Knowing the Truth about Christmas

Most people don’t know that the world was once perfect and all was at peace. There were no broken lives. The earth and the sky and the animals were unblemished. Everything was right. God created perfection, but he did not program us as robots. He gave us the ability to choose right or wrong.

illustration by Viktor Miller-Gausa

Dale Mason
Publisher

Most people don’t know that the gospel begins in Genesis. You see, the first man and woman decided to disobey God’s command not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden of Eden. When Adam and Eve ate from that tree, sin entered the world, and everything changed. Disobedience brought death, as God had warned. At that terrible moment, the need for a punishment-bearing Savior began. Over the next several centuries, humanity became more and more wicked.

Most people don’t know that God sent a global flood to judge man’s wickedness. He provided an ark to save righteous Noah, his family, and the animals that God sent. Everyone else and every land-dwelling, air-breathing animal not on the ark died. After the huge vessel came to rest, God told Noah’s family and all the animals to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. Man continued to sin.

But some two thousand years ago, God showed how much he loved the world by sending his only begotten son, Jesus Christ, to die so that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16).

Most people just don’t know. The Bible tells us that we love darkness and hate light—specifically the Light that came into the world as a baby in Bethlehem.

This season, amid all the darkness that saturates our culture, you and the people in your life can know the truth found in God’s Word. While Answers and Kids Answers are always packed with articles that affirm the truth of the Bible, this time they also contain some special tools to help you tell the people you know about Christmas and the ultimate healer of our brokenness, the one who gives salvation and saves us from our sins.

I urge you to dedicate one or two daily devotional times per week—individually or with others—between now and Christmas to read the weekly passages about “Christmas Characters” on pages 38 and 39. It will set a peaceful and faith-affirming tone. And whether you have children in the home or not, read “Journey Back to Bethlehem” in the enclosed Kids Answers.

I know it’s only October, but it’s always a good time to be reminded that Jesus came to restore his broken creation, beginning with people like you and me!