December 16, 2020 Show with Dr. Phillip Kayser on “December 25th Jewish-Style”

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Live from the historic parsonage of the 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

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Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs chapter 27 verse 17 tells us iron sharpens iron so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours and we hope to hear from you the listener with your own questions and now here's your host

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Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon

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Cumberland County Pennsylvania Lake City Florida and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com

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this is Chris Arnzen your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio wishing you all a happy Wednesday on the 16th day of December 2020 and at the enthusiastic urging and recommendation of my dear friend

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Dr. Joseph C. Moorcraft III pastor of Heritage Presbyterian Church in Cumming Georgia I have invited a first -time guest on today who is a dear friend of Joe's and that is

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Dr. Philip Kaiser he is an author a board member at the Pickering Foundation of Biblical Preservation professor of ethics at Whitfield Theological Seminary and senior pastor of Dominion Covenant Church in Omaha Nebraska today we are going to be addressing one of Dr.

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Kaiser's books that is just in time for the holidays December 25th

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Jewish style the ancient Jewish celebration anticipating the birth of Christ and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Dr.

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Philip Kaiser thank you very much Chris privilege and before we go into a bit of summary of your own personal salvation testimony which is something that we always do as a tradition here when we have a first -time guest tell our listeners something about the

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Pickering Foundation of Biblical Preservation well Dr.

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Pickering has been involved for years in collating manuscripts and talking about how

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God has preserved every jot and tittle of the scriptures there's been a lot of angst in people's minds about the variations that you will find in various versions of the

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Bible and he's one of several scholars that has been working and demonstrating that God has indeed using manuscripts all over the ancient world preserved every bit of his word my my own approach to the whole subject has been presuppositional

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I've looked at what the scripture says about how God would preserve his word and there's about a dozen principles that if you buy into what those scriptures say you would recognize what the text is even an unbeliever would have to say yeah okay if that's true then these manuscripts definitely represent the

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Word of God well if anybody wants to find more information about that you can go to Pickering Foundation org

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P -I -C -K -E -R -I -N -G Foundation org and now let us hear something about Whitfield Theological Seminary where you serve as professor of ethics yes this has been an attempt to merge the church and seminary together instead of sending people off to a seminary where you are a stranger and you don't have the support system and for that matter the church loses some of their talent and many times never gets that talent back this is bringing seminary distance education into the church and together with the local pastors who train the interns in all of the practical areas of life they are providing the theological and history background that typically you'll get in a seminary so it's just a wonderful blessing to local churches well that website is seminary .reformed

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.info seminary .reformed .info and I have several close friends who have actually gotten their degrees from Whitfield Theological Seminary and now last but not least tell us about Dominion Covenant Church in Omaha Nebraska well this was the latest church that we had planted and from the ground up we have sought to not do anything that we could not explicitly justify from the scripture and so it's been an experiment from the ground up on a biblically based church and not just its worship but its administration every aspect of and we've been around since let's see in 1999 that we started this particular church plant.

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Praise God well if anybody wants more information about Dominion Covenant Church of Omaha Nebraska you can go to dominioncovenantchurch .com

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dominioncovenantchurch .com and as I mentioned earlier what we do here on I Interprets on Radio when we have a first -time guest such as yourself we like to have them provide a summary of their salvation testimony what kind of religious atmosphere if any they were raised in and what kind of providential circumstances our

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Sovereign Lord raised up in their lives that drew them to himself and saved them and that would include you and so we would love to hear your story.

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Well thank you brother I grew up in a Christian home and actually we've had a

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Christian heritage on my mother's side going all the way back to 1066 AD in England over into the

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Americas to escape persecution some of the Puritans there and there has been as we've traced it our family history back non -stop

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Christianity now I grew up having a professed faith at a very early age but I really don't believe that I was regenerate until grade 12 where God did a remarkable work in my life completely turning my life upside down and giving me a hatred for sin for the first time a desire to be saved from my sins not just saved from hell which is exactly what

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Matthew 121 said at the advent you shall call his name

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Jesus for he shall save his people from their sins and so that was a time where God used the scripture in Hebrews chapter 12 to imprint upon me where it says that everyone who

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God loves he chastises and if you are without chastisement then are you bastards and not sons is the way the

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King James worded it and I looked at my life and realized constant deliberate sin yet no chastisement that I was not a son and for the first time in my life

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I came before the Lord telling him he I deserve to be sent to hell and if he chose to do so he was perfectly just but I just pleaded the merits of Christ asked him to save me from my sins and from that day on I began seeing the hand of the

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Lord bringing discipline into my life the first one was a remarkable one where the

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Lord prompted me to witness to somebody who was a blasphemer and I was so shy in those days

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I said no I can't do that and I instantly felt paralysis on half of my body and so the

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Lord just chose he doesn't often do that but he chose in his loving kindness to show me a remarkable discipline and so I immediately cried out uncle which is probably not an appropriate thing to say to the

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Lord but I said I submit I submit immediately it went away and I gave the most bumbling horribleness imaginable to this person but I felt so joyful and liberated that my father loved me enough to discipline me and so that was my testimony of the change in my life where God took me from a formal

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Christianity into being a regenerate Christian who was committed to following the

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Lord praise God and how did you come to discover and embrace reform theology well

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I was going to a Bible school up in Canada and I read the wrong book that had not been checked out in 50 years by a reformed

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Baptist Conrad Merle was his name oh yeah you recognize that yes yes my friend

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Mac Tomlinson introduced me to come okay oh wow that turned my his book salvation when turned my life upside down I kind of argued with it for about two hours but I saw

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I was just plain scripture that he was presenting when I realized I was wrong in the sovereignty of God in salvation

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I began systematically going through every loci of doctrine and examining the scriptures and it brought me into the reformed faith well praise

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God for that since I happen to be reformed myself and a reformed Baptist I always love hearing that story and and just to let you know but since you brought it up if anybody is interested in getting the biography of Conrad Merle that my friend

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Mac Tomlinson wrote you can go to comrade Merle calm

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Conrad Merle calm and that's spelt c o n r a d m u r r e l l .com

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and you'll find more about this very large hardcover biography written by my dear friend pastor

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Mac Tomlinson of Providence Chapel in Denton Texas. I'll have to pick that up I did not even realize there was a biography of him.

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Yeah well you do now and make sure you tell them that you heard about it from Chris Orensen on Ion Sharpen's Ion Radio.

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Will do. And so now this is a fascinating discussion that we are about to have on your book

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December 25th Jewish style the ancient Jewish celebration anticipating the birth of Christ.

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One of the reasons why it's fascinating to me is that all my life as an evangelical

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I was raised Roman Catholic and I was mercifully and graciously saved out of that false religious system by our sovereign

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Lord and brought into thankfully immediately a

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Reformed Baptist congregation where I remained a member all the way until 2014 before relocating from New York to Pennsylvania and where I joined a sister church of that church on Long Island Grace Baptist Church of Carlisle Pennsylvania.

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But all my life as an evangelical I had never heard anyone put any significance to the date of December 25th.

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I had heard that it was just merely at one time a pagan holiday of winter solstice and Christians adopted it.

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I've heard that this was purely a holiday of the

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Church of Rome and of course as you probably well know there is a division amongst those in the body of Christ and perhaps even particularly in Reformed circles there's a division on whether we should recognize the celebration of Christmas because some would say it is purely of pagan or Roman Catholic origin not of course the incarnation of our

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Lord and Savior Jesus Christ but the actual holiday attached to it and the date attached to it. So this is a this is new information for me and I would love to hear first of all what compelled you to even begin studying the subject and writing a book on it?

