ANY QUESTIONS ANSWERED

[JEM]

WE SOMETIMES FIND IT HARD TO BELIEVE GOD

because something worries us, or the Bible seems to contradict itself

Thomas one of the first friends of Jesus who was absent when the Risen Lord Jesus appeared in Jerusalem to his disciples, said that he would not believe it had happened unless he saw the nail print marks and the spear wound on the body of Jesus.
A week later he saw them and believed
Jesus reminded him “Blessed are those who have not seen but have believed”

This article seeks to give considered answers to a friend who finds it hard to accept Jesus Christ as his Lord and Saviour because of various questions and doubts he has.

SIX DAY CREATION.
How could the world, leave alone the universe by created in 6 days?
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The Bible account tells us right at the beginning “The Spirit of God hovered over the waters” and that was before the 6 day creation began

So there was already water, which means there was already matter, rocks in which the water could to be held. So the whole universe was not formed in 6 calendar days because some of it already existed. Probably most of it. Scientists reckon's the Universe is 3 – 4 times older than Earth is.

One wonders how Moses centuries later knew the world had been created in 6 days with a day off?
He edited Genesis in 10 sections or 10 Accounts beginning with the account of Adam and then the account of Noah. So the account of Adam must have been handed down the generations to Noah and became the folk lore of successive nationalities, dynasties, and religions

Moses may well have got some of these stories from the priests of Egypt from older religions Egyptian and Babylonian since for his first 40 years he lived as a prince but also on the Hebrew side of his family these stories would have been handed on by word of mouth and later by writing and some facts may have been muddled over time

If Adam and Eve had been the first humans and they began with only 2 sons, one of which was killed that left only Cain who was exiled to wander as a nomad how did he find a wife so quick?. But the pronouns Adam, Eve and God [ Elohim] in Hebrew are all plural nouns meaning not 1 man, 1 woman,1 god but men, women, gods. Which fits in with ancient Hindus, Balaam, Egyptian and Babylonian cultures

It is clear that the purpose of GENESIS was to preface the story Moses wanted to tell of how Israel began and that included the 6 day week with a rest day which became particularly significant in the 10 Commandments and their effect on the people of God.
Also there is an order of progression not so unlike that of the Theory of Evolution with humans at the end at the top.

Many Jews for many years as well as Christians have interpreted these “days” as longer “periods of time”. The Hebrew words do not suggest a 24 hour day but a “period of indefinite consecutive duration.” David in one of the Psalms. Psalm 90 verse 4wrote “For a thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by” and the 2nd letter of Peter states in chapter 3 verse 8 “With the Lord a Day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like a day”

It maybe that this idea is reflecting that when all things began first God prepared a day, and then 6 days and an extra sacred day. And that was the first week, the first of many weeks in which all the other things happened.
Genesis also tells us that the first humans were on friendly relations with God and despite their disobedience his care for them continued after they left Paradise to make a life for themselves in the wider world. They had matured. Their rebellion and disobedience introduced sin into the world. For sin is basically ignoring what God wants in favour of what we want. Putting ourselves at the centre of our lives rather than God. Apostle John writing to Christians declared” If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us, but if we confess our sin he is willing to forgive us our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness,”
We all need a personal relationship with God as we are each unique and to achieve that we need to admit that we are not perfect which should not be too difficult

We need to realise that man's inhumanity to man and our own attitudes to some other people hurt people and if we would not like done to us what is done to them, or how we treat them we would not like to be treated ourselves, we see examples of wrong doing which God through the Bible calls sin.

If we write an e above sin and a w under it we see a logo of the world on it side, North, East, South, West with - I – me- in the middle
and what sin is, is our basic selfishness, and rebellion towards God, as he ought to be at the centre of our lives. To the extent that He is not is the measure of our individual sin and it is true of everyone on the planet. We all share that in common.

I am a Christian because after 10 years being taught in Sunday School and listening to preachers I became convicted of the awesome wickedness of my sin at the age of 15 and that unless I heeded God I would join the Devil in Hell when my soul leaves my body at death and my only hope of avoiding that was to forsake my sins, and trust Jesus Christ as my Saviour and with His help live for Him rather than for me.

That I could do that with his help but not on my own. If I have achieved any good in this world since it is because he has empowered me and the credit is His.

This salvation begins the moment we surrender to Him and is renewed constantly because we are always making mistakes and falling short of what God wants of us.

I have studied much of the Bible, and studied much history and a lot of science. But the more I have discovered, the more questions it raises which is the problem facing most of our scientists.

If we can accept the principle that we are not just animals but people formed by God, by what ever means and over what ever long a period, with a living God-given soul living in our brains until our body wears out and stops replicating the cells we need to survive, and that at death that soul has to go somewhere, we should be able to accept that God has put in place the means to deal with this situation to deal with the souls of every human being from first to last.

