by Pastor Ray Viola | Dec 21, 2023 | Devotionals
The celebration of Christmas is not the celebration of something, it is the celebration of Someone, and that Someone is Jesus Christ. Let’s just take a moment to ponder and wonder at what God did when He became a man. Somehow, in a miraculous, marvelous, mysterious...
by Pastor Ray Viola | Dec 20, 2023 | Devotionals
As we saw yesterday, the very first promise of the incarnation of the Messiah was given in Genesis 3:15: “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” This prophecy of...
by Pastor Ray Viola | Dec 19, 2023 | Devotionals
The incarnation, or human birth of Jesus Christ, was not His beginning. Jesus Christ is Emmanuel, God with us. He is the Uncreated Word Who was in the beginning with God, and was God Himself! This is what Scripture declares to be the blessed mystery of godliness. God...
by Pastor Ray Viola | Dec 18, 2023 | Devotionals
In both Testaments the Lord declares that His people shall be holy, for He is holy. Our God is a holy God. There is nothing impure or unclean about Him. He is pure because He is holy. The holiness of which we speak implies a separateness, or setting apart. Of course,...
by Pastor Ray Viola | Dec 17, 2023 | Contemporary Christianity
Jesus made this statement before His disciples in the area of Caesarea Philippi (Matt 16:13-18). After our heavenly Father revealed to Peter that Jesus is indeed the Christ (Messiah), the Son of the living God, Jesus told him that he was blessed to receive that...