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Why the Nativity? (w/ Dr. David Jeremiah)

Our American Stories / Lee Habeeb
The Truth Network Radio
December 23, 2024 3:01 am

Why the Nativity? (w/ Dr. David Jeremiah)

Our American Stories / Lee Habeeb

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December 23, 2024 3:01 am

On this episode of Our American Stories, in his book-turned-docudrama Why the Nativity? Dr. David Jeremiah looks in detail at the people and events that surround the Christmas story and why each of them was chosen for their specific purpose. Here's the story of the nativity! 

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Void where prohibited by law. 18 plus terms and... And we continue with our American stories and with some of our Christmas season programming. And our next story comes to us from the founder of Turning Point Radio and Television Ministries and the senior pastor of Shadow Mountain Community Church, Dr. David Jeremiah.

And every morning at 6 a.m. he's my teacher. I'm a Christian. And, well, 64% of Americans are Christians. And this story is for you and for anybody else interested in why we celebrate Christmas and why the nativity It was a terrific book written by David Jeremiah in 2006 and it has now been adapted into a terrific film that's available for free to stream. Just type in why the nativity on your browser or go to davidjeremiah.org and watch it with your family. And now here is Dr. David Jeremiah to tell the story of the nativity and to answer the question and many questions around the birth of Jesus.

You know we celebrate Christmas now but most people don't know what Christmas is about so I decided to write a book and answer a lot of questions that people had and and we started out was going to be 11 questions then it was going to be 15 and then it became 25. And these are key questions like why Mary and why Joseph and where do they all fit into the story. So one of the questions we talk about in the beginning of the book is why did God become a man and the answer to that is is really so much a part of the heart of the story.

He did that because of his love. He had to reach man and the only way he could reach man was to become a man himself. So he he sent his own son Jesus Christ to become a person. The Bible says he tasted flesh and at Christmas time we celebrate that Jesus being born into humanity.

And I always like to say to people because sometimes people don't really understand it he didn't become a man then he didn't become a person. Jesus has always been and he always will be there never was a time when he was not and there never will be a time when he ceases to be. But in that moment he came and he came through the birth canal of his mother Mary and became a human being so that in his humanity he could reach down to man and in his divinity he could reach up to God. And one day on a cross outside of the city of Jerusalem he hung there as the God man and as the man God and paid the penalty for the sin of all of us.

