Jesus Christ The Real Birth Date

Almost the entire world knows about the existence of Jesus Christ, Our Lord Jesus Christ is God the Son, the Creator of the Universe, Savior, Lord, Friend, and Soon-Coming King over all the Earth. Even though we know a lot about him, we don’t know for sure his real birth date.  His birth date has been a mystery.  Before we discuss the birth date of Jesus Christ, it is important to know who he was, his achievements, and what he means to the world.

“... I proceeded forth, and came from God.”— John 8:42.  This is what Jesus said about his coming, but before he arrived to earth, his arrival had been prophesied. 

And after their punishment shall have come from the Lord, the priesthood shall fail. Then shall the Lord raise up a new priest. And to him all the words of the Lord shall be revealed;... and his star shall arise in heaven as of a king. Lighting up the light of knowledge as the sun the day, and he shall be magnified in the world. He shall shine forth as the sun on the earth, and shall remove all darkness from under heaven, and there shall be peace in all the earth. The heavens shall exult in his days, and the earth shall be glad, and the clouds shall rejoice; and the angels of the glory of the presence of the Lord shall be glad in him. The heavens shall be opened, and from the temple of glory shall come upon him sanctification, With the Father's voice as from Abraham to Isaac. And the glory of the Most High shall be uttered over him, and the spirit of understanding and sanctification shall rest upon him. For he shall give the majesty of the Lord to His sons in truth for evermore; and there shall none succeed him for all generations forever. And in his priesthood the Gentiles shall be multiplied in knowledge upon the earth. And enlightened through the grace of the Lord: In his priesthood shall sin come to an end, and the lawless shall cease to do evil. And he shall open the gates of paradise, and shall remove the threatening sword against Adam. And he shall give to the saints to eat from the tree of life, and the spirit of holiness shall be on them. And Belial shall be bound by him, and he shall give power to His children to tread upon the evil spirits. And the Lord shall rejoice in His children, and be well pleased in His beloved ones forever. Then shall Abraham and Isaac and Jacob exult, and I [Levi] will be glad, and all the saints shall clothe themselves with joy (Testament of Levi 18:1-14)"(Charles, Pseudepigrapha, pp. 314-15).

So, Christ came to earth to bring change to the world by opening heaven’s gates for mankind, and giving them hope for eternal life.  He also gave great power to his followers, over the power of Satan. 

Christ came to the earth to become a servant for all of mankind.  Through his death, he made provision for the forgiveness of the sins of man.  He laid down his life, so others may live eternally. He was also a man who lived his life without sin.   “But if God is come in salvation and not judgment, there must be a final provision for sin, and fulfillment of the righteousness God requires.  Not only must the Lord come; the Servant of the Lord must come:  a prophet like Moses, but greater; a King like David, but holy (and wiser than Solomon); a priest free of the sinfulness of the line of Aaron (Clowney, p. 4).  

Christ was also said to be the Word of God come in the flesh and the Son of God “The Word became flesh, and dwelt [tabernacled] among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth” (Clowney,  p. 5). He came to this earth to teach mankind about God the Father and the way to get to heaven. He taught some things that were not easy for human beings to understand, but then he explained them in simpler terms so they would gain good understanding of what he was trying to teach them.  He also became a bit frustrated with some of the highly educated teachers in Judaism, who did not seem to understand what God had plainly told them through the scriptures. 

When Jesus told Nicodemus that ‘no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit.’  Nicodemus did not recognize the passage to which Jesus alluded.  Jesus rebuked Nicodemus, a teacher of Israel, for not understanding the promised new birth.  Only when God intervenes, only when his sovereign Spirit moves, can stony hearts be made to beat and dead bones be given new life.  Nicodemus said that Jesus was a teacher come from God (Clowney, p. 5).

Christ is the redeemer of mankind, having already paid the price for everyone’s sin.  He took the punishment so we wouldn’t have to if we accept his free gift of life.  “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree’) (Clowney p. 6).

