A Message from Pastor Andrea Chaumont

February 4, 2026

Dear MBPPC,                                                                                                     

Hebrews 11: 1 says “faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Hebrews 11 continues “all of these died in faith without having received the promises…they confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth…they desire a better country, that is a heavenly one” (v. 13-16).

When Jesus sits down and begins to teach his disciples, he begins with “blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” We are used to thinking of heaven as “up there” but heaven in the Biblical sense is the reign of God here on the earth; an earth that one day will be totally renewed and restored. It was with this assurance of hope that the prophets and disciples died in faith without having received the promises. They experienced the kingdom of God as an already and not yet reality and lived within that tension. We live within that tension too, as seekers, disciples and doubters listening to what this way of Jesus is all about. This week we will continue to look at the Beatitudes and listen for the voice of Jesus who is gentle and meek, God of both heaven and earth.

"The Beatitudes turn the value-systems of the world upside down” (Frederick Dale Bruner) much like the Magnificat…

“He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,

and has lifted up the lowly.

He has filled the hungry with good things,

and the rich he has sent away empty.”

French scholar Fr. Jacques Dupont says “The great reversals heard in the original Beatitudes (by this he means Luke’s gospel) ought to be taken seriously: the kingdom of God belongs to the despised weak people who are unable to defend themselves.” 

May we take seriously too, the upside down kingdom.

Blessings,

Pastor Andrea