New Year's Eve 2015

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Wednesday, December 31, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

New Year's Eve 2015

   

        

"I have not achieve it, but I focus on this one thing; Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead,
I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God,
through Christ Jesus, is calling us."
Philippians 3:13-14 (NLT)

I have always felt lousy on New Year’s Eve.  It always seemed like I should be experiencing something that wasn’t experiencing.  Everyone in the world appeared to be having a big party, but I wasn’t at that party.  I looked to me as if everyone was celebrating, capping off the year either triumphantly, “what an awesome year” or were drowning their misery in loud music, alcohol and sex, “what a lousy year 2015 was, let’s party”.   And everyone would sing Auld Lang Syne and even that made me feel left out because I had no idea what it meant.    

Recently New Year’s eve has been spent with friends (let auld acquaintance never be forgot – or something like that) and that’s been good, even great, but still something short of the world wide party that it’s somehow supposed to be for everyone in the world.

Yet I have learned to take these feelings of unfulfilled yearning, the past New Year’s Eves’ let downs and the feeling of the loss of something I never had and chalk it all up to the only joy that contains the kind of hope that I can live on.  

 

That hope is the one promised by the Christian Gospel.   It is the hope that this world, the year just completed, is not all there is.   It is the hope that every single thing in this world, the absolute best of it, is not the ultimate, rather the best of this world finds it’s purpose as a hint of the New World to come.

So tonight I’m going to party, (yes there are time when pastor Jeff can actually be fun, at least that’s what Kathy tells me – at least sometimes), but I know that it will be nostalgic.   I’ll experience a nostalgia not for the events of 2015 now past, rather for that place that exists, but which I’ve never actually been to, but which I know in my heart of hearts does exist and is expecting me.

How about you?   How do you connect this last day of 2015 to the reality of God in Jesus Christ who has come to bring you life, not just existence, life that is truly life not just temporary pleasure, a deep pain transcending joy, not just temporary happinesses?   Can you go to bed tonight profoundly and eternally grateful for the gift of 2015, humbled by God’s Grace in your life, prepared to awaken tomorrow committed to find your truest life in Jesus Christ?

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The Week After Christmas

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Wednesday, December 30, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

The Week After Christmas

                         

"Then Jesus said, 'Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you.  Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light."
Matthew 11:28-30 (New living Translation)

"Are you tired?  Worn out?  Burned out on religion?  Come to me.  Get away with me and you'll recover your life.
I'll show you how to take a real rest.  Walk with me and work with me - watch how I do it.
Learn the unforced rhythms of grace.
I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you.
Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly."
Matthew 11:28-30 ("The Message" paraphrase)

Were time pressure and fatigue and apt description of your life in 2015?   Did they describe the pace and stress of your life during the Christmas season?

I admit it.   Those words describe my 2015!  But that means that there is something wrong, something out of order, something that’s in the way of living the peace that Jesus told us was ours simply for the asking.

So, what’s in the way?  I think that the main thing that’s in the way is me.  Yes, the pressures of work and family and problems and illnesses are all there, but those are just givens in the world as it exists today.   What isn’t a given is our chasing all the things that promise what they can’t deliver.   And we ignore the peace that Jesus offers.  

Many people are really good at leading others, but are terrible at leading themselves.   They (probably including you and me) watch TV instead reading the bible, listen to sports radio instead of all the Christ connecting things we could do while driving, overwork rather than rest, read our iphones rather than talk with our children, spouses and parents, and text rather than listening to and connecting with another person face to face (90% of communication is non-verbal).

How is Jesus’ yoke easy?  It’s easy only when we’re yoked to him and go where he goes, stop when he stops, turn in the direction he turns, speed up when he speeds up, and slow down when he slows down.  This takes attentiveness to Jesus.   Find your own way to be attentive and then demonstrate self-leadership by disciplining yourself to practice it. 

Here’s a hint.  Nothing good is ever accomplished in hurry.  Eliminate hurry from your life.  Do this ruthlessly.   You’re too busy to slow down, you say?   Well then, be busy slowly.   It’s impossible to be attentive to Jesus and the unforced rhythms of his Grace when you rush and hurry.  

In a world where speed is king, it is also true that speed kills, in far more ways than one.   Therefore I suggest a modern day heresy.   Practice the practice of SLOWING.   SLOW is a four letter in 21^st century lingo, but not in God’s vocabulary.

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When Christmas Turns Into This

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Tuesday, December 29, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

When Christmas Turns Into This

                              

"When God began creating the heavens and the earth, the earth was a shapeless, chaotic mass,  

with the Spirit of God brooding over the dark vapors.

