What Does the X in Xmas Mean?



The X in Christmas is used like the R in R.C. My given name at birth was Robert Charles, although before I was even taken home from the hospital my parents called me by my initials, R.C., and nobody seems to be too scandalized by that.

X can mean so many things. For example, when we want to denote an unknown quantity, we use the symbol X. It can refer to an obscene level of films, something that is X-rated. People seem to express chagrin about seeing Christ’s name dropped and replaced by this symbol for an unknown quantity X. Every year you see the signs and the bumper stickers saying, “Put Christ back into Christmas” as a response to this substitution of the letter X for the name of Christ.

There’s No X in Christmas

First of all, you have to understand that it is not the letter X that is put into Christmas. We see the English letter X there, but actually what it involves is the first letter of the Greek name for Christ. Christos is the New Testament Greek for Christ. The first letter of the Greek word Christos is transliterated into our alphabet as an X. That X has come through church history to be a shorthand symbol for the name of Christ.

We don’t see people protesting the use of the Greek letter theta, which is an O with a line across the middle. We use that as a shorthand abbreviation for God because it is the first letter of the word Theos, the Greek word for God.

X Has a Long and Sacred History

The idea of X as an abbreviation for the name of Christ came into use in our culture with no intent to show any disrespect for Jesus. The church has used the symbol of the fish historically because it is an acronym. Fish in Greek (ichthus) involved the use of the first letters for the Greek phrase “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.” So the early Christians would take the first letter of those words and put those letters together to spell the Greek word for fish. That’s how the symbol of the fish became the universal symbol of Christendom. There’s a long and sacred history of the use of X to symbolize the name of Christ, and from its origin, it has meant no disrespect.

From: https://www.ligonier.org/learn/articles/why-is-x-used-when-it-replaces-christ-in-christmas

Game Summary

Dear Friends – praise the Lord for  Bob Mastin  securing this location at the Thomas Robinson National Stadium in Nassau for today’s Bahamas Bowl! Please pray for Bob and his team evangelizing at today’s game. Kickoff: Noon!

https://sfoi.org/College-Football-Bowl-Games

Daily Devotional 12-20-21

Love Beyond Doubt

I have loved you with an everlasting love.

 Jeremiah 31:3

Sometimes the Lord Jesus tells His Church His love thoughts. “He does not consider it sufficient to declare them behind her back, but in her very presence He says, ‘Behold, you are beautiful, my love.’1 It is true, this is not His ordinary method. He is a wise lover and knows when to hold back the intimation of love and when to declare it; but there are times when He will make no secret of it, times when He will put it beyond all dispute in the souls of His people” (R. Erskine’s Sermons).

The Holy Spirit is often pleased, in a most gracious manner, to witness with our spirits to the love of Jesus. He takes the things of Christ and reveals them to us. No voice is heard from the clouds, and no vision is seen in the night, but we have a testimony more certain than either of these.

If an angel should fly from heaven and inform the believer personally of the Savior’s love for him, the evidence would not be one bit more satisfactory than that which is born in the heart by the Holy Spirit.

Ask the Lord’s people who have lived the nearest to the gates of heaven, and they will tell you that they have had seasons when the love of Christ toward them has been a fact so clear and sure that they could no more doubt it than they could question their own existence.

Yes, dear believer, you and I have had times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord, and then our faith has soared to the heights of assurance. We have had confidence to lean our heads upon the shoulder of our Lord, and we have not questioned our Master’s affection for us. The dark question, “Lord, is it I that will betray You?” has been put far from us. He has kissed us with the kisses of His mouth and killed our doubts by the closeness of His embrace. His love has been sweeter than wine to our souls.

1) Song of Solomon 1:15

From: https://www.truthforlife.org/resources/daily-devotionals/latest/gclid=CjwKCAjwnK36BRBVEiwAsMT8WCR8UteIwaWlAyP4o9ZIuAWio8l7qmAM1nDcB3pFiYr-jOUNkgMsShoC68IQAvD_BwE

Daily Devotional 12-17-21

He Never Ceases to Remember



I remember the devotion of your youth.

 Jeremiah 2:2

Let us note that Christ delights to think upon His Church and to look upon her beauty. As the bird returns often to its nest, and as the traveler hurries to his home, so the mind continually pursues the object of its choice. We cannot look too often upon the face we love; we continually desire to have what is precious to us.

