Wise Men Still Seek Him

So the story of the wise men visiting the Christ child is an intriguing one.

These men began a long trip to Israel simply because a particular star or a,

magnificent sight in the sky led them there, alerting them to the birth of the King of the Jews.

They traveled for several months to finally meet this Christ child in person.

We don't know exactly where they were from, but we think probably from like

Persia or someplace like that. We don't know.

And I believe it is more than just a story meant to entertain us.

It is meant to teach us something today about seeking the Christ child.

So this morning we're going to be reading our passage from Matthew chapter 2, verses 1 through 12.

Matthew 2:1–12

The Magi visit the Messiah. After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea during

the time of King Herod, Magi from the east called to Jerusalem and asked,

Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews?

We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.

When King Herod heard that this was disturbed and all Jerusalem with him,

when he had called together all the people's chief priests and teachers of the

law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born.

In Bethlehem in Judea they replied for

this was the prophet this for this

is what the prophet has written but you

Bethlehem in the land of Judea are by no means least among the rulers of Judah

for out of you will come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel when Herod

called the magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had

appeared he sent them to Bethlehem and said,

Go and search carefully for the child as soon as you find him.

Report to me so that I too may go and worship him.

After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had

seen when it rose went ahead of them, until it stopped over the place where the child was.

When they saw the star, they were overjoyed.

On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary,

and they bowed down and worshipped him.

Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold,

frankincense, and muir.

And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to

their country by another route.

So let's look at four lessons that the wise men teach us in this encounter.

The first one is this. God makes every effort to reach every person who is far away from him.

God used the star or a magnificent light.

Some believe that it was an aligning of three planets that actually created a great light.

We don't know that. I wasn't there, I don't think anybody here was.

Anyway, but he used a great, magnificent astronomical light to reach pagan Gentile

scientists, astronomers, in order to bring them to Christ.

The first we read of these wise

men is when they actually have arrived in Jerusalem, the Jewish capital.

It says, As magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, where is the one

who has been born king of the Jews?

We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.

The wise men were on a mission to find their newborn king of the Jews and to

worship him as king of the Jews.

What's fascinating about these men is what they have to teach us about God,

that God makes every effort to reach every person, no matter how far away they are from him.

First, we have to remember that these wise men were Gentiles,

very possibly Persians, as I said, and not Jews, who had come seeking the king of the Jews.

The Jews thought the promised Messiah was going to be for the Jews only and

not for the Gentiles to release them from oppression.

In fact, all the first followers of Christ were almost exclusively Jewish.

The Christ was supposed to deliver them from their sins.

He was supposed to deliver them from their oppressors, and yet the signal to

the wise men was that God was calling them as Gentiles to this king of the Jews.

Second, not only were they not of the same bloodline as the chosen people of

Israel, they didn't even share the same religion as the Jews.

They were magi, which was a combination of a learned scientist and an astronomer.

They knew some science as well as magic.

They were the teachers of their time, but they were still believers in the thought

that the stars foretold all future events.

They looked to the stars and the signs in the skies to tell them what was going to be happening.

I don't know what book they followed to teach them.

I mean, I don't think they had books about the stars, but somebody had to write

these down and come up with these at some point in time. What this tells us

is that God never abandons anybody.

There's never anyone too far gone for his grace.

In fact, I remember a gentleman in one of our churches, well,

he didn't attend our church, but I ministered to him.

His girlfriend had died, and I had done her funeral.

And I was talking with him, visiting with him over the period of time,

and he said, but you don't understand, Pastor.

I have done way too many bad things. I am too far away from God for him to ever want me.

And I said, no, that's not true. I said, every one of us has been away from God.

Sin separates us from God. He wants us back.

So there's nobody that's too far gone. If God could reach pagan Gentile astrologers,

then he can still work on people who may think they are too far gone.

As you think about those in this world, from the terrorists to everything else,

do you ever wonder if there are some people that are just way too lost?

Is there any—sometimes I wonder, is there any possible ways some of these people

could ever accept Christ?

Are they way too past?

God never gives up on anyone, and he uses whatever means possible that he can

to help lead them to Christ.

In this case, God sent down a messenger using an astronomical event, a star,

or what appeared to be a star, to signal to them that they needed to search

for this child who was born to be king of the Jews.

Even though God said that the worship of the astrological beings is wrong,

he still used the star to bring the wise men to Christ.

Isn't it interesting how God used the language that they understood.

Perhaps if an angel had appeared to them like the shepherds,

it would have been misinterpreted. They wouldn't have known what it was.

But God knew the best way to reach astrologers was through a star.

God used the star as a way to bring the magi to see this Christ.

You remember the movie, maybe you don't, but the movie, Oh God,

way back when, when God came in the person of the actor, George Burns,

who was a cigar smoking fisherman type person that came in short little guy

came into the produce section to meet the produce manager.

That was the only thing that would have ministered to that produce manager at

the time, or according to the movie anyway. I think God probably wouldn't have

been smoking a cigar, but that's my own thought. I just don't know.

