December 23, 2024 • 20 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, in his book-turned-docudrama Why the Nativity? Dr. David Jeremiah looks in detail at the people and events that surround the Christmas story and why each of them was chosen for their specific purpose. Here's the story of the nativity!
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
And we continue with our American stories and with some
of our Christmas season programming, and our next story comes
to us from the founder of Turning Point Radio and
television ministries and the senior pastor of Shadow Mountain Community Church,
doctor David Jeremiah.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
And every morning at six am, he's my teacher.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
I'm a Christian, and well sixty four percent of Americans
are Christians.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
And this story is for you and for anybody.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Else interested in why we celebrate Christmas and Why the Nativity.
It was a terrific book written by David Jeremiah in
two thousand and six, and it has now been adapted
into a terrific film that's available for free to stream.
Just type in Why the Nativity on your browser or
go to Davidjeremiah dot org and watch it with your family.
(01:05):
And now here is doctor David Jeremiah to tell the
story of the Nativity and to answer the question and
many questions around the birth of Jesus.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
You know, we celebrate Christmas now, but most people don't
know what Christmas is about. So I decided to write
a book and answer a lot of questions that people had,
and we started out was going to be eleven questions,
then it was going to be fifteen, and then it
became twenty five. And these are key questions like why
Mary and why Joseph and where do they all fit
(01:39):
into the story. So one of the questions we talk
about in the beginning of the book is why did
God become a man? And the answer to that is
really so much a part of the heart of the story.
He did that because of his love he had to
reach man, and the only way he could reach man
was to become a man himself. So he said his
(02:00):
own son, Jesus Christ, to become a person. The Bible
says he tasted flesh. And at Christmas time we celebrate
that Jesus being born into humanity. And I always like
to say the people, because sometimes people don't really understand it.
He didn't become a man, then he didn't become a person.
Jesus has always been and he always will be. There
(02:21):
never was a time when he was not, and there
never will be a time when he ceases to be.
But in that moment, he came, and he came through
the birth canal of his mother Mary and became a
human being, so that in his humanity he could reach
down to man, and in his divinity he could reach
up to God. And one day, on a cross outside
(02:44):
of the city of Jerusalem, he hung there as the
God Man and as the man God and paid the
penalty for the sin of all of us. A truly
remarkable story that not duplicated anywhere else, and it is
so amazing. It had to be God, because nobody else
would ever have come up with that. Nazareth was an
(03:06):
interesting place. Actually, I've had the privilege to talk about
Nazareth before, and I've actually been a Nazareth on maybe
five times. And that's the place where Jesus grew up
as a carpenter. When we were building the set for
our movie that we did, we built the set so
if you walk into the set this way, especially him,
(03:28):
and if you walk into it the other way, it's
a Nazareth.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
And it was.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
It was the place where Jesus grew up. He was
a carpenter's son there, he learned to work there, he
learned to be a godly son. And it's you know,
the attitude was, can anything good come out on Nazareth? Well,
something did come out on Asareth pretty good, and that
was the Lord God. Why Mary is a really good
question to ask. Why would she be chosen? I'm sure
(03:55):
she asked that question. You know, I think about Mark
Lowry's song Mary, did you know? Oh, did you know
this was going to happen? Obviously she didn't. And sometimes,
you know, we think she's thirty or thirty five years
She was fifteen, maybe sixteen, a very young child, and
when the angels came and told her that she was
to be the mother of Jesus, she was stunned. You know,
(04:18):
in the Old Testament they looked for the Messiah, and
many young women thought maybe they would be the mother
of the Messiah because they were looking for the Messiah. Well,
Mary wasn't looking for it, and it happened to her
and the angel said she would be the mother of Jesus.
