Having considered myself to be a Christian almost my whole life… and because of growing up in the church learning a lot of stuff… I've thought I’ve actually known quite a lot too!
A few weeks ago I began to wonder about the word “gospel” so I did something that has been relatively a new thing – I studied it. I looked up the word in a couple of dictionaries… I discussed it with a few people… various ones input a bit… and I looked up (and read!) every reference that used the word “gospel” in the Bible (approximately 90 of them).
One way Church defines ‘gospel’ is “The Good News”... we refer to the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John as ‘the gospels’ and the way I would have defined it is “the story of Jesus”.
I was blown away by the immensity of what I found when I studied!
I don’t know how come I had never wondered before.
I don’t know how come I would previously have said so little about the Whole behind the Definition while thinking it was enough.
What I know now though is that yet again I feel like my eyes have been opened.
Obviously, when we define something we distil that thing down to the barest essence. The minimum words for ease of communication. But just like a subject synopsis in a University brochure, while the definition or synopsis is TRUE, it doesn’t do justice to the whole… it is an introduction, an overview - why else go to university to study the subject!
What I also now know is that UNLESS I have a working knowledge of the Body behind the Definition of the Word Gospel – I would not be equipped to know:
A) If a DIFFERENT Jesus than the true one is being preached
B) If a DIFFERENT Spirit came than the One True
C) If a DIFFERENT Gospel than the True were preached
Yet we are told over and over:
A) To watch our life and doctrine closely
B) That scoffers and deceivers will come
C) That even the elect will be deceived
GAL 1:6-9 I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel- which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!
2 COR 10:4 For if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted…
If the leader leading is himself misled how would you know?
If the teacher teaching is himself deceived how would you discern?
We are not meant to swallow, we are not meant to follow WITHOUT testing, proving, assessing, measuring, watching for OURSELVES with the Word of God as the plumb line.
Back to ‘gospel’.
We are warned the gospel will be mishandled.
We are admonished to look out for that happening.
There are dire warnings about handling and responding to it properly.
And what IT is, is much bigger than I thought I knew till a few weeks ago.
Perhaps the most impacting portion of Scripture to me was the one that follows in a moment… but rather than follow ME and/or MY conclusions about it – GO FIND OUT FOR YOURSELVES! When the Word opens up to you personally it is finding the greatest treasure!
Doit-doit-doit-doit-doit!
Sometimes when we think we’re testing or measuring by the Word, what we’re actually doing is enacting what we’ve been taught to think about the Scriptures instead of letting the Scriptures show us how to think.
I’m a baby at this, I’m just getting started but I’m having the time of my life.
The remainder of this blog is taken from my notes here. They are pretty raw – just the Scriptures with a few thoughts as I went through.
RO 1:1 Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God-- 2 the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures 3 regarding his Son, who as to his human nature was a descendant of David, 4 and who through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord. 5 Through him and for his name's sake, we received grace and apostleship to call people from among all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith. 6 And you also are among those who are called to belong to Jesus Christ
Broken down:
1. The gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy
Scriptures
2. regarding his Son,
3. who as to his human nature was a descendant of David,
4. and who through the Spirit of holiness
5. was declared
6. with power
7. to be the Son of God
8. by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord.
9. Through him
10. and for his name's sake
11. we received
12. grace
13. and apostleship
14. to call people
15. from among all the Gentiles
16. to the obedience
17. that comes from faith
In this list we see:
Past, then present, then future, now present, now still future
Father, Son, Holy Spirit
Blood, water, Spirit
Jew and Gentile
Jesus son of God, born of man
Foretelling
What we receive
Obedience because of faith
And to follow on from Ro 1
The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. RO 1:21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
Broken down:
The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven
Against all the godlessness and wickedness of men
Who suppress the truth by their wickedness,
since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.
For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
For although they knew God,
They neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him,
But their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.
Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools
And exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
And in this list we see:
God’s wrath being made known
The truth being suppressed (by man and Satan’s powers)
God’s reality and nature being evident in creation
People who ONCE KNEW God falling away and prey to mortal wiles
28March 2010 - FLIP SIDES OF TRADITION
Just a little over a year ago I barely had even as much as a surface knowledge of the 7 Feasts of Israel. I had never given a moments thought to the few times I had noticed a specific month named in the Bible – they are in a different language (!!!) so had never bothered to wonder when these mentioned things happened in our frame of reference… but all this changed and my fascination with these subjects has brought depth and dimension to my life in ways I could never have imagined.
I have a love/loathe relationship with tradition. I love the traditions we have marked out within our family – of which there are many! Mostly very informal – just the funny/odd things we do as family that develop over time. Some of them have been more formal, and with certain hopes, dreams or goals in mind that having these traditions might hopefully help us achieve.
Not having been brought up in a church with much tradition – almost none as far as many flavours of church go – I have tended towards suspicion over many of these church traditions – and at times worse… to scorn. Mainly through a particular friend, I have learned respect for many of these age old church traditions as I have come to recognise much depth, biblical foundation and desire to honour God within them.
I do seem to have a bent tho for bucking the system, questioning and searching. It’s not for the purpose of being difficult or for playing devils advocate, it’s because if I don’t grasp the meaning of a thing I see it as a pointless waste of time and I want to either UNDERSTAND or flick that which I see is pointless or useless or distracting from what really matters.
When I began finding out about the Feasts of Israel, I became so very excited at every level. (Article on Passover & Communion here and on the 7 feasts here). To see the riches of what was written thousands of years before our time but for our learning, and thousands of years before Jesus time also for the learning of all who would see – is awesome!
These 7 occasions all fall within the first 7 months of the Hebrew calendar. They are each to mark something past, but are prophetic in the pictures they portray of events future. Four are fulfilled and three are yet to be. The four fulfilled all fell within the space of less than 60 days of real time – about 2000 years ago. The three to come all will fall within a space of about 20 days at some point (in what I think will be the not too distant) future.
Tomorrow is the 29th of March – the 14th of Nissan. Passover. The first of the 7 feasts. The first of the four foretold 3500 years ago and fulfilled 2000 years ago. Both the foretelling and the fulfilment commemorative events from OUR point in history but with the purpose of all things being fulfilled in the right time.
Because these dates have become so special – I want to mark them. Not out of a sense of duty or religiosity but of wonder and a desire to press deeper to see what other treasures of wisdom and knowledge they hold. Because I am a creature of habit – which in a sense is how all traditions come about – my immediate tendency is to treat these occasions the same way we did last year but I know that as soon as we (humanly speaking) set a form for how something is to be done, it becomes so much easier to lose the heart of the reason we began it in the first place and the longer it goes, the easier it is to lose the real message. So while we will repeat some elements, I am resolved never to treat these things identically from year to year but to keep on pressing for more depth and meaning and application.
See – the parenting materials we have used and taught have imparted much to us in the understanding and use of family tradition… one of the concepts being “family identity”. (Article here soon). Traditions help us form a sense of who “we” collectively are. It is no different in a church or a nation or any grouping of people. Traditions help form an identity. I believe this is very important – it’s part of why God gave so many traditions and laws to the Hebrew people! It made them a very distinctive nation – a platform through which the prophecy and coming of Jesus as Messiah would be recognised! Yet – so many missed Him and did NOT see or understand as they were caught in the surface applications of those laws and traditions.
Our present day churches, customs and traditions can do exactly the same.
The very thing set to honour the One we believe in becomes the focus, rather than He Himself!
I was listening to an MP3 message last night where the speaker said “ritualism expels Christ, and Christ expels ritualism”. Likewise there is a joke – a little boy sitting on a step outside a church and Jesus sits down beside him and asks him what’s wrong. He replies “they wont let me in”. Jesus replies “they won’t let me in either”.
