3 posts tagged “christmas”

   If I asked most Christians what they thought was the greatest miracle,  I know almost everyone would say Christ's sacrifice and His resurrection.  It is true that that event changed everything and made a way that the fallen race of Adam could come home again.  Paradise lost....could be regained through faith in Christ.  To be honest though, I would expect the God of the universe to defeat death but who would have really believed that the same creator of all things could be manifest in a lttle baby in Bethlehem.  Think about it.  God is outside our plane of existance reaching in.  He did not make all things from part of himself...but apart from himself.  Created from nothing (bara).  God is non-linear.  God is not subject to time, he does not age, he does not sleep and require sustenance.  He is perfect and complete.  To God everything is in the now.  From His perspective he sees me at this computer, sees His Son upon the cross and at the same time the marriage supper of the lamb.  We on the other hand are stuck in linear time, constantly moving forward in time. We age...and we die.  But God loved us so much that he stepped out of his non-linear existence and in the person of His Son, Jesus...entered our linear history.  God layed aside His robe of majesty and girded Himself with the towel of humanity.  It is His birth that divides history.  Our hopes, our dreams and God's greatest gift....all wrapped in swaddeling clothes....little baby Jesus.... laying in a manger.  May you be blessed by the wonderful miracle of His Birth.   Merry Christmas!!

A lot of people wonder not only why we celebrate Christmas on December 25th, but when was Jesus actually born?  On a previous blog "Christmas Day", I went into the history of selecting the 25th of December as the traditional birthday of Jesus but there are indications in the scriptures that a good investgator could pick up that points to his birth in spring...around the season of Passover.  Actually close to the same time he was cruxified 32 years later.  First, the scriptures say their were "shepherds abiding in the field keeping watch over their flocks by night".  The only time they had a night watch on the sheep was in the spring to protect the young spring lambs from wolves.  Also in referance to Jesus birth it was prophecized, "Oh Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me to be ruler in Israel" (Mic 5:2).  Ephratah is still just ouside Bethlehem.  It is a small pasture area that was used by the priests to care for the Passover lambs.  These shepherds were not ordinary shepherds but also levitical priests.  How appropriate that the Lamb of God would be born in the season of the Passover and revealed to the priest  shepherds watching the Passover lambs.  For this lamb would become the final sacrifice for the sins on not just the nation of Israel...but the whole world.

Have you ever wondered what the star of bethlehem really was?  The term star is used throughtout the Old and New Testament symbolically representing supernatural beings..either the Messiah (Num 24:17.."there shall come a Star out of Jacob", 2 Peter 1:19/ Rev 2:28/Rev 22:16..." the day star and the morning star),  as well as angels both in heaven and those cast out of heaven (demons)  Isa 14:13.."I will exalt my throne above the stars of God (angels), Rev 12:4/Daniel 12:3...stars cast out of heaven ...and even Satan himself ..Rev 9:1.."and I saw a star fall from heaven.  What we do know is this "star" could not have been an actual star as it had to be low enough in the atmosphere to move...much like a satellite...so that it could be seen moving past the stationary stars to lead the Magi on there quest.  It also had to be low enough to be able to stop over a house and this gave them the location of the babe.  Actual stars are so far from the earth that you could move a thousand miles with no change, except declination and ascension.  Also such a phenomenon if it were an actual star would be visible to everyone on earth as the earth rotated and would have been recorded in their star charts such as those recorded by those in ancient China.  Imagine if this "star" was one of Gods messenger angels maybe 5 miles up in the atmosphere, radiating his glory.  When he stopped...the Magi stopped.  When he moved again....they followed.  According to Matt 2:9/ 2:16, they wise men had been observing and following the star for two years.  Until it made its final stop in Matt 2:9-11, "and lo, the star, which they saw in the east, went before them, till it came and stood over where the young child was.  When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceedingly great joy.  And when they were come unto the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down and worshipped him; and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; gold and frankincense, and myrrh".       Merry Christmas!