To accommodate them he would have to have lot of dwelling places as the Greek puts it in English from that AV description of Jesus to his friends

“ don't be afraid in my Father's house [ Space ] there are many dwelling places [ planets ] if it had not been so I would have told you, I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go I will come again and receive you. He went – his body on Earth died, he left it - and 3 days later he returned to them as he had promised and was seen by upwards of 500 until 40 days later he returned to Heaven by ascending into the clouds

And this took place in historical time for which there is not only Biblical testimony but Greek and Roman too

[JEM]

THE TRINITY.? THE TRIUNE GOD?. 1 GOD WITH 3 PERSONALITIES?

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You are a son, and a father and a husband but still you are you.
So God has more than one personality but remains the same Source and Ruler of everything.

The idea of the Trinity does not occur in the Bible except in one place in one of the letters of John which it is believed was added a long time after that letter was written and added at a time when the idea of the Trinity was under attack Modern translations leave that verse out as it does not appear in the earliest Bible manuscripts

Jesus Christ said “ I and the Father are one” - meaning united or One and the same.
Jesus said that the Holy Spirit would be sent to replace him when he returned to Heaven, which is what happened on the Day of Pentecost, the first birthday of the Christian Church.

From that theologians from the early church onwards accepted that
GOD THE FATHER,
JESUS CHRIST GOD THE SON
GOD THE HOLY SPIRIT

are all parts of the personality of GOD the creator and author of all things , hence the “3 in 1” and “1 in 3” Triune in Latin. Trinity in English

[JEM]

THE LIFE OF JESUS BEFORE HIS PUBLIC MINISTRY
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We know that from birth to the age of 2 he lived at Bethlehem
We know from 4 to about 8 he lived with his parents in exile in Egypt
From 8 – 12 he lived with Joseph the carpenter of Nazareth
We know he first visited the Temple in Jerusalem when he was 12
and having been told off by his parents for not obeying them he returned with them to Nazareth where he was subject to them [ grounded ].
There it seems likely he learned the trade of carpenter apprenticed to Joseph his human father

We know from Matthew 13 v 55 and Mark 6 v 3 that he had 4 brothers, James, who later after the death of the Apostle James, became leader of the Church in Jerusalem from AD 44 to AD 62 when he was assassinated and is known as James the Righteous, the writer of the Letter of James, Joses [ in the AV Bible but which is translated in modern English as Joseph,] Simon and Juda [ also translated in modern English as Judah, Jude, or Judas the writer of the letter of Jude, and the passage also says “are not his sisters here with us”

In this passage in Matthew it says that Jesus was “the carpenter's son”, using a Greek word that could also mean stonemason or smith.
In this passage in Mark, Jesus is described just as “the carpenter”.

When with his disciples Jesus visited Nazareth on one occasion the New Testament says and he came to Nazareth where he had been brought up, , and when at the synagogue he worshipped, read the scriptures, and spoke there the local people marvelled at him and also scoffed derogatively and in a derisory way asking where did he get this knowledge, and said “Is not this Joseph's son? “ Both of which comments suggest that while he had lived there he may not have continued to live there and that in asking “Is this not Joseph's son?” there was some doubt about his identity which there would not have been if he had stayed there until his public ministry began.

When Jesus with his disciples visited Caesarea on the coast, he was asked to pay tax. Every adult had to pay a sort of poll tax and for Jews it was usually paid in the Jewish Shekel, while non-Jews, visitors, strangers, paid in a coin of their currency and Jesus obtained a coin found on the shore that paid what was due, which suggested he had been out of the country for some time.

We know from Jewish and early church traditions that his Mum's uncle was Joseph of Arimathaea, a member of the Governing assembly, the Sanhedrin, who was a merchant in gold, silver, and tin who traded between Ceasarea, Cyrene, Crete, Sicily, Marseilles and overland to Limoges and Martarx, and then at Ictis and Marazion in Cornwall, and at Glastonbury

Cornish legend suggests that Jesus came to Cornwall with his uncle, then part of a kingdom separate from Britain and this was the inspiration later for Blakes poem JERUSALEM. Long since a national song of England.

When Jesus was dead it was Joseph who claimed his body. His body would only have been released to a member of his family.

We know that his mother's husband acted as his human father and that was Joseph the carpenter of Nazareth and that Jesus might also have been the town carpenter there which partly answers where he had been from the age of 12 to the age of 30. It has long been assumed Joseph was older than Mary and that after he died, Jesus had become the town carpenter to provide for his mother and younger siblings.

[JEM]

LIFE ON OTHER PLANETS
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Up to 20 years ago we were aware of only 9 planets none of them currently capable of sustaining life , since down graded to 8, as Pluto is regarded now as one of the Asteroids. Now scientists are aware of around 1000 planets orbiting other stars but none look as though they could support life as we know it.

It is conceivable that if Heaven encompasses the whole Universe rather than just part of it, that those whose souls have been taken there by their guardian angels may inhabit other planets and this would explain what Jesus meant in saying to his disciples in my Father's house are many mansions, if it had not been so I would have told you, I go to prepare a place for you, and I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am you may be also.

