John 9

Much trouble has come into the world because of sin. Nonetheless, sin is not the first and highest cause of anything, even trouble. There is something bigger in the eternal purposes of God going on, something above sin, and above trouble, something that is so important that it in some sense necessitated sin entering into the world through Adam, and necessitated trouble coming into the world with sin. This great intention of the Almighty is that the works of God be displayed before the eyes of men, and even somehow within men. In order for a blind man to be healed by the son of God, displaying some resurrection kingdom truths, it was necessary for there to be a blind man. In order for any kind of trouble to come into the world, including blindness, it was in some sense necessary for there to be a fall, and consequences of that fall. A son’s blindness is not all about his sin, or his parent’s sin, or even Adam’s sin. It is first about the work of God being displayed, the work of a God who intends to provide the perfect conclusion to a book of life with many chapters about brokenness and misery. On that day so long ago when Jesus healed a man who was blind from birth, He displayed the work of God in that man, giving further proof for all who could see, that the Messiah was the Light of the world.

The healing of the man born blind was not the end of his story. It seemed to be the beginning of controversy, and also the beginning of a progressively clearer yielding of this one man’s life to a Messiah who gives sight to the blind. When he was asked about the healing, he first said that it was the work of “the man called Jesus.” Then when he was questioned by the Pharisees concerning the agent of this Sabbath healing, he said, “He is a prophet.” When he saw Jesus again at the end of the chapter, he acknowledged Him as the Messianic Son of Man, he called Him Lord, and told Him that he believed.

The progression of the Pharisees was different. First they acknowledged the difficulty that a man who did not keep their understanding of Sabbath traditions was able to do such amazing signs. Some of them seemed to entertain the possibility that Jesus might be from God, while others reacted vehemently against and show of weakness toward such a position. Then they questioned the man’s parents, apparently hoping that this would prove to be a false miracle, and that the man had not actually been blind before. By this point they had already agreed that any who confessed that Jesus was the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. Finally they questioned him, and in something of a rage, they cast the healed man out and pronounced their own judgment upon him, that he was born in sin.

The two questions that seem to be most troubling for them were the question of where Jesus came from and the question of whether or not He was a sinner. Both of these things are very serious to consider. Jesus was sent by God from heaven to earth in order to achieve the will of God for us. If He was to fulfill His destiny, He could not sin, since to bear the weight of our sin effectively He could not have any of His own sin. Was the making of mud and applying it to the eyes of the man a violation of the Lord’s commandment to do no work on the Sabbath day, or was it the perfect fulfillment of this day of testimony, pointing to the coming eternal Sabbath rest in heaven, when the blind shall certainly see? The Pharisees took the first position and Jesus the second. On the second question, was Jesus a Galilean of questionable heritage, perhaps even the illegitimate child of very poor parents, or was He the Son of God made flesh? The two questions were connected. If Jesus was truly the Messiah, then His understanding of what it means to keep the Law of God was correct, and the traditions of the fathers concerning Sabbath-keeping and many other matters were wrong.

Those Pharisees who were firmly against Jesus were hoping to pressure the healed man to support them in their contention that Jesus was a Law-breaker. This proved to be difficult. This man had been blind, and now he was able to see, and the reason for the change was obvious. It seems amazingly arrogant that the Pharisees imagined that this man would be a good witness against Jesus. They seemed to be unusually blind to such a gracious and miraculous sign of the resurrection Kingdom, as if their own wrong interpretations of the Law of God should be considered more glorious than sight being granted to the blind. They were convinced that they had the most wonderful spiritual vision as the self-authorized disciples of Moses, but they were strikingly blind to the truths and proofs of the kingdom of God.

Their attempt to trouble Jesus was a sign of another spiritual truth: that the leaders of God’s own people have a surprisingly hatred of His Son. With each episode in John’s gospel we are getting closer to the cross. To see the cross in all its healing power does require some spiritual vision. It is necessary for us to see our own sin, and to see the perfect holiness of the Lamb of God. It is required that we take Jesus at His Word, that He has come from the Father and is going to the Father, and that He will be victorious in His Messianic work. Those who are able to see their own need, and to see the glory of God in the atoning work of Christ, however blind they may seem to the world, are actually seeing things rightly. But those who imagine that they have peace with God through their own Sabbath-keeping, however scrupulous they may be in all of their religious tradition-keeping, are actually blind to the truth of God, and to the wonder of His power. For those who reject the Lord’s Messiah, it is a sad fact that their guilt remains, but for those who are granted eyes to see the Christ as their only hope, it is a happy truth that their sins are forgiven, for they have believe in the One who is the Light of the world.

John 8

In the previous chapter of John’s gospel, at the Feast of Tabernacles, that feast that celebrates God dwelling with His people, our Savior cried out in the temple in Jerusalem, that whoever would believe in Him, out of his heart would flow rivers of living water. It is from the heavenly temple of God that a river of life flows. Jesus is the Temple of the Holy Spirit, and He has promised that in Him we shall truly be the temple of the Holy Spirit, of which He is the Cornerstone. Here in John 8, Jesus says, “I am the Light of the world.” He also says that His being the Light of the world will mean something to those who are united to Him. We will walk in light, and have the light of life through our union with Him. In saying these things, Jesus identifies Himself publicly as much more than a teacher, or even a prophet. He is instructing anyone with ears to hear, that they should be spiritually united with Him, in order to share in the benefits of intimate connection with the One who is not only fully man, but is also fully God.

When the Son of God came to save, He came to a world that was not universally willing to receive Him. As His claims concerning His identity became clearer to people, the antagonism of those who would not believe also became more obvious. At root, Jesus claimed to be true, and especially that He was true to the Father in the fullest meaning of those words. Those who rejected Him insisted that He was just plain false. He claimed that what He was saying was precisely what the Father would say, because these two are one. Their agreement was not a compromise by two differing parties, but the perfect eternal determination of the one voice of God. The mind of Jesus is the heavenly mind, the divine mind. He told those who were disturbed by His words, “Unless you believe that I-AM, you will die in your sins.” He also spoke of His being “lifted up,” without saying what those words meant on this occasion, though we learn exactly what they mean in John 12:32. What is clear here is that Jesus is definitively asserting that He always does the things that are pleasing to the Father. It is this sinless Son of God who would be lifted up on the cross to die for our sins.

There were some, we are told, who believed in Him as He was saying these things. His instruction to them was clear and wonderfully simple. “Abide in my Word, and you are truly my disciples.” Many people may be interested in the Word of this Man who makes such great claims of connection with the Father, but some stay with that Word, and live in that Word, they settle their lives upon that Word, and they are called disciples, learners, followers of Jesus Christ. To them, Christ made a great promise. “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” We were created to be free, but sin has made us slaves, and foolish slaves at that. Foolish slaves of sin think that they have reached the height of freedom when they are perfectly autonomous, free to choose what they want. Yet when they choose sin, they are not free at all. Real freedom comes through finding our place as servants of God, and even sons of God, through Jesus Christ our Lord, and then in pursuing the fullest obedience to God’s commandments from a heart that has been freed by God to willingly and eagerly do what we were created to do. The agent of such a change of life in a human being can been none other that God Himself, but He indicates here that He does this work through people coming to know the truth as they hear and even abide in the Word of Christ.

It is very plain that Jesus was insisting that God was His Father. Those who rejected this Word, made two claims about themselves. They first claimed that Abraham was their Father, and then insisted that God was their Father. Both of these claims were part of a larger effort to deny the claim of Jesus, that through His Word they could become free. Their response was very direct. As children of Abraham, and even children of God, they did not need this Jesus to make them free. They already were free.

The problem with this claim of freedom is that our sin is a plain fact, and the one who sins is not free, he is living a life against the will of the Father, because He is sinning against the Father. We can call that freedom, but it leads only to God’s judgment, and to be eternally judged by God is not to be free. By this understanding of freedom, there is only one Man who is free in Himself, and that Man is Jesus Christ, because Jesus did not sin. This free Man became the Servant of the Lord to win our true freedom. He died for sin that was not His own. But in that death, He won for us freedom in Him, just as we are the temple of God because He is the Temple of God, and we are the light of the world because He is the Light of the world.

