Merry Merry Christmas! The king is born! Or, was He born on this day? Read to the end for a discussion.
Welcome to BibleBum where we are exploring the entire Bible in one year to better learn how to follow God’s instructions and discover the purpose for our lives. The BibleBum blog uses The One Year Chronological Bible, the New Living Translation version. At the end of each day’s reading, Rob, a cultural history aficionado and seminary graduate, answers questions from Leigh An, the blogger host, about the daily scripture. To start from the beginning, click on “Index” and select Day 1.
3 John 1:1-15
1 John 4:7-5:21
2 John 1:1-13
Questions & Observations
Q. (1 John 11-12): This verse reminds me of those people I meet that are just radiating with kindness. I want to ask them if they are a Christian because I am very curious about that. Is that OK to ask, or should I just assume they are Christian?
A. I can’t really see someone taking offense to the question, but I personally confess that I rarely ask people when I am similar circumstances. Someone who is a true, confessing Christian should frankly be eager to tell you so.
Q. (5:6b): I am still foggy on what this means: “And the Spirit, who is truth, confirms it with his testimony.” Does that just mean that we know that Jesus is God’s Son and, when we are baptized we get the gift of the Holy Spirit, which Jesus said we would. Therefore, His promise came true. And the Holy Spirit confirms Jesus’ teaching because the Spirit shows us the right way to live, the same as Jesus did. Thus, the spirit of Jesus (who taught us to be godly) still resides in us.
A. One of the things we established in Ephesians 1 is that the presence of the Spirit is the “mark” of our salvation, so in a sense, it is His presence that serves as a “testimony” about our faith in Christ. He would not be present within us if we did not believe in God’s work in Christ, so His very presence testifies about what we believe.
Q. (5:16b): The sin that leads to death is denying that Jesus is the Son of God? And, talking about praying for sinners, my daughter has started praying for Satan. What do you say to that? It actually stemmed from me because God says we are to love our enemies.
A. John tends to describe things in very strong black and white terms: you are either with God, or an antichrist — that sort of thing. So it is little surprise that he would say that denying Jesus was the Son of God is a sin that leads to death. As to your daughter’s action, I love her vision for praying for her enemies!
Q. (2 John 1:1): Is John singling out women believers?
A. Not really. There is some speculation that 2 John is written to a particular woman, but the scholarly consensus is that the “women” represents a congregation or a particular church. Revelation will repeatedly refer to congregations using feminine imagery, so it is hardly an uncommon thing for the NT (watch for the bride of Christ imagery).
O. (3 John 1:1-4): Growing up, I remember taking care of visiting evangelists and musicians that came to our church for a revival. I think they stayed with us some, we fed them, had church dinners. But now that I belong to a megachurch, there isn’t that sense of close-knit community. I miss it! But, as my life has changed from going to a small community to a big metropolis, we can still carve out ways to help others. And, our church definitely supports missionaries who must travel abroad.
Q. Rob, since this is Christmas Day, can you explain if Christmas was the actual day Jesus was born? I have heard studies where He was born in January. Regardless, it’s a very important event to celebrate! I think it’s interesting to hear how dates get set or rearranged in history.
A. The word Christmas comes from the words “Christ” and “Mass,” or Christ’s coming or arrival. In the old days, the celebrations were known as liturgical feasts or feast days, as they still are in the “high” churches. The first indication of the Christ Mass in the Western Church dates to around 354 AD, but the Eastern Church (what we today call the big “o” Orthodox) had already tied the birth of Christ into one combined feast day known as Epiphany, which takes place on Jan 6th of each year. The Western Church also recognizes Epiphany as the date of the Magi’s arrival (Matthew 2), obviously have a different date for Christmas. (In passing reference, you get 12 days if you add the dates from Christmas, Dec 25th, to Epiphany, Jan 6th, which would be the 12 days of Christmas, in case you ever wondered).
Okay, now about that date. Well, as you can clearly see from what we have already discussed, there was no consensus about the ACTUAL date of Jesus’ birth, because the Gospels do not tell us. The OBSERVANCE of the birth is what takes place on Dec. 25, so it should not be understood that the liturgical churches have been saying Jesus was born on Dec. 25 for 1700 years … it hasn’t. As to WHY Dec. 25 was selected, well, now we’re in deeper water. There is some close proximity to what is called the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year and a major holiday for pagan culture, the dominant force in the world both Jesus and Christianity were “born” into. So there is frequently discussed and “known” pseudo-knowledge that the 25th was selected to “replace” the feast of the Solstice, but I do not think this is actually what happened. What caused it then? Since that’s a long answer, I’m going to recommend you read an essay from a Catholic writer named Mark Shea (he’s a great writer and normally blogs here: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/) on that very topic here: http://pblosser.blogspot.com/2006/12/is-christmas-really-just-warmed-over.html
Hope you find it as interesting and thought provoking as I did. Merry Christmas!
BibleBum 