Robert A. Sabin summarizes who Christ really is in his article titled, The Man Christ Jesus.  He goes on to say,

Jesus is God in flesh.  That is a glorious message.  He is also a man, and that full message surpasses everything.  It deals with creation, why and how God created us.  It deals with the whole plan of redemption- how we are redeemed.  It deals with all that God foresaw and all that he predestinated.  It deals with our eternal reward.  It deals with the ultimate place of the child of God in heaven.  The message of who Jesus is, and all that he is, is absolutely central to everything Christians believe.  For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.  He is the mediator of he better covenant found in the New Testament (Sabin, p. 1).

To many people on this earth, Jesus Christ is the King of all Kings.  Now that we have discussed who Jesus Christ is, we will move on to talk about his great achievements.

Christ performed many miracles.  These are phenomena that are outside of normal things that happen. There are many examples of Christ’s miracles in the Bible.  Christ healed lepers; he caused the blind to see and healed diseases which could not be healed by doctors of the time.  He also fed five thousand people with just one boy’s lunch.  “The food was miraculously multiplied, so that it fed the whole throng, with twelve baskets left over” (anonymous, pp. 1-2). 

 Jesus attained great power as the Son of God.  He has been exalted to a high place in heaven… He came to earth as a man so he could understand what man goes through as he makes his journey through life.  He understands the temptations we face and the sorrows that we face.  This has made Christ the best advocate to God, for the forgiveness of the sins and shortcomings of man.  This is one of Christ’s many great achievements.  “Now he is just below the majesty in the heavens, or as he put it, ‘’at the right hand of power.’  When Jesus is exalted to his ultimate place, the very throne itself, he has promised to take us with him and to share all his achievements with us (Psalm 110:1, Isaiah 53:12, Revelation 3:21) (Sabin, p. 1). 

Jesus Christ achieved the status of a unique relationship with God the Father.  He is God’s only Son, but God is also a Father to him.

The Bible emphatically declares I will be to him a father, he shall be to me a son, a future prediction of a reciprocally exclusive relationship.  Christ possessed two identities, and two capacities.  Jesus was both God and man.  He could act in his capacity as God.  He could act in the capacity of man.  He could speak as God and he could speak as mean.  As a man he said, ‘I thirst.’  As God he could say to the blind man or to the leper, ‘I will, be thou clean,’ without any reverence to being deity (Sabin, p. 2).

Jesus was the only man ever to be God and at the same time a man.  He mastered the art of self-discipline.  He was able to sacrifice his own will to the will of God the Father (Sabin, p. 2).  When tempted by Satan, to use his great powers and abilities to satisfy his intense hunger (the flesh), he resisted the temptation and quoted scripture.  “When Satan said, ‘Command these stones that they be made bread,’ Jesus refused.  He accepted human suffering, suffering even the death of the cross” (Sabin, p. 2).  When Judas betrayed Christ to the Romans for money, Christ knew what he was going to do and he forgave him because he knew that it was just a part of the plans that God had for him.  Only divine love can allow a human being to forgive someone for such a terrible betrayal of trust and friendship.

The part of Christ that was definitely man, or human is shown in the scripture that tells about the emotional difficulties he had just before he was to be crucified. 

The agony in the Garden of Gethsemane the night before had been an ordeal in prayer before His Father that we can scarcely understand.  The writer of Hebrews comments on this incident, ‘In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard for his godly fear.  Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered…’ (Hebrews 5:7,8)” (Dolphin, p. 1).

     Jesus Christ had foretold his own death in Matthew 26:59-61.  His betrayers used his own words against him when the council was looking for witnesses who could accuse him of heresy and make it believable. “Now the chief priests, and elders, and all the council, sought false witness against Jesus, to put him to death; but found none: yea, though many false witnesses came, [yet] found they none.  At the last came two false witnesses, and said, this [fellow] said, I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days”  (Dolphin, p. 16).  This was exactly the kind of statement that the council needed to have Christ crucified.

Christ was crucified on a Wednesday and then rose from the grave on a Sunday.  It was important that he be taken down off of the cross before Friday at sunset because of Jewish laws and the sacredness of the Sabbath.  Through his ministry on earth, Christ achieved the faith and belief of multitudes that still follow his teachings to this day. 

