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"Owe no man
anything..."
-Romans 13:8
"...the borrower becomes the lender's
slave."
-Proverbs 22:7
"...the
righteous man shall live by faith."
-Romans 1:17
"...without
faith it is impossible to please Him."
-Hebrews 11:6
"No one can
serve two masters..."
-Matthew 6:24
"The Lord
will make you abound in prosperity..."
-Deuteronomy 25:11
"...God
loves a cheerful giver."
-2 Corinthians 9:7
"...the
Lord... is giving you power to make
wealth..."
-Deuteronomy 8:18
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Greetings in the name of Christ Jesus!
Thanks be to God who ALWAYS gives us the
OVERWHELMING victory!
In two weeks most folks in this part of the world will be
celebrating Christmas. It's still one of the strongest
traditions in Western culture despite the efforts of so
many people to do away with it or at least keep it out of
sight as much as possible. For some in the secular
community anything portraying a nativity scene or
mentioning the name JESUS is especially
objectionable. But many of those same people are
able to tolerate a "Christmas holiday" if it's limited to
Santa Claus, Christmas Trees and going into debt to
purchase gifts. Of course the name of the day they're
celebrating springs from the word CHRIST which
means MESSIAH so perhaps that's why some of the
more determined members of their group want to just
call it THE WINTER BREAK.
Within the Body of Christ there's also a group of well-
meaning Believers who want to kick Christmas out
because they feel it's rooted in paganism or because
Jesus was born in September (or some other month)
instead of December. Others say that if the Puritans
refused to celebrate Christmas on religious grounds
more than 300 years ago then we should take up their
example. Never mind that some of those same
Puritans executed 19 "witches" and falsely imprisoned
150 other "witch suspects" in the late seventeenth
century, also on religious grounds. Still others say
Christmas shouldn't be observed because it isn't a
scriptural (Mosaic) festival even though Jesus Himself
observed the Feast of the Dedication (John 10:22),
aka Chanukah, which wasn't part of the Mosaic
tradition either. Generally speaking, Christians in the
anti-Christmas camp tend to strongly CONDEMN the
current tradition of observing Christmas Day and in
the process they perhaps overlook the following Bible
verses:
"Who are you to judge the servant of another? To
his own master he stands or falls; and he will stand,
for the Lord is able to make him stand. One person
regards one day above another, another regards every
day alike. Each person must be fully convinced in his
own mind. He who observes the day, observes it for
the Lord" (Romans 14:4-6).
Now it's certainly true that the TRADITIONS OF MEN
can make the Word of God of no effect (Mark 7:13).
And it DOES seem that lots of people who celebrate
Christmas appear to be doing it out of TRADITION
without considering it in their own minds. But frankly
what one or another Believer chooses to do in
observing a particular day is their own business.
Whether or not they're doing the right thing is between
them and Jesus. Isn't that what New Testament
scripture really teaches, that the WRONG thing to do is
CONDEMN and JUDGE other Believers? If this is true
then the question we should be asking is NOT
whether it's correct to celebrate Christmas Day. No,
based on scripture the better question would be more
like the following:
"Do you know what you're celebrating and why?
And if not, are you interested in finding out what the
Bible really says so you can be fully convinced in your
own mind that what you're deciding to do is the right
thing for you?"
Most people, even secular folks and those from other
religions, know full well that what Christmas is
supposed to be about is the BIRTH OF JESUS. But
beyond that, knowledge gets kind of sketchy. Why is
this event so important? What are we really
celebrating? The facts are that Jesus was born in the
town of Bethlehem (Luke 2:4) and laid in a manger
(Luke 2:7) more than two thousand years ago. It was
obviously an important event because it was attended
by an Angel of the Lord who spoke to some nearby
shepherds and told them he had some really good
news for ALL PEOPLE which was that Christ (the
Messiah) had arrived (Luke 2:8-11). The Angel of the
Lord was accompanied by a MULTITUDE of other
angels who were praising God as they made the rest
of the announcement: on earth peace, good
will toward men (Luke 2:14 KJV). Friend,
those angels were glorifying God and singing and
celebrating; and what they said is TRULY a reason for
us to celebrate too. We just need to know WHY so that
if we DO want to celebrate the birth of Jesus we can
be convinced in our own minds that it's right. And, the
truth is what those angels really said that night is NOT
what most people think they said.