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Well I started off actually having read Hislop's book on Roman Catholicism and comparing it to Babylon being very opposed to any

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Christmas celebration and of course long before Hislop Paul Ernst Jablonsky back in the early 1700s proposed the idea that Christians were imitating paganism and celebrating

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Christ's birth on December 25th and so well I don't want to have anything to do with paganism and so there was a number of years where I did not celebrate

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Christmas at all but then I have been at the urging of Calvin and Luther and a number of the

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French Huguenots who said no the Church of the first thousand years was

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Protestant through and through so I began reading a lot of these church fathers and discovering it was

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Rome that abandoned the Catholic faith they are not Catholic and it's really the

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Protestants who have upheld the core doctrines and teachings of the church way back then so anyway

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I've been reading these church fathers I began discovering Hislop was absolutely wrong and that long before there was any pagan celebration of December 25 150 years before that we have indisputable evidence that they were celebrating the birth of Christ on December 25 and so that got me to start researching just because church fathers as early as 100

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AD in fact before 100 AD just because they were doing it does not necessarily mean it's right we go to the

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Bible and the Bible alone to govern our lives but that was what got me at least curious why was it that people like Ignatius of Antioch who lived between 80 35 and 98 was celebrating some of these

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Jewish festivals in a Christianized way because I had been taught you just do not celebrate

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I still treat only the Lord's Day as being a holy day but as the

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Westminster Confession and the Baptist Confessions as well like the London Confession state there is a basis for having

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Thanksgiving days for God's providences of the past and then I began reading

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Calvin whom I was told never celebrated Christmas and was very opposed to it realized actually that was an area that he gave liberty on as did

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Turreton and other Reformers and so it's been a long pilgrimage and I decided

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I just have to study this out thoroughly and that brought me to the position that it was actually the

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Jewish celebration of Hanukkah that was the basis for that and I believe that that which was on Kislev 25 the equivalent of December 25 actually lands exactly on December 25 and 5

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BC that that was the basis for the celebration of Christmas in the early church and so there's a lot of the book that goes through the history of it and shows how you can hold as I do to the regulative principle of worship and still hold that Christmas can be a yes and since we do have on occasion not only non -reformed listeners but even non -christian listeners in our audience if you could give us a definition of the regulative principle of worship and compare it with the other views that there that have existed such as the normative principle and so on well the

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Roman Catholics introduced a lot of traditions into the church that at the time may have seemed fun and maybe even thought of as being reverent but they could not find them in the

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Bible and over time these began to be things that bound the consciences of people were imposed with the same authority that the scriptures were they call it tradition whereas any reference to tradition in the

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Bible is scripture teaching in fact the early church fathers and you can find later church fathers said don't believe anything that I teach unless I can back it up from the scripture they interpreted tradition as being much like the

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London Confession of Faith or the Westminster is our tradition a summary of the scriptures teaching and so the regulative principle of worship says we may not introduce anything into worship that we cannot justify from the

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Bible and the Bible alone just a simple way of looking at it is we ought to worship

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God the way God wants to be worshipped rather than the way we want to be worshipped it's a God -centered approach to worship rather than a man -centered approach to worship yes and from I understand the regulative principle of worship would take silence in the scripture to be prohibitive to participate something in participate in something in a worship service whereas the normative takes a silence as a liberty if there's no clear condemnation of it the normative principle would say it is it is appropriate for you to be more creative as it were and of course even those that claim to believe in the normative principle wouldn't believe that everything that people do these days in worship services is appropriate which is one of the reasons

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I think that there comes a point when even those that reject the regulative principle say okay hold on a minute now right right yeah there's been many things that have been introduced into worship services that that you could not justify from the scripture here is so the way that the

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Puritans really worded it they said it's not just worship it's anything that the church does so the broader doctrine was the regulative principle of government that the family and the individual retains to all liberties all powers all ministries that are not explicitly given to either state or church well that makes automatically for a very small church government and very small state government power tends to grow if it is not chained in and it always grows at the liberty at the expense of other people's liberties and this is what we're seeing happening in both church and state is that things that used to be in the province of the family have been taken by either the civil government or by the churches the regulative principle of government completely blows that away and says that the civil government may not do anything that is not explicitly laid out in the

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Bible same with the church government well how do you square then going back to the regulative principle the celebration of Christmas in a church service for instance when we don't have an example of that clearly in the

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New Testament yes and I would say we actually do have an example in the

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New Testament of Christ celebrating the festival of dedication which was a

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Thanksgiving day that was given it started with Moses it continued with Solomon and Hezekiah and then with the

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Maccabees who were after the time of the end they were actually very godly people who were opposing the tyranny of the

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Syrian government so why would Jesus be celebrating the feast of dedication if it was an area that was just a man -made or man -imposed celebration in fact the

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Gospel of John is structured around the synagogue liturgical readings they had different readings of Scripture on different days and the period right around the festival of Hanukkah or dedication has those scriptures related to it as well in in the

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Gospel of John so what we would say is this is not something that we impose upon the church or that we impose upon people there could be people who choose not to celebrate

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Christmas that's a -okay but it is a Thanksgiving day and both the

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Westminster Confession London Confession and other Reformed Confessions talk about the appropriateness of having days of fasting when we call out upon the

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Lord and mercy for mercy upon our nation or days of Thanksgiving and I would treat this as a day of Thanksgiving I'm going to give our listeners our email address if you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own for Dr.

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Philip Kaiser on the subject that we are discussing today December 25th

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Jewish style our email address is chrisanzen at gmail .com chris a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com

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please as always give us your first name at least your city and state of residence and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter let's say you disagree with your own pastor or your elders over something that you believe and you are going to be including in your question today and you'd rather not draw attention to attention to your identity

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I understand that perhaps you're even a pastor and you disagree with your own fellow elders or your denomination over something those would be good reasons why you would want to remain anonymous perhaps there's even some kind of a family feud going on over something you're asking well we would grant you your request to remain anonymous in these personal matters but if it's just a general question on history and theology on scripture etc please give us at least your first name your city and state and your country of residence don't go away we're going to be right back with Philip Kaiser and more of our discussion on December 25th

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Call 1 -800 -669 -4870. Welcome back this is

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Chris Arms and if you just tuned us in our guest today for the full program is Dr. Philip Kaiser and we are discussing his book

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December 25th Jewish Style The Ancient Jewish Celebration Anticipating the

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Birth of Christ. Our email address is chrisarmsen at gmail .com chrisarmsen at gmail .com.

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As always give us your first name at least your city and state of residence and your country of residence if you live outside of the

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USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter. And we do have a listener in Asheboro, North Carolina happens to be a very loyal and faithful listener of this program who is also a very generous contributor to this program.

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His name is Grady from Asheboro and Grady says greeting brothers I have heard

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Christmas started as a pagan holiday do you know how the name came about old pagans started started it to counterfeit

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Christmas as Satan does sometimes or is this just a rumor

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I'm trying to figure out did pagans started to counterfeit

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Christmas I'm not really sure what he means by that but if you could.

