Category: christ

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christ

Nativitas

It was during the time when Caesar Augustus ordered a census to be taken of all those who inhabited the Empire; it was the first census taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria.

Everyone had to go back to their own city and register for the census so Joseph, who was from the was living in Galilee in the small city of Nazareth, had to go back to province of Judea to Bethlehem, which is the city of David—who was his family—in order to register along with Mary, his pregnant fiancée.

While they were there she came to term and gave birth to her firstborn son; and she wrapped him in cloths and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn.

It was in this same area that some shepherds who were out in the fields and watching their flock by night were surprised and horrendously frightened by the sudden appearance of an angel of the Lord, shining in glory and brightness.

“Don’t be afraid” the angel said to them “For I bring you good news of great joy which will be for everyone; today, in the city of David, there has been born for all of you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find the baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”

Then suddenly there appeared a multitude of heavenly beings praising God and saying “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among men with whom God is pleased!”

After the angels had disappeared, the shepherds quickly decided what they had to do: “Let’s go straight to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened which the Lord has revealed to us.”

So they came in a hurry and found their way to Bethlehem, to a stable outside of an inn, and found Mary and Joseph and the baby who was lying in the manger—the very sign they were told to look for. When they saw this they related the story to the parents and all those nearby who were all perplexed and astounded by the story the shepherds told them.

And although Mary kept these things in her heart and thought about them for many years, that evening the shepherds went back glorifying and praising God aloud for all that they had heard and seen, just as they had been told by God.

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christ sin

Against the Divine ‘Attaboy

Here’s the expectation: Christ suffered; don’t expect better. Here’s the expectation: Christ came to save His own and His own knew Him not; don’t expect better. I can say it but I don’t think we really believe it. We live in a place where we go to school to be guaranteed a job. We go to doctors to be guaranteed good health. We invest in our 401K to be ensured with a retirement fund.

All these things that we do with an expectation of a return; we do it just right, we get a cosmic ‘Attaboy.

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apologetics christ church

How Cell Phones, Clothing and Movies Can Be Used For the Gospel

A while back I did a post where I attacked the position that one must dress up for church. But there was one workaround I purposefully ignored in light of its complexities. “Since it is true that I don’t have to dress up for Church to impress God”, says a reader,” therefore I can dress how I want.” The first half of the answer to this sort of response deals with the subject of modesty and gender specific clothing—a topic I’m not planning to get into in this post. The second half of the answer deals with how we use what we wear.

This doesn’t only apply to clothing. There’s nothing in Scripture against movies (well, certain kinds of movies anyway) but movies can also fall under the usage I plan to explain here. There’s nothing in Scripture against cell phones, iPods, video game systems, cartoons or cheerios either—but all of these will fall underneath the same header: Things that can one can use to illustrate the Gospel.

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apologetics christ salvation

Theological Necessity of a Physical Resurrection

I’ve underscored that: it would be inconsistent to believe the Gospel and not believe in a physical resurrection; there are dire consequences of holding to a non-physical resurrection; and that there is no biological and cosmological grounds to outright deny a future physical resurrection. (I even shared some thoughts on how important the resurrection is to me in my experience.) Now, although I touched on some of this with the consequences of holding to a non-Physical resurrection, I wanted to delineate a theological necessity for a physical resurrection.

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christ salvation

Not Us

How would you fix things?

How would you go about addressing failing economy, the war, and jobs going overseas? Or how would you go about fixing the divided church, rampant error in the blogosphere and the constant temptation to become lax in your ways?

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