The most racially and socially diverse place in the country

It might surprise you, but local churches are the most diverse places in the country.

“Churches are best social melting pots in modern Britain,” ran the headline of a Daily Telegraph article in December 2014. Based on a survey of over 4000 people aged 13 upwards, the article explained, “Churches and other places of worship are more successful than any other social setting at bringing people of different backgrounds together, well ahead of gatherings such as parties, meetings, weddings or venues such as pubs and clubs.”

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It went on to show how churches were far more racially and socially diverse than the average UK setting, and came a close second to sporting events when it came to age. Church, it seems, is for everyone.

Church for Everyone

Then again, maybe this isn’t so surprising. Ever since its foundation, two thousand years ago, the church has been a multi-coloured blend of Europeans and Asians, men and women, slaves and masters, old and young, rich and poor. In a world where birds of a feather tend to flock together, even in religious contexts — wherever you are in the world, mosques and Hindu temples tend to look and feel pretty much the same — the church has often stood out as a place where totally different people come together as one. The only thing we have in common is our shared commitment to the God revealed in Jesus.

Jesus unites people who would never otherwise know each other. When he was born, he was admired by peasant farmers and foreign philosophers. When he got his twelve disciples together, they included impulsive alpha males alongside dreamy mystics, and rebels alongside collaborators. The crowds who followed him were urban and rural, rich and poor. He died between outlaws, then was buried in the tomb of an aristocrat. Something about this man drew the attention of everyone. It still does.

“Churches and other places of worship are more successful than any other social setting at bringing people of different backgrounds together”

That’s not just true globally, but locally here at Kings. Every Sunday, we gather together as kids and teens, babies and grandparents and students. We have academics and artists. We have marrieds, singles, parents and single parents, and others who have gone through the heartache of divorce, or the pain of bereavement. We have the employed and the job seeker, the long term sick and the long term carer. We have pharmacists licensed to deal in drugs, and others who have dealt illegally. We have current law-keepers and former law breakers: prison officers, police officers, politicians and magistrates, right alongside those who’ve turned over a new leaf. We have army and navy, sparks and plumbers, writers, artists and musicians. Shelf stackers and baristas and till operators. Alcohol dependents and addiction counsellors. Former atheists, agnostics and sceptics; former Muslims, Hindus and Jehovah’s Witnesses. Kings really is a church for everyone.

Books: The Life We Never Expected

Sometimes you end up living the life you never expected. When Andrew and Rachel found out that one, and then both, of their children had severe autism, their world was turned on its head.

With clarity and biblical insight, they share their experience of grief and worship, struggle and hope. As well as reflecting on the specific challenges of raising children with special needs, they speak to broader questions as well: the problem of suffering, building a marriage under pressure, fighting for joy and trusting in the goodness of God.

This is not just a book for families and friends of special needs children, but for all who have been thrown a curve ball in life, and need to know how to lament, worship, pray and hope. The opening chapter is included below, and the book is available on Amazon here.

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Opening Chapter

Finding out your children have special needs is kind of like being given an orange.

You’re sitting with a group of friends in a restaurant. You’ve just finished a decent main course, and are about to consider the dessert menu when one of your friends gets up, taps their glass with a spoon, and announces that they have bought desserts for everyone as a gift. They disappear round the corner, and return a minute later with an armful of spherical objects about the size of tennis balls, beautifully wrapped, with a bow on each.

As they begin distributing the mysterious desserts, everyone starts to open them in excitement, and one by one the group discovers that they have each been given a chocolate orange. Twenty segments of rich, smooth, lightly flavoured milk chocolate: a perfect conclusion to a fine meal, and a very sociable way of topping off an enjoyable evening. The table is filled with chatter, expressions of gratitude between mouthfuls, and that odd mixture of squelching sound and intermittent silence that you always get when a large group is filling their faces. Then you open yours.

You’ve been given an orange. Not a chocolate orange; an actual orange. Eleven segments of erratically sized, pith-covered segments, with surprisingly large pips in annoying places, requiring a degree in engineering in order to peel it properly, the consumption of which inevitably involves having juice run down to (at least) your wrists, being squirted in the eye with painful acid, and spending the remainder of the meal picking strands the size of iron filings out from in between your molars. You stare at the orange in front of you with a mixture of surprise, disappointment and confusion. The rest of the table hasn’t noticed. They’re too busy enjoying their chocolate.

