EVENING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/2/2026
9:50 PM
My
Worship Time Focus:
PT-1Intro to “The
Announcement of Jesus’ Birth”
Bible
Reading & Meditation Reference: Luke
2:8-10
Message of the verses: “ 8
¶ And in the same region there were
shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and
the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear. 10
And the angel said to them, "Fear
not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the
people. 11 For unto you is born this day
in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. 12 And this will be a sign for you: you will find
a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger." 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a
multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, 14 “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth
peace among those with whom he is pleased!” 15 When the angels went away from them into
heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go over to Bethlehem and see
this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” 16 And they went with haste and found Mary and
Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. 17 And when they saw it, they made known the
saying that had been told them concerning this child. 18 And all who heard it wondered at what the
shepherds told them. 19 But Mary
treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart. 20 And the shepherds returned, glorifying and
praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.” (ESV)
A couple of things before I begin to quote from John
MacArthur’s introduction to these verses and that is where I live at in Ohio we
had a bad electrical and rain storm which cause me to lose power and therefore
could not put any Spiritual Diaries onto my blogs. Besides that I was running in and out of the
house to put gasoline into my generator to keep the lights and heat on. As mentioned I will do as I have been doing
and that is to quote the entire introduction to these verses from MacArthur’s
commentary.
“The Scripture says that in His
incarnation the Lord of glory (1 Cor. 2:8) ‘emptied Himself, taking the form
of a bond-servant, and [was] made in the likeness of men’ (Phil. 2:7). All the adjectives and exclamations in
language could never say enough about that reality. Yet, paradoxically, history’s most notable
birth happened under the most obscure, nondescript, humble circumstances
imaginable—Jesus was born in the place where animals of those staying in a
public shelter were kept.” Now again I
challenge you to look at my Spiritual Diary from 03-28-2026 which is the
introduction to the 12th chapter of MacArthur’s commentary to see
what I quoted about Jesus may have been born in the place where the Passover
Lambs were born and raised. “No one in
the sleepy little village of Bethlehem realized the significance of what had
happened, except, to a certain degree, the Child’s parents. But that was about to change; the silence
regarding the Savior’s birth would be broken in a most supernaturally dramatic
way,
“If the announcement of Jesus’ birth
had been part of a humanly planned public relations campaign, it would have
been handled very differently. The
announcement would have targeted the powerful and influential in Israel: the
high priest, the members of the Sanhedrin, the priests, Levites, scribes,
Sadducees, and Pharisees. Instead God
chose to reveal this glorious truth first of all to members of a lowly,
despised group.
“The theme of this passage is found
in the angel’s declaration in verse 11, ‘there has been born for you a
Savior.’ The statement is the heart
of the gospel message that the church proclaims to the world: all people are
sinners, and in need of a Savior. But
the concept of a savior is by no means limited to the New Testament. The idea that there is a radical disconnect
between the supposedly angry, hostile, vengeful God of the Old Testament and
the compassionate, loving, saving Christ of the New Testament is a figment of
the skeptics’ imagination.
“The truth is that in the Old
Testament God was known to His people as a Savior and a deliverer. That is in sharp contrast to the false gods’
worshiped by Israel’s neighbors. When
the prophets of Baal, one of the chief Canaanite deities, confronted Elijah on
Mount Carmel, they tried for hours to get Baal’s attention. But ‘there was no voice and no one
answered’ (1 Kings 18:26). That
prompted Elijah to say mockingly, ‘Call out with a loud voice, for he is a
god; either he is occupied or gone aside, or is on a journey, or perhaps he is asleep
and needs to be awakened’ (v. 27). Even
after they in desperation mutilated themselves (v. 28) ‘there was no voice,
no one answered, and no one paid attention (v. 29). At the other end of the spectrum from Baal’s
indifference was Molech’s cruelty and hostility, which his worshipers
desperately attempted to appease by the unspeakable atrocity of infant
sacrifices (Lev. 18:21, 20:2-5; 2 Kings 23:10; Jer. 32:35).
“Unlike the false gods of Israel’s
pagan neighbors, the God of Israel, the only true, eternal, and living God, is
by nature ‘compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in
lovingkindness’’(Ex. 34:6; cf. Neh. 9:17; Ps. 103:8; Joel 2:13; Jonah
4:2). The Jewish people understood,
therefore, that it was in keeping with God’s nature to save His people. In Deuteronomy 20:4 Moses reminded Israel, ‘The
Lord your God is the one who goes with you, to fight for you against your
enemies, to save you.’ David called
God ‘my savior, [the one who] save [s] me from violence’ (2 Sam. 22:3); the
‘God of [his] right hand’ (Ps. 17:7).
Psalm 106:21, Isaiah 45:15; 63:8-9; and Jeremiah 14:8 also refer to
God as Israel’s Savior, as does God Himself (Isa. 43:3, 11; 45:21; 49:26;
60:16; Hos. 13:4). Reflecting their understanding
of that key Old Testament truth, Mary (Luke 1:47), Zacharias (Luke 1:68-69, 77),
and Simeon (Luke 2:30) all spoke of God as Savior, as does the rest of the New
Testament (1 Tim. 1:1; 2:3; 4:10; Titus 1:3; 2:10; 3:4; Jude 25). Since God alone is the Savior (Isa. 43:11;
Hos. 13:4), the New Testament’s repeated use of that title for the Lord Jesus
Christ (e.g., Luke 2:11; Acts 5:31; 13:23; Phil. 3:20; 2 Tim. 1:10; Titus 1:4;
2:13; 3:6; 2 Peter 1:2, 11; 2:20; 3:18; 1 John 4:14) is a strong affirmation of
His full deity and equality with the Father.”
4/2/2026
10:40 PM
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