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Sure I'd be happy to do that there are people whom

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I very much respect who believe that it was actually the pagans who celebrated the festival of the sun on December 25 but that actually did not start happening until about 150 years after the earliest references

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I have that the church was already celebrating the birth of Christ on December 25 secondly it was a different date that they celebrated it on at that point and early on it was in August later the earliest date that they've even come up with pagans celebrated in December was

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December 19 but again much much later than what the

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Christians themselves did now the word Christmas itself people say is that harking back to the

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Roman Catholic idea of mass and that's the view of Michael Schneider and a number of other people on that but that word for mass is just an old

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English word that means festival or worship or observance and so it's not using the modern ideas of a mass where the blasphemy of Roman Catholic substantiation is being offered up so I don't actually have a problem with the word

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Christmas but you can call it Hanukkah like many times we did or festival of dedication we don't see this as a church celebration we see it as a family celebration and the family does have liberty to do much like you said earlier the normative approach if it's not forbidden we're free to do it in the family the church does not have that liberty the church must be able to justify what they're doing and so you'll find examples like Paul in Acts 18 21 he says

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I must by all means keep this coming feast in Jerusalem now if anybody were to impose the

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Jewish feast upon the church then Paul would no way he and Colossians absolutely would not allow anyone's conscience to be judged by the

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Jewish festival same with circumcision Titus because it was imposed as a mandate he would in no way submit

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Titus to that but with Timothy when it was just an issue of reaching out to the

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Jews in terms of evangelism he had no problem with circumcising him so again it was a liberty issue but the moment it becomes a religiously imposed day then

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I would be opposed to it as well so let me have you clarify that because I don't know if this would fall under the category of imposed in your opinion some would say it certainly would fall into the category of imposed because if you're sitting in the building where your worship services are occurring and they are openly celebrating

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Christmas with greenery and Christmas carols that are obviously hymns and so on someone might feel that that is being imposed upon them but so exactly what do you mean by that do you actually have a recognition of the

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Christmas holiday in your worship services or don't you because I couldn't really tell for certain well we don't have like for example

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Christmas trees or anything like that we didn't even have that in our home but we try not to do anything in the church that we could not do on in July or in some other part but I don't have an issue with churches preaching on the incarnation but I would have an issue with introducing things like Christmas trees and different traditions and pageants and things like that that you don't see in the

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Bible because again my governing presupposition that is if we cannot defend something from the

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Bible we won't do it and people say well you've got heating artificial heating artificial well you can find artificial heating you can find liberties in the scripture for the church where you can meet inside you can meet outside they preached standing up like Ezra did they preached sitting down like Christ did and so if there if the

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Bible gives liberty for the church to do something we have liberty to do that as well and the

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Bible even the circumstances of worship such as whether it's appropriate to have overhead words of a hymn projected up there

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I think that's quite appropriate that's exactly what Moses did when they whitewashed the cliffs on both sides and painted words that were being read responsibly by the the congregation so there there is

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I think some flexibility that the Bible itself allows within the church but if it doesn't allow that flexibility then we would say we can't do it.

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Now are you saying this out of a personal conviction but allow liberty in pastors and churches that would be openly celebrating

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Christmas in a worship service would you break fellowship with a church like that for instance? I would not break fellowship we're still in my opinion in the infancy of the church and there's going to be differing opinions when you look at the debates at the time of the reformation you'll find people like Calvin, Turretin, Bollinger, Beza, a number of reformed leaders who thought that the

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Scotch Presbyterians were being a little bit too strict a little bit too legalistic on that and they wanted to allow more liberty but if we're introducing into the celebration of any day in the church things that there is no way you could back up from the

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Old or the New Testaments then they would say let's not do that so Calvin was trying to reform

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Christmas whereas the Puritans just did away with it. And I'm assuming you'd be completely fine with singing hymns that are typically associated perhaps even immediately with Christmas but they are not exclusively and perhaps weren't even necessarily written exclusively to be sung during the

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Christmas season. I know that in the church where I was saved we would sometimes sing songs that were known as Christmas carols in the middle of the summer just because they were beautiful hymns.

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Yes we do that, Joy to the World and other things like that. We have a lot of times of four

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Sundays right around Christmas where we'll have music that emphasizes the incarnation but we'll do that other times of year as well so anything that would be legitimate preaching at other times of year

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I don't think you could say was wrong and so even preaching an Advent series I wouldn't see anything wrong with that if you were willing to preach that on other times of year as well.

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Great, well by the way, Grady in Asheboro, North Carolina, make sure you give us your full mailing address again because you have just won a free copy of the book that we are discussing

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December 25th, Jewish style, The Ancient Jewish Celebration Anticipating the Birth of Christ and that is compliments of our friends at Dominion Covenant Church there in Omaha, Nebraska.

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So thank you very much for these gifts and we have, let's see, we have

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Susan Margaret in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, who says can you please explain the leap to go from Jesus is observing the

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Feast of Dedication to a Christmas celebration that specifically celebrates his birth and also is not the importing of something like the

42:47

Feast of Dedication into New Covenant worship too close to what might be considered

42:53

Judaizing? Yeah, I can appreciate that question.

42:59

In fact, I came precisely from the Puritan background on that and we want to steer clear of imposing anything along the lines of what

43:09

Colossians prohibits, but at the same time there are passages like Zechariah chapter 14 that predicts in New Covenant times that there will be from one

43:24

Sabbath to another, from one new moon to another, there will be worship by the

43:31

Gentiles and it mentions right in that context the Gentiles celebrating the

43:36

Feast of Tabernacles. So if Paul could in three different scriptures celebrate various Jewish festivals but do it in a

43:45

New Covenant way, and it didn't just say that he was watching the

43:52

Feast in Jerusalem, he says I must by all means keep this coming Feast.

43:57

So there was some way in which he actually celebrated it, but did he do it as an individual in the family?

44:05

He didn't have a family, but did he do it as an individual? Did he do it within a church?

44:12

Well, he had earthly parents he may have celebrated. Right, but the key thing is that I don't think it is wrong to celebrate, just say, okay, for instructional purposes we're not going to sacrifice any sheep, but we want to go through what not the modern

44:30

Jewish Passover looks like. In fact, we might get some instruction on how they have very deliberately changed that Passover, but we want to give some instruction on exactly how the original

44:42

Passover happened, minus the shedding of blood and things like that, which we'll discuss.

44:49

It can be an educational thing, and I think all of the festivals of the Old Testament for homeschoolers can be fantastic educational opportunities.

44:58

And so what we are celebrating when we celebrate Hanukkah in our home is the same festival that was being celebrated under Moses when the tabernacle was set up, and under Solomon at the

45:14

Feast of Dedication of the temple, and under Hezekiah when a polluted temple was restored again on Kislev 25, and festival of dedication under Nehemiah, and once again on Kislev 25 providentially, that happened under the

45:32

Maccabees then as well. All of these festivals foreshadowed the birth of Christ.

45:39

So interestingly, under Moses, the tabernacle started in March. Jesus was conceived in March, and I show in my book the different theories on when

45:50

Christ was born, when he was conceived, and I try to demonstrate exactly that.

45:56

It's the only one that really fits all of the evidence. Tabernacle finished on Kislev 25.

46:02

Jesus is born on Kislev 25. There was eight days of purification in the tabernacle that was related to the eight days of Hanukkah.

46:12

Well, Jesus has eight days of purification. On the eighth day, there's a sacrifice, and God sets the altar apart with fire.

46:20

On the eighth day, Joseph and Mary offer a sacrifice. Jesus is circumcised and dedicated to the

46:26

Lord. Firstborn Levites were dedicated at the original Hanukkah. Firstborn of God is as well.

46:33

So anyway, there's a lot of symbolism that goes through, and I think they could be fabulous educational opportunities for our families.

46:42

You know, you reminded me of someone who I've loved to hear preach.

46:47

In fact, I've interviewed him at least a couple of times, Baruch Maoz. Have you ever heard of Baruch?

46:54

I don't believe so. Baruch Maoz is an Israeli. He was born in Judaism and was saved later on in his life.

47:06

He is a Reformed Baptist today and has been for many years, probably much longer than he was involved in Judaism, and he wrote a book actually called

47:16

Judaism is Not Jewish, and he brings up some of the things that you mentioned, that the modern

47:26

Jewish people are doing things in a different way than that we read about in the

47:35

Hebrew scriptures. They have adopted and changed and transformed things, very often connected with the rabbinical writings that are not

47:44

God -breathed. Very much so. I took modern

47:50

Hebrew from a Jewish rabbi, because it's slightly different than biblical

47:56

Hebrew, and he would always give us culture, and the culture was basically Phariseeism. He and I really had a pretty good relationship.

