Turn, if you will, we'll be in Matthew chapter 2.
Interestingly, today's advent presentation lines up with
exactly where we are in our series.
So we'll be looking at the wise men.
So Matthew chapter 2 page eight O 7.
If you're using one of the Bibles there in front of you.
So the wise men, this is this is one of those moments that's
galvanized in Christmas lore, right?
3 kings kneeling there in in front of the Manger with, with
arms outstretched, offering their gifts to the baby Jesus
who is laying in the Manger and the the camels are photo bombing
the shot, right? The wise men have made their way
into Christmas songs, but what is fact and what's fiction?
Are they actually 3 kings from the Orient?
Were they actually kings? Were there even three of them?
This morning? We're going to see what
Scripture does and does not say about the wise men.
So we already read our passage this morning.
I forgot that that was going to happen.
So I had planned to have you stand to do it.
But Hadley did such an excellent job.
So. So we'll continue.
But yeah, it occurred to me literally while she was reading,
I was like, oh, hey, this is what we were doing this morning.
So. All right.
So Jesus has already been born in Bethlehem.
That's what what the passage tells us.
You know, Jesus has already been born.
This is still during the days of King Herod's reign.
A few weeks ago I mentioned what Herod was like.
Herod was was well known for his massive building projects.
So so in a sense there was some good that that he brought to
Judea. But for all the goods that he
may have been perceived to have done, he is most well known for
how evil he was. Herod was a ruthless evil man
who would literally stop at nothing to eliminate all
potential threats or people he just simply didn't like.
And I mentioned that they had one of his wives killed and
killed some of his children and and had numerous members of the
of the Jewish Sanhedrin killed just because he didn't like
them. They stood in the way of of his
plans. Verse one set the timing and
then it continues. Behold, wise men from the east
came to Jerusalem saying, where is he who has been born king of
the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose
and have come to worship him. So this is the arrival of the
wise men. The wise men had suddenly burst
onto the scene with no introduction or anything like
that. We're not expecting any guests
at this point, right? We are focused on the Messiah.
Jesus has come. So we're focused on that in the
text. And suddenly the wise men come
in from seemingly out of nowhere, right?
Who are these mysterious men that have just arrived in
Jerusalem? First of all, the text tells us
from there they're from the east, right?
How Far East? A little bit to the east.
You know, a few miles, 100 miles, 1000 miles.
How far? I think we can arrive at some
solid logical conclusions. Now, when you and I hear the
word Orient, our natural inclination is to think of the
Far East, right? Places like China, Japan, Korea,
Far East. However, historically the Orient
also included the Near and Middle East, not just the Far
East. You saw the word Orient to
describe a geographical region came out of Europe, and so for
them the east of the Orient was everything that was east of
Europe. So that's how it came to be
called. Orient included everything east
of Europe specifically, though it's likely that the wise men
are from the Middle East. They might have been from
Babylon. We have, we have some evidence
that seems to indicate as we look at Scripture, that they
might have been from Battle Babylon, which is modern day
Iraq. They're often referred to as the
Magi, right? The term Magi comes from the
Greek word magos, which originates from a Persian word
and it means magician. It originally referred to a
priestly cast in ancient Persia. Babylonian elements of
astrology, demonology, wisdom, and magic were incorporated into
into their practices and they had extensive knowledge of
science, agriculture, mathematics, and history.
So they knew all these things and so that made them wise men.
They knew a lot about a lot of different subjects and they were
involved in a cultic practices and they were also known for
their ability to interpret dreams.
They were also some of the highest ranking officials in
Babylon. Now after Daniel interpreted
King Nebuchadnezzar's dream in Daniel Two, it reads, then the
king gave Daniel high honors and many great gifts and made him
ruler over the whole province of Babylon and chief prefect over
all the wise men of Babylon. So this isn't the first time
when, when Jesus is born isn't the first time we hear about
these wise men. We hear about them here all the
way back during the exile. So Daniel wasn't involved in a
cultic practices, but but his spirit, given capacity to
interpret the King's dream, set him above the other magi of that
time. In many ways, the wise men would
not be considered marginalized. They were.
