Luke 3:1-2  :

Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene, in the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness.

This is a long, two verse sentence in which Dr. Luke provides very specific historic detail about when John the Baptist started his ministry. Just seeing this kind of specific data makes be have more confidence in the Holiness of the Bible.

The Bible has had many enemies over the time in which it has existed. Many times in many places, attempts have been made to completely destroy it or pervert it in some way. These verses have survived for almost 2,000 years now and we have this specific detail that continues to be available to every critic. You'd think that if Dr. Luke's accuracy was in question that it would be passages like this that would expose significant error, especially if the work had been made by someone who wasn't careful or who had attempted to make up the data. Instead, Dr. Luke's record continues to be respected among scholars today, providing important details about history.

Here we have the political leaders of Judea, Galilee, Ituraea and Trachonitis as well as the fact that there were two people involved in the high priesthood of Israel at the time. It also specifies that John was in the desert. Now these facts are hard to manufacture, and if they were, it appears to me that there is enough detail to expose a lie. Instead, after 2,000 years the accuracy has held up. This is one of the reasons that makes it difficult to not accept Dr. Luke's information about the miraculous things that he claims were witnessed by eye-witnesses. There is absolutely no reason for Luke to start making things up in this narrative! He clearly has a mind for detail and it just doesn't make any sense to me that he would add strange details into his accurate account if it weren't for the fact that he truly believed that they were just as real as the names and places that he specified here.

I am so glad that we have these details now. They give us insight into the importance that history is to Christianity and demonstrate to the world the reality of God's visitation and provision for mankind.

Luke 1:31  :

Behold, you will conceive in your womb, and bring forth a son, and will call his name ‘Jesus.’

There are a couple of things I would like to point out about this verse that the angel Gabriel spoke to Mary.

First, notice that God never shies away from predicting the future. I want to bring this up because this is something that man cannot do. One of the biggest evidences for the validity of the Bible is the fact that it is continually predicting very specific things about the future that actually come true.

It is logical to expect that if the God who made the universe is really speaking through the Bible, that it would have no trouble speaking about the future and that's exactly what we find. This prophesy of Gabriel was to happen very soon compared to many of the prophesies found in the Bible. In fact, some of the prophesy that Gabriel talks about in this chapter hasn't even happened yet, but this verse has already happened.

Second, notice that God brings up the subject of the womb. As I was growing up I thought that this was kind of weird, but now I can see why this is so important. Today, in my culture, people attempt to force their minds to think that "that conceived thing" in the womb is not even a person. The Bible is clear that it is a person. We will also be finding out more about that as we go along. Already, we have read in the prophesy to Zacharias that John the Baptist would have the Holy Spirit from the womb, and now we read this. Notice that we haven't even got out of Luke 1 before we have a couple of discussions about abortion. This is a very, very serious issue right now. There is no shame in voting based on this issue alone! Why, because murder is not something that an elected official should approve of. If that child in the womb is a person, then killing it is murder. That's why abortion is such a big issue to those who are Biblically minded.

It's a good thing that the unwed mother of Jesus decided to go with God on this one and allow Jesus to be born don't you think? This birth became the source of a great deal of shame among her peers as you might imagine. It continues that way today as people disregard supernatural history in favor of their sinful lifestyles. We are all very grateful that Jesus born to remove our sinful lifestyles that were leading us to a rightful death.

Luke 1:28-30  :

Having come in, the angel said to her, “Rejoice, you highly favored one! The Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women!” But when she saw him, she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered what kind of salutation this might be. The angel said to her, “Don’t be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.

It is interesting that when the angel appeared to Mary she didn't think to herself, "of course, God sent His angel to recognize my good works and to give me special favor." Instead, she "considered what kind of salutation this might be." I think that Mary was aware that she was a sinner just like everyone else. How could it be that she could have found favor with God?

I think that those who have favor with God realize that it isn't because of what they have done. Those who have favor with God know that it is because of God and not because of themselves. There is, however, a thing that God gives us the power to do that, when we do it, it pleases Him. Let's look at Abraham:

Genesis 15:1-7  :

After these things the word of Yahweh came to Abram in a vision, saying, “Don’t be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward.”

Abram said, “Lord Yahweh, what will you give me, since I go childless, and he who will inherit my estate is Eliezer of Damascus?” Abram said, “Behold, to me you have given no seed: and, behold, one born in my house is my heir.”

