Peter Witkowski Christmas

The Virgin Birth Still Matters

virgin-birthDespite the worry of many Christians, Christ is still very much a part of Christmas. Secular music specials feature songs for from our church hymnals, stores decorate with nativity scenes, and Christmas cards continue to feature the Wise men on their way to view baby Jesus. In short, the battle between the culture and our churches is not really over whether or not we keep the first syllable in the word Christmas. The real fight is over the virgin birth. It is over Jesus’ identity.

Our culture has no problem praising the arrival of Jesus, the great teacher.  After all, Jesus cared about the poor, offered the world of ton of pithy statements, and tried to bring peace to earth. As the atheist R. Elisabeth Cornwell remarked, “Christmas belongs to anyone who wants it, and just because I gave up believing in a god doesn’t mean I gave up believing in the love and joy of family.” In short, the world has no problem with celebrating the principles that Jesus triumphed while on earth.

The real Christmas battle is actually being fought over the virgin birth. As the great revolutionary writer Thomas Paine once wrote, “It is…at least millions to one, that the reporter of a miracle tells a lie.” Miracles are inconceivable to the modern scientific mind because they bespeak of a reckless embrace of the absurd. But what makes the virgin birth so unfathomable to the modern mind goes beyond the scientific method. The theological and the philosophical implications are truly the most troubling part of the Christmas story for our culture.

If Jesus was really born of a virgin, then his claims of divinity carry great weight. His offer of salvation transforms from a pithy idea into an ever present reality. If we belief, Jesus can down from heaven being both fully God and fully, then we truly must worship him. We must obey him. We must realize that we are powerless to redefine sexuality, morality, or to pay for our wrongs. We must surrender our lives to him. And then, we must do all that we can to follow him. As the pastor Tim Keller wrote,

If there is a God, and he has become human, why would you find it incredible that he would do miracles, pay for the sins of the world, or rise from the dead?

If we admit that something miraculous happened in that Bethlehem stable so long ago, then we have to admit that something even better happened on Calvary. We have to admit the Jesus, the “way the truth and the life.”

But what if the Paine and today’s atheists are right? What if Jesus is simply just another human? Is Christmas still worth celebrating?”

I think the answer is most decidedly no. As Paul said in I Corinthians 15:19, “If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.” If Christ is not God, Christmas is not a triumph over sin and death. Rather, the holiday is a testimony to the futility of humanity. Think about it. Thousands of babies are killed because of this Jesus’s birth. He most loyal predecessors and cousin ends up dead at because of an evil king. Eventually, Jesus too is executed unjustly. And then all but one of his disciples is murdered or executed. When Jesus attempted to bring at the best in people, he was slain by the worst in people. Christmas without a divine Jesus is nothing more than a tale of human hope dashed upon the rocks of human failure. Why celebrate Jesus if he is just human?

Thankfully, Jesus life and death were not useless. He was not just a man. He was both fully man and fully God. By his death and resurrection, Jesus secured eternal for the innocent babies that died Bethlehem, for John the Baptist, for his disciples, and for the millions of his followers. Jesus conquered death. As Hebrews 2:14b-15 says,

he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

As we talk about Christmas in the days ahead, let’s not just stop with putting Christ in Christmas. Let’s mention who Jesus really is. Let’s share about how the whole meaning of Christmas rides upon the virgin birth. From Bethlehem, the whole story of salvation unfolds.  Are we ready to share it?

Peter Witkowski Discipleship

Christmas Reveals the Worst in People

dark-side-of-humanity.gifThe Christmas holidays is perhaps one of the greatest sources of hope for humanity. We gather together to eat big family meals, we exchange presents with long lost relatives, and we take an interest in the poor and broken. The very lights on the street seem to boldly proclaim that hope for humanity does exists. As Lady Gaga recently said, “Kindness is the cure to violence and hatred around world.” Is there a kinder time than Christmas for the western world? Let the hope bubble up anew.