48:06

I one time joked that I'm more Jewish than he is because I follow the Old Testament laws, and he said, oh no, it's not the

48:12

Bible that defines Judaism, it's the Talmud. Anytime that the two contradict each other, the

48:18

Talmud always takes precedence. Very Roman Catholic sounding. Yes. Well, Baruch, when

48:24

I interviewed him years ago on the old Iron Sharpens Iron radio broadcasting out of New York, I told him that I have enjoyed over the years going to churches that are

48:39

Messianic, and sometimes even those that are not necessarily Messianic in their identity, but they still have

48:47

Jewish celebrations and they point to Christ in these celebrations.

48:54

And it's interesting that Baruch, even though he is Jewish and an Israeli, he believes that those things, just as you were mentioning before, he believes those things should be, should remain in the celebration of households and families, which he does.

49:13

He celebrates Hanukkah, he celebrates Passover, and all these major Jewish celebrations and feasts and holidays, but he does so in his home.

49:24

He is one of the unusual folks coming from that background who does not believe in bringing it into the church.

49:31

So I told him I enjoyed going to Passover celebrations, for instance, that churches have had where they point to Christ in the

49:40

Passover. And Baruch said in a way that only Baruch Mose could say, he said, well,

49:47

Chris, I am not sure what exactly about these celebrations that you intended, that you actually enjoyed, but I can assure you the

49:58

Passover that you experienced is not the one that our Lord and Savior Jesus celebrated.

50:07

Yes, very, very true. But actually we have another listener.

50:13

Oh, by the way, I don't know if I told Susan Margaret, you've also won a free copy of December 25th Jewish Style, the

50:19

Ancient Jewish Celebration, Anticipating the Birth of Christ, so make sure we have your full mailing address in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania.

50:28

We have Harrison in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, who says,

50:34

I have heard pastors read Luke chapter 2 verse 8, which says, in the same region there were some shepherds staying out in the fields and keeping watch over their flock by night, in reference to the

50:52

Christmas story, the birth of Christ. They will say that this verse is just one that would prove that Jesus was very likely not born in the winter, since the shepherds were outside and sleeping outside, and it must have been much warmer, even in that area of the world.

51:18

Yes, I have heard that as well. That was one of the arguments that I had used previously, but the more

51:28

I did research, and I first found it through Edersheim's Life and Times of Jesus the

51:35

Messiah, he points out that the temple lambs were out in the field with the shepherds year -round.

51:44

There was no month that was accepted, and they kept their sheep outside of Bethlehem, right in the fields where Jesus would have been.

51:53

In fact, it was probably exactly the same shepherds that were there. There are a number of historical references to people who have been in the fields in December and said, yes, shepherds out there could very easily have been doing that, but we do have historical evidence that they were there year -round.

52:16

Well, thank you, Harrison, and make sure we get your full mailing address so that you will get in the mail a free copy of December 25th

52:27

Jewish Style. And by the way, folks, we want to also thank Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, cvbbs .com,

52:34

for shipping out these books to our winners at no cost to you nor to Iron Trip and Zion Radio.

52:42

So we thank both Dominion Covenant Church and cvbbs .com

52:48

for these gifts that you are receiving today by virtue of submitting questions.

52:54

We're going to our midway break. This is the longer than normal break, so please be patient, folks, because Grace Life Radio 90 .1

53:01

FM in Lake City, Florida requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show because they have to air their own public service announcements and other local things in order to remain obedient to the

53:14

FCC, who requires of them to localize their programming to Lake City, Florida, which would include

53:20

Iron Trip and Zion Radio, which they air twice a day in a pre -recorded format. So while they air their own public service announcements in this middle break, we air our own globally heard commercials.

53:32

So please use this time wisely. Write down as much of the information as you can for as many of our advertisers as you can so that you can more frequently and successfully patronize them.

53:41

That way, they're likely, more than likely, to remain our advertisers, which will mean, subsequently, we will remain,

53:49

God willing, on the air for a longer future because we absolutely depend upon our advertisers' finances to exist.

53:56

So even if it just means reaching out to our advertisers and thanking them for sponsoring the show, please try to respond to these commercials as much as you can.

54:05

And also send in questions about Christmas to Dr. Philip Kaiser at chrisarnson at gmail .com.

54:12

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Don't go away. We'll be right back after these messages from our sponsors. Chris Arnson, host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, announcing a new website with an exciting offer from World Magazine, my trusted source for news from a

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Christian perspective. Try World Now at no charge for 90 days by going to getworldnow .com.

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That's getworldnow .com. I rely on World because I trust the reporting. I gain insight from the analysis, and World provides clarity to the news stories that really matter.

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I believe you'll also find World to be an invaluable resource to better understand critical topics with a depth that's simply not found in other media outlets.

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Armed with this coverage, World can help you to be a voice of wisdom in your family and your community.

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This trial includes bi -weekly issues of World Magazine, on -scene reporting from World Radio, and the fully shareable content of World Digital.

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There's no obligation and no credit card required. Visit getworldnow .com

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today. Also check out World News Group's podcast, The World and Everything in It, at wng .org

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forward slash podcast. That's W for World, N for News, G for Group, dot org forward slash podcast.

55:41

James White of Alpha Omega Ministries and the Dividing Line webcast here. Although God has brought me all over the globe for many years to teach, preach, and debate at numerous venues, some of my very fondest memories are from those precious times of fellowship with Pastor Rich Jensen and the brethren at Hope Reform Baptist Church, now located at their new beautiful facilities in Corham, Long Island, New York.

56:03

I've had the privilege of opening God's Word from their pulpit on many occasions, have led youth retreats for them, and have always been thrilled to see their members filling many seats at my

56:12

New York debates. I do not hesitate to highly recommend Hope Reform Baptist Church of Corham, Long Island to anyone who wants to be accurately taught, discipled, and edified by the

56:22

Holy Scriptures, and to be surrounded by truly loving and caring brothers and sisters in Christ.

56:27

I also want to congratulate Hope Reform Baptist Church of Corham for their recent appointment of Pastor Rich Jensen's co -elder,

56:33

Pastor Christopher McDowell. For more information on Hope Reform Baptist Church, go to hopereformedli .net,

56:41

that's hopereformedli .net, or call 631 -696 -5711, that's 631 -696 -5711.

56:51

Tell the folks at Hope Reform Baptist Church of Corham, Long Island that you heard about them from James White on Iron Sharpens Iron radio.

57:07

Iron Sharpens Iron radio depends upon the financial support of fine Christian organizations to remain on the air, like the

57:15

Historical Bible Society. The Historical Bible Society maintains a collection of Christian books, manuscripts, and Bibles of historical significance spanning nearly a thousand years.

57:27

The mission of HBS is the preservation and public display of ancient Scripture, dissemination of Scripture, to provide tools equipping believers and Christian apologetics with evidence for the

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Bible's reliability, and to introduce Reformation literature and Christian art to a broader audience.

57:44

Since 2004, HBS has toured schools and churches throughout the northeast

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United States, reaching thousands of believers and non -believers alike who are hungry for knowledge of the

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Bible. HBS's founder, Daniel P. Buttafuoco, attorney at law, is committed to sharing this collection along with an inspirational historical message that will captivate you and your church.

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Come journey through their website, historicalbiblesociety .org. The collection includes a complete 11th century

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Geneva Bible, the 1611 King James Bible, and much, much more. Visit historicalbiblesociety .org

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today. Thank you, Daniel P. Buttafuoco, attorney at law, for your faithful support of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

58:51

This is Pastor Bill Sousa, Grace Church at Franklin, here in the beautiful state of Tennessee.