If the enemies of Christ were really sons and followers of Abraham, and sons of followers of God, then they would have done what Abraham did. They would have heard the Word of God and believed. They showed themselves to be sons and followers of the devil, who rebelled against the Word of God. They needed the Son of God, the only One who was so radically free of sin, to become a sin offering for them, to atone for their sins, in order that they might truly be free, but they would not hear Him and believe. They could not bear to hear His Word.

Abraham did not hate the Messiah to come. Abraham did not resent Melchizedek, this mysterious Christ-like figure, the King of Righteousness, and the King of Peace who seemed to come out of nowhere. Abraham did not reject the Voice of God when God provided a Messiah-like ram in the thicket as a substitute for His Son Isaac. Abraham rejoiced to see the day of Jesus, because He knew that the Messiah was greater than Him. He believed and it was counted to Him as righteousness. When our Lord said to those against Him that day, “Before Abraham was, I-AM,” He stood on the truth that He not only knew Abraham, and that He knew God His Father, but that He was and is God forever. They knew He was saying this, so they picked up stones to stone Him as a blasphemer. We hear His Word, and we rejoice with Abraham. We are content to be united with Jesus Christ and to honor Him forever. Because He is the Son of God, we are sons of God through Him, for He was lifted up on the cross for our transgressions, and He was raised for our justification.

John 7

As Jesus moved toward the cross, the controversy around Him grew. A major turning point in the opinion of even many of those who had once considered themselves to be His disciples came when He told them they needed to eat His flesh and drink His blood in order to have life. This was an escalation of a conversation where people who were already offended by His statement that He came down from heaven, now frankly admitted that His difficult words were too troubling for them to remain associated with Him. Nonetheless, it was not yet time for the cross. He escaped some of the day to day dangers of being too near Jerusalem by travelling around Galilee, not because He was afraid of death, but because His time had not yet come.

One problem with avoiding Jerusalem is that Jewish adult males were commanded by God’s Law to gather in Jerusalem for three major religious feasts every year. One of these feasts was the culmination of the annual calendar, the Feast of Booths, or Tabernacles, which is rightly associated with the idea of God dwelling with His people in a world of perfection forever. That feast, we are told, was at hand, so as a true worshipper of the Father, He eventually went to Jerusalem. His brothers were trying to push Him to go to the feast for another reason, to make a name for Himself, to attend with the idea that this would be a way to prominence. They did not believe in Him, or they would have trusted Him to know the pathway to the fulfillment of His destiny. They thought as the world thinks. The way of Jesus and His kingdom is different than the way of the world. Jesus came to glory through the cross, and the time for that had not yet fully come. He did go to the feast, but He went first as a private worshipper.

There was much discussion about Him at the feast. Somewhere in the middle of the eight days of Tabernacles, Jesus went up into the temple and began teaching. His teaching came from His Father. In this way He was very different from celebrated rabbis who studied the opinions of other teachers from the past and showed that their understanding was based on their research and their assent to the traditions of scholarly Jews. Jesus had an immediate Word from God in His teaching, and seemed to even possess an immediate understanding of the opinions and motives of those who were listening to Him. He forthrightly confronted those who would not receive His Word as violators of God’s Law who were actually seeking to kill Him, an innocent Man, and this because of His healing people on the Sabbath. Everyone agreed that to circumcise on the Sabbath was necessary work, and yet to heal the whole man was not allowed. Though the religious leaders taught based on tradition, they had full trust in their own opinions, even when those traditions and opinions were at complete odds with the bold teaching of One who was performing the signs of the Messiah from the Scriptures.

It is easy to imagine that this situation was not only awkward, but full of significant tension. A Man was openly teaching who was generally known to be opposed by powerful people, and yet He was not being arrested. His miracles seem to be well known to everyone, but as the people judge Jesus, some find Him lacking in some detail of what they expect to be signs of Messiah. For example some apparently expect that Messiah will come in such a way that people will not know where He came from. Others insist that He will be known to have come from Bethlehem. In addition to all this, Jesus is talking about going away to Him who sent Him, and some of them are getting the distinct impression that it is the intention of Jesus to go to other Greek-speaking parts of the Roman Empire.

In the midst of all of this, on the last day of the Feast, Jesus stood up and cried out one of the most dramatic and meaningful sayings of His entire ministry. “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” We are told by the gospel writer that Jesus was speaking about the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Godhead, whom those who would believe in Him were to receive.

The story of a healing river that is connected with the presence of God is a story that starts in Eden, and finds its perfectly secure fulfillment in the new heavens and the new earth, described at the very end of the Bible. Along the way, the prophet Ezekiel is given a vision of what has to be a heavenly temple where God dwells. Proceeding out from under that temple is a healing river. Jesus is that Temple, and those who believe in Him are united with Him in His designation as the temple of the Holy Spirit. This heavenly hope is what Tabernacles was all about, and Jesus is saying to all who would hear, “If you want the glory of the life to come, come to me and drink. Not only will you get heaven’s river, that river will proceed from you, for you will be the temple of the Holy Spirit, together with all the church, of which I am the Cornerstone.”

This was a very appropriate declaration by just the right Man, at just the right time, in just the right setting. It did not take away all of the trouble that was already swirling around His Name. Instead it caused the conflict to grow, since it was a conflict that could only end at the cross. Eventually His time would really come, the time of His atoning death on the cross for us, the time for His resurrection from the dead, the time for His ascension into heaven, where from the right hand of the Father, the Spirit of God would be poured out upon the church, and the New Testament temple of believing people would be born and would grow. This growth of the temple would happen with still more controversy. There would continue to be men like Nicodemus who would question the rightness of persecuting the innocent, and there would continue to be those who would be ready to hurl curses and insults at anyone who showed any weakness in the direction of faith. Above all of them, there would be the true Rock of our salvation who will not be moved. He is an ever-determined Source of life-giving waters to His people.

John 6

By this time in the ministry of Jesus there were great crowds following Him, particularly because He was performing signs of the coming resurrection age, when a new life beyond the life of decay and mortality that we are so used to now will be here upon the earth. That life can be known now through the preaching of the kingdom, and will be known even more when we are in heaven. The crowds did not connect the signs that Jesus was doing to the new heavens and the new earth promised by the prophets, nor did they connect the signs to the Messiah as the key figure in bringing about the resurrection world to come. They certainly did not see the connection between the role of Jesus as the Passover Sin-Bearer and the coming of the fullness of God’s promises. What they did see is that people were being fixed now, and they wanted that. So many people wanted those blessings, and so many were following Him, that there was nothing approaching an adequate supply of food to meet everyone’s needs. Jesus cared about this, and though He knew what He would do to solve this problem, He put the question to His disciples, “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat.”

Part of the correct answer to that question would be the inability of the disciples to do this task. They could not provide bread for thousands, but this is only part of the correct answer. The other part of the correct answer is that Jesus could do this, and that His performance of this miraculous feeding, providing bread from heaven, would be another confirming sign of His identity. As the Messiah would bring the Word of life to millions through the use of His disciples, He used them that day to give bread to thousands. He then instructed them to gather up the leftover fragments, that nothing may be lost. The baskets of fragments they gathered was a public display of the extent of this miracle, but His direction to gather the fragments may have had another point. The use of the imagery and vocabulary of lost bread and perishing people mentioned later in this chapter, makes us suspect that there was something more here in this surprising command after this sign of resurrection fullness. God does not like things to be permanently out of place (See Luke 15). Someone saved through the blood of Christ must not remain scattered abroad as if lost or perishing. Such a person should be gathered into God’s kingdom.

The people saw the sign that Jesus did, even though He was working through His disciples. They concluded that He was the great Prophet that they were expecting, and they determined that He should be King, and that they could make that happen their way. Therefore, He went away by Himself, which created the occasion for another miracle, this one seen only by His disciples, who were travelling by night on stormy seas. As He walked upon the rough waters with a memorable display of His sovereignty, He spoke amazing words of self-identification often translated, “It is I.” Our Lord used the words here that God used for His own name in the Old Testament, “I-AM.” Given the fact that He was walking on the water and that they quickly arrived at their destination once He came on board, it seems clear that Jesus was providing the reassurance to His disciples that would be a comfort to them through their proclamation of the Bread of Life to a world that often rejected Him and them. I-AM is with us.