I always have been struck by the fact that something
as dramatic as that happened to her. And her response was,
(04:40):
be it unto me, according to your word? And I thought,
I wish I had that kind of that kind of
submission to the Lord. Her submission to the Lord is amazing,
and she she was God's choice and she was the
perfect choice. Well, you know, Joseph was I have a
(05:02):
whole message about why Joseph, and the message is the
Forgotten Man of Christmas. That's the name of the message,
because he comes on the scene for a period of
time and then he disappears and you never hear another
word about him. But he was the man that God
chose to be the earthly father of Jesus. As he
(05:23):
was growing up, he was. The Bible describes him as
a good man and a godly man, certainly as surprised
as Mary was when he got the message from But
I think the thing that to me is most critical
about him was his faith endured a great challenge, and
that was the challenge of Mary's pregnancy. And in our
(05:44):
film we showed the disappointment that he had when he
found out that she was with child. She came back
from Elizabeth's house and she was pregnant, and he couldn't
figure that out. He did, Nobody had told him that.
I think in the film we have him going away
for a little bit, but he comes back and he
settles into being the person God asked him to be,
(06:05):
and that was the human human father, the surrogate father,
if you will, of Jesus Christ. Well, you know, there's
why did Jesus come When he came? You know, the
Bible says he came in the fullness of time. I
don't know if you've ever seen that verse. And the
fullness of time he came. What does that mean? Well,
I think it means exactly the right time. First of all,
(06:27):
it's interesting if you study history. The Romans had just
paved the way with their roads to all of the
various regions of that particular part of the world. Greek
had become more and more common as a language, so
now you have transportation and communication coming together, and the
(06:48):
message of the Gospel could travel quickly to all points
of the world, just at the right time. And it
was also I think about that as we have gone
through what we've gone through here in our own country
and all the stuff that goes on, and how awful
things have been in some cases with crime and all
of that. That was sort of like what it was
when Jesus came. It wasn't a good time. It was
(07:10):
a time they needed a redeemer, they needed to Christ,
They needed Jesus at that time. But it was perfect
because he came into the world at the right time. Well,
Bethlehem is a really interesting story why Bethlehem. The word
Bethlehem means house of bread, and it was the place
(07:31):
where the bread of life was born. It's a very
special place because there are some other famous Rachels buried there,
and it's about a few miles from Jerusalem. I've been
in Bethlehem. But this was the prophecy out of you
shall come he who is to come forth Bethlehem of Ephrita.
(07:51):
It was the prophecy that made Bethlehem so special. Interestingly enough,
when the prophet was making that prophecy was not really
in existence, but it became the answer to the prophecy.
And there to Bethlehem's there's Bethlehem and Bethlehem at Befeta,
he came to the right one. He showed up at
the right place. You have to put we have to
(08:14):
when you ask ourselves why there was no room in
the inn, I think we have to kind of put
ourselves in that situation. We read the Christmas story through
our Christian eyes, and we don't read it through the
eyes of the culture into which he was born. People
in Bethlehem, apart from some divine revelation, would have had
no idea what was going on. Who is this mother,
(08:34):
who is this person? The bottom line, it was census.
It was census time in Bethlehem. There was no room
anywhere for anybody. I don't think they were singling out
in Jesus. They just had no room. And when he
came to the door and they didn't have any room
and ultimately gave him a place where he could be born.
That was a gracious thing for him to do because
there wasn't room any place else. And it wasn't hey,
(08:57):
we're not going to let Jesus in here. They didn't
know who he was, have a clue who he was.
But it became a wonderful story because just as they
had no room for Jesus, in the end, so many
people that they don't have any room for Jesus at all,
whether it's Christmas or East or anytime. And I can
speak about that because I'm a pastor and I know
(09:17):
what that's like.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
And when we come back more from doctor David Jeremiah,
the film the book Why the Nativity, here on our
American stories, and we returned to our American stories and
(09:41):
to doctor David Jeremiah and his conversation about his film
and book Why the Nativity, let's pick up where we
last left off.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Why was Jesus born in a stable? The stable, to
me is a picture that Jesus wanted people to know
that he came for all men, not just for the hierarchy,
not for the aristocrats. He came. In fact, this is
an amazing thing that he was first worshiped by a
group of shepherds who were the outcasts of that culture.
