Jim
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At the Mall on December 26
I thought my Canadian friends might be interested in this. I went to the mall – actually, two malls, here in town on the 26th of December. They were open. But they were dead. Not too many people around. Nice and peaceful, actually. Never seen them so quiet.
As I walked out in a parking lot, thinking how different things probably were in Canada, I glanced down and saw a licence plate that said Beautiful British Columbia (I don’t think I’ve ever seen another Canadian plate here in Ixtapaluca, except people we know)!
I guess old habits die hard – that mall has probably never seen such a high percentage of Canadians!
I wasn’t at the mall looking for deals, I was actually getting what I hope will be the last prescribed drugs I need for a while. I’ve been fighting some kind of stomach thing since before conference (at the end of November). I was actually quite sick at conference, then got a little better, then worse again.
Anyway, after several doctor’s visits, I think I’m on the mend. The doctor things I’m probably somewhat undernourished after all that time, so he’s got me on some super-vitamins for a while. Between that and the turkey, I should do fine… 😉
The Concert and the Pastorela… the Rest of the Story
It’s about time I gave you an update about the last part of our week last week. It’s been quite a ride! Let me start with the concert.
The Battle of the Bands
The concert took place in the traffic circle in front of our church meeting place, and we got permission to actually close off the street. That night I was at Nathanael’s school Christmas concert, and so I arrived a couple of hours late, only to discover they hadn’t started yet! They were still putting the finishing touches on the massive light and sound system, I guess. So the concert finally started with Laura Guaza and her band (Laura is from Columbia but living here), then followed Charlie Bostik, and finally Lighthouse Collective from the USA.
I missed quite a bit of the concert, because I ended up taking Laura’s band back into Mexico City that night. It was a late night for me, but far later for those taking down the sound system, who I understand were working after 2am!
I do know that the message about Jesus as Saviour was shared at the concert, and one person accepted the Lord and came to our worship service on Sunday morning. His name is Alberto – please pray for him, and others who heard the message!h3>The Pastorela
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The Pastorela, or Christmas play, took place Sunday night in the Walmart plaza (El Cortijo). The children from Hannah’s Sunday School were to put on a "Christmas Tree" first. They all wore black with green capes, and using benches made up a Christmas tree, telling the Christmas story with their lines and songs. Then the pastorela was to follow.
That’s basically what did happen, but a few things did go wrong.
- First, a teen band ended up going on stage before us – and actually about when we were supposed to go on stage. That meant no time for a walk through on the stage and a test of the sound system and lights. It also meant that by the time the pastorela started, the shops were closing and people were heading home.
- Next, during the children’s Christmas Tree, the microphone got handed to the wrong child at the wrong time, meaning that Hannah’s lines – which she had practised for weeks – were totally missed! She was pretty disappointed.
- Having had no time to test the mics, we were halfway through the first scene before we discovered that no one could hear anything. We switched mid-scene to having everyone hold mics, which wasn’t ideal.
Now the mic thing was unfortunate, but two things were amazing. First, how prepared MartÃn and Miguel were, and how quickly the cast adapted, without missing a beat. Unbelievable.
In spite of things going wrong, a lot more went right. The kids did an amazing job (see a brief video here). They had all kinds of special hand motions planned, and it looked great. Here’s a clip from Rod:
The actors also did an amazing job in the pastorela. The message was clear … very clear. And there were surely a couple of hundred people listening, and many really were listening, not just wandering by.
I didn’t get to watch it all closely. I was busy fixing the backdrop that had come loose, or making sure people had mics, prompting, reminding people to pray, and so on. But from all I saw, it was a grand success, and God answered our prayers.
Here’s a brief clip from Rod, showing the entrance of the Magi. The stage is above (you can see Mary and Joseph and the baby in the house):
A team from Lighthouse Collective agreed to help as stage hands at the last minute, and they did an excellent job as well.
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Directing the pastorela was not something I wanted to do. The language and cultural barrier are still pretty big for the subtleties involved. No doubt the cast missed half of what I tried to say, and I missed half of what they tried to say. But they were very patient, and I think we all had a great time (I did, anyway!), and God used it.
It was good to brush up on my drama skills anyway – it’s been a while!
The actors performed way beyond my expectations. Kinda wondering what their next triumph will be!
Thanks so much to those of you that prayed, or through your donations helped make all this a reality. And also to those who encouraged all of us involved. And of course, thanks to all who were a part of it – Lighthouse Collective, the people from our church, and others!
There are some great pictures in the photo gallery – check here for more recent shots.
Who is He in Yonder Stall?
It’s been happening for 2000 years. But it seems like the voices have been coming from more and more directions lately. The voices are trying to convince us – almost obsessively – that the baby in the manger was not really God. More specifically, that this idea came later on in the history of the Church.
Maybe one of the most famous voices is Dan Brown, in his bestseller The Da Vinci Code. His book was fictional, but Brown claimed it was entirely based on historic fact. The diety of Jesus, according to Brown, was voted into existence for political reasons:
"Jesus’ establishment as ‘the Son of God’ was officially proposed and voted on by the Council of Nicea."
"Hold on. You’re saying Jesus’ divinity was the result of a vote?"