58:58

Our congregation is one of a growing number of churches who love and support Iron Sharpens Iron Radio financially.

59:07

Grace Church at Franklin is an independent, autonomous body of believers which strives to clearly declare the whole counsel of God as revealed in scripture through the person and work of our

59:19

Lord Jesus Christ. And, of course, the end of which we strive is the glory of God.

59:26

If you live near Franklin, Tennessee, and Franklin is just south of Nashville, maybe 10 minutes, or you are visiting this area, or you have friends and loved ones nearby, we hope you will join us some

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Lord's Day in worshiping our God and Savior. Please feel free to contact me if you have more questions about Grace Church at Franklin.

59:49

Our website is gracechurchatfranklin .org. That's gracechurchatfranklin .org.

59:57

This is Pastor Bill Sousa wishing you all the richest blessings of our

01:00:03

Sovereign Lord, God, Savior, and King Jesus Christ, today and always.

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When Iron Sharpens Iron Radio first launched in 2005, the publishers of the

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Lynnbrook Baptist Church on 225 Earl Avenue in Lynnbrook, Long Island, is teaching God's timeless truths in the 21st century.

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We're a diverse family of all ages, enthusiastically serving our Lord Jesus Christ in fellowship, play, and together.

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Hi, I'm Pastor Bob Walderman, and I invite you to come and join us here at Lynnbrook Baptist Church and see all that a church can be.

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Call Lynnbrook Baptist at 516 -599 -9402. That's 516 -599 -9402, or visit lynnbrookbaptist .org.

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That's lynnbrookbaptist .org. We are excited to announce another new member of the

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Greetings in the matchless name of our Lord Jesus Christ. My name is Banu Gadi. I'm a pharmacist in New York, which is the epicenter of the latest crisis the world is going through.

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In Psalm 139 verse 14, the psalmist offers praise to the Lord like this,

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I praise you because I'm fearfully and wonderfully made and wondrous are your works that my soul knows very well.

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He saw God's goodness and mercy, kindness, and the beauty in what

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God has designed and he has erupted into praise. In any crisis or problem, brothers and sisters, our only fallback position is to trust

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God's design. And once we do, there is nothing for us to do but to erupt in praise to him.

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When the whole world is searching for a solution, God in his infinite mercy has given us what we need to address this illness, which can be very serious.

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Such is the beauty of his design. Knowing that design, how can we not erupt in praise to our great

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God like the psalmist did. May God bless you and give all of us wisdom to see greater things in his design.

01:05:05

Thank you. Hi, this is

01:05:11

John Sampson, pastor of King's Church in Peoria, Arizona, taking a moment of your day to talk about Chris Arnson and the

01:05:19

Iron Sharpens Iron podcast. I consider Chris a true friend and a man of high integrity. He's a skilled interviewer who's not afraid to ask the big penetrating questions while always defending the key doctrines of the

01:05:31

Christian faith. I've always been happy to point people to this podcast knowing it's one of the very few safe places on the internet where folk won't be led astray.

01:05:40

I believe this podcast needs to be heard far and wide. This is a day of great spiritual compromise, and yet God has raised

01:05:47

Chris up for just such a time. And knowing this, it's up to us as members of the body of Christ to stand with such a ministry in prayer and in finances.

01:05:56

I'm pleased to do so and would like to ask you to prayerfully consider joining me in supporting

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Iron Sharpens Iron financially. Would you consider sending either a one -time gift or even becoming a regular monthly partner with this ministry?

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I know it would be a huge encouragement to Chris if you would. All the details can be found at ironsharpensironradio .com

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where you can click support. That's ironsharpensironradio .com. Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said, give yourself unto reading.

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The man who never reads will never be read. He who never quotes will never be quoted.

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He will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves he has no brains of his own.

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You need to read. Solid Ground Christian Books is a publisher and book distributor who takes these words of the

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Solid Ground Christian Books is honored to be a weekly sponsor of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. And don't forget folks that solid -ground -books .com

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So please do much of your remaining Christmas shopping at solid -ground -books .com

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and your book purchases throughout the year. They publish the finest in Christian literature of the past and the present and I think that you should remember not to just exclusively purchase books from solid -ground -books .com

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for your Christian brothers and sisters in Christ. Also include on that gift -giving list your lost friends and loved ones.

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A book from Solid Ground Christian Books might be used of our Sovereign Lord to draw those lost loved ones into a saving relationship with Him.

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So please don't ever forget solid -ground -books .com. Put that website tacked to your refrigerator with a magnet or something or on a post -it note on your laptop screen or your computer screen or right near your phone or wherever you frequently are looking.

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That's solid -ground -books .com and purchase from them frequently and generously and you're not going to be just doing solid -ground -books .com

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a favor when you purchase books from them and you're not only going to be doing us a favor because you're keeping a very important advertiser happy, you're going to be doing yourself and anyone for whom you are purchasing gifts from solid -ground -books .com

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an enormous favor because as I've already said they publish the finest in Christian literature from the past and the present.

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Always tell them that you heard about them from Chris Arnson of Iron Trump and Zion Radio. Before I return to Philip Kaiser and our discussion on his book

01:09:41

December 25th Jewish Style, I have some important announcements to make. First of all, tomorrow we have joining us again on this program

01:09:51

Ryan Denton. He is the author of a new book

01:09:57

Even If None Reclaiming Biblical Evangelism and joining him halfway through tomorrow's program will be the publisher of that book

01:10:07

Joe Jakowitz who is not only founder of First Love Publications but he's also the founder of First Love Radio that live streams

01:10:16

Iron Trump and Zion Radio every single day. We are actually the primary program on, they call it the anchor program on First Love Radio and Joe also happens to be the pastor of Christ Bible Church in Dublin, California and he is a thoroughly reformed

01:10:37

Baptist pastor, a dear friend and so you'll be hearing both of them, both Ryan Denton and Joe Jakowitz tomorrow

01:10:44

God willing on Iron Trump and Zion Radio. Then on Friday I have Dr. Michael Haken, world -renowned

01:10:51

Baptist theologian and historian primarily. He is going to be cutting through the myths and legends and hateful slanders of the left who have perpetrated ridiculous and ahistoric and libelous falsehoods about the pilgrims and so I'm sure you'll be fascinated by his book that we are going to be discussing that he edited and contributed to,

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Strangers and Pilgrims on Earth, featuring a special contribution by the late

01:11:30

Dr. Martin Lloyd -Jones. Strangers and Pilgrims on Earth in the subtitle Remembering the

01:11:36

Mayflower Pilgrims from 1620 to 2020. That's Friday here on Iron Trump and Zion Radio.

01:11:42

Then on Monday for the second time in the history of this program

01:11:47

I have guests or should I say guest hosts filling in for me as the host and that will be

01:11:58

Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries and also a

01:12:03

Reformed Baptist theologian and Greek scholar and apologist and debater.

01:12:10

He is going to be joined by his dear friend and my dear friend Pastor Bill Shishko of the

01:12:16

Haven Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Deer Park, Long Island, New York. Formerly Pastor Bill for many years decades pastored the

01:12:26

Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Franklin Square, New York. Well both Dr. White and Pastor Shishko are going to be co -hosting the program together on Monday.

01:12:38

In fact it's quite interesting that they also debated each other on infant baptism taking different opposing views on that subject but they have remained the most wonderful friends and they highly regard each other as excellent

01:12:57

Christian defenders of the faith. So I hope that you tune in Monday for that as well and folks if you love this show you love sharing the free downloadable mp3s with your family friends and loved ones.