(10:13):
And to be born in a manger was to state
the very obvious fact that he had come for all people.
He didn't. He came. And if he came for the
shepherds and he was born in a manger, he came
for you. One of the big arguments that comes around
Christmas time is the argument of the virgin birth. Why
(10:36):
was Jesus born of a virgin? Why was it important
for him to be born of a virgin? Because he
was God. He had to come into this world and
not lose his holiness. So when he came through a virgin,
without the male involved in the birth process, he preserved
his holiness. He came and he could become at that
(10:58):
particular time, God and one percent man and Mary who
had never known a man. I remember, there's a funny
little story about that. I had some books some years
ago that I actually it was a little new Testament
I had written worked on to make available to people.
My grandchildren were pretty young at the time. I have twins,
(11:20):
and they came in and they said, hey, Poppy, can
we have one of these? And I said, yeah, but
you got to promise me you read it. And they
what you meet, I said, starts with Matthew. I want
you to I want you to read Matthew this week
and tell me you read it. So about halfway through
the week, I get a call from their mom and
they said, okay, okay, you answered this one. Bradley came
and said, hey, mom, if Mary and Joseph never even
(11:44):
knew each other, how could they have a baby. I said, well,
some mask their father. But I mean so so the
whole thing about the virgin birth is the key. It
preserves the deity of Jesus Christ. And I want to
tell you I know it's true. I remember reading this
story and how it helps me so much to know
(12:05):
it's true. When Mary was standing at the foot of
the cross and they were getting ready to crucify her son,
they were getting ready to crucify her son because he
claimed to be God and they said he was a blasphemer.
Mary could have spoken up and said, no, he's not God.
(12:28):
I remember the night he was conceived, he is not God.
But she never did that. She watched her son die
on the cross because she knew that what the Bible
says about him was true. And to me, you don't
need any other argument for the virgin birth of Christ
than that one. You know, I've gotten a little bit
(12:51):
involved in the Shepherd's story. Why the Shepherd's because if
you had. I mean, I just got up a phone
call with somebody a few minutes ago, and I'm asking
him to help us promote this film. And he asked
me this question. If I gave you the keys to
this network, where would you want to put this show?
And I know what he does that And I think
about that with the Shepherds. If I gave you the
(13:12):
key to who you want to have received the Gospel
at first, who would you want? It wouldn't be the shepherds,
you know when the shepherds, when the Israeli people were shepherds,
they weren't even allowed to live with other people. They
were the outcast. They had no credibility. They couldn't go
to the temple. They weren't allowed in the temple. Shepherds
(13:33):
were the lowest of the low. And yet it was
to the shepherds that Jesus first revealed himself, as if
once again to say, no matter who you are, no
matter what you've done, no matter how far you feel
you are away from God, think of the shepherds. They're
the picture of God's willingness. When we couldn't come up
(13:55):
to where he was, he came down to where we are.
And that's especially true with the shepherds. Well, why the angels.
You know, the angels are really involved in Jesus' life.
In fact, if you go through the life of Jesus,
you can almost say these are the important moments in
jesus life because angels were there. They were there at
his birth, they were as baptism, they were there at
(14:17):
as temptation in the wilderness. They're going to be totally
involved in his coming again in the Rapture and in
the Second coming. Angels were there as emissaries from heaven.
They were God's messengers. I think they were God's protectors too.
They God said I'm going to send Jesus to be
the savior of the world, and you angels, I'm sending
you down here to make sure it goes right and
(14:37):
take care of it.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Watch it.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
They were the messengers, you know, Gabriel and Michael, the
only two angels we know about by name in the Bible.
