Acts 1:1-3
Jesus Appeared After His Death for Forty Days
1 In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach 2 until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen. 3 After his suffering, he presented himself to them and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God.
1 Corinthians 2:6-16
God’s Wisdom Revealed by the Spirit
6 We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. 7 No, we declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. 8 None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 However, as it is written:
“What no eye has seen,
what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived”—
the things God has prepared for those who love him—
10 these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.
The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. 13 This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words. 14 The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. 15 The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, 16 for,
“Who has known the mind of the Lord
so as to instruct him?”
But we have the mind of Christ.
1 Corinthians 15:50-57
Where is Your Sting
50 I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. 54 When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”
55
“Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?”
56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
John 15:13
No Greater LOVE is There Than to Lay Down Your Life for Your Friends
13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.
Jesus appeared to the apostles he had chosen after His death...After His suffering and death on the cross, He presented Himself to them and gave His disciples many convincing proofs that He was alive...He gave them instructions through the Holy Spirit...And He continued to teach His disciples until the day He was taken up to heaven...He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God...A Dead Man was still teaching His students, His disciples...
Jesus continued to speak and teach about the Kingdom of God after His death...His Kingdom He had taught about while He was alive, would now seem more real to His disciples...After all He had died, and three days later He rose back to life -all things He said would be a little clearer after His death...There is this mystery in life, but there is still this great mystery surrounding the One, who died and resurrected and continued to teach after His death...The sting of death is no more for His disciples...They saw firsthand that He was alive...His disciples and close followers would not look at death the same way...Death was no longer the final word...Where, O death is your victory?...And Jesus, who was so mysterious, spoke often of this Kingdom, where one day those who follow Him would go...Somehow a treasure is hidden in this mystery of death that each of us has...
For those who believe in Jesus, believe St. Paul is right...“Where, O death, is your victory?...Where, O death, is your sting?”...And because we love Him, we will die, but death is now different...Death is different for those close to Him...As Jesus taught about LOVE, He stated that no greater love is there, for someone to lay down their life for their friends...He did that...The mystery of His Kingdom in Another World is hard for us to understand...But that day will be greatest of days, when we meet Him...We will one day die and be with Him, in His Kingdom...
God is revealed by His Spirit... And the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has been freely given to us....For our human thoughts have trouble understanding the mystery of the Spirit, and the mystery of death...So our eyes, and our ears cannot even imagine those things that He has prepared for us after our deaths...We can only try to imagine how great heaven might be...