Many of us can see the irony in that but the truth of it is appalling. The very thing we have purposed to do in honour of the King, eclipses Him instead. Or it can – and frequently does.
I think many people have had a total gutful of meaningless repetition and empty tradition. People are longing for freedom in God. But the backlash to that has included the assumption that freedom means no form. This is wrong. And very dangerous.
The answer is not in man made traditions – thought they may serve other wonderful purposes.
The answer is not “no form” – that leaves people open to deception and fruit-loopy (or demonic) experience.
The answer is in HIS form – HIS pattern – THE way HE has marked out for us.
The road and the door are narrow and few will find it. Yet we are promised that those who DILIGENTLY seek it WILL find it. He WILL be found!
Real Church is His people, and Real Church (being His people) is not necessarily one and the same as those who attend every church.
So how do we know His form? The Way to His presence, His life, His forgiveness? Well – primarily the Word of God, or through those that genuinely know Him – not those who just know stuff about Him.
While each of us is individual, and He wants an individual relationship with each of us, the pattern towards him is the same in each of our lives as it is then HIS pattern, HIS form, HIS way that is marked.
I recently taught our kids 5 words that name what God so frequently does in the Old Testament through the laws, traditions, events and instructions there. They are...
picture
pattern
prophecy
type and
foreshadow.
If we have a view to recognise it all pointing to Jesus, we will see Him there over and over again.
Many have taught much and better than I could on the Tabernacle so look into it for yourselves but just for now a teeny tiny peek…
First we must enter the gate – it is an impossibility to enter His most holy place without entering through the gate.
Next we must come to the alter and see His salvation – the price paid for us. The price paid in full at Passover 2000 years ago.
Next we wash at the laver. The laver (basin) will be returned to over and over and over again through our lives – particularly as we view water AS the word of God which we need in order to transform our lives. When we are reborn we need washing. And as we live, we need frequent washes. The laver is also represented by baptism – but we again put so much form around baptism that we can lose sight of it being about death to sin! (Planning an article on that soon).
We cannot come into His Holy place without passing through the outer areas first.
So. Monday is Passover. And Tuesday is the first day of the 7 day feast of unleavened bread.
Passover was the very feast that Jesus inserted Himself into as the reason for the previous 1500 years tradition. In so doing He instituted the first communion service. He help the cup of wine they had for 1500 years known as the cup of redemption and said “This is my blood, do this in remembrance of me”. The same night He took the bread that for 1500 years represented sinlessness and said “This is my body, broken for you, do this in remembrance of me”.
The feast of unleavened bread represents seriousness about ridding our lives of sin. The ancient tradition was to thoroughly clean out the whole home from every product or use of any rising agent. A kind of object lesson about the seriousness of how we should rid our lives of sin. In a way it corresponds with the laver in the tabernacle. While Jesus was sinless, we are not, and though at the alter we receive forgiveness, we need the constant washing of the water of the Word, His Holy Spirit, to purify us.
Interestingly in another reference, the words TO eat unleavened bread every day appear and a serious case could be made for not only NOT eating leavened bread, but TO ALSO eat unleavened bread every day. If this is an accurate take on those verses, I see this as the need to seriously take Him INTO our lives – He is the Bread of Life - as well as ridding our lives of sin. It’s not enough to not do the don’ts. Not doing the don’ts might be safer and healthier than otherwise but it does not make us righteous in His eyes. Only the price paid on the cross can ever do that.
23 FEB 2010
When I made our family Christmas card back in 2008 I found it too hard to write about the year we’d had without being epic, glib or depressing so I put a calendar of events on the back of our photos instead of my usual catch-up note. I scoped a heap of websites and filled as many days of the year as possible with those “international day of something” days – from the sublime to the ridiculous. (Read it here if you like). It proved to be alot of fun and was undoubtedly a better read than any note I’ve ever written! People invariably had the same idea of looking to see what day fell on their birthday. We had a bit of fun with some of them at home too – sometimes having a food from a special day (who can resist ‘Chocolate Covered Peanut Day”?) and one time delivering the a giftwrapped celebratory item as mentioned below to a friend whose birthday fell on “Sneak a Zucchini Onto Your Neighbour’s Porch Day”!!!
