November/December 2023
You have a reputation. I have a reputation. Mine’s not so good. How’s yours?
Since becoming a Christian almost forty years ago, one thing I have always tried to do is get Scripture right. To understand it. To believe it’s truth. To hold God’s Word up with a spirit of reverence. 1 John 4:1 says “try the spirits.” How else would you test what you hear but against Scripture? What does the Bible say and what doesn’t the Bible say? If it says something, it must be there for a reason.
The song says, “We Three Kings,” the Bible doesn’t say that. This became the tip of the iceberg for me. What parts of all the other songs, stories, traditions, and Nativity scenes do not line up with Scripture? All the Nativity scenes that I have seen have wise men at the manger. The shepherds belong there of course, but do the wise men? The more that I studied the Christmas story in Matthew 2 and Luke 2, the more I didn’t think so. The proof that they were not there in Bethlehem, the final say of Scripture hinges on Mary’s Reputation.
Mary doesn’t have a bad reputation. Just the opposite. Joseph too, for that matter. I ...
