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Exploring God's Amazing Word
18 Bible Studies on Positive Living in Christ.
The Word is amazing in its effect upon humanity. Lives have been changed as its truths have been applied. You will be inspired to see yourself as blessed with Heaven's best. Word studies, topical studies, expository studies. How far do you want to go with God's Word? 180 pages. IN STOCK.
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Christmas Blessings
to all our readers
from Peter and Vivien Wade
This is our last newsletter for 2005. We trust you have been helped by the 20 issues sent out this year, and we look forward to your company in the New Year.
Thank you for your support during 2005 in prayer, in sharing our site with others, in encouragement, in donations. Without God and you we would not have come this far! And thanks to Geri Johnson in the US for hundreds of mail outs, Guy Vieira for the great designs and print brokering, and Bill Morgan for promotion and encouragement.
Christmas Bible Studies
Christ Was "Made"
Think of the seven things He was made:
1. As to His humanity, he was "made of a woman" (Galatians 4:4).
2. As to His genealogy, He was "made of the seed of David" (Romans 1:3).
3. As to His identity, He was "made like unto His brethren" (Hebrews 2:17).
4. As to His humility, He "made Himself of no reputation" (Philippians 2:7).
5. As to His ignominy, He was "made a curse" (Gal. 3:13).
6. As to His responsibility, He was "made under the law" (Galatians 4:4).
7. As to His substitutionary work, He was "made... sin for us" (II Corinthians 5:21).
Christ's Names as the Incarnate One
In Matthew chapter 2
1. "Jesus" of Bethlehem, a Savior for us -- verse 1.
2. "King of the Jews", a King over Israel -- verse 2.
3. "Christ", the Anointed One sent to us -- verse 4.
4. The "Governor", to rule over Israel -- verse 6.
5. "The Young Child" (9 times). His actual humanity -- v.8.
6. "Son", as One with God, and One given to us -- verse 15.
7. The "Nazarene", as the Separated to God and His service -- verse 23
Christ's Incarnation
As to Incarnate One, Christ...
1. Bears the Sweetest Name ever given -- "Jesus" (Luke 2:21).
2. Embodies the Greatest Power ever known -- "Emmanuel, God with us" (Matthew 1:23).
3. Stooped to the Lowest Place ever taken -- "For our sakes became poor" or a beggar (II Corinthians 8:9).
4. Came on the Mightiest Mission ever undertaken -- "He took part of the same... that he might deliver" (Hebrews 2:14-16).
5. Is the Greatest Unfolding ever seen -- "God manifest in the flesh" (I Timothy 3:16).
6. Bearer of the Grandest Blessing ever bestowed -- "Life ...and have it more abundantly" (John 10:10).
7. Is the Most Potent Force ever communicated. "Rise and fall of many" (Luke 2:34).
The above studies are adapted from the book 1,000 Bible Study Outlines by F.E. Marsh (Kregel Publications).
The Helpless Babe
The natal day of the New Creation was a fulfillment of prophecy of a new thing. It came so quietly, so unobtrusively, it came as only God could come on a visit to the human.
We know that a Babe is the fruit of human love. This Babe was the fruit of Divine Love. It was an unveiling of God's intense passion for man. We call it the lifting of the curtain on the drama of love. It was the showing forth of the love life, or the life that reveals itself in love.
Jesus as a Babe was the fulfillment of a prophecy of the New Creation. He was a type of the New Man that was to come. In love's weakness was unveiled the strength of God. That love man that was to come out of the Incarnation is graphically described by Paul as "created in Christ Jesus." In that Babe lying in a crude manger was a revelation of creative energy which brought the universe into being.
How gentle, how helpless to natural reason was love that morning. For that Babe was a manifestation of love. God had manifested love, but the manifestation was not understood. It was a root out of dry ground then. It is still a root out of dry ground today to most. Yet we owe all our progress, our great mental and spiritual and material development to that Babe which was lying in the bosom of its mother.
Those baby hands were to lift the hinges off the doors of history and swing wide a New Way into an untrod future. His baby hands, unconscious to men, were pointing to a New Creation, a New Heaven and a New Earth, yes, to a New Man that would not be a slave to the forces of nature but to the environment of love. That Babe would produce a race of supermen, conquerors where humanity had been defeated, victors where slavery had held sway. We are glad for every memory of Christmas. We are glad for the fragrance that comes from the Babe that lay in swaddling clothes in that stable.
Christmas was His birthday. The Cross and Resurrection was our birthday. His birthday was Heaven breaking into the realm of selfishness to unveil Love. He knew why He came. He knew what the end would mean, yet Love drove Him as a leaf upon a stream. It was Love incarnate in that manger cradle.
As we meditate upon this, how it thrills our hearts. We can hear Him whisper, "It is finished." We can hear the rending of the temple veil. We can see the dissolution of the temple worship. We can see a New Creation coming into being with a New Covenant. The other Covenant had a Law of Death. This was a Law of Love. The first Covenant was with spiritually dead men. The New Covenant is with New Creation men.
How few of us realize what it means, this glad Christmas day. I call it the Incarnation Day, the New Creation Day. It was the coming into being of a new plan, a new concept of life. It is all wrapped up in the sentence of the Master, "I am the light of the world. He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness but shall have the light of life." It is really the light of Love. Love had come to the earth. Selfishness had reigned ever since the Fall, but now Love had come.
The reason we give gifts on this day is because Love came... a new kind of Love. For the first time in human history, men found that giving is a part of their very being. They gave themselves first to the Lord, then they gave themselves to the ministry of Love. Today we give, because He gave to us. Today we love, because He shed His Love in our hearts. We are celebrating Love's natal day, Love's birthday into the realm of selfishness.
From Kenyon's Herald of Life by E.W. Kenyon.
Easter Starts at Christmas
They borrowed a bed to lay His head,
When Christ the Lord came down;
They borrowed an ass in the mountain pass
For Him to ride to town.
But the crown that He wore
And the cross that He bore
Were His own.
He borrowed the bread when the crowd He fed
On the grassy mountain side;
He borrowed the dish of broken fish
With which He satisfied.
But the crown that He wore
And the cross that He bore
Were His own.
He borrowed the ship in which to sit
To teach the multitude,
He borrowed the nest in which to rest,
He had never a home as rude,
But the crown that He wore
And the cross that He bore
Were His own.
He borrowed a room on the way to the tomb,
The passover lamb to eat.
They borrowed a cave, for Him a grave,
They borrowed a winding sheet.
But the crown that He wore
And the cross that He bore
Were His own.
The thorns on His head were worn in my stead,
For me the Saviour died;
For the guilt of my sin the nails drove in
When Him they crucified.
Though the crown that He wore
And the cross that He bore
Were His own,
They rightly were mine.
-- L. M. Hollingworth
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