A truly remarkable story that not duplicated anywhere else and it is so amazing it had to be God because nobody else would ever have come up with that. Nazareth was a an interesting place actually I've had the privilege to talk about Nazareth before and I've actually been to Nazareth on maybe five times and that's the place where Jesus grew up as a carpenter. When we were building the set for our movie that we did we built the set so if you walk into the set this way it's Bethlehem and if you walk into it the other way it's Nazareth. And it was the place where Jesus grew up he was the carpenter's son there he learned to work there he learned to be a godly son and it's you know the attitude was can anything good come out of Nazareth well something did come out of Nazareth pretty good and that was the Lord God. Why Mary is a really good question to ask why would she be chosen I'm sure she asked that question you know I think about Mark Lowry's song Mary did you know did you know this was going to happen obviously she didn't and sometimes you know we think she's she's 30 or 35 she was 15 maybe 16 a very young child and when the angels came and told her that she was to be the mother of Jesus she was stunned. You know in the old testament they looked for the Messiah and many young women thought maybe they would be the mother of the Messiah because they were looking for the Messiah. Well Mary wasn't looking for it and it happened to her and the angel said she would be the mother of Jesus. I always have been struck by the fact that something as dramatic as that happened to her and her response was be it unto me according to your word and I thought I wish I had that kind of that kind of submission to the Lord her submission to the Lord is amazing and she she was God's choice and she was the perfect choice. Well you know Joseph was he I have a whole message about why Joseph and the message is the forgotten man of Christmas that's the name of the message because he comes on the scene for a period of time and then he disappears and you never hear another word about him but he was the man that God chose to to be the earthly father of Jesus as he was growing up he was the Bible describes him as a good man and a godly man certainly a surprised as Mary was when he got the message from but I think the thing that to me is most critical about him was his faith endured a great challenge and that was the challenge of Mary's pregnancy and I in our film we we show the disappointment that that he had when he found out that she was with child she came back from Elizabeth's house and she was pregnant and he couldn't figure that out he did he nobody had told him that I think in the film we have him going away for a little bit but he comes back and he settles in to being the person God asked him to be and that was the human human father the surrogate father if you will of Jesus Christ. Well you know there's probably why did Jesus come when he came you know the Bible says he came in the fullness of time I don't know if you've ever seen that verse in the fullness of time he came what does that mean well he came well I think it means exactly the right time first of all it's interesting if you study history the Romans had just paved the way with their roads to all of the various regions of that particular part of the world Greek had become more and more common as a language so now you have transportation and communication coming together and the message of the gospel could travel quickly to all points of the world just at the right time and it was also I think about that as we as we have gone through what we've gone through here in our own country and all the stuff that goes on and how awful things have been in some cases with crime and all of that that was sort of like what it was when Jesus came it wasn't a good time it was a time they needed a redeemer they needed a Christ they needed Jesus at that time but it was perfect because he came into the world at the right time well Bethlehem is a really interesting story why Bethlehem the word Bethlehem means house of bread and it was the place where the bread of life was born it's a very special place because there are some other famous Rachel's buried there and it's not it's about a few miles from Jerusalem I've been in Bethlehem but this was the prophecy out of you shall come he who is to come forth Bethlehem of Ephrata it was the prophecy that that made Bethlehem so special and interestingly enough when the prophet was making that prophecy Bethlehem was not really in existence but it became the answer to the prophecy and there are two Bethlehams there's Bethlehem and Bethlehem at Ephrata he came to him at Ephrata he came to the right one he showed up at the right place you have to put we have to when you ask ourselves why there was no room in the inn I think we have to kind of put ourselves in that situation we read the Christmas story through our Christian eyes and we don't read it through the eyes of the culture into which he was born people in Bethlehem apart from some divine revelation would have had no idea what was going on who was this mother who is this person the bottom line it was census it was census time in Bethlehem there was no room anywhere for anybody I don't think they were singling out Jesus they just had no room and when he came to the door and they didn't have any room and ultimately gave him a place where he could be born that was a gracious thing for him to do because there wasn't room any place else and it wasn't hey we're not going to let Jesus in here they didn't know who he was they didn't have a clue who he was but it became a wonderful story because just as they had no room for Jesus in the end so many people today don't have any room for Jesus at all whether it's Christmas or Easter or anytime and I can speak about that because I'm a pastor and I know what that's like and when we come back more from Dr. David Jeremiah the film the book why the nativity here on our American stories you wake up put on your ray-ban meta glasses classic style innovative tech you're living all in you realize you need coffee desperately so you say hey meta how do I make a latte to make a latte brew two shots of espresso after meta ai gets you caffeinated you start walking to work and you need a soundtrack hey meta play hip-hop music with the built-in camera you snap a pic of a dope mural on the side of a building that you think is worth sharing hey meta text my last photo to Eva sending message after work you had to meet some friends hey nice glasses ray-ban meta glasses the next generation of ai glasses just say hey meta to harness the power of meta ai listen to music make hands-free calls with open-air audio and built-in microphones and so much more all while staying present to the world around you shop ray-ban meta glasses at meta.com slash smart 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around christmas time is the argument of the virgin birth why was jesus born of a virgin why was it important for him to be born of a virgin because he was god he had to come into this world and not lose his holiness so when he came through a virgin without the male involved in the birth process he preserved his holiness he came and he could become at that particular time 100 god and 100 man and mary had never known a man um i remember there's a funny little story about that i i had some books some years ago that i actually was a little new testament i had written worked on to make available to people my my grandchildren were pretty young at the time i have twins and they came in and they said hey poppy can we have one of these and i said yeah but you gotta promise me you'll read it and they said what do you mean i said starts with matthew i want you i want you to read matthew this week and tell me you read it so about halfway through the week i get a call from their mom and they said okay okay you answer this one bradley came and said hey mom if mary and joseph never even knew