BYE FOR NOW!

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And He led them out as far as Bethany, and lifting up His hands, He blessed them. And it happened that while He was blessing them, He parted from them and was carried up into heaven. And they, after worshiping Him, returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple blessing God.
Luke 24:50‭-‬53 LSB

¶These men and women were so full of joy! So different from their state after Jesus's first departure 40 days earlier, when the apostle John says they locked themselves away in fear. By all appearances, their hero and champion again taken from them, they were worse off. But what did they now have? They had a story. They had the Gospel, waiting to be released in their lives by the power of God's Spirit. They had the good news of the Gospel, the fulfillment of God's ancient covenant promise to deliver His people, not just from the oppression of other people, but from themselves. So it follows that they would return to the temple, about which Jesus, quoting the prophet Isaiah, prophesies "my house shall be a house of prayer for all nations".

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