After that he went to his death and then risen from death returned to them over a period of 40 days, seen by upwards of 500 witnesses, according to Paul before he returned to Heaven of which he is King

[JEM]

YOU FIND CREATION A PROBLEM
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. It wasn't originally because most people including scientists accepted the Jewish account up to the 1940's when led by Professor Hoyle many astronomers adopted the STEADY STATE THEORY. That the universe has always been in existence and always in the same form.

That was to counter the findings of the Belgian astronomer Georges Lemaitr 1894-1966 who in 1927 first propounded the
BIG BANG THEORY

Now because the maths on that don't add up, the scientists have been forced to come up with other THEORIES.

They have the OSCILIATING UNIVERSE THEORY that the present universe began 15,000,000,000 when a minute cosmic egg of extraordinary immeasurable energy exploded, but that the expansion of matter across the universe reverses back to the minute size every 80.000,000,000 million years So that there may have been 3 universes before this one

Given the speed of expansion they do not understand how the known measurable matter in the universe could be sufficient to sustain it's diameter of 17,000 million light years so they have suggested more theories

DARK MATTER, it's light obscured in millions of black holes.as if the universe was honeycombed
DARK POWER, the unimagined spread of dark matter forcing the galaxies outward
DARK SPEED the immeasurable speed with which it all happens
THE STRING THEORY that all the expanding galaxies are strung together by strings of gravitational energy that can be reversed to pull them all back.

But they are all theories and at the centre of them is Stephen Hawking who is Director of the Department of Theoretical Science at Cambridge University's Science Park, and directors of similar institutions around the globe.

They reject the Steady State theory developed in the 1940's by Professor Hoyle based on the Genesis accounts and they reject the Hindu alternative of a world balanced on the backs of 2 elephants standing on the back of a very large salamander or the idea from the Middle Ages of a flat Earth covered with an upturned bowl forming the Dome of Heaven which at night was seen to be perforated by holes due to it's great age, through which the light of Heaven lit up the Earth, a plausible idea for a 3 tier universe with Heaven above

[JEM]

YOU MENTIONED THE BIBLE BEING A BOOK OF STORIES
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but it is much more complicated than that. It is a library put together over 2500 years
It includes
allegory, accounts of beginnings handed down orally for centuries,
statistical data as in Numbers, Rules as in Deuteronomy.
History as in Joshua, Judges, Kings, Chronicles, Samuel, -
Prophecies, poetry embedded in the prose in many places, songs - the Psalms were songs many sung later in the Temple. By huge temple choirs and with orchestras,
Wisdom, Proverbs, and Stories, true and fictional,
Eye witness accounts as written up by Matthew the Tax gatherer , John the Fisherman, Mark the teenager, and Luke the interviewer physician to Paul ,
parables, stories with a hidden meaning
a diary [ most of Acts ]
and letters from Peter, John, James the Righteous brother of Jesus and leader of the Jerusalem Church from AD 44 to AD 62 , the letter of Jude, another brother of Jesus, and the letters of Paul
and the letters to the 7 churches, and the visions of John recorded in Revelation.
Much of it is supported by archaeology

The Gospel writer Mark [ Mark chapter 14 ] watched what happened in the garden of Gethsemane from behind the bushes and to avoid arrest ran away naked leaving his linen garment or bed sheet behind him, who traditions in the Orthodox Church tell us was baptised in the brook there that night by Jesus. Mark for much of what he included in his account of the life of Christ also interviewed Peter, before Peter left Palestine to preach, landing up eventually in Britain before returning to Rome where he was executed somewhere on the way.

The English Bible originally had 80 Books although our version only has 66.

This is because the Apocrypha literature of Palestine is no longer included except in the Roman Catholic Jerusalem Bible, [ translated, and published in Italy in 1966 ].

The Apocrypha literature comes from the latter period of the 700 year period between the last of the prophets and the arrival of John the Baptist and Jesus the Christ, during which Israel most of the time was occupied by other empires apart from a brief period of independence under the Maccabees, has not been included since the revised version of the 4th edition of the Authorised Version of 1769 was revised in 1881 called the Revised Version [ RV ]

The early modern English Bible translations are flawed having used solely the Greek New Testament of Bishops Westcott and Hort devised 1853 by them to replace the Greek New Testament of Erasmus on which the AV is based. Their 1853 version is based on two copies of the Greek Bible discovered in the 19th century from Egypt which were earlier than many of the copies then available. Westcott and Hort were Anglican Catholics who did not like the Evangelical Church of England leaders, did not like the AV Bible or it's main translator William Tyndale and one of them admitted in his diary written in cypher that they had worked out their Greek version using only the Egyptian books which being from the 4th century AD from the College of Philosophy of Alexandria were considered flawed by using Greek Philosophy in them.