They were well off and and well educated.
You know, this series that we've been in is Miracles and the
margins. So why are we talking about the
wise men who were rich? Well, their status as foreigners
arriving to Jerusalem probably made them suspect as they show
up with this large retinue of AIDS and supports.
What are all these men from Babylon coming to Jerusalem for?
Surely for nefarious purposes, but perhaps because they were
foreigners, Herod thought he could manipulate them for his
purposes so that he could get what he wanted out of them and
out of this situation, using them as pawns.
This explains who they are, but it doesn't help us understand
why in the world these possibly, probably Pagan Gentiles would be
coming to Jerusalem from the east.
Now it's easy for us to forget that not all Jews returned back
to Judea to rebuild and resettle it.
In fact, the vast majority remain in Babylon practicing
their faith as as much as they could.
You know, obviously they didn't have a temple or anything like
that while they were there, but they would practice their faith
as much as they could while still living in the in the
comforts of Babylon and and living off of what Babylon had
to offer them. Many Jews had intermarried with
the Persians in Babylon, no doubt giving these these
Persians some exposure to the Hebrew Scriptures and and some
knowledge of the Messiah. Near the end of the 1st century,
the Roman historians Suetonius wrote there had spread over all
the Orient an old and established belief that it was
faded at that time for men coming from Judea to rule the
world. Jews no doubt would have taken
this to be the Messiah, of course, while Rome would have
understood its own power and authority in that region.
To fulfill that expectation, In Numbers 2417, Balaam prophesied
over Israel. He said a star shall come out of
Jacob and a a scepter shall rise out of Israel.
Taken at face value, this simply means a ruler would be coming
out of the land of Judea. Now of course there could, this
could possibly have been fulfilled to some extent in King
David, but it's fulfilled even more in Jesus Christ.
But something big was prophesied here, something big was going to
happen in Judea, and the wise men wanted to be there when it
happened. So they saw Jesus star while
they were while they were still off in the East, and they'd come
to Jerusalem to worship him. Possibly feel fueled by Balaam's
prophecy. Much has been made of the star.
It's hard to say what they were actually seeing or witnessing,
as they didn't have the same understandings of celestial
objects, but there are three options that I would propose.
The first interpretive option is to view this as as simply
natural phenomenon. Just natural phenomenon.
This could have been an event like a comet, a supernova, or a
or a conjunction of planets that was perhaps out of the ordinary
they'd not witnessed before. There are various astronomical
events that that happened in this time frame in the years
leading up to 0 which we actually don't believe.
Jesus was born at zero. It seems he was probably born
closer to 4-4 BC. So if that makes sense.
Jesus was born before Christ. But timing, when we consider
Herod and Quirinius and some different things, it seems he
was probably born actually before the year 0.
But there was some different actual astronomical events that
were significance that possibly could have been a factor in
this. Another possibility is that it
was a supernatural astral phenomenon, that is, that is a
star like phenomenon. God could well have used star
like objects in the sky, something not explainable by
modern science and and which would appear and reappear at
various times in the narrative and it and it helped direct the
Magi to Jerusalem and then to the precise location when they
arrived in Bethlehem. This could even account for the
idea of it being an Angel, as scripture sometimes refers to
angels as stars. Then 1/3 idea that's suggested
is it could have been simply God's glory, could have been
God's glory. The Old Testament is filled with
accounts of God's glory being revealed as light.
Of course, as as the Israelites were were in the wilderness and
wandering around, they were being LED at night with a pillar
of fire. When Moses came down from Mount
Sinai, his face shone because of the glory of Lord Jesus.
When he was transfigured, likewise shone on the road to
Damascus, Paul was blinded by a light that he describes as being
even brighter than the sun. And then in Revelation John
referred to Jesus face shining like the sun and and the new
Jerusalem will have no need for the sun, since the glory of the
Lord and the Lamb will be its light.
