Our Desperate Need for Christmas

America's current state strikingly illustrates our desperate need for Christmas.  Let it not be lost on us this season, as the very tragedies we are reeling from as a nation are precisely the reason why there is a Christmas.  For if we continue to fail to make that connection, we are lost ... as a nation, and as individuals.  The stakes could not be higher.

As my recent Facebook posts illustrate, I am NOT a fan of gun control.  I believe very strongly that we have enough gun control laws already ... far too many actually.  What is needed is not more controls (which have no effect upon criminals anyway), but rather internal controls ... aka "SELF-control" ... and self-control will never come through governments or laws.  Self-control only comes through good parenting and the development of sound inward convictions - both of which must be based on a solid moral foundation and upon the principle of personal accountability for one's actions. 

Ultimately, this means the Judgment of God ... in a word: HELL.  Without understanding that there exists a Holy, Perfect, All-knowing, and All-powerful Judge and that there are eternal consequences to our behavior ... sin ... there will never be any basis or motivation for personal responsibility (not to mention a defendable basis for our legal system) or self-control. 

Despite what our children are being taught today, our nation was in fact conceived, founded, built, and administered upon the moral code of God found in the Judeo-Christian Scriptures.  It is the basis for our Declaration of Independence, our Constitution, our Legal System, and even the very "triune" structure of our government.  For nearly 200 years, America was run in such a way as to recognize and magnify God as our Creator, Judge, and Provider.  We taught our children the moral laws of God in public schools (and spanked them when they misbehaved!); we held our citizens accountable to them through our legal system; and our churches openly and clearly taught the Biblical foundations of accountability and consequence both in this life and the next for our choices - as individuals and as a nation.  This is not to say that people weren't allowed to practice the religion of their choice, they have always been. But our laws and culture are based on the Bible. Period.  The practice of other religions has always been free only insofar as it has not contradicted the laws of America - which are based on the Law of God.

Today however, in a staggeringly rapid and accelerating fall from all that once made us great, our government, schools, and even churches have walked, nay RUN, away from even acknowledging, much less teaching these values and principles.  We have eradicated them from our schools, stricken them from our laws, reinterpreted our own Constitution, and banned the public display of even the symbols of these great principles and truths.

Yet, God's laws have not changed, for they are based on His nature and character which is immutable and timeless.

Sin is still sin.

Judgment is still Judgement.

Hell is still Hell.

And it awaits all those who do not surrender their lives to God's will and control as it always has.

I personally harbor no further hope that our government is capable of saving our nation from its ongoing decay and coming destruction.  Sorry if that sounds overly pessimistic. I would call it "realistic".  Our lawmakers are indeed a primary source of this decay and daily demonstrate that they have no grasp of the root problem, thus no solution will be forthcoming from that quarter.  If our nation has any hope of even slowing its headlong rush into oblivion (much less recovery), it lies not in the election process (recent events have demonstrated this beyond argument), but in calling its people back to God ... to a knowledge of sin and our personal (and national) responsibility and accountability for it, and thus need for a Savior/Messiah both personally and nationally - which can be filled by Jesus Christ Who was sent specifically and uniquely for the purpose of saving us from the consequence of sin.

As we reel from recent and ongoing tragedies that have rocked our nation, we are brought face-to-face with the very problem I speak of - the black, ugly, evil of sin that pervades the human soul.  The Evolutionists, Humanists, and Post-Modernists try their best to deny its existence teaching than Man is inherently good or at least neutral, and that evil acts such as school shootings must be the result of some kind of external corrupting influences.  They therefore look to external means to try to control them - gun control for example.  But attempting to control the inward evil of sin in a heart by external means is like the proverbial act of gold-plating a turd (please forgive the vernacular, but the analogy is appropriate).  For God's Word describes the condition of the human heart apart from Him in this way:

"Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." -- Genesis 6:5

"All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all." -- Isaiah 53:6

"But we are all like an unclean thing, And all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags; We all fade as a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, Have taken us away." -- Isaiah 64:6 

"... For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" -- Romans 3:23  

"So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God." -- Romans 8:8  

"...Without Me you can do nothing." -- John 15:5  

Outward controls will never change the inward sin nature from which the evil originates.  Indeed, God Himself demonstrates that His own outward Law can never fix the problem of sin.