01:13:13

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01:13:26

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01:13:35

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01:13:41

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01:14:47

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I'm urging you please help us. There are tens of thousands of people who download this show every single month download the recordings tens of thousands and yet we only have a small handful of faithful supporters financially of this program.

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It boggles my mind so I'm asking you please to please begin supporting us financially if you don't already if you're able to that is and please do it soon because we have been hit hard financially due to the hysteria associated with the coronavirus pandemic.

01:16:01

People's businesses have been hit really hard and therefore they're giving less or postponing giving at all.

01:16:09

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Go to ironsharpensironradio .com click support then click click to donate now. Last but not least if you are not a member of a local bible believing church no matter where on the planet earth you live

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I have biblically faithful churches on very extensive lists all over the globe and I have helped people all over the world find churches near where they live sometimes right around the corner from where they live that are biblically sound and faithful to the scriptures.

01:16:43

So I may be able to help you too if you are in that category send me an email to chrisorenson at gmail .com chrisorenson at gmail .com

01:16:50

and put I need a church in the subject line that's also the email address where you could send in a question to Dr.

01:16:55

Philip Kaiser on our discussion today celebrating or should

01:17:00

I say December 25th Jewish style the ancient Jewish celebration anticipating the birth of Christ.

01:17:08

Our email address is chrisorenson at gmail .com chrisorenson at gmail .com give us your first name at least your city and state of residence and your country of residence if you live outside the

01:17:18

USA and let's see here Dr. Kaiser we do have a question from Bobby in Hartsdale New York who said

01:17:31

I have heard this text of scripture used as a prohibition of the traditional celebration of Christmas in your homes in Jeremiah chapter 10 we read hear what the

01:17:44

Lord says to you oh house of Israel this is what the Lord says do not learn the ways of the nations or be terrified by signs in the sky though the nations are terrified by them for the customs of the peoples are worthless they cut a tree out of the forest and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel they adorn it with silver and gold they fasten it with hammer and nails so it will not totter that does sound like a

01:18:15

Christmas tree but what is your response to that if you have one Dr. Kaiser well we ourselves did not use a

01:18:23

Christmas tree because we were trying to keep it as rustic for educational purposes as what

01:18:29

Christ well Joseph and Mary would have been celebrating on on that day but at the same time the there well in my book

01:18:40

I go through a number of different backgrounds to different things and there is there is some evidence that that tree worship and things of that nature were brought into certain syncretistic approaches to Christmas but that does not mean people who currently use trees do for example

01:19:07

Hanukkah their celebration in the Bible had all kinds of evergreen branches everywhere and and so if you're not treating it as an idol you're not bowing down to it and it's not causing other people to bow down to it

01:19:25

I would not think it's per se a violation of a scripture when we were in Ethiopia I grew up grew up in Ethiopia my parents were missionaries there they even though they did not believe anything that I had in this book

01:19:39

I don't think we had studied that just because the Ethiopians worship trees they did not put a

01:19:46

Christmas tree into their home we do it we didn't didn't do it not because we think it's a sin to do it we didn't do it just because we're trying to keep it as authentic to Hanukkah as we can yes in fact there are this is sort of connected

01:20:04

I know of Reformed Baptist churches in Trinidad that do not use the term

01:20:11

Baptist in the name of their church they will call themselves either a Reformed Evangelical Church or Reformed Christian Church or use other terms because among the

01:20:23

Baptists in Trinidad I have heard from these pastors Baptists are very much associated with false pagan religions because they have incorporated animism and other tribal pagan rituals into their their activities so they don't want to be obviously associated with that so it's sort of a similar thing that you're saying right right and there were some things that were introduced into Christmas that I think clearly did have you know pagan background just like with the celebration of first fruits um many people have introduced you know

01:21:04

Easter bunny with eggs and things like that fertility cult aspects that we would tend to avoid so I think it is worthwhile examining our traditions to see if they do have pagan origins but the way that we recommend celebrating it in the book has nothing to do with paganism whatsoever it's a

01:21:27

Jewish background holiday well thank you Bobby in Hartsdale New York make sure we have your full mailing address so that we can have cvbbs .com

01:21:38

ship you a copy of December 25th Jewish style and we thank cvbbs .com

01:21:45

for shipping out our winners these books and we also want to thank Dominion Covenant Church of Omaha Nebraska for supplying these books for us um we have a listener who is remaining anonymous who says

01:22:02

I'm in the middle of a war between brothers and sisters in Christ over the celebration of Christmas in the church and it is very sad

01:22:11

I see it splitting some local churches and it brings my heart to a very low point aren't these things that we can at least agree to disagree upon and as long as we are not being prohibited from celebrating

01:22:28

Christmas in our own homes with our families that we should not overreact to the guidance of elders whose consciences forbid them from bringing the celebration of Christmas into an actual worship service and he has a second or maybe a she because has a second question and I'll have you answer that one after you finish this one well um let's just deal with the issue of do churches have liberty to uh you know preach on Christmas have

01:23:01

Christmas music and I would say yes and many of the reformers including John Calvin would say yes and people say but does that not find the conscience of a person who doesn't believe in Christmas and in my whole approach to that is so long as you're not introducing any elements into the worship service that were not there in other times in other words that are not authorized by scripture

01:23:26

I don't see how you are violating their conscience so for example if singing a traditional Christmas hymn in July would not violate the regulative principle then why would singing the same hymn in December do so uh if preaching on Matthew 1 to 2 in August would not violate the regulated principle of worship why would it violate the regulated principle of worship in December so I think there does need to be liberty and and Turretin who is one of the uh reformers after Calvin he pleaded with people to allow liberty you know amongst churches he said there were certain churches that that celebrated

01:24:03

Christmas and but did so with all of the uh non -biblical issues removed in other words they did what exactly what

01:24:15

Calvin recommended let's reform it rather than doing away with it but he equally admired and I do admire as well people who disagreed with him and said let's not celebrate it at all and so I have

01:24:28

I'd have no problem being in a church that did not celebrate it I would not have a problem with being in a church that did celebrate it so long as the celebration did not introduce any new man -made traditions and thank you anonymous and if you provide for me of course off the air

01:24:47

I will not identify you publicly since you've remained anonymous but if you could email me your your full name and your mailing address so that cvbbs .com

01:24:57

can ship out to you a free copy of December 25th Jewish style we would love to do that and thank you again cvbbs for helping us out with these with that with shipping out these books we have bb in Cumberland County Pennsylvania who says taking what you said about the

01:25:18

Christmas tree in someone's home not being inappropriate as long as we were not worshipping it could we not also have nativity scenes in our home that we are using as decorations purely even though they are of course decorations pointing to a very significant and beautiful historical and biblical event but we are not worshipping these little statues in our nativity sets is this something that you would find appropriate yeah that's a good question and again there is people who differ on that all reformed people should be opposed to any images of God that's very clearly laid out in the commandments there are differences about images of Jesus I personally believe we should not have images of Jesus because it gets into the whole historian question can you divide between his humanity and his deity

01:26:17

I say no and the historic church said no and so I don't have any image of Jesus in a nativity scene but we do have decorations we've got a very rustic looking kind of a cubicle that we put the presents for the kids into and we have a nativity scene there but there's no baby

01:26:43

Jesus inside and that's just my personal conscience issue on that well thank you and you have also won a bb in Cumberland County a free copy of December 25th

01:26:58

Jewish style make sure we have your full mailing address we're going to go to our final break right now and it's going to be a lot more brief than the last breaks so if you have questions

01:27:08

I would ask of you to try to submit them quickly because we are going to run out of time before you know it and our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:27:17

chrisarnson at gmail .com as always give us your first name at least your city and state and your country of residence if you live outside the

01:27:25

USA and again only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter that's chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:27:36

chrisarnson at gmail .com don't go away we'll be back with more of Dr. Philip Kaiser in our discussion on December 25th

