1. Christians do have a hope that those who sleep in death will be awakened and their joy will never end, and we yearn for that day.
  2. Couldn't Mary and Joseph have used more practical gifts? Why did the magi bring such unusual presents to the Christ Child? And how do these Gentiles fit into this very Jewish part of Matthew's Gospel? Let's ask some Old Testament prophets and poets for the answer.
  3. The church’s song goes on and on, singing and ringing down to us today.
  4. This Christmas season we are thankful that even though we “fallers” are unable to climb up to God, he came down the ladder to us.
  5. While the world and other religions might be fine with considering him everything but, the foremost thing our Jesus came to be and still remains is Jesus, Savior.
  6. Buried deep in our human psyche, there seems to be more than a need—almost a necessity—to celebrate the arrival of a new year. It’s like an unspoken, unlegislated cultural demand, as instinctual as moving to music or smiling at a newborn. Why? What deep human need is at work here?
  7. Love turns out to be not simply a thing or action, but a characteristic of God himself.
  8. The shepherds are the most unlikely people to play the role the angels cast them in.
  9. A madman king. State-decreed infanticide. A fleeing holy family. What does all this have to do with Christmas? And how did a day of horror also become a day of hope? Today, December 28, the church remembers The Holy Innocents.
  10. As Christians, we rest in the finished work of Christ on the cross, and we yearn for our neighbor to be reconciled to God, to know the peace that we are resting in.
  11. God’s candle is not so easily extinguished. His promise is not some vague light at the end of the tunnel that we may or may not reach. In fact, God’s light has a name: Jesus Christ.
  12. What we are asked to believe as we ponder the birth of this child is that in his coming, a new creation has dawned.