Standing apart from all the forced cheeriness of Christmas, the sentimentality, the dreams of family warmth and togetherness, there is this austere and somewhat disturbing tale of a strange baby of uncertain parentage, born in refugee conditions, hailed as King by spirit messengers. Compared to what we tend to think of as Christmas, the actual Christmas story is kind of like reading an original Grimm's Fairy Tale after only knowing the Disney versions. True, the story is so familiar that we tend to view it through a soft-focus lens.

Nevertheless if you read it carefully, considering what those familiar words are actually describing, it can be a little disturbing.

This is even more true when you consider how the church has interpreted these events (and the events to follow) even from the very beginning. The child was born of a woman who had never had intercourse with a man. What? The man grew up and began walking around the countryside healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, even raising the dead. Whoa! He so disturbed the ruling authorities that they conspired to have him arrested, tried, and executed in the most brutal fashion. That part is harsh, but people are executed brutally all the time -- nothing really strange in that. But then the story has him rising from the dead. And the reason for all this, says the church, is that he is God in the Flesh, come to sacrifice himself for humanity, to save us from our fundamental tendency to mess everything up, and to set right all that is wrong with the world.

We shouldn't be surprised that there are people who object to that story, and the meaning it has been given, on multiple points.

And yet...this is what Christians believe, and we believe it so firmly that we stake our lives on it.

But as wild a tale as it is, is it unreasonable? I don't think so. For instance, there are many things about the universe that science proclaims as true, that are also pretty wild: Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, the dual nature of light as particle and wave, black holes, dark matter. Most of us don't understand all the evidence for these things either, yet we say we believe them. Although, I don't think if a gun were pressed to your head, very many would be willing to die for the higgs boson. I'm not saying these things aren't true -- what I'm saying is that at the most basic level we live most of our lives by faith, even if we call ourselves atheists.

In a recent interview in the NY Times, Rev. Tim Keller expressed this in his usual articulate way:

"...no one can demonstrably prove the primary things human beings base their lives on, whether we are talking about the existence of God or the importance of human rights and equality. Nietzsche argued that the humanistic values of most secular people, such as the importance of the individual, human rights and responsibility for the poor, have no place in a completely materialistic universe. He even accused people holding humanistic values as being “covert Christians” because it required a leap of faith to hold to them. We must all live by faith."

The heart of the Christmas story is the Christ story. The lights, and the evergreens, and the presents (and the food; let's not forget the food) are all very nice. But at the core of the thing is something much harder and brighter and sharper. To many people it will be offensively hard, and offensively jagged. But let's not be apologizing for that. Let's share the greater meaning and purpose and invite everyone to see the ultimate beauty and glory that suffuses all of it. Christmas is not a trap to accuse people, nor is it a weapon for us to bludgeon people. It is a story into which we may invite everyone, so that they also may trust in it.

It is through this story that God is making us into the kind of humans he originally meant us to be. That's why at it's heart, Christmas is good news for all people.

I sometimes talk to people who think they are not good enough to come to church. Of course, when they talk about coming to church, they aren't really talking about being good enough to walk into a building. They are worried because they have messed up so many things in life that God doesn't want them. These folks have a kind of innate understanding of sin -- but they don't really understand how God has already dealt with all of our failure and messed-upness for us.

I recently read a pretty good article on just this topic on the  Campaign for Core Christianity website:

"Whatever form it takes, we all know how messing up feels. First comes the realization regarding the mistake we made. Next may be someone finding out about it—along with the shame and embarrassment—and finally having to face the consequences of our mistake.For days afterwards, depression, anxiety, emotional and sometimes physical distress may dominate our lives. We replay the events over and over in our minds, and doubts about our self-worth and value can begin to creep in. In those moments, it is easy to think that maybe we should give up and quit the job, the marriage, the family, the friendship, or whatever will get us away from the situation.

These thoughts can also cause us to forget the gospel message. Or even if we remember it, it doesn’t necessarily take away the pain. Maybe we wonder, “Jesus died for my sins but I still mess up. I let people down or hurt someone or acted stupidly. How does Jesus’ death so long ago and so isolated from my life now bring me any comfort? I still messed up, and I still have to face that shame today.”

