"While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them."- Luke 2:6-7
Merry Christmas to all of you! I just wanted to talk a little bit about the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. There are many things that are significant about His birth. First off, the whole thing was significant because He came to save us. What sticks out to many people is the fact that Mary placed Him in a manger. While that is what makes His birth unique, there is something else that a lot of people look past. Many scholars believe that the cloths that Mary wraps Him in are burial cloths. The fact that He was wrapped in burial cloths points to the fact that He was born to die. Jesus was born over 2000 years ago, and His ultimate purpose was to die, a gruesome death on a cross, to be the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world. Hebrews 9:12 says, "He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption."
For those who don't know what the Most Holy Place is, it is a part of the Jewish Temple that was only gone into once a year. That day was the Day of Atonement. The High Priest (the head man in charge) was the only guy that could go in there. What made this such a big deal was that the Most Holy Place is where God's presence was. If just anyone went in there, they would die. If the High Priest messed up, he would die. Jesus is the High Priest, and he is sinless. He was the perfect sacrifice for our sins, and now because of His sacrifice, we can be with Him one day.
I pray that we all remember that God gave us His Son over 2000 years ago to die for us because He loved us so much.
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Nothing is Impossible: Part 2
"For nothing is impossible with God."- Luke 1:37
So I told you that last week I was in the middle of the Christmas reading plan on Youversion and I read this verse. Well last week I also thought that I had gotten the full effect of the verse too. Today after I got done with my AP Calculus mid-term, I was reading some more in the book of Isaiah. What is funny is that nothing I was reading in Isaiah had to do with what happened while I was reading. I was sitting there and then a thought just runs through my head about his verse. I just got to thinking about it, and once again, I thought that I had gotten the full effect of the verse, but I was wrong.
The thought that ran through my head was about the word before God in this verse. I feel like that is the most significant word in the verse- WITH. It doesn't seem very important at first, but let's look at it differently for a second. What if instead of the angel saying the word "with", he said "for"? That changes the whole verse. Now we all know that nothing is impossible for God. He created the heavens and the earth, He can do anything He wants to. See how different that is? But instead the angel said, "For nothing is impossible WITH God." To me, that makes all the difference in the world. The angel is telling Mary this because she couldn't believe that she (as a virgin) was going to have a baby, and that her sister, Elizabeth, who was barren, was six months pregnant.
To me, the word with is saying that with the help of God, anything is possible. BUT without Him, nothing is possible. Think about a tree. A tree can't survive without water. It sucks up water from the ground at distributes it to the whole tree. Now think about gravity. How in the world just the tree take the water UP the tree, defying gravity, to distribute it to the whole tree? Nothing is impossible WITH God. The same goes with our blood flow. It defies gravity to come from the lowest point in our body, back up to our heart. There is another example that my friend, Will Lott, told me about. Let's just say, Will isn't a math genius. Well, he decided to take calculus this year. Will Lott+Calculus= not good. Will didn't like calculus very much. He found it difficult and frustrating. Well since yesterday was his final exam in that class, he was just hoping that he would pass. Well he got home and his dad said, "Son, it is by the grace of God that you ended up passing calculus." I just thought that was pretty funny, but it is a good example. I look at Will as a very good, Christian man, and with God he passed calculus when all the odds seemed to be against him.
Like I said in my other post about this verse, WITH God, anything is possible but we have to be WITH Him.
So I told you that last week I was in the middle of the Christmas reading plan on Youversion and I read this verse. Well last week I also thought that I had gotten the full effect of the verse too. Today after I got done with my AP Calculus mid-term, I was reading some more in the book of Isaiah. What is funny is that nothing I was reading in Isaiah had to do with what happened while I was reading. I was sitting there and then a thought just runs through my head about his verse. I just got to thinking about it, and once again, I thought that I had gotten the full effect of the verse, but I was wrong.
The thought that ran through my head was about the word before God in this verse. I feel like that is the most significant word in the verse- WITH. It doesn't seem very important at first, but let's look at it differently for a second. What if instead of the angel saying the word "with", he said "for"? That changes the whole verse. Now we all know that nothing is impossible for God. He created the heavens and the earth, He can do anything He wants to. See how different that is? But instead the angel said, "For nothing is impossible WITH God." To me, that makes all the difference in the world. The angel is telling Mary this because she couldn't believe that she (as a virgin) was going to have a baby, and that her sister, Elizabeth, who was barren, was six months pregnant.