However – my point is that when I was filling out the calendar out a little over 12 months ago I had to look a few of them up to see if they were OK (not New Agey or Occult or from some other religion) and I didn’t know at that time what PURIM was – so after sussing out that it came from Biblical tradition I left it in. Just a few months later I smiled at myself as I became so very interested in the Jewish feast days and studied them right throughout the year – from not even having known what Purim was such a short time ago to working it into our families traditions!
“For such a time as this” is a phrase becoming well known… we often ascribe them to those living in troubled times upholding good or‘uphill’ causes . The full quote comes from the ancient record of Queen Esther – over two and a half thousand years ago. Through God at work in her actions she proved she was indeed in her position for “such a time as this” and from those events came the feast of Purim which has been celebrated by the Jewish people ever since.
ESTHER 4:12 When Esther's words were reported to Mordecai,13 he sent back this answer: "Do not thinkthat because you are in the king's house you alone of all the Jews will escape.14 For if you remain silent at this time, reliefand deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and yourfather's family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to royalposition for such a time as this?"
Both Purim and Hanukah (and Christmas for that matter) are celebrations of great events set by humans for remembrance rather than by God as instruction.
This coming Sunday and Monday are Purim… the 28thFeb 2010 and the 1 March 2010. (14thand 15th of Adar – as recorded in the Bible. (Esther 9:21)
Esther is quite a short read and a truly fascinating one… I’m not going to tell you any more about Purim itself because I think you should read Esther and allow the immensity of the story grip you and teach you for itself. Full of tension, intrigue, suspense, faithfulness, deliverance, and justice - you can read the whole thing online here (just click the arrows at the top of the page to go to each next chapter).
Do we have to mark Purim? No; no-one said we had no mark Christmas either. It’s not a 'have-to' thing, it’s an opportunity to enter into a living biblical object lesson – taking the opportunity to learn and grow and remember the great deeds of the Lord.
For us – I plan to take a break from our current morning readings of Deuteronomy, and read through Esther for the next several days instead. Perhaps on Sunday or Monday we might have some hamentashen - a YUMMY biscuit we made at Purim last year… they were so good I’m not tempted to even, try anything else yet! (Google it for recipes).
And we will play the little You Tube PURIM dance we found last year too – little Miss 15 months LOVED it then and loves it still – we all have to dance and twirl and play it over and over!
Why not make a few new family traditions as you mark an ancient one that showed God’s might hand at work?
P.S. For a great fictionalised account of Esther get hold of the books by Tommy Tenney and Mark Olsen “Hadassah: One Night with the King” and “The Hadassah Covenant” (for those in Oz at Koorong here)
We had none of the usual 'freebie' calendars that usually flow in as Christmas promo prezzies so I decided to make one instead.
ABOUT THE CALENDAR
If you lived and worked in two different time zones, you would obviously need to keep track of the time in both places. The calendar we are used to is not the same as the calendar spoken of in the Bible. Because of this difference most of us are unaware of the days on which many recorded Biblical events happened, or the days on which God set His “appointed times” (moed).
The way God set the universe in motion gives us our days, weeks months and years.
The rotation of the earth (on its axis) gives us A DAY
In the beginning God worked for 6 days and rested for 1 establishing A WEEK
The revolution of the moon around the earth gives us A LUNAR MONTH
The revolution of the earth around the sun gives us A YEAR
The Hebrew calendar combines each of these events and has a complicated system of compensating for the difference in the length of lunar years and solar years. (A lunar year can be either 11 days less or 19 days more than a solar year!) A day on the Jewish calendar begins at sundown and each month begins when the first sliver of the new moon appears. In Bible times each new month (rosh chodesh) was announced by trumpet or shofar blasts from the temple. Keeping track of the months and days was very important in Bible times as God required the men to come to Jerusalem on 3 specific occasions in the year, regardless of where they lived.
