Advertise on podcast: Water City Church - Oshkosh

“Religious thinkers have differed about this.  Some have insisted there are seven, but Faber sang of the ‘God of a thousand attributes,’ and Charles Wesley exclaimed, ‘Glory thine attributes confess, Glorious all and numberless.’ True, these men were worshiping, not counting; but we might be wise to follow the insight of the enraptured heart rather than the more cautious reasoning of the theological mind.  If an attribute is something that is true of God, we may as well not try to enumerate them.” A.W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy

“What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” A.W. Tozer

Closing message in our series recentering on the Beatitudes. This week, we sit with the question: What is persecution in our actual context? The Kingdom of Heaven is not fragile. The kingdom of God will not be defeated. The kingdom is still open to all. “There’s trouble ahead when you live only for the approval of others, saying what flatters them, doing what indulges them. Popularity contests are not truth contests—look how many scoundrel preachers were approved by your ancestors! Your task is to be true, not popular." Luke 6:26 (the Message)

Luke 24 "I have never had clarity; what I have always had is trust.  So I will pray that you trust God.” Mother Teresa

John 20 - Faith comes before understanding... "Almost nothing that makes any real difference can be proved.  I can prove the law of gravity by dropping a shoe out the window.  I can prove that the world is round if I’m clever at that sort of thing – that the radio works, that light travels faster than sound.  I cannot prove the greatness of the great or the beauty of the beautiful.  I cannot even prove my own free will; maybe my most heroic act, my truest love, my deepest thought, are all just subtler versions of what happens when the doctor taps my knee with his little rubber hammer and my foot jumps.” Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking Link for Art Study - Two Disciples at the Tomb by Henry Ossawa Tanner

“And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume...” Mary took the most precious thing she possessed and spent it all on Jesus. Love is not love if it nicely calculates the cost.  It gives its all, and its only regret is that it has not still more to give.

Guest Speaker: Rachel Yokers

It’s the most demanding of all the Beatitudes, because there is no hiding. “Rules for Self-Discovery: 1. What we want most; 2. What we think about most; 3. How we use our money; 4. What we do with our leisure time; 5. The company we enjoy; 6. Who and what we admire; 7. What we laugh at. A. W. Tozer

Matthew 5:7 "Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy." “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.” Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

"No one is just one thing, even the worst of us.  That doesn’t excuse anyone’s behavior, but it does complicate a narrative we might otherwise want to make very simple.”                                                                         MikeCosper, Land of my Sojourn

Jesus' words, "Blessed are the meek," are a counter voice to the growing number of angry alpha pseudo-religious. They are an invitation... They are a challenge... They are healing... “We may say as a general rule for life that it is never right to be angry for any insult or injury done to ourselves – that is something that no Christian must ever resent – but that it is often right to be angry at injuries done to other people.  Selfish anger is always a sin; selfless anger can be one of the great moral dynamics of the world.” William Barclay

"Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted." Matthew 5:4 "Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break,"  Shakespeare, Macbeth

As a follower of Christ, what is our place in this moment? The way of the Kingdom of God is a different path. “Blessed are the poor. Blessed are you who are conscious of your lack of merit and readily open yourselves to the divine mercy.”
 Brennan Manning, The Importance of Being Foolish

Before Jesus ever began his sermon, the disciples first came to him. Are we willing to come to Jesus... even when that means God is going to disrupt our lives?

Matthew 2 The Joy of the Magi is on display, contrasted against Herod's rage. “Son,'he said,' ye cannot in your present state understand eternity...That is what mortals misunderstand. They say of some temporal suffering, "No future bliss can make up for it," not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory. And of some sinful pleasure they say "Let me have but this and I'll take the consequences": little dreaming how damnation will spread back and back into their past and contaminate the pleasure of the sin. Both processes begin even before death. The good man's past begins to change so that his forgiven sins and remembered sorrows take on the quality of Heaven: the bad man's past already conforms to his badness and is filled only with dreariness. And that is why...the Blessed will say "We have never lived anywhere except in Heaven, : and the Lost, "We were always in Hell." And both will speak truly.” C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce Art Study:  “The Adoration of the Magi” by Peter Paul Rubens 1st - LINK 2nd - LINK