Category Archives: Birth of Jesus

How (not) to preach a Christmas sermon

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At Christmas, fact and fiction, truth and legend, are mixed so thoroughly that even preachers include what they should have left out, and leave out what they should have included.

The late Dick France wrote:-

‘Most people’s awareness of the Christmas story is derived mainly from school nativity plays, in which Luke’s tea-toweled shepherds rub shoulders with Matthew’s magi (promoted to royal status), and a surly innkeeper and his wife are surrounded by infant angels with tinsel halos.

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Top ten Christmas conversation starters

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To the seasonally tongue-tied among us, Donald Whitney suggests that the following could get a meaningful conversation going in almost any Christmas situation.  It will be noticed that the later questions in the list would help in moving the conversation to a deeper level:-

  1. What’s the best thing that’s happened to you since last Christmas?
  2. What was your best Christmas ever? Why?
  3. What’s the most meaningful Christmas gift you’ve ever received?
  4. What was the most appreciated Christmas gift you’ve ever given?
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Matthew 2:2 – The star of Bethlehem

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2:1 After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, in the time of King Herod, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem 2:2 saying, “Where is the one who is born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”

As to the identity of this star:

1. Some regard the entire story as fictional.  Ehrman (Jesus, Interrupted) makes no attempt to make sense of the account. …

When, and where, was Jesus born?

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How does ‘main-stream’ critical scholarship deal with the biblical narratives of the birth of Jesus?

What follows is based on this article by Helen K. Bond, senior lecturer in New Testament at the University of Aberdeen.  I also draw on her book The Historical Jesus: A Guide For the Perplexed (HJ).  A similar line is taken by Rodolfo Galvan Estrada III in this article.

First, Bond notes that only Matthew and Luke record Jesus’ birth, and their stories are quite different.  …