Now personally, I would favor one of these last two
supernatural options, or possibly a combination of all
three. Perhaps something natural
happened that got them initially headed out and then God started
to reveal through other supernatural stars and through
his glory. Theologians speculate that God
must have must have made this light visible only to those who
were intended to see it. The wise men, they were intended
to see it, but it would not have been visible to to Herod and to
the chief priests and scribes. Otherwise they too may well have
acted. And verse 3 read, When Herod the
King heard this, he was troubled in all Jerusalem with him.
This is the agitation of King Herod.
Of course, Herod was troubled at the news of the wise men.
This entourage of from the East had had shown up looking for
someone that they claimed they said was the king of the Jews.
This is an affront to Herod. Only one person wore that title.
So Herod was not pleased and he was on high alert.
Who did he need to add to his long line of people that he
disposed of in order to maintain his control over the crown?
Now, it's safe to assume the inhabitants of Jerusalem knew
what it meant when someone threatened the title of the King
of the Jews. They knew all too well.
Herod's agitation would likely mean maniacal bloodshed.
He wasn't calculated in his approach to problems.
He didn't work to identify the enemy.
Herod was extremely volatile and and he would simply act.
This would have led all Jerusalem to fear for their
safety. Anyone with the label King of
the Jews was a threat. So Herod needed to know where
the threat that the wise men spoke of might lie.
In order to do this he he consults with the with the
scribes and the chief priests. Now by the time of Jesus birth,
the the chief priests had become little more than a group of
corrupt, religiously oriented politicians who are more about
politics than they were actually religion, and Rome would use
them in order to implement its will.
There in Judea, among the Jews, the scribes, they were the
actual scholars of Judaism. They would have instantly known
where the Messiah would be born. But it seems that they had no
interest in Herod's query. In Greek, Herod's inquiring is
is in the imperfect tense. And when the imperfect tense is
used, that means that it's a continuing process.
If Herod asked once, it would have used the perfect tense, but
it's in the imperfect. So it implies that he asked and
he asked and he and he had to keep pressing the issue with,
with the scribes and the and the chief priests.
And finally they relented and they would have referred, they
referred him to Micah. 52 But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who
are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall
come forth for me, one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming
forth is from of old, from ancient days.
But these scribes and chief priests, they should have been
waiting for the Messiah, but they seemingly had no interest
in this announcement by the Magi.
They didn't recognize Jesus at his birth, nor did they
recognize him in his teaching, his suffering, his death, and
his resurrection. Instead, they were Jesus literal
enemies from the beginning to the end when he ascended back
into heaven. So Micah's prophecy had pointed
to Bethlehem. But this isn't the only thing
that that has happened in Bethlehem.
You see, Bethlehem is already an important place, just it's just
5 miles South of Jerusalem. And it's important because Jacob
buried Rachel there, Ruth Ruth met and married Boaz there, and
then their grandson David. He grows up there and and by the
time Jesus was born, Bethlehem has long been called the city of
David. Herod's agitation was further
exacerbated when when he discovered that the wise men
went home a different way. It wasn't convenient for them to
go home a different way, but they did.
They were they? They were supposed to go worship
the child and report back to Herod so he too could go worship
the child, he says. But we know Herod.
We know that he has ulterior motives and and likely would
have killed the child. But when the Magi went home
another way, he had to take action.
He worked out the timing of when this child was likely born.
And he had all boys in Bethlehem 2 years old and under killed.
Jesus wasn't an infant when the wise men arrived at Joseph and
Mary's permanent residency there in Bethlehem.
Sorry, the the pictures with the with the Magi in the stable and
baby Jesus in the Manger. As lovely as it is, it's not
accurate. There's a home just northwest of
Long Grove, just just outside of the town of Long Grove, and as
you approach it, you see there's a nativity scene in on one side
of their very large yard. It's a nativity scene.