Then God said, 'Let there be light.' And light appeared.  And God was pleased with it and divided the light from the darkness.

  he called the light 'daytime', and the darkness 'nighttime'.  Together they formed the first day."

Genesis 1:1-5          

Is your house a mess?  Is it like a hurricane ripped through and left everything strewn everywhere?   It is like a “chaotic, shapeless mass” of stuff everywhere?  Maybe you even have “dark vapors” all over the place from spilled drinks to slices of fruitcakes hidden under furniture by guests and family members who hate fruitcake but were afraid to tell you.

Then entire bible starts with God creating order out of Chaos.  Order matters.   All of Genesis one and two are an extension of the first two verse.  God sets up a world where everything has its place, where everything has its function and where humans can flourish within an ordered world as long as they cooperate with that order.  

You and I live within that order.   When my sleep matches the God given time for that sleep, when my time allocations for God, work, marriage and family are ordered and prioritized as God created them to be then life works.  When we arrange our lives in a way that conflicts with order, life doesn’t work.

Each of us is different.  Kathy’s definition of order differs from mine.   Order for Kathy looks like a mess to me but she knows where everything is in that mess.   Order for me means ensuring that everything looks like all’s in order although I rarely know how and where I’ve put anything.   Yet I have to have a neat desk, swept floors, clean surfaces and the impression of organization.   I can’t function happily without it.

The Apostle Paul wrote, “everything must be done decently and in order” (1 Cor. 14:40)

The big picture of a life oriented around God’s order for the world is J-O-Y

Jesus

Others

You

What can you decide, discipline yourself to do in 2016, that will order your life so that it matches God’s order and positions to experience God’s peace and joy instead of the splinters that come from going against the grain?

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Christmas is over and I ate too much!!

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Monday, December 28, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

Christmas is over and
I ate too much!
               

"Therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, I urge you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God; this is your spiritual act of worship. "
Romans 12:1

"Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?
You are not your own; you were bought at a price.  Therefore honor God with your body." 
1 Corinthians 6:19-20

"Physical training is good"
1 Timothy 4:8

Although the passage from Romans refers to serving and the Corinthians passage refers specifically to sexual immorality, and the Timothy passage is actually about practicing the spiritual disciplines,  it seems to me that the broader reality that scripture teaches us is that our bodies matter, that our bodies are not simply disposable matter as if the spirit and soul are something else.   The bible teaches us that we are a unit, that spirit, soul and our physical bodies are one.   This means that our bodies are spiritual things, not just disposable containers of the spiritual.

I have read about the “sitting disease”, that those of us who sit all day in our work are in much greater danger of ill health and premature death.   I know that for myself exercise is a magic bullet.   When I exercise, I simply feel better, have more energy, am of more value to others, am happier, am more alert to God, am more apt to pray, do my bible reading, and overall be better for other people.   

Yet exercise is a struggle.   I often simply don’t feel like doing it.   But that’s exactly when I need it the most.  Same with eating in an opposite way.   When I feel like bad food, that’s when I get it.    These facts of my life lead me to the other thing about our bodies.   We must master them or outside forces will.   Discipline in the matters of body care is a spiritual issue.   It’s the issue of arranging my life to be under the mastery of God or under the mastery of the principalties and powers of this earth whose purpose is to consume us by turning us into consumers of comfort rather than dispensers of the energies of God for the sake of others.   To be that kind of energy, love and grace dispenser that God wants us to be we must assume the responsibility of making sure our God given bodies are up to the task.

What’s your plan for the care of your body in 2016?

“Lord, because my body matters to you, I will take care of it and I will begin today and I will keep it up.   If I falter, I will just get up and begin again, with your help,  Amen”

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Born in Bethlehem, Known as the Nazarene

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Saturday, December 26, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

Born in Bethlehem, Known as the Nazarene

So Joseph got up and returned to the land of Israel with Jesus and his mother.  But when he learned that the new ruler of Judea was Herod’s son Archelaus, he was afraid to go there. Then, after being warned in a dream, he left for the region of Galilee.  So the family went and lived in a town called Nazareth. This fulfilled what the prophets had said: 'He will be called a Nazarene.'”      Matthew 2:21-23 (NLT)

After the slaughter in Bethlehem and the escape to Egypt, Joseph returned to his hometown of Nazareth located in the hilly area of southern Galilee near the crossroads of great caravan trade routes. The LAB commentary tells us that “the town itself was rather small. The Roman garrison in charge of Galilee was housed there. The people of Nazareth had constant contact with people from all over the world, so world news reached them quickly. The people of Nazareth had an attitude of independence that many of the Jews despised. This may have been why Nathanael later commented, "Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?" (John 1:46)   

Although the Old Testament does not record the specific statement He will be called a Nazarene, many scholars believe that Matthew was referring to Isaiah 11:1 where the Hebrew word for "branch" (netser) is similar to the word for "Nazarene."  The same commentary tells us that Matthew may have been referring to a prophecy unrecorded in the Bible, or to a combination of prophecies (because he used the plural prophets).  

