He is alive!

So we've learnt about His life, we've learnt about the ultimate sacrifice He made because He loves us.

Now, we're going to learn about his Resurrection.

After he died, Jesus was taken from the cross and placed in a tomb, with a huge stone rolled across to seal it. In Matthew, we're told that Pilate had guards placed in front of the tomb too - it was a super secure tomb.

So at this point, Jesus had been dead for 3 days. Mary Magdalene went to the tomb fully expecting to find Jesus - and didn't! She ran straight to Simon Peter and he went to the tomb and saw the linen that Jesus was wrapped in, but no Jesus.

Can you imagine how freaked out they would've been?! What would you have done in that situation?

In John 20:11-18 we see what Mary did.

Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where jesus' body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. They asked her, 'Woman, why are you crying?' 

  'They have taken my Lord away' she said, 'and I don't know where they have put him.' At this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realise that it was Jesus. 

  He asked her, 'Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?' Thinking he was the gardener, she said, 'Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.' 

  Jesus said to her, 'Mary'. 

She turned towards him and cried out in Aramaic,'Rabboni!' (which means 'Teacher'). 

  Jesus said, 'Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my  brothers and tell them, "I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God."'

  Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: 'I have seen the Lord!' and she told them that he had said these things to her. 

To Jesus, death was just a nap! Now there's something I want to draw your attention to here (apart from the obvious Resurrection!); 

The disciples forgot what Jesus had told them in scripture (John 20:9). Jesus had already told them that in three days he would rise again. 

Here's what I'm trying to say: Jesus is alive, and he's alive for us. We should never forget his teachings. 

If you guys have got any questions about ANYTHING you can contact us at: christianunion.blog@gmail.com

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'Good' Friday?

What is 'Good Friday' and why is it good?

Matthew 27:45 is the first time we see Jesus' death. 

45 From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land. 46 About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).

47 When some of those standing there heard this, they said, “He’s calling Elijah.”

48 Immediately one of them ran and got a sponge. He filled it with wine vinegar, put it on a staff, and offered it to Jesus to drink. 49 The rest said, “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to save him.”

50 And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit.

51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split 52 and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53 They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and[c] went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

54 When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, “Surely he was the Son of God!”

55 Many women were there, watching from a distance. They had followed Jesus from Galilee to care for his needs.

Normally death is something that is sad, something we mourn. 

But here's the thing - we shouldn't cry for Jesus! The only thing we should be asking ourselves about Jesus' death is WHY he died. 

Jesus' death was a very intricate and thought out plan by God. All through the Old Testament there are signs of Jesus' life and death. An example of this would be the story of Abraham and Isacc (Genesis 22)

God sent Jesus in order to give the greatest sacrifice for the thing He loved the most. US. 

I leave you with this quote from John 3:16 

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 

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Idolatry // What do you Worship?

Exodus 32:1-7.

"When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, "Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him. 

Aaron answered them, "Take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to me." So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron. He took what they had handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, "These are yor gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt."

When Aaron saw this, he built an altar in font of the calf and announced, "Tomorrow there will be a festival to the Lord." 

So the next day the people rose early and sacrificed burnt offerings and presented fellowship offerings. Afterward they sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry."

During this part of Exodus Moses is leading some people called the Isralites from Egypt (where they were slaves) to land that God had promised for them. Moses had left the Isralites for quite a long time - the verses even open with "When the people saw that Moses was so long  in coming down from the mountain." Moses was talking to God up on the mountain while the Isralites had this conversation that we read of in these verses.

They decided that Moses was taking too long so they build for themselves a statue of a calf to worship. The Isralited 18 chapters earlier crossed the Red Sea with Moses. These people literally saw miracles, they experianced the awesome power of God. And here they are, worshiping a statue they made instead of God who made them. 

Don't you think the Isralites were a little stupid to make this calf their God and worship it - Would you worship a statue of a calf? 

I hope your answer was no.

It's easy to look back at the Isralites worshiping a calf and laugh but we do the same in 2014.

It just looks a bit different.

Everyone has a god weather or not it's the God of the gospel.

God is defined as whatever we make supreme. 

This dosen't mean that if we dont worship God then he's not God. God is God weather we worship him or not, however we can make things in our lives supreme - these are our 'gods', or what we worship. 

If you don't know what your idol is in your life, if you don't know what you worship in your life then it's probably the first thing you think of when you read the next sentance;

An idol is when you look at something and say 'if I have that, my life will have meaning'.

What did you think of? 

A huge TV?

A bigger house? 

A relationship with someone?

An iPhone?

Better grades in school?

A better job? 

To have something that isn't God as your idol is a very dangerous thing because if you worship something and you can't give it up then you don't own it, it owns you. 

If we skip forwards a few chapters in the Bible to Exodus chapter 20:3 we see God giving Moses the 10 commandments. Verse 3 starts with the first commandment, they are in no particular order but the very first commandment God gives to Moses is; 

"You shall have no other gods before (or besides) me."

And then we read on and the seccond commandment God gives Moses in verse 4 is; 

"You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in Heaven or on Earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them."

The very first two commandments are God basically saying 'Don't make idols. No seriously.'

Puting this in the context of our modern lives, we put our idols in place of God. Whatever it is that we can't live without we try to make them fit a God shaped hole in our lives.

What idol took nails to it's wrists and died a long and painful death on the cross so that every single thing you do wrong dosen't matter anymore? 

If you have any questions please feel free to email us at christianunion.blog@gmail.com