Behold, the word of Yahweh came to him, saying, “This man will not be your heir, but he who will come out of your own body will be your heir.” Yahweh brought him outside, and said, “Look now toward the sky, and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” He said to Abram, “So shall your seed be.” He believed in Yahweh; and he reckoned it to him for righteousness.

Abram (later to be named Abraham) had no children much like Zacharias, but when God told him that he would someday have children too numerous to count, Abraham believed. Notice that God made him righteous even though Abraham wasn't righteous because of his good works. God clearly favors someone who believes what He says. This is such an important point that it is repeated three times in the New Testament:

Romans 4:3  :

For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.”

Galatians 3:6  :

Even as Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness.”

The third time that this is repeated is especially interesting for our discussion today. Listen to this:

James 2:19-24  :

You believe that God is one. You do well. The demons also believe, and shudder. But do you want to know, vain man, that faith apart from works is dead? Wasn’t Abraham our father justified by works, in that he offered up Isaac his son on the altar? You see that faith worked with his works, and by works faith was perfected; and the Scripture was fulfilled which says, “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him as righteousness”;* and he was called the friend of God. You see then that by works, a man is justified, and not only by faith.

An interesting thing that I want to highlight is the order of events. Notice that in the first passage, Abraham heard that he would have many children and believed. Right at that point, God favored him and gave him righteousness. God favored the faith right away, but outwardly, the evidence of that faith had not been shown outwardly. That is what we see next in the James passage. Later, Abraham did have a Son and God told him to kill him as a sacrifice. This was the outward evidence of Abraham's faith as He had to believe that God would somehow keep His promise. Fortunately, the New Testament tells us what Abraham was thinking at that point:

Hebrews 11:17-19  :

By faith, Abraham, being tested, offered up Isaac. Yes, he who had gladly received the promises was offering up his one and only son; even he to whom it was said, “In Isaac will your seed be called”;* concluding that God is able to raise up even from the dead. Figuratively speaking, he also did receive him back from the dead.

Abraham believed that after sacrificing his son, that God would raise him from the dead in order to fulfill His promise.

The point I am making is that the outward evidence of Abraham's favor with God came after the favor. God favored first and then the evidence came. That is what we will read here with Mary. God has already found favor with Mary, but as we read on we will find out more about the faith of Mary. Feel free to read on in your Bible.

Luke 1:8-12  :

Now it happened, while he executed the priest’s office before God in the order of his division, according to the custom of the priest’s office, his lot was to enter into the temple of the Lord and burn incense. The whole multitude of the people were praying outside at the hour of incense.

An angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing on the right side of the altar of incense. Zacharias was troubled when he saw him, and fear fell upon him.

Luke doesn't waste any time in describing the eyewitness account of an angelic visitation. Evidently, the Jews during Roman times didn't know about anti-supernaturalism including the "fact" that angels don't exist. I am, of course, speaking sarcastically. Here we have an obvious problem with thinking that History should serve Science. How can you set up an experiment that involves the appearance of an angel? It is a cop-out to say that angels don't exist just because you can't demonstrate their existence in a lab but this is the kind of "logic" that I hear in my culture today. It is important for us to remember that science depends on history rather than the opposite as science depends on "journals" and "experiments" that happened at a point in history and must be critically analyzed just as much as the Bible does (actually more so since the Bible has proven to be accurate for so long and scientific journals are constantly being proven wrong.)

God is heavily involved with the Jewish nation and supernatural events are common, just ask their enemies. Even in recent history, Israel has enjoyed, statistically unlikely success in wars and commerce. Even the land, which once was desolate, is now full of life since the nation came back together. The fact that a culture so ancient and so separated and even subject to attempts to entirely destroy them came back together, is itself supernatural. I pity the country that attempts to go against them; scientifically, it's not a good idea as history has shown that their enemies are ultimately destroyed in the end and sometimes wiped off the face of the map entirely.

Angels are not cute little creatures with wings as we read here. Zacharias responded with the typical response: terror. We live a natural world and things work best for us when things happen naturally. At times God needs to intervene on our behalf and He sends his messengers. The angels are aware of our terror and they almost always respond the same way when they are sent from God to righteous people as we see next.  There were other reasons for a priest to be terrified, however. God could strike a person dead for not following protocol since sinners cannot enter God's presence outside of correct protocol. We know from yesterday that Zacharias was known by God to follow protocol so we know that this wasn't a bad meeting. To find out more about priest protocol in the temple, study the Old Testament where it is described in detail. It is interesting that Dr. Luke records which side of the alter the angel stood. This demonstrates his attention to detail.

