Barbara Rainey mentors women in their most important relationships. She loves encouraging women to believe God and experience Him in every area of their lives.
Samantha: When Barbara Rainey considers the connection between Christmas and Easter, she’s flooded with gratitude—thankful for the hope we have of life after death. That hope sustains her through difficulty.
Barbara Rainey: I thought by now in my life I would have arrived and that the Christian life would be easier. And I thought I wouldn't struggle with as many things as I did when I was younger, but it's not true. We will struggle with all the things that God calls us to do until we leave this world and go to the next one. So Easter is why I love Christmas because without Easter, without Jesus' victory over death, Christmas would be meaningless.
Samantha: You’re listening to the Barbara Rainey Podcast from Ever Thine Home, a ministry dedicated to helping you experience God in your home.
Thanks for joining us today! If you’re not already a subscriber to Barbara’s Friends and Family, make sure you do that. As a member, you’ll have access to more podcast episodes and other content from Barbara. You can sign up at BarbaraRainey.substack.com. If you’re already part of Barbara’s Friends and Family, thanks for subscribing!!
Now, be sure to listen to the end, because I’ll share with you how you can receive a beautiful print that will communicate hope and God’s truth to your heart this Christmas and all year long.
Not long ago, Barbara spoke to a gathering of women in Hot Springs, Arkansas. In this episode and the next, we’ll listen to her message, called “When Christmas Came.” Here’s Barbara.
Barbara: Well, I love Christmas, as most people do, but in the last few years I've really learned some interesting things about Christmas that have not so much changed my love for it, but I think I've changed my perception and what I think about Christmas. I want to share those with you tonight.
There are four things that I want to share about Christmas and when Christmas came.
1. When Christmas came, it was with surprise in mind.
There was a surprise planned in Christmas from the very, very beginning. Most of us love surprises, don't we? Especially at Christmas. There's something about presents and the surprise of opening them and surprising the one that you give it to. It's all wrapped up in our excitement at the Christmas season. Surprise means something unexpected or something unanticipated or something unforeseen, and we like that element about the holiday.
I want to take you on a little journey to Bethlehem and think about what that might have been like in the days of the first Christmas in Bethlehem. Imagine that Jewish world and that little town on that first Christmas Eve.
When I was thinking about Bethlehem as I was thinking this through, I thought, you know what? Probably was a little bit like that very small town in the Netherlands called Haarlem, where Corrie Ten Boom grew up. I don't know how many of you know who Corrie Ten Boom was, but she grew up in a real small town and in 1940 the Netherlands was invaded by the Nazi army, and when they came in, they came in with all their soldiers and all their tanks. And the country of Netherlands was occupied territory for many years. And when they would go out into the streets, there were soldiers everywhere with guns and they were controlling their lives.
Well, that's a lot like the world in the time when Jesus was born, because the Jewish people who lived in what was once the nation of Israel were living in occupied territory. The Romans were in charge and they had soldiers everywhere, and the soldiers were controlling the people's lives and some of the soldiers were mean, and they would make life miserable for the people. Some of them weren't so mean, but they lived in occupied territory. So when Christmas came, they weren't prepared for it, were they?
There's a poem about Christmas that has a little stanza that talks about what life was like in Bethlehem, and it goes like this.
‘Twas the night before Christmas, but nobody knew.
No stockings, no ornaments, no gifts or good news.
All the people were anxious. All the people felt fear.
Now listen, I'll tell you why Christmas came near.
So that first Christmas Eve in Bethlehem, everybody went to bed that night, and nobody knew anything was going to happen. And that first Christmas day in Bethlehem and in all of that region, everybody woke up, and nobody knew anything had happened except a few shepherds. Nobody knew that the world had just been changed. So Christmas came with quite a surprise.
But who did God plan to surprise with that first Christmas? Do you think he was trying to surprise us? Was he trying to surprise the people of Bethlehem or maybe the shepherds? No, who God really was trying to surprise was Satan, because for a very, very long time there has been a war going on. There's a war going on in the supernatural world between the enemy (Satan) and God.