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The Background |
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The story of Christmas actually starts in the Garden of
Eden where God placed His first PEOPLE, a man and
then a little later a woman both created in His own
image. From the very beginning God gave the man
AUTHORITY (the rule) over the entire earth and
everything on it. In other words, He DELEGATED FULL
AUTHORITY AND CONTROL to mankind and told the
first man to exercise his AUTHORITY by filling the
earth and subduing it (Genesis 1:26-28). God would
not have told the man to do those things without also
giving him the empowerment to do them and without
planning to make Himself available to help get the job
done. That's the way God always wants to work,
through people.
Unfortunately though the man allowed sin to come
onto the earth when he disobeyed God and ate the
fruit he had been specifically and pointedly told not to
eat (Genesis 2:17 and 3:6). God had told the man
clearly that if he ate the fruit from a particular tree he
would surely DIE. The Hebrew word in this scripture
translated into the English word DIE means to be
DISCONNECTED from the Source, in other words a
spiritual death, NOT physical death which came later
as a separate consequence. Therefore, as a result of
sin man immediately became DISCONNECTED from
God and by default was reconnected to Satan as his
new source who then usurped man's authority and
the empowerment God had delegated. It was certainly
within man's AUTHORITY to give away what God had
delegated and because of sin he gave it all over to
Satan.
Now the Bible says that by the acts of one man sin
entered the entire world and the sin nature of Adam
permeated all of mankind and was passed on from
generation to generation. But from the moment Adam
fell, God went to WAR against their sins because He
does NOT tolerate sin in any form. Certainly God
continued to love His people but His wrath was stirred
against their sin and under the Old Covenant He
continuously judged it. The wages of sin is DEATH
(Romans 6:23), both the separation from God kind of
death and physical death, and sometimes God's
judgment of sin under the Old Covenant seemed
harsh and severe. But the nature of God is to judge
sin even as the nature of man in his fallen state is to
commit sin.
And so after the Fall of Adam the world was in a bad
state of affairs and the only way it could be rescued
from that was by the shedding of blood to pay for the
sin that had taken over everything. Since God
doesn't/can't/won't tolerate sin, it must always be
judged by the shedding of blood. Mankind tried
shedding the blood of animals under the Law of
Moses trying to pay for their sin but to no avail. The
blood of animals proved to be ineffective. What was
needed was a MESSIAH, THE CHRIST about whom
there were approximately 700 prophecies in the Old
Testament. And so, on the night the Angel of the Lord
began speaking to those shepherds near Bethlehem,
the world had been trying for 4,000 years to find a way
to re-establish the CONNECTION that had been lost
in the Garden. They were desperate for the arrival of
their MESSIAH.
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The Gift of Jesus |
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Now, it was going to take nothing less than the blood
of a PERFECT human being to assuage God's wrath
and pay for all those sins and it took special
circumstances that only a loving God could have
arranged to produce that PERFECT human. Mary was
a faith-filled virgin and that condition was an essential
requirement for producing a human being with no
Adamic sin nature. Don't let spiritually-limited people
talk you out of the reality of Mary's VIRGINITY because
it was a REQUIRED CONDITION. The other required
condition was that the Father of the perfect human had
to also be perfect. And so God arranged for that by
sending the Holy Spirit to overshadow Mary and
conceive the PERFECT child by the seed of His Word.
Nine months later Jesus the CHIRST was born in
Bethlehem and the Angel of the Lord appeared there
to make the official announcement.
Every year most of our churches do their best to try to
commemorate what happened that night with our
Christmas Pageants and Cantatas and dancing and
special lights and sometimes even live animals. The
kids are so cute and people have fun being a part of
all those activities. Indeed, those things about the
local church are great to be a part of. But friend many
of them, maybe most, miss the point; the people don't
really understand what they're celebrating. Yes, 33
years later Jesus DID die on the Cross and the blood
of redemption was shed at that time. So is the
significance of the birth of Jesus merely that it was the
beginning of a life that eventually led to Calvary and
redemption?
