Christmas Miracles
As we prepare for the Christmas season, one can’t help but wonder, where is Jesus? For many of us, it has been a difficult few years. The COVID-19 pandemic continues and even though many jurisdictions have lifted restrictions to those that have been vaccinated, since the beginning of the pandemic at the end of 2019, over 5 million people world-wide have died because of this disease. Different variants have mutated from the original strain and now the Omicron strain is spreading rapidly and causing countries to close their borders again. Add to this, the mental strain of people coping with loneliness from isolation and the environmental losses through forest fires and flooding, and people are asking where is Jesus? This is the season we are supposed to celebrate His birth, but where is He? It doesn’t seem like He is around with all the suffering.
Christmas time is supposed to be a joyous, happy time, but for many of us, it’s filled with stress and depression too. But there is a cure. There is a cure for the Christmas blues and it is in the true meaning of Christmas. To be joyful: to have true peace during this season, we need to UNDERSTAND THE MIRACLES OF CHRISTMAS.
The first miracle of Christmas: Roughly 2000 years ago, God came to earth. Many people will say, “God came to earth? I thought that Christmas is about Jesus. Isn’t Christmas about the birth of Jesus. Wasn’t it Jesus that was born in a manger in Bethlehem? Isn’t it Jesus that we sing about in all these Christmas carols?” Yes, Christmas is about Jesus but Jesus is God. He said it Himself. He claimed to be God. The Bible calls Him God and He proved He was God by dying on the cross, being resurrected three days later and many people saw His resurrected body.
Colossians 1:15,16 says this about Jesus, “Christ is the exact likeness of the unseen God. He existed before God made anything at all. In fact, Christ himself is the creator who made everything in heaven and in earth.” (LB). The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ participated in the creation of the world. Jesus Christ did not start off in a stable. What we are celebrating is not the beginning of Jesus Christ; it’s the day that He came to earth.
The second miracle of Christmas was how He came. God became a man. He became like one of us. He became a human being.
In Philippians 2, Paul writes, “Christ gave up His place as God and made Himself nothing. He was born to be a man and became like a servant. When He was living as a man, He humbled Himself.” Think about this miracle: Of all the ways God could have chosen to communicate that there was a God to human beings, He chose to become one of us.
But there’s a third miracle. When God came to earth, He came to ordinary people. When Jesus Christ was born, He didn’t come to a select few. He didn’t come to the privileged class. He didn’t even come for religious people. He came for people who could care less about religion. He came to lowly shepherds. He came for all of us.
At CIM Ministries, we embrace these miracles. We understand the gospel message that Jesus is for everyone and in a cross-cultural way, we spread these miracles to the villages in western Africa and to the Roma Settlements in Ukraine. We can have joy that God came to this world through the person of Jesus Christ to have a relationship with all people and through that personal relationship with Jesus, a pandemic that has swept all of mankind called sin can be wiped out and we can have eternal life with God. So, though things may seem difficult as we prepare to enter 2022, know that there is hope and that hope is because of Christmas; because of God becoming human as Jesus, and then ultimately dying for our sins at Easter.
May everyone have a blessed Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year.
Rev. Isaac Quan
Executive Director
CIM Canada
November Financials
1. General Fund - for general and administrative purposes, such as staff salaries
2. Designated Fund - for specific ministries in different field locations as designated (cannot be transferred between funds)
*All financial figures are in Canadian dollars and rounded to the nearest dollar
Pray With Us:
Pray for opportunities to share about the miracles of Christmas this season.
Praise God for a successful Roma Pastoral Training session and an informative Roma Info Session in November.
Pray for CIM USA and Christine Pi as she has retired as Executive Director. CIM USA is currently recruiting for an Executive Director successor, as well as a Director of Ministry.
Pray for the preparation of a trip to Ghana at the end of December to mid-January where our executive director and chairman of the board will visit our international worker and also the different sites that CIM Ministries have been doing ministries. Pray for protection in travel. We are closely monitoring the Omicron variant situation.
VOLUNTEERS NEEDED
Are you looking to make a difference? Do you have a heart for missions?
As many of you reading can probably relate, there is much work to be done but often, not enough hands. The same rings true at CIM. We run on a very lean team of staff and board members. As we look towards 2022, we need to reach out to the CIM community for help.
Please spread the word for us if you know someone who may be suitable or if it is yourself, please pray about it and if you feel burdened to join us in the work to share the Gospel, email us at contact@cimcanada.org.
We are looking for volunteers to help in various capacities, including but not limited to:
someone with a heart for social media and communications
someone with a background in law
someone with a heart for fundraising