But this attitude shows a fundamental misunderstanding of what is really going on. The truth is that Jesus is the best comfort we can have when facing failure. In the midst of our failures and mistakes, it is vital that we remember these four crucial points Scripture tells us about reality."

Read the whole article here.

 In a recent conversation with a friend, we got to talking about religion and faith. No surprise there. It was an especially enjoyable conversation, though, because my friend doesn't consider himself religious. Nothing against it, mind you. It just never really made much sense to him or seemed like it really mattered.

Along the way, he raised one of his questions: Jesus lived so long ago. How can we know that that information we have about him can be trusted? In other words, can we trust what we read in the Bible?

That's actually a great question. A very common one, in fact.

There are also some very good answers to that question. They may not persuade someone who just set against the notion of God. There are people for whom no evidence would be sufficient. For someone who is open-minded to the possibility, there are good reasons to think that the accounts we have in the Bible are dependable and should be taken seriously.

Nicholas Davis has written an excellent summary of those answers in an article titled "Why I Trust the Bible." He gives five reasons and a succinct explanation of each one.

• The Bible is historically accurate.
• Compared to other ancient documents, there is no comparison!
• The New Testament manuscripts were written by eyewitnesses.
• The Bible cared about what women thought at a time when no one else did.
• If Jesus Christ rose from the dead, then the Bible is true.

The article is simple and direct. It doesn't go into all the possible detail, but gives the basic outline of why it is perfectly reasonable to accept that the Bible is true, and to accept the truth that it proclaims.

I have always like Andy Stanley's formulation of this idea.

"If a man can predict his own death and resurrection, and then pull it off, I just go with whatever that man says."

Yup, we can depend on the Bible. It may be a little hard to figure out sometimes, but considering what's in it, the effort is worth it.

That's a pretty good question, actually. You have your story. I have my story. They don't match up but just because it's true for you doesn't mean it's true for me. Right?

But then Christianity comes along and says that there are just certain things that are ultimately non-negotiable. You are either on the right side or the wrong side -- and in the end, your side matters.

That seems pretty harsh. Unfair even. Especially such a shifty, turbulent world. So for someone, anyone, to take a stand that this is right and that is wrong -- that just seems pretty arrogant. But is it?

Maybe the way Christianity view that whole question is more nuanced than the way the story is usually told. Maybe when you have more information about what Jesus is actually about, we see that this whole exclusion/inclusion question works completely different from what we thought.

That's why author Nicholas Davis writes about this:

The question “Does a person really have to go through Jesus to get into heaven?” is clearly a divisive one within evangelical Christianity today. Some might wonder, “Why is Christianity so exclusive?” This is a good question, but there is an even better question to ask...why is Christianity so INCLUSIVE?

Read the whole article here. It might give you a different perspective.

United Baptist Church has recently begun hosting another church, Restoration Foursquare Church. They meet to worship on Sundays at 4:00 pm, and hold a youth meeting called Summit on Wednesdays at 6:00.

You can read about in the Concord Monitor.

To some, this might seem odd -- one church letting another church use their building. Why would we do this? The answer is actually pretty straightforward: we do this because it's not about us -- it's about Jesus.

You see, this building that we meet in is not our building. It was built for the advancement of God's Kingdom, through the proclamation of his Good News in Jesus Christ. Therefore his building at 39 Fayette Street belongs to him. UBC only holds it in trust -- you might say that we manage it for God. This building is here because God provided through the work of hundreds of faithful people who worked hard and gave generously over decades to build and maintain this facility.

So it simply isn't right for us to keep this treasure to ourselves. Part of the mission God has laid on us is to use the tools he has provided for demonstrating his love for this old broken wounded world. And the tool we have closest at hand is our building. So when we make our building available, to serve and love our neighbors, and to proclaim his Good News in Jesus, we are doing ministry. The only territory that matters is territory for God's Kingdom -- and that territory is a matter of the hearts of the men and women all around us.

That's why we rejoice in the opportunity to partner in the gospel along with Restoration Foursquare. We bless them with what God has blessed us. And in turn, we are confident that RFC will bless us. Then together, through our sharing in the joy and labor in the Spirit, we both will bless God our Savior.