"For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death." -- Romans 7:5  

"The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law." --  1 Corinthians 15:56  

 For the purpose of even God's Law was never to "fix" men's hearts, but rather to spotlight sin and hold them accountable for it.

"For until the law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law." -- Romans 5:13  

No, the solution to the problem of sin is not more laws - either from God of from Men - but rather a new heart, and inward change of nature which can only be wrought by God Himself.
 

"For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh," -- Romans 8:3  

THIS is reason that God sent His Son into the world - that the penalty for our own sin could be paid for by Someone other than ourselves

"For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." -- Romans 6:23 

"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.  For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.  He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.  And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. " -- John 3:16-19

Without the life-changing power of God available through Jesus Christ, we would all not only be accountable for our sin but powerless to change ourselves or our destinies.  But in His love God gave us Christmas.  Of course I mean the advent of Jesus Christ (whatever time of year it was :) as the only true solution to the problem of sin and evil.  By extension then, it becomes also the only true solution to the problems facing our nation as well.

This Christmas season, as we wrestle with the long list of tragic events and difficulties we face looking forward, let us not only remember and reflect on God's "indescribable gift" (2 Cor 9:15), but let us also commit to doing all we can - as individuals, as families, and as citizens - of proclaiming the only True Solution to our problems. Teach your children and proclaim to those you know that America's future lies not gun control, or a balanced budget, or immigration reform or smaller government.  It lies where it always has - in Jesus Christ, and in making Him and His principles and His solution for Mankind's evil the center of our personal actions as well as those of our nation.

We must of course continue to do all we can as citizens to slow the tide of this decay through the legal and democratic means afforded us. We would be remiss to not.  But we must also recognize that these can only slow the tide we face until we restore our Nation to Godliness and her people to recognition of and accountability for sin.  When we have done that, we will once again rejoice to sing these forgotten verses of "America The Beautiful".

O beautiful for pilgrim feet,

Whose stern impassion'd stress

A thoroughfare for freedom beat

Across the wilderness!

America! America! God mend thine ev'ry flaw,

Confirm thy soul in self-control,

Thy liberty in law!

O beautiful for heroes proved In liberating strife,

Who more than self their country loved,

And mercy more than life!

America! America! May God thy gold refine

Till all success be nobleness,

And ev'ry gain divine!

To each and all, a very merry and blessed Christmas season in all the full meaning thereof,

- Tim -

I leave you with the words of the 3rd and 4th verses of "It Came Upon A Midnight Clear"

Yet with te woes of sin and strife

The world hath suffered long;

Beneath the angel-strain have rolled

Two thousand years of wrong;

And man, at war with man, hears not

The love song which they bring:

O hush the noise, ye men of strife,

And hear the angels sing.

For lo! the days are hastening on,

By prophet bards foretold,

When, with the ever-circling years,

Shall come the Age of Gold;

When peace shall over all the earth

Its ancient splendors fling,

And all the world give back the song

Which now the angels sing.

On The End of the World ... "Apocalypse"? Not So Much

This post is somewhat of a rant, I'll confess up front.  I've actually been enjoying, in a somewhat perverse way, all the silliness about the end of the world tomorrow (12/21/12).  Most people that I know don't seem to be taking it seriously, but I know there are many who are.  And I suspect that a lot more are actually harboring some secret level of "concern" about it but not letting on.

Whatever. 

When much of the hubub started several months ago, I did about 10 minutes worth of digging and found enough evidence to recognize that the entire thing was based on a misrepresentation of the facts, even if you DID take the Mayan calendars & beliefs seriously. The Mayan's calendar system was, similar to most parts of ours in that it was based on "cycles" rather than "lines".  By that I'm referring to the portions of our calendar that repeats itself - seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months - they all run in cycles which repeat.  There are 60 seconds in a minute and then it starts over.  There are 24hours in a day, 7 days in a week, etc. etc.  To some extent, we even do this with years as we count numbers of centuries or millennia from a given point.  However, in general, our years run in a straight line though ... they'll just keep counting up until ... well until something really big happens. 