The New International Version we use, and revised twice since, is regarded as possibly flawed again, because the Chairman of the Board of Translation in America was after the translation had been published revealed to be a Unitarian who does not believe that Jesus was a person of God, but regards him only as a great teacher and prophet as the Moslems also regard him. But his defection cannot undo that work of the other scholars that worked on it.

All translations are liable to be flawed in some ways
The Christians from earliest time used the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint produced about 200 years before the arrival of Jesus. Some early Christians used various of the books of what became the Apocrypha.

The first Scriptures of the New Testament were the teaching of Jesus. The main Christian document of the teachings of Jesus was the “Apostles Teaching” and that preceded and became part of the Gospels from AD 60 onwards and they were written in Greek the language in widespread use from the time Palestine was part of the Greek Empire.

Around AD 200 the first list of contents of the New Testament appeared containing the 4 Gospels. the 13 letters of Paul, Acts, two of the 3 letters of John, Jude and Revelation of John plus the Wisdom of Solomon and the Revelation of Peter but Hebrews, James, and the letters of Peter were missing.

The Eastern Church centred on Alexandria approved the present contents of the NT in AD 367 but also encouraged use of the Didache [ Apostles teaching ] and the Shepherd of Hermas

The Syriac Church used a harmony of the 4 gospels instead of the 4 separate gospels

The Western Church centred on Hippo approved the present contents of the NT in AD 393 and the North African Church approved it at Carthage in AD 397.

The original Latin Bible used by the Roman Christians published in AD 157 was called the Vulgate meaning Common Latin of the people It was OK as far as it went and based on early Greek copies but it only contained parts of what the New Testament contains today plus some it doesn't now contain.

But the language changed and a new edition was published by Jerome between AD 382-405 but using Egyptians manuscripts considered since to be flawed and the first complete Bible in English was produced by the English reformer John Wycliff who lived from 1329 – 1384 translating from Jerome's Latin Vulgate but because the Latin was flawed so was the English translation, yet God used it to bring many to faith in Christ

More recent modern translations use a collection of a wider range of older original manuscript copies of the New Testament discovered more recently called the Eclective Text, and the Dead Sea Scrolls version of the Old Testament which is 1000 years earlier than anything else known to scholars, first discovered about 1946.

The English Standard Version [ ESV ] published in America in 2007 and in Anglicanised English for use in the UK in 2008 is now regarded as the most accurate.

[JEM]

THE EXISTANCE OF ANGELS- IS THIS REALLY TRUE ?
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Angels, messengers of God, ministering spirits

Judaism records in the Talmud, published about 500AD, references to other angels with other names including Raphael and Oriel

In the Good News Bible there are 42 references to angels in the Old Testament plus 9 references to the cherubim or winged creatures and 30 references to angels in the New Testament.

3 Angels are mentioned by name in our NIV Bible. Michael, Gabriel and Apollyon, the Angel of Death

In the Book of Tobit, originally part of the Jewish Bible, and later one of the books of the Apocrypha, the angel Raphael appears a lot and tells Tobit that he is one of the 7 angels that stand ready constantly to enter the glorious presence of God. Michael and Gabriel are two of the others but the other 4 are not named in the Bible but referred to in the Book of Revelation. In Revelation we are told that they present the prayers of the saints to God in the Throne Room of Heaven

Michael was Mentioned in the Prophecy of Daniel 10 verse 13, 10 verse 21 12 verse 1 in which he is referred to as Prince, which means he was a Prince of the Kingdom of Heaven the chief Prince, therefore the chief angel from the throne room of God He is mentioned again in Jude 1 v 9 where he is called the Archangel Michael archangel was a chief angel and mentioned again in Revelation 12 v 7 when John the Divine on the island of Patmos had a vision of Heaven and what went on there and this verse refers to war in Heaven when Michael with his angels fought again the Dragon meaning Satan, and the dragon and his angels fought back but the dragon was not strong enough and they lost there place in heaven and were hurled down to Earth with that ancient serpent called the Devil or Satan, who leads the whole world astray
Gabriel was mentioned in the Prophecy of Daniel chapter 8 verse 16 as the messenger that explained to Daniel; the meaning of the vision he had just had that points to the time when the Messiah returns to this planet ; [ sometime ahead of us in the future ] to confront the Anti-Christ who is the coming world wide dictator who is expected to rule from Rome and maybe the future president of a federal Europe

For us today the main 3 threats may be
1.a global financial collapse now predicted by economists to hit the world in 2014
2.the possible asteroid attacks predicted for 2013 and 2014.
3.the take over of the Secular and Christian world cultures by the Moslems
any of those scenarios could unify Europe under 1 leader.
We came close under Napoleon and Hitler.

