Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

Those who grieve the effects of sin in our world, lives and relationships - just as Jesus did at the tomb of his friend Lazarus - will find comfort in Jesus’ Kingdom.

Those who weep, and mourn are fit for God’s Kingdom.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

God’s kingdom isn’t what you’d expect, and in the same way, Jesus is showing that those who are blessed in God’s sight aren’t those who we’d expect.

Blessed - The Greek word used here, makarios (meaning “happy” or “fortunate), often indicates someone who is favoured by God.

The beatitudes are some of the most powerful. unbelievable, and controversial words in the Bible, if you actually consider what Jesus is saying!! And can actually threaten a lot of what we (as Christians) presume, and take for granted, to be true about God. 

So next few Sundays, that’s what we’re going to be looking at….

In John 20, so many details reaffirm the amazing themes we explored in our Living with God series. We think about a few of them here...

We revisit the Good Friday episode from 2020.

The point remains... 'more often than not, we don't have to be taught - just remember to remember how we got to this spot'.

In a world with so many distractions, and a constant desire for something 'new and improved', we need to remember to remember.

At Easter, we take time to remember Jesus' crucial words, and the point of his sacrifice.

This is part 4… the final part in our mini series on Heaven called living with God.

We want to finish by stating, or re-stating the overall big idea!  

Which is this…  the Bible is telling us one complete story! It starts with the purpose why God created us in the beginning. And how all things are working, through history, in our present day, and even in the future to come, to a point when that purpose is fully restored!  

It starts and ends with God preparing a home for His people. With a garden and a tree of eternal life! With God and his people united, in the same space!God wants to live with you!

In Jesus we see God comes and dwells among us. 

His kingdom invades the earth, and Heaven and earth overlap once more.

Jesus is able to unite us with a holy God and grant access to Him. 

 

(And because I use the word a lot in this episode... Domain = an area of territory owned, or controlled, by a particular ruler or government)

Here’s the Big Idea for Part 2: God comes and dwells in the presence of his people. There is a glimpse of God’s space and human space overlapping again. But God’s holiness, and our sin, mean that the two can’t mix as they were designed to. Something needs to happen to resolve this tension. Or someone, in the form of one of the priests, needs to resolve the issue for sinful humans, so we can exist in the presence of God’s holiness, and the two can overlap once more.

I'm sure when you hear the word Heaven, loads of ideas and images spring to mind. But rather than just dive straight into exploring those ideas and images, first we need to do some groundwork...

Encouragement that we should seek to grow in Lockdown, not just survive it.

I encountered quite a few issues when delivering this on Zoom, so wanted to give a quick review of the lesson, around the theme of 'God is in Control'.