To me, the word with is saying that with the help of God, anything is possible. BUT without Him, nothing is possible. Think about a tree. A tree can't survive without water. It sucks up water from the ground at distributes it to the whole tree. Now think about gravity. How in the world just the tree take the water UP the tree, defying gravity, to distribute it to the whole tree? Nothing is impossible WITH God. The same goes with our blood flow. It defies gravity to come from the lowest point in our body, back up to our heart. There is another example that my friend, Will Lott, told me about. Let's just say, Will isn't a math genius. Well, he decided to take calculus this year. Will Lott+Calculus= not good. Will didn't like calculus very much. He found it difficult and frustrating. Well since yesterday was his final exam in that class, he was just hoping that he would pass. Well he got home and his dad said, "Son, it is by the grace of God that you ended up passing calculus." I just thought that was pretty funny, but it is a good example. I look at Will as a very good, Christian man, and with God he passed calculus when all the odds seemed to be against him.
Like I said in my other post about this verse, WITH God, anything is possible but we have to be WITH Him.
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Nothing is Impossible
"For nothing is impossible with God."- Luke 1:37
I just started a reading plan on Youversion today that they have for Christmas. This is the verse for today that really spoke to me. We see this time and time again through Scripture, and it is amazing. One example is God's promise to Abraham. In Genesis 12:2, God said, "I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing." Well making Abraham into a great nation was going to be kind of tough (through Abraham's eyes) because his wife, Sarah, was barren. In Genesis 18:12 it says that Sarah laughed when she was told that she was going to have a son. She didn't believe that it was going to happen because she was about 90 years old, and yet it happened. Abraham's people became as numerous as the stars in the sky. What is even more amazing is that God also told Abraham that the nations would be blessed through him. While Abraham and his wife were both sitting there laughing because they didn't believe what God had told them, God had engineered an amazing plan to bless the nations through Abraham by sending Jesus 2,000 years later as a descendant of Abraham.
And of course the reason that this verse is even where it is... JESUS WAS BORN TO A VIRGIN... nuff said. After that He changed water into wine. He made the blind see. He made the lame walk. He cured the lepers. He fed 5,000. He walked on water. He calmed the storm. He arose from the dead. Jesus says in John 14:10, "Don't you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing His work." What is amazing is that, yes Jesus does all of these things, but He only did them with the help of God. That is amazing.
There are many Biblical examples of this, and I encourage you to read about them, but here are some things that have happened recently that prove this. One of my friends and his family found out 10 months ago that my friend's dad had colon cancer. Not only was that a scare, but it was stage 4 colon cancer. That is like the worst of the worst. My mom got a call saying that we need a miracle for him to make it. I like to see things in numbers, so I looked up the survival rate of this cancer not too long ago. For stage 4 colon cancer, the survival rate is 6%. We did need a miracle. Just a week or two ago, we got a call saying that, through the power of prayer, my friend's dad is in remission. 10 months ago he had a 6% chance of survival, and now he is in remission. I think that is just amazing.
Another example that is happening once a week is Tim Tebow. You may be tired of hearing about him, but I can't get enough of it. It is amazing what he is doing. With the help of God, Tim Tebow has defied the odds and has taken a 1-4 team and put them at the head of the AFC West (now 8-5). Most of those wins have been comebacks in the fourth quarter, or in overtime. Like I said earlier, I like numbers, and the odds of this happening are a mere 0.0007%. That is amazing.
With God, we can defy the odds, but we have to completely rely on Him.
I just started a reading plan on Youversion today that they have for Christmas. This is the verse for today that really spoke to me. We see this time and time again through Scripture, and it is amazing. One example is God's promise to Abraham. In Genesis 12:2, God said, "I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing." Well making Abraham into a great nation was going to be kind of tough (through Abraham's eyes) because his wife, Sarah, was barren. In Genesis 18:12 it says that Sarah laughed when she was told that she was going to have a son. She didn't believe that it was going to happen because she was about 90 years old, and yet it happened. Abraham's people became as numerous as the stars in the sky. What is even more amazing is that God also told Abraham that the nations would be blessed through him. While Abraham and his wife were both sitting there laughing because they didn't believe what God had told them, God had engineered an amazing plan to bless the nations through Abraham by sending Jesus 2,000 years later as a descendant of Abraham.