Prophecy of Daniel Chapter 9 verse 21 Gabriel comes to explain the meaning of another vision to Daniel that concerns
the rebuilding of Jerusalem and it's Temple [ later rebuilt by Herod the great ]
it's desecration [ happened under Greek rule ]
the coming of the Anointed One [ that is the Messiah Jesus Christ and him being cut off – killed ]
the destruction of temple and city [ that occurred under Roman control in AD 70
and war continuing from there forwards until the end [which has happened as for 20 centuries wars have continued to be fought across the planet with scarcely one year when there wasn't one. War is endemic in human society and the 2 biggest are yet to come, the second 1000 years after the first which we are still waiting for]
In Daniel 10 v 12 we are told Gabriel came again to Daniel but had been delayed 21 days by evil forces and Michael came to his assistance

Gabriel is also mentioned in Luke chapter 1 verse 19 and 26 as the messenger from God to Zechariah to tell him of the birth to his childless wife of a baby they were to call JOHN who would become John the Baptist [ the other one not me] who later brought God's message to Mary concerning the birth of her son who they were to name JESUS


Sightings of angels if seen today would be called aliens
Their vehicles, one is described in the life of Ezekiel [ chapter 1 ] , would be called flying saucers. UFO's, space craft, and would need to be something like that to move between the stars at speeds greater than light possibly using light for fuel. Far fetched? No, not in a time of space exploration and UFO's, anything is possible.

Regarding the Bible books of Ezekiel and Revelation. The humans central to the accounts of these 2 books were and are important people in God's plan, but they lived at a time when people regarded the Earth as flat with the dome of the sky separating Earth from Heaven and the lights called stars being holes in the canopy shining the light of heaven through. A view still held in England in the Middle Ages.

We with our greater knowledge of a spherical planet part of a solar system and a galaxy, find that difficult to understand,

But then so do we find it difficult to know how 2 million slaves from Egypt could wander in the wilderness between Egypt and Palestine, 11 hours walking distance from the land God had promised to them, for 40 years and be daily led by a cloud and at night a pillar of fire and be fed every morning 6 days a week with a substance they called manna meaning “What is it? “ they could make into bread

We find it hard to see how on 2 different occasions , 6 months apart in different parts of the region Jesus could feed 4000 people and 5000 people just using a few fish and loaves and collect up baskets of bits afterwards.
Truth is stranger than fiction.

[JEM]

WHERE DOES CHRISTMAS COME FROM?
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We find it hard to understand how wise magi from the East could follow a star for 2 years to find baby Jesus in a house 2 years after his birth by the time they arrived, and he was not born in a stable any way, that is just legend added since the event. The manger too was not a wooden feeding trough , but a space at the side of the upper room floor of the average house from which a cow or ass might eat standing on the floor below.
No stable – is mentioned anywhere in the Biblical story nor were there any cattle, donkeys or camels mentioned, not even an inn in the original Greek account.

Contrary to Common belief there were no Inn's in Bethlehem.

William Tyndale whose 1535 NT translation was based on Erasmus's Greek New Testament in Classical Greek based on between 3 and 8 Byzantine manuscripts from Antioch translated a Greek word KATALYMA in Luke 2 verse 7 as "Inn" whereas John Wycliff in 1395 translated into English from the Latin Bible, the Vulgate,which Jerome based upon Common Greek manuscripts from Alexandria, and he translated it as "chaumbir" which in modern English is "chamber", and "chamber" stood for the "guest chamber" in any of the homes in Bethlehem. The New English Bible translated Luke 2 v 7 as "She wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was " no room for them to lodge in the house" while

The New Testament in Hebrew renders it in English translation "She wrapped him in cloth and laid him down in a feeding trough because there was no space for them, in the living quarters"

The homes of those days and for centuries afterwards into the early 20th century in Palestine, were mainly one downstairs front family living room,with the livestock enclosure at the back of the front room at a level lower than the floor of the front room where a cow and donkey and sometimes some sheep would be tethered at night. The floor of the family living room was about 3 feet higher than the livestock enclosure and along the top edge of that front room floor was the stone eating trough used by the animals. [ this was the "manger" Jesus would have been laid in.] and there was an upstairs "guest chamber" above the front room maybe extending over the animal pen.,
The word Greek KATALYMA is also used by Luke in Luke 22 v 11 and by the writer of Mark's gospel in Mark 14 v 14 where it is translated as a "furnished upper room"

When Luke referred in the parable of the Good Samaritan, [ Luke 10 v 25 - 37] to the wounded man being taken to an Inn, the Greek word for Inn used is PANDOCHEION.

Also it would have been regarded as shameful of any village in the area to have to turn away a descendent of King David or put them in an animal pen [ that we would call a stable ] and there were lots of villages within an hour's donkey journey from Bethlehem where an extended family such as Joseph's could have lodged such guests and the birth did not take place on the day they arrived but "while they were there".

So it would seem that because of William Tyndale's mistake, the popular English Protestant Geneva Bible of 1560 and the Authorised Version of 1611, including the 1769 edition still in common use, and many modern versions have misled us and that has been enshrined into folk lore, carols, art, Bible pictures, nativity plays and Christmas cards.