The first Christmas was a lot like the story of the Trojan horse or it was a lot like the attack on Pearl Harbor. It was unexpected or it was like that battle in the Revolutionary War when George Washington crossed the Delaware and he went across at Christmas Day and completely surprised the British army. Nobody expected those things to happen. And the first Christmas in Bethlehem, nobody expected it. Satan didn't expect it, either.
Another poem about Christmas states it this way.
God's brilliant counteroffensive had begun,
Incognito, veiled in flesh arrived the Son,
Our warrior King, our Redeemer. He landed alone,
Nothing's impossible from God's holy throne.
I'm reading a book right now by an author named Mike Mason. It's a really good book I've enjoyed a lot. He has a quote in there that I want to read to you about the first Christmas. He said, “God wishes so passionately to bring peace between Himself and humanity—peace at any price—that He becomes willing to bend. He bends, in fact, all the way down from his lofty throne in heaven to a lowly stable in Bethlehem in order to provide mankind with a fully human Savior, like us in every way, yet without sin.”
So you see, on the first Christmas, there was a big surprise. Satan never expected a helpless infant to be God's battle plan in their war.
So number one was that Christmas came with a surprise. Christmas came with a surprise because God had so much more in mind.
2. When Christmas came, it was with Easter in mind.
Donna just shared a whole bunch of really nice things about me, probably more than anybody wanted to know. And some of you might have listened to her say all those things, and you might be thinking more highly of me than you should. Some of you may think, “Oh, well, she doesn't know what I deal with. She doesn't know the struggles that I have.” But what you don't know about me is that our family, my family, is just like yours. We are plagued with generational sin that keeps cropping up in ugly ways in our family, in our extended family, and it just doesn't stop, because we're still broken and we live in a very broken world.
What you also don't know about me is that I have a hard time loving people. It's just not easy for me to love people, even sometimes my husband and my kids, and I have to ask God to help me love people. I'm reading the book of Luke for Advent.
I have a friend who suggested that as a reading plan for Advent, and I thought that's a really great idea because she said the book of Luke has 24 chapters. So you read a chapter a day for the month of December, and I thought, “That's pretty cool. I'm going to try that.”
So this week I was reading chapter six of the book of Luke, and at the end of that chapter is this verse. And every time I read this verse, it just startles me because of who God is. Jesus said, “But love your enemies and do good and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great and you'll be sons of the Most High.”
(And this is the part that gets me every time.) “For he himself (God himself) is kind to ungrateful and evil men.”
And every time I read that, I think, “Okay, Lord, you are kind to ungrateful and evil people, and I can be kind, too, because I belong to you.
I thought by now in my life I would have arrived and that the Christian life would be easier. And I thought I wouldn't struggle with as many things as I did when I was younger, but it's not true. We will struggle with difficulties and hardships. We'll struggle with our sin. We'll struggle with all the things that God calls us to do until we leave this world and go to the next one.
So Easter is why I love Christmas because without Easter, without Jesus' victory over death, Christmas would be meaningless. I don't think it would've ever become a holiday at all.
You see, we think of Christmas and Easter as two separate events separated by 33 years. Christmas happened here and then 33 years later Easter happened. We think of Jesus' life as a timeline, and there are these mile markers on the timeline of his life.
But when Jesus was born, it was for one purpose. He came with one goal in mind, and that goal in mind was the cross. It was Easter. From the beginning, Christmas was the starting point for his journey to the cross.
So I want to ask you some questions to help you think about this a little differently, perhaps.
As you know the Bible, did Jesus ever reference his birth in many of his sermons or parables?
What did he talk about all the time?
Did Jesus ever tell his disciples to celebrate his birth? He didn't.
What did he tell us to remember and celebrate? He told us to remember and celebrate his death on the cross and his resurrection. But what do we do? We've kind of flipped them upside down, haven't we?
Which event do we emphasize?
