The vital importance of baptism

By Pastor Paul, Director, Bibles for Mideast

Our Lord's birth, baptism, crucifixion, death, resurrection and ascension—all happened for the salvation of the whole of humanity. When we accept Jesus, from that day forward we are partakers of His birth, baptism, crucifixion, death, resurrection and ascension. 

In accepting Jesus as our personal savior and Lord, we must totally reject the world, flesh and Satan. Our ‘old person’ is crucified and dead with Christ. Our dead self must then be buried with Christ, something a pastor or elder of His holy Church helps with.

Immersion in the baptismal waters by a Church leader represents our burial in Christ Jesus. When the pastor raises us out of the water, we are ‘resurrected with Christ’, new creations. From then onwards we clothe ourselves with Messiah Jesus by the Heavenly Father through the Holy Spirit. All is new. This is a Christian's birth in Jesus Christ (see:  Rom. 6:3-5; Gal. 3:27; Col.2:12-13;  Titus 3:6-7). 

In 2 Corinthians 5:17 we read: "So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! " This is not renovating, overpainting or whitewashing. We become absolutely new in Jesus Christ. 

In 2 Corinthians 5:17 we read: "So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! " This is not renovating, overpainting or whitewashing. We become absolutely new in Jesus Christ. 

In 2 Corinthians 5:17 we read: "So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! " This is not renovating, overpainting or whitewashing. We become absolutely new in Jesus Christ. 

In 2 Corinthians 5:17 we read: "So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! " This is not renovating, overpainting or whitewashing. We become absolutely new in Jesus Christ. 

There is only one God with three personalities—the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. All these personalities ‘seal’ the baptized person together in baptism. They witness the baptism and accept the ‘new creation’ as a citizen of heaven.

When Jesus underwent his own baptism by John the Baptist, the gates of heaven opened and the Holy Spirit came down and rested on him (see Luke 3:21–22 and elsewhere).

Happy, blessed and prosperous New Year to you!

“The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves.  He will take great delight in you; He will quiet you with His love [making no mention of your past sins]; He will rejoice over you with singing.”  (Zeph. 3:17)

“ ‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’ ”  (Jer. 29:11)

Please continue praying for us, our ministry Bibles for Mideast and the Assembly of Loving God Church, our pastors, ministers, staff, believers and all seekers, prayer partners and contributors. 

With prayers, love and Shalom
In the mighty name of Jesus

Pastor Paul (Director)
Bibles for Mideast

JESUS and His mission: visible in all Creation, through all time, and in ways still being revealed

God reveals His Son and the Truths of salvation in so many ways and means all throughout history and Creation, just one powerful example being what the prophet Isaiah recorded in Isaiah 9:6.

He also has an interesting way of hiding truths for us to discover, and here is one we recently came upon. The very names of Jacob’s sons, taken together, point to God’s plan for us. When we put the meanings of their names together, we can see the gospel ‘hidden’ there.

First, the names and their meanings:

Reuben: Behold, a son is born to us
Simeon: One who hears
Levi: Attached or joined
Judah: Praise
Dan: He judged
Naphtali: Struggling or wrestling
Gad: Good fortune, or a troop
Asher: Happiness
Issachar: Wages, reward
Zebulun: Honour
Joseph: Add or increase
Benjamin: ‘Son of my right hand’; considering Benjamin’s constant faithfulness to his father, we could interpret this ‘son of righteousness’.

Stitching the names together, we have this:

Behold, a son is born to us, one who hears us and became joined to us. Praise the Lord. He judged our struggles and brought us good fortune and fellowship, happiness, reward, honor. He added us to his family and called us sons of righteousness.

Clearly, Jesus is the scarlet thread joining all of the Bible, all of Creation, together in God’s grand redemptive story, HIStory.

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Our great thanks to Natan Lawrence, who as far as we know was the first to glean and write about this. You can read his post here: Hidden Message in the Names of the 12 Tribes.

Exciting update: entire Muslim village now Christian!

The health of Pastors Shah* and Asif*, attacked in the remote mountain village where they live and serve in Central Asia, continues to improve [original story here: Urgent prayer request: Pastors attacked and church demolished by terrorists]. We praise God for all 45 families of the village who stand with the ministers, encouraging and helping them in their recovery. The other injured individuals have almost fully recovered as well. We thank everyone who has been praying for them.

As reported two weeks ago, several local youngsters, influenced by outside extremists, had demolished the church, health clinic, sewing school and education center, all which had been set up by the pastors. Both ministers as well as a number of believers, including children, had suffered serious injuries. The young attackers’ parents and other elders in the village severely reprimanded them, and advised them to ask the pastors’ forgiveness.

The village’s medical student, home on vacation, paid the young men a visit and full of the love of Christ (with plans to become a missionary doctor), counselled them similarly. They finally agreed.

All the villagers, including the young men, then joined forces and chased the militants from their town. The former ‘temporary terrorists’ then approached the pastors and asked forgiveness for what they had done. The ministers embraced them with brotherly love and prayed for them.

The villagers have since been working hard to rebuild the tin sheet church and the health clinic, all under the leadership of the young people.

Before the attack, 27 of the village’s families counted themselves believers. The other 18 families remained Muslim, but had no complaints against either the church or their fellow villagers who became Christian. The boys who had joined with the terrorists and persecuted the church had come from those families.