The people were determined to find Him because they wanted more bread. They kept on speaking about bread, and He kept on speaking about Himself. They knew what they wanted, and God knew who they needed. They needed His Son, the Bread that came down from heaven. They did not believe this, and He knew it. He also knew two facts of salvation that are still just as true today as they were back then. 1. Everyone who looks on the Son, and believes in Him, will have eternal life, raised up gloriously by Jesus on the day of His return. 2. No one can come to Jesus, unless the Father draws him. The point of this second fact is not that we should be passive or resigned about our eternal state. We are to believe in the one that the Father has sent and labor to have Him, for He is the bread from heaven, the only One with the Father’s seal of approval.

There were many who did not like the idea that Jesus was saying that He came down from heaven and Jesus knew it, but He did not back away from this important truth at all. He is the preexistent, eternal Son of God, and He holds the key to resurrection life. Those who are being drawn to Him by the Father will eventually vigorously desire Him. He spoke of them eating His flesh and drinking His blood, which then further offended those who were rejecting His Word. He said that those who want eternal life must feed on Him, and many of the larger group of His disciples were so offended by this that they no longer followed Him. The twelve remained with Him, though even one of them would eventually betray Him.

Jesus was using the imagery of eating His flesh, because He is the peace offering and the Passover Lamb. These were sacrificial offerings that the people of Israel were permitted to consume. Jesus is our peace and our rescue from certain judgment. The profit for us is not in His physical flesh, it is in His Word, which is Spirit and life to the one who will eagerly desire it and receive it. Something like this is surely happening when we rightly partake of the Lord’s Supper, which had not yet been instituted when the events of John 6 took place. Today we receive the Word from heaven gladly. There is no other place for us to go. We listen eagerly to the Word of God, knowing that this Word is alive and powerful. We long for Him, and we receive Him, for He is the bread who came down from heaven to give us life.

Prayer based on Leviticus 12

Our Father, You have given us the gift of children in Your church. We thank You for bringing the mothers among us through the challenge of pregnancy and childbirth. We thank You for the life that is a gift from You. We know that we have all been cleansed by the blood of Christ. His true and perfect sacrifice has made both us and our young ones clean.

Prayer based on Jeremiah 47

Father God, for generations people of power have feigned a great confidence in their strength, yet at heart men know that they are dust. Who can pretend that the day of our death is so very far away? Make us sensible to the fact of Your existence. Help us to worship You in the beauty of holiness.

John 5

The world is full of false answers to our deepest problems. We know that we have brokenness in us and all around us. Some of it is so serious, that it prevents those who are deeply troubled from having anything close to normal lives. As people attempt to cope with trials, they can easily become trapped in systems of recovery that are only false solutions to their tragedies. The pool of Bethesda was a place dedicated to one of these false systems. There apparently was a commonly held belief that the waters there, when they were agitated in a certain way, were some kind of conduit for angelic powers of healing. It was there where our Lord spoke to a man who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. He said, “Do you want to be healed.”

The man did not answer the question, but launched into an explanation as to why this false spirituality had not yet delivered for him. The system at the pool was one where the first shall be first. If you were fast enough, you would win the benefit of the magic waters, and then all would be well. This is what we want, and we expect that it will come through some use of our own abilities. Jesus cut through this explanation with these simple words, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” The power came from the Word that was spoken, and not through anything in the man who received the Word. He was healed. Then he took up his bed and walked.

This taking up of a bed and walking was no small issue. It drew attention to the healing that had taken place and it violated the false understanding that many Jews had concerning the Sabbath commandment. Both healing and picking up a bed were understood by many followers of Jewish rituals to be violations of God’s Law. By instructing this man to pick up his bed, Jesus was confronting the false spiritual way of man-made Jewish traditions. He added to this conflict by His answer to those who questioned the things that He was doing on the Sabbath. “My Father is working until now, and I am working.” They understood from this kind of statement that Jesus was making Himself equal with God, and they took such offense at this that they wanted to kill Him.

Jesus did not back away from His contentions concerning both the Law and His own person. He explained that His connection with the Father was even greater than anything of which they have accused Him. Jesus knows all that the Father does, and He does what the Father does. This includes even the raising of the dead. Furthermore, it is the Son who is the One who will execute all divine judgment. Anyone who claims to honor God must honor the Son just as they honor the Father, which means that they must worship the Son, since that is the way that we honor the Father. To ignore this duty to honor the Son of God is an insult to the Father. Jesus says that it is through His own Word that eternal life is experienced now, and through His own voice that the dead will be raised forever. This is because the Son has life in Himself, just as the Father has life in Himself. The Son is the great I-AM, just as the Father is the great I-AM.

The fact of the resurrection of the dead should surprise no one who claims to be following the Scriptural answer to the problems of sin and death. Instead of being offended by Jesus, and seeking to kill Him, the righteous hearer of His Word should have marveled at the grace of God in the provision of a Messiah who had the power to speak words of life to the dead, and to bring forth a resurrection kingdom. It is a plain Scriptural fact that there will be a resurrection of the dead and a separation of the righteous and the wicked. What should have cause a righteous man to fall to the ground before Jesus was the fact that the central figure in this great salvation of the unworthy was before Him in the flesh.

But what is the testimony to Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah, which should have been conclusive. It was not what He said about Himself alone. They also had the word of John the Baptist, who pointed to Him as the Lamb of God. More than this, Jesus had the approval of the Father which was displayed in the works that He performed. Even these might have caused people to question what was occurring before their eyes, but they should have turned to the Scriptures for confirmation that the signs that were being performed before them were the signs of the Messiah. It is the Scriptures that are such a solid testimony to the fact that Jesus is the One who we should come to for eternal life.

Jesus said these things not in order win their approval, as if He needed to be glorified by men in order to believe in His own worth. He is God in the flesh, and they need to be approved by Him. It was clear to Him that they do not have the love of God in them. He is the giver of divine glory, a glory that can only come at the cost of His life. Instead of receiving the great gifts that He has for His people, they were showing their rejection of God by their refusal to receive Him. Moses did not do this. Moses looked for the coming of One who was greater than Him. Moses longed for the days of the Messiah. They claim to be followers of Moses, but they reject his words as these testify to the truth about Jesus Christ. Their trust in Jewish traditions is just as false and as powerless as the supposedly magical waters of the pool where an invalid had waited for healing for so many years without any good result. The only way to receive the resurrection is to receive it as a gift from God, a gift where the unworthy are given the greatest divine kindness, and where some who are the last, end up being first.

On his birthday... Still living with grief, still walking in grace

When we heard that Sam was dead, I immediately felt that my life was over. Very soon I was overcome with the idea that all of our efforts at raising him to be a man, and especially to be a godly man, had come to nothing; that they were wasted.

I turned to God, nonetheless, and found comfort in worship and in reading the Bible. I began to have new thoughts that were more hopeful based on the encouragement of trusted friends, the things I was finding in the Bible, and my own meditations. I remember thinking that we here are in Christ, and that Sam is also in Christ, so that we might not be that far away from each other, since we are all in Christ; we on this side of a divide, and he on another.

Within a few days of Sam’s death, I had a great desire to look carefully at the Bible concerning those matters that were related to his situation at the end of his life, and especially things concerning his experiences beyond his death. I remember thinking about how someone, like Moses, might face some discipline from God that could even lead to the end of his life, and yet still be saved for the life to come. Moses was not permitted to go into the Promised Land, and it was because of something he did. His life here was eventually brought to an end, but he certainly was kept by God for a better place, since he was with Jesus at the Transfiguration. This idea of earthly judgment followed by heavenly blessing was a new idea, and it was very comforting to me.

For the first six months I just wrote prayers as I listened to the Bible. During the following six months I wrote a meditation addressed to God on life and death, and heaven and earth, as I listened to the Bible a second time. In the meantime, Candy was reading and studying about grief, and then about heaven, and we were talking with each other about these things, and loving each other through our loss.

