Philip Church

I published this on the Laidlaw College blog a few years ago. I thought I might say it again Was Jesus really born in a stable? The traditional Christmas story, played out in numerous nativity pageants around the world every year has Joseph and a highly pregnant Mary knocking on doors in Bethlehem, being turned away from every place, and ending up in a stable where Jesus is born. When I looked at the text again this year that picture did not seem quite right. Luke 2:4-7 explains, 4 Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5 He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. The text explai...

In 1996 my wife Dorothy and I went to Israel. At that time I had no idea of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and knew little about Zionism. It happened to be around the time of the Feast of Tabernacles, and in Jerusalem, I was mystified when I kept encountering Christians asking me if I had “come up to the feast.” I was unaware at the time, but I now know that the “International Christian Embassy Jerusalem” organizes tours to Israel for Christians who want to do just that. They set themselves up in 1980 when about a dozen countries moved their embassies to Tel Aviv after Israel declared unilateral ownership of Jerusalem. It was an act of protest over that, because they felt that Jerusalem was too important to not have an international Christian presence. Ironically the Israeli Government gave them a house that was formerly owned by a wealthy Christian Palestinian family who had been ejected from it. About 5,000 Christians usually attend the 9 day festival. Then, on one October Su...