No, it was more than that because there was an
immediate impact. Up until the night of the birth of
Jesus, God had been engaged in a 4,000-year war
against sin. But the multitude of angels that came to
Bethlehem that night said: peace on earth
good will TOWARD men. The word TOWARD
is mainly found in the King James Version of the
Bible. Other translations say peace and good
will AMONG men or something to that effect.
But where is the peace and good will AMONG men
then or now? Jesus Himself said later: Do not
think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not
come to bring peace, but a sword (Matthew
10:34). The Greek word can be translated either way:
TOWARD or AMONG. But because of other scriptures,
AMONG doesn't fit what happened that night and
represents an incomplete explanation for what the
angels were actually announcing. The word TOWARD
is the better translation.
What they were announcing and what the celebration
of Christmas is really all about is that the 4,000-year
WAR ENDED THAT NIGHT. God stopped JUDGING
sin in anticipation of what Jesus would do later. From
the birth of Jesus forward, God started releasing His
good will, His favor, TOWARD mankind. During the
previous millennia He had withheld that favor from
most people because of sin and now with the birth of
Christ, God was calling an end to the hostilities and
releasing His undeserved favor (GRACE) so that the
relationship could be reconciled (2 Corinthians 5:18)
and man RECONNECTED to his original Source
through a New Covenant that was soon to be
established. And it all started that night.
You may be wondering what all this has to do with
living in victory in HARD TIMES. Well, it has everything
to do with it. Achieving victory in HARD TIMES or in any
other times requires that we know who we are in
Christ. Friend, the war is over! It has been over since
that night in Bethlehem more than 2,000 years ago.
God is not our problem and He has ALREADY judged
our sins by the blood of Christ. Some Believers have a
hard time accepting this. Since the birth of Christ
though, the bad things that happen don't come from
God; they come from the enemy, from the world and
from our own bad choices and decisions. They do
NOT come from God. That means we can overcome
the HARD TIMES we're facing by coming into
agreement with the Word of God and by redirecting
our energy TOWARD resisting and overcoming the
real causes of our problems. If we RESIST the enemy
he must flee (James 4:7) and because of the birth of
Jesus we can enter into the real war which is against
a defeated enemy that has already lost ALL the
authority he had stolen. Now in Christ the
RECONNECTED Believer has regained the
AUTHORITY that had been lost by Adam and we can
use that AUTHORITY to achieve the victory!
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Some Final Thoughts |
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Friend, if you're convinced in your own mind that you
should celebrate the birth of Jesus, God doesn't care
when you celebrate it. December 25th is just as good
as any other day if you know what you're doing and
why. Don't let others condemn you for what is right for
you (Colossians 2:16). On the other hand don't let
TRADITION cause you to celebrate it for the wrong
reasons either. The point is the birth of Jesus is the
greatest event in the history of the world. Everything
changed that night. Grace and faith came back to the
earth and hope came back to the hearts of men. The
war ended! Celebrate it with joy and thanksgiving just
as the multitude of angels did and receive by faith the
gift of ABUNDANT LIFE God wants you to have.
Thanks for reading PLN today and we'll be looking for
you again in three weeks on Friday, January 1st in the
new year of 2010. In the meantime, may God
overwhelm you with the fullness of His love and
spiritual blessing! Declare your victory over HARD
TIMES and then walk in it!
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Sinners' Prayer |
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If you've never invited Jesus to be the Lord of your life,
you can
do so today just by saying the following simple prayer:
Jesus I believe in you and I believe that God
raised you
from
the dead. I receive forgiveness for my sins and I ask
you to
come into my life today. I receive you as my Lord and
Savior. I receive eternal life..
If you were sincere as you prayed this prayer, God has
already
come into your life and you are a new creation, a totally
new
species recreated in His image. Now ask the Lord to
lead you to
a good faith-based, bible-teaching church where you
can be
equipped to fulfill your potential in the Kingdom of God.
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� Make A Way Ministries, Inc.
10621 North Kendall Drive - Suite 113,
Miami, Florida 33176
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