The Mayans did this too, but where are largest, named, repeating cycles are probably months, they included bigger cycles called "baktun".  Each baktun was 144,000 days in length (400 years with each year being 360 days in length - yes the Mayans used 360 day years as did most ancient cultures prior to a particular date - but that's another issue. ;-)  The "calendar" everyone is talking about "rolls over" or restarts at the end of each baktun in the same way our months start over at the conclusion of each yearly cycle.  Once you get to the end of December, we start back at January and increment the year.  The baktun cycle has started over 11 times since it was started and we are currently in the 12th baktun. The last time it rolled over (from the 11th baktun to the 12th) in the year A.D. 1618.  It's probably relevant to note that the world didn't end in 1618 ... as far as we know.

Tomorrow, 12/21/12, the same thing happens and the calendar will roll over from the 12th to the 13th baktun and start the counting over again.  That's it.  Nothing else.  About the same amount of excitement as watching the car odometer roll over from 99,999 to 100,000 miles.  Cool to watch, but then you move on.

I find it fascinating that people get so hung up about these kinds of "roll-overs" and believing that they're bringing the end of the world (note I'm NOT using the word "apocalypse" - I'll come back to that in a moment.  When the first millennium rolled over (the year 999 to 1000 back in medieval times, people went berserk too.  We saw some of the same thing at the end of 1999 for the end of the 2nd millennium.  There's probably much to be learned from the very fact that people seem to have a built-in expectation for the world to end at some point ... and they are afraid of it.  All kinds of lessons there, but that's for another post.

Now for my rant.  Whether the context is Nostradamus, or zombies, or Mayans, or any other non-Biblical reference to some end-of-the-world event, the use of the word "apocalypse" is wildly inappropriate.  When I hear it used in these contexts, it produces a strange mixture of annoyance and amusement.  The latter is because I'm pretty sure that if the people using it this way had any idea what it actually meant, they'd run away screaming hysterically, "NO! NO! THAT'S NOT WHAT I MEANT!!!"  And that makes me smile. :-)

The word "apocalypse" is a transliterated Greek word (meaning it's still pretty much the original Greek word, just "Englishized" in the way it's spelled) that literally means "unveiling" in the way an artist might unveil a newly finished statue or painting.  "Revealing" is a close synonym.  It is the first word of the first verse of the Biblical book of Revelation and, obviously, where the book gets its title.  However, what most people don't know (because they're only knowledge of the contents of the book comes from Hollywood) is that the "revelation" that is being referred to is NOT knowledge about how the world ends.  In fact, contrary to popular misconception, the world does not end in the book ... EVER!  It does go through some pretty rough events for a few years, but this is immediately followed by 1000 years of the greatest peace and harmony the Earth has seen since its creation.  Later, it is replaced by a new Earth ... in fact a whole new Universe, but it continues onward ... forever.

So what IS revealed in the book of Revelation?  Jesus Christ!  His true nature, mission, and glory are revealed - first to Him (by the Father), then to His disciples (us) through the writing and publication of the book.  The first line of the book is, "The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants--things which must shortly take place."  Although these events are referred to as "the End Times", they do not relate to the end of the world itself, but only the end of the reign of Men upon this planet - the "End of the Age" is a more appropriate understanding, or the end of God's tolerance and patience with Mankind's (and Satan's) rebellion.

So every time the word "apocalypse" is used in some relation to the end-of-the-world (zombies, Mayans, Mad Max, etc.) I have to chuckle because they are inadvertently referencing the "Revelation (apocalypse) of Jesus Christ" and the very idea that God's patience with our foolishness WILL run out.  There will indeed be a resurrection of the dead, but we can be sure that it has nothing to do with zombies! 