One of the greatest achievements of Christ, is that he gave himself to be sacrificed for the sins of the world, even to the point of dying on a cross along with two common criminals.  Three days after he died, he came back to life and after teaching for a while on the earth to show men that what he had said was true, he was taken up into heaven in front of the crowd so they could witness the miracle.  According to the book of 1Corinthians chapter 15, verse 15, Christ died for our sins, he was buried, and he was raised from the dead on the third day (King James Bible).  The biblical description of Christ’s resurrection provides information about how Christ rose from the dead, and then walked the earth and showed himself to people. “Now, after three days, there was a great earthquake, and an angel of the Lord rolled back the stone from the tomb’s door.  In fright, the Roman soldiers trembled and then ran away.  When followers of Jesus came to the tomb and saw the stone moved, they were confused” (anon, p. 1).  The missing body they thought they would find was more than their minds could understand.  “Suddenly, two men stood by them in shining garments, saying, ‘Why are you looking for the living among the dead?  He is not here, He is risen.  Remember how He told you before that He must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified, and the third day rise again?”(anon. P. 1).  The angels were reminding them of the words Christ had spoken earlier so they would understand what had happened.  Still, they did not really believe.  “The same day in the evening, Jesus came to the disciples and stood among them and said, ‘Peace to you.’  But they were terrified, thinking that they were seeing a spirit” (anon. p. 1).    Christ was still there for them to bring them comfort and bring them in touch with reality.  “So He said, ‘Look at my hands and my feet and see that it is really Me.  Touch me and see, for a spirit doesn’t have flesh and bones, like you see I have” (anon. p. 1).

The very birth of Christ was a miraculous event.  He did not come into this world in a completely normal way.  He was born to a woman, as most human being are, but was conceived through immaculate conception.

In Luke 1. 26-33 we learn that the angel Gabriel who was sent to Mary by God.  Gabriel said,

“Do not be afraid Mary, you have found favor with God.  You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name of Jesus.  He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.  The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end” King James Bible, Luke 1:26-33). 

When Mary told her fiancé Joseph about what the angel had said, he did not

believe her.  He thought she had lied to him.  Then an angel came to Joseph and told him that he should go ahead and marry Mary, because what she had told him about her carrying the Son of God was true.

The movie The Birth of Jesus, starring Kirk Cameron, shows that Christ’s survival was also miraculous because King Herod, who had heard that the savior of the world would be born soon, decreed that all male children under the age of 2 years must be killed.  A bright star shone in the eastern sky over the place where Christ was born to give a sign to wise men of the East who had foretold Christ’s birth.  The wise men followed the star to where Christ was so they could worship him.  After the wise men of the orient had spoken with Herod and told him that they were going to worship the newborn king (Christ), Herod tried to lie to them so they would tell him where Christ was.  They did not tell him where to find the baby.  An angel warned Joseph of Herod’s plans.  Joseph took his family out of the danger zone until he was sure that the baby Jesus would be safe.  They stayed out of the country until Herod’s death.

It is generally believed by many Christian and non-Christian people that the birth date of Jesus Christ is December 25^th in the year 1 BC because that is the day that is celebrated world-wide and it has been done that way for many years.  Christmas has become a tradition in many countries.  There are many studies that have been done to show that the date is probably not the correct date.  The question has been asked many times.  What is the real birth date of Christ?  No one really knows for sure, but studies have shown some possible dates based upon research of old documents and what is known about the circumstances documented in ancient texts around the time of Christ’s birth.  According to the four gospels in the new testament of the Christian Bible, Christ was born just before King Herod had died and there are records that support the time of Herod’s death.  Josephus was a Jewish Historian  “who wrote in the 70’s A.D.  He states that Herod died 37 years from the time of the Romans declared him King, and 34 years from the time he actually became King.  Both these figures arrive at a date of 4 B.C” (McCallum, p. 1).  Due to information that we have about astronomical patterns, it has been established that there have been no lunar eclipses in the years 3 or 2 B.C.

Josephus records an eclipse of the moon just before Herod passed on.  This occurred on March 12^th or 13^th in 4 B.C.  Josephus also tells us that Herod expired just before Passover.  This feast took place on April 11^th in the same year, 4 B.C. 

From other details supplied by Josephus, we can pinpoint Herod the Great’s demise as occurring between March 29^th and April 4^th in 4 B.C.” (Wallace, p. 1).

