Merry Christmas to you All!!

Beloved in the Lord

Christmas greetings and joy to you all as we celebrate Christmas for our Lord Jesus Christ. We are filled with Thanks Giving and appreciation for God who became flesh (God incarnate). His purpose was to save us from our sins in which Adam broke the covenant with God. Our relationship with God our Creator, was shuttered. Man have tried to reach out to God through sacrifices but all were not in vain. “Beacuse it was impossible for the blood of bulls or goats to take away sins, (Heb. 10:4).”

Christ was there in the beginning (John 1:1,14). Christ for us; Christ in us; and Christ with us. The prophecy of Micah was fulfilled that Jesus was to be born in the city of David (Micah 5:2). It was divine timing. They are two funamental Greek words that draw our attention: Kairos, which means Divine time and Chronos, the human ordinary time. Kairos is when God declares His time and determines the time for an event.

Jesus became flesh (John 1:14). Jesus means “Jehoviah is salvation.” This is good news for us. A question can be posed, “How many years were there between the end of the Old Testament and the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ? Well, as you turn from Malachi to Matthew, you pass over 400 years about which the Bible is silent. No books of Bible were written during this time. The Old Testament closes with the book of Malachi and opens the New Testament with the birth of Christ. The dates for this inter-Biblical period are 424 B.C. to 6 B.C, about 400 years. Christ was born in 5 or 6 B.C. We know this because King Herod died in 4 B.C. (Matt. 2:1). A renowned Romano-Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus, in the 1st century, documented such data.

The world has tried several times to bring peace and maitain it. But it has dismally failed to bring peace. United Nations was crafted by Franklin Roosovelt of USA and ramified by Sir Winston ChurchHill of Britain.The Charter was officially adopted and orchestrated in October 1945 by US, UK and China, France and USSR in 1945. Did the charter bring peace to the world? Absolutely no peace. We see even today, the chaos and fisco in the world. Christ brought peace not the peace that the world brings. But He brings Shalom, peace that superceeds human understanding. Shalom in Hebrew means well-being, good health, prosperity, security, soundness and completeness. Christ brought complete and inner peace that drives out fear of the unkown and the future because He is our future.

Why do I write that? It is just a reminder to you. You know all this. As we celebrate Christ’s birth, let us be reminded that He came so that He would forgive us and give us eternal life. Let us forgive others, forgive each other, love them and serve them in humility in remembrace of Christ. Let us start a new year with umph and passion for others. Emmanuel, “God with us.”

We will meet in 2013 with many exciting programs in store. Merry Christmas!!!! God bless you and your lovely families.

Sam S. Gasela-Mhlanga

ICFM-President