{"id":5074,"date":"2013-12-16T16:00:37","date_gmt":"2013-12-16T21:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/?p=5074"},"modified":"2014-07-21T10:05:48","modified_gmt":"2014-07-21T14:05:48","slug":"the-reason-for-the-season-part-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/the-reason-for-the-season-part-ii\/","title":{"rendered":"The Reason for the Season! (Part II)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/81729168\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" frameborder=\"0\" title=\"The Reason for the Season PREVIEW\" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\nThis is part II of a two part series about the reason we celebrate during the Christmas season.\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/the-reason-for-the-season\/\">Part I<\/a> focused on two reasons we celebrate:\u00a0 <b>1) God\u2019s goodness to us<\/b> and <b>2) The Birth of Jesus<\/b>.\u00a0 This series picks up in this post by looking at what exactly Jesus, the Son of God and God Himself, accomplished by entering into His Creation!\u00a0 <b><\/b><\/p>\n<h1>Jesus Paid the Price<\/h1>\n<p>Our survey of Scripture today begins in the book of Hebrews.\u00a0 The author of Hebrews records exactly what Jesus accomplished by coming to earth.<\/p>\n<p><b>Hebrews 2:14\u201318<\/b><\/p>\n<p><i>Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, He (Jesus) Himself likewise <!--more-->also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives. For assuredly He does not give help to angels, but He gives help to the descendant of Abraham. Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted. <\/i><\/p>\n<p>As God, <b>Jesus came down to be a human, like us, and ultimately died for us<\/b>!\u00a0 Although the enemy thought that he won at the death of Jesus Christ, <b>Jesus\u2019 death actually rendered the enemy powerless<\/b>!\u00a0 By the Son of God dying, he broke the power of death forever for all who call on His name.\u00a0 By doing this <b>Jesus Christ paid the price for our restoration to God<\/b>, a price that we could never have paid.\u00a0 Not only that, He also now knows what it is like to be tempted as we are, so He is able to come to our help when we struggle with temptation.<\/p>\n<p>A second passage from Hebrews (4:15-16) gives us even more hope from Jesus\u2019 life and death by stating:<\/p>\n<p><i>For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. <\/i><\/p>\n<h1>Jesus Gives Us Hope<\/h1>\n<p><b>Jesus was different<\/b>, He obeyed God perfectly and never rebelled against Him like we all have.\u00a0 Because of His perfect obedience and death, today <b>we are able to come near to God so that we can have mercy and grace in our time of need!<\/b>\u00a0 <b>We are not left alone in this life!<\/b>\u00a0 We don\u2019t have to just \u201ctry to be a good person\u201d, we are able to draw near to the throne of grace so that we can be rescued from our rebellion against God!\u00a0 <b>We have a great God and a great Savior who want us to live an abundant and joyful life for Him, and in Him.\u00a0 <\/b><\/p>\n<h1>Reasons to Celebrate<\/h1>\n<p>This is why we celebrate Christmas.\u00a0 It is the anniversary of our Savior\u2019s birth.\u00a0 The answer that all of Creation had been waiting for to overcome the enemy and the curse of sin and death.\u00a0 We know from Romans 6:23 that \u201cthe wages of sin is death\u2026 but the <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">free<\/span> gift of God is <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">eternal life<\/span> in Christ Jesus our Lord!\u201d<b>\u00a0 Let\u2019s celebrate today that this gift is FREE and it is available to all who call on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved.\u00a0 We have the hope of eternal life and the knowledge that we will not receive the eternal death that we deserved.\u00a0 That is worth celebrating!<\/b><\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re reading this blog and you haven\u2019t made the decision to trust Jesus as your Lord and Savior, then I want you to know that I\u2019m glad you\u2019re reading right now.\u00a0 I want to invite you to join us on Sunday mornings at Faith to hear the Good News of Jesus Christ.\u00a0 To listen closely to the songs during our worship set and the message shared afterwards.\u00a0 To consider the common themes you hear in them and ask yourself what is keeping you from trusting in this Jesus to be your Savior and Lord.\u00a0 If you have further questions, our staff would love to sit down with you to discuss them.\u00a0 <b>Please don\u2019t go through another Christmas without a personal relationship with the Son of God who entered into His own creation to rescue you.\u00a0 It is possible for you to know, that you know, that you know, that you\u2019re on your way to heaven this Christmas season.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is part II of a two part series about the reason we celebrate during the Christmas season.\u00a0 Part I focused on two reasons we celebrate:\u00a0 1) God\u2019s goodness to us and 2) The Birth of Jesus.\u00a0 This series picks up in this post by looking at what exactly Jesus, the Son of God and&#8230; <a class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/the-reason-for-the-season-part-ii\/\">read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":62,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[97,1],"tags":[4500,15342,8392,4124],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.14 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Reason for the Season! (Part II) - Faith Church Blog<\/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:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/the-reason-for-the-season-part-ii\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Reason for the Season! 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Nick oversees the College, Wedding and Faith Church West Children\u2019s Ministries, as well as Faith West Ministry Housing. Nick is also an ACBC certified counselor. He and Micaela have four daughters, Anniston, Eden, Haddyn and one still in the \u201coven\u201d.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/author\/nlees\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Reason for the Season! (Part II) - Faith Church Blog","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/the-reason-for-the-season-part-ii\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Reason for the Season! 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