To dedicate the newly-constructed church, the pastors held three days prayer and fasting in the building, from Thursday through Saturday.  Even though still weak, Pastors Shah and Asif led the services, with all the villages’ 45 families taking part! 

By the end of the three days, every single one of the those Muslims accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior. So the whole village, in an otherwise entirely Muslim-dominated region, has become Christian!

Thank you for your prayers for the Assembly of Loving God Church and Bibles for Mideast. Please pray now as we prepare for baptismal services for the new believers, as well as for all future activities of the church.

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* Names changed for security reasons

Hanukkah/Chanukah lights the way to Christmas

The Jewish festival Hanukkah, also known as the Feast of Dedication or the Festival of Lights, has just begun.* After the victory of the Maccabees (from the priestly line of Aaron) over the Syrian Greek army, the eight-day holiday celebrates the rededication of Jerusalem's holy temple in 164 B.C.

In 167 B.C., the Maccabees rebelled against the Syrian king Antiochus IV, who desecrated the temple in Jerusalem with an altar to the pagan god Zeus, and tried forcibly to Hellenize the Jews.

After three to four years of fighting, the Jewish zealots, led by Judah the Maccabee, miraculously experienced victory over the mighty Greek forces and defeated the evil king. They demolished the defiled old altar, built a new one, and rededicated the temple. According to the story, they could find only one vessel of sanctified oil, enough for one day of burning candles, yet it somehow lasted eight days. The menorah, or eight-branched candelabrum often associated with Hanukkah, commemorates those miraculous eight days of burning.

The rededication of the Temple to the God of Israel is celebrated during Hanukkah, officially established by King Hezekiah (see 2 Chron. 29:17). John’s gospel also briefly mentions the holiday: "Then came the Festival of Dedication at Jerusalem. It was winter, …” (John 10:22).

The menorah lighting may well be the most familiar tradition of Hanukkah. Holding nine candles, the central light of the menorah, the shamash, is used to kindle the other eight. During the holiday, the first candle of the eight-branched lamp is lit on the first day; two candles on the second day, and so on until the eighth day when all the candles would be lit. Before the menorah is lit, celebrants often sing special blessings and then traditional songs afterward.

It is also customary to play dreidel, a four-sided spinning top bearing the Hebrew letters nun, gimmel, hei and shin, derived from the words nes gadol hayah sham, which translates to ‘a great miracle happened there.’

Hanukkah celebrations include much feasting as well, with many Jewish households enjoying foods fried in oil, particularly potato pancakes (latkes) and jam-filled donuts (sufganiyot).. Other Hanukkah customs include exchanging gifts and rewarding children for positive behavior and devotion to Torah study throughout the year.

Hanukkah then serves as a reminder of a crucial time in history when God saved the Jewish people and their religion from being annihilated by Antiochus. The Lord remained faithful to the Jews, allowing them to defeat the powerful Greeks against all odds. 

Had the evil king succeeded, there would have been no Jewish woman named Mary to become the mother of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world. Hanukkah then celebrates a God capable of doing supernatural things, both in biblical times and right now. 

So it’s important for Christians to understand the significance of this holiday, as it prepared the way for the birth and ministry of Jesus and reminds us of God's faithfulness and power—even in the most impossible situations. 

2000 years later, the oil of the Holy Spirit has not dried up. The glow of nine candles burning together is far brighter than one. Though we may not fully understand all that God is doing, we know that one day, “All the earth will be filled with the glory of the Lord.” (Num.14:21; Ps.72:19; Isaiah 6:3;  Hab. 2:14) 

A foreshadowing of Christmas

Think of it. The menorah in the Jerusalem temple — holding, bearing the light — so aptly represents Mary, the virgin who bore Jesus. The light, then and now, stands for the Light of the world, Jesus Christ. Oil symbolizes the Holy Spirit, a recurring reference in both Old and New Testaments (i.e., 1 Sam. 16:13). The overshadowing power of the Most High God is always the miracle.

“And the angel said to her in reply, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the Holy One to be born will be called the Son of God.’ ” (Luke 1:35).

The Jewish people celebrated Hanukkah about 160 years before the birth of Jesus Christ. Knowing how the Old Testament prefigures so much of the Truth in the New Testament, it seems an easy conclusion to see ‘Chanukah’ (a more traditional spelling) as a foretelling of the annual Christmas celebration. Interesting also that Chanukah starts on Kislev 25 and Christmas is on December 25. While we know the birth of Jesus Christ really didn’t happen in winter time, it still seems a divine God-incidence. And how about the fact that Hanukkah celebrations last eight days, the same length of time between Christmas and New Year’s.

Of additional and most significant note, the Hebrew word ‘shamash’ for the central candle of the menorah—the one which lights all the others—means ‘servant’. What a bright visual symbol of Jesus, whose bringing the Light of salvation to the world we celebrate annually around the very same time!

Jesus said this about himself: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).

 By Pastor Paul, Director, Bibles for Mideast (with editing and small additions by Susanna Perry-Ettel)

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* This year Hanukkah began on the evening of December 2nd and ends at sunset on December 9th.

Bibles for Mideast and the Assembly of Loving God (ALG) pray you have a Merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year!    "May the eyes of our Lord be upon you from the beginning of the year to the very end of the year.” (Deut. 11:12)   If the Holy Spirit leads you to participate with our Bible Distribution Ministry or to provide our ministers with a Christmas/New Year’s blessing, please click HERE.

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