Matthew painted a picture of Jesus as the true Messiah announced by God through the prophets; he made the point that Jesus, the Messiah, had unexpectedly humble beginnings and would be despised by those to whom he came, just as the Old Testament had predicted.  

In the picture at the top of this post you will notice a painted symbol on a home in the Iraqi city of Mosul, about 300 miles north of Bagdhad.  Mosul is the approximate site of the ancient city of Ninevah.  Until June of 2014 it had a huge and vibrant Christian population.  

Unfortunately the painted symbol is not a happy face.  Rather it is “noon” the fourteenth letter of the Arabic alphabet and the equivalent of the Roman letter N.  It stands for Nasara or Nazarene, an Arabic term of insult to refer to Christians.   Those who had this marking on their homes were given a few days to leave or be executed.  18 months ago Mosul had  a population of over 300,000 Christians.  Today there are none.  

So, where was Jesus, the Nazarene, when this happened?  

He was there . . . . being exiled, being persecuted, being beheaded, suffering the breakup of families and the worst of man’s inhumanity to man.   

Actually He’s still there even though his people aren’t.    

Jesus isn’t like us.   He doesn’t respond to evil with evil.   

He enters it, suffers in it and redeems it.   

How will it all end?    The final chapter of this story has indeed been written, but is yet to be realized.  And indeed it will be when the unimaginable becomes real, when God’s Kingdom will have come, when heaven on earth will transition from hope and metaphor to lived reality.

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Christmas in Egypt

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Wednesday, December 23, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

Christmas in Egypt

"When Israel was a child I loved him as a son and brought him out of Egypt."
 Hosea 11:1 (TLB)  

“an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. "Get up and flee to Egypt with the baby and his mother," the angel said, "and stay there until I tell you to return, for
King Herod is going to try to kill the child."  That same night he left for Egypt with Mary
and the baby,  and stayed there until King Herod’s death. This fulfilled the prophet’s prediction, "I have called my Son from Egypt." Matthew 2:13-15 (TLB)  

Going to Egypt was not unusual because there were colonies of Jews in several major Egyptian cities. These colonies had developed during the time of the great captivity.   Further the borders of Egypt extended eastward past the Sinai.

Matthew writes that Jesus was sent to and returned from Egypt so that the prophet's words, “Out of Egypt I called My Son”, might be fulfilled.  This is a reference to Hosea 11:1 where Hosea is actually writing about God's calling Israel out of Egypt.  

Matthew, as he contemplated his incredible life of experiencing all that Jesus was, looked back reflectively and through his sanctified mental “eyes” was able to see the profound parallel.

Israel was God's chosen "son" by adoption (Ex. 4:22), and Jesus is the Messiah, God's Son. In both cases the descent into Egypt was to escape danger, and the return was crucial in the history of Israel and eventually of the world.  

While Hosea was specifically referring to Israel's deliverance, Matthew saw the fuller deliverance of Israel (all believers through faith in Christ are included) through Jesus.   Matthew gives us the gift of seeing not just the words of scripture, but of God’s heart and plan behind those words.  

Enemies, danger, fear, deliverance, return.   The pattern is experienced by Jesus.   It’s the pattern of our lives as well.   Today would be a good day to reflect on how God has played that out in your life.   Wherever you are in the pattern, the final chapter, the final scene, the final ending is sure.   It’s return.   This is a story with a happy ending . .  . .  

 . . . . as is your story, regardless of how your story feels to you right now.

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Christmas Eve

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Thursday, December 24, 2015
Megann Graf




Christmas Eve

I can’t believe it’s almost Christmas!  If you’re like me, this week has been full of last minute preparations, frantic last minute purchases, and lots of chocolate and caffeine.  I don’t why it seems to happen every year, but no matter how prepared I try to be, there’s always a few things that get lost until the last minute.  I always hope to be better at it the next year, but alas, I am not.  That’s why I like this little quote above from “Scrooged.”  It ends with “…For a couple of hours out of the whole year, we are the people we always hoped we would be.”  I started thinking about what that meant.  Am I who I want to be?  Am I being that for the right reasons? 

