That Season of the year!

We have arrived at that time of season where the whole world is gearing up to celebrate Christmas, the favorite time of the year. Our homes get a new outlook with cleaning, painting, Christmas decorations, setting up of the manger scene and so on. Christmas has become more than a ritual, it's looked upon as a time to celebrate, display one's wealth and relax. Religious festivals become opportunities for celebration.

But I apologize for breaking this warped up bubble of belief. Christmas is not a religious festival of delicious cakes, Christmas trees, Christmas bells, Santa Claus, etc. It is about a true story in history, a happening which history vouches for a man named, Jesus who lived on this earth between 4 BC to 32 AD. The fact that underscores the pages of history is that his birth and death was not a finality in His story, but an added facet to the celebration is His resurrection from death. If we were to clear away all the trees, lights, wreaths, candy, chocolate, mistletoe, gifts, hot cider, eggnog, silver bells, festive music, Santa Claus, reindeer, and elves – the Church of Jesus has got to the core of the celebration, which is documented in the Historical book, the Bible. It says, “In the beginning was the word, ..The word became flesh and dwelt among us, we  observed his glory as the one and only son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”. And then the fact both History and Bible records is “that he was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the scriptures.”.

Prof Bart Ehrman, a world-famous historian working in University of North Carolina says regarding historicity of Jesus as, “In my experience as an historian, I have met and interacted with literally 1000’s of historians and scholars, and almost all of them have no issues in accepting the historicity of Jesus Christ. Christ mythicism is not even considered as an option among the scholarly circles!”

Another historian, Tacitus is considered unanimously to be one of the greatest historians by scholars. He was a patriotic Roman senator and his writings show no sympathy towards Christians. He refers to Christ, his execution by Pontius Pilate and the existence of early Christians in Rome in his final work, Annals (c. AD 116), book 15, chapter 44.[35][36][37]. The relevant passage reads: "called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus." Scholars generally consider Tacitus's reference to the execution of Jesus by Pontius Pilate to be both authentic and of historical value. He is also considered as an independent Roman source about early Christianity that is in unison with other historical records.

With all of the above evidence portrayed, we are all left with a choice as to how we are going to view Christmas, this season. We can consider Christ a myth, blissfully ignoring the fact that He lived, died and rose again and is a living God or embrace the truth recorded in the Bible and celebrate the birth of Christ in a meaningful way. J I Packer states, “The Christmas message is that there is hope for a ruined humanity-hope of pardon, hope of glory- because at the Father’s will Jesus became poor, and was born in stable so that thirty years later He might hang on a cross.”. Are we willing to take time to know Jesus, this Christmas season, to find out the real reason for His birth?

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Reference:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sources_for_the_historicity_of_Jesus