2|42 Community Church

There's a difference between a peacemaker and a peacekeeper — and most of us have been a peacekeeper our whole lives without realizing it. In this final message of The Good Life, we sit in Matthew 5:9: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God." If you've ever kept the peace by staying quiet, smoothing it over, or sweeping it under the rug, this one is for you.

Keeping the peace can look calm on the outside while nothing underneath is actually whole. The Bible has a fuller word for peace — shalom — that means wholeness and restoration, not just the absence of conflict. Which means real peace sometimes asks us to step toward the hard conversation instead of around it: in our marriages, our friendships, our health, our finances. This message unpacks what Jesus actually meant, why "being nice" isn't the same as being at peace, and how peace stops being something you chase and starts being Someone you know.

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You can check every box — the job, the family, the schedule that actually works — and still lie awake feeling like something's missing. If nothing ever quite feels like enough, this message is about why, and where that hunger is actually pointing.

In this message from our series The Good Life, we walk through Matthew 5:6 — "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled." Jesus names something most of us feel but rarely say out loud: there's a difference between what we hunger for and what we actually want to hunger for. We keep going back to the same menu — approval, security, comfort, the next thing — and keep walking away unsatisfied. The promise isn't that you'll stop being hungry. It's that there's One who finally fills you.

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What did Jesus really mean by "Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth"? In Matthew 5:5, meek doesn't mean weak, timid, or a pushover — it means something closer to strength under control. This message unpacks the third Beatitude and why the good life belongs to the people who stop fighting to control everything.

We tend to run our lives like little kings and queens of our own small empires — controlling our image, our schedules, our future, the outcome of every hard conversation. It's exhausting, and it never quite delivers the peace we're after. The Greek word behind "meek" (praus) describes a wild horse that's been tamed: all its power still there, simply surrendered. Jesus lived this out himself — standing before Pilate with all authority in heaven and earth, and choosing restraint. This is a look at what it means to be still before God, to let go of control, and to find the peace and belonging that comes with it.

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What did Jesus actually mean by "blessed are the poor in spirit"? It's the first line of the Beatitudes, the opening of the most famous sermon ever preached, and it's almost the opposite of what most of us picture when we imagine the good life. In this message from Matthew 5:3, we walk through what "poor in spirit" really means, and why Jesus says the good life belongs not to the people who have it all together, but to the ones who come empty.

We tend to fill in the blank "Blessed is the one who…" with success, security, or having our life in order. Jesus fills it in differently. Using the picture of a full cup and an empty cup, this teaching unpacks why the kingdom of heaven is available right now, not later, not after you've earned it, to anyone willing to come to God open-handed. It's an honest look at the Sermon on the Mount, grace, and what it means to stop striving and start receiving.

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Most of us were taught that Revelation is a map of the end of the world — dragons, beasts, and a countdown to catastrophe. But what if the whole book was actually pointing at something much closer to home? In this final message of our journey through Revelation, Pastor Tony walks through chapters 21 and 22 to show what the book was really about all along: not a prediction about the world, but an invitation to you.

At the center of it is a strange, hopeful image John keeps returning to — robes. Clean ones and stained ones. Two kingdoms, two "uniforms," and one honest question underneath all the imagery: how do you actually get in? The answer isn't "try harder" or "clean yourself up first." It's the opposite. You can't scrub the stain out on your own — you're invited to come exactly as you are and let the blood of the Lamb do what your own effort never could. If you've been exhausted from trying to hold a perfect image together, this is the message that hands you a way to set it down.

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Do you know if your name is in the Book of Life? In Revelation 20, John describes a moment where every person stands before God — and two books decide everything. This week, Pastor Tony Johnson unpacks what those books actually are, and why the question isn't as simple as "be a good person" or "just believe."

Most of us live inside a false dichotomy. Either salvation is entirely up to Jesus and nothing you do matters, or you have to earn your way in by being good enough. Revelation 20 puts both books on the table and gives us a different way of looking at it. Because faith without works is dead — but works without faith won't save you either. So the real question isn't which one matters most. It's this: if someone read your life like a ledger, would they know you follow Jesus?

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Revelation 20 is where the story finally lands: Satan is bound, released for one last rebellion, and thrown into the lake of fire for good. But the point isn't a timeline — it's that the outcome is already settled. If we know how the story ends, how should we live right now?

In this message from our Revelation series, we walk through Revelation 19:19–20:10... the final battle, the thousand years, and the decisive end of evil. Like watching a game you already know the score to, the tension is real but the result isn't in doubt. The invitation is one word: stand. Stand with confidence in the moments where following Jesus actually costs you something — at work, in your family, when you're the only one — because the victory was never up for grabs.

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What will it look like when Jesus actually returns? Most of us picture a Rambo-style hero charging in with a sword, but the Bible paints a very different picture, and it changes everything about how we live right now.

This week at 2|42 Community Church, we walk through Revelation 19 and the moment the hero finally steps into the story. Jesus returns on a white horse, eyes like fire, wearing a robe dipped in blood but here's the thing most people miss: it's His own blood. Before there was a white horse, there was a cross. Before a crown, there were thorns. Before Jesus was the conquering King, He was the sacrificial Lamb. And He's not riding back alone,  there's an army behind Him, dressed in white, following Him into final victory. The question this passage leaves us with isn't "is Jesus coming back?" It's "when He does, where will you be?"

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In Revelation 17, John has already watched dragons, beasts, and armies without flinching and then one thing finally stops him in his tracks. Not something terrifying. Something beautiful. A woman called Babylon, dressed in gold, holding a cup that looks like everything you've ever wanted. That's the warning: the most dangerous things in our lives rarely look dangerous. They look like the good life.

In this sixth week of our Revelation series, we walk through Revelation 17–18 and
ask what Babylon, "the great prostitute," actually represents — and why John keeps insisting she's not just an end-times symbol for some distant empire, but a
present-tense pull on every one of us. Babylon is what the world becomes, and what our own lives become, when we quietly slide ourselves into the center where God belongs. She promises that a little more — more success, more approval, more security will finally hold your life together. Instead, like a wheel spinning
without a hub, it slowly shreds. That's why, right in the middle of her downfall,
a voice from heaven says something tender: "Come out of her, my people." Not an
accusation. An invitation. The real question this passage leaves us with is a
quiet one worth sitting with: what's actually at the center of your life right now?

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Everything you've heard about the mark of the beast is probably wrong — and the truth is honestly more relevant to your Tuesday than to some far-off end times timeline. In this message from our series on Revelation, we walk through Revelation 13 and 14, decode what 666 actually meant to the people who first read it, and ask a more uncomfortable question than "what is the mark?" The real question is: what's already marking you?

Because here's the idea underneath the whole chapter — everyone is already marked. The only question is which mark you're living under. Long before the spooky 666 stuff, Scripture says you carry a mark in how you think and how you live: what you give your attention to, what you worship, what's quietly shaping you without you ever signing up for it. The algorithm knows what you like and feeds it back to you. Something is always competing for your attention. This message is a reality check, and a hopeful one — because the choice of which mark you carry is actually yours.

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