Galatians 6:13  :

For even they who receive circumcision don’t keep the law themselves, but they desire to have you circumcised, that they may boast in your flesh.

One thing that I've noticed about those who make a big deal about following rules at church is that they are very external. These rules are usually not in the Bible either, but they are able to use parts of the Bible that seem to support their actions when taken out of context. They are careful to select things to focus on that are highly visible but will not expose themselves as rule breakers.

If they were making some kind of a social club, it would be a little different, but these people call their rules "Christianity." Christianity is about Christ and He said for us to love each other as He loved us. That's a pretty big assignment as I have mentioned before. The kind of teacher that Paul is talking about here are aware of the true laws of God, but they insist on focusing on the external rules.

Paul says that these legalists were seeking to take pride in this external behavior that they helped produce in others. They were proud of their own false accomplishments as they controlled others instead of loving them.

We should never let a religious man control us. He should teach us the true word of God and let us submit to the Holy Spirit's control. Guilt over external rules is a major distraction and will not help us obey the Law of Christ.

The best thing to do is to leave these false teachers behind and seek good teachers that will teach you the Bible.  It may be difficult to find a good Bible teacher, but it will be worth it.

Galatians 6:9  :

Let us not be weary in doing good, for we will reap in due season, if we don’t give up.

I would like to consider this verse in the context of some other verses as well. Here's what Paul tells the Romans:

Romans 11:17-23  :

But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive, were grafted in among them, and became partaker with them of the root and of the richness of the olive tree; don’t boast over the branches. But if you boast, it is not you who support the root, but the root supports you. You will say then, "Branches were broken off, that I might be grafted in." True; by their unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by your faith. Don’t be conceited, but fear; for if God didn’t spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. See then the goodness and severity of God. Toward those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in his goodness; otherwise you also will be cut off. They also, if they don’t continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again.

When we believe, we need to keep believing. Paul was troubled because the Galatians were leaving the true teaching of the Gospel to follow something else that wasn't just the Gospel. If you really believe in the truth, you will be saved. If you stop believing you cannot be saved. I am not saying that you can lose your salvation by doing something wrong. I am saying that you lose your salvation when it becomes evident that you don't really believe. You can't be saved without believing in Jesus.

Have you ever noticed that it is easy to get tired of something when you forget why you are doing it? Faith is a rational process. You have to actually believe something to be true in your mind. When you really believe in something you do things that are consistent with those beliefs. Paul doesn't want us to stop doing good. That is a sign we aren't believing in the truth that He keeps talking about.  Notice how Paul says don't get tired, remember we will reap... that's a rational faith and one we desperately need to remember today.

I want to make it clear that Paul isn't saying that you need to keep trying to follow God's laws so that you can be saved. We know, as we have been studying, that the context of this book is that he is talking about sowing and reaping. When we sow to the Spirit we do good. When we sow to the flesh, we are not doing good and the sowing comes down to belief in the Gospel, that we must listen to God's word and believe so that the Holy Spirit can do His work in us, making us able to do good.

Notice in the Romans passage that being conceited is a problem again. This is evidence of self-reliance. It's as if those who are conceited believe that somehow they deserve God's blessing. The fact is none of us do. The way to not get tired of doing good is to remain in the faith of God's word, realizing that it is God working in us to do what is right.

Also notice that if someone starts believing after having disbelieved, they still have a chance to be saved. We should not give up on people but always hope that they will someday believe as long as they are still alive.

When we believe in something we cannot see, it is called "hope" in the Bible. We have a hope that someday we will be with Jesus forever and that we will no longer be troubled by our flesh, the world's system and Satan. We will reap a harvest someday if we continue in faith. Let's not forget this. Let's hold on to the Bible and continue to believe no matter what the world around us tries to get us to think.

Galatians 5:18  :

But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

The law is not required when you are being led by the Spirit. If you think about it, this makes a lot of sense. Why do you need a law to tell you what you already want to do? What would the law be keeping you from? There are many other reasons why a Christian who is being led by the Spirit is not under the law.