One was the protector, one was the communicator, and God
sent them both to be here when Jesus was born. Well,
you know, if you ask, if you ask scientists about
the Star of Bethlehem and why it was so important,
(15:00):
and they'll give you all kinds of scientific reasons why
this was a meteor that was out of control or something.
But this was God's star. The star was going in
the wrong direction scientifically. It was almost like God was
defying everything to make sure that his wise men that
(15:23):
were coming would not get lost. I don't have a
scientific explanation for the star, because there is no scientific explanation.
It was God's star. And if God made him in
the first place, he can move him around any way
he wants, and that night he moved a star to
make sure those three guys didn't miss what they set
(15:45):
out to do. Well, the wise men represent a whole
different why the wise men is a good question. They
represent a whole different aspect of the culture. Isn't it
interesting You got the shepherds over here representing the down
and out, and you got the wise men over here
representing the aristocracy. It's almost like God put this pin
(16:07):
down here, and put this pin down here, and he says,
I came for everybody in between. The wise men came.
Their gifts were special, they represented worship, and unfortunately they
get caught up in the major scenes all over the country,
and they didn't come when the major scenes were there.
They came way later. The Bible says Jesus was a
(16:28):
young lad when they came, but they gave gold frankensense,
and gold for his kingship, franken sense for his suffering,
and mr which was was a bitter tasting element that
represented his death and his sufferings. So the wise men,
(16:52):
they're always a beautiful part of the story, and they're
not very much written about him except they followed the Lord,
and the journey they took wasn't like two days. It
was a long journey to get to where Jesus was.
This story of the birth of Jesus, which we celebrate
with such exuberance in our culture today. Actually is communicated
in Luke and in Matthew, and then it's referenced in
(17:14):
Philippians and a few other places. But the actual story
of Christmas, the story of the Nativity, is found in
a couple chapters in Luke, in one chapter in Matthew.
It was prophesied in the Old Testament. As you know,
many many places in the Old Testament. Isaiah prophesied, Micah
prophesied it, Jeremiah prophesied. It was foretold and then it
(17:38):
was experienced.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
And we have.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
Somebody said, why don't you have more information? We don't
need any more information. This is what God said would happened.
This is what happened. Here's the record of it. I
can embellish it if you want to. And when you
take the story and you go back and get all
of the prophecies and put them together, then you have
more of a body of work on the Nativity. But
the story itself is simple. It's not hard to understand,
(18:05):
and it's miraculous. Have your fun, celebrate doo the things
you do, but don't forget. Christmas is about God becoming man.
God loving us so much that he left the courts
of heaven to live in the womb of a woman
so he could become one of us and go to
the cross and pay the penalty for our sin. The
(18:26):
redemption story doesn't start at the crucifixion. It starts at Bethlehem,
because part of the sacrifice of God was the sacrifice
of his son, his only begotten son, and part of
the sacrifice of Jesus was leaving his place in heaven
to come down here and welcome among us. There's no
way to describe.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
That, and a great job is always by our own
Greg Hengler on the editing and production, and a special
thanks to doctor David Jeremiah and a special thanks to
Turning Point Ministries for putting this film together again. It's
free for all to stream all through Christmas season and beyond.
(19:07):
Type in the words Why the Nativity on your browser
or go to Davidjeremiah dot org. Also, you can check
your cable listings. It will be appearing throughout the month
and again check tv Guide or wherever you get your
cable listings. Why the Nativity. By the way, pick up
the book. It's terrific if you're a Christian, even if
(19:28):
you're not sixty four percent of Americans call themselves Christians.
