The Heart of Christmas (Divine Design Devotionals)

By Rod Trent

The idea for this book first took root during another exhausting December of scrolling through social media. Year after year, I watched the Christmas story being twisted, manipulated, and misused-especially by politicians who invoked God's name while simultaneously cursing it through their actions and agendas.

One narrative particularly troubled me: the claim that Mary and Joseph were immigrants, used as a political weapon against those who support secure borders. This comparison is not just inaccurate-it's horribly wrong. Mary and Joseph were not immigrants crossing into a foreign nation. They were Jews traveling within their own country to their ancestral hometown for a Roman census. They were obeying the law, not violating it. To weaponize the holy family's circumstances for contemporary political battles does violence to Scripture and dishonors the very story being told.

But it wasn't just politicians who got the story wrong. Everywhere I looked-in movies, advertisements, casual conversations-the Christmas narrative was being distorted. Some reduced it to a feel-good story about family and togetherness. Others stripped away every supernatural element, leaving only a tale of an ancient birth. Still others turned it into a social justice manifesto, importing modern political categories into a first-century Jewish context.

Watching this year after year, I realized something had to be done. Christians needed a resource that presented the Christmas story faithfully-rooted in Scripture, informed by history, applicable to life, and free from political manipulation. That conviction ultimately led to this book.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0GC55R4P6
• ISBN13: 9798279466184
• Release Date: December 2025
• Publisher: Independently published
• Length: 284 Pages
• Weight: 0.85 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.6" x 6.0"