"Armageddon" is another one, but I'll not go into details here except to say that it is a Hebrew word which refers to the specific location (the Valley of Meggiddo in Israel) where the final battle will take place between Israel and the other nations of the world that initiates the Return of Jesus Christ (aka "Second Coming").  So here again, when secular people and media use the term "Armageddon" to refer to the end of the world, it's just another testament to their own ignorance as they inadvertently reference Second Coming of Jesus Christ to defeat those who have aligned themselves against Him and to usher in the Millennial age of His own Kingship over the planet Earth and all its peoples and nations. 

As Christians, while there is that certain "perverse" sense of amusement that comes with watching people who have no idea what they're talking about inadvertently bear testimony to the Bible's prophecies about the Return and Preeminence of Jesus Christ, it's also an incredibly sad testimony to the ignorance of the general population and the media in particular of God's Word and what the near future holds in store for Mankind.  We Christians should see this as opportunity to proclaim what the Bible teaches us about these things.  The next time you hear or see someone misuse "Apocalypse" or "Armageddon", you can jump in with a friendly, "I was just wondering - do you know what that word really means?"  After all, THEY brought it up! :-)

Grace, Peace, and a very merry Christmas to all;

- Tim -

Appreciating Christmas Hymns - Hark, The Herald Angels Sing

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing!

Since becoming a Christian as a senior in high school, I've held a deep appreciation for many of the great, classic hymns.  Those we sing at Christmas time are all the more special, not only because of the feelings and memories which which they are associated for me, but but also, like so many others, because of their profound theological content.  It is unfortunate in some ways that we know these songs so well because we tend to recite them without even hearing the words anymore.  Their meaning is reduced to traditional recitation because ... well ... "we always sing these songs at this time of year!"

Yet many of them hold deep, rich truths of our faith packaged up in their concise verses and are in fact a miniature theology lesson if we would take the time to reflect upon them - personally, or with our children.  I hope to comment on a few here in this blog before Christmas gets here, but I'm already late getting started as there are SO MANY that say so much.  So let me encourage you this season, as you sing or listen to these great traditional hymns of the season, to let your attention be drawn to the lyrics - and be blessed by them.

This year, I've been particularly taken (again) with the depth of the lyrics in the hymn / carol "Hark The Herald Angels Sing" by Charles Wesley.  Each verse is powerfully laden with Biblical Truth about the nature of the Kenosis and Incarnation of Jesus Christ.  Can you count the names of Christ, or His Godly "attributes" listed here?  The second verse especially is one of the most profound and concise descriptions of the "Kenosis" to be found anywhere in my opinion.  The "Kenosis" is the theological word given to the event of Christ "setting aside" some of his Godly attributes and "humbling" Himself to become (and remain) a human man.  It is taken from the Greek word that describes this in Philippians 2:7 - often translated as "emptied" in the phrase "but emptied himself by taking on the form of a slave, by looking like other men,and by sharing in human nature."

This concept is contained in the 3rd verse also as well as the concepts of Salvation, Regeneration, Sanctification, Justification, healing, Universal Atonement, Resurrection of the Dead, the Millennial Reign, the Trinity, the Incarnation, and the Kingship of Christ. We could also identify half a dozen or so attributes and names of Christ all in just the 3rd verse!  It turns out all of the Wesley brothers' hymns are this powerfully packed with doctrine as they found it was a powerful way to get it across to people and have them remember it!  Indeed, we remember their lessons to this day ... if we stop long enough to listen to what it is we're singing anyway.

Won't you join with me this Christmas season in really listening, appreciating, and perhaps even learning from these timeless classics we have handed down to us such as "Hark The Herald Angels Sing" ... and even better - make time to do it with your children to help them appreciate not only the wonderful traditions, beauty, and "magic" of the Christmas season, but also the "why".  Reading the "Christmas Story" from Matthew or Luke is good and right and most certainly should be done.  But take note that if our children only hear WHAT happened (the history part of the story) they may well still have no idea WHY it happened - the significance of the Incarnation.  And while there are many excellent resources and ways to communicate this, you might also find that our favorite Christmas Hymns are in fact powerful teaching tools that our kids may even already have memorized!!

