Q: A: Christmas is a time filled with anticipation and preparation. Cards are sent and received, and the thrill of wrapping and unwrapping gifts makes for a joyful time shared with loved ones. Even today, people who don’t necessarily believe personally in Jesus as the Savior of the world send cards with pictures of what artists think Jesus may have looked like. There are images of the Babe in the manger, shepherds, and animals. The world is fascinated with the grandeur of the greatest story ever told. But it isn’t just a story. It is truth. No matter how Jesus is imagined, He has no stronger portrait than the one in the Bible. It is a picture of the man who is God. He is the foundation of Christianity. Since the quickest way to destroy any edifice is to tear out or weaken its base, people have always tried to disprove, ignore, or scoff at the claims of Christ. The hope of the world, however, is found only in the redemption from sin. This is dependent upon the deity of Christ. While there are attacks on the celebration of Christmas in the 21st century, Christmas has been commercialized and is big business. The reality is that Jesus is truth and proclaims all people are sinners. This is why He came to seek and save those who are lost (Luke 19:10). This is the story of Christmas and this is the portrait of the Son of God. On this Christmas Eve, believe in Him and receive Him. He is the Light of the world. (This column is based on the words and writings of the late Rev. Billy Graham.) Report: Attacks on Christian Churches Nearly Triple in Four Years: Attacks on Christian churches have nearly tripled in the last four years, according to an 84-page report released by Family Research Council (FRC) in December. Between January 2018 and September 2022, FRC found 420 documented acts of hostility against 397 separate churches in the United States. Many cases included incidences of vandalism, bomb threats, arson, and gun-related violence. “The report documents one homicide, numerous arsons, bomb threats (real and fake), and a pervasive desecration of holy items. Vandals regularly smashed crosses, statues, and headstones in cemeteries; vandalized carvings of the Ten Commandments; set fire to a Nativity scene. . . according to the Washington Stand, FRC’s news outlet. “They tore up a Bible and desecrated an American flag in a Primitive Methodist church in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Denver’s Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Catholic Church suffered two drive-by shootings this August. Smashed windows and spray-painted doors became ubiquitous. Pro-abortion extremists executed at least 57 attacks in the first nine months of 2022 against Christian churches, a “1,140 percent increase over the past four years,” the outlet reported. Besides abortion and the Black Lives Matter movement, FRC found that “radical pro-LGBTQ activism, support for COVID-19 church closures, secularism, Satanism, Islamic fundamentalism, and anti-Americanism also wrought havoc in parishes nationwide.” The Salt And Light Must Not Check Out, Tune Out, Or Recoil Into Silence When The World Needs Us Most: Recently, I’ve heard more statements of distrust. It concerns me. Have you heard it too? “I don’t know who to believe or trust. I just tune it all out. I’ve stopped listening to the Left or Right. I don’t read any news because I don’t know who’s telling the truth. I turned off the media altogether.” Why is that a problem? Because we are supposed to be discerning salt-pourers and light-bearers. God is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart, and we must be as well. We are not given a choice to check out, tune out, or recoil into silence. Tony Perkins at Family Research Council said it extremely well in his article about truth: Political and cultural engagement are part of fulfilling Jesus’s command to love our neighbors. By supporting policies like the rule of law, limited government, human dignity, parental rights, and religious freedom, we can establish the kind of conditions that allow all people to flourish. However, the Left opposes such policies and instead wants our tax dollars to pay for abortion-on-demand and public schools to teach gender identity ideology to children as young as kindergarten behind parents’ backs.” Salt preserves what is most susceptible to rot and decay. When we check out, tune out, or stay silent, we stop being the active ingredient that preserves freedom, hope, sanity, and peace. We allow the rot to begin or the decay to spread. When we pull back from the battle and stop speaking, participating, or standing against the tide of evil, we cease to dispel the darkness. The world hates the Light. Jesus promised us nothing less, “If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.” (John 15:18-19; 17:14; 1 John 3:13). Church, this is our moment! Be His voice in the silence. Be His light in the darkness. Be His salt in the time of decay and tastelessness. Believers, this is our moment. We’re surrounded by darkness. Lies, deceit, and moral depravity are everywhere. Some Christians bemoan the darkness and lament the decay, but that is the wrong response. It’s not time for depression, anxiety, and timidity. It’s time for offense! What is Christmas Without Christ?: The ABCCBSNBCCNNMSNBCPBSNPR Cartel tells us constantly that we now live in a post-Christian America. They exalt in proclaiming the end of Christ’s dominant influence on Western Civilization. As a result, we’ve descended from a city on a hill to a modern Sodom and Gomorrah. Our elites call evil good and good evil. Ever since the nine black-robed masters of America decreed back in 1962 that God was expelled from school we’ve witnessed the steady degradation of our society. The coarseness and vulgarity we’re deluged with on a daily basis was unknown in earlier days. Back in the dream time we used to go to Christmas programs at our children’s schools and listen to the little darlings sing The First Noel, Oh Little Town of Bethlehem, and O Come O Come Emmanuel. Now we listen to them sing songs in foreign languages. . . intermixed with a few songs about winter, snow, or maybe animals. It may all be Woke but it sure doesn’t have anything to do with the reason for the season. Just in case all the tinsel and the twinkling lights have blinded us to what that reason is, let me elaborate. Christmas is all about Jesus the Christ born as a human so that he could bear the sins of the world, die a substitutionary death in our place, rise triumphantly from the grave and ascend into heaven so that we who believe can live in and through Him. That’s what it’s all about. Not to be Grinch, let me wish everyone a Merry Christmas. Let’s enjoy our family and friends. Let’s celebrate our traditions as we remember Jesus is the reason for the season. Let’s wake up and smell the frankincense and myrrh for without Christ in Christmas all we have is “mas.” https://canadafreepress.com/article/what-is-christmas-without-christ-3 China Sends 71 War Planes In the Skies Around Taiwan in “Military Drill”: China appears to be setting up Taiwan for a Chinese invasion. We previously reported on China’s efforts to invade Taiwan. Expert Bradley Thayer said China could invade Taiwan any day. Today, it was reported that China sent 71 warplanes over Taiwan’s airspace yesterday. China deployed 71 warplanes to skies around Taiwan in a chilling ‘strike drill’, then blamed the US for ‘provocations’ and ‘collusion’ with the self-governing island – in one of the biggest daily incursions to date. Sixty fighter jets took part in the drills, including six Su-30 warplanes, some of China’s most advanced, Taipei’s defense ministry said in a Twitter post on Monday. 