Since Herod died shortly before the Passover on April 11^th, it is believed that He died sometime between March 12^th and April 15^th.  That would place the birth of Christ before the time of March 12-April 11, 4 B.C. since Christ was born before the death of Herod the Great (McCallum, p. 2). 

Since the modern calendar we use today has a definite line between B.C. and A.D., most people believe that the years recorded begin with B.C, 0, but there is no such thing.  The calendar begins with 1 B.C. and then goes to 1 A.D. (The Encyclopedia American).   The calendar we use today splits up the time between B.C. and A.D. and was not created nor used until A.D. 525.  That is the year that Pope John the First ordered that a standardized calendar be created for the western Church.  It is presumed that the monk in charge of creating this calendar missed the correct division point by no less than 4 years (Wallace, pp. 1-2). 

In the gospel of Matthew, we read that Herod had all of Bethlehem’s babies killed who were two years old and under.  According to author Daniel B. Wallace, “The earliest Jesus could have been born, therefore, is 6 B.C.  Through a variety of other time indicators, we can be relatively confident that the one called Messiah was born in either late 5 or early 4 B.C. (Wallace, p. 2).

There are some who support December 25^th as being the birth date of Jesus Christ.  “Hippolytus, in the second century A.D., argued that this was Christ’s birthday.  Meanwhile, in the Eastern Church, January 6^th was the date followed “(Wallace, p. 2).  During the fourth century there was a great supporter of the December 25^th date named John Chrysostom and he argued with other historians about the date.  At that point in time, the Church in the East and the Church in the West began to observe the 25^th as the correct date for Christ’s birth (Wallace, p. 2).  “Virtually every month on the calendar has been proposed by biblical scholars,” as the birth time of Christ (Wallace, p. 2).  So the question arises.  Was December 25^th really the birth date of Christ?  No one knows for sure.  As author Daniel Wallace says, “December 25^th fits both tradition and the biblical narrative well.  There is no sound objection to it”…”And December 25^th has been the frontrunner for eighteen centuries.  Without more evidence, there seems no good reason to change the celebration date now” (Wallace, pp. 2-3).

In this paper, we have talked about Jesus Christ, the man, the God, his life, and the life that he gives to all who will accept his gift.  During Christ’s life on earth, he showed people who God the Father is and he taught the way to follow God.  He gave his life as a sacrifice for the sins of the world and then rose from the dead to show how great God’s power is.  Christ was conceived in a very unusual way that was considered a miracle, yet he was born into the world as any other human baby would be.  He was born as a very poor child, without even a bed, in a stable.  Yet he came into the world as a king.  His life had been foretold in the Old Testament scriptures hundreds of years before he was born. 

Throughout his life, he did good by healing people with diseases and other physical problems.  He performed many miracles so the people would know that he was the Son of God, yet many still did not believe him.  He lived with the common problems and temptations that all people face, yet, he was God, and did not commit sin.  But he still understood what mankind goes through in his struggle to please God and avoid sinning.  That is why Christ is the perfect advocate for us.

In celebration of Jesus Christ, it is natural that people would want to have a special day set aside to honor him.  Jesus Christ is the reason that Christianity exists.  Many people believe that the date of his birth is December 25th.  This belief has been passed down for hundreds of years and has become a tradition in many countries and cultures.  Researchers have found information that tells them that the actual birth date of Christ may not be Dec. 25^th, but there is information to show that it could be anywhere from the month of March, through the month of April, and it could be between 1BC and 4BC.  Nobody really knows for sure, what the actual date of Christ’s birth is.  But among Christians who love and follow Christ’s teachings, it doesn’t really matter.  Just so they do honor him.

I believe that Jesus Christ was born, but I am not sure when exactly.  I don’t think anyone knows for sure.  There is too much evidence that his birth date may not have been December 25^th, for me to be certain.  I think that no one knows when Jesus Christ was born.  I also believe that no one knows when he is going to come back to the earth.  I still believe that he came to save those who want to be saved.  That is all that matters to me.  He only knows when he is coming back, and the same about when he was born.  No one knows what day, or even what year for that matter.  I believe that Jesus Christ someday will tell us when his birth date was, just so we will know.  Then, it will be too late to change our lives.  Now is the time to change our lives.  Those people who follow him will know the whole story when they see him.  He will tell them when he comes to take them home.