“it rocks everything, and the entire picture of our lives, both in the present and the future, gets repainted in the course of a few hours”

You pause to reflect. There’s nothing wrong with oranges, you say to yourself. They are sharp, sweet, refreshing and zesty. The undisputed kings of the citrus fruit world – when did you last order a freshly squeezed lemon juice? – oranges are enliveningly flavoursome, filled with Vitamin C, and far better for you than the mixture of sugar, milk powder, cocoa butter and milk fat your friends are greedily consuming. With a bit of practice, they can probably be peeled without blinding your neighbours. Looked at from a number of perspectives, in fact – medical, dietary, environmental – you have actually been given a better dessert than everyone else. And you didn’t have a right to be given anything anyway.

But your heart sinks, all the same. An orange was not what you expected; as soon as you saw everyone else opening their chocolate, you simply assumed that is what you would get, too. Not only that, but it wasn’t what you wanted – you could pretend that it was, and do your best to appreciate it and be thankful, but you really had your heart set on those rich, smooth, lightly flavoured milk chocolate segments. And because you’re surrounded by other people, you have to come to terms with the sheer unfairness of being given your orange, while your friends enjoy, share, laugh about and celebrate theirs. A nice meal has taken an unexpected turn, and you suddenly feel isolated, disappointed, frustrated, even alone.

Discovering your kids have special needs is like that.

Before we become parents, we have all sorts of ideas, expectations and dreams about what it will be like. These ideas come from our own childhood, whether good or bad, from the media, and from seeing the experiences of our friends and relatives: pushing prams with sleeping babies along the riverside, teaching our children to walk, training them how to draw with crayons rather than eat them, answering cute questions, making star charts, walking them to school. We don’t look forward to the more unpleasant aspects of parenting – interrupted nights, nappies, tantrums – but because we know that they will come, and because we know that they will pass, we are emotionally prepared for them. Mostly, we daydream about the good bits, and talk to our friends about the joys and challenges of what are about to take on.

Then something happens. For some of us, it is at a twelve-week scan, or at birth; for others, it is several months or even years later. But something happens that tells us, somehow, that all is not well. We’ll talk a bit more about this later, but for now, it’s enough to say that it rocks everything, and the entire picture of our lives, both in the present and the future, gets repainted in the course of a few hours. Gradually, as time starts to heal, we come to terms with the situation, and we learn that there are some wonderful things about what we’ve been given, as well as the difficult and painful things. Yet we can’t help feeling isolated, disappointed, frustrated, even alone.

Special needs, like the orange, are unexpected. We didn’t plan for them, and we didn’t anticipate them. Because our children are such a beautiful gift, we often feel guilty for even saying this, but we might as well admit that we didn’t want our children to have autism, any more than we wanted them to have Down’s, or cerebral palsy, or whatever else. Give or take, we wanted pretty much what our friends had: children who crawled at one, talked at two, potty trained at three, asked questions at four, and went off to mainstream school at five. We could have lived quite happily without knowing what Piedro boots were for, or what stimming was, or how to fill out DLA forms. So there are times, when we’re wiping the citric acid out of our eyes and watching our friends enjoying their chocolate, when it feels spectacularly unfair, and we wish we could retreat to a place where everyone had oranges, so we wouldn’t have to fight so hard against the temptation to comparison-shopping and wallowing in self-pity. We know that oranges are juicy in their own way. We know that they’re good for us, and that we’ll experience many things that others will miss. But we wish we had a chocolate one, all the same.

If you’re new to all this, you should know: that feeling becomes less acute, and less frequent, over time. Your appreciation for the wonders of tangy citrus and Vitamin C increases, and your desire for milk fat and cocoa butter diminishes. But in our story, so far, it hasn’t disappeared. I’m not sure it ever will. And that’s OK.

December 2015 baptisms

Here are the baptisms from our December 2015 meeting, featuring: Paul (00:00), Tracy (04:19), Grace (11:01), Sarah (12:43) and Nancy (15:46). (Unfortunately there was a technical issue with the main camera, so only the footage from camera 2 has been used in this recording).

Day 26: The Father Who Bruises the Son

Scripture

Today’s full reading is John 18:1-14

“Jesus commanded Peter, ‘put your sword away! Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?”
John 18:11

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Observation

Jesus is clear. What’s happening to him is from the Father.

