Posted in Christmas, Uncategorized, tagged Building Biblical Literacy, Christmas, The Coming King on December 26, 2024|
As we celebrate Christmas, we are celebrating the coming of Jesus. But Jesus, the child born in the manger, the man nailed to a cross and risen from the dead, already came. So whose coming are we anticipating?
What do the following scriptures tell us about the story of Jesus yet to come?
Colossians 3:4
2 Timothy 4:1
Revelation 5:5
Revelation 21:3-7
Revelation 22:12
Posted in Christmas, Poem, tagged Christina Rossetti, Christmas Poem on December 23, 2024|
–Christina Georgina Rossetti, 1885
Love Came Down at Christmas
Love came down at Christmas,
Love all lovely, Love Divine;
Love was born at Christmas,
Star and Angels gave the sign.
Worship we the Godhead,
Love Incarnate, Love Divine;
Worship we our Jesus:
But wherewith for sacred sign?
Love shall be our token,
Love shall be yours and love be mine,
Love to God and all men,
Love for plea and gift and sign.
Posted in Christmas, tagged Baby Jesus, Christmas Poem, Jesus Poem on December 22, 2024|
WHAT WILL YOU DO WITH JESUS?
What will you do with Jesus?
Will you set up your fine nativity,
place the baby Jesus in
sit back and watch His angelic face
vaguely staring back at you?
What will you do with Jesus this year,
will you put Him in a box
gently wrapped in tissue paper
on the highest shelf atop?
Take Jesus out of storage.
Praise Him as the King of Kings!
Pay homage at the manager
and with the angels sing
“Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
He is Emmanuel!
God who dwelt among us
Your worship He compels.
For who else can offer eternal life?
Who can break the seven seals?
Who can pay the sin offering for all mankind
with blood shed sacrificially?
We’ve all a debt for sin we owe.
The wages for sin is death.
Jesus is the way, the truth, the life.
There is no other way.
What will you do with Jesus
the babe who in the manager lay?
His salvation is with in your grasp
the ransom has been paid.
Just believe on Him,
that He is the Son of God
and that He died upon the cross
the lamb unblemished by one sin
for you He paid the price.
He bought our wretched, sinful souls
in exchange His righteousness.
The baby Jesus is not an ornament,
an accessory to your manger scene.
He is the promised Messiah.
The Prophets told of Him.
Isaiah said, “Unto us a Child is born,”
seven hundred years before
His name would be “Emmanuel”
His kingdom without end.
God has had this plan for you
a life He wants to give
not the fading, temporal kind
that rots with death and sin
but life with Him eternal
reigning with Him in His realm.
What will you do with Jesus this year?
Will you take the life He gives
or will you settle for dear Santa
and his busy little elves?
Merry Christmas!
May the love of Christ be poured out on your family this Christmas. May the God of all Creation reveal His glory to you that you might enjoy the comfort and security of knowing how much He loves and cares about every detail of your life.
Posted in Christmas, Jesus, Poem, tagged Baby Jesus Born to Die, Christmas Poem, Jesus Poem on December 19, 2024|
By M. E. Mullin
Baby Jesus, small and soft
born that star-filled night
for ages prophets had foretold
Light to pierce the night
Your heavenly home You left behind
eternal things put aside
to enter human time and space
the Father as your guide.
Why would You,
Almighty King
Lord of all the Lords
come down to earth to be with us
the outcasts and the poor
O Jesus, help me see the truth
Your life was not in vain
Your coming was to meet my need
Yours a blood sacrifice
For the living, it was needful
without blemish You were found
yet dying was the pinnacle
my sin stain it removed
The cross it is the centerpiece
instrument of pain
see where blood was flowing down
the lamb on it was slain
In dying You gave your life for me
propitiatory substitute
in rising You opened eternity
the accuser rendered mute
A baby born to humble means
lain in a manger bare
is only part the story told
look further if you dare
the only true and living God
the one they call “I AM”
He kept His promise in the child
He sent His Son, the Lamb
May God bless you this Christmas with a vision of Easter.
Copyright 2015
Posted in Christmas, tagged Christmas Bible Study, Matthew chapter 1, Names of God on December 17, 2024|
Read Matthew 1
It is our desire to help you grow in your knowledge of Adonai and His Word. If you are looking for additional information and/or materials, please visit our website at RootedinHisWord.org and our Facebook page.
Posted in Bible Study, Christmas, tagged Christmas Bible Study, Luke 1, Zechariah and Elizabeth on December 12, 2024|
Read Luke 1:39-80
1. Who does Mary go to visit? What happens when she gets there?
2. What prophetic statement does Elizabeth make about the baby Mary is carrying?
3. Verses 46 to 55 of Luke 1 are often referred to as the Magnificat (also known as Song of Mary or Canticle of Mary) What strikes you in this section of scripture?
