You can imagine then, the joy and excitement. Imagine living every day, and Jesus is going to turn up sometime today - physically! Imagine then having the meal with Him, and He's sharing with them things from the word of God, sharing with them about the kingdom, sharing with them about His plan for the world. Oh my goodness! The joy and the excitement must have been enormous - that whole dimension of heaven and earth connecting like that. It must have been phenomenal; and every time, they can just touch Him like that, they can give Him a physical hug. Then suddenly… gone; and they don't know when He'll come back - when He's ready, so they just carry on. What are they going to do? They're going to carry on with their lives. So that's an insight - the joy and excitement!
The last thought I would have on it is: intense joy; or great sorrow? God's purpose has always been that heaven would come to earth, that the two realms would overlap. Can you imagine what it would be like to be part of it? Imagine what it would be like to be disqualified, for some reason. Intense joy; a really intense, eternal joy; being resurrected, part of the first resurrection; part of the eternal ministry of Jesus. Great sorrow to think: I've been in church all these years, I've just sort of been carrying on and whatever, but I missed out on what I was really called for.
We have to make a daily choice how we're going to live our life: whether we'll live it for the ‘now’; or we live it for eternity. Will He live it now, for His kingdom, advancing His kingdom, allowing Him to work in our life?
Numbers 14:21 - “As truly as I live (in other words, you can take this one to the bank), all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord”.
We hunger for that glory in meetings. We long for that glory in meetings. We have waves of it, and levels of it, when it's really heavy; where you can't get up off the ground, when the weight of that glory is on you - you can't move, you cry; things happen, healings and deliverance. Imagine the whole earth full of the glory of the Lord - everyone knows about it, it’s not hidden.
There's a company of people with Jesus - the Sons of God, transforming the earth, bringing justice, and setting everything right. You and I are called into that! It's called the high calling of God, in Jesus Christ. What a calling that is!
I encourage you to go through the notes and have a look at them; study the scriptures, make them your own scriptures; and when you've done that, then they become your message. The more you look at them and see it, the more you will then have it as a part of you.
Not everyone, as I say, agrees or believes these things. There will be other people who have a different view: from those who don't know there's two resurrections; to those who think it's already happened; those who think everyone gets resurrected in that first resurrection. Then you will find there are some, a remnant, that believe: no, it's a prize to be won! This is why you lay your life down! This is what it is about. It's all for something, and even if there's frustrations in the short term; in the long term, there's a prize, that you will never want to have taken away from you.