Sometimes cast aside as a minor player in the retelling of the Christmas story, Joseph’s story mirrored that of his wife in many ways. He sat with her marvelling at this baby. He wondered about the baby’s origin. And yet, Joseph was forced to make a choice that not even Mary had to make. Where Mary carried the baby within her, Joseph had to choose to stay, to involve himself in the baby’s life.
“Do not be afraid.” We see this phrase recur throughout the Christmas story and it’s easy to gloss over without fully comprehending it.
The virgin birth circumvented the transmission of the sin nature and allowed the eternal God to become a perfect man. He never sinned, which qualified Him to be a righteous substitutionary sacrifice for sinners.
God chose an upstanding couple to raise His only Son and nurture Him. But what a strain was initially placed on their relationship. You might say their romance was saved by a dream.
Two millennia ago, God answered the anguished cry of humanity by making “the problem of evil” His own. God Almighty became Immanuel, “God with us.” He lived as we live, suffered as we suffer, died as we die, yet without sin.
As Chuck Swindoll assures us in this message, God continues to walk into our lives when we least expect Him, and His surprises still bring relief. When we say yes to God’s will for our lives, God floods our hearts with relief. And, oh, the joy that God’s peace brings to our hearts!
The first few pages in the New Testament contain a list of complicated names. Matthew’s account sounds more like a phone directory than the genealogy of Jesus!
Want to make this Christmas season one to remember? Let’s consider how to move into the neighbourhood with our celebration. Let’s help people know God’s love this season by being generous inside and out, true from start to finish.
Chuck Swindoll presents the storyline of Jesus’ birth in a manner you’ve likely never heard before. Although many of the specific details are familiar to us, Chuck will help us see the powerful backstory of the first Christmas that’s not as obvious or well known.
Mary was a teenage girl. Joseph was an ordinary carpenter. But God chose these commonplace peasants from a backwater town to raise the Saviour of the world. Chuck Swindoll describes how and why God chooses His servants.
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