In my thinking about the Christian faith, I already knew what the most honored confessions from the history of the church said about these things. When believers die, our bodies rest in the grave, and our souls, now perfected in holiness, go to be with the Lord in the present heaven. When Christ returns, our bodies are resurrected to an immortal condition and are reunited with our perfected souls, and we live with the Lord forever.

Though I knew this before, and though I believed it and taught it, this all became more immediate and personal to me, because I was undone by the loss of Sam. This was of critical importance to me, and I thought about it all the time. I wanted to see this teaching in the words of the Bible itself, and so I listened to the Bible and wrote what I found to be the story of heaven and earth; the story of life now and of the life to come; the story as it is revealed through the Scriptures.

This is what I learned.

God created heaven and earth to be together. Sin destroyed that. The whole Bible is about God bringing heaven and earth back together again forever. There are many things about life on earth now that are very difficult, and in a way, this is how it is supposed to be at the moment. There are also many opportunities here for faith, hope, and love. That must be why we are still here. What we think and do now matters; and God, His angels, and His people in heaven pay attention to what we do below. When we die in the Lord we go to their side of the divide, to an existence in the present heavens that is far better than our current life, and much fuller in every way than I had ever imagined. When Jesus returns, He brings that fullness of heaven down to earth, and heaven and earth are together again in the most wonderful way forever.

What about life here now?

After the separation of heaven and earth, the story of true religion on earth is a story of being in relationship with God in the ways that He reveals and allows. God gave His people of old special places of His presence that were like borderlands to heaven. These places have always been full of danger: the Land of Israel, the Tabernacle, and later, the Temple, and especially the Holy of Holies within the Temple. The worship of the church in Christ is our special place today, and it is superior to all the old ways, but it is still dangerous.

The old ways were important symbols during the time of preparation for the coming of our Savior. But it has always been the case that it is through Jesus Christ alone that the problem between heaven and earth could be solved. Our Lord has done this. He demonstrated the Kingdom of heaven to us in His miracles, and He taught us about it with His words, but He especially displayed it in His resurrection. He is the proof of what He has promised to us in the resurrection of the dead. We need to live for Him and labor in Him; and we are encouraged by the announcement to us that our service of loving Him and each other is not a waste. Every good thing that we could do in the name of the Lord must have some resurrection reality connected to it, since we are told that these things are not in vain. Even something as simple as giving a cup of cold water to a little child in Jesus’ Name makes a difference in the Kingdom of heaven.

This does not take away our grief, but it does purify it with a certain kind of happiness that often eludes me. Sam is in a place now that is far better than here. We will be there in due time too. I need to keep my mind focused on that heavenly life, and I need to live the daily life that I have here with a quiet, faithful, and loving confidence that Christ has conquered sin, death, and the grave, and that those who are with Him now in the present heavens know His complete victory in a land where there is no doubt.

I have been humbled by these events, and I am hurt. But I know that even this is for my good and for God’s glory, so I need to accept it, and eventually embrace it.

There is another thing that I have learned. I was wrong. My life is not over. My efforts at loving my son were not a waste. He has gone above. We are still below. He could teach better lessons now about heaven than Candy and I can. We are ready to learn many good things from Sam when we meet him again in Christ above. Until that day, we are in Christ even now, somehow we are actually said to be in Christ in the heavens already, and Christ is still the brightest jewel of heaven, whether we live on this side of the present divide, or on the other.

John 4

One of the most important realizations that can overtake a soul is that in all the vastness of the universe, the God who created and sustains all things knows and loves me. To believe such a thing can change a life. A woman of Samaria met Jesus at a well, and from the progress of the dialogue between them, we are left with the distinct impression that she is known and loved by God. It all starts with a drink of water, but it ends with a large number of people, Samaritans no less, apparently convinced that Jesus, a Jew, is the Messiah.

It is rather surprising to the woman at the well that Jesus would be talking to her at all. The region of Samaria, in between Judea to the south and Galilee to the north was populated by a people who rejected large sections of the Hebrew Scriptures. They were a mixed multitude, ethnically and spiritually diverse as a result of foreign settlers during centuries of occupation by outside empires, yet with a strong identification with the heritage of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They knew that Jews generally did not have dealings with them, but here was a Man who actually asked for a drink. She questions this, and He speaks of Himself and something He calls “living water” that He claims He can give to her.

The woman can see that Jesus is in some way asserting greatness, and she questions this. To her He appears to be poorly equipped to give any kind of water to anyone. Jesus clarifies His message some by speaking of “living water” as greater than physical water, which has such temporary benefits. The water that Jesus is speaking of has something to do with forever, and a life that Jesus says is eternal.

The woman claims to want this living water, though she is still thinking of water that only satisfies daily thirst. Jesus tells her to call her husband, and to bring him to the well. He then gently exposes some central facts about this woman’s life that He could not have been expected to know. She has had five husbands, and the one she lives with now is not her husband. This is where we begin to see the intentionality of divine love. Jesus knows this woman. He has engaged her in this conversation. His purpose is not to expose her, but to bless her.

This Samaritan woman is aware of one of the great areas of contention between the Jews and the Samaritans, the issue of the place of worship. According to portions of the Bible that the Samaritans reject, the followers of Yahweh are to worship Him in the temple in Jerusalem. The Samaritans have an alternate holy site. Jesus reveals that something major is happening in the story of God’s saving work that will soon make this question unimportant. The true worshipers of the Father will worship in some different “place,” called here “in spirit and truth.” Though this statement is not explained, there can be little doubt that the place is a Person, that Jesus Himself is the Temple of the Holy Spirit, and that the church becomes a temple of the Holy Spirit when we worship in Him. It is at this point that the woman reveals that she is waiting for Messiah to come, and Jesus plainly reveals Himself as the Messiah.

At this point the disciples return, and the woman, leaving her water jar, goes back into the town and gathers many people to come out and see Jesus. She draws their attention to His special knowledge of her own life story, and then asks them something like this, “This can’t be the Christ. Could it be?” At the same time, as the people are coming toward Jesus, He speaks to His disciples of a future harvest that is beginning even now. This is a companion piece of important theological information, fitting well with the revelation that the temple in Jerusalem will not be the most important spiritual place in the world anymore. The time is almost here for a gospel harvest, and the disciples will eventually be very much engaged in that operation, that will involve sowing of the Word of God, and gathering a new kind of temple, involving the labors of many over some period of time. The imagery of the final age of blessing is quoted from the Hebrew prophets. This great age is now upon us, somehow sneaking ahead in front of the cross and the resurrection in this amazing encounter in a Samaritan town. The harvest is now, and it turns out that God loves Samaritans, and many from that town come to believe in Jesus, that He is the Savior of the world.

As our Lord returns to Galilee, He performs the second of John’s revelatory signs, healing the son of an official at a distance. This too is a display of the coming of a new day of resurrection. When that age has fully arrived, we will all see with our eyes what we are called to believe with our hearts now. Until the fulfillment of this in the return of Christ, this resurrection age is lived out in a preliminary stage, the era of the proclamation of the gospel. In the Word of the gospel we are told to believe that we will live, though we cannot yet see the fullness of that life.

The true announcement of the healing of this boy is a fitting display of the coming of this exciting time of spiritual opportunity. Now the Word goes forward with divine power, and not only Jews, but also Samaritans, and Gentiles from the uttermost parts of the earth hear the message of the divine love of God supremely displayed in the cross of Christ. To hear this message, to understand that God knows us and loves us, to believe that our sins have actually been atoned for through the blood of this Jewish Messiah, this is life-changing and powerful. Until the Lord returns in glorious splendor, it remains a fact that the fields are still white unto harvest, and that the message that we have been given to communicate is strikingly good news.

John 3

Nicodemus was an important man in the circles of religious power in Judea. He was a ruler of the Jews, one of the elders of the nation, and a leader in the religious and political party known as the Pharisees. The Pharisees were known for their seriousness in attending to the Law, though their understanding of God’s Law was deeply flawed, and their expectation of what would come to them through their supposed keeping of that Law was greatly inflated. Because of these problems, it was very difficult for someone committed to the Pharisaic way to appreciate the ministry and purpose of Jesus Christ, and the good news that He came to bring. A right understanding of Jesus and the gospel is built upon the fact that we are all guilty sinners according to the Law of God, rightly condemned for our disobedience. This was something that the Pharisees as a group could not fully embrace. Therefore, it is easy to see why they would have no place in their system for a Messiah who would atone for the sins of Israel through His own obedience and death.