The first mention in the Bible of a specific month is in the book of Exodus when God had Moses lead the Hebrews out of Egypt - though in the story of Noah’s flood it is obvious that many years before Moses, time-keeping was well established. The records in the Bible of how long people lived show that keeping time has been important to mankind since Adam!
The year 2010 in the Gregorian calendar spans the years 5770-5771 on the Hebrew count.
The Gregorian calendar was instituted by the Catholic Church in 1582 by Pope Gregory XIII. It was adopted by Britain in 1752 and other countries even later – as recently as 1926! It was an adaptation or refinement of the Julian calendar (enforced by Julius Caesar in 45 BC) – itself an adaptation of the previously existing Roman calendar!
The Gregorian calendar has divided the solar year into set months with the basic adjustment of the leap year. It is simpler and accurate to the solar year though doesn’t attempt to recon the months according to the patterns of the moon as the Hebrew calendar does. (The watching of the moon was not mystical – it was the available, practical and visible measure of time).
The Hebrews have two ways of observing the calendar – like we have the regular and the financial year calendars. They have the Sacred Calendar which marks the cycle of Feasts. And there is the Civil Calendar, which is the official calendar for Kings, contracts and childbirth. That is why you will see 2 “new years” in both the Hebrew and Gregorian Calendars!
FASCINATING!
It is fascinating to be able to read the Bible and be able to figure out what day commemorates a Biblical event!
It’s fascinating to know what days God’s “Appointed Times” occur! (# Mostly!)
It’s fascinating to wonder what more there might be that God meant when He said: "Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth." Genesis 1:14-15
A WORD ABOUT CHRISTMAS
Like Purim and Hanukkah, Christmas is a celebration of a great event set by humans for remembrance rather than by God as instruction.
Unlike Purim and Hanukkah, Christmas is not celebrated on the actual day of the past event but one designated for the purpose. Many well reasoned theories exist about the time of Jesus birth, but true to the rest of the Biblical pattern, recording the date of death is sometimes present but never a date of birth!
Whatever your family believes and does about the Christmas celebrations over the years - may each be times of opportunity as one of the two occaisions in the Gregorian year when the world is a little less hostile to the things of God.
WHOLE CALENDAR: Poster size 120cm x 88cm
I will have it available for sale once I've spoken to the printer to see what it'll cost!
Every year it seems I approach Christmas with a little more jadedness about all the hoop-la involved. I tend to search each year for something to bring fresh awe to our family’s commemoration. This year I find so much that I will not be able to write it all in time for this Christmas - so at the moment I’m just picking out two "small" things amongst the treasure pile.
Several years ago a visiting speaker to our church gave a sermon about the different creatures Satan is either likened-to or named-as in Scripture.
Going on memory there was the serpent, the roaring lion, the dragon – and some others that I can’t remember anymore!
Different Christmas Idea no 1.
I bought a beautiful nativity set earlier this year. It is currently being displayed on top of the microwave with a dragon poised at a distance. I have done this a little bit cautiously – not wanting to give Satan any place of honour in the most beautiful Story of all time – but with the hopes that it will trigger some conversations with people who visit and notice this strange inclusion!
“Why?” I hope you are wondering???
This is why… it’s not from the regular places we find the accounts of the Nativity, but rather, from the book of Revelation.
REV 12:1 A great and wondrous sign appeared in heaven:a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown oftwelve stars on her head. 2 She was pregnant and cried out in pain as shewas about to give birth. 3 Then another sign appeared in heaven: anenormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on hisheads. 4 His tail swept a third of the stars out of thesky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who wasabout to give birth, so that he might devour her child the moment it was born. 5 She gave birth to a son, a male child, who will rule all thenations with an iron scepter...
The wonderful DVD “THE STAR” (www.bethlehemstar.net) goes into somedepth about the significance of this and describes an event in the sky in 3 BC.