And it's an important story, it's an important date, and
we celebrate as we do. But again, we want to
learn why we celebrate and get the stories behind the stories.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Why the Nativity does that, the book.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
And the film and doctor Jeremiah also happens to be
my teacher.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
We don't have a relationship.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
He's on the television every day at six am Central
Time where I live, and he's been teaching me and
coaching me for fifteen years and doesn't know it. Well,
it didn't know it until I met him. This is
Lee Habib, Why the Nativity with Doctor David Jeremiah here
on our American Stories
And we continue with our American stories and with some
of our Christmas season programming, and our next story comes
to us from the founder of Turning Point Radio and
television ministries and the senior pastor of Shadow Mountain Community Church,
doctor David Jeremiah.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
And every morning at six am, he's my teacher.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
I'm a Christian, and well sixty four percent of Americans
are Christians.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
And this story is for you and for anybody.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Else interested in why we celebrate Christmas and Why the Nativity.
It was a terrific book written by David Jeremiah in
two thousand and six, and it has now been adapted
into a terrific film that's available for free to stream.
Just type in Why the Nativity on your browser or
go to Davidjeremiah dot org and watch it with your family.
(01:05):
And now here is doctor David Jeremiah to tell the
story of the Nativity and to answer the question and
many questions around the birth of Jesus.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
You know, we celebrate Christmas now, but most people don't
know what Christmas is about. So I decided to write
a book and answer a lot of questions that people had,
and we started out was going to be eleven questions,
then it was going to be fifteen, and then it
became twenty five. And these are key questions like why
Mary and why Joseph and where do they all fit
(01:39):
into the story. So one of the questions we talk
about in the beginning of the book is why did
God become a man? And the answer to that is
really so much a part of the heart of the story.
He did that because of his love he had to
reach man, and the only way he could reach man
was to become a man himself. So he said his
(02:00):
own son, Jesus Christ, to become a person. The Bible
says he tasted flesh. And at Christmas time we celebrate
that Jesus being born into humanity. And I always like
to say the people, because sometimes people don't really understand it.
He didn't become a man, then he didn't become a person.
Jesus has always been and he always will be. There
(02:21):
never was a time when he was not, and there
never will be a time when he ceases to be.
But in that moment, he came, and he came through
the birth canal of his mother Mary and became a
human being, so that in his humanity he could reach
down to man, and in his divinity he could reach
up to God. And one day, on a cross outside
(02:44):
of the city of Jerusalem, he hung there as the
God Man and as the man God and paid the
penalty for the sin of all of us. A truly
remarkable story that not duplicated anywhere else, and it is
so amazing. It had to be God, because nobody else
would ever have come up with that. Nazareth was an
(03:06):
interesting place. Actually, I've had the privilege to talk about
Nazareth before, and I've actually been a Nazareth on maybe
five times. And that's the place where Jesus grew up
as a carpenter. When we were building the set for
our movie that we did, we built the set so
if you walk into the set this way, especially him,
(03:28):
and if you walk into it the other way, it's
a Nazareth.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
And it was.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
It was the place where Jesus grew up. He was
a carpenter's son there, he learned to work there, he
learned to be a godly son. And it's you know,
the attitude was, can anything good come out on Nazareth? Well,
something did come out on Asareth pretty good, and that
was the Lord God. Why Mary is a really good
question to ask. Why would she be chosen? I'm sure
(03:55):
she asked that question. You know, I think about Mark
Lowry's song Mary, did you know? Oh, did you know
this was going to happen? Obviously she didn't. And sometimes,
you know, we think she's thirty or thirty five years
She was fifteen, maybe sixteen, a very young child, and
when the angels came and told her that she was
to be the mother of Jesus, she was stunned. You know,
(04:18):
in the Old Testament they looked for the Messiah, and
many young women thought maybe they would be the mother
of the Messiah because they were looking for the Messiah. Well,
Mary wasn't looking for it, and it happened to her
and the angel said she would be the mother of Jesus.