As I mentioned before, if you died with Christ already, the price has been paid for the penalty for breaking the law. In that sense you are already dead to the law. Because the penalty has been paid, the law doesn't have any force.

I don't believe that this is saying that we should not be aware of what is right and wrong. The Bible says that the law can teach us things about what God says are good and bad. It isn't that we don't have rules in our lives. The 10 Commandments are good rules, but we are not gaining ground with God by doing them. Basically, we don't do them for the same reason that those who have not already been blessed by God would do them and not all of them still apply. The 10 Commandments were written as a way to teach follows how to get blessed. In that sense they are directed to a different audience. We should be aware of this when we study that part of the Bible and not directly apply it as if God intended us to be there taking it to heart like those who were living at that time. We follow the rules of our Father's house because we are already blessed to be His Children! We are not under the law! But, if we don't follow the rules of our Father's house, what does that say about our faith in the fact that we are His children? (See 1 John)

Many of you may have recently made new year's resolutions. I'm not saying it's bad to have goals. I am saying that you attempt to reach your goals by the power of your own flesh, you will probably fail. That includes new year's resolutions. I don't have to tell you about how common it is that people fail to keep their resolutions because you probably already are well aware.

If you attempt to keep your new year's resolutions by having faith in God's word and allowing His Spirit to help you keep them, if your resolution is not one that is ignorant of God's word or fleshly to start out with, you will be able to keep it as you trust in God. In that case you are not under the law but are being led by the Spirit.

I suggest that you make a new life resolution to walk by the Spirit from this time on by reading and hearing God's word and believing what it says every moment of every day.

Galatians 5:16  :

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you won’t fulfill the lust of the flesh.

This is a critical verse for Christians that I believe is often not given an appropriate amount of focus. The way to actually overcome sin and win the war against your body's lust is defined right here in this verse.

It is important to understand these words so I want to make sure that you understand what is meant by "walk by the Spirit." This was something that I tried to understand for many years and only recently came to a better understanding. First of all, "walk by the Spirit" does not mean that you actually "go walking next to the Spirit." Sure, we should be close to the Spirit but this is different. This actually means that we should be "by the Spirit's power, walking." The big difference is that you are not to be the driving force or the power behind your walk. When you think that you are walking by the Spirit, you have probably missed the point.

The point here is that it is not you providing the power to do the walking. Have you wondered why you have not been able to overcome sin in your life? It could be because you are trying to do the walking yourself! See how important know the way to live the Christian life is?

Sure we need to know what things a Christian should do, but it is also very important for us to know how to actually have the ability to do those things. We need both parts.

It is good to understand that "Spirit" doesn't mean your own spirit. Notice the capitalization there. Your spirit doesn't get capitalized. Here the Spirit is referring to God Himself.

Also, it is important to understand how to walk by the Spirit. This one of my biggest difficulties. I had heard it said that walking by the Spirit is to completely rely on Him and not on myself. Now, I think that this is correct, but I didn't understand how to "completely rely" on the Spirit either. Then I was reminded of a verse we read back in chapter 3 of Galatians:

Galatians 3:2  :

I just want to learn this from you. Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by hearing of faith?

Now it could be argued here that Paul is talking about Salvation. I would agree. I think he is talking about Salvation. But notice, that you receive the Spirit by "hearing of faith." To make sure that we don't wonder if this is only about Salvation it says this too:

Galatians 3:5  :

He therefore who supplies the Spirit to you, and works miracles among you, does he do it by the works of the law, or by hearing of faith?

Now we're talking. This is clearly representing the people in the Church by talking about a "supply" of the Spirit to us and doing miracles, and, believe me, overcoming our flesh is a miracle; one that this world really needs.

Notice that here, again, it says, "by hearing of faith." One might ask "hearing of what?" (Isn't interesting how much questioning and confusion surrounds this extremely important topic?) Well, we know that the hearing of the Gospel is what brought us to believe and brought the Spirit's presence to us. The Gospel was written down for us and is now in the Bible. The Bible also contains truth about who we are and what we were meant to do as Christians. I believe that by reading, or hearing the Bible, and believing it, the Holy Spirit is able to then empower us and cause us to overcome our flesh. I want to leave you with one other verse about this:

Romans 10:17  :

So faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

So, there is the way to victory. It isn't by you at all but by the word of God and by His Spirit that lives in you and is activated by faith in God's word. You are doing the right thing to study His word now and there is so much more to learn!  You don't have to read this blog to learn what God says in the Bible for us. You can read his word yourself and go to a Bible-believing church.  Just getting together with other believers is helpful in keeping our focus on the word of God.