Nonetheless, this Nicodemus was attracted to Jesus, and came to Him at night, and he spoke to Him some words of approval. Yet Jesus Christ did not receive his compliments. It is true that Jesus was a teacher from God, and that the signs that He performed displayed that fact, but Nicodemus needed to see more than this. It is not enough for us to recognize our Lord’s good qualities and gifts, or even to consider Him to be the best of all prophets. We must see Him as the Messiah who takes away our sins, and to see this requires a work of God in our souls that Jesus calls here being “born again,” or “born from above.”

The kingdom of God is the kingdom of heaven, and to be a part of that kingdom is greatly to be desired. The way into that kingdom is by birth, not the physical birth that seems to be the only birth that Nicodemus can think of, but by spiritual birth that can only come from heaven and heaven’s God. It is by God the Holy Spirit that people are brought into heaven’s world. He is a wind from another land that cannot be observed with the eyes entirely, and cannot be controlled by even the most well-connected, influential, and pious people. The fact that there would be a coming age of the Spirit of God could have been known from many passages in the Law, the prophets, and the writings of the Old Testament Scriptures. This is something that any true religious teacher in Israel should have known. Yet they did not seem to know, and even though Nicodemus had some respect and admiration for Jesus, he also did not seem to know these things.

The way of the kingdom of heaven on earth has come through the One who came from heaven to earth, and who ascended back to His heavenly abode after completing His work that He came to accomplish. The way for someone to experience heaven’s birth in his soul is to look to Him and live. As the people of Israel dying in the wilderness because of their sin and rebellion needed to look to the serpent lifted up upon the pole, the people of every time and place on earth need to look to Jesus and the cross in faith in order to live, in order to be born in heaven. This is why Jesus first came into the world, not to condemn, but that people who are already condemned might find eternal life through believing in the name of the only Son of God.

Nonetheless, when the Son of God came with such mercy and salvation, just as when God provided the serpent in the wilderness, not everyone would look to Him and live. The Light came into the world, but those who were not yet born from above showed that they loved their evil more than their God. They turned away from the Light of the world instead of embracing Him. They may have insisted on their good standing with God, and their excellence in keeping all kinds of religious traditions. They would not see their depravity and find life in Jesus.

Those who rejected the way to peace with God through the works and atonement of a Substitute, rejected both John the Baptist and Jesus. They believed that their standing with God had to do with things like purification rituals of cleansing oneself from the stain of a dirty world, rather than admitting the sin that is within, and turning away from that sin. The rituals of Jewish purification were one thing, the baptism of repentance as preparation for the coming of the Messiah was another, and the baptism of union with Christ as a spiritual reality was yet another, better, thing. This final baptism is well connected with the kingdom of heaven, and with the celebration of a marriage between Christ and His church. The purification rituals would go their way, and even John and his baptism of preparation for the Messiah would decrease, but Jesus Christ and the reality of our engagement to be the Lord’s people will increase forever.

The amazing thing about Jesus is that He is from above. Prophets and godly men were entrusted with messages that were from above, but He Himself is from above, and He is above all. The testimony that He gives is the testimony of the one who has seen and heard the reality of the kingdom of heaven. It is somewhat understandable when those who do not accept this reality of the pre-existent Son of God reject His testimony concerning the facts about heaven. What is harder to understand is when we who believe in Jesus still insist on treating heavenly realms as a complete mystery, though He has revealed to us so much. We need to receive His testimony. God is true, and Jesus is God. Set your seal of approval on the person of Jesus and on His teaching about heaven and earth. He is an unending Source of the gift of the Holy Spirit, and the Father has given all things into His hand. We need more than purification ceremonies and even our own thoughts of repentance if we are to have honest evidence that we are no longer under the wrath of God. We need to believe in the Son of God, and to obey Him by the grace of the Holy Spirit.

John 2

A wedding is supposed to be a great celebration. God is in favor of the idea of one man from one family and one woman from another family being united together in marriage, such that the two are somehow made one. He invented the concept, and He has made it one of the responsibilities of societies and their governing authorities to protect the interests of people as it relates to this good gift of marriage. There are many great advantages that come to us as a result of this great blessing, but paramount among them is that marriage is to be a display of God’s love for His people, and our submission to Him as a Husband.

Jesus came to bring about a great wedding. He gives His life for His bride, and she is to be purified by Him to be holy, spotless, and without blemish. That final wedding marks the end of a long period of decay and mourning. Finally things will be right again, and we will celebrate. It is particularly because of this great story of the best of all weddings, that the commencement of any blessed marriage should be a cause for rejoicing. This is one of the reasons that God has given wine among men, that we might more readily have our hearts appropriately gladdened. In this very important and surprising episode, even before the appropriate public commencement of Jesus’ ministry, there was a problem that came up at a wedding that He attended. The poor couple had run out of wine.

It is Mary, the mother of Jesus, who brings this need to the attention of her Son. She must know that He is able to take care of this problem. After He makes the point that His hour has not yet come, she gives this wonderful instruction to the servant, “Do whatever He tells you.” Jesus was under no compulsion to work this miracle, and he certainly faced no absolute necessity to do what He did the way that He did it. It is interesting that He chose to bless a wedding, but even more interesting that He chose to do this by using large jars that were normally used for Jewish rites of purification. These customs of purification would soon be a matter of some controversy between Jesus and the Pharisees in the months ahead. This action is suggestive of the ministry that Christ brings. The traditional ceremonial customs that have become such a large part of Pharisaic Judaism must give way to the joy of the most delightful wine on a most wonderful occasion.

One other detail is worth seeing here. The steward is not aware of the fact that Jesus has turned the water into wine, but he is aware of the fact that this new wine is the best wine. The marriage that is coming is a heavenly marriage, and the wine that is provided at this wedding in Galilee is a heavenly foretaste of a celebration to come. The one who is the Bridegroom has provided the blessing. The celebration is beginning even now, in a way. This is the first of seven signs in John’s gospel, signs that show us the divine Christ and the kingdom of heaven.

This transition from the old ways to the new ways shows up not only in our Lord’s miracles, but also in his teaching and his actions of judgment. We are used to thinking about the cleansing of the Old Testament temple in Jerusalem as an event that took place at the very end of Jesus’ ministry, just prior to the cross. John tells us that Jesus began His public ministry with a similar episode, so that the two form important bookends for our understanding of what He was doing.

It was not that Jesus hated the temple or the sacrificial system that God had appointed for His people in His Word. He loved these things, though He knew that it was time for the old ceremonial laws to be completed, and for a new way of worship to begin. What He did hate was the abuse of God’s ordinances. He loved His Father’s house, but He hated the fact that men had perverted the things of God for their own selfish gain. In the words of Psalm 69, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” Jesus is the “Me” that the psalmist refers to. He loved the Old Covenant place of the presence of God, and He loved the New Testament temple of the Holy Spirit, the Messiah and His church. He loved that new temple so much that He was willing to be consumed for that love, in a sense, on the cross. This was necessary in order for us to be a part of the temple of God.

Those who thought of themselves as in charge of the temple area were taken aback by the boldness of Christ’s actions. They asked for some sign that would justify His words and deeds. He spoke of the coming destruction of a temple, a temple that would be raised again in three days. This was a very unusual thing to speak about. They naturally thought that He was referring to the temple building on the top of Mt. Zion. After the cross and the resurrection there can be no doubt that He was referring to those important events, and to His only position as the true Temple of God. This was a somewhat veiled reference to the ultimate sign of Messiah. His disciples only understood what He was speaking of after the events themselves took place.