If you're not familiar with some of these concepts, I encourage you to dig in.  There's lots and lots of great content to be found on the Internet (though it's sometimes difficult to separate it from the not-so-great content!), or of course I'm sure your pastor would be THRILLED to answer your questions :-).  Or (shameless plug here), I'll actually be teaching a 10 week introductory course in Christian theology this January for beginners if you'd really like to dig in!  (stay tuned for further details).

Grace and Peace to all in this wonderful season,

- Tim -


The following introduction was taken from http://www.carols.org.uk 

“Hark the herald angels sing” Christmas Carol was written by Charles Wesley, brother of John Wesley founder of the Methodist church, in 1739. A sombre man, he requested slow and solemn music for his lyrics and thus “Hark the herald angels sing” was sung to a different tune initially. Over a hundred years later Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) composed a cantata in 1840 to commemorate Johann Gutenberg's invention of the printing press. English musician William H. Cummings adapted Mendelssohn’s music to fit the lyrics of “Hark the herald angels sing” already written by Wesley.


Lyrics:
Hark the herald angels sing, "Glory to the newborn King!
Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled".
Joyful, all ye nations rise; Join the triumph of the skies.
With the angelic host proclaim: "Christ is born in Bethlehem".
Hark! The herald angels sing, "Glory to the newborn King!"

Christ by highest heav'n adored: Christ the everlasting Lord!
Late in time behold Him come: Offspring of a Virgin's womb.
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see; Hail the incarnate Deity.
Pleased as man with man to dwell: Jesus, our Emmanuel.
Hark! The herald angels sing, "Glory to the newborn King!"

Hail the heav'n-born Prince of Peace!  Hail the Son of Righteousness!
Light and life to all He brings, Ris'n with healing in His wings.
Mild He lays His glory by; Born that man no more may die.
Born to raise the sons of earth.  Born to give them second birth.
Hark! The herald angels sing, "Glory to the newborn King!"

Learning About St. Nicholas Day

Happy Feast of St. Nicholas day!!  I'm just learning about this for the first time this year.  Apparently in many places around the world and even certain locations here in the U.S. this is a big deal - almost another "Christmas" for the kids.  As most (?) people know, Our Christmas legends & traditions derive from the real 4th century person named Saint Nicholas (=>"Santa Claus") who died on this day (6 Dec) in A.D. 343 and was later sainted by the Catholic church.  Below is some information currently being passed around regarding his legend and associated customs.

Regardless of how you interpret the various stories & legends surrounding Nicholas, we can be sure that he was in fact a very real person and a great man at that.  His reputation for compassion, helping those in need, and defending the Gospel is quite literally "the stuff of legend".  Personally, I consider it a very good thing to remember those who have gone before us that distinguished themselves by their example.  These are the men  and women who deserve to remembered as "heroes" and their stories passed on to our children.  And while I personally have no problem with the tradition of telling our children that Santa Claus visits us on Christmas Eve to leave presents, I also think it's important to distinguish between these fun festivities and the Real Reason for the Season ... which also happens to be the very basis for who the real Saint Nicholas was and why he did the things he did as well.  I find that discovering and emphasizing the connection between the two in this way has really helpful in establishing my own opinions on the proper place and appropriateness of "Santa" in conjunction with Christmas.  Admittedly, our modern U.S. celebration of Christmas is an enormously complex hodgepodge of different traditions and even different religions from around the world and more than 2000 years of history.  Some of it has decidedly non-Christian origins and an increasingly large portion in the U.S. is decidedly secular and (amazingly) even anti-Christian.  But I've made my own peace with how my family and I celebrate at this time of year and I hope each person will study these things enough to arrive at your own conclusions as to what you feel is appropriate and what is not.    I hope to find time this season to write a lot more on this topic, but then, it's already December 6th isn't it!?

However you choose to celebrate, I wish you all a very happy Christmas!

