Category: Truth

Don’t feel bad if you feel this way too, you’re not alone

A W Tozer on Christmas:

“So completely are we carried away by the excitement of this midwinter festival that we are apt to forget that its romantic appeal is the least significant thing about it. The theology of Christmas too easily gets lost under the gay wrappings, yet apart from the theological meaning it really has none at all. A half dozen doctrinally sound carols serve to keep alive the great deep truth of the Incarnation, but aside from these, popular Christmas music is void of any real lasting truth. The English mouse that was not even stirring, the German Tannenbaum so fair and lovely and the American red-nosed reindeer that has nothing to recommend it have pretty well taken over in Christmas poetry and song. These along with merry old St. Nicholas have about displaced Christian theology.… It does seem strange that so many persons become excited about Christmas and so few stop to inquire into its meaning; but I suppose this odd phenomenon is quite in harmony with our unfortunate human habit of magnifying trivialities and ignoring matters of greatest import.… The Christmas message, when stripped of its pagan overtones, is relatively simple: God is come to earth in the form of man. John 1:14; Galatians 4:4–5; 1 Timothy 3:16

In these latter-years of the twentieth century no other season of the year reveals so much religion and so little godliness as the Christmas season.… How far have we come in the corruption of our tastes from the reverence of the simple shepherds, the chant of the angels and the beauty of the heavenly host! The Star of Bethlehem could not lead a wise man to Christ today; it could not be distinguished amid the millions of artificial lights hung aloft on Main Street by the Merchants Association. No angels could sing loudly enough to make themselves heard above the raucous, earsplitting rendition of “Silent Night” meant to draw customers to the neighborhood stores. In our mad materialism we have turned beauty into ashes, prostituted every normal emotion and made merchandise of the holiest gift the world ever knew.

Christ came to bring peace and we celebrate His coming by making peace impossible for six weeks of each year. Not peace but tension, fatigue and irritation rule the Christmas season. He came to free us of debt and many respond by going deep into debt each year to buy enervating luxuries for people who do not appreciate them. He came to help the poor and we heap gifts upon those who do not need them. The simple token given out of love has been displaced by expensive presents given because we have been caught in a squeeze and don’t know how to back out of it. Not the beauty of the Lord our God is found in such a situation, but the ugliness and deformity of human sin. Matthew 2:1–11; Luke 2:8–20; Luke 4:18–19”
— A.W Tozer “The Warfare of the Spirit”

For more thoughts about the practice of celebrating “Christmas” see:
http://www.scripturesongs.net/misc/THE-PRACTICE-OF-CELEBRATING-CHRISTMAS.pdf

The Good News according to Peter

“And opening his mouth, Peter said, Truly I see that God is not a respecter of faces, but in every nation the one fearing Him and working righteousness is acceptable to Him. The Word which He sent to the sons of Israel, preaching the gospel of peace through Jesus Christ/Anointed, this One is Lord of all. You know the thing that happened throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John proclaimed, Jesus the One from Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good, and healing all those having been oppressed by the devil, because God was with Him. And we are witnesses of all things which He did, both in the country of the Jews, and in Jerusalem. They did away with Him, hanging Him on a tree. God raised up this One the third day and gave to Him to become visible; not to all the people, but to witnesses, the ones having been before hand-picked by God, to us who ate and drank with Him after His rising again from the dead. And He commanded us to proclaim to the people and to witness solemnly that it is He who has been marked out by God to be Judge of the living and the dead. To this One all the Prophets witness, so that through His name everyone believing into Him will receive remission of sins. As Peter was yet speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell on all those hearing the Word. And the faithful of the circumcision were amazed, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out on the nations also. For they heard them speaking in languages and magnifying God. Then Peter answered, Can anyone forbid the water that these not be baptized, who the Holy Spirit received, even as we also? And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord. Then they asked him to remain some days.”
— Acts 10.34-48 (Green’s Literal Translation)

…later, as Peter was recounting what had happened…

“And in my beginning to speak, the Holy Spirit fell on them, as also on us in the beginning. And I recalled the Word of the Lord, how He said, John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized in the Holy Spirit. Then if God gave the same gift to them as also to us, believing on the Lord Jesus Christ/Anointed, and I, who was I to be able to prevent God? And hearing these things, they kept silent and glorified God, saying, Then God also has granted to the nations repentance unto life.”
— Acts 11.15-18 (Green’s Literal Translation)

To create a process already in motion

God — because He is God — can create a process that is already in motion.

For example, God can create a car that is, at the instant of creation, already moving down the highway at 70 miles per hour. One does not have to deny science, or our common understanding of physical processes, to believe this.

Everyone believes in processes. Everyone knows that cars come into being as a result of very detailed, deliberate and scientific processes, and that a car can be traced back to its manufacturer and origin. It is no different with the entire physical universe. Everyone knows that there are processes in motion in the heaves and the earth. What many people do not know is, when these processes came into being. To believe that God could create a physical universe that is already in motion — at the instant of its creation — is not to deny science or natural processes, but rather to embrace faith in God.

For many people, the source of frustration or confusion toward the idea that God created the heavens and the earth — in mid-process — is the result of lack of faith in, and lack of first hand experience with, God.

I hope and pray that you will find faith in your heart and, through faith, come to the knowledge of God and His unique purposes, plans and processes in the universe.

“when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”
—Luke 18:8

“God, who created all things through Jesus Christ/Anointed.”
—Ephesians 3:9

“For by Him were all things created, in the heavens and on the earth, things visible and things invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things have been created through Him, and for Him.”
—Colossians 1:16

“Worthy are you, our Lord and God, the Holy One, to receive the glory, the honor, and the power, for you created all things, and because of Your desire they existed, and were created!”
—Revelation 4:11

God has desired it

For Yahweh has chosen Zion. He has desired it for his habitation. “This is my resting place forever. Here I will live, for I have desired it.”
—Psalms 132:13, 14

But you have come to Mount Zion, and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable hosts of angels, to the general assembly and assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, to God the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect, to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better than that of Abel.
—Hebrews 12:22-24

Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour comes, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, will you worship the Father. You worship that which you don’t know. We worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour comes, and now is, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such to be His worshippers. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
—John 4:21-24

The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah comes,” (he who is called Christ/Anointed). “When he has come, he will declare to us all things.” Jesus said to her, “I am He, the one who speaks to you.” —John 4:25,26

Father God is seeking and desiring hearts that are voluntarily passionate for Him, to be with Him where He is, through His Son Yeshua.