This is also true with our Lord Jesus. From all eternity He has been “delighting in the children of man.”1 His thoughts rolled onward to the time when His elect would be born into the world; He viewed them in the mirror of His foreknowledge. “In your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there were none of them” (Ps. 139:16). When the world was set upon its pillars, He was there, and He set the boundaries of the people according to the number of the children of Israel. Many a time before His incarnation, He descended to this lower earth in the similitude of a man—on the plains of Mamre (Gen. 18), by the brook of Jabbok (Gen. 32:24–30), beneath the walls of Jericho (Josh. 5:13), and in the fiery furnace of Babylon (Dan. 3:19, 25).

The Son of Man visited His people. Because His soul delighted in them, He could not stay away from them, for His heart longed for them. They were never absent from His heart, for He had written their names upon His hands and had graven them upon His side.

As the breastplate containing the names of the tribes of Israel was the most brilliant ornament worn by the high priest, so the names of Christ’s elect were His most precious jewels and glittered on His heart. We may often forget to meditate upon the perfections of our Lord, but He never ceases to remember us. Let us chide ourselves for past forgetfulness, and pray for grace that we might constantly and fondly remember Him. Lord, paint upon the eyeballs of my soul the image of Your Son.

1) Proverbs 8:31

From: https://www.truthforlife.org/resources/daily-devotionals/latest/gclid=CjwKCAjwnK36BRBVEiwAsMT8WCR8UteIwaWlAyP4o9ZIuAWio8l7qmAM1nDcB3pFiYr-jOUNkgMsShoC68IQAvD_BwE

Daily Devotional 12-16-21

Consider Jesus

“Therefore, holy brothers, you who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus.” ( Heb. 3:1 )

“Consider Jesus.” It’s great advice, but life is full of demands, of responsibilities, of distractions, and, yes, things to consider.

“Consider Jesus.” But which one? It seems anyone can have their own. There’s the philosopher, the example, the teacher, the guru, the guide. There are plenty of Jesi to consider. And Jesus indeed is many of these things, but none of them capture who he really is, who he came and comes and will come to be for us.

To make things harder, part of us shrinks back from the idea itself. Considering Jesus means considering a lot of things that we’d much rather file away or set on the back burner. Considering Jesus makes us reexamine our selfish decisions, our shortsighted goals and destructive desires

But yet, “Consider Jesus.” That is the goal set before us this Advent season, and the writer to the Hebrews helps us to do so by placing him next to another Biblical hero, Moses.

When it comes to the Old Testament, Moses is the man. He was the leader of Israel, delivering them from slavery in Egypt. He was the prophet of Israel, speaking to them the Word of God. It was Moses who had taught them to worship as they would worship until the time of Christ. It was Moses who taught them the law that would set them apart as a people until the time of Christ. In the Jewish mind at the time of Christ there could perhaps be no greater man than Moses, and that’s what makes the writer to the Hebrew’s statement so amazing: “For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses—as much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself. (For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.)” Moses was great, but Jesus is greater. Moses was the man, but Jesus is the God-Man, the builder of all things. And so, “Consider Jesus.”

Do you remember what happened when Jesus arrived on the scene and John the Baptist’s disciples noticed that many were leaving to follow him? They complained,

‘Look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.’ They thought they were looking out for John. His congregation was shrinking as many crossed the river to listen to this new preacher named Jesus. John, however, looking out for them, and doing what every preacher and congregation is called to do, explained, ‘He must increase, but I must decrease’ ( John 3:25-30 ).

The same is true for us. In this season where we are so tempted to focus on what I want, what I get, what others do for me, we must remember that this is precisely the time for Christ to increase in us, even as we decrease. Now is the time to prepare to find true peace in the manger, peace found, not in our own will, but in God’s, not in our works, but in this Child’s, not in our plans, but in the plan that brought him down from heaven above to earth.

Moses would have said the same, because the prophets were sent for no other reason than to proclaim the coming of this Jesus, and they longed for nothing more than the fulfillment of that which they proclaimed. Do you remember the Transfiguration? Who appears next to Jesus but Moses, together with Elijah? Jesus, who is the fruition of their message and the realization of their hope.

St. John reminds us in the very beginning of his Gospel, “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ” ( John 1:17 ). As Jesus’ person is greater than Moses, so also Jesus’ message is greater—not more necessary, but greater.

Moses has given us the law. Love God above all, and we haven’t. Love God’s name, and we haven’t. Love God’s Word, and we haven’t. Honor those in authority, and we haven’t. Honor body and life, and we haven’t. Honor God’s gift of sex and your spouse, and we haven’t. Honor each other’s property, and we haven’t. Honor each other’s reputation, and we haven’t. Honor each other’s best interest, and we haven’t.