01:27:43

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01:31:14

that's gracechurchatfranklin .org this is pastor bill sasa wishing you all the richest blessings of our sovereign lord god savior and king jesus christ today and always when iron sharpens iron radio first launched in 2005 the publishers of the new american standard bible were among my very first sponsors it gives me joy knowing that many scholars and pastors in the iron sharpens iron radio audience have been sticking with or switching to the nasb i'm dr joseph piper president and professor of systematic and homiletical theology at greenville presbyterian theological seminary in taylor's south carolina and the nasb is my bible of choice i'm pastor chuck white at the first trinity lutheran church in tonawanda new york and the nasb is my bible of choice i'm pastor anthony methenia of christ church in radford virginia and the nasb is my bible of choice i'm pastor jesse miller of damascus road christian church in gardenville nevada and the nasb is my bible of choice i'm pastor bruce bennett of word of truth church in farmingville long island new york and the nasb is my bible of choice i'm pastor rodney brown of metro bible church in south lake texas and the nasb is my bible of choice i'm pastor jim harrison of redmills baptist church in mayapac falls new york and the nasb is my bible of choice here's a great way for your church to help keep iron sharpens iron radio on the air pastors are your pew bibles tattered and falling apart consider restocking your pews with the nasb and tell the publishers you heard about them from chris arnzen on iron trupp and zion radio go to nasbible .com

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that's nasbible .com to place your order you every day at thousands of community centers high schools middle schools juvenile institutions coffee shops and local hangouts long island youth for christ staff and volunteers meet with young people who need jesus we are rural and urban and we are always about the message of jesus our mission is to have a noticeable spiritual impact on long island new york by engaging young people in the lifelong journey of following christ long island youth for christ has been a stalwart bedrock ministry since 1959 we have a world -class staff and a proven track record of bringing consistent love and encouragement to youths in need all over the country and around the world help honor our history by becoming a part of our future volunteer donate pray or all for details call long island youth for christ at 631 -385 -8333 that's 631 -385 -8333 or visit liyfc .org

01:34:40

that's liyfc .org so as host of iron sharpens iron radio i frequently get requests from listeners for church recommendations the church i've been strongly recommending as far back as the 1980s is grace covenant baptist church in flemington new jersey pastored by alan dunn grace covenant baptist church believes it's god's prerogative to determine how he shall be worshiped and how he shall be represented in the world they believe churches need to turn to the bible to discover what to include in worship and how to worship god in spirit and truth grace covenant baptist church endeavors to maintain a god -centered focus reading preaching and hearing the word of god singing psalms hymns and spiritual songs baptism and communion are the scriptural elements of their corporate worship performed with faith joy and sobriety discover more about grace covenant baptist church in flemington new jersey at gcbcnj .squarespace

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.com that's gcbcnj .squarespace .com

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or call them at 908 -996 -7654 that's 908 -996 -7654 tell pastor dunn that you heard about grace covenant baptist church on iron sharpens iron radio james white of alphanamaga ministries here if you've watched my dividing line webcast often enough you know i have a great love for getting bibles and other documents vital to my ministry rebound to preserve and ensure their longevity and besides that they feel so good i'm so delighted i discovered post tenebrous lux bible rebinding no radio ad will be long enough to sing their praises sufficiently but i'll give it a shot jeffrey rice of post tenebrous lux is a remarkably gifted craftsman and artisan all his work is done by hand from the cutting to the pleating of corners to the perimeter stitching jeffrey uses the finest and buttery soft imported leathers in a wide variety of gorgeous colors like the turquoise goat skin tanned in italy used for my 28th edition with a navy blue goat skin inside liner and the electric blue goat skin from a french tannery used to rebind a reformation study bible i used as a gift the silver gilding he added on the page edges has a stunning mirror finish resembling highly polished chrome jeffrey will customize your rebinding to your specifications and even emboss your logo into the leather making whatever he rebinds a one -of -a -kind work of art for more details on post tenebrous lux bible rebinding go to ptl bible rebinding .com

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that's ptl bible rebinding .com charles heddon spurgeon once said give yourself unto reading the man who never reads will never be read he who never quotes will never be quoted he will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves he has no brains of his own you need to read solid ground christian books is a publisher and book distributor who takes these words of the prince of preachers to heart the mission of solid ground christian books is to bring back treasures of the past to minister to christians in the present and future and to publish new titles that address burning issues in the church and the world since its beginning in 2001 solid ground has been committed to publish god -centered christ exalting books for all ages we invite you to go treasure hunting at solid -ground -books .com

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that's l -e -e -s drugs rx .com don't forget to ask about their discount generic drug program welcome back this is chris arnzen and we have an anonymous listener uh for dr kaiser on december 25th jewish dial the anonymous listener says i am also in the middle of feuding over whether or not christians can appropriately celebrate christmas and one thing that disturbs me is that the time that is spent trashing this beautiful holiday and celebration could be put to better use by declaring and proclaiming joyfully to the world that a savior did come that god became man and was born of the virgin mary and giving the whole gospel story connected with us with that i'm sorry is a squandered opportunity when we do nothing but trash this holiday as if we are a bunch of jehovah's witnesses or members of a cult don't you think that regardless of your view of whether or not to openly celebrate by name christmas in a worship service we should never at the same time squander this wonderful and rare opportunity when at least one season of the year even the pagans are singing songs of celebration to christ and may have a more open ear to listen to what we have to say about this very special event in human history yes well well said this book i've written it in a positive style to try to show the precisely the theological significance of this day and how it could be an incredibly beautiful and meaningful celebration for our families i've got a chart on there that goes through every one of the jewish festivals starts with kislev 25 which points to the incarnation of christ goes on to passover which points to his death unleavened bread his being in the grave first fruits his resurrection pentecost 50 days later referring to the pouring out of the holy spirit trumpets yom kippur tabernacles and then the last one is purim which was authorized in the book of esther and again not one that was in the law of god but one which is very similar to the feast of dedication it was a thanksgiving day that uh celebrated god's providence has passed and look forward to the work of christ in the future well thank you anonymous and you've also won a free copy of december 25th jewish style so please make sure you have your full name and mailing address so that cvbbs .com