He rebukes Peter on that basis: ‘this has come to me from the Father.’ Jesus trusts his Father and desires to do what the Father sent him to do. His rebuke of Peter is a question that sounds a little like ‘do you know better than my Father?!’

Jesus is incredulous. The Father is in charge of all things and is over all things. The Father has given his Son this ‘cup’ and now the Son must drink it.

The cup he mentions is the same cup he was agonising over in the Garden of Gethsemane. The cup is the wrath of the Father, the cross and the abandonment Jesus will experience by his Father. Having already asked for ‘another way’ Jesus is now convinced that this is the only way. It is certainly the way his Father wants him to travel. Having prayed that prayer and arrived at his conclusion, Jesus is ready.

Peter on the other hand hasn’t been on this emotional journey and arrived at the same conclusion. Peter is only concerned with protecting Jesus and getting him enthroned in place of the Romans.

Let’s consider the Father mentioned here.

We begin by reminding ourselves that everything else we’ve seen about him until this point is still true. At this moment it’s extremely important for us to keep that in our minds.

With that in place it’s clear that this moment, this cup, is not something the Father has issued to his Son easily. This is difficult and costly for both of them, and true as that is — Jesus still drank it, the Father still gave it.

Here we see a God who willingly and without coercion gives up his Son to death. See the Father who allows his Son to drink poison in order that we all may be reconciled to him. This is the final nail in the coffin of the austere, strict and malicious Father God of our nightmares.

This act by the Father was on that broke his heart. This act of braking his Son, broke him. A Father like the one Jesus has been describing to us throughout this series certainly couldn’t have been left unaffected by these events.

Prayer

Father Thank you. Thank you for the glorious truth contained here. Thank you for your commitment to me and to us. You’re a good good father and I am thrilled to belong to you. I gladly bow my knee to you today, gladly trust you knowing that you would not ask me to do anything you’ve not been through yourself. You’re a Father who identifies with us in our pain. Thank you.

Day 25: The Father: An Overview

Scripture

Today’s reading is the whole of Jesus’ prayer in John 17. Since the Father is mentioned throughout the prayer we’re not going to focus on one specific verse but instead provide a birds eye overview of some of the themes Jesus draws out. Take some time now to read the chapter, making some observations of your own and then come back and go through it with me.

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Observation

Verse 1 — Knowing the Father is eternal life. This is something that is so exciting it demands a whole extra blog. You can read that blog here if you want to.

Verse 5 — The Father and the Son were together in glory (majesty and splendour) before the world began.

Verse 6 — The Father gave the Son his disciples. He gave the Son those people who are right now believing in him and following him. It can therefore be said that the disciples or believers belonged to the Father since you can’t give something you don’t have.

Verse 8 — The Father sent the Son. Jesus wasn’t acting just out of his own good idea.

Verse 9 — Jesus saw himself as a steward of the things and people that the Father had given to him.

Verse 10 — The Father shares everything with the Son.

Verse 11 — The Father is holy. Holy means pure, untouchable, unapproachable and reserved entirely for God. We also see here that the Father and the Son are one.

Verse 17 — The Father is able to sanctify, that is he is able to make holy. The Father’s word is truth.

Verse 21 — The Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father.

Verse 24 — The Father has given the Son glory. The Father loved the Son before the world began.

Finally we can observe from verse 25 that the Father is righteous and that the Father is unknown by the world. The world does not know him. For all its ideas about God they fall a long way short of truthfully speaking about the Father and for all its knowledge about God they do not know the Father.

To conclude this devotional series on the Father let’s put in front of us all of the descriptions of the Father from the titles of our daily entries:

  • The Forgotten Father
  • The Father of Grace & Truth
  • The Father’s Side
  • The Father Hasn’t Walked Out On Us
  • The Father and the Son
  • The Father At Work
  • The One the Son is Tethered To
  • The Father Who Raises the Dead
  • The Father Who Honours the Son
  • The Father Who Provides Bread From Heaven
  • The Father Who Gives Eternal Life
  • The Father Who Draws People to the Son
  • The Alive and Life Giving Father
  • The Father Who Seeks His Son’s Glory
  • The Father Who Glorifies the Son
  • The Father Who Knows Me
  • The Reason the Father Loves the Son
  • The Father Who Won’t Let Go
  • The Father Who Hears the Son
  • The Father Who Honours Us
  • The Father to Trust Unto Death
  • The Slave God
  • The Father, Son & Spirit
  • The Father Death Leads You To
  • The Father is Greater than the Son
  • The Gardening Father
  • The Father to Be Known

We haven’t ‘made up’ any of these. These are all insights from the mouth of Jesus. I trust Jesus. Jesus died on Good Friday and was raised to life on Easter Sunday and is in charge of all things. Jesus can be trusted to speak truthfully about God. He is my primary basis for speaking about the Father. He is my authority for saying anything at all about God.