Here is a small portion from the website – I do hope you’llbuy the DVD or visit the website and read for yourselves… www.bethlehemstar.net
... a portion of the Book of Revelation provides clear and compelling guidance for our astronomical investigation. The apostle John wrote the book as an old man while in exile on the island of Patmos. Perhaps the austerity of this exile or a lack of companionship left him time to ponder the night sky.Whatever the reason, Revelation is full of star imagery. In Chapter 12,John describes a life and death drama played out in the sky: the birth of aking.
1 A great and wondrous sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under herfeet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. 2 She was pregnant and cried outin pain as she was about to give birth. 3 Then another sign appeared in heaven:an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on hisheads. 4 His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them tothe earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth,so that he might devour her child the moment it was born. 5 She gave birth to ason, a male child, who will rule all the nations with an iron sceptre...
A woman in labor, a dragon bent on infanticide and a ruler of the nations. We have already seen this rulerin the Book of Genesis, above. This would be the Messiah, in his role asKing of Kings. If that interpretation is correct, then according to the gospel story the woman would be Mary, the mother of Jesus. The dragon which waits to kill the child at birth would be Herod, who did that very thing. John says the woman he saw was clothed in the Sun. She had the moon at her feet. What can he be describing? When we continue our study of the sky of September of 3 BC, the mystery of John's vision is unlocked: he is describing more of the starry dance which began with the Jewish New Year.
As Jupiter was beginning the coronation of Regulus, another startling symbol rose in the sky. The constellation which rises in the east behind Leo is Virgo, The Virgin. When Jupiter and Regulus were first meeting, she rose clothed in the Sun. And as John said, the moon was at her feet. It was a new moon, symbolically birthed at the feet of The Virgin.
The sheer concentration of symbolism inthe stars at this moment is remarkable…
I wrote once before about the significance of the two different records… it’s from a booklet “A Jesse Tree for Christmas” which you can download for free here http://www.mammafrazzle.com.au/A-Jesse-Tree-for-Christmas.php. There’s a great deal of significanceto be found and quite a bit included in the booklet but here’s just a snippet:
The first prophecy of Jesus was written into what we now know as the book of Genesis about 1400 years before Jesus birth. This prophecy refers to the birth of Jesus taking place without a father. Only one person has ever been born of the ‘seed’ of a woman only – all others are born of the seed of a man. Matthew 1:18, written nearly 1500 years later, confirms this as so.
Prophecy: Recorded approximately 1400 BC "born of the seed of a woman"
Fulfillment: Recorded approximately 70 AD “ before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost”.
The Jews were very careful to keep track of their genealogy as this was what determined their property rights. People who couldn’t trace their family history could receive no inheritance
The lists of genealogy in the books of Luke and Matthew are there to prove the line through which Jesus was born – to show the fulfillment of so many prophesies inthe old Testament. The book of Matthew follows Joseph’s family line, and the book of Luke follows Mary’s family line.
The use of the word ‘son’ in the lists of descendants is not only referring to what we think of as a son, but also included other relationships. Nephew’s, sons-in-law, grandsons and great grandsons as well as other ‘kinfolk’ are recorded as sons. So descendants over many generations could be called a ‘son’.
The two lines of genealogy lists show Jesus absolute connection and right to the throne of David. With his death and resurrection from the dead - as a living King these two lines were sealed for ever. Because of who He is, the right to rule cannot be passed on to, or ever again claimed by any one else. WOW!
And so – we understand a little better why Jesus is referredto as “Son of David”.
And we understand a little better why they were specificallyin Bethlehem atthe time of Jesus birth. Bethlehem being the placewhere David was born and crowned king – Mary AND Joseph both decending from hisline and visiting there to register in the census.
Q So what is this‘different’ idea?
A To make a paper chain with the children (to hang outside the front door) with the names of both lines written on the links – concluding at the last link that will bearthe name of Jesus. (You can find thenames easily here http://www.bcbsr.com/survey/sgosp1.html)
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