These great events were spoken of in the Scriptures, but they could only be understood as the central events of God’s plan of redemption after they had taken place. Yet there was One Man who understood the Scriptures and Himself. In fact, He knew what was in man. He knew our need for the gift of faith, and for the miracle of spiritual life. He knew about our sin, and our need for an atoning sacrifice, and He came as the one who was prepared to do the will of His Father, despite the tremendous cost of our salvation in His own flesh and blood. After He had won victory over sin and death, the church began to see more clearly that He was the new Temple and the great Husband of redeemed bride. We see these things now, and have great cause for celebration. Yet we are aware of the fact that the best wedding reception is yet to come.

Prayer based on Jeremiah 46

Lord God Almighty, all nations are known to You. Lands devoted to idolatry cannot pretend that they do not know of Your great works of creation. Yet people everywhere are full of confidence in themselves. You are in charge of the affairs of every land. The warrior considers his own strength invincible, but a greater foe can come in a moment. Your people must not put their trust in the powers of this world. We trust in You. One nation may seem to have the strength to last forever, but that country will not stand in the day of her trouble. You, O Lord of hosts, will judge the rulers and idols of all nations. Give us hope in a better day, a hope that is secure not through the weapons of this world, but through Your divine power and love.

Prayer based on Leviticus 11

Great God and King, You set apart Your people Israel from all of the other nations of the earth. You governed even the things that they consumed. They were not allowed to eat according to their own private judgment. You told them what was to be detestable among them. You gave them a powerful experience of being different from the world. This ceremonial law had its purpose for the time of preparation, reminding your people that we are to be distinct from the world, not because of what goes into our bodies, but because of what comes out of us. When the time of the Old Covenant was near fulfillment, Your Son announced to us a new freedom to eat according to conscience. We ask that You would aid us in turning away from the way of death, which is truly unclean. The things of sin that come out of us still defile us. Out of our hearts and our mouths come filthy desires and words that are an attack on the way of life that we have been given. Your Son was perfectly holy for us. May we walk in holiness with joy, observing all things that He has commanded.

John 1

The Greek translation of the Old Testament begins with these words (translated), “In the beginning.” John starts his gospel with these same words. Not only are the actual words the same, but they are referring to the same beginning, not the beginning of Jesus’ ministry on earth as a man, but the beginning of the world. John tells us that the divine Voice of God, the Word, the eternal Son of God is the same divine Person as the man who was baptized by John the Baptist. He was in the beginning. He was with God, and He was and is God. Everything that was made was made through Him. It would be completely correct to say that in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and He did this all through His divine Voice, and that this Word is none other than the Son of God, Jesus Christ. He is the divine Light that gives light to men, first by their nature in Adam as those created in the image of God, but then secondly in their souls by the second Adam, who gives spiritual life to men, and finally at the resurrection of the dead. Sin, death, and all the darkness that comes with them came through one man, Adam, but all light and life have come to us through Jesus Christ.

God sent John the Baptist to be the forerunner of the One who is the Light of the World, Jesus, the Builder of a great kingdom of light. John was a prophet, and was surely a great man, but he was not the Son of God. His testimony was very valuable, but Jesus was more than one who brings testimony. He came as God incarnate.

When the Son of God visited us, He was not gladly received by everyone. The Jews rejected their Messiah, and even those within His own family were not ready to embrace Him as Lord or Savior. Yet by the will of God, there were some few before His death and resurrection, and many more after those important events, who would receive Him as the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. To embrace Christ in this way is not first a matter of our natural heritage, or even primarily of our own decision. We are enabled to believe in His Name. We are made to be new creatures in Christ, and even children of God, with all the rights that go with such an exalted position. This is much more than Moses or the Law could have given to us. This is a gift of the One who was before John, even from before the beginning, One who was with God, and who is God, Jesus Christ. He came from heaven. He has seen God. He is the only God who is at the Father’s side, and is the One who was chosen to make God known to us in person.

The forerunner, John the Baptist, was consistent in his testimony that he, John, was not the Christ. Though he was something of an Elijah, and certainly was a prophet, yet he did not consider himself to be the Elijah or Prophet that people had wrongly come to expect. He knew that he was a voice crying in the wilderness in fulfillment of Isaiah 40. He was baptizing Jews with a baptism of repentance, which was a very bold thing to do. Yet he consistently was testifying to the great superiority of Jesus Christ. Jesus would bring about the pouring out of the Holy Spirit upon the church in a far greater baptism than John’s baptism of water.

God confirmed to John that Jesus was the One, the Lamb of God, the Sacrifice appointed who would take away the sin of a new world. Pointing out Jesus to Israel was the purpose of even John’s ministry of water baptism. Here was the Lord, full of the Holy Spirit, and marked by God through a visible manifestation of His presence from on high, such that John the Baptist was definitely convinced that Jesus was the One.

The disciples of John were given another Word of testimony by the Baptist the day after He pointed to Jesus in person. He again said, “Behold, the Lamb of God!” Two of the men did begin to follow Him at that moment, but they did not seem to know what to say or do. They would spend time with Him over the next three years, years that ended with the tumultuous events of the cross and the resurrection.

There would be others who would be chosen by Jesus as His most intimate followers. They seemed to have an almost immediate awareness that Jesus was the Messiah, but very little concept of what this would actually mean. They knew that He was the fulfillment of what was written about Him in the Law and the Prophets, but they did not seem to understand what all that testimony actually said. They would learn now by following Him. They would see many amazing things, unexpected things about a Messiah who seemed to come from the wrong town, even the wrong region of the ancient nation of Israel, but who also seemed to know things that He could not know unless He possessed capabilities beyond those of normal men.

This Teacher who took it upon Himself to assign a name to a grown man, was truly the Son of God. He was the King of Israel, but He was also much more than they realized Him to be. They did not yet understand that this King would be victorious through His death. They did not know that the power of that death would open up a way for people to have bold access to God in heaven through Him. He would be the stairway to heaven. He was the one encountered by a sleeping Jacob so long before. He would be the ladder between heaven and earth that Jacob had seen in his dreams. He was the Way, the only Way, who would bring about the reunion again of heaven and earth. He was the glorious Son of Man spoken of by the prophet Daniel. He did not live for the praise of men, yet millions would praise Him. Here was the Light of the world. Here was the Source of resurrection life.

Luke 24

The women who travelled to the tomb where Jesus was buried very early on Sunday morning did not find there what they expected to find. They came with burial spices hoping to show their respect for Jesus by caring for His dead body. There is no indication that they were expecting the resurrection. They did believe in the resurrection of the dead, but they understood that this would happen in connection with a final judgment that would come at the culmination of all things. An earlier resurrection of the Messiah, only three days after His death, was very unexpected, despite our Lord’s Word guaranteeing that this very thing would take place.

Even from the outset of His ministry (John 2:19), Jesus had predicted it with these subtle words, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” He had clearly instructed his disciples about this in Luke 18:33 saying of the Son of Man after His coming death, “On the third day he will rise.” Yet the disciples were not waiting there that morning, and the women were bringing burial spices. In fact, there is no indication that anyone believed that He would rise from the dead that Sunday morning. There were some who were concerned, and their words prove that his prediction of a speedy resurrection was not a closely held secret. We read of the words of His enemies after His death in Matthew 27:63, “We remember how that impostor said, while he was still alive, ‘After three days I will rise.’” It was based on this information that Pilate agreed to a guard of soldiers who were to make the tomb as secure as they could. Despite their efforts, it remains a fact of history that on that first day of the week, Jesus rose from the dead.

On that Sunday morning a stone had been rolled away. On that day the tomb did not contain the body of Jesus. On that day angels announced that Jesus was alive. On that day, Peter saw linen grave cloths lying by themselves. On that day, they heard reports that seemed like idle tales, and they all remembered what He had told them about the third day, and they still found it very hard to believe what admitted of no other explanation.

On that day, a follower of Jesus named Cleopas and his companion had heard a report about an empty tomb, and an angel message, but they did not believe. We know they did not believe because as they were walking along the road their hearts were dejected. They thought that all hope was lost, and that Jesus could not have really been the Redeemer. They also knew about the Word that Jesus had spoken earlier concerning the third day, but they were unable to be happy, because their eyes were closed to the truth of the resurrection.