But even though God said that the worship of the astrological beings was wrong,

he still sent this message through the wise men, through the magi.

God used the star as a way to bring the Magi to see the Christ.

Remember, not everyone is raised in the church. They don't know church language.

We are sometimes baffled why people don't participate in church.

Many times it's because they have no foundation or it was not part of their upbringing.

They don't know they are supposed to seek God, and so God comes to us in ways

we can understand. He makes it relevant to us where we are, what situation is in our life.

That's why God came in the flesh, so that he could be like one of us and talk

to the people in their own language, eat their own food,

experience their own culture through their eyes, so that he could tell them

of their need for him and seek them out.

We call this prevenient grace. Even though we're not looking for it,

God has gone before and provided the means for us to accept this grace as we

go on. God expects us to do the same for others.

God doesn't want us to compromise our integrity or violate his commandments,

but he expects us to be like him, to use whatever means we can to reach people

in a language they understand in order to help them see the Christ or the Savior.

Paul said this, I have become all things to all men, so by all means I might save some.

Doesn't mean we fall into sin to reach people, but we become whatever's in their

situation, we understand them, and we move toward showing them the way of God and the way we live.

Think of a person you think is too far gone, someone you think will never come

to Christ as their Savior.

Remember, God continues to love them and is still working on them.

He wants, as the song said, he's working on us.

He's still working. He wants to bring them to Christ, and he wants to help them.

We do this by seeing where God is at work in our lives and help point them to

the Christ that needs to get their attention.

You know, we have this saying in here, God is on a mission to redeem a lost

world to himself, and he chooses to use us as chosen people to accomplish his mission.

Do you get that? Do you live that? I mean, that's where we are.

That's what God is wanting to use us to reach people wherever they are,

because he's on a mission to reach a lost people.

We need to be mindful of life's events in people's lives, because there may

be opportunities for God would like to use for us to reach them for Christ.

It may be a tragedy like an accident or death of a loved one,

or it may be a significant change in their life,

like a marriage or the birth of a child, but God uses these times to let people

be vulnerable to ask questions of us that might allow them to see God.

I have had opportunities.

At funerals and during the counseling before and after have had opportunities

to lead people to Christ because they're at some of their most vulnerable stages

of life when they are grieving the loss of a loved one,

and they are looking toward what the future holds.

And we can share with them the love of Christ.

Second thing we see is God wants us to diligently seek him.

We need more than knowledge about Christ. We need to seek out the Christ.

We need to have an experience, a relationship, as Liz said earlier.

By that, I mean we must seek out that relationship with him or God through Christ.

The danger we fall into is thinking that knowing about Christ is enough.

The truth is, we can have all the knowledge of the Bible and still miss what

the Christian faith is all about, and that is seeking Christ until we find him

and following him until we become like him.

That's what it's all about. It's not knowing the verses. It's not memorizing the verses.

It's not taking several verses out of context and putting them together and

make your life's mission by that. It's knowing the Christ of the Bible through the Bible.

And becoming part with him. These Gentile pagan astrologers with only partial

information about a Jewish Messiah set off on a journey of faith to find the

Christ, the King of the Jews,

a journey that is estimated to be anywhere from 500 to 1,000 miles.

It would have taken them probably at least three months, perhaps even longer,

to get to Jerusalem and then to Bethlehem.

That journey cost them time, money, and it cost them precious gifts.

We know these magi only had partial knowledge about the Bible and the Jewish Messiah,

or the Old Testament actually at that time, because otherwise they would have

known to look for the infant in Bethlehem if they'd had the prophecy to read.

But they had faith and made an effort to seek out this Christ child.

They had a belief that this sign in the sky was going to lead them to a certain place.

On the other hand, we see the religious community in Jerusalem,

the people with a firm grasp on the Old Testament, people who lived out the

letter of the law as written in the Scripture, people who were advisors to the king on Scriptures.

They performed all of the rituals perfectly and followed all the commandments.

They knew about God from the scriptures, yet when the wise men showed up,

Herod and those religious leaders were surprised and stunned to find out that

the Messiah had been born.

In fact, it says they were disturbed or troubled upon hearing the news.

They had either not seen the star in the sky or were unable to interpret its meaning.

Have you ever noticed anybody that knows the Bible so well, their minds are

closed, really, to what God is having to say.

They had no clue that their king had been born. It had to take some pagan.

Gentile astrologers to tell them about the Messiah.

Can you imagine how that could have gone over.

Imagine having somebody who

practices witchcraft and magic come to the church to tell us about Jesus.

It would have been strange for us, wouldn't it? And that's kind of the way it was.

You can see how the Jewish religious leaders would have been stunned by this

news coming from the mouths of these dirty Gentiles.

Who are you to tell me about the Jewish Messiah that's written about in my scriptures?

Hmm. Rather than be overjoyed at the news that the Messiah had come,

they were worried, probably skeptical, and so they chose to do nothing about it.