Moses has given us the law, and the law would give us life if we could keep it, but the problem is that we can’t. Sure, we can make a decent go of things now and again, but that’s only now and again, and only a decent go.

“For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” There will not only be a Baby in the manger this Christmas, but a Baby who will grow in wisdom and stature to become a Man in the waters of the Jordan being baptized, a Man nailed to a cross while being mocked, a Man walking out of a tomb being glorified. To consider Jesus is to ponder more than the hay; it is to walk through the entire Church Year in your head, to call to mind all the Gospels say about him. Moses was sent to keep the house in order, but this Child is sent to bring the house home, and you are part of that house, the household of God.

“Consider Jesus.” No, it’s not easy, but I pray it’s on top of your list, because if Advent passes and you’ve accomplished everything else for Christmas but this, you haven’t gotten anything done. “Consider Jesus.” Yes, there’s a lot to be done, and, yes, there’s a lot of Jesi out there, but this is what the season is about, and this Jesus, the One put forth in God’s Word, born to die for your sins and to rise for your justification, is the One upon which to focus, because he is for you, in every way. All the rest is bells and tinsel—not bad, but not the thing to consider.

From: https://www.1517.org/articles/consider-jesus

Daily Devotional 12-15-21

The Transcendental Interferer…?

We all like to think that there are areas in our life where we are in control.

CS Lewis in  Surprised by Joy  wrote this of his pre-Christian phase: “… But, of course, what mattered most of all was my deep-seated hatred of authority, my monstrous individualism, my lawlessness. No word in my vocabulary expressed deeper hatred than the word INTERFERENCE. But Christianity placed at the centre what then seemed to me a transcendental Interferer. If its picture were true, then no sort of ‘treaty with reality’ could ever be possible. There was no region, even in the innermost depth of one’s soul (nay, there least of all) which one could surround with a barbed wire fence and guard with a notice No Admittance. And that was what I wanted; some area, however small, of which I could say to all other beings, ‘This is my business and mine only’.”

As we prepare for Christmas it’s worth reflecting on one of the most breath-taking moments in history – the angel Gabriel’s announcement to Mary: “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you” (Luke 1:28b). We can appreciate Mary’s perplexity with this supernatural visitation: she wondered what it might mean.

But the angel, sensitive to her apprehension continued, “Do not be afraid, for you have found favor with God. And now you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus… (Luke 1:30-31).

“How can this be, since I have no husband?” Mary responded (Luke 1:34). Even though she was engaged to Joseph, at this point she had clearly not slept with him. And, perhaps like Peter at the time of Jesus’ transfiguration (Luke 9:33), she uttered the first thought that came to mind.

The angel’s response to Mary’s question is unexpected and astonishing (Luke 1:35). It is one of the most awesome statements about Jesus in the whole of Luke. Gabriel clarified for Mary, and for us, just why this baby can be described as truly human and yet divine: ‘God’s Holy Spirit will come upon you,’ he says, and ‘the power of the Most High will overshadow you’. They reflect the life-giving work of God in creation (Genesis 1:2; Psalm 104:30), and in salvation (Ezekiel 37:14).

Mary was a special recipient of God’s grace. God would be with her (future tenses) in the events that were to unfold. His centuries old promises concerning his kingdom and his salvation were about to be fulfilled.

Consider what the angel Gabriel goes on to say to Mary about her baby: “He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end” Luke 1:32f).

The theme of a virgin or young woman bearing a special son found in Isaiah 7:14 is present here. Yet Luke, unlike Matthew, doesn’t reference this. His emphasis is on the son rather than the mother: the baby is to be named Jesus. Furthermore, Luke sets out who the baby is – drawing our attention to the themes of the prophet Nathan’s words to king David in Second Samuel, chapter 7. Nathan speaks of David’s descendent whose name would be great and who would sit on the throne of his father David (2 Samuel 7:9 and 13-16). Furthermore, Nathan speaks of him as God’s son who will rule over God’s people (see also Psalm 7:17 and Daniel 4:24).

We should also note Luke’s contrasting statements about Jesus and John the Baptist. Whereas John would be great before the Lord (Luke 1:15), Jesus would be great in his own right (Luke 1:32). Many will rejoice at John’s birth (Luke 1:14) but God would give Jesus the throne of his father David (Luke 1:32). While John will turn many of the sons of Israel to the Lord their God (Luke 1:16), Jesus will reign over the house of Jacob forever (Luke 1:33).

John would play a significant role in God’s plan, but Jesus would be more significant in every way. John would stand in the tradition of the great prophets, but Jesus would be greater than a prophet. He would not simply stand in the tradition of the kings but would be the king God had promised long ago. (2 Samuel 7:9-16; Psalm 89:14, 19-29, 35-37).