And though the world is understandably hopeful at Christmas, we must recall that this is not the point of Christmas. The point of Christmas is not that a lifetime of kindness can change the world. The point of Christmas is that humanity is beyond fixing. The point of Christmas is that humanity forces the kindest person in the world, Jesus, into stable and then seeks to violently kill the baby that offers to heal the sick and to restore the broken-hearted. The greatest gift of kindness is met with some of the greatest expressions of human violence and hatred that the world has ever known. The message of Christmas is that men and women are hopeless race devoted to violence and hatred. Even the best of us violently reject God’s loving design for our lives. In short, the message of Christmas is one of human despair. As the philosopher Bertrand Russell once said of the human condition:

The life of Man is a long march through the night, surrounded by invisible foes, tortured by weariness and pain, towards a goal that few can hope to reach, and where none may tarry long.

But that is not the end of the story. Christmas is also comes with a message of divine hope. Men and women are not left condemned to wonder through clouds of doom on their way to death.

In Isaiah 9:2, the prophet says,

The people who walked in darkness Have seen a great light; Those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, Upon them a light has shined.

The story of Christmas is the story of how a great light broke into our dark world. It is the story of how the Son of God came to earth as a baby to fix our relationships and to usher in peace between us and God. It is the story of how our God suffered poverty, loneliness, hate, and even death to overcome the violence and hatred that ultimately lead to his death on the cross. Christmas is not about our acts of kindness; it is about how Jesus’ one act of kindness ( his death, burial, and resurrection) liberated all of God’s children from this world of doom. Christmas is hopeful precisely because it is all about Christ.

And Christ is not the ultimate motivator of human self-advancement; he is the savior. He is as Isaiah wrote the, “Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” He is the God of the universe who sacrificed all to save us from our despair. This Christmas and every Christmas, we should seek to make much of him as we talk to our kids, as we open presents, and as we interact with our families.Christmas is a time of hope!

How do you point people to Christ at Christmas?

Peter Witkowski Children's Ministry

Why Do Families Skip Church?

church-empty

Why do families skip church on Sunday? Why is our Sunday school attendance going down? Why do kids stop coming to our Wednesday night programs? There are all kinds of answers to these questions. We can blame our kids’ sports league, Netflix, social media, the low price of gas, and a the weather.

But what about us? What about our churches, our programs, and our kids’ activities? Is it possible that the problem is not out there but in here?  Is it possible that people no longer view church as a priority because we, the church, are longer offering anything compelling? It’s possible.

People Centered?

Now before I go further, I want to hedge off one concern.  I am not advocating for Christian consumerism. I am not advocating for hanging lights, creating crazy worship sets, and installing bouncy houses so that our churches will begin to resemble Disney World. We do not need to appeal to sinners via their sinful flesh. As James McDonald said in his book, Vertical Church:

If you build your church on celebrity guests and circus chicanery of all sorts, you will attract the kind of people who want shallow service and grow them into snotty-nosed, high-demand, never-satisfied “disciples.”

What About The Glory?

We need to offer something much, much greater. We need to point people to God. Specifically, we need to call people to worship the one true God. What is true worship?   “Worship is the magnification of God and the minimization of self.” Christ came so that he might be glorified through us. As John 1:14 reports:

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

The church exists to glorify the savior of the world. We exist to help people (even kids) to escape their selfish hearts by making much of God. As Paul David Tripp writes,

Children’s Ministry must have as its goal to ignite in young children a life-shaping awe of God.

And when adults, youth, and kids interact with the glory of God, hearts change, lives become altered, and the kingdom grows. Our goal as leaders, teachers, and ambassadors in the church should be to introduce our families to the majesty and the glory of God. We exist to promote the awe of God through worship.

What About Us?

Is this happening in our church? Do people regularly walk into our buildings and experience the glory and the majesty of God? Or is the height of their church experience a few cool crafts, a warm handshake, and a casual conversation about the latest football game?  If our church is nothing more than a religious, social event, our people can easily skip it. But if our church is a venue through which people corporately experience the wonder of the one true God, our people will come. God’s glory and majesty is infinitely more compelling than any program we can think of. Every ministry in our church should be exist to connect people to God through worship. Are we doing this? Are we connecting people to God?