Let me finish by quoting again from Doug Wilson’s masterful book ‘Father Hunger’ where he lists the attributes of God’s generosity seen in John’s gospel:

The most obvious feature of the Father is his generosity. He is generous with his glory (1:14), with tasks (5:18), with his protection (10:28-32), with his home (14:1-2), and with his joy (16:23-24). The Father gives (3:34-36). The Father gives his Son (3:16; 18:11); the Father gives his Spirit (14:16-17); the Father gives himself (14:22-24).

He then goes on to say that God is seeking worshippers who will become like he is, and what is he:

He is generous with everything. Is there anything he has that he has held back? And what should we — tangible fathers — be like? The question is terribly hard to answer, but not because it is difficult to understand.

I hope that these devotional studies have been of benefit to you. Thanks for coming along for the ride!

Jez

P.S. For more devotional studies on the Father you’re welcome to visit my own blog site www.jezfield.blogspot.co.uk or come back tomorrow for a final (bonus edition) post.

Day 24: The Father Who Loves Me

Scripture

Today’s full reading is John 16:25-33

“The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures of speech but will tell you plainly about the Father. In that day you will ask in my name, and I do not say to you that I will ask the Father on your behalf, for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. I came from the Father and have come into the world, and now I am leaving the world and going to the Father.”
John 16:25-28

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Observation

I don’t know if you’ve had this experience before, there’s every chance that I’m just a little odd, but as I sit here writing this my heart is beating fast at the truth contained in these words. I feel as though an answer to a question I’ve wondered about for some time has at last arrived.

It’s a question Amy and I were discussing together recently: ‘since the Father loves the Son so much (and it’s clear from John’s gospel that he loves him a lot), does he actually love me or is it only the bits of his Son he sees in me that he likes?’ Does he love me for me or does he just tolerate me because the Son softens his heart towards me?

Does God know me and love me for me?

It’s a valid question.

There are several ways of answering that question but in my opinion none of them are quite as definitive as this one from the mouth of Jesus.

When we come to God and ask him for things ‘in the name of Jesus’ that means we’re asking on the basis of who Jesus is; it’s on his reputation and authority that we stake our claims and requests.

What we’re not doing (as Jesus points out here) is asking the Son to ask the Father as though he’s in the next room. We don’t hand our requests to the Son and then wait nervously in the corridor for the Father’s answer. Jesus says that explicitly: ‘I won’t ask him on your behalf’ but rather, he says ‘the Father loves you.’

It may be temping to skip onto the next phrase from Jesus mouth ‘because you love me’ and have it sour the statement ‘the Father loves you’ but before we do, allow this to sink in — the Father loves you. Jesus says so, explicitly.

You. The personal pronoun, you. The you mentioned here are the disciples he’s speaking to, so do we have permission from the text to apply that ‘you’ to well, me? Let’s hold that question for now.

We can come to the Father (in Jesus’ name) and ask knowing that he loves us, individually.

God the Father lavishes us with his love and kindness and generosity; based on what? Based on the fact that we share a common love: ‘because you love me’ he says.

Understood like this the phrase that could sound like a reluctant condition to the Father’s love ie ‘only because you love me’, starts to taste a little less bitter and a lot more sweet. It isn’t ‘I love youBUTonly because you love him!’ but rather ‘I love you because you have turned away from loving the things that stop me from knowing you and have come to love the object of my affection as well.’ It is this phrase (the ‘because you love’ the Son phrase) that gives me permission to claim the first part of Jesus’ statement for myself: The Father loves you. This makes it true not only of Jesus’ original hearers but of me as well since I also love the Son as they did (and this answers the question above that we put on hold).

