2 Peter 1:13-18 Yea, I think it meet, as long as I am in this tabernacle, to stir you up by putting you in remembrance; 14 Knowing that shortly I must put off this my tabernacle, even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath shewed me. 15 Moreover I will endeavor that ye may be able after my decease to have these things always in remembrance. 16 For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty. 17 For he received from God the Father honor and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. 18 And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy mount.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary always announces it’s “word of the year”. This year the “word of the year” is “AUTHENTIC”, which means “not false or imitation, real, actual”. Sadly, I don’t think most people understand what the word actually means. What I’ve seen advertised is “be your AUTHENTIC self”, and they attach this to transgenderism or some other abnormal fetish. Being authentic today is subjective, meaning to be true to your feelings. John Stonestreet of Breakpoint notes:

“This new definition of “authentic,” that what I feel inside is the highest truth, would have baffled people in centuries past and still baffles many non-Westerners today. However, the real problem is that this new definition of “authentic” is utter nonsense. Truth is not primarily subjective but objective. Reality is not decided by individuals but given by a Creator. One of the things our Creator both demands of us and enables us to do through redemption is conform our inner selves to His will and design, which He reveals, objectively, in both creation and Scripture.”

Comedian and Author Brad Stein – also a conservative Christian – said he had no problem understanding the difference between male and female as a child. He had a sister, and one Christmas his parents got them both bicycles. The girl’s bike has a bar in front of the seat that goes downward to the lower frame, whereas his bike – a boy’s bike – has a bar that is horizontal in front of the seat. Brad said that the first time he was standing up and slipped off the petals – he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt he was a boy!

That’s AUTHENTIC!

Of all the religions in the world, the Apostle wants us to know that Christianity is not based on myths or legend.

Christianity is GREATER THAN all these other religions, because Christianity was founded by God Himself, Who became the Messiah or the Christ.

The very “WORD” that created all things came into the world. The Bible says:

John 1:1-3 (ESV) In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without Him was not any thing made that was made.

But it doesn’t stop here. The text then tells us

John 1:14 (ESV) And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us …

God became Man, Perfect Man, Sinless Man and dwelt among us. He was seen of others. The Bible tells us there is a God – and the Christ made flesh PROVES there is a God.

Jesus Proves There Is A God, And
Eyewitnesses Prove There Is A Jesus

Before Jesus came, people believed there was a God Who created all things. Yet there was much misunderstanding about this God. Then Jesus came – Perfect Man, God became Man. The Prophets foresaw the coming of God in the flesh, the “Immanuel”.

Isaiah 7:14 (ESV) Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.

The Gospels witness the coming of Christ. When God sent an angel to Mary to tell her that she had been chosen to carry the Messiah (Luke 1:26-35), Mary responded by saying “How can this be? I am a virgin.” Mary was betrothed to Joseph, and had yet to consummate their wedding. The Angel told her “The Holy Spirit will come to you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the holy child developing inside you will be called the Son of God.” (GWT). Mary agreed to this. But there’s one problem.

Joseph.
Joseph Witnesses That Jesus Is The Messiah.

When Joseph found out that Mary was pregnant – and he knew he wasn’t the father – the Bible says:

Matthew 1:19 (ESV) … her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.

Had Joseph raised a fuss – had he went to the High Priest and demanded that Mary be punished – under the Law of God Mary could have been stoned with stones until she was dead (Leviticus 20:10). I’m sure that Joseph was heartbroken at first. And yet, he was not vengeful. Joseph decided to “divorce her quietly”. When he went to bed that night the Bible says:

Matthew 1:20-25 (ESV) … an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, (meaning “God our Savior”) for he will save his people from their sins.” 22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: 23 “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). 24 When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, 25 but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.

Here we have three witnesses to Christ. We have the Angel, who quotes the Prophetic Witness. Then we have Joseph Himself. Joseph had, as a young bridegroom, planned on taking Mary off on a honeymoon. He planned on being with her intimately. He hoped to raise a family. But Joseph surrendered his plans to God. The Bible says Joseph “knew her not until she had given birth to a son”. He put off his own intimate plans until the Messiah came into the world. Joseph would go on to have other children by Mary (see Matthew 13:55-56; Mark 6:3), so Jesus would have step brothers and step sisters.

After Jesus resurrected from the Grave He would make an appearance to His step brother James (1 Corinthians 15:7) – ANOTHER WITNESS. Jesus encouraged His other brothers to meet Him in Galilee (Matthew 28:10). Joseph both protected Mary and Jesus, and honored the Lord by being there through Jesus’ early years.

Had Mary been pregnant because of promiscuity, Joseph would have never stayed with her. This is a powerful witness to the Messiah. But we have greater witnesses.