"A relatively close vote at that. Nonetheless, establishing Christ’s divinity was critical to the further unification of the Roman Empire…"
The Council of Nicea was held in 325AD. Of course, if the Church went for 3 centuries without believing Jesus was God, one would have to question whether the doctrine is important or even with any basis in reality!
Brown may be one of the more famous voices in recent years, but he’s not alone. People have assured us that Jesus never claimed to be God. The apostles never claimed He was God. That the Scripture was later twisted into saying this. That it was centuries before the doctrine was ever accepted, and that the huge political infrastucture that was the Church took a good teacher and used him for their own purposes.
So was the baby in the manger just another boy child?
Let’s take a look at the decades and centuries after Jesus was born. Did people believe He was God?
In a short post it’s impossible to give a full overview, but let’s look at just a few examples.
We won’t get into the Old Testament, which has a lot to say about who the Christ would be. We also won’t get into what Jesus said about Himself. Of course a lot has been written about that, and I think it’s clear that Jesus equated Himself with the God of the Jews.
What about the apostles – the people who lived with Jesus, ate with Him, heard Him teach?
Even before you’re out of the Gospels, you see Jesus’ followers talking about His diety. Upon seeing Christ after His resurrection, Thomas cried,"My Lord and My God!" (Joh 20:28). Of course, John himself gives a clear message in the first chapter of his Gospel: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." (Joh 1:1)
Most scholars suggest that John was written somewhere between 60 and 100AD, putting it close enough to Jesus ministry on earth that people who knew Him would have read it.
Over and over the apostles continued to ascribe diety to Jesus. Paul used terms like "the form of God" and "our God and Saviour Jesus Christ" (Phil 2:6; Tit 2:13). The writer of the book of Hebrews uses Old Testament descriptions of God for Jesus (Heb 1:8).
Frequently the apostles don’t seem to care if they mix around Jesus and God in their writing. For example, we hear Jesus and God both calling themselves by the same title in Revelation – The Beginning and the End (Rev 1:8; Rev 22:13)
But even if Jesus claimed to be God, and his apostles claimed He was God, did others accept this belief?
The answer is an overwhelming yes. Take for example Irenaeus, a bishop of Lugdunum (in modern day France) who lived around 130-202AD. Iranaeus said that the apostles proclaimed "the one Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who was enfleshed for our Salvation." Then he called Jesus "our Lord and God, Saviour and King". A disciple of Irenaeus, Hippolytus, said that "Christ is God above all."
Ignatius, a Bishop of Antioch who died around 98-117AD, may have been a disciple of John. He wrote,"Mary then did truly conceive a body which had God inhabiting it. And God the Word was truly born of the Virgin, having clothed Himself with a body of like passions with our own."
Others could be mentioned, but suffice to say the doctrine of Jesus’ diety was known to the Church right from the start, and continued to be accepted 100 and 200 years after His ascension. It wasn’t much of a secret.
The Council of Nicea was indeed, in part, a fight to maintain this belief that Jesus was God, a belief that had been affirmed and re-affirmed many times in the past 300 years. But in the end, His diety was reaffirmed. But it wasn’t a close vote as Brown suggested. Two voted against. About 218-316 voted for.
 Photo courtesy of mtsofan |
People who knew Jesus claimed He was God. The early Church fathers frequently defended the belief that He was God. All through the first 300 years of the Church, and to this day, the Church affirms that God lived among us as Jesus. This was not "proposed" in 325AD – it was accepted by the Church from the start.
Who is He in yonder stall? God in the flesh. Of course, there are many more reasons why we know this, but it’s important to realize that the bluster about His diety being a later invention doesn’t stand up to a closer look. This belief alone has a remarkable history – could it be that Jesus was more than just another baby?
The title is from the song by Benjamin R. Hanby:
At Whose feet the shepherds fall?
‘Tis the Lord! O wondrous story!
‘Tis the Lord! the King of glory!
At His feet we humbly fall,
Crown Him! crown Him, Lord of all!
For more on Dan Brown’s claims, read THE DA VINCI CODE: A Critique of Dan Brown’s Novel by Robert Cottrill. For more on the historic belief in the diety of Christ, I highly recommend For Us and for Our Salvation by Stephen J. Nichols.
Nathanael’s Christmas Program (video)
Here’s the Christmas program from Nathanael’s school that I mentioned in the 20 December post. This is about 3 minutes long, so it may be for more diehard Nathanael fans, or those who like programs with little kids (I know – 3 minutes – we have short attention spans these days!).
Let me mention some highlights. When the kids come in at the beginning, Nathanael is in the Santa suit, right behind Mary and her donkey. Then he’s in some other songs with the whole group. He’s also in "Navidad Rock", and at the very end you can see him hitting a piñata.
After the Pastorela
I just got home from the pastorela at the plaza! Many thanks to those of you who were praying – you have no idea how much we appreciate it.
Everyone did an amazing job. I won’t give you a full report tonight, but I just wanted to let you know that it happened! 🙂
Tomorrow morning at 8:15am I’ll be meeting with the team, and we’re going to go visit our local pyramids. Then we’ll be taking them to the airport. I’m sure they appreciate your prayers too.
But now – I have no idea why, but I seem to be a little tired. I’ll get back to you soon with the details.
Good night!