Joseph of Nazareth Meets Planned Parenthood

A few years ago the Planned Parenthood Federation of America got my attention by pioneering a Christmas card. The group sent a holiday greeting — complete with sentimental snowflakes and stars — with the caption “Choice on Earth.”

Evangelicals and Roman Catholics rightly noted the incongruity of the nation’s largest abortion provider using an ancient Christian holiday to promote abortion rights. The give-and-take over this card was a quick controversy, forgotten once all the wrapping paper and tinsel were put away for the season.

But the card made me think of Joseph, and how this obscure Middle Eastern laborer could show 21st-century Christians how to celebrate Christmas in a culture of death?

For too long, Christians have concentrated almost exclusively on what we do not believe about Joseph.

We rightly insist that he was not the birth-father of Jesus. Mary, a virgin, conceived the Messiah through the power of the Holy Spirit, with no biological contribution from a man (Luke 1:34-35). And yet, there is so much more that Scripture has to say about Joseph.  Continue at Russell D. Moore

The Christmas Story by John MacArthur

The Virgin Birth and the Immaculate Conception

During Christmas season each year, we read the accounts of Jesus’ birth in the Gospels (Matt 1:18–25; Luke 1:26–38), and we are reminded once more of our Savior’s Virgin Birth. What exactly do we mean by the Virgin Birth of Christ? Maybe that’s obvious, but let’s start with a definition. By the Virgin Birth we understand that Jesus was conceived in the womb of his mother Mary by a miraculous work of the Holy Spirit without a human father.

We must not confuse the Virgin Birth of Christ with the so-called Immaculate Conception. Many Christians incorrectly believe that the Immaculate Conception has reference to Christ. Instead, the Immaculate Conception is the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was herself conceived in her own mother’s womb free from sin. The Roman Catholic Church teaches that Mary was not only free from inherited sin by the Immaculate Conception, but neither did she commit any personal sins in her lifetime. Thus, she was in fact as sinless as her son Jesus. It’s important to remember that this idea of the Immaculate Conception of Mary did not become an official doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church until 1854.

But this doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of Mary is in reality nowhere taught in Scripture. Nevertheless, the Roman Catholic Church does point to a verse in Luke they claim teaches it—Luke 1:28: “And coming in, he [Gabriel] said to her, ‘Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you’” (NASB). You may be saying, “I don’t see where this verse teaches that Mary was conceived without sin or lived a sinless life.” And you would be right; it teaches no such thing.  Keep Reading >>>

The Simple Announcement

If you didn’t pay careful attention, you might pass right over one of the most important announcements in the New Testament: the miraculous birth of Jesus Christ. Matthew took only one verse to announce it. Such a concise statement, though it doesn’t all by itself prove the point, strongly suggests that our Lord and Savior’s virgin birth was not simply a man-made story.

A human author, writing strictly on his own initiative, would tend to describe such an amazing event in an expansive, detailed, and elaborate manner. But not the apostle Matthew. He does relate additional circumstances surrounding the virgin birth, but the basic fact is stated in one simple sentence: “After His mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Spirit.”

Matthew devotes the previous seventeen verses to Jesus’ human genealogy but just this part of one verse to His divine genealogy. As the Son of God, Jesus “descended” from His heavenly Father by a miraculous and never-repeated act of the Holy Spirit; even so, the Holy Spirit chose to announce that astounding truth by just one brief, declarative sentence. As all God’s Word does, Matthew’s simple statement contains the solemn tone of authenticity. By contrast, a human fabrication would tend to have that false ring of exaggeration to it, being filled out with much more “convincing” material than what this inspired version needed.

Scripture gives us little information about Mary and even less about Joseph. Mary was undoubtedly a godly young woman, probably a native of Nazareth who came from a relatively poor family. Joseph was the son of Jacob (Matt. 1:16) and was a craftsman, probably a carpenter (13:55). Most significant, he was a “just man” (1:19), one who placed saving trust in the coming Messiah.  Keep Reading >>>

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The First Christmas: Myths and Realities

I. A Reality Check

Here’s a true-false quiz:

1. Mary and Joseph had to travel as quickly as possible to Bethlehem because Mary could have given birth at any moment.

2. The Bethlehem innkeeper was fully booked, and so Mary had to give birth to Jesus in the barn/stall nearby/behind the inn.

3. Initially, this experience must have been frightening and lonely for Mary and Joseph.

4. “The little Lord Jesus no crying he makes.”

5. The angels who appeared to the shepherds had wings.

How’d you do on the quiz? Check your answers below. (Some of these thoughts are taken from a talk I gave on what really happened that first Christmas.)

Marcus Borg, a member of the liberal Jesus Seminar, claims that the Gospels are in serious conflict: Jesus was born “in a stable” in Luke but in a home in Matthew (Marcus Borg [and N.T. Wright], The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions [San Francisco: HarperSF, 1999], 180). As it turns out, this isn’t really a conflict at all. Contrary to the traditional Christmas story, Jesus was indeed born in a home! Borg’s claim is based on the notable King James Version’s mistranslation of Luke 2:7: “there was no room for them in the inn.” But the KJV rendering goes against Luke’s in(n)tention.  Keep Reading >>>