Unlike the wise men who had traveled hundreds of miles to worship the Christ,

the religious leaders couldn't even travel six to eight miles with them to seek

out and worship this Christ in Bethlehem.

Bethlehem is about six to eight miles travel from Jerusalem down south to Bethlehem.

King Herod even sent the wise men off to find the Christ child in his place

so they could report back to him.

It never mentions one person at least going with them to check out to see if

their information might be true.

Why didn't they go and check it out? Because pagan Gentile astronomers certainly

couldn't know anything about their Messiah.

They had to be doubting it. They were disturbed by that news.

Why would God tell these pagans about Christ and not them?

Well, he had numerous times, and they just weren't looking for it.

Besides, they couldn't be in the company with these pagan astrologers,

these Gentiles, or goyim as we heard them mentioned, which really means dirty outcasts.

Gentiles are dirty outcasts. They couldn't be with them because then their being

with these Gentiles would make them filthy and unworthy to practice their religion.

So we can have all the knowledge of the Bible. We can even have religious convictions.

We can even live out God's commands to the letter and be piously righteous in

appearance, yet we can still miss the point of Christ's arrival.

God's seeking a relationship with us through his Son, Jesus Christ,

and he wants us to seek him.

The author of Hebrews wrote this, And without faith, it is impossible to please

God because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he

rewards those who earnestly seek him.

And then when we find him, when we come to have a personal relationship with

God through Christ, everything else falls into place.

The Magi were rewarded for their journey of faith to meet the Christ.

When we come to church, when we live good lives, is it because our primary focus

is on seeking Christ, to search for him, or to draw near to him?

Or are we like the religious leaders in Jesus's day who think that doing our

religious duty is enough?

Coming to church, paying our tithes and offerings, Paying our tithes and offerings

sounds like a pain and suffering, doesn't it?

But we think sometimes that just doing, going through the motions and doing all of that is enough.

The Magi were rewarded when they found out that they found the Christ and they appeared before him.

Third thing we see is we need to worship Christ. Wise men offered valuable gifts. what do we offer?

Is it often just the leftovers?

I've been in so many churches where the furnishings of the church are what's

cast off from people's homes.

In fact, one of the churches we were in, a couple of the chairs out in the lobby,

had been cast off from one of the ladies in the church when she got brand new

furniture, and they had to be wired together to be able to be used.

So when we come to God, when we come to worship God,

are we giving him our best, our first fruits, or are we giving him what's left

over after we've been worn out by a week with the world? Just a thought.

Worship is not an option with Christ. We need to worship him with our entire

beings and all that we have and are.

Once the wise men reached Jesus, it says the first thing they did was worship him,

just like the shepherds who had already visited Jesus and worshiped it by shouting

praises to God and by telling others what they had seen with their own eyes.

Matthew 2, verse 11, as we read, On coming to the house, the Magi saw the child

Matthew 2:11

with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him.

Then they opened their presents and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh.

They bowed down and worshiped him.

One way to worship was to bow lower than the one you are worshiping.

In that Middle Eastern tradition, in fact, if these magi would have known this

well, it signaled one's subservient submission to the other by lowering themselves lower than the person.

Now, how do you suppose that these magi got lower to the ground than a baby in a manger.

It says they bowed down and worshiped. Well, I think they did more than bow down.

My feeling is they had to almost lay down on the ground.

To get lower than the king of the Jews. Question is, this is not a thing about

limbo, but how low can you go?

How far are we willing to submit ourselves and humble ourselves in front of the Christ?

They bowed down and worshiped.

That's why today we say we must accept Christ as our Lord because we acknowledge

that he is higher and in control, and we must submit ourselves to him. He is above all things.

We don't see that too much in our services today, and I'm not sure why.

Well, part of it, I do know why, because at 67 years old, it's really hard to get low.

No, let me rephrase that. It's easy to get low. It's just hard to get back up.

But we need to worship Christ, and we need to bow ourselves,

submit ourselves, and be in worship of him.

You know, I've heard people say, if Christ were to appear here and come into

our presence, we would all shout up, all stand up and shout and praise God and

sing hallelujahs and all this kind of things.

But I'm telling you what, if Christ came and appeared here in person,

I'm on the ground because there's no way I can stand before him and neither can you.

It's almost as if our worship sometimes

is for others to see us in worship rather than to see our Christ.

In any case, they worshiped in another way.

They presented an offering. Three gifts were presented to Jesus,

or three that were recorded were presented to Jesus as a sign of worship.

Remember, to worship also means to offer something.

We worship when we give our tithes and our offerings. We worship by giving our times.

We worship by offering ourselves to God.

We worship by going and serving a world that desperately needs Jesus.

How much better worship is there than to be Christ to our community.

We worship by offering that which is valuable to us, our very lives.

The gifts which the Magi brought were very valuable.

They were given at a great cost to themselves. The Christ deserved a gift worthy of his kingship.

The first gift listed was gold, a treasure deserving of a king.

The second, frank incense, was a fragrant scent