I believe the text I've included below to have originated at the following website - and though I am not Roman Catholic, I found the text to be well-written, very informative, and thought it worth sharing.
http://www.fisheaters.com/customsadvent3.html

Additional information about the historical Saint Nicholas can be found at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Nicholas.
    and:
http://www.cantius.org/go/liturgy_devotions/liturgical_seasons/advent_extraordinary/saint_nicholas/

The historical work quoted in the text below titled The Golden Legend can be found, as a free ebook here:
https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=UesOAAAAIAAJ&rdid=book-UesOAAAAIAAJ&rdot=1
   Or in HTML format, here:
http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/golden000.htm

Enjoy!

- Tim -

St. Nick is the Saint better known as "Santa Claus" (Sinterklaas in the Dutch whence "Santa Claus" comes). His image in America has been mixed up with a lot of traits and imagery from sources as disparate as the poetry of Clement Moore, pagan Norse mythology, and American advertising. In real life, though, St. Nicholas was a beloved and wonderful Bishop of Myra (in modern-day Turkey). He was born in Asia Minor in A.D. 260 and orphaned at an early age.

As a young man, he made a pilgrimage to Palestine and Egypt, becoming a Bishop upon his return. He was imprisoned during the persecutions of Diocletian, but was released after Constantine came to rule. According to legend, he was present at the Council of Nicaea and became so incensed at Arius -- the heretical Bishop whose denial of the two natures of Christ spread through the Church -- that he slapped him across the face. He intervened twice in cases in which innocent men were accused of crimes they did not commit, once appearing to Constantine and the local prefect in a dream, encouraging them to do the right thing in their regard.

Many stories about his life indicate his kindness and reveal miracles. The Golden Legend, written in A.D. 1275 by Jacobus de Voragine, Archbishop of Genoa, tells us how the Saint threw bags of gold coins to a man in order to provide dowries for the man's daughters and save them from lives of lechery:

"And it was so that one, his neighbour, had then three daughters, virgins, and he was a nobleman: but for the poverty of them together, they were constrained, and in very purpose to abandon them to the sin of lechery, so that by the gain and winning of their infamy they might be sustained. And when the holy man Nicholas knew hereof he had great horror of this villainy, and threw by night secretly into the house of the man a mass of gold wrapped in a cloth. And when the man arose in the morning, he found this mass of gold, and rendered to God therefor great thankings, and therewith he married his oldest daughter. 

And a little while after this holy servant of God threw in another mass of gold, which the man found, and thanked God, and purposed to wake, for to know him that so had aided him in his poverty. And after a few days Nicholas doubled the mass of gold, and cast it into the house of this man. He awoke by the sound of the gold, and followed Nicholas, which fled from him, and he said to him: Sir, flee not away so but that I may see and know thee. 

Then he ran after him more hastily, and knew that it was Nicholas; and anon he kneeled down, and would have kissed his feet, but the holy man would not, but required him not to tell nor discover this thing as long as he lived."

Another tale from the Golden Legend explains how St. Nicholas saved sailors from a tempest:

"It is read in a chronicle that, the blessed Nicholas was at the Council of Nice; and on a day, as a ship with mariners were in perishing on the sea, they prayed and required devoutly Nicholas, servant of God, saying: If those things that we have heard of thee said be true, prove them now. 

And anon a man appeared in his likeness, and said: Lo! see ye me not? ye called me, and then he began to help them in their exploit of the sea, and anon the tempest ceased. 

And when they were come to his church, they knew him without any man to show him to them, and yet they had never seen him. And then they thanked God and him of their deliverance. And he bade them to attribute it to the mercy of God, and to their belief, and nothing to his merits. "

The Golden Legend also gives us the story of a Jewish man who was robbed, and how St. Nicholas used the event to imitate Christ, thereby not only bringing the Jewish man to Christ, but causing the thieves to repent:

"Another Jew saw the virtuous miracles of St. Nicholas, and did do make an image of the saint, and set it in his house, and commanded him that he should keep well his house when he went out, and that he should keep well all his goods, saying to him: Nicholas, lo! here be all my goods, I charge thee to keep them, and if thou keep them not well, I shall avenge me on thee in beating and tormenting thee. 

