ChristmasReading2022A - Flipbook - Page 8
DAY THREE: November 30 - Wednesday
The Human Project
“It’s a mess, ain’t it Sheri ?” Ed Tom replies, “If it ain’t, it’ll do ll a
mess gets here.” (Cormack McCarthy, No Country for Old Men)
Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues,
proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease
and sickness among the people. News about him spread all over Syria,
and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those
su ering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and
the paralyzed; and he healed them. Ma hew 4:23-24
But when the set me had fully
come, God sent his Son, born of a Christmas is a
woman, born under the law, to
redeem those under the law, that reminder that God
we might receive adop on to
sonship. Because you are his sons, will not leave
God sent the Spirit of his Son into humans alone.
our hearts, the Spirit who calls out,
“Abba, Father.” So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since
you are his child, God has made you also an heir. Gala ans 4:4-7
The world Jesus was born into is more recognizable to us than we
might imagine. Although twenty centuries have rolled past, there are
touch points that remind us that the world—such as it is—has not
changed much from the ancient world—such as it was.
Israel was fragmented. Israel was oppressed and under the thumb of
the conqueror du jour: Rome. Rome was just the latest. It was a long
list of foreign rulers: Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Alexander the Great,
Ptolemies, Seleucids and now Rome. Even the brief respite during the
Maccabean revolt of 168 BC added to the angst as many considered
the Jewish leadership illegi mate.
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Josephus writes of the four major Jewish philosophies of the day:
Pharisee, Sadducee, Essene (famous for the Dead Sea Scrolls) and
Zealots. These all had their agenda for Israel. The zealots of the day
were looking for a ght which would eventually come some four
decades a er Jesus and which would bring unimaginable disaster upon
the people. The Sadducees were comfortable in their aristocra c
wealth and power. They did not, a er all, believe in a resurrec on
future. The Pharisees were the holiness movement which devolved
into self-righteousness. The Essenes got as far away as they could.