Translating mistakes and Christmas cards have a lot to blame for our Christmas myths.

It did not help William Tyndale that Erasmus prepared his Greek New Testament from the old manuscripts, updating the language into Classical Greek as used then in the Monasteries and colleges, instead of the Common Greek as originally spoken in the 1st century AD.

It is from Babylon that a lot of our Christmas customs and traditions originate.
From the title of this event, Christmas, one might suppose that it originated with Jesus Christ to be observed annually by those who believe in him, the Christians, who formed the original thousands of congregations across Europe, the middle East and North Africa that together were to be His Church.

NO! Jesus did not teach Christmas , and they, the Church, for several centuries did not celebrate it either.
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It was invented in the 4th century AD by Roman Catholicism, a religion that grew out of the original Christian movement of those who trusted in Jesus Christ and tried to live as he had taught.

This Roman Catholicism all but destroyed the original true Christian movement by slaughtering millions of people world wide, as they took over dominating the affairs of nations for long centuries led by their Pope, until first the kings of the nations and then the people themselves who elected their governments learned to defy and to oppose this domination.

In Britain there was a Christian Church, The Celtic Church, of many congregations whose first were established before there was a Church at Rome and remained independent of Rome for 5 centuries during which they observed believers baptism by total immersion, did not baptise infants, had elders [ another word for pastors and bishops doing the same job as them ] both male and female and joined with Rome in 6th century on the orders of the king with great reluctance and misgiving at the Synod of Whitby
For the next 1000 years members of that original movement continued to resist but when they were arrested they were usually executed and often burnt alive so proving that Roman Catholics, in fact had nothing whatever to do with Jesus Christ, who had taught tolerance, urged people to forgive each other and love one another.

However in the 14th century the Greek Christian New Testament was rediscovered. That blew the lid off Roman Catholicism and all it’s false teaching and wrong doing. As this Greek New Testament was translated into German, French, Italian, Spanish, Czech, Dutch, and English it sparked off the Reformation that changed the face of Europe and eventually Earth and liberated the true Church of Jesus Christ.

Of course Roman Catholicism reacted violently against any that opposed them much as Islam does today, but eventually as millions left them they had to make some changes to their beliefs and practices. Today that religion still persists and still is led by a Pope, who since the 13th century has claimed the title Vicar of Christ, which he never has been, and from the 19th century has claimed to be infallible, which means incapable of making a mistake or misleading people which was, is and always will be self deluding deceitful rubbish as the long history of popes proves. Naturally any criticism of them is likely to antagonise them.

THE FOLLOWING DATA comes from my 3 articles about Christmas on the LIGHTHOUSE PRAYER MINISTRY Web Board Site www.lhpm.proboards.com there since 2007 and 2008

WHY DO WE CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS?
CORRECTING CHRISTMAS
THE PURPOSE OF CHRISTMAS ?

The Christians of the first few centuries did not observe Christmas nor did they baptise babies, celebrate Mass, nor observe Lent, Good Friday, Ascension, Advent nor Saints Days.

These are all inventions of that other religion, Roman Catholicism
led by their Pope, that dominated Europe for over 1200 years from the 4th century, and almost destroyed true Christianity while slaughtering millions of it’s followers.

That began to change during the Reformation in the 16th century with the rediscovery of the Greek New Testament, lost for centuries, and then translated into other European languages which revealed the errors of Roman Catholicism

Roman Catholicism came into existence in the 4th. Century AD when Emperor Constantine embraced Christianity in gratitude for a military victory that gave him the throne.

In the 5th century AD all Romans were ordered to observe Dec 25th as the Mass of Christ, or Birthday of Christ. Many did not follow their emperor in becoming Christians. But they accepted Dec 25th as a day for partying as it was already a Mithraic feast, and the cult of Mithras was an all male club.

The Mithrans got it , from the Egyptians as in their religion it was the birthday of the son of Isis the Egyptian name for their “Queen of Heaven”
The Egyptians got it from the Babylonian Cult of Nimrod, as it was the birthday of Nimrod, the son of Ham, and grandson of Noah.

Nimrod is credited with having started the rebellion against God which is now worldwide . His name in Hebrew is Marad, meaning The Rebel.
Nimrod built the tower of Babel and became the King of Babylonia (situated in Modern Iraq). He began the system of organised competition, known as capitalism, of man-ruled governments and empires and profit making economic systems which has become the consumer society. It is recorded that he married his mother Semiramis.

When Nimrod died young, his mother-wife Semiramis claimed that he had returned to this world as a spirit that caused a tree stump to grow instantly into an evergreen tree. Each year on his birthday she draped the tree with decorations and gifts. This is the real origin of the Christmas Tree even if Martin Luther reinvented it after visiting a forest in Germany, and Queen Victoria’s husband Albert popularised it here in the 19th century.

