Had the Emperor Augustus made his decision three months earlier or three months later or one

month earlier or one month later, Jesus wouldn't have been born in Bethlehem, but he was.

Every single detail was in the hand of Almighty God.

God still direct history and he still holds every king, every monarch, every ruler in his hand for his own

purposes.

Welcome to Grace to you with John MacArthur. I'm your host, Phil Johnson. If you live in the United

States, you might know that 2020 was a census year.

The U.S. Constitution requires one every 10 years.

So while a census can be important, it's pretty routine and not that big of a deal, right?

Well, there's one particular census taken 2,000 years ago in the Middle East that is still

talked about today, and deservedly so.

Today, you'll relive that census and the political world that surrounded the first Christmas.

Jesus birth in Bethlehem.

That's John MacArthur's focus today in his study that's preparing you for December 25th called The Promise of Christmas.

And here's John with the lesson.

Now, as we come to these seven verses, and I'm only going to give you the first of them, he gives us three settings here.

He gives us a world setting.

He gives us a national setting with Israel, and he gives us a national setting with Israel and he gives us a personal setting.

And all three of these are very important in identifying the nature of the Messiah,

in identifying the fulfillment of prophecy in identifying his role to the world.

Let's look at the world setting.

I find this fascinating.

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