How much time and money do you spend planning for, preparing for, and decorating for Easter? We go to a lot of expense and a lot of trouble for Christmas, don't we? And Jesus never said to celebrate it, and we spend very little time and effort, by comparison, with Easter.
Do you plan parties and give gifts and play Easter music for a month or longer like we do for Christmas? Probably not.
And has your church ever had a candlelight dinner for the women to celebrate Easter? I don't know of a church that's ever done that.
So this isn't so much a guilt trip as it is to say, “Wait a minute! Let's think about this. What does God really want us to emphasize?” I don't think there's anything wrong with Christmas, but I think there is something wrong with our under-celebrating of Easter, our under-emphasizing of Easter.
When you look at the four gospels, how much of the four gospels are dedicated to the birth of Christ? The first two chapters of Matthew, and the first two chapters of Luke. So four chapters in the gospels are dedicated to his birth, but how much of the gospels and the New Testament, the rest of the New Testament is about his life and his death and his burial and resurrection? If you took away those four chapters, you would still have a New Testament. It would be virtually unchanged. But if you took away all the writings about his death and his resurrection, you wouldn't have a New Testament anymore.
Christmas came with Easter in mind because we are lost without the cross.
3. When Christmas came, it was with heaven in mind.
On Tuesday this week, I ran a bunch of errands. I was out running around, and I had this list of things that I needed to get done. I ended up with more time at the end of my time in town because we live about 20 minutes outside of town and I thought, “I've got some time left. I'm going to run to Trader Joe's.” How many of you know about Trader Joe's? I know you don't have one in Hot Springs. Well, Trader Joe's is a really fun place if you've never been. So if you come to Little Rock anytime soon, you ought to swing by there because it's a fun place to shop. So I decided I was going to run in to Trader Joe's and see what they had because they have all these seasonal things that they only have one time a year, and it's just kind of fun.
So I ran in, I walked through the store, I got some things, and checked out. On my way out I picked up this little flyer that they have and I threw it in my bag. And when I got home, unloaded my groceries, and after we had dinner, I picked it up to read it, because it's so entertaining and it's so creative. And so I wanted to read you a couple of things that they have on the front of this little flyer, because they're so imaginative.
These are three of the products that are now available if they're still left in Trader Joe's that are seasonal. One is called Jingle Jangle. Jingle Jangle.
It says, “If you've never tried Jingle Jangle before, you might think the headline was referring to a seventies era cartoon character. As always, context is everything. And at Trader Joe's, Jingle Jangle is an only-at-Trader-Joe's assortment of a whole bunch of things that taste terrific, bathed in chocolate. Moreover, it's a sign that the holiday season is truly upon us.”
The second item on the front page: “Gaze upon those chocolate stars. For more than 15 years, we've held space on our shelves (not to mention in our hearts) during the holidays for Trader Joe's, dark chocolate stars—” There’s lots of chocolate in these! “—crunchy, star-shaped shortbread cookies, covered in rich, dark chocolate.”
I mean, it just makes you want to go buy some, right?
The third one is called “A taste test of caramels.” This one says: “Back again for its 11th year as part of our holiday lineup, each distinctively-designed box of Trader Joe's taste test of caramels contains 12 square caramels covered in luscious dark chocolate. Each is hand decorated with a unique design that may hint at the fascinating flavors that lie within. This year, joining the returning favorites of double espresso, fig and honey, hot chili and maple, you will also find eight brand new flavors—caramel mousse, salted torte, gingerbread, pear and cinnamon, sea salt, passion fruit, creme brulee, and salted lavender.”
I had taken this home, and when I read it, I said, “Dennis, you have got to listen to this. This is amazing! I mean, their writers are so creative, and they come up with all these interesting things that just make you want to buy them.”
When I read it to him, he said, “You need to read that to the ladies.” Because I was telling him that my third point was about how Christmas came because of wanting to take us to heaven. And so we started talking about heaven. Well, this is so creative and imaginative, and it reminded me of that verse in 1 Corinthians 2:9, “Eye has not seen nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined all that God has prepared for those who love him.”