Their travelling Companion along the road somehow remained unknown to them, even though He corrected them in their foolishness, and told them that they were “slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken.” This Companion taught them from the Old Testament, showing them the truth of the Messiah from the Scriptures, the truth that the Christ needed to suffer and enter into His glory. It was only later, in the breaking of the bread, that the risen Christ was revealed to them. The one who opened up the Scriptures to them was the very One who was spoken of in those Scriptures. But then, He was gone. Still they knew then that He was alive, not only because of their newly opened eyes, but because their hearts had burned within them while He talked to them on the road.

As they returned with great enthusiasm to the larger group of disciples, suddenly things were happening. Peter had seen the Lord, and then Christ Himself was suddenly standing among them, announcing the peace of God upon them all. Still they were afraid, and it was hard for them to believe what had to be true. He had to draw attention to His hands and feet, which bore the emblems of His crucifixion, and invited them to touch Him, to look at Him, and He ate food.

Once again, now with the apostles present, He directed their attention especially to the Scriptures, teaching them from the entire Hebrew Bible the truths that were written about Him there, using the three categories of Law, Prophets, and Writings or Psalms. It was from an illuminated understanding of the existing Scriptures that the church and her leaders could know that the Messiah had to suffer and die, that He had to rise from the dead on the third day, and that they had to preach repentance and forgiveness of sins to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.

In order for this mission to move forward, one more major event would soon take place, an event that the Lord told them to wait for, the pouring out of the Holy Spirit upon them after His ascension to heavenly realms. By this pouring out of the Spirit of God, they would be clothed with heavenly power to do kingdom of God work. With the giving of the Holy Spirit, the Promise of the Father, and with the benediction of the Son of God, now ascending on high, the Word of the Scriptures would be proclaimed throughout the earth, and the worshipers of God would be gathered from every tribe and tongue and nation. Now they did understand, and they waited for the promise, worshiping Jesus continually with great joy and expectation.

Luke 23

Jesus the Messiah, was, in fact, the King of the Jews. He was the One that God had promised so long ago to David, who was not merely a royal descendant, like Solomon or Hezekiah. He was the eternal King over God’s chosen people, not only on the earth but in heaven. To state it this way is the same thing as saying that Jesus Christ was the Head of the church. The elect church is the worship gathering of the Israel of God, so the One who is the ultimate King of the Jews must also be the Ruler over all those who through Him are adopted into the family and household of God.

This promised Son of David was not merely rejected by the leaders of the Jews in His day; they led Him off to the Roman governor with false accusations that He was misleading the nation and moving others toward a tax revolt. While these charges were lies, their final claim was true, in a way. Jesus was saying that He Himself was the Christ, a King, yet this is something that His own disciples could not yet really understand. Certainly Pilate could not have rightly understood these words. Despite His confusion concerning the Man who was before him, the Roman governor did correctly see and contend for what he discovered through his own examination of the Accused, “I find no guilt in this Man.”

The governor did not know what to do with Jesus. Neither did Herod, who was also in Jerusalem at the time. Herod had long been curious about Jesus, and wanted to see him perform a great sign, but Jesus had nothing to say to him when this Herod, called by the title of “king,” addressed Him. On this day, when the real King of the Jews, who was also the King over a new creation, would go to the cross to die for sinners, two important men, Pilate and Herod, would become friends with one another. They were suddenly drawn together in their strange predicament of having the power to order the death of a man who they knew to be innocent of the charges against him, and who did nothing to defend himself. The actual determination of what to do was Pilate’s, and his first decision was to release Him.

By this time the crowd had been stirred up as weapon of influence against Pilate. They demanded the freeing of an insurrectionist, Barabbas, and the crucifixion of Jesus. While Pilate attempted to resist their force for a time, he soon gave in to them, though he knew that Christ had no civil guilt according to Roman law that would have justified a capital penalty. Through all of this there was one silent Man who was actually in charge. He was not changed in His course by the shouts of the crowds, by the plots of the religious leaders, by the words and actions of Pilate or Herod, by the mocking or cruelty of anyone there that day. Though Pilate delivered this true King over to the will of those who would kill Him, it was Jesus Christ who was doing what He Himself came to do, to express the love of God for the elect, not through words, but through the only action that could accomplish our eternal redemption. This Jesus, who appeared to be so powerless, was in control.

This Jesus spoke, not to try to secure a last minute pardon, but to warn the daughters of Jerusalem concerning a day of trial that will be coming upon them. He was going down this road of suffering as the Head of the church and a Husband of a bride. Others would follow in the way of the cross, though they could atone for no man’s sins. They would suffer as a testimony of their faith in Him, and some would see trouble coming upon them as a result of the end of the Old Covenant era, in the destruction of Jerusalem.

The Lord of glory was put on a cross, and the details of Psalm 22, Psalm 69, and Isaiah 53 were happening before His holy eyes. They cast lots to divide His garments, they offered Him a bitter drink, and He was numbered with transgressors in His death when two thieves were crucified with Him, one on His right and the other on His left. Though soldiers and rulers mocked and scoffed, one of those two thieves was quite suddenly granted a gift of repentance and faith. He saw Jesus as the One who was coming into a heavenly kingdom, and he wanted the King to remember him. This request was granted in such a way that we now understand that the life of Christ went to this paradise while His body rested in the grave. He said, “Today you will be with Me in paradise.”

And then, He died. In the midst of a deep darkness over the whole land, a light of heaven, as it were, came shining through the veil of death and misery that had come upon creation so long ago in man’s first representative. When Adam sinned, a veil of anguish came upon the earth; when Jesus died the curtain in the temple was torn in two, and a sure way to the Father of lights was made through the blood of the perfect Lamb of God. Jesus did not have His life grabbed from Him; He yielded His life to the Father, and then His body was dead; and He was buried in the tomb of a rich man, a man who was looking for the kingdom of God.

Did that man understand that he was a witness of the dead body of the One who was King over the kingdom of heaven? The centurion was given eyes to see that Jesus was an innocent man. The crowds were able to see the horror of the death of the righteous One, for they went home, not celebrating, but beating their breasts in heartache. No one was yet able to see that Jesus was the victorious King of the kingdom, and the Head of a worldwide gathering of worshippers that He had called His church. Many would see this in just a few days, since, as He promised, the body of our Lord would not be in the tomb for very long.

Prayer based on Matthew 28

Lord of Hosts, Your Son is risen! The stone is rolled away and the tomb is empty. More than this, our Risen Savior has met with His disciples. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Him. We must go forth and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the Triune Name. We will teach and do what He has commanded. Our confidence is in His presence, for He is with us always, even to the end of the age. Cast far away from us all doubt. Strengthen us by Your Spirit that we might stand firm in the face of every foe, for Jesus is Lord, forever and ever.

Jonah 1

The Apostle Paul writes to Timothy that the one who desires the work of an elder desires a good thing. One of the qualifications for this office is that a person be apt to teach. Within this classification that we call “elder” were apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastors and teachers. Paul tells the Ephesian church that these men who proclaim the truth of the Lord are gifts from God. That does not mean that it is always easy to be an ambassador for the Lord, and it does not mean that everyone who has ever spoken for the Lord did so with a great sense of willingness.

Luke 22

Many hands were raised to wound the Son of God, but it was our sin that sent Him to the cross. The chief priests and the scribes were certainly against Him, but why did they pursue the course of murder? One can disagree with an adversary vehemently without seeking to actually kill Him. Something else was going on here that is hard for us to understand unless we admit the truth about what the Scriptures teach us concerning our own inner depravity. The religious leaders were not neutral observers of the Messiah who gave Him a fair hearing. In fulfillment of the Scriptures (See Psalm 7, 35, 69, 109), they hated Him without a cause. They were not alone in this. They found a co-conspirator in one of the twelve, Judas Iscariot. Satan, we are told, entered into him, and the close companion of the Lord sought an opportunity to betray Jesus away from the crowd. No one anticipated that the crowd would soon consent to Jesus’ death. Nor did anyone seem to expect that Jesus would rise from the dead prior to the general resurrection, despite the fact that He told them this would happen on more than one occasion.

