{"id":8692,"date":"2018-12-15T09:12:35","date_gmt":"2018-12-15T09:12:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/carrickfergusbaptist.com\/site\/?p=8692"},"modified":"2018-12-15T09:38:15","modified_gmt":"2018-12-15T09:38:15","slug":"why-we-love-christmas-david-dickson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/carrickfergusbaptist.com\/site\/blog\/2018\/12\/why-we-love-christmas-david-dickson\/","title":{"rendered":"Why we love Christmas &#8211; David Dickson"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I love Christmas! First, there\u2019s the food; turkey, turkey curry, turkey sandwiches, turkey toasties.\u00a0 Then there\u2019s the music;<em> I wish it could be Christmas every day<\/em>!\u00a0 Not forgetting the Christmas movies; <em>Elf<\/em>, <em>The Grinch<\/em>, <em>It\u2019s a Wonderful Life<\/em>. The bright lights of Christmas help to shorten what would be a long and dark Northern Irish winter.\u00a0 But best of all, Christmas holidays allow us to rest and spend quality time with our family and friends.\u00a0 What\u2019s not to love about Christmas?<\/p>\n<p>Of course, these things are fun, but they are also superficial; Christmas is really about Jesus. And Christmas allows us to pause and reflect on what the birth of Jesus the Messiah really means to a fallen and broken world.<\/p>\n<p>We all love to sing the traditional carols, one of my favourites is <em>Hark the Herald Angels Sing.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>\u00a0<\/em>The last verse quotes Malachi 4:2, \u201cRisen with healing in His wings.\u201d The promised Saviour was coming! \u201cThe sun of righteousness,\u201d would rise. \u00a0He would bring healing, \u201cFor you who fear my name.\u201d And so, just as Malachi prophesied\u2026400 years later, Jesus came!<\/p>\n<p>This is the real Christmas hope; that Jesus brought (and brings) healing to a messed up, sinful world.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The<\/strong> broken relationship between God and a repentant sinner\u2026 healed!<br \/>\n<strong>The <\/strong>spiritual deadness brought about by our sin\u2026healed!<br \/>\n<strong>The<\/strong> physical deadness that we will all experience because of sin\u2026will be healed!<\/p>\n<p>Malachi prophesied that Jesus would come: Jesus came as Malachi promised.<br \/>\nJesus promised that He will come <strong>again<\/strong>.<br \/>\nJesus will keep His promise!<br \/>\nAnd when he returns, then we will experience complete healing, we will be changed, \u201cand we shall be like him.\u201d (1 John 3:2) This is the real hope of Christmas!<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>Light and life to all He brings, risen with healing in His wings.<br \/>\n<\/em><em>Hark the herald angels sing, glory to the new born king!<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I love Christmas! First, there\u2019s the food; turkey, turkey curry, turkey sandwiches, turkey toasties.\u00a0 Then there\u2019s the music; I wish it could be Christmas every day!\u00a0 Not forgetting the Christmas movies; Elf, The Grinch, It\u2019s a Wonderful Life. The bright lights of Christmas help to shorten what would be a long and dark Northern Irish winter.\u00a0 But best of all, Christmas holidays allow us to rest and spend quality time with our family and friends.\u00a0 What\u2019s not to love about [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8693,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[834,707],"tags":[391,833],"class_list":["post-8692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-christmas","category-missionary-updates","tag-christmas","tag-missionaries","ctfw-has-image"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Why we love Christmas - David Dickson - Carrickfergus Baptist Church<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/carrickfergusbaptist.com\/site\/blog\/2018\/12\/why-we-love-christmas-david-dickson\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"David MacDermott\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/carrickfergusbaptist.com\\\/site\\\/blog\\\/2018\\\/12\\\/why-we-love-christmas-david-dickson\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/carrickfergusbaptist.com\\\/site\\\/blog\\\/2018\\\/12\\\/why-we-love-christmas-david-dickson\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"David MacDermott\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/carrickfergusbaptist.com\\\/site\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/7640b2e179c0a5f7695bf1aab3f14eff\"},\"headline\":\"Why we love Christmas &#8211; 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