It has the right people. The wise men are not in the
nativity scene. They have the wise men on the
other side of their yard because wise men were far away.
Every time I see it, I always giggle inside.
I appreciate it. I appreciate their desire to be
biblically accurate. The wise men were not there.
It makes for a wonderful picture.
But they weren't there. The prophet Jeremiah had had
spoken of this defining moment in King Herod's reign.
Jeremiah 3115 says Thus says the Lord.
A voice is heard in Rama lamentation and bitter weeping.
Rachel is weeping for her children.
She refuses to be comforted for her children because they are no
more. Rachel who had been buried
there. Rachel was metaphorically
weeping over her children, these little boys who had been killed.
Stepping back a little bit on our story, we look, we'll look
at the wise men's journey to Bethlehem and, and what actually
happened there. After listening to the king,
they went on their way, it reads.
And behold, the star that they had seen when it rose, went
before them, until it came to rest over the place where the
child was. When they saw the star, they
rejoiced exceedingly with great joy.
And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his
mother, and they fell down and worshipped him.
Then opening their treasure, they treasures, they offered him
gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh.
As we look at the adoration of the Magi, we see that they had
great joy. The text uses a few superlatives
to convey how joy filled that they actually were.
To have seen the star that first LED them to Jerusalem and then
to this specific house. They were overflowing with joy.
As they went into the house they found Mary and Jesus.
It's possible Joseph text doesn't name him.
The wise men fell down to worship the child.
They knew who he was. They fully believed in him being
the Messiah and offered him 3 gifts, gold, frankincense, and
myrrh. Now because they brought 3
gifts, history has deduced that the number of wise men was 3.
But where does the text tell us how many wise men there were?
It only mentions the number of gifts.
Throughout history, gold has considered the most precious of
metals, right? It is a universal symbol of
wealth, universal from the ancient days up to today, and it
was used extensively in the construction of the temple.
Gold symbolizes royalty. Gold symbolizes royalty.
So it's fitting that the the wise men are are giving this
gift to the real king of the Jews, the King of Kings.
Then Frankincense. Frankincense was a costly,
beautiful smelling incense that represented divinity.
It was used only for the most special of occasions.
We see it used in grain offerings and royal processions
and sometimes at weddings. The Great Church Father Origin
noted that frankincense was sprinkled on certain offerings
as a symbol of the people's desire to please God.
It was representative of divinity.
When the wise men offered frankincense, it indicated their
desire to please God, whom they presumed this child that they
had just met to be. Lastly, myrrh.
Myrrh was a valuable perfume symbolizing humanity.
Sometimes myrrh would be used as an anesthetic, or it would be
used in preparing a body for burial or also in embalming.
We don't want to go too crazy with what they might have
understood about the personhood of Jesus.
But when the wise men offered these gifts, it seems that they
were offering them to a king who was both God and man.
It seems they were offering these gifts to a king who is
both God and man. So that's the story of the wise
men. As with everything I like to ask
So what? So what?
How does this impact us? Is it just a nice little story
that makes our hearts warm when when we see images of the wise
men in the stable bowing down as they offer their gifts to the
baby Jesus in a Manger? Or is it more than that?
First of all, the story teaches us trust in God's plan, teaches
us to trust in God's plan. The Christmas narrative that
that we've looked at each week has unfolded in ways that that
seems so unlikely. Hence, we've been calling it
miracle in the margins, God taking the unlikeliest of people
and scenarios and working them for his purposes and plan.
Matthew's account helps focus our attention on the fact that
God is in control, even as the events surrounding his work
unfold in unexpected ways. When we don't see exactly what's
happening, God is still sovereign and working in the
circumstances around us. And here in this passage, the
the political power of King Herod is juxtaposed against the
humble and the precarious beginnings of this baby, now
toddler. And the powers that be
continually wanted to destroy Jesus, not just in his birth,
but also 30 years later as he began teaching.