4. How does Zechariah come to speak again? What is the first thing he says?
5. What does Zechariah say in his prophecy about the Coming One (Messiah)?
6. Imagine that you were Mary, a young woman somewhere between the ages of 14 and 18 living in a small town with your parents. You are visited by an angel and told that you will have a child who sit on the throne of David, fulfilling all the prophecies of Messiah. What would you be thinking? Feeling? Consider the favor shown to Mary. The favor shown to you, a child of God, is much greater than even that shown to Mary. How does that impact you as you prepare for Christmas?
7. Read Luke 1:39-56. Verses 46-55 are known as The Magnificat, and they represent some of what Mary was feeling spoken out in praise to her God. Write out your pray of praise to God for all that He has done for you in and through Christmas.
It is our desire to help you grow in your knowledge of Adonai and His Word. If you are looking for additional information and/or materials, please visit our website at RootedinHisWord.org and our Facebook page.
Posted in Bible Study, Christmas, tagged Christmas Bible Study, Luke 1 on December 10, 2024|
Read Luke 1:26 to 38
1. Who is Mary? What do we learn about her from this passage?
2. Who comes to visit her? Why?
3. Why does Gabriel say “Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!”?
4. Why does he tell her not to be afraid?
5. What is the prophecy that Gabriel tells Mary?
6. What does Mary ask Gabriel in Luke 1:34? What proof does he offer to her that the words that he says are true?
7. Copy Luke 1:37 here. Meditate on this and record your thoughts and impressions. As you meditate on Luke 1:37, consider the proof you have seen that this is true in your own life or the lives of those around you? Explain.
8. What is Mary’s response to the news in verse 1:38?
9. What do we learn in James 4:7? 1 Peter 5:5? How does Mary demonstrate these concepts?
It is our desire to help you grow in your knowledge of Adonai and His Word. If you are looking for additional information and/or materials, please visit our website at RootedinHisWord.org and our Facebook page.
Posted in Christmas, tagged Christmas Bible Study, Love of God on December 5, 2024|
Christmas is about love. Ultimately, God so LOVED the world that He sent His only Son that whosoever believed in Him would be saved. In order to really understand Christmas as God intended it, we need to consider the love of God.
1. What do the following verses teach you about the love of God?
□ Jeremiah 31:3
□ Proverbs 8:17
□ Zephaniah 3:17
□ John 14:21
□ Romans 5:5
□ Romans 8:38-39
□ Titus 3:3-7
□ 1 John 4:9
2. As you meditate and read over the above verses, how do they speak to your celebration of Christmas?
Posted in Christmas, tagged Advent, Christmas Bible Study, Jesus our hope on December 3, 2024|
The Christmas message is that there is hope for a ruined humanity–hope of pardon, hope of peace with God, hope of glory–because at the Father’s will, Jesus Christ became poor and was born in a stable so that thirty years later, He might hang on a cross.
–J. I. Packer
2. Read the following scriptures and record how they bring hope:
□ Psalm 72:10-14
□ Isaiah 11:1-11
□ Isaiah 42:1-5
□ Isaiah 60:1-3
It is our desire to help you grow in your knowledge of Adonai and His Word. If you are looking for additional information and/or materials, please visit our website at RootedinHisWord.org and our Facebook page.
Posted in C.S. Lewis, Christmas, tagged C.S. Lewis on the incarnation, Christmas, the incarnation on December 2, 2024|
We catch sight of a new key principle–the power of the Higher, just in so far as it is truly Higher, to come down, the power of the greater to include the less . . . Everywhere the great enters the little–its power to do so is almost the test of its greatness. In the Christian story God . . . comes down; down from the heights of absolute being into time and space, down into humanity; . . . down to the very roots and seabed of the Nature He has created. But he goes down to come up again and bring the whole ruined world up with Him . . . [O]ne may think of a diver, first reducing himself to nakedness, then glancing in mid-air, then gone with a splash, vanished, rushing down through green and warm water into black and cold water, down through increasing pressure into the death-like region of ooze and slime and old decay; then up again, back to color and light, his lungs almost bursting, till suddenly he breaks surface again, holding in his hand the dripping, precious thing that he went down to recover.”
C.S. Lewis, Miracles
It is our desire to help you grow in your knowledge of Adonai and His Word. If you are looking for additional information and/or materials, please visit our website at RootedinHisWord.org and our Facebook page.
Rooted and Grounded 