We have the eyewitness accounts of the martyrs of our faith. Peter wrote:

2 Peter 1:13-14 Yea, I think it meet, as long as I am in this tabernacle, to stir you up by putting you in remembrance; 14 Knowing that shortly I must put off this my tabernacle, even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath shewed me.

skēnōma Peter speaks of being “in this tabernacle” in verse 13, and in verse 14 says “shortly I must put off this my tabernacle”. The word “tabernacle” is the Greek skēnōma, which means “a skin tent in which one dwells”. In the Old Testament the “tabernacle” – a manmade tent designed to worship God in – preceded the Temple that Solomon built. Peter is not talking about the Old Testament Tabernacle, but of his own body. The Apostle often spoke of the human body as a skēnōma or a temporary abode for the soul. The Apostle Paul wanted every Christian to know that our bodies that we now have are but skēnōma, temporary tents that our souls inhabit, until we get to Heaven. The Scripture promises:

2 Corinthians 5:1 For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle (skēnōma) were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house (oikia, a proper residence) not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

Often “we groan in our present tent (skēnōma)” (2 Corinthians 5:4), and look forward to the time we can be with the Lord in Heaven. Peter said that “shortly I must put off this my tabernacle”, that is, his soul must soon leave his body. Why? He said “even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath shewed me”. Peter knew that he was going to be crucified for his faith in Christ. Jesus had previously told Peter:

John 21:18-19 (ESV) Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.” 19 (This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.) And after saying this he said to him, “Follow me.”

Peter was told to follow Jesus. Our Lord told Peter that “you will stretch out your hands”, a reference to his own crucifixion. Of all of the original disciples, only John (the brother of James the Greater, a son of Zebedee) died a natural death around 96 AD. Before he died, John was boiled in oil then exiled to a desert island called Patmos to die. Consider the other disciples:

Andrew was crucified, bound not nailed in Greece
Bartholomew was skinned alive and crucified in West Asia
James the Lesser (son of Alphaeus) was stoned and clubbed
Jude (Thaddeus) beaten with a club then crucified 72 AD Turkey
Matthew (Levi) staked and speared to the ground Ethiopia
Simon Peter crucified 68 AD
Philip tortured, impaled by iron hooks 54 AD in Egypt
Simon (The Canaanite) crucified 74 AD then sawn in half
Thomas (Didymus) speared to death in India
Mark (John Mark) dragged to death
Luke (The Physician) hanged on an olive tree
Paul (Saul) beheaded 66 AD
James (Christ’s stepbrother) thrown 100 feet off a wall, beaten

The two earliest martyrs (outside of Christ our Lord) was James the Greater (John’s brother) was stabbed and beheaded (Acts 12:2), and the Evangelist and Deacon Stephen (Acts 7:59) who was stoned to death. What does all this have to do with the proof of Christ. I’ll explain.

Many parents teach their children about the mythical Santa Claus and more recently the Elf on a Shelf. The concept of Santa Claus is actually based on a Christian Pastor called Saint Nicolas of Myra (March 15, 270 – December 6, 343 AD). The original Saint Nicolas preached in Turkey. The Santa Claus of the North Pole with all the elves is a myth, a fable parents tell their children. Certainly it is done in good fun, and I’m not trying to be a Scrooge, or to judge you parents. But I do have a point.

Would you die for Santa Claus?
Would you be skinned alive and crucified for Saint Nick?
Would you be hung on meat hooks, and beaten to death,
To preserve the myth of that jolly Fat Man?

Some people have died for a lie, not knowing that it was a lie. In World War II, Japanese Kamikati Pilots would take an aircraft loaded with explosives and fly them into ships. They were told by the Emperor of Japan that their actions would earn them “Paradise”. More recently, Muslim terrorists have become suicide bombers because some half baked holy “Ian” told them they would earn “Paradise”. They died for a lie – but they didn’t know it was a lie. A religious group called “Heaven’s Gate” committed mass suicide (39 people) March 22-23, 1997 when they were convinced by their leader that they had to leave their bodies to achieve a higher state of “being”. Or you may have heard of Jim Jones, leader of the People’s Temple, led 909 people to murder-suicide. The devil can convince people that evil is good. As Jesus said, “The devil is a liar, and the father of it” (John 8:44).

No one would suffer martyrdom knowing that
they were dying for a myth or a lie.

