My beloved fellow Servants, Saints and Phishermen,
May our King, Jesus the Christ, fill your days with the joy of knowing that God came to earth as one of us to redeem us from the curse of sin. I, Timothy Nathaneal, a doulos of Christ along with Jeremy, Greg and all the brothers who are with me, bring grace to you and peace from God our Father.
Christmas time has become so much more than celebrating the birth of our Savior. This time of year is being hijacked by many groups outside of the church. Over this month our pastors will do a great job at going over the events leading up to the birth of the Christ and even the details shortly after this blessed day. I too will teach on some important details later.
I want to encourage all of you to not be distracted by the commercialization of this time of year and even the date, December 25th. Don’t’ let the lost with their smoke and mirrors, false teachings and out right blasphemies deter you from the truth. “Don’t lose faith in what you know because of what you don’t know”. (B.B.S.) You might ask yourself what is that knowledge. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…” John 1:1 is, in my opinion, the strongest passage in the New Testament for declaring the Deity of Jesus the Christ. Many who deny this biblical doctrine, especially cultists, have attempted to tell us that He is not really God by arguing that this passage only says that Jesus is “a god”. They also want to point to pagan roots at this time of the year. Satan’s plan is to always use our doubts and lack of biblical knowledge to stop us from declaring the truth to the unsaved world.
Verse one of the first chapter of John reads, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”. The last part of 1:1 is the major point they will argue. In the Greek, it reads Theos ēn ho logos, “The Word was God”.
I don’t want to come across smarter than I am, so I’m going to use the note from my study bible to cover this deeper. “God, or Theos, occurs in the verse without the Greek article ho, so that some have contended that the lack of the article in the Greek text should cause the statement to be translated ‘the Word was a god’. The best understanding for the translation however, as recognized by Greek scholars, is that since Theos is a predicate and precedes the noun logos and a verb, it is natural for it to occur here without the article. Greek scholars are agreed that the verse should be translated as it regularly is in modern and ancient translation, clearly affirming that Jesus is indeed God”. (Nelson’s NKJV Study Bible)
Jesus himself called himself God. Jesus’ “I am” statements would have great meaning to His Jewish audience. God had revealed Himself to Moses with “I am” (Ex. 3:14). Now Jesus was using the same words to describe Himself. There are those who would say that Jesus never claimed to be God. That is an outright lie from the pit of Hell.
John 6:35 “I am the bread of life”.
John 8:12 “I am the light of the world”.
John 10:7 “I am the door of the sheep”.
John 10:11 “I am the Good Shepherd”.
John 11:25 “I am the Resurrection and the Life”.
John 14:6 “I am the way, the truth and the life”.
John 15:1 “I am the true vine”.
Jesus’ Jewish listeners knew fully what Jesus was saying. “I AM God”. Father, I will let the “Good Confession” found in John 18:33-38 speak of the truth. “Then Pilate entered the praetorium again, called Jesus, and said to Him, “Are you the King of the Jews”?
Jesus answered him, “Are you speaking for yourself about this, or did others tell you this concerning Me?” Pilate answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the Chief Priest have delivered you to Me. What have you done?” Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now My Kingdom is not here.” Pilate therefore said to Him, “Are you a king then?” Jesus answered, “You say rightly that I am a King for this I was born. And for this cause I have come to the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears my voice. Pilate said to Him, “What is truth?” And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews, and said to them, “I find no fault in Him at all.”
He is our King. He does not deny it. Over and over He says “My kingdom” and “my servants”. So, what are we to do with this baby on Christmas day? Forget if we have the date right or any so-called pagan roots. God changes what was bad-for a good use. So celebrate that our God, our King is born to save the world. That Jesus is the Messiah, tell the world! And when they ask you how do know He is tell them this: Jesus fulfilled hundreds of Old Testament prophecies.
Prophecy in OT and NT
“The Messiah would be the Gen. 3:15 Gal. 4:4
the seed of a woman”
“The Messiah would be a Gen. 12:3 Matt. 1:1
descendant of Abraham”
“The Messiah would be a Gen. 17:19 Luke 3:34
descendant of Isaac”
“The Messiah would be a Num. 24:17 /Matt. 1:2, 2:2
descendant of Jacob”
“The Messiah would be from Gen. 49:10 Luke 3:33
the tribe of
“The Messiah would be an Isa. 9:7 Luke 1:32,33
heir to the throne of David”
“The Messiah would be Ps. 45:6-7 Heb 1:8-12
Anointed and eternal” 102:25-27
“The Messiah would be born Mic. 5:2 Luke 2:4-7
in
“The Messiah would be born Is. 7:14 Luke 1:26-31
of a virgin”
____________________________________________________________________________
“The Messiah would also Hos. 1:1 Matt. 2:16-18
come from
“ The Messiah’s birth would Jer. 31:15 Matt 14-15
trigger a slaughter of children”
Jesus as man had no way to control these and other prophecies, and still they were fulfilled by Him! Don’t back down because of what you don’t know just tell the world what you do know:
“Jesus is God!”
Up date for this month:
*Winter has set in here at
*Something new in the works. You might have noticed that the top of the letter now says “In the Phish Bowl Ministries”. This has to do with domain names…I think that’s what it’s called. Two brothers in Christ from Calvary Chapel Loveland have stepped up to get PBM on the web. We (all of us who are a part of PBM, it’s a WE thing, not a ME thing) have a new blog page. Get this; I have never seen a blog page. I hear they are cool. I will add the address as soon as I get it. Through this page my hope is to touch as many lives with the redemption of Christ’s love…to call all saints to a walk of obedience and to shine a light on what sin will do in a person’s life if we don’t repent. By God’s grace today I’m in jail, NOT HELL!
*Once again to send thanks out for all of the prayers and support. Because of the brothers and sisters, PBM is going to do a Christmas spread. Please pray for the men and women behind the wall. Christmas seems to hit harder than other holidays.
*When is comes to Phish Bowl Coffee House, it has been under attack. First during a shake down, the c.o. took the coffee. It was being stored in a peanut butter jar and this is not allowed (not that breaking rules is ever OK!) I’ve used this for storage for a year now. Then, the next day my coffee pot died. Not bad for something that goes all day for almost 4 years. Now to the prayer request. Our brother in Christ, Greg, asked his boss if he could bring it to work in the electrical shop to fix it. His boss told him O.K. on Friday! So Friday, he took it to work and another c.o. stopped him and took it. Greg was informed that he is going to be written up for “unauthorized possession of someone else’s property”. I too can get written up for this. Keep this in prayer.
*Praise report: Last month I was asked if I wanted to join the church set-up team. I’m always thankful to our Lord for His continuous use of me in His service. This will now give me contact with both the eastside and the Westside of the yard. Before, I was confined to just the eastside.
God is good.
Merry Christmas!
“Chummin’ for saints..."
Love, Your brother -
Timothy -
Eph 4:29-32
No comments:
Post a Comment