Here are the next questions for your family Christmas Study or Advent Study. They are followed by a creative idea on keeping Christ in your family Christmas. The answers to the questions appear at the end of this blog. One great benefit of doing this with your family is that it will become a tradition which transcends the Advent Season whereby you do a short daily Bible study as a family at every meal throughout the year. Answer each question True or False. According to the Bible… 12) _____ Even if you had known the prophecies concerning Jesus, you would not have been able to join the shepherds in worshiping the baby Jesus as He lay in the manger.
13) _____ The angels who appeared to the shepherds were led by Gabriel
14) _____ The angels told the shepherds where to find the baby Jesus
15) _____ The birth, although prophesied in scripture, was hidden from all except those to whom God chose to reveal it through His angels.
Keeping Christ In Christmas - Evangelistic Caroling One of the fun events that we always included in our family Christmas tradition and in all our Christmas parties was Evangelistic Caroling. We compiled a list of Christmas Hymns which were particularly evangelistic in nature. These need to be “meaty” in terms of content, the list needs to be short enough so that you do not lose your audience and lastly basic enough that all can sing. My suggested list is – Joy To The World, God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman and O Come All Ye Faithful. First – run through the hymns a couple of times at your front porch. (Singing outside is very different so this gets the group/family used to the songs and doing them outside.) Next decide how many homes you want to visit. (You can do it randomly, working your way down the block and back or you can be intentional, visiting homes with whom you have evangelistic relationship.)We would ring the doorbell and then when we heard the door open begin to sing. (It is good to have someone designated as the “starter”.) When you finish give everyone listening a candy cane with the “tradition of the candy cane attached” and leave an inexpensive New Testament with the home with a Christmas tract inserted. (Lifeway Christian Bookstore has these for sale for $1.00) This is great fun and as Christmas approached neighbors would ask us “Are you going to do the Dickens caroling again this year?” Often children will join us and the group would slowly grow. If this begins to be the case then you always have the option of bringing everyone home for hot chocolate and sharing the gospel. (El has specific ornaments strategically placed on the tree for just such an occasion.) Note – Sound like a lot of work? When you complain that Christ is no longer a part of Christmas are you implying that non-Christian merchants, government officials and neighborhood associations should bear the burden of the proclamation of Jesus’ Incarnation? No, it is the church and yes you and I who have responsibility to keep Christ in Christmas. Witnesses are described as “laborers” in the harvest. Keeping Christ in Christmas is not a matter of merchant boycotts nor of letter writing campaigns to government officials but rather the personal initiatives of Christians and yes, of Christian families to present this wonderful Gospel of Salvation to those around us this Christmas season. (You can follow this link to our website for Carols, Candy Cane attachments and other useful tools.) http://gciweb.org/2011/07/holidays-resources/
The Answers to today’s Advent Questions -
12. T - Micah 5:2; Matthew 2:2-6 (Even if you had known the prophecies concerning Jesus, you would not have been able to join the shepherds in worshiping the baby Jesus as He lay in the manger.) Even though you were versed in the Holy Scriptures, expecting the Messiah, had decided to live in Bethlehem in order to be there for the Messiah’s birth, you would not, from Holy Scriptures, be found to be waiting with shepherds in the open air, associate Jesus and the manger nor have any idea of the exact day of His birth. To find Jesus you would need assistance either from the angels or the shepherds. Since there is no mention of a “star” in any of the prophecies concerning the birth of Christ you would not be looking for it’s appearance nor associate it with the birth of Christ.
13. F – Luke 2:8 – 15 (The angels who appeared to the shepherds were led by Gabriel.) The only Angel referred to is “an Angel of the Lord” (Luke 2:9) who was accompanied by a “multitude of heavenly host”. (Authors Note: Some scholars universally attribute the appearance in the Old Testament of “the angel of the Lord” with Jesus, the second person of the Trinity. The fact the “angel of the Lord” is appearing to the shepherds while Jesus is in the manger should give us pause for reflection on this tendency.)
14. T – Luke 2:11 & 15; Micah 5:2 (The angels told the shepherd where to find the baby Jesus.) The angels indicated the baby would be found in Luke 2:11 “the city of David” which the shepherd took to be Bethlehem. Also Micah 5:2 clearly places the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem. If you were a shepherd versed in Holy Scriptures this would immediately come to mind. The angels then went on to be even more specific in Luke 2:12 by describing His exact location, “... you will find a baby wrapped in cloths, and lying in a manger." The shepherds then had two aids, prophecy and the angels testimony. However, to find the exact location of a baby in a town, you would need more than this to go on. Bethlehem was a starting point but you still needed to find the exact location. There is at this point no star and the angles did not lead the shepherds. Rather they were left to their own initiative.
15. F - Luke 2:21- 35 & 36 - 38; Matthew 2:1 – 6; Mark 15:43 (The birth, although prophesied in scripture, was hidden from all except those to whom God chose to reveal it through His angels.) Evidently there were people looking for the Messiah at or around the time of Christ’s birth. Mentioned in Scripture are, among others, Zacharias, Elizabeth, Simeon and Anna.
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