And then the disciples were baffled and distraught when
Jesus died. But it was his sacrifice that
brought redemption. You see, they'd forgotten Isaiah
55, nine in that God's ways are higher than our ways.
We can trust that God is working even when we don't understand
what's happening. So that's trust in God's plan.
Now, as we further examine the Magi, it begs the question, how
do you respond to Jesus? How is it that we ourselves
respond to Jesus? Everyone essentially fits into
three different categories. 1st is hostility.
Some people are outright hostile to the idea of Jesus, his
historicity and life, which are well proven and documented, and
their need for a savior. They're openly hostile to him,
and it's clear that they are enemies of God.
Romans 87 speaks to this person. It says the mind that is set on
the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law.
Indeed it cannot. This person refuses to place
themselves in submission to God. They don't want to come under
His authority. But most people are probably in
the second category, indifference.
Indifference. This is indifference like the
the scribes and the chief priests, the Jewish leaders.
They had, they had the Hebrew scriptures.
They could look into God's word and see what it said.
They would have large sections of it memorized.
But they chose to ignore the actual words of God.
They had no real interest in the Messiah, and instead they were
focused on political affiliations and power they
should have been waiting for. They should have been longing
for the Messiah, but they'd forgotten to anticipate his
arrival. This indifference reminds me of
the parable of the sower and the seed that was sown among the
thorns. In Mark 4 it reads Others are
the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the
word. But the cares of the world and
the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things
enter in and choke the Word, and it proves unfruitful.
Life creeps in and chokes out the revelation of God's Word,
and people who might have had an interest find themselves
completely indifferent to the Lord.
But the Gentile Magi, the ones we wouldn't expect, respond and
worship. They responded in worship.
The Holy Spirit was working in them, and then they responded to
the revelation of God in their hearts.
They didn't. They didn't have much, But what
they did have, they chose to believe and follow.
That was worship, simply giving gifts to God like the wise men
did. They gave their gifts with the
right heart posture, responding to God's revelation, right
giving, right learning, and right service.
Or they're all contingent on our hearts orientation to God.
Someone's giving. Your giving may well be
generous, but done apart from a loving relationship with God, it
proves empty. It's it's simply philanthropy.
Learning the right things is good, but apart from knowing and
depending on the source of that truth, learning is simply empty
knowledge. It's just information, like that
of the chief priests and the scribes.
Just vain knowledge. One service to others may well
be demanding and even sacrificial perhaps, but
performed in the power of the flesh or for the praise of men,
it turns out to be empty, just vanity, true worship, whether
giving, learning, serving, it must be performed in the context
of a relationship with our Savior.
This response to Him is the foundation of our Christian
walk. Those who should have worshipped
Jesus, those who should have responded to his revelation,
didn't. But those who were least
expected to did respond. Some, like Herod, are hostile to
Jesus. Some, like the chief priests and
scribes, are indifferent to him. They don't.
They don't necessarily need Him in their lives.
Some, like the Magi, worship him.
So where do we find ourselves? Are we ready to acknowledge
Jesus presence and all the details of life?
Or do our own desires and ambitions cause us to overlook
and completely miss what God is doing?
Let's bow our heads and close our eyes.
Let's take a moment in the quietness of your heart and
consider what does my worship look like?
Is my worship out of the flesh just simply going through the
motions? The the service that I render
the, the knowledge, the, the, the time with God, is that all
so that I can just grow closer and closer to him?
Or is it just so I can say, look what I'm doing?
Look, I did this. I I read the word.
We want our hearts to be fully engaged, seeking Jesus because
we want to know Him more. Let's take a moment of quiet.
Just examine our hearts. God, may we be people who who
respond. Some can respond in even with a
relationship with you. They may at seasons find
themselves indifferent. God, may we be people who truly
respond to you in worship, not just out of routine, going
through the motions, but true worship, a desire to to respond
to you with all that we are because you have revealed
yourself to us. So we thank you for coming into
this world. May we worship you with all that
we are. It's in Jesus name we pray.