01:43:05

can ship that out to you sorry about a tickle in my throat right now uh i'd like to make sure that before i take any more listener questions that you have ample time i'm going to give you like five minutes of uninterrupted time where you can summarize what you most want to have etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today on this subject before this program slips by us and is over well the main thing that i would want to emphasize is that december 25 was not rooted in paganism it was rooted in the scriptural festival of dedication and i believe a lot of people debate whether christ really was born on december 25 i think there's only two credible theories out there on the date of his birth and one shows that he was conceived on december 25 and born in september there's a number of people and i give all of the good arguments for that the other is the one i hold to he was conceived in march and born on december 25 either way um the um the the significance of december 25 cannot be ignored uh those are the only two theories of christ death and one either one points to december 25 his look 25 being the the festival of hanukkah being of great significance and so as i've gone through those two theories i think that december 25 theory fits christ ministry as being three and a half years uh which i think slam dunk the gospel demonstrates whereas the fall of 6bc theory mandates a four -year ministry and mandates at least five months to have elapsed between christ baptism and john 2 verse 13 which i think i've demonstrated quite clearly is impossible uh december 25 best fits the year of christ birth that best fits the time of the angelic visitation to zachariah i give a whole bunch of arguments on that um um it um is i think rather significant that in 5bc which if you believe he died in 30 ad which i do uh that kislev 25 landed it's pretty rare that it lands exactly on december 25 but it did land on december 25 of that year and i'm a detailed person if every piece of the puzzle does not fit together i go back to the drawing board and what you believe about the date of his birth affects where you believe that he died and uh there's many dates in between that are affected everything has to seamlessly fit together so for me this is uh even though it's not one of the main big issues of christianity it is a an issue that the bible clearly addresses and there's so many scriptures that i think people are ignored that point to december 25 wow that's something because you are actually the first uh reformed protestant christian that i believe i've ever spoken with who holds that view well there are others uh edersheim held to this view william hendrickson and his commentary uh held to that view as well so there are other people who pointed me in that direction uh and convinced me of this date before so i i can't take credit for having come up with this and there's a long history i go through from the first century all the way up of church fathers uh who said they saw the census forms uh in in rome and unless you can accuse them of lying which these are men of great character um you have to believe them when they say yeah it all pointed to december 25th wow but again since you said earlier that we are not bound to even if this is a fact that is provable that he was born on december 25th we are not bound to honor that day in any uniquely celebratory way as opposed to other days that is correct because uh the only holy day we have in the new testament is the lord's day the christian uh sabbath i sort of view it the the way that paul approached uh festivals same way that he approached uh circumcision i mentioned that earlier he he really wanted he looked forward to celebrating keeping observing uh one of the jewish festivals in this case it was passover but he never wanted passover and not passover it was pentecost he never wanted any of those festivals imposed upon people and so in colossians he absolutely rejects treating it as a as a mandate we're no longer under the ceremonial law of the old testament but at the same time he valued keeping it so long as your your conscience was not binding others and was not being bound itself okay we have another anonymous listener who says i have been arguing with a friend of mine who has bought into something that a theologically reformed author has taught him who is also a theonomist and that is that there are no jewish people ethnically that exist today in reality that they are all descendants of the kazars who were turkish gentile converts to judaism what is your view of this i'm assuming you reject it since you have titled your book december 25th jewish style well actually this book doesn't necessitate taking a position one way or the other on the kazar theory and it is just a theory i've read the books on it i'm not persuaded personally that uh that the kazar obviously the kazar empire was converted to judaism but who converted them there were there were jews that were out there so i've looked at genetic studies i've looked at other things and to me that's really immaterial even in the old testament to become a jew you did not have to be a descendant of abraham for example it says that many gentiles became jews well that right there shows that uh the issue of jewishness is not an ethnic issue is primarily a religious issue in fact abraham was a gentile that's correct that's correct but for in esther for gentiles to become jews again indicates that it was conversion and uh was not uh primarily an ethnic issue if you look at joshua he was well not joshua he was jew but caleb was not a jew and yet he's one of the heroes of the jewish nation fighting on their behalf ray have the harlot uh there were any number of gentiles who became jews because they wanted to embrace the covenant as a whole yes and we want to make it clear that uh both my guests and myself are theologically reformed and i believe my guest uh unlike me as a theonomist so this is not some universally held view of the caesar theory amongst theonomists or reformed christians correct correct i i reject that i actually i don't know what your eschatology is but uh i'm a post -millennialist and i do believe that god has preserved jews and that they will be converted at some point in the future there are some all -millennialists believe that and some pre -millennialists believe that as well so uh i even though i don't buy into the caesar uh thing it's irrelevant to the issue of this book on whether christmas should be celebrated on december 25 or the birth of christ should be celebrated on december 25 or whether it should be celebrated at all um i i can respect both viewpoints but this is an argument in favor of celebrating great and by the way i am an optimistic on millennialist although i am very teachable on the subject i just know with certainty that i would not adopt a pre -tribulational view of eschatology or a hyper -preterist view i would consider myself a partial preterist and an optimistic on millennialist unlike most of my partial preterist friends who are post -millennial i still remain the optimistic version of sure but i'm teachable i am teachable yep and it's it's very similar to it would be very similar to my view optimistic on mail there are a few scriptures that would make a difference one way or the other okay we have a cj from lindenhurst long island new york who wants to know do you have books that you would recommend other than your own obviously to give away during the christmas season especially to lost people that could be used as a tool to bring them to salvation um you know i love the puritan small booklet reprints that banner of truth has been yes has been putting out and as far as gifts for christians one of my favorite that i've been going through a second time has been gurnalls christian incomplete armor it's been updated into modern english it's a three -volume set it is such a refreshing beautiful beautiful book uh for spiritual warfare for your own spiritual growth um i love that book but i could recommend most of the banner of truth books out there as far as a gift for an unbeliever that is a that is a good question um my mind is drawing a blank right now what's your recommendation chris that is specifically hinged on christmas i'm drawing a blank actually myself uh all i could tell you is that uh uh i obviously highly recommend solid -ground -books .com

01:53:50

that's the website of my sponsor solid ground christian books everything that they publish or bring back into print which is probably the majority of their books are treasures from the past that they have republished that some of them have fallen into complete obscurity until they were brought back into print by solid -ground -books .com

01:54:13

so if you go on that website uh you will find a lot of things that would be ideal for a christian friend or a loved one or a lost one so i would strongly urge that a book that pops into my mind that you may be able to get from cvbbs .com

01:54:34

and if not you could probably order it from there my friend peter jeffrey who is now in eternity with christ a great welsh pastor and preacher and author he wrote a book titled why i will never become a christian i'm almost positive it is the the title or i will never become a christian um but he was obviously being sarcastic in that title give it and it was intended to give to somebody who says that very thing who acts as if you're never going to convince them or the truths of christianity so uh peter jeffrey uh is a really wonderful uh author who breaks everything down from a high and lofty and deeply theological realm to something that layman can readily understand uh let's see here uh we do have uh another anonymous listener who says how do you in your own life bring up the birth of christ and the gospel during gatherings with unbelievers without starting an argument well you know i i think uh we've had guests uh over the years in our home in fact uh for upwards of 20 years we had internationals who were unbelievers that lived with us they were usually businessmen or children of government officials it was a fantastic opportunity for evangelism and letting them see the full covenant context of the gospel they were there to learn and so we just had devotions as we normally would and uh involved them in that asked if they had any questions but um we don't stop doing our devotions or living our christian life because unbelievers happen to be present and jesus didn't um if they reject it there in the future probably won't want to come back uh but uh we just uh let people see the full covenant context of the gospel in our home and uh by the way listener you've also received or will receive i should say december 25th jewish style and cvbbs .com

01:56:59

will ship that out to you as long as you give us your full mailing address and by the way i found a book on the website of solid -ground -books .com

01:57:10

that would be obviously ideal for the christmas season although i haven't read it i know of the authors in fact i've interviewed uh at least two of the authors that have contributed to it it's called a powerful trilogy celebrating our lord's incarnation by paul david tripp andreas kostenberger and those two are the ones that i've interviewed alexander stewart and nancy guthrie so if you go if you go to solid -ground -books .com

01:57:45

if you type in powerful trilogy in the search engine that will come up with so fantastic uh well you know we are out of time unfortunately i am definitely uh going to have you back uh in the future if you are willing and obviously if god is willing but i'd like to have you back frequently i've really been thoroughly blessed by our conversation today and learned some things that i did not know and even that i've never heard and i want to make sure that our listeners have all of the contact information that they need uh first of all uh if you uh want to find out more about the pickering foundation of biblical preservation go to pickeringfoundation .org

01:58:32

pickeringfoundation .org if you want to find out more about whitfield theological seminary you can go to seminary .reformed

01:58:40

.info seminary .reformed .info and if you want to find out more about the church where my guest dr philip kaiser serves as a senior pastor dominion covenant church of omaha nebraska you can go to dominioncovenantchurch .com

01:58:56

dominioncovenantchurch .com and do you have any other websites or all of my writings and there's lots of free material is on biblicalblueprints .com

01:59:11

biblicalblueprints .com excellent uh title and actually excellent website too biblicalblueprints .com