Galatians 4:12-14  :

I beg you, brothers, become as I am, for I also have become as you are. You did me no wrong, but you know that because of weakness of the flesh I preached the Good News to you the first time. That which was a temptation to you in my flesh, you didn’t despise nor reject; but you received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus.

Paul was not aloof.  He didn't try to act like one who was greater than others.  In fact, he would try to bring the message of Christ into the lives of those he preached to by adopting as much of their culture as he could. That is not to say that he did what was wrong before God because it was convenient, but he tried to communicate the Gospel in the clearest way possible.

Some people think that the best way to communicate is to modify the gospel. That is absolutely wrong. This whole letter from Paul is about exactly how and why it is wrong. But we read that the transfer of that Gospel is done by learning the language of those to whom we are preaching to, whatever that language might be.

In Christian history, there have been serious denials of the principle. At one time, even the Bible was not allowed to be read by anyone who was not approved to read it by certain people. This is one of the reasons why Martin Luther saw a need for the Catholic Church to be reformed. God intends for his ministers to speak as clearly as possible in the language and culture of the people who need to hear the message.

It is a great blessing to have clear translations of the Bible in our language. This is why I am against the King James Only concept. Just as we don't speak Latin anymore, we also don't speak Old English either. It is very impractical to "become as" they are with archaic language. That being said, the KJO crowd is correct about serious corruption in many of the translations today. We should carefully discern which translations are appropriately representing the word of God.

Those new believers who heard Paul's message, heard it at a time when Paul was sick or weak for some reason. It isn't a great thing to have a leader so weak he cannot even teach well. It would have been easy for the people to deny him on the grounds that God allowed him to be sick. That's another thing we hear today that is simply wrong. Paul got sick as did other great workers for the Gospel. Evidently, the sickness, or whatever weakness Paul had at the time he preached to the Galatians ended up being the reason he told them the Gospel. God can and does use sickness! The Gospel is more important than our health. God can easily heal us just as he will someday, easily, raise us up from the dead.  Now, I am not saying that you should allow yourself to become  sick.  Paul, also, asked God to take sickness away, as we should also.

I think that we can all relate to the fact that when we hear and understand the Gospel for the first time it is so wonderful to us that the person telling us would be beautiful no matter what they looked like. Paul was reminding them that they acted abnormally back then because of the great message of salvation that the Holy Spirit spoke to them; so happy that they treated a sick man like an angel. Paul loved them and didn't want to see this great love disappear. He was reminding them that things used to be better before they were under the influence of these bad teachings.

Galatians 4:1-5  :

But I say that so long as the heir is a child, he is no different from a bondservant, though he is lord of all; but is under guardians and stewards until the day appointed by the father. So we also, when we were children, were held in bondage under the elemental principles of the world. But when the fullness of the time came, God sent out his Son, born to a woman, born under the law, that he might redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of children.

The law is not really our parent. It is more like a guardian, and it is only a temporary one. The law held us prisoner even though we were to become God's children. We were in a prison, but it was one that was for our own good until the time that Jesus would be revealed. It was for our own good because it taught us to recognize our sin for what it was.

Not many these days have actually tried to obey Moses' law, but we have tried to obey some of them whether we knew that God also wrote them down or not. God wrote down that we should not steal. Most of us were told by our parents or by the cultures that we live in not to steal. Many of us have stolen anyway. The law of our culture was good at showing us that we were thieves. The same goes for lying. Many of us were told by our parents not to lie. We did anyway, so the law in that case made it clear that we were liars. The law was good at making us ready to realize that we needed to be changed so that we wouldn't be thieves and liars anymore.

Now, Jesus was born under the strict Mosaic law and He outperformed everyone else. Jesus didn't need any sacrifice for His own sin. God took this perfect one and put our sin on Him when He died. That paid our sin's punishment and made us true children of God. This change was internal and by faith we would be able to actually live good lives by faith.

In order to do this transaction, Jesus had to be born as a human and had to live without sin and finally had to die. That is how we were saved. Our own working of laws does not work. God knew that this would be happening in the future during the time the law was in charge. But when the event actually took place, the temporary system was not required to keep people in check. Jesus had come and the promise applied.