19th Century Vermont Farmer Wilson Bentley Was The World’s First Person To Photograph A Snowflake, Forever Proving That God Created No Two Alike: Wilson Bentley was called the Snowflake Man because he created photographic proof that no two snowflakes are created alike, a feat only God could do: You likely have never heard the name Wilson Bentley, but there was a day when he was quite famous, but by another name, the Snowflake Man. He was called that because he was the world’s first person to capture a freshly-fallen snowflake on camera, and over the course of his life would photograph 5,000 of them. What did those 5,000 snowflakes prove? That God created them all in different shapes, with no two alike, a feat that evolution could never pull off in a billion years. But God could, and did. Have you ever wondered how many snowflakes fall from Heaven upon the earth in a given year? The actual number is unknowable, but a really close estimate is absolutely possible, so brace yourself for this. Each year, about 1 septillion snowflakes fall from the sky, that’s a 1 with 24 zeros after it and it looks like this – 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. Because the Bible says that snow comes from heaven, that means it’s a creation of God Almighty, and He makes all of them in different shapes every time it snows. In his study of snowflakes, he learned that almost all snow crystals have six similar branches, and a few very rare ones have three. He at first expected that all snowflakes would be the same, but was surprised to learn that all of those he examined were different. Bentley concluded that, to the best of his knowledge, no snowflake “was an exact duplicate of any other snowflake!,” adding “with profound humility, we acknowledge that the Great Designer is incomparable and unapproachable in the infinite prodigality and beauty of His works.” Hollywood realizes massive market value decline of more than $500 billion in 2022: Whether by choice or out of necessity, Americans voted with their dollars in a big way in 2022, and those financial moves spelled disaster for Hollywood now facing more than half a trillion dollars in losses. At all levels of corporate media, consumers have been faced with a constant barrage of progressive narratives from social justice causes to climate activism and radical gender theories. The desire to escape into fiction for entertainment has been sullied by those only ever striving to advance their personal agenda resulting not in the change of hearts and minds, but in major box office flops. The news was celebrated by many who saw it as just dessert for the flaunted disconnect that corporate media has espoused from consumers. Iran brags about its missile export to Palestinians, Hezbollah: Tehran Times published an article describing how Iran developed its missiles and distributed them to its allies throughout the Middle East. Iranian pro-government media published an article on Sunday bragging about its “integrated missile network” and how it has armed the “resistance” in the Middle East. By “resistance,” the report was referring to a network of pro-Iranian groups and proxy groups it supports, particularly Hezbollah, the Palestinians and Yemen. https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/article-725757 S.Korea Fires Shots, Scrambles Jets After North Sends Drones Near Seoul: A rare and hugely significant incident occurred Monday along the heavily fortified border which separates the Korean peninsula. South Korea's military has confirmed it fired warning shots and scrambled jets after the north sent drones that violated the south's sovereign airspace. It marks the first such major territory-breaching incident in a half-decade, also resulting in Seoul sending surveillance aircraft across the border in response. The North Korean drones penetrated deep into the south's territory, resulting in civilian commercial flights being temporarily grounded in and around Seoul. "South Korea’s military detected five drones from North Korea crossing the border, and one traveled as far as the northern part of the South Korean capital region, which is about an hour’s drive away, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said," according to The Associated Press. "The military responded by firing warning shots and launching fighter jets and attack helicopters to shoot down the North Korean drones," the report based on official military statements continues. "The attack helicopters fired a combined 100 rounds but it wasn’t immediately known if any of the North Korean drones were shot down, according to the Defense Ministry." Only one of the five drones was observed flying back across the border into North Korea, while the others disappeared from radar, according to the south's Joint Chiefs. "Our military will thoroughly and resolutely respond to this kind of North Korean provocation," Maj. Gen. Lee Seung-o, spokesman for the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a press briefing. Tensions along the militarized border have already been high due to Pyongyang firing off a record number of ballistic and other missiles this year, including a pair fired last week toward Japan. With now days left in 2022, analysts have tracked over 90 missiles fired this year.
I don't believe in Jesus as a real person, but I do love the Christmas season with the Babe in the manger, the lights that represent hope, and the carols that speak of peace. Is it okay to celebrate a myth?
From the writings of the Rev. Billy Graham
“When there’s hostility towards faith, it seems easier to just give up on the public square. ‘I’ll just focus on my family, my job, and go about my day,’ some think. Yet when you take that seemingly safer path, it means you’re neglecting the Lord’s instructions to be salt and light.