On Christmas Eve, lots of people are being nice, so it makes it easier to put on a smile and be nicer.  But, the truth is, some of those people will be going through things this next year that will make it very hard for them to smile.  Can I still be nice to them then?   What about the people who are hurting this year, and they are just putting on a good face to go along with everyone else.  I pray that they don’t hope to be people who can hide their pain from others.  See, the problem with this, is that it’s not real.  It’s the big mistake we can sometimes make when we think of that first Christmas.  That it was soft and sweet and nice and perfect.  And, that’s how we want to wrap up religion, in a nice and tidy bow that makes everybody feel good and doesn’t push the envelope too much.  If that’s what we hope to be, then I have to disagree with that quote.

God came into a broken world to get right in the midst of all our pain and all of our shame and all of our hurt.  He doesn’t hope for us to be people who put on a good face for the sake of looking nice.  He wants us to be real.  He came and lived on this earth and suffered for us, so that we CAN be real.  There’s a reason why we have a hard time living up to the “perfect person” standard all year long.   We aren’t perfect.  We aren’t always happy.  We aren’t always nice.  We are in desperate need of a Savior.   We are in desperate need of grace and mercy and love.  That’s why a baby was born on this night so many years ago. 

Now, don’t take this as a pass to go out tonight and complain about everything that’s not great in your life.  On the contrary, go, be nice, and smile.  But don’t do it just to put on a good face.  Don’t do it because it’s what everyone else does.  Do it because you are celebrating the birth of hope!  Let’s celebrate the Savior.  Let’s celebrate the hope that he brought.  Don’t be the person you hope to be, just be the person who has hope!  Hope in a Savior, whose name is Jesus.  He is Christ the Lord! 

Merry Christmas!!

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Christmas in Ramah

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Tuesday, December 22, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

Christmas in Ramah

The Lord spoke to me again, saying: "In Ramah there is bitter weeping—
Rachel weeping for her children and cannot be comforted, for they are gone." 
Jeremiah 31:15 (TLB)  

"A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for
her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more." 
Matthew 2:18 (NIV)

Rachel, Jacob's favorite wife, was the symbolic mother of the northern tribes (known as the Northern Kingdom or Israel), which were taken into captivity by the Assyrians in 622 BC.  Jeremiah pictures Rachel crying for the exiles at Ramah, a staging point of deportation five miles north of Jerusalem.   Ramah was actually the staging point for the deportation of the Jews in the southern Kingdom, Judah, in 586 BC when they were deported to Babylon.  Imagine women crying, double over in agony, because their husbands are dead and they will never see their children ever again.

After the Magi had left Bethlehem (Jesus was perhaps two years old), Herod sought to ensure that this prophesied new King of the Jews would not grow up to usurp his throne.   He did so be sending his troops into Bethlehem to kill all male infants under the age of 2.
(Matthew 2:13-17) Can you imagine the pain of the scene?  It must have been sickening, horrendous, certainly to awful to think about on Christmas.

Christmas is the most painful time of year for many people.  Maybe it is for you.  Some of us spend Christmas alone.  Others are with family, but all are not present, perhaps due to estrangement or divorce or death.   For others this Christmas will be sparse because of recent job loss.  For still others this Christmas is probably their last.

In the metaphor of Rachel weeping for her children we see God weeping for each and every sufferer on planet earth.   In Jesus we discover Immanuel, God who is with us.   It is to bring His salvation, comfort, love, hope, tangible presence to the Rachels who weep, to men and women who are alone, to teens who are hopeless, to the sick who are both sick and sick and tired of being sick. 

I find it to be a very strange but very real and powerful thing.   Having lived a decent number of years now, I can look back on many Christmas seasons and among the most special were the ones where I was hurting the most.   In retrospect it was in those times that that I made the discovery that God was there.   I probably can’t explain to you why and it probably didn’t look to others who were with me that I was being comforted by God.   Yet those times stand out.  I remember them.  I remember the excruciating, gut wrenching pain.  I remember feeling like I had hit bottom and there was nowhere lower I could go.  

But I also remember discovering, after a time, that the bottom was solid.

And, after a time, I was able to get up again . . . . . . or rather I was picked up again.