Jesus understood exactly what was taking place that night. This is especially clear as the disciples prepared to eat the Passover with Him according to His instructions. It is at this “Last Supper” that Jesus instituted the meal that the church calls the “Lord’s Supper” or “Communion,” the meal that we eat when we gather together in worship, a meal that we eat in memory of His death. Think of what the events of this night tell us about Jesus’ understanding of what was about to take place. He knew that Judas would betray Him. He knew that He would die. He knew that His death, portrayed in the bread and wine that He called His body and blood, was something so central to His mission, that it would be right for us to remember it regularly in the most solemn and joyous celebration of a death that could ever be given among men. He knew that there would be great trouble for the man who betrayed Him. He knew that His death was somehow connected to the Old Testament ceremony of the Passover, where an animal was the substitute for the people, a substitute that ensured that they would live, though they deserved to die. He knew that His death would not be the end of the story, but that He would live in something He called the kingdom of God, where He would eat and drink again. He knew that this meal, and the death that it represented was a covenantal meal, a meal for the people of God’s covenant blessing, and that it signaled such a change from the way of the Mosaic ceremonies, that it could be called a “New Covenant,” in accord with the prophecies of Jeremiah. All of this Jesus knew, and that is why He earnestly desired to eat this Passover with His disciples.

Though Jesus understood these things, even at this late moment, it is clear that His disciples had missed not only the facts of the coming kingdom, but more importantly that had no feel for the values of the kingdom. Though the King was headed to the cross, thus taking the lowest position of humble service, they still wanted to be the greatest. Nonetheless, they were not rejected by Him because of this, but they were kept by His grace, and their confusion and sin underscored the overwhelming fact that He alone could be the Lamb of God. The disciples would have a place eating and drinking with the Master, and even judging the tribes of Israel. Though Satan wanted to grind Peter to powder, His faith would not fail, but He would deny they Lord before these events were over. Jesus was about to face the trial that He was born to face. They too would have troubles, but He would fulfill His unique role according to the Scriptures, and would be numbered with the transgressors. As they left that important meal, they went to the Mount of Olives, and Jesus consecrated Himself to the will of His Father above every other desire.

It was there that the Son of God was soon betrayed with a kiss. There he gave Himself up to everything that would follow this wretched moment, everything that was necessary for Him who came to do the will of God in dying for us. The way to the glory of the kingdom of this unusual King would be through the cross and the grave. Victory would not come through the sword. Nor would the Son of Man be trapped against His will by the clever plots of His adversaries. He was willing to face the horror of divine wrath that we deserved. He did not need to be taken away in handcuffs. He was ready to serve in this unusual way, and he was the only One who could do it.

Everything that Jesus had predicted would come to pass. Peter did deny Him three times. Yet this low point for the man who had confessed that Jesus was the Christ would not be the end of his life, but something of a new beginning that would be especially seen when the Spirit was poured out upon the church. This great apostle would preach Christ, and suffer for the Name of Jesus. Here there is a beginning hint of a transition that is coming, a transition that was given in brokenness, as the Lord looked at Peter, and Peter wept bitter tears.

But now was not the time of preaching, but the time of darkness. The Son of God would face new hands coming against Him in vicious hatred. Petty officials would have their moment to say what they really felt about the Lord of Glory. They made fun of Him, blindfolding the God who sees, and then beating Him up. Here was God in the flesh. What a target for blasphemy! Now the council of Jewish leaders would have their chance. They would decisively reject the Messiah of the Jews, the One who was to sit at the right hand of the power of God. This prophesy and with His claim to be the Son of God was enough for them to believe that He was pretending His own divinity, and they rejected Him without any consideration of the facts before them.

Did they want the truth? Apparently they did not. They did not investigate the signs that He patiently had performed. They did not give careful consideration to His public teaching, and then compare these things according to the standard of the prophetic Scriptures. They raised their hands against Him. This is how the Lamb of God was treated when He came in the fullness of divine love. Any suffering that we face today is much smaller than what our perfectly holy Redeemer knowingly and willingly faced for our sake. If we have been called to give anything for Him, it is not too much for God to ask of us. It was by our sins that Jesus died, and it was by His death we have been granted life.

Luke 21

What does it mean to really give yourself to God and to His kingdom? There has never been a better display of that kind of life than Jesus Christ, and especially His love for us displayed on the cross. This is the vision for living that we must always return to. But even in the days of the Old Covenant, there were those who truly loved God and His kingdom, and they wanted to give their all to Him. Since the days of Christ, there have also been many inspiring examples of cross love throughout the centuries of the church, where the Lord has supplied extraordinary resources of grace to certain followers to meet the need of the moment in their day of trial or testing.

Some of these may be entirely unknown to us, since we tend to focus on those who give much according to our way of measuring devotion. Jesus called upon His disciples to measure kingdom dedication according to kingdom wisdom. By that standard, a poor woman humbly placing two small copper coins into the temple treasure was a star of devotion, while many rich people who gave very substantial gifts were nothing of the kind. All of us need to gaze at the truth of the cross, and surrender our all for the glory of the coming kingdom. In the day of that woman, the temple in Jerusalem was the very picture of heaven displayed among men. Now Christ has died and risen, and the preaching of these truths in the hope of the gospel is the center of our sacrificial prayers, efforts, and contributions, together with the care of the poor, especially in the church.

In the day of Jesus a very significant kingdom transition was taking place. In just a few decades there would be no box for temple offerings on the top of Mount Zion, because there would be no temple on the highest point of the earthly Jerusalem. In this way our attention would be drawn to a higher place with greater clarity than ever. Even here on earth, a new kingdom expression would be seen in the gathered church with Christ as the Head. Wherever His name would be proclaimed in Word and sacrament, wherever the faithful would gather to sing and to pray together, wherever the teaching of the apostles would be received with joyful hearts, the kingdom of God would be visible among men.

Until the time when that kingdom would come in fullness, there would continue to be many trials of various kinds, trials that would only signal that something more glorious than the temple in Jerusalem would one day be born in resurrection splendor. The life of the kingdom after the pouring out of the Spirit at Pentecost would be a wonderful step forward beyond the old life of preparatory ceremonies, yet it would still be a life in a world of mortality. Here the church would face not only the common afflictions of natural disasters and societal upheaval, but also persecution for the truth from adversaries who would stand against the Lord’s people. These kinds of troubles are not unexpected, and in the midst of them, our Lord will supply us with grace and with words appropriate to the opportunity before us. At such a time it should not surprise us that people would hate us. The pathway that God has for us is one of patient endurance leading to the fulfillment of the kingdom in resurrection glory.

The time of Old Testament Israel was coming to a decided conclusion in that generation. This would be an event of much suffering and upheaval, but it would also be a necessary thing, since the people of God would no longer be restricted to one nation. Beyond this judgment, there would eventually come a much more cosmic destruction and renewal at the coming of the Son of Man in glory. It is important for us to see that this Son of Man is the same Son of Man who came first to suffer and die. As He was so near to the cross, He spoke here of the assurance of His coming again in a different way, a way that no one could miss. In Him, the kingdom of God was so near, but the timing of the fulfillment of that kingdom might be centuries away. The time of Israel, God’s fig tree, was now coming to a close, but the time of Christ and the resurrection was just beginning.

Jesus has inaugurated a new generation, a new age, in His coming to save. The old age of the temple in Jerusalem was coming to a speedy close. The new age of Christ and the resurrection and the preaching of His good news had just begun. This new age that started in Jerusalem with the last Passover and the last Pentecost would not end until the Lord came again on the clouds of glory. This is the generation that Christ spoke of, the entire age that stretched from his death and resurrection until His coming with the angels of heaven.

Until that day, we are told to give ourselves over to Christ and His Kingdom, just as that humble poor widow gave herself to the work of God and the Old Covenant temple in Jerusalem. She did what was right in her day. We do what is right in ours. What would not be right would be to consider the kingdom of God on earth to be a place of earthly gain and lazy riches. We follow the One who gave Himself to us on the cross. We need to stay awake to the facts of the Lord and His kingdom, turning away from all drunkenness and dissipation, being careful not to be overwhelmed unnecessarily by the cares of this world, and staying awake to the teaching of Christ and the kingdom. This is the pathway of escaping the tribulations of the world all around us in our day, so that we may stand at last before the Son of Man.