Application

The Father loves me. The Father loves you. We don’t pass our prayers onto the Son who reads them to his Father. We can come in, we can have an audience with him. Why? On what basis can we be so bold? Because he loves us. He loves us. The good and pleasant things we receive in this world do not come to us neutrally. They come from a Father who is good and who does good and who loves us. You are loved.

This also means that the bad and unpleasant stuff in life doesn’t come to us as punishment or as evidence of God’s disdain toward us. These things come but they do not change the truth of Jesus’ words one bit. He loves you.

Prayer

Thank you that you love me Father. Thank you that you are always inclined to bless me, to shower me with goodness, to lavish me with your kindnesses. Thank you Father that I can stand before you, or sit or kneel (or sleep!) and know that you love ME. Me. Little old, smelly old, flawed ME. Yippee.

Day 23: The Gardening Father

Scripture

Today’s full reading is John 15:1-17

“I am the true vine and my Father is the vine dresser.”
John 15:1

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Observation

This is quite a clear ‘here’s what the Father’s like’ sort of verse. The Father is the ‘vine dresser’ or sometimes the translations say ‘the gardener’.

He is as actively involved with his people as a vine dresser or gardener is with his plants. Daily a gardener waters, prunes and shapes his plants and depending on the season of the year he treats it differently. In winter the vine gets very little attentions from a gardener apart from perhaps some protection from the frost. In spring time there is weeding and shaping, in summer there is watering and gathering and in autumn there is preparing for winter.

As a vine dresser he knows the vine, knows its needs and is committed to the vine’s wellbeing. The vine after all is Christ, not us; that is perhaps a useful idea and one for us to stay with for a while. I am/we are branches on the vine and get the attention and dedication of the vine dresser purely because I’m part of the vine and the gardener loves the vine.

Again we see how much the Father is committed to his Son and how my benefits come from being in the Son. Plead the Son therefore, have confidence in the Son. Dote on the Son, delight in the Son, have the love and affection of the Father toward the Son.

The Father tenderly prunes, shapes, harvest, waters and waits over the vine. Those are all words then that describe the character and personality of the Father, my Father.

Application

The vine dresser always acts in such a way to try and bring about more fruitfulness from the vine. The Father, by implication, will always work and act in our lives to try and bring about more fruitfulness for us. Fruitfulness of Christ-like character, fruitfulness of intimacy with the Father, fruitfulness of answered prayer and personal joy in God.

Given that that’s his motive it allows me to surrender to his ways and submit myself to what he wants to do. But surrender in the Christian life isn’t ‘let go’, surrender is ‘go on abiding’. When I surrender to God and submit myself to his plans that doesn’t mean that I ‘coast’ through life or that I simply shrug my shoulders and say ‘whatever will be, will be’. Rather it looks like a practical and intentional pursuit of Jesus. I am promised the vine dresser’s good will by virtue of ‘abiding’ in the vine and so I shall ensure that I, in as many ways and means, abide in the vine.

Prayer

Father. Thank you so much that you are committed to the careful working and pruning and shaping and trimming of my life, with the intention of bringing about more fruitfulness. Thank you that you give what I desire, fruitfulness, purpose and intimacy. Help me to surrender, not in the sense that I ‘give up’ but in the sense that I ‘press in’ to Jesus more and more. Amen.

Day 22: The Father is Greater than the Son

Scripture

Today’s full reading is John 14:1-14

“For the Father is greater than I.”
John 14:28

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Observation

Yesterday we looked at the destination of the Son, today we’re considering the relationship of the Father and the Son.

The greater Father.

This seems like a strange phrase to hear Jesus say. Is Jesus saying that the Father is ‘better’ as in ‘more godlike’? Is he saying that the Father is stronger or more powerful?

Whatever Jesus means it must be held consistently with everything else he’s said about the Father up until now:

‘obey me and the Father will honour you’ — John 12:26
‘I and the Father are one.’ — John 10:30
‘Before Abraham was, I am.’ — John 8:58

All this leads me to rule out interpretations and explanations of our verse that might end up with a Jesus who is less than God. Therefore he is not saying ‘The Father’s the real deal, I’m just his mouthpiece, nothing more than a vessel of his will.’ He can’t be saying that having also said the above statements about himself and the Father.

What Jesus is doing instead is pointing to the inner workings of the relationship between him and his Father. He is giving us some insight into the Godhead. There is total equality in God, each person is God, there is one God. But, within the Godhead of Father, Son and Spirit there is also deference and submission. ‘The Father is greater than I’ means ‘I’m submitted to him and his authority’.

