Well, it’s begun: the season of Advent. This year will you join me with fresh eyes as we journey with Mary and Joseph, the angels and the shepherds to Bethlehem? True, you’ve heard it all before but this year, I pray that I offer to you an ability to go deeper. To stretch your mind beyond what you have learned and heard. So that when you look at the nativity scene here or even a nativity in yard, you will think of each of the individuals that God tapped for this great event anew. In these five weeks, with the assistance of Adam Hamilton, pastor at The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection*, I want to show you how you can come even closer to God in the heart of the story, using the tools available to us through archeologists, Biblical scholars and most importantly the Bible, allowing the Word of God to touch us deeply! In the coming weeks we’ll grapple with these questions: What actually happened leading up to and including the first Christmas? What does the story teach us about the character of God? What does it tell us about the child whose birth we celebrate? What does this story mean for our lives?
And so we come to the beginning. The scriptures tell us that God sent Gabriel to a town in the region of Galilee called Nazareth: Mary’s home. So what do Biblical scholars know about Nazareth?
And so we come to the beginning. The scriptures tell us that God sent Gabriel to a town in the region of Galilee called Nazareth: Mary’s home. So what do Biblical scholars know about Nazareth?
Today, it is a booming metropolis with almost 70,000 people. But it wasn’t always that way. Actually, it wasn’t mentioned prior to Gabriel coming to Mary. The Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, mentions 63 villages in Galilee, Nazareth is not one of them. Josephus, 1st century historian mentioned 45 Galilean towns, but does not speak of Nazareth. Historians estimate that Nazareth had between 100-400 residences.
Mary was one of them! And, how did this handful of farmers, shepherds, trades men and laborers survive in such a small town? Just about an hours walk was Sepphoris, a city of 30,000. Mary’s family likely spent their days in Sepphoris making a living. If you decide to join the Bible Study beginning on Wednesday or on Monday, December 5th, you will glean much more history of Nazareth.
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