in a little town nothing town a little province of a little country in the Backwater of the Roman Empire a child is born and the entire age is going to hang on that in the year of Our Lord what does that mean it means the same thing that virtually every date in the world means that every event that is marked with a year is connected to a specific event the event that took place in Bethlehem that we are celebrating tonight and here is the scripture Galatians 4 verse1 now I say as long as the heir is a child he doesn’t differ
from a slave in the house although he’s the owner of everything but he’s not he’s under Guardians and managers until the date set by the father so also we while we were children were held in bondage to the elemental things of the world but when the fullness of the time came God sent forth his son born of a woman born under the law the Torah so that he might redeem those who were under the Torah under the law that we might receive the adoption as Sons children because you are children God has sent forth the spirit of his son
into our hearts crying out Abba Father therefore you are no longer a slave but you are a child a son and if so you are an heir through through God a few weeks ago we were singing Christmas carols over the actual land of Bethlehem at night and we all have our pictures of Bethlehem nativity scenes Christmas cards holiday specials Starlight music but to try to find those things today is another story to try to find this in Bethlehem today is a totally other story a few years back uh on our tour to Israel a number of years
back we went to Beth it was a time when in order to go to Bethlehem you had you had to go to a security you still there’s still a security thing because it is it is not in the area that Israel has sovereignty over you stop at a security barrier you switch bu you had to switch buses from the Israeli buses to the Palestinian buses with a Palestinian tour guide and we you go into Bethlehem we went to Bethlehem a whole different feeling not the feeling of safety and peace on Earth one of our women was stalked by a
carload of men following her we were taken to the Church of the Nativity incense candles a million things all these things but not an iota of the sense of the actual Bethlehem or the or the scenery or what it would have been like it’s so removed from what it would have been like in the Simplicity of that first Christmas and the guide was going to show us more things like that and finally I said listen just just take us outside take us to a field take us to a hill take us something that has nothing and and finally he did that and that was