Semiramis, became the Queen of Heaven of the Babylonian religion and Nimrod became the false messiah, the son of Baal the Sun God. The two of them became the Madonna and Child of the Babylonian religion the worship of whom spread all over the world and is known in Asia as Cybele and Deoius, In Egypt as Isis and Osiris, in pagan Rome as Fortuna and Jupiterpuer; and it even appears in other forms in Greece, China, Japan, and Tibet.

So much of our traditional Christmas has been going on for thousands of years long before the birth of Christ. and since then, a lot more traditions have been added including carol singing, the myths of Santa Claus, and from the 19th century the exchange of Christmas cards .

Roman Catholicism found it hard to stop pagan ways so they super imposed Biblical events on top of pagan customs.
They produced the season of preparation for the coming of Christ - Advent -super imposed upon the pagan Roman Feast of Saturnalia Dec 17-24
including the winter solstice and the cult of the ever living Sol (The Sun) culminating with the Feast of Brumalia on Dec 25 the celebration that began with Nimrod.

The traditions of the Yule log, Feasting with wine and food, decorations, decorated trees, and exchanging of gifts therefore goes back at least 3,500 years to the Cult of Nimrod and the ancient Babylonian religion.

The birth of Jesus the Christ was not upon Dec 25th

It was not celebrated by the apostles who led by Jesus Christ founded the Christian Church, nor did the early church, begin to observe Christmas until the 4th century AD and then it was ordered to be observed by the RC Pope in the 5th century who had no authority from Christ to do so.

It was not until the 19th century that Roman Catholicism declared the Pope to be infallible, incapable of making mistakes. Who made this decision and pronouncement? Well it was the then self obsessed Pope, liar that he undoubtedly was. It was rubbish then, and it is rubbish now and it has always been rubbish

The birth of Jesus could not have been on Dec 25th since shepherds were on the hills above Bethlehem and were summoned to go and worship the new born King, Jesus Christ in Bethlehem. Had this been in December the weather would have been too cold and wet for sheep to be on the hills at all in day or night. They would have been in stables.
What is more they were not ordinary sheep but especially bred to provide animals for the sacrifices in the Temple at Jerusalem,

The most likely time for the birth of Jesus would be in Sept or Oct, earlier than Oct 15th It has also been claimed as during March although the claim for that is based on their month of Marchesvan which corresponds to a period from mid October to mid November in our calendar which was the season of the first rain of the agricultural year. By December all sheep would have been indoors
It is falsely claimed that we exchange gifts at Christmas because of the example of the 3 Wise Men giving Jesus gifts on his birthday, but it was not his birthday as they arrived when he had grown from being a baby into a young child living with his parents in a their own house. They did not exchange gifts amongst themselves or anyone else, they presented gifts to Jesus as was then, as now, customary to a head of state.
The giving of gifts to children, and then by them to adults arises from stories about St Nicholas a bishop of Myra , who was said to have given monitory gifts for dowries to the 3 daughters of an impoverished man so enabling them to get married. His saint’s day was January 6th. and the legend grew that on the eve of that day he would visit the homes of children who had been good and bring them a gift ( not a stocking full; not a pillowcase or sack full, just one single gift each.
This tradition persists on the continent but in England it has transferred to Christmas Eve Dec 24th.

So each set of babies born are told by their parents whom they should be able to trust, the lie about Santa Claus or Father Christmas, and when they are a bit older and discover the truth that they were lied to, some of them think “Is anything Mum and Dad say really true? So undermining parental authority and causing many of the nations ills. Some children then say “Well is this whole God thing a lie too?”
As one little lad was overheard to say to his friend, how disillusioned he was in his deceitful parents over the Santa Claus affair, and the other one said Yes, I know and I’m going to look into the Jesus Christ business too. Thus are sown from earliest years the seeds of unbelief and rebellion.

About 400 years ago during the English Civil War the Puritan Parliament abolished the observation of Christmas as papal ( of the Pope) and pagan. It became illegal to do so on pain of imprisonment.
The ban may have been observed in some cities and towns but in rural England it was widely ignored on the grounds that “Them Londoners did not know what they were talking about” and because people enjoyed feasting and the old customs. Christmas was officially restored with the restoration of the Monarchy.

Jehovah’s Witnesses do not observe Christmas, as they deny that Jesus Christ is, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, GOD, The Triune God known as The Trinity; and who regard the Holy Spirit as a force or power, not a person.

So where does all this leave us today?

No one has the authority to impose Christmas on any of us.

We don’t have to send Christmas cards.

We don’t have to exchange Christmas presents and certainly not spend a mint on children and grandchildren who think they have some right to expect or demand expensive toys and gadgets.

We don’t have to put up decorations, or have lighted trees, or party. We should tolerate those who do wish to do so. Christians may by choice observe Christmas, or by choice ignore it.