And of course the reason that this verse is even where it is... JESUS WAS BORN TO A VIRGIN... nuff said. After that He changed water into wine. He made the blind see. He made the lame walk. He cured the lepers. He fed 5,000. He walked on water. He calmed the storm. He arose from the dead. Jesus says in John 14:10, "Don't you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing His work." What is amazing is that, yes Jesus does all of these things, but He only did them with the help of God. That is amazing.
There are many Biblical examples of this, and I encourage you to read about them, but here are some things that have happened recently that prove this. One of my friends and his family found out 10 months ago that my friend's dad had colon cancer. Not only was that a scare, but it was stage 4 colon cancer. That is like the worst of the worst. My mom got a call saying that we need a miracle for him to make it. I like to see things in numbers, so I looked up the survival rate of this cancer not too long ago. For stage 4 colon cancer, the survival rate is 6%. We did need a miracle. Just a week or two ago, we got a call saying that, through the power of prayer, my friend's dad is in remission. 10 months ago he had a 6% chance of survival, and now he is in remission. I think that is just amazing.
Another example that is happening once a week is Tim Tebow. You may be tired of hearing about him, but I can't get enough of it. It is amazing what he is doing. With the help of God, Tim Tebow has defied the odds and has taken a 1-4 team and put them at the head of the AFC West (now 8-5). Most of those wins have been comebacks in the fourth quarter, or in overtime. Like I said earlier, I like numbers, and the odds of this happening are a mere 0.0007%. That is amazing.
With God, we can defy the odds, but we have to completely rely on Him.
Monday, December 12, 2011
The Great Commission
"Then Jesus came to them and said, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."- Matthew 28:18-20
This is a great Bible verse that many people have called "The Great Commission", but it is misunderstood by a lot of people. People stress the word "go" in verse 19, when that isn't what is supposed to be focused on too much. The word that is supposed to be focused on is "make". What is really being said is "As you go, make disciples." We go places all of the time, and while we are going we should make disciples. Jesus came to Earth and spent all of His time here with a group of just 12 guys and teaching them everything he knows so they may make disciples one day. They traveled the nation of Israel, which isn't a whole lot of land, and spread the good news. This just goes to show that you don't have to travel halfway around the world to make disciples. The making of disciples can happen at work, at home, in school, etc. Wherever you go, make disciples.
This is a great Bible verse that many people have called "The Great Commission", but it is misunderstood by a lot of people. People stress the word "go" in verse 19, when that isn't what is supposed to be focused on too much. The word that is supposed to be focused on is "make". What is really being said is "As you go, make disciples." We go places all of the time, and while we are going we should make disciples. Jesus came to Earth and spent all of His time here with a group of just 12 guys and teaching them everything he knows so they may make disciples one day. They traveled the nation of Israel, which isn't a whole lot of land, and spread the good news. This just goes to show that you don't have to travel halfway around the world to make disciples. The making of disciples can happen at work, at home, in school, etc. Wherever you go, make disciples.
Monday, December 5, 2011
Season of Giving
We all call this time of year the season of giving. The reason, off the top of our heads, being that we go out and get a gift to give to someone on Christmas. This year's season of giving has been pretty ridiculous. There have been multiple occasions this year where police had to intervene to stop people from hurting each other because they were trying to get a black friday deal. Well I have really been thinking about this lately, so let's take it back to why Christmas is even here. Jesus was born on Christmas day about 2014-2017 years ago. That is why we call it CHRISTmas... Anyways, how did this part of the year leading up to Christmas get the title of the season of giving? Yes, when the three wise men came to see Jesus after he was born they all gave him gifts symbolizing he was king. That is not what I'm talking about. John 3:16 says, "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life." We have all heard the verse and most of us have become numb to what it means because we have heard it so much. This season is called the season of giving because on Christmas day 2014-2017 years ago, God gave us the ultimate gift-His Son. He gave us His Son who would eventually be hung on a cross and suffer for us. Since it is the season of giving we should constantly be giving thanks to God for giving us His Son, along with all of the other blessings that we have. Yes, I know that Thanksgiving day is only once a year, but that doesn't mean that we should just give thanks for one day out of the year. During these next few days, remember why we are celebrating this day- Jesus, the Ultimate Gift.
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