I always have been struck by the fact that something
as dramatic as that happened to her. And her response was,
(04:40):
be it unto me, according to your word? And I thought,
I wish I had that kind of that kind of
submission to the Lord. Her submission to the Lord is amazing,
and she she was God's choice and she was the
perfect choice. Well, you know, Joseph was I have a
(05:02):
whole message about why Joseph, and the message is the
Forgotten Man of Christmas. That's the name of the message,
because he comes on the scene for a period of
time and then he disappears and you never hear another
word about him. But he was the man that God
chose to be the earthly father of Jesus. As he
(05:23):
was growing up, he was. The Bible describes him as
a good man and a godly man, certainly as surprised
as Mary was when he got the message from But
I think the thing that to me is most critical
about him was his faith endured a great challenge, and
that was the challenge of Mary's pregnancy. And in our
(05:44):
film we showed the disappointment that he had when he
found out that she was with child. She came back
from Elizabeth's house and she was pregnant, and he couldn't
figure that out. He did, Nobody had told him that.
I think in the film we have him going away
for a little bit, but he comes back and he
settles into being the person God asked him to be,
(06:05):
and that was the human human father, the surrogate father,
if you will, of Jesus Christ. Well, you know, there's
why did Jesus come When he came? You know, the
Bible says he came in the fullness of time. I
don't know if you've ever seen that verse. And the
fullness of time he came. What does that mean? Well,
I think it means exactly the right time. First of all,
(06:27):
it's interesting if you study history. The Romans had just
paved the way with their roads to all of the
various regions of that particular part of the world. Greek
had become more and more common as a language, so
now you have transportation and communication coming together, and the
(06:48):
message of the Gospel could travel quickly to all points
of the world, just at the right time. And it
was also I think about that as we have gone
through what we've gone through here in our own country
and all the stuff that goes on, and how awful
things have been in some cases with crime and all
of that. That was sort of like what it was
when Jesus came. It wasn't a good time. It was
(07:10):
a time they needed a redeemer, they needed to Christ,
They needed Jesus at that time. But it was perfect
because he came into the world at the right time. Well,
Bethlehem is a really interesting story why Bethlehem. The word
Bethlehem means house of bread, and it was the place
(07:31):
where the bread of life was born. It's a very
special place because there are some other famous Rachels buried there,
and it's about a few miles from Jerusalem. I've been
in Bethlehem. But this was the prophecy out of you
shall come he who is to come forth Bethlehem of Ephrita.
(07:51):
It was the prophecy that made Bethlehem so special. Interestingly enough,
when the prophet was making that prophecy was not really
in existence, but it became the answer to the prophecy.
And there to Bethlehem's there's Bethlehem and Bethlehem at Befeta,
he came to the right one. He showed up at
the right place. You have to put we have to
(08:14):
when you ask ourselves why there was no room in
the inn, I think we have to kind of put
ourselves in that situation. We read the Christmas story through
our Christian eyes, and we don't read it through the
eyes of the culture into which he was born. People
in Bethlehem, apart from some divine revelation, would have had
no idea what was going on. Who is this mother,
(08:34):
who is this person? The bottom line, it was census.
It was census time in Bethlehem. There was no room
anywhere for anybody. I don't think they were singling out
in Jesus. They just had no room. And when he
came to the door and they didn't have any room
and ultimately gave him a place where he could be born.
That was a gracious thing for him to do because
there wasn't room any place else. And it wasn't hey,
(08:57):
we're not going to let Jesus in here. They didn't
know who he was, have a clue who he was.
But it became a wonderful story because just as they
had no room for Jesus, in the end, so many
people that they don't have any room for Jesus at all,
whether it's Christmas or East or anytime. And I can
speak about that because I'm a pastor and I know
(09:17):
what that's like.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
And when we come back more from doctor David Jeremiah,
the film the book Why the Nativity, here on our
American stories, and we returned to our American stories and
(09:41):
to doctor David Jeremiah and his conversation about his film
and book Why the Nativity, let's pick up where we
last left off.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Why was Jesus born in a stable? The stable, to
me is a picture that Jesus wanted people to know
that he came for all men, not just for the hierarchy,
not for the aristocrats. He came. In fact, this is
an amazing thing that he was first worshiped by a
group of shepherds who were the outcasts of that culture.
