Josephus does not tell us that Christianity is true, and Christians do not need Josephus to tell them that Christ is risen. But Christianity makes claims about things that happened in public history under identifiable rulers, priests, and governors. For that reason, testimony from outside the church matters.
Today, the longing for cultural Christianity on both the left and the right hearkens back to an older version of Christendom that was a mixed blessing for the church in the western world. The cultural mediation of Christian views on created order has certainly benefitted the civilization we’ve inherited. But the gospel itself isn’t something that can be reduced to cultural mediation either. Instead, the gospel as a message stands apart from all human accomplishments and achievements, no matter how beneficial they might be.
The student of Scripture should always have a map open next to their Bible as they read. If possible, they should also travel to Israel, not to make a pilgrimage, but to see the context of the land in which these stories took place. These are not fairy tales made up about fictional fantasy lands; these are stories about real people in real places interacting with a real God.

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The following is an excerpt from "Finding Christ in the Straw" written by Robert M. Hiller (1517 Publishing, 2020).
Even when God doesn’t take away the troubled waters of our life, he is the Bridge we can lean on no matter what storms may come our way.
Above all, pastors must aim their preaching at the people God has placed in the care of the pastor rather than airing pious ideas that did not speak to their situations.
We preach, teach and confess the virgin birth, and rightly so, but the actual sign is not the Virgin giving birth, it is the Child who is born.
The Church becomes anti-church when the new world order Christ inaugurated by eliminating demographic division through the commonality of Baptism is exploded by allegiance to cults of personality.
This is the wonder which is present in the calling of the disciples. Not how they drop their nets to follow Jesus, but that Jesus does not need to go far to find disciples. He chooses the people He lives among.
From all accounts, everyone in Nazareth would have just thought of Jesus as a very good boy who obeyed his parents and worked hard with his father as a tekton’s apprentice in the family trade.
The goal of Arrangement is to make the proclamation of the Gospel clearer and more compelling for your hearers.
This is what makes the reading from John so frightening and yet so exciting. Notice how Jesus appears. Not in miracles, not in marvels, but in relationships.
One name repeatedly emerges from the heart and mind of Paul: Jesus. Jesus is Messiah, Jesus is Savior, Jesus is the world’s rightful and reigning King.
For the Israelites, the language of restoration cannot be separated from the language of resurrection.
Having the assurance that perfect righteousness has already been gifted to you is, perhaps, the leading spiritual scuffle in which every believer is entangled.