So pray for RFC that God will use them to reach and love people for Jesus's sake. And pray for UBC that we will be able to do the same in our own way. And finally, pray for our work together. We don't know what that will mean yet, but we look forward to seeing how God will work and what he will do. The Gospel is a beautiful thing. Together we can hold it higher for all to see.

"The more the world changes, the more it stays the same." That's how the old saying goes. Computers, the internet, and smartphones all seem like they have changed everything, and they have -- but they haven't. Not really. Our very human hearts still long to feel as though we are OK, even though we suspect we are not. We still long for human connection, even as we fear the vulnerability that it brings. We still long for stability while hungering for new things, and desire to do what feels good, even if it kills us.

In short, humans are still human regardless of the device that holds our attention.

Sometimes, when it comes to the command of Jesus to make disciples, we forget that, and we fixate on using technological means to tell people about Jesus. These technologies might be printed tracts, christian movies, or evangelistic revival services. A method doesn't have to involve computer chips to be a technology. Other people may fixate on music concerts, light shows, or social media to draw in crowds to hear the News. Either way, we are making the same assumption -- that the message requires machinery.

The Good News of Jesus is pretty powerful stuff. So whether it is delivered on a little folded piece of paper, or through a 40 foot projection screen, God can and does use all of these means to penetrate and soften hearts. Making disciples for Jesus, however, does not require machinery, or marketing, or any other kind of technique. Churches don't have to invest enormous amounts of money in electronics and software. They can still make disciples, and do it very effectively. All you need is a table, some chairs, and some food.

Hospitality is the oldest form of evangelism. Or, to use different words, you could call it friendship and sharing. This is good news for Churches like ours. We don't have a big budget. We don't have lots of people. And frankly, the ones that we do have are kind of old and a little tired (don't worry, this is not news to us. Just calling it like it is). But that doesn't have to stop us. We can still make friends. We can still invite people to sit with us and eat while we listen, and talk, and share our lives. It can be in your home, or in a coffee shop, or at a picnic table. It really doesn't matter. It's about you and your friend, sharing food, and time, and your lives.

And when we do that, crazy things happen. You might find yourself sharing Jesus along with the entree. We serve up gospel love, along with dessert. Our guests may ask for seconds, or they may let the dish pass. That is not our concern. Our job is to love, to share, to serve. But still, experience shows that many people discover they have a taste for a spiritual food they had never tried before, and they find that it satisfies something they have been desiring for years.

That's the writer of this this article on Biblical Hospitality discovered. Read about what happens when you start just loving your neighbors for Jesus sake, and comment on your thoughts and experiences.

We’ll be holding a very simple Ash Wednesday service at United Baptist Church this evening. When I have mentioned this to people, a large percentage of them respond with some form of the question, “But…why? You aren’t Catholic.”

And that is certainly true. We aren’t Catholic. It’s pretty clearly spelled out in the name.

But why should Catholics get to have all the fun?

Not that Ash Wednesday is fun exactly, but it is a powerful and physical way to remind ourselves that our fate is in God’s hands. The good news, of course, is that when we trust our fate to him, he promises that all will end well.

Before we talk more about that, here’s quick primer on the whole Ash Wednesday thing. Ash Wednesday is the traditional first day of the season of Lent. Lent encompasses approximately 6 weeks leading up to Resurrection Day, and has traditionally been a time to focus on repentance and sharing in the human suffering of our Lord Jesus Christ. If you want to know more about Lent, you can read a great article on the site InternetMonk.com.

Ash Wednesday is often observed by a worship service of which the centerpiece is the minister or priest taking a bit of ash mixed with oil onto his finger, and drawing the shape of the cross on your forehead. This is called the “imposition of ashes.” At that same time, the minister will say something like, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” In other words, it is reminder that in the end, every one of us is going to die.

In world obsessed with youth, with accomplishment, with winning, with beauty, and with feeling happy all the time, this might seem like kind of a downer. But for Christians – that is everyone who trusts in Jesus for rescue from sin and death – that’s not bad news. In fact, the Good News of Jesus Christ is inextricably bound up with death – both his death and ours. Because Jesus death destroyed the power of sin that separates us from the Living God, and because his resurrection opens eternal life with God to all who believe, death is no longer a downer, but actually the path to True and Better Life with the Source of All Life.

It is as Jesus told his disciples, "And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it."