each other how could they have a baby i said well tell them to ask their father but i mean so so the whole thing about the virgin birth is the key it it preserves the deity of jesus christ and i want to tell you why i know it's true i i remember reading this story and how it helps me so much to know it's true when mary was standing at the foot of the cross and they were getting ready to crucify her son they were getting ready to crucify her son because he claimed to be god and they said he was a blasphemer mary could have spoken up and said no he's not god i remember the night he was conceived he is not god but she never did that she watched her son die on the cross because she knew that what the bible says about him was true and to me you don't need any other argument for the virgin birth of christ than that one you know um i've gotten a little bit involved in the shepherd's story why the shepherds because if you had i mean i just got off a phone call with somebody a few minutes ago and i'm asking him to help us promote this film and he asked me this question if i gave you the keys to this network where would you want to put this show only nobody does that and i think about that with the shepherds if i gave you the key to who you want to have received the gospel at first who would you want it wouldn't be the shepherds you know when the shepherds uh when the when the israeli people were shepherds they weren't even allowed to live with other people they were the outcasts they had no credibility they couldn't go to the temple they could they weren't allowed in the temple shepherds were the lowest of the low and yet it was to the shepherds that jesus first revealed himself as if once again to say no matter who you are no matter what you've done no matter how far you feel you are away from god think of the shepherds they're the picture of god's willingness when we couldn't come up to where he was he came down to where we are and and that's especially true with the shepherds well if uh why the angels you know the angels are really involved in jesus life in fact if you go through the life of jesus you can almost say these are the important moments in jesus life because angels were there they were there at his birth they were at his baptism they were there at his temptation in the wilderness they're going to be totally involved in his coming again in the rapture and in the second coming angels were there as emissaries from heaven they were god's messengers i think they were god's protectors too they god said i'm going to send jesus to be the savior of the world and you angels i'm sending you down to make sure it goes right and take care of it watch it they were the messengers um you know gabriel and michael the only two angels we know about by name in the bible one was the protector one was the communicator and god sent them both to be here when jesus was born well you know if you ask if you ask scientists about the star of bethlehem and why it was so important they'll give you all kinds of scientific reasons why this was a meteor that was out of control or something but this was god's star the star was going in the wrong direction scientifically it was almost like god was defying everything to make sure that his that his wise men that were coming would not get lost i don't have a scientific explanation for the star because there is no scientific explanation it was god's star and if god made him in the first place he can move him around any way he wants and that night he moved a star to make sure those three guys didn't miss what they set out to do well the wise men the wise men represent a whole different uh why the wise men is a good question they represent a whole different aspect of the culture isn't it interesting you got the shepherds over here representing the down and out and you got the wise men over here representing the aristocracy it's almost like god put this pin down here and put this pin down here and he says i came for everybody in between the wise men came their gifts were special they they represented worship and unfortunately they get caught up in the major scenes all over the country and they didn't come when the major scenes were there they came way later the bible says jesus was a young lad when they came but they gave gold frankincense and myrrh gold for his kingship frankincense for his his suffering and myrrh which was uh was a bitter tasting um element that represented his death and his his suffering so the wise men they're always a beautiful part of the story and there's not very much written about them except they followed the lord and the journey they took wasn't like two days it was a long journey to get to where jesus was uh this this story of the birth of jesus which we celebrate with such exuberance in our culture today actually is communicated in luke and in matthew and it's referenced in philippians and a few other places but the actual story of christmas the story of the nativity is found in a couple chapters in luke in one chapter in matthew um it was prophesied in the old testament as you know many many places in the old testament isaiah prophesied mica prophesied it jeremiah prophesied it it was foretold and then it was experienced and we have somebody said why don't you have more information we don't need any more information this is what god said would happen this is what happened here's the record of it i can embellish it if you want to and when you take the story and you go back and get all of the prophecies and put them together then you have more of a body of work on the on the nativity but the story itself is simple it's not hard to understand and it it's miraculous have your fun to celebrate do things you do but don't forget christmas is about god becoming man god loving us so much that he left the quarters of heaven to live in the womb of a woman so he could become one of us and go to the cross and pay the penalty for our sin the redemption story doesn't start at the crucifixion it starts at bethlehem because part of the sacrifice of god was the sacrifice of his son his only begotten son and part of the sacrifice of jesus was leaving his place in heaven to come down here and walk among us there's no way to describe that and a great job as always by our own greg hangler on the editing and production and a special thanks to dr david jeremiah and a special thanks to turning point ministries for putting this film together again it's free for all to stream all through christmas season and beyond type in the words why the nativity on your browser or go to davidjeremiah.org also you can check your cable listings it will be appearing throughout the month and again check tv guide or wherever you get your table listings why the nativity by the way pick up the book it's terrific if you're a christian even if you're not 64 of americans call themselves christians and it's an important story it's an important date and we celebrate as we do but again we want to learn why we celebrate and get the stories behind the stories why the nativity does that the book and the film and dr jeremiah jeremiah also happens to be my teacher we don't have a relationship he's on the television every day at 6 a.m central time where i live and he's been teaching me and coaching me for 15 years and doesn't know it well didn't know it until i met him this is lee habib why the nativity with dr david jeremiah here on our american stories so experience sensational sound with visio's soundbar collection starting at just 99 there's a soundbar for every budget with dolby atmos in every model cinema quality sound is closer than ever this collection features visio's simplest setup yet so you'll be streaming your favorite iheart radio playlists in no time whether you're looking for a simple setup or the cutting edge elevate se with 360 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Whisper: medium.en / 2024-12-23 04:42:22 / 2024-12-23 04:53:07 / 11

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