So in heaven, we may have all kinds of Trader Joe's delicacies, I don't know! But if man can think of this many creative, wonderful things that sound so yummy to eat, imagine what God is thinking of!
In the summer of 2018, Dennis and I were on vacation in Boulder, Colorado, and we were staying with some friends of ours who live there. We were there partly for some time off, but also to see two of our kids who live in the Denver area. And so we camped out in Boulder at their house and then went and saw our kids and did different things.
One evening we went for a walk because the weather there in the summer is just delightful. It's not like here, but it's so pleasant and delightful. And we went for a walk and as we were walking, I don't remember now exactly how this came up and how our conversation turned this way, but somehow one of us mentioned heaven.
And I said to Dennis, “Do you think much about heaven and what it's going to be like? What do you think?”
He said, “Not really. I haven't really thought too much about it.”
I said, ‘Well, you know, interestingly, I have been thinking about it.” And I said, “I've got this crazy idea. I don't know if it's true.” Obviously, nobody knows. But I said, “I just wonder if, when we get to heaven someday, there are going to be instant replays of everything that happened in the Bible and all the things that God did that we don't even know about. And maybe, because we're not bound by time, maybe we'll be able to actually see them happen. I mean, what would that be like if you're not bound by time? Could we go back and see the Red Sea part? Could we go to another location and see the sun stand still for Joshua in that battle?”
I mean, I don't know. But maybe. Because heaven is going to be an amazing place.
Part of the reason that I think that might be a possibility is that Psalm 89:5 says, “Let the heavens praise your wonders, oh Lord.” And God has told us to remember his wonders in the Psalms. He wants us to remember the things that he has done. We all have terrible memories. We all forget the things that God has done.
So I wonder if heaven is not going to be a place where we remember those things and we see things that we didn't experience, and maybe there'll be theaters, or maybe there'll be some kind of crazy, hard-to-imagine things like instant replays and seeing the things that God did so that we may praise him. That's what heaven is going to be about, is praising God for all that he has done for us.
I think we have a great gift in having an imagination (and the imagination of man is evident in this Trader Joe's flyer!) The imagination of man is evident in the way the decorations came together and these amazing trees that Suzanne's daughter built. God has given us this gift of an imagination. And I think God wants us to imagine what heaven might be like if we're going there. We spend time imagining where we're going to go sometimes when we go on vacation or different trips. And an imagination is a really good thing. Some of you even right now might be imagining what you need to do when you get home. Do you ever do that? You'll find your mind wandering. You're thinking about the things you have to do when you get back home. Well, I want to help you imagine heaven a little bit more tonight.
Samantha: And we’re going to break in there. That’s Barbara Rainey, helping us use our imaginations in part one of a message she gave to a gathering of women, talking about some of the implications of Jesus’ coming to be one of us. She’ll help us imagine heaven a little bit more in the next episode.
You know, we celebrate Jesus’ incarnation at Christmas, but it’s something that affects all of life all year round, as Barbara’s been showing us.
You can be reminded of the Lord’s constant presence with you, even in the most difficult and overwhelming circumstances. I mentioned earlier a print that we’d love to send you. It features the comforting words from Isaiah chapter 43, “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you.” And in the background is a photo of the underwater statue “Christ of the Abyss.” You can see what the print looks like when you go to EverThineHome.com. If it doesn’t pop up on your screen right away, just search our website for “Christ of the Abyss.” There’s also a link to it in the notes—the description—for this episode.
We’ll send you a copy when you make a donation of at least $25 to support Ever Thine Home. Your gift allows us to continue bringing you more resources to help you experience God in your home, all year round.
In our next episode, Barbara will finish up her message on things that were true “When Christmas Came.” And they’re still true today!
I’m Samantha. We’ll see you for the second half of Barbara’s message, in the next episode of the Barbara Rainey Podcast, from Ever Thine Home.