(10:13):
And to be born in a manger was to state
the very obvious fact that he had come for all people.
He didn't. He came. And if he came for the
shepherds and he was born in a manger, he came
for you. One of the big arguments that comes around
Christmas time is the argument of the virgin birth. Why
(10:36):
was Jesus born of a virgin? Why was it important
for him to be born of a virgin? Because he
was God. He had to come into this world and
not lose his holiness. So when he came through a virgin,
without the male involved in the birth process, he preserved
his holiness. He came and he could become at that
(10:58):
particular time, God and one percent man and Mary who
had never known a man. I remember, there's a funny
little story about that. I had some books some years
ago that I actually it was a little new Testament
I had written worked on to make available to people.
My grandchildren were pretty young at the time. I have twins,
(11:20):
and they came in and they said, hey, Poppy, can
we have one of these? And I said, yeah, but
you got to promise me you read it. And they
what you meet, I said, starts with Matthew. I want
you to I want you to read Matthew this week
and tell me you read it. So about halfway through
the week, I get a call from their mom and
they said, okay, okay, you answered this one. Bradley came
and said, hey, mom, if Mary and Joseph never even
(11:44):
knew each other, how could they have a baby. I said, well,
some mask their father. But I mean so so the
whole thing about the virgin birth is the key. It
preserves the deity of Jesus Christ. And I want to
tell you I know it's true. I remember reading this
story and how it helps me so much to know
(12:05):
it's true. When Mary was standing at the foot of
the cross and they were getting ready to crucify her son,
they were getting ready to crucify her son because he
claimed to be God and they said he was a blasphemer.
Mary could have spoken up and said, no, he's not God.
(12:28):
I remember the night he was conceived, he is not God.
But she never did that. She watched her son die
on the cross because she knew that what the Bible
says about him was true. And to me, you don't
need any other argument for the virgin birth of Christ
than that one. You know, I've gotten a little bit
(12:51):
involved in the Shepherd's story. Why the Shepherd's because if
you had. I mean, I just got up a phone
call with somebody a few minutes ago, and I'm asking
him to help us promote this film. And he asked
me this question. If I gave you the keys to
this network, where would you want to put this show?
And I know what he does that And I think
about that with the Shepherds. If I gave you the
(13:12):
key to who you want to have received the Gospel
at first, who would you want? It wouldn't be the shepherds,
you know when the shepherds, when the Israeli people were shepherds,
they weren't even allowed to live with other people. They
were the outcast. They had no credibility. They couldn't go
to the temple. They weren't allowed in the temple. Shepherds
(13:33):
were the lowest of the low. And yet it was
to the shepherds that Jesus first revealed himself, as if
once again to say, no matter who you are, no
matter what you've done, no matter how far you feel
you are away from God, think of the shepherds. They're
the picture of God's willingness. When we couldn't come up
(13:55):
to where he was, he came down to where we are.
And that's especially true with the shepherds. Well, why the angels.
You know, the angels are really involved in Jesus' life.
In fact, if you go through the life of Jesus,
you can almost say these are the important moments in
jesus life because angels were there. They were there at
his birth, they were as baptism, they were there at
(14:17):
as temptation in the wilderness. They're going to be totally
involved in his coming again in the Rapture and in
the Second coming. Angels were there as emissaries from heaven.
They were God's messengers. I think they were God's protectors too.
They God said I'm going to send Jesus to be
the savior of the world, and you angels, I'm sending
you down here to make sure it goes right and
(14:37):
take care of it.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Watch it.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
They were the messengers, you know, Gabriel and Michael, the
only two angels we know about by name in the Bible.
One was the protector, one was the communicator, and God
sent them both to be here when Jesus was born. Well,
you know, if you ask, if you ask scientists about
the Star of Bethlehem and why it was so important,
(15:00):
and they'll give you all kinds of scientific reasons why
this was a meteor that was out of control or something.