And on a time, when the Jew was out, thieves came and robbed all his goods, and left, unborne away, only the image. And when the Jew came home he found him robbed of all his goods. He areasoned the image saying these words: Sir Nicholas, I had set you in my house for to keep my goods from thieves, wherefore have ye not kept them? Ye shall receive sorrow and torments, and shall have pain for the thieves. I shall avenge my loss, and subdue my madness in beating thee. 

And then took the Jew the image, and beat it, and tormented it cruelly. Then happed a great marvel, for when the thieves departed the goods, the holy saint, like as he had been in his array, appeared to the thieves, and said to them: Wherefore have I been beaten so cruelly for you and have so many torments? See how my body is hewed and broken; see how that the red blood runneth down by my body; go ye fast and restore it again, or else the ire of God Almighty shall make you as to be one out of his wit, and that all men shall know your felony, and that each of you shall be hanged. 

And they said: Who art thou that sayest to us such things? And he said to them: I am Nicholas the servant of Jesu Christ, whom the Jew hath so cruelly beaten for his goods that ye bare away. 

Then they were afeard, and came to the Jew, and heard what he had done to the image, and they told him the miracle, and delivered to him again all his goods. And thus came the thieves to the way of truth, and the Jew to the way of Jesu Christ. "

Another famous story, this one not contained in the Golden Legend, tells how three children were killed by an innkeeper and put into a tub of brine. St. Nicholas, by the power of God, brought them back to life.

"When the great Saint died, he was buried in Myra, but the town was later taken by the Saracens in A.D. 1034. The Italians rallied to gather and preserve his relics from desecration, and in 1097, sailors brought them to Bari, Italy. A lovely church -- the Church of San Niccolo -- was built to house them, and tere they can be found today. A curative Oil of Saints -- "Manna di San Niccolo" -- is said to exude from them to this day."

St. Nicholas is the patron of children, sailors, and bakers, and is represented in art as a bearded, older man -- usually mitred -- holding 3 gold coins or a bag of coins, or three orbs. He is also often shown with children, and/or a ship.

Customs:
Today is, for many Catholics, the day for gift-giving (some do this on Christmas, some do this on the Feast of the Epiphany in memory of the gifts the 3 Kings gave to Baby Jesus, and some spread the gift-giving out on all these days). In some places, especially in the Eastern Catholic churches, "St. Nicholas," dressed as a Bishop, will show up and hand out presents to the little ones, and children put their shoes in front of the fireplace to be filled with candy and presents by morning. Because coins are one of the many symbols of St. Nicholas, chocolate coins are a perfect thing to put in the childrens' shoes. One can use Christmas stockings instead of shoes, or one can buy adult-sized wooden shoes, paint and decorate them, and bring them out for use just on St. Nicholas's Day.

In any case, an icon -- even a nice Holy Card -- of St. Nicholas should be visible today if at all possible. Surround it with greenery and candles, and tell your children the story of the Saint Nicholas behind the "Santa Claus."

On St. Nicholas's Feast Day, it is customary to serve Speculaas cookies, a spicy Dutch cookie, cut into shapes relevant to the life of St. Nicholas (coins, mitres, ships, balls, money bags), and painted with colorful icing:

Speculaas Cookies 
(makes 3 dozen depending on size)

Cookie:
1 Cup (2 sticks) sweet butter, at room temperature
2 cups dark brown sugar
2 eggs
Grated rind of 1 lemon
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg or mace
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/8 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon cardamom
1/8 teaspoon salt
4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder

Icing:
Powdered sugar
Water
Lemon juice
A little beaten egg white for consistency, if desired
Food coloring

In a large bowl, cream the butter with the sugar until fluffy. Stir in the eggs one at a time, blending thoroughly after each addition. Stir in the lemon rind. Sift the spices and salt with the flour and baking powder, and stir gradually into the butter mixture. Wrap in waxed paper or plastic wrap and chill for several hours or overnight. On a floured surface, roll out the dough to about 1/8 inch, or for larger figures to about 1/4 inch. Cut into shapes (Bishop, Bishop's staff, Bishop's mitre, ship, coins, etc.) and bake at 350 degrees until lightly browned (don't overbake). When cool, mix together icing ingredients and paint cookies as desired.