The word “epiphany” comes from the Greek word “epiphaneia,” which means “manifestation” or “appearance.” In the Christian tradition, the Epiphany is considered to be the day when the divinity of Jesus was revealed to the world through the visit of the Magi, also known as the three wise men or kings, who brought gifts to the newborn Jesus [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses For Advent & Christmas
Our Lord Jesus Christ | Nativity | Advent | Christmas
Birth of our Lord Jesus Christ
We pray through Advent that we be redeemed
Our Lord Jesus Christ be with us
Daily Bible Verses For Advent | Gospel Faith | Sin | Healing | John the Baptist’s Messengers to Jesus
John the Baptist has been imprisoned for speaking the truth about how the people should prepare themselves to be fit for the coming of the Kingdom. It may seem strange that he now sends to Jesus to ask him if he is indeed the one to come, the Messiah. Does John now doubt that Jesus is the Son of God?
Advent | True Faith | Christianity | Baptism | Prepare Ye The Way Of The Lord | Clean And Pure In Jesus
The message of this Sunday’s Gospel is so clear and so perfect. John has come to prepare the way of the Lord. He is not the Lord; he is come to prepare his way, the way of Christ.
The opening of John’s Gospel may be heard this week as a beautiful restatement from a new point of view of the message of the coming of the Lord and the beginning of Christ’s ministry [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses Advent & Christmas | The Witness Of John The Baptist | A Burning And Shining Light
Jesus pays tribute to John as a great prophet, bringing the truth of God to the people, as a burning and a shining light. There is perhaps a veiled rebuke as Jesus reminds the people that they flocked to him for a period, as if theirs was a fickle and fleeting regard. Nonetheless, Jesus speaks of John now to help the people, because John witnessed Christ and that witness could help people to believe and so be saved [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses Advent & Christmas | Sin, Redemption, Baptism | True Faith | John The Baptist, More Than A Prophet
Jesus pays tribute to John the Baptist is a way which is enormously encouraging to the crowds. He teaches them that they have already begun to respond to God’s call. They have searched for God, and they have travelled on pilgrimage to see John the Baptist, who was not something flimsy and delicate but a prophet, and the greatest of the prophets at that, because he is nearest to Christ, especially called to prepare the way and to point Christ out to his followers [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | True Faith | Baptism And Prayer | John The Baptist Bears Witness To Jesus
Jesus and his disciples have moved south into Judea, and Jesus and John are baptizing people very near to one other. John’s location is precisely stated in these Gospel verses: he is at Aenon, an Aramaic word meaning wells, near Salim, which was to the northeast of Samaria, about thirteen miles to the south of the Sea of Galilee. In these verses, John’s Gospel develops the information given to us in the Synoptics: we learn that Jesus’ public ministry began while John the Baptist’s was current, and that there was no rivalry between Jesus and John; indeed, that John the Baptist rejoiced in Jesus’ beginning his ministry [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Calling Of The First Disciples
The first two disciples called by Jesus are disciples of John the Baptist. It is he who looks to Jesus and directs his disciples to look and so behold the Lamb of God. They are sent by John, through being told by him to recognize Jesus. John shows them the way to Jesus – as ‘the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord.’ [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Finding Of Jesus In The Temple | The Hidden Life Of Jesus At Nazareth
The infancy narratives of Jesus are more than mere history. Luke’s accounts of Jesus’ infancy constitute a theological and Christological prologue to his Gospel. Many great truths of the Gospels are here prefigured. We may think of the Jesus’ infancy narratives given to us in Luke as a beautiful gateway, through which we enter to encounter the Gospels as a whole. This would certainly be appropriate to the spirit of our celebrations of Christmas, when we rejoice that God has answered our calls to be with us, as we celebrate the great mystery of the Incarnation [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses Advent & Christmas | The Nativity Of The Lord | Christ Is Born | The Shepherds Hear The Good News | Christmas Midnight And Dawn
Jesus is born into what must have been, for Mary and Joseph, the most trying, indeed tedious, of circumstances. Who of us likes filling in a tax return? And we don’t usually have to travel to a different city to do so, let alone know that our taxes are dictated by a foreign and conquering power [ … ]