The Birth of Jesus — It Really Happened
Probably not on December 25 — but it happened!
When I was a kid, I just assumed Jesus was born on December 25 in the year zero AD. My parents were church-going Christians, and so Christmas was always about Jesus. One of my earliest church memories was playing a shepherd in a church Christmas play! I was no more than four years old!
But, as Paul the Apostle wrote two thousand years ago…
When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. (I Corinthians 13:11, KJV)
By my teen years (probably before), I realized Jesus almost certainly wasn’t born on December 25, and that there wasn’t a year zero A.D. (now C.E. for the politically correct). I also learned that there are a lot of things about those nativity scenes that aren’t historically accurate — such as the wise men (they came later).
What’s more, we don’t know the month or year of Jesus’ birth. We aren’t even sure of the exact year. There are also some questions about the whole tax-related census Luke talks about, but…