But this was God's star. The star was going in
the wrong direction scientifically. It was almost like God was
defying everything to make sure that his wise men that
(15:23):
were coming would not get lost. I don't have a
scientific explanation for the star, because there is no scientific explanation.
It was God's star. And if God made him in
the first place, he can move him around any way
he wants, and that night he moved a star to
make sure those three guys didn't miss what they set
(15:45):
out to do. Well, the wise men represent a whole
different why the wise men is a good question. They
represent a whole different aspect of the culture. Isn't it
interesting You got the shepherds over here representing the down
and out, and you got the wise men over here
representing the aristocracy. It's almost like God put this pin
(16:07):
down here, and put this pin down here, and he says,
I came for everybody in between. The wise men came.
Their gifts were special, they represented worship, and unfortunately they
get caught up in the major scenes all over the country,
and they didn't come when the major scenes were there.
They came way later. The Bible says Jesus was a
(16:28):
young lad when they came, but they gave gold frankensense,
and gold for his kingship, franken sense for his suffering,
and mr which was was a bitter tasting element that
represented his death and his sufferings. So the wise men,
(16:52):
they're always a beautiful part of the story, and they're
not very much written about him except they followed the Lord,
and the journey they took wasn't like two days. It
was a long journey to get to where Jesus was.
This story of the birth of Jesus, which we celebrate
with such exuberance in our culture today. Actually is communicated
in Luke and in Matthew, and then it's referenced in
(17:14):
Philippians and a few other places. But the actual story
of Christmas, the story of the Nativity, is found in
a couple chapters in Luke, in one chapter in Matthew.
It was prophesied in the Old Testament. As you know,
many many places in the Old Testament. Isaiah prophesied, Micah
prophesied it, Jeremiah prophesied. It was foretold and then it
(17:38):
was experienced.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
And we have.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
Somebody said, why don't you have more information? We don't
need any more information. This is what God said would happened.
This is what happened. Here's the record of it. I
can embellish it if you want to. And when you
take the story and you go back and get all
of the prophecies and put them together, then you have
more of a body of work on the Nativity. But
the story itself is simple. It's not hard to understand,
(18:05):
and it's miraculous. Have your fun, celebrate doo the things
you do, but don't forget. Christmas is about God becoming man.
God loving us so much that he left the courts
of heaven to live in the womb of a woman
so he could become one of us and go to
the cross and pay the penalty for our sin. The
(18:26):
redemption story doesn't start at the crucifixion. It starts at Bethlehem,
because part of the sacrifice of God was the sacrifice
of his son, his only begotten son, and part of
the sacrifice of Jesus was leaving his place in heaven
to come down here and welcome among us. There's no
way to describe.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
That, and a great job is always by our own
Greg Hengler on the editing and production, and a special
thanks to doctor David Jeremiah and a special thanks to
Turning Point Ministries for putting this film together again. It's
free for all to stream all through Christmas season and beyond.
(19:07):
Type in the words Why the Nativity on your browser
or go to Davidjeremiah dot org. Also, you can check
your cable listings. It will be appearing throughout the month
and again check tv Guide or wherever you get your
cable listings. Why the Nativity. By the way, pick up
the book. It's terrific if you're a Christian, even if
(19:28):
you're not sixty four percent of Americans call themselves Christians.
And it's an important story, it's an important date, and
we celebrate as we do. But again, we want to
learn why we celebrate and get the stories behind the stories.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Why the Nativity does that, the book.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
And the film and doctor Jeremiah also happens to be
my teacher.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
We don't have a relationship.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
He's on the television every day at six am Central
Time where I live, and he's been teaching me and
coaching me for fifteen years and doesn't know it. Well,
it didn't know it until I met him. This is
Lee Habib, Why the Nativity with Doctor David Jeremiah here
on our American Stories
Host
Lee Habeeb
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