The Christian martyrs died willingly in horrific ways because they were eyewitnesses to the reality of Jesus Christ. This is Peter’s point here:

The Eyewitness Accounts Were Not Delusions,
But Reality That More Than One Saw

2 Peter 1:16 For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

The Apostle tells us that what he has seen are not “cunningly devised fables”. This is the Greek sophizō mythos, which means “inventive or clever myths”. These are not delusions or visions from false prophets like Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism. Smith said that in 1820 the Father and the Son visited him ALONE and told him that ALL CHRISTIAN CHURCHES were corrupt. Three years later, Smith declared that the Angel Moroni visited him ALONE and gave him an everlasting gospel on golden plates called The Book of Mormon.

The founder of Islam, Mohammad claimed that when he was in the Cave of Hira, three kilometers from Mecca, Saudi Arabia, that the Angel Gabriel came and told him ALONE that he was the true Messiah and prophet. Only Mohammad saw Gabriel in that cave.

Charles Taze Russell, the founder of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Ellen G. White the founder of the Seventh Day Adventists all had one on one ALONE “encounters with God”. Yet their assertions do not ring true, as there are no other witnesses that were there when an Angel or God spoke to them.

This is not the case with Christianity. Peter said, “we WEre eyewitnesses of his majesty”. The Law of God given in the Old Testament did not allow one person to establish something as truth. The Law stated:

Deuteronomy 19:15 (ESV) … Only on the evidence of two witnesses or of three witnesses shall a charge be established.

The Apostle Paul, trained by the great Rabbi Gamaliel, well knew this requirement. He wrote:

2 Corinthians 13:1 (ESV) This is the third time I am coming to you. Every charge must be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.

Two or three witnesses was God’s requirement on the seriousness of anything. “Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of TWO OR THREE WITNESSES” (Hebrews 10:28, ESV). Peter says that they are not following cunning myths, but they “were eyewitnesses of his majesty”. Peter says of Jesus,

2 Peter 1:17-18 For He {Jesus} received from God the Father honor and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. 18 And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy mount.

What is Peter speaking of? Jesus had three disciples that He chose from out of the twelve for special training. These were Peter, James and John. James and John were brothers, the Sons of Zebedee (Mark 3:16-17), and friends of Peter. All three were fishermen who had worked together, and had been with Jesus the longest (Luke 5:4-11). When Jesus resurrected Jairus’ daughter from death, only Peter, James and John were with Him (Mark 5:37).

One day Jesus called these three to go with Him:

Mark 9:2-4 (ESV) And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, 3 and his clothes became radiant, intensely white, as no one on earth could bleach them. 4 And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, and they were talking with Jesus.

Three men saw Jesus transfigured, and saw Jesus speaking with Elijah and Moses. These three men would not only see this, but would hear God the Father speak from Heaven saying “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased”. Peter, who would later become the leader of all the Apostles, and James the leader of the Church of Jerusalem, would both eventually suffer horrible deaths for preaching the Gospel of Christ. They would not recant. John would be horribly tortured and abandoned to die – but by the Grace of God he would live.

Christmas Is All About The Witnesses For
The Christ’s First Coming

On January 28, 1986 the US Space Shuttle Challenger was about to be launched. The engineer in charge of the rocket boosters, Alan McDonald, told NASA not to launch the Challenger. Though threatened and scorned, Alan stood his ground. The supervisors at NASA vetoed Alan. 73 seconds after launch Challenger exploded, killing 6 people. The University of Virginia noted that the disaster cost the United States over three BILLION dollars.

It didn’t have to happen.

Christmas is a time when we celebrate the coming of Christ – the one and only Messiah – into the world. God became Man, Perfect Man. His conception, His birth, and His later life was well documented by a might cloud of witnesses. The first witnesses were Shepherds, who were told by the Angel of the Lord:

Luke 2:10-12 Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. 11 For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. 12 And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

The Shepherds went to Bethlehem, saw Jesus, and went about the countryside telling others what they had seen. They saw “a Savior, which is Christ the Lord”. He is the Savior of His people. He came to the lowest to raise us to the highest. Eight days after His birth, Jesus was taken to the Temple to be dedicated and circumcised (Luke 2:21). There an old man named Simeon saw Jesus … for the Holy Spirit had promised that he would not die before he saw the Christ (Luke 2:26). Seeing Jesus, this old man …

Luke 2:28 (AP) … took Jesus up in his arms, and blessed God, saying, “Lord, let me now depart this earth in peace, just as You promised. My EYES have SEEN Your salvation, the Savior You sent for all people, both for the Gentiles and the Jews.”

Witnessing Christ, Simeon was prepared for death. You are not equipped for life until you are prepared for death. Are you prepared? Have you “seen” Jesus by the eye of faith? Have you received Him as Lord and Savior? If you have, you are ready for not just eternity – but for what tomorrow will hold.

Oh, how I pray that God the Holy Spirit touch your hearts, and lead you to Jesus. May God make it so. May God make it so. Amen and Amen.