This appears to me as a strange concept since a lot of the things Jesus has said up until now has implied the opposite:

‘The Father has given all things into my hands’ — John 3:35
‘My Father glorifies me.’ — John 8:54

As much as the Son defers to the Father and submits to him there is also a clear delight in and deference to the Son by the Father. The Father has given the Son authority, rule and dominion over the earth. It is as though the Father has said ‘I won’t do anything on Earth without your permission,’ or even just ‘you’re in charge here.’ and in response Jesus says ‘I’ll only do what I see my Father doing, or what I know my Father would have me do.’

This is mind-stretchingly beautiful. The Father is a Father secure enough in his greatness and happy enough in his Son that he wants to give his Son as much authority and freedom as possible. How does the Son respond to such a Father?

‘The Father is greater than I.’

Who wouldn’t want to surrender to a Father like that?

Application

It’s that question that leads nicely into our application today. Who wouldn’t want to surrender to a Father like that? The answer that comes to my mind is: ‘I don’t’. What I mean is that although I see the trustworthiness of the Father and although I can understand why the Son wants to submit to him, my rebellious self still would rather seek self-glory and self-reliance than the Father’s plan. Acknowledging this is perhaps the first step along the way. Having acknowledged the goodness of the Father and the rebelliousness of my nature I am better able to pray and build an honest relationship with him.

Prayer

I love you Father, I am yours. Today I choose to trust you and submit to you. When I don’t want to obey you and when my passions run wild help me to remember the Son who submits to the Father and help me to also bring my will under your rule. You are a Father who cares and who knows best. I trust you today. Amen.

Day 21: The Father Death Leads Us To

Scripture

Today’s full reading is John 14:1-14

“If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going away to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.”
John 14:28

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Observation

We’re going to spend a couple of days on this one verse noting two different things about the Father. The first has to do with the destination Jesus believes he going to and the second about the nature of the relationship between the Father and the Son.

Jesus’ Destination

Instantly I’m struck by Jesus’ thoughts about the Father. He’s talking about his death, he’s talking about dying and yet he doesn’t say ‘I’m going to better place’ (like a sentimental Englishman). Instead he says ‘I’m going to the Father.’

Jesus is enthusiastic not about dying, nor about ‘being at peace’, nor about ‘going to a better place’. He’s enthusiastic and optimistic about going to be with the Father.

For Jesus dying is but a doorway to the Father. It’s unpleasant and in his case it’s going to be excruciatingly painful (literally ex-crux — ‘from the cross’) but it’s the person of his Father that he’s most mindful about being with. He’s not looking forward to the pain of the cross but he is looking past that to the reality and pleasure of being with his Father.

This is what the Father is like then. He is one whose company is to be desired. Jesus said ‘if you love me… you’d rejoice.’ Rejoice!? He wanted his disciples to celebrate. He wanted them to be glad. They were to celebrate not that he’s dying but that he’s going to be with his Father.

In all likelihood when the disciples first heard Jesus say this all they probably heard was ‘I’m going away’ — but what filled Jesus’ mind wasn’t the leaving but the arriving, arriving in his Father’s presence once again.

Application

This is what death is for the Christian. Death is going to be with our Father. It isn’t just going to a ‘better place’ nor even is to just go and be with ‘God’. Rather it is our ‘Father’ who is the object of death’s destination. The person, the presence, the intimacy, the reality of our Father.

Thinking about death like this comforts me when I consider those I’ve known who’ve died, especially those who’ve died in Christ. It also gives me comfort when thinking about my own death. It helps me to believe that death isn’t the end, a full stop after the final chapter of my life. Death is what leads me to be with the one I love and who loves me and who created all things out of the overflow of his love.

All this also reinforces to me the importance of changing the way I think about God. If I believe that God is a mean, strict and cold ‘man in the sky’ then death has nothing for me to look forward to. But he isn’t like that. He is a Father that the Son was enthusiastic about going to be with.

Prayer

Father I’m comforted and encouraged by your Son’s attitude to death. It helps me dispel some of my own doubts about death and fear of death. Thank you that the people I love aren’t lost, that they aren’t even just ‘at peace’. Thank you that those I love are with you, in your company seeing you face to face. I love you. Amen.