom belong together. We ask God to bring his reign to bear in the world, and then we acknowledge that the reign is already his. We are not voting a new king into office. We are asking the rightful king to make his rule visible where it is presently resisted. The prayer does not create the kingdom; it aligns the one praying with a kingdom that already exists.
Praying this way also reorders our ambitions. If the kingdom is God's, then my little empire of reputation, comfort, and control is not ultimate. The prayer quietly dismantles the illusion that I am the one holding things together. That is uncomfortable, and it is also freeing. The weight of the kingdom rests on God, not on me.
And the Power: Why This Word Matters
The second member of the doxology, and the power, names God's ability to do what he has promised. Psalm 145:10-13 says, All your works will give thanks to you, Yahweh. Your saints will extol you. They will speak of the glory of your kingdom, and talk of your power, to make known to the sons of men his mighty acts, and the glory of the majesty of his kingdom. The saints are not told to boast of their own strength. They are told to talk about God's.
That distinction is important for prayer. When we ask for daily bread, forgiveness, and deliverance from evil, we are not asking a weak God to try harder. We are asking a powerful God to act. The doxology reminds us who we are speaking to. It also guards us against a subtle form of unbelief that treats prayer as a last resort rather than the first response of a child to a Father who is able.
At the same time, the phrase does not grant us control over God's power. It is not a lever. It is a confession. We do not say the power is ours, or that our praying releases it on demand. We say the power is his, and we rest in that. 1 Timothy 1:17 puts it plainly: Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen. Honor and glory are given, not extracted.
And the Glory: The End of Every Prayer
And the glory names the weight and beauty of God's own character. In Scripture, glory is not primarily a light show. It is the manifest goodness and majesty of God. When David blessed Yahweh in 1 Chronicles 29:11, he listed greatness, power, glory, victory, and majesty, and then added, for all that is in the heavens and in the earth is yours. Glory belongs to God because everything that exists belongs to God.
This means the doxology ends prayer where prayer should end: not on us, but on him. Many of our prayers are entirely about our needs, our worries, our people, and our plans. Those things matter. Jesus himself told us to ask for daily bread. But the model prayer does not stop there. It closes by returning to the one who is worthy, so that our requests are framed by worship rather than the other way around.
When glory becomes the last word, our prayers gain perspective. The problem that felt all-consuming this morning is real, but it is not ultimate. The God we are speaking to is. Praying for thine is the glory does not mean ignoring our needs. It means placing them in the hands of the one whose glory is the point of everything, including our own lives.
Forever: The Everlasting Kingdom
The final word of the doxology, forever, is what makes the whole line unshakable. Every earthly kingdom has a shelf life. Nebuchadnezzar learned this the hard way, and David knew it as he watched his own house struggle. But the kingdom of God does not rise and fall with the fortunes of a nation or a leader. Daniel 4:34-35 says his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom from generation to generation.
Forever also means that the things we pray for now will one day be answered fully. The kingdom we ask to come will come. The will we ask to be done on earth will be done. The deliverance we ask for will be complete. The doxology is not wishful thinking. It is confidence grounded in the character of the one who made the promise and who is himself eternal.
That is why Christians have kept praying this line even though it is not in the earliest text of Matthew. It gathers up everything the prayer has already said and returns it to God as an offering. It is short, it is simple, and it is true. Whether we say it aloud or end our prayers at deliver us from evil, the reality it names remains: the kingdom, the power, and the glory are his, forever.
How to Pray This Line Without Superstition
It is possible to pray the doxology in a way that quietly turns it into a formula. When we treat certain words as though they guarantee a result, we are back among the Gentiles Jesus warned about, who thought they would be heard for their many words. The doxology is not a password. It is worship. Its power is not in the syllables but in the God to whom it is spoken.
A better approach is to pray slowly and mean what the words say. Pause at kingdom and ask whether you actually want God to rule. Pause at power and consider whether you believe he is able. Pause at glory and ask whether your prayer is ultimately about him or about you. Pause at forever and let it stretch your horizon beyond this week. Even a few seconds of that kind of attention will change how the prayer feels.
It also helps to remember that the doxology is not the only way to close a prayer. Some traditions end with it, some do not, and both are within the bounds of faithful practice. If you pray in a congregation that uses it, say it with the whole heart. If you pray alone and prefer to end at deliver us from evil, that is also a faithful use of the text Jesus gave. The point is never the formula. The point is the Father.
Biblical fidelity check
Matthew 6:9-13 establishes a model for prayer, not a mandatory liturgy. Jesus introduces it with pray like this, which tells us the prayer is a pattern to shape our praying, not a spell to be repeated for effect. The passage establishes the priority of God's name, kingdom, and will over our requests, and it authorizes us to ask for bread, forgiveness, and deliverance. It does not teach that a specific closing sentence is required for prayer to be heard, nor does it promise that every request will be granted exactly as asked.
The most common misreading is to treat the doxology as original to Matthew and therefore as an absolute rule of prayer. Since the earliest manuscripts do not contain it, that claim cannot be sustained. Another misreading is the opposite error: dismissing the line as a later addition with no value. The line is not Scripture in Matthew, but it is thoroughly biblical in its content, drawn from David's prayer in 1 Chronicles 29 and consistent with Daniel 4 and Psalm 145. Faithful Christians differ on whether to pray it, and that difference should be treated with patience rather than suspicion.
Other passages that speak to Matthew 6:9-13
The themes of the Lord's Prayer echo throughout Scripture. The priority of God's rule appears in Matthew 6:33 Meaning: Seek First the Kingdom of God, where Jesus tells his disciples to seek first the kingdom and his righteousness. The language of God's greatness, power, and glory in the doxology comes from 1 Chronicles 1: Adam to Edom's Chiefs, which introduces the book that contains David's prayer in chapter 29. The transfer of earthly kingdom from one king to another is pictured in 1 Chronicles 10: Saul's Death and the Kingdom Given to David, and the establishment of David's reign, which points forward to an everlasting kingdom, is narrated in 1 Chronicles 11: David Anointed King and His Mighty Men.
Frequently asked questions
Is for thine is the kingdom in the original Bible?
No. The earliest Greek manuscripts of Matthew 6:9-13 end the prayer at deliver us from evil. The doxology appears in later manuscripts and was included in the Textus Receptus, which is why the King James Version has it. Modern translations based on older manuscripts, including the World English Bible, either omit it or place it in a footnote. This does not make the line wrong to pray. It simply means the line is a very early Christian response to the prayer rather than a record of what Jesus said on that occasion.
Should I still pray this ending today?
Many Christians do, and it is entirely appropriate. The words are drawn from David's prayer in 1 Chronicles 29 and reflect the same themes Jesus built into the model prayer. Praying it can be an act of genuine worship. Others prefer to end at deliver us from evil, following the earliest text. Both practices are consistent with Scripture. The important thing is that the line is prayed as a confession of God's reign, not as a technique for getting what we want or as a mark of superior spirituality.
What does it mean that the kingdom is God's forever?
It means God's reign does not depend on human circumstances, elections, economies, or lifespans. Daniel 4:34-35 says his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom from generation to generation. Every earthly kingdom rises and falls, but God's does not. Praying forever places our hopes and fears inside that unchanging reality. It is a way of saying that whatever happens in our lives or in the world, the one we are praying to remains the rightful king, and he will not be overthrown or caught off guard.