For Luke, Jesus’ connection with David is most important (1:32; 1:69; 2:4; 2:11; 3:31). While Jesus would be given the title Lord after his death and resurrection (Acts 2:29-36), glimpses of this would be seen during the course of his ministry (Luke 18:39; 19:38). This royal figure would be the Son of the Most High (Luke 1:32). His rule would be over Jacob and would be forever (Luke 1:33).

In this remarkable, unexpected scene, Luke records God’s direct and personal involvement in his creation. From the moment of his conception in Mary’s womb, Jesus is understood to be truly man and truly God. God’s kingdom or rule has come into our human experience in a new and personal way. Jesus is truly divine and yet he is from the family of the kings.

Mary’s closing words challenge us: “Here I am, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word” (Luke 1:38).

When we consider this simple yet profound scene the implications are life-changing. They threaten our desire to be in control. Yet when we reflect, we discover an unexpected ray of light and hope for us and for our world. Yes, God is the ‘transcendental interferer’ but his ‘interference’ springs from his amazing heart of love and mercy.

No wonder we sing, Hark! The herald angels sing, … glory to the newborn king.

A prayer. Lord we beseech you, pour out your grace into our hearts; so that, knowing the incarnation of your Son Jesus Christ by the message of an angel, we may be brought to the glory of his resurrection by his cross and passion. We ask this through Jesus Christ who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

From: https://anglicanconnection.com/the-transcendental-interferer/

Daily Devotional 12-14-21

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Game Summary

On December 12, 2021 59,000 Bengal’s fans heard the gospel being proclaimed in the open air before the game. According to one fan, “You are annoying.”

We are praying for fruit from the proclamation of the gospel this season. Also, hecklers are good for business. They help draw a crowd to hear the gospel. May God get the glory as sinners hear the message to repent and believe in Christ.

See the two minute video below: “Bengals Heckler: You are Annoying.”

Romans 10: 17

“So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.

Evangelize Cincinnati

We proclaim the gospel at local sporting events and at the local abortion clinic. We do one-to-one evangelism at the local bus station.

Check our  Evangelism Outreach Schedule  and join us as we Evangelize Cincinnati.

If you are interested in like-minded sports fan outreaches in your area, check out Sports Fan Outreach International. https://sfoi.org/Cincinnati-Bengals

Daily Devotional 12-13-21

More Grace Brings More Joy

. . . Salt without prescribing how much.

 Ezra 7:22

Salt was used in every offering made by fire to the Lord, and with its preserving and purifying properties it was the grateful emblem of divine grace in the soul. It is worthy of our careful attention that when Artaxerxes gave salt to Ezra the priest, he set no limit to the quantity, and we may be quite certain that when the King of kings distributes grace among His royal priesthood, the supply is not cut short by Him.

In ourselves we are often in short supply, but never in the Lord. He who chooses to gather much manna will find that he may have as much as he desires. There is no famine in Jerusalem that causes the citizens to eat their bread by weight and drink their water by measure.

Some things in the economy of grace are measured; for instance our vinegar and gall are given us with such exactness that we never have a single drop too much; but the salt of grace is not restricted in its provision. “Ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.”1

Parents need to lock up the fruit cupboard and the candy jars, but there is no need to keep the salt-box under lock and key, for few children will eat too greedily from that.

A man may have too much money or too much honor, but he cannot have too much grace. When Jeshurun grew fat, he forsook God, but there is no fear of a man’s becoming too full of grace: A plethora of grace is impossible. More wealth brings more care, but more grace brings more joy. Increased wisdom is increased sorrow, but an abundance of the Spirit is fullness of joy.

Believer, go to the throne for a large supply of heavenly salt. It will season your afflictions, which are unsavory without salt; it will preserve your heart, which grows corrupt if salt is absent; and it will kill your sins even as salt kills reptiles. You need much; seek much and have much.

1) John 15:7

From: https://www.truthforlife.org/resources/daily-devotionals/latest/gclid=CjwKCAjwnK36BRBVEiwAsMT8WCR8UteIwaWlAyP4o9ZIuAWio8l7qmAM1nDcB3pFiYr-jOUNkgMsShoC68IQAvD_BwE

Game Summary

Sport Fan Outreach International – Open Air Preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ at the Mercedes Benz Stadium this morning. “For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bond-servants for Jesus’ sake.” 2 Corinthians 4:5 NASB1995

https://sfoi.org/Atlanta-Falcons