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Christmas in Bethlehem

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Monday, December 21, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

Christmas in Bethlehem

“Mobilize! The enemy lays siege to Jerusalem! With a rod they shall strike the Judge of Israel on the face.  
"O Bethlehem Ephrathah, you are but a small Judean village, yet you will be the birthplace of my King who is alive from everlasting ages past!"
God will abandon his people to their enemies until she who is to give birth has her son; then at last his fellow countrymen—the exile remnants of Israel—will rejoin their brethren in their own land.  And he shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God, and his people shall remain there undisturbed, for he will be greatly honored all around the world.  He will be our Peace.”               Micah 5:1-6 (TLB)  

Micah, an 8^th century BC contemporary of Isaiah, foresaw a time when Israel would fall under the military assault of an alien power.  We know that Israel did fall to Babylon (Iraq) in 586 BC.    

But Micah wasn’t done with his prophecy.   He also foresaw a woman giving birth to a son, a new kind of ruler, who would reunite his people, provide for their needs, rule with strength and majesty would be honored around the world. And indeed, “He will be our peace.”   A new kind ruler arising out of Israel would reestablish the nation and bring it peace.   Recall some of Jesus’ last words

"I am leaving you with a gift—peace of mind and heart. And the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give. So don't be troubled or afraid"       (John 14:27).

Seven hundred years later the Grande Miracle occurs.  God merges Himself with humanity in a peasant teen, Mary, while He at the very same time plays chess with world history by moving his pawn, Caesar Augustus, to call a census which would cause Mary and Joseph to have to go to Bethlehem to register in the town of their ancestry, thus fulfilling another of the many prophecies of the coming of God Himself to earth.

Are you amazed yet?  And humbled?

Of Course God still isn’t finished.     The picture above is an artist’s attempt to show us how the Prince of Peace hasn’t finished His work.   The picture depicts how, if Mary and Joseph set off from Nazareth to Bethlehem today, they would cross 11 Israeli checkpoints, a security check and a 30’ wall.

Yet the day is coming . . . . . !!!!!!

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Christmas looks back and forward to and through David

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Sunday, December 20, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

Christmas looks back and forward to and through David


 
“The LORD declares to you that the LORD himself will establish a house for you:
hen your days are over and you rest with your fathers,
 I will raise up your offspring to succeed you,
who will come from your own body,
 and I will establish his kingdom.” 
2 Samuel 7:11-12 (NIV)  

In about 1,000 BC Israel got its 1^st King, Saul.  He was succeeded/supplanted by David.   In the above passage God (through the prophet Nathan) promises David that God will establish His forever Kingdom through his son.   We know that David’s son (by way of Bathsheba through adultery) was Solomon.  

But we read on:  

“He is the one who will build a house for my Name” 2 Samuel 7:13  

We also know that Solomon did indeed build Israel’s first temple to God.  

“and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.  I will be his father, and he will be my son. When he does wrong, I will punish him with the rod of men, with floggings inflicted by men.  But my love will never be taken away from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed from before you.  Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever.'"                 

2 Samuel 7:13-16 (NIV)  

Forever?   But we know that didn’t happen!   After Solomon came civil war, the secession of the north from the south, the destruction of the north by Assyria and the destruction of the south by Babylon.  After Solomon Israel had never again been an independent nation until 1948 AD.   

This section of scripture predicts both immediate and distant history.   David is told that the temple will be built by his son, Solomon, and that Solomon will be punished just like Saul was (Solomon did fall as if punished by the rod of men).   This is a prophecy referring to the immediate history of the day.   

However, “I will be his father and he will be my son” is a typical Old Testament Messianic prophecy.   Both the geneology of Luke and of Matthew trace Jesus’ lineage right through 

King David.     

Why does this matter?   These prophecies (hints) of Jesus birth, death, resurrection, Lordship, and eventual Renewal of the world, tell me that God has a plan that he began, is working, and has written us into it.   We are not the victims of randomness, rather, regardless of the degree of difficulty of each our lives, our lives have meaning and purpose and a calling to join God in his purposes for His Good World.