So when we remind ourselves and each other that death is certain, we are using death as a lens to look past death to our resurrection in Christ. Death is not nothing. It is real, and it is hard. But because Jesus has transformed death by his own death and resurrection, he has transformed our death as well. The meaning of death is changed from hopeless darkness into a bright and certain hope. And we who trust in him get to share in that hope. We get to rely on that hope. We can face death with confidence and even joy because we know that the end has been re-written.

But to ignore the dying part, and just focus on the resurrection part is not really telling the whole story. There is no resurrection without death on the cross. No Easter without Good Friday. That’s why we do Ash Wednesday. The suffering and death of our Lord Jesus is so big, and so important, that it is worth meditating upon it for six weeks. And we start on Ash Wednesday by undertaking a simple symbolic physical act that ties our death to his.

You don’t have to be Roman Catholic to do that. That’s why we are a Baptist church holding an Ash Wednesday service. In the end, it isn’t about being Baptist, or Catholic, or Orthodox or any other flavor of Christian experience. It’s about Jesus. It’s all about Jesus. Because it is Jesus Christ who is Good News for all people.

Since when do Baptist churches pay attention to Lent?

Well, lots of them don't. In fact, this is probably a pretty good question since I would guess that most Baptist churches don't. But that doesn't mean that none of them do. At United Baptist Church, we are learning about all the seasons of the church calendar and how they can help us to walk closer to Jesus.

At UBC, we look at the church calendar as a simple plan that helps us walk through the Jesus Story together every year. Lent is the part of the plan that leads up to the suffering and death of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the celebration of his resurrection. Therefore, it is generally used as a time to remind us of our need for repentance and doing things to actively bring our focus onto Jesus. There are many ways to put this into practice, and many people throughout the history of the Christian church have found lent to be a refreshing time of renewal in Christ.

The blog InternetMonk.com  recently published a very helpful introduction to Lent originally posted on the blog of Mark D. Roberts. It provides a very nice explanation of lent and the practices of Lent for folks who might not be familiar with it. I'd like to share a couple of useful quotes here, but you can read the whole piece here.

First, let's address some of the objections about Lent just being one more thing that we are required to do. Lent is neither recommended (it's not even mentioned) nor prohibited in the Bible. I find it best to look at it in a similar fashion to committing yourself to a plan to read the entire Bible in one year. It's not required so it's not bad if you don't do it. On the other hand, good can come from it if you do it. But remember this:

Then there is the issue of fasting. Fasting is the spiritual practice of depriving yourself of something for a period of time, in order to devote additional time and energy to prayer, meditation, and Bible study. There are lots of ways to fast, and lots of reasons to fast. To my mind, one of the most important reasons is to bring my idolatry out in the open.

Of course, there is no requirement saying that fasting is the only way to observe Lent. Instead of taking something away, you might do just as well to add something to your life. Pick something specially intended to take your mind off yourself and focus it on caring for and serving others, and of course, our Lord Jesus Christ.

And that's the whole point. Lent is NOT about doing something to get God to love you more, or earn points you can trade in for divine favors. It is simply a traditional time to do simple things that get our minds off of ourselves and our own agendas, and ask God to work in our hearts through the Holy Spirit to make us more like Jesus.

Family Promise Needs Your Help. Family Promise is an innovative interfaith Hospitality Network of congregations and volunteers working to meet homeless families’ immediate needs for shelter, meals, and comprehensive support services in a non-sectarian program. To learn more about how Family Promise works, click here. United Baptist is supporting Family Promise as a host congregation and through volunteer effort.

Family Promise is putting the finishing touches on the Day Center on the IHM Campus. They are almost ready to begin hosting families. To supply the Day Center and begin hosting families, there are still a list of needed supplies – things like dishes, kitchen supplies and tools, bedding and linens, office supplies and equipment, and so on.

If you would like to help Family Promise help families as they make their way out of a tight spot, you can donate items on the list below. If you have items on the list that are in good condition, Family Promise is happy to receive your donation. If you would like to purchase something new to donate to Family Promise, they are also happy to receive your help.

By the time you read this, is it possible that some of the items on this list may already have been offered by someone else. So please email Gail Page at gailpage90@gmail.com to make sure your item is still needed, and to confirm where and when to drop off your donation.

To see the WISH LIST CLICK HERE.