There is in Norfolk a group, the Humbugs, and similar groups elsewhere of pagans, followers of the pre-Christian religion of Britain, and atheists who do not believe in any God, who regard Christmas as a time to retreat to pubs and other places where Christmas has by mutual consent been banned.. They amuse themselves in other ways but raise large sums of money for useful charities.

The central purpose of Christian Christmas is to worship God, with gratitude and thanks giving for God’s gift beyond words of prepacked love, Jesus Christ, the boy born to be king. By whose teachings, life, sacrifice, and victory over death we have confidence of eternal life and reason to celebrate and share in loving.

WE MAY CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS in what ever way we like providing Jesus Christ is at centre stage and we love Him. We need not observe it by the rite and custom of any church or dictated to how we do it, It is not Church traditions, Pagan traditions or Secular Consumeristic traditions that should dominate us but love for God, for Jesus and for other people who need our help

CORRECTING CHRISTMAS

All this interesting commentary on the text is to be found in an article by Mike Moore in the THE HERALD, the magazine of CHRISTIAN WITNESS TO ISRAEL, formerly called the British Mission to the Jews, which since the late 19th century has been evangelising Jews in the UK, around the world and in modern Israel.
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Christmas has only been celebrated in our church since the reign of Queen Victoria who with her German Consort Albert popularised Christmas

[JEM]

BLINDING FLASH CONVERSION
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When Jesus was baptised he saw a great light and heard a voice
When I was baptised at 16 a shy and private person I was shivering with apprehension, scared, wondering what I had let myself in for, I saw no light and heard no voice, but experienced a warm feeling run through my body from top to toe, as it did when I had some visions later in life, and on a couple of occasions when speaking in tongues during private prayers that reassure me that the Holy Spirit is with me, and I have felt it in more recent times when praying for the casting out of demons.

When Stephen was martyred he saw a vision of heaven above him
Saul who became Paul saw a great light in the sky and heard a voice
Constantine saw a blazing cross in the sky and took it as assurance God was on his side and he would be victorious
and in every century since around the planet people have recorded seeing unusual flying objects as they did for centuries before Christ came.

The Famous 19h century preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon, founder of Spurgeon's Child Care and Spurgeon's College for training ministers was the son of a Congregationalist minister
But at 16 he felt miserable guilty unforgivable and confused by his father's preaching, and the behaviour of his father's congregation and one snowy winter morning unable due to the weather to reach his father's chapel, he visited a Primitive Methodist Chapel on the outskirts of Colchester where a rustic lay preacher, preaching his trial sermon challenged Charles to “Look to Jesus Christ and him only” and the truth dawned on him that he did not need his dad's religion he needed to turn his life over to Jesus Christ and trust and obey him only. There was no blinding flash but it shook him to the core that all he needed to do was to accept Jesus as his Saviour. It was that simple. Trust Jesus.

My Dad was on a journey for 60 years until he became a Christian, ten years after me and my brother. While he doubted and questioned it seemed to make no sense and then he began to exercise faith. The simple trust he used for other things and people, but centred upon God the Father and the Jesus Christe.

When I became a Christian he had told Mum “Don't worry, the boy's got religious mania, in a fortnight he will be back to normal” He had a problem when it did not happen that way and attending my baptism was probably the beginning of change for him.

[JEM]

THE NATURE OF THE DEVIL
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According to Jude the brother of Jesus, The Devil, SATAN, is an angel who stood closest to God in the Throne Room of Heaven but he got self important, proud of himself and of his role, and for that he was demoted and sacked. He then led a rebellion of some of the hosts of angels and they were defeated. He and they with him, were banished from Heaven for ever, so they set up an alternative kingdom on Earth established before humans arrived and then set to deceiving us with lies, theories, half-truths,and subtle deceit even to the extent of misleading our religions and philosophies.
and they are doomed ultimately to complete destruction.
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SATAN is known to be like a raging lion, skulking about to see whom he can devour, the arch accuser and defamer of character, the father of lies and crimes.
He tests out our weaknesses and then tempts us. When we fail he regards us as trapped and accuses us to make us feel depressed, despairing and defeated and encourages us to join him in defying God. On the basis, you have failed, you have no hope of salvation or improvement you may as well join me. That however is a lie as salvation remains available to all who will believe, and with God's help improvement is always possible.

In His parable of the tares [weeds] Jesus said “Let the corn and the tares [ weeds ] grow together until the harvest then my angels will separate the corn from the weeds, the wheat from the chaff, the sheep from the goats. “

He also said when he returns many will say to him “ Lord Lord we did this and that for you,” and He will say that He never knew them and send them away.

We also understand that it Heaven we will all have new bodies constantly renewed for ever and that there will be no more sex and so no more reproduction or increase in population to replace people who die as there no one dies again.

Yet we may recognise the personalities of those we knew and loved here, and any who do not go there our souls will have been programmed to forget.

Jesus did also say “Broad is the way that leads to destruction and many go that way, narrow is the way to life, and few there are who find it.”