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Christmas Prophesied Through Judah

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Saturday, December 19, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

Christmas Prophesied Through Judah

“Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry. He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph, the son of Heli,  the son of Matthat, the son of Levi, the son of Melki, the son of Jannai, the son of Joseph,  the son of Mattathias, the son of Amos, the son of Nahum, the son of Esli, the son of Naggai,  the son of Maath, the son of Mattathias, the son of Semein, the son of Josech, the son of Joda,  the son of Joanan, the son of Rhesa, the son of Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, the son of Neri,  the son of Melki, the son of Addi, the son of Cosam, the son of Elmadam, the son of Er,  the son of Joshua, the son of Eliezer, the son of Jorim, the son of Matthat, the son of Levi,  the son of Simeon, the son of Judah, the son of Joseph, the son of Jonam, the son of Eliakim,  the son of Melea, the son of Menna, the son of Mattatha, the son of Nathan, the son of David,  the son of Jesse, the son of Obed, the son of Boaz, the son of Salmon, the son of Nahshon,  the son of Amminadab, the son of Ram, the son of Hezron, the son of Perez, the son of Judah,  the son of Jacob, the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham, the son of Terah, the son of Nahor,  the son of Serug, the son of Reu, the son of Peleg, the son of Eber, the son of Shelah,  the son of Cainan, the son of Arphaxad, the son of Shem, the son of Noah, the son of Lamech,  the son of Methuselah, the son of Enoch, the son of Jared, the son of Mahalalel, the son of Kenan,  the son of Enosh, the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God.” 
Luke 3:23-38 (NIV)  

"The scepter will not depart from Judah,
nor the ruler's staff from between his feet,
until he comes to whom it belongs 
and the obedience of the nations is his”.       Genesis 49:10 (NIV)   

Luke traces Jesus’ family tree all the way back to God and he does so through Judah one of the 12 Sons of Jacob, the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham.    It is noteworthy that in the last days of his Jacob pronounced a blessing on each of his twelve sons.  After addressing Reuben, Simeon and Levi, he blesses his son Judah by telling him that he will be praised by his brothers, that he will triumph over enemies, that he will be like a lion (Notice Aslan in the Chronicles of Narnia is a Lion), that the ruler’s staff will be his, and that the obedience of the nations will be his.

“The Obedience of the nations”?  

Fascinating isn’t it?   Jesus’s lineage went right through Judah.   Judah became the name of Israel’s southern Kingdom, the place where Jesus was born.   Neither Matthew nor Luke could help but see and then record that Jesus’ coming to earth, dying and rising again was in no sense a “plan B” of God, rather it was part of “plan A” all along.   The “ruler’s staff” was taken away from the nation of Judah when it was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BC.   Yet the Gospels proclaim that Jesus is currently ruling not just Israel but the nations.  

No, the obedience of the nations is not yet his.   We are in an as of yet unfinished story.   But it will be finished when the King returns to complete his powerful renewal of all things (Acts 3:21)

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Christmas Foreseen in Abraham

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Friday, December 18, 2015
Jeff Lampl  

Christmas Foreseen in Abraham

“The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you.  "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.  I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you." . . . . .  “The LORD appeared to Abram and said, "To your offspring (or seed) I will give this land."                                                                  Genesis 12:1-7 (NIV)  

After the huge mess that the world had become as described in Genesis 3-11, Genesis 12 marks the beginning of God’s renewal project for planet earth and all creatures on it.   God started with Abraham and tells him that that “all peoples on earth will be blessed”, through him, a pretty big promise don’t you think?  

The message to Abraham was that he would father a nation which God would send on a rescue mission to the rest of the world with the clear implication is that this nation would succeed in rescuing the world from sin and evil.   

Notice verse 7 (the last line in the scripture above).   The promise is made to Abraham and to his “seed” which is a singular noun, meaning one seed.   We know that Abraham had one son by Hagar and another, Isaac, by his wife Sarah.  It was this one seed, Isaac, which led to the creation of the nation of Israel (through Isaac’s son Jacob and Jacob’s progeny)  

But there’s a problem.   

Israel never did become the healing and rescuing force for the world that would fulfill God’s promise to Abraham.   How, then would the promise get fulfilled?  

The Apostle Paul explains in Galatians 3:16  

"Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. He does not say, 'And to seeds,' as referring to many, but rather to one. 'And to your seed,' that is Christ."

Paul is telling us that Genesis 12 is saying that through Abraham would come a great nation. From that nation would come great blessing to the world. In that nation there would be a seed, a seed that is none other than Christ through whom all other promises are fulfilled, which is why when you open the New Testament to the first page and the first verse, this is what you read in Matthew 1:1,

"The book of the Genealogy of Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham."

And there is a genealogy that follows to show you step by step, person by person the full genealogy that begins with Abraham and ends up with Joseph the “father” of our Lord Jesus. The Old Testament said the Messiah would be a descendant of Abraham and the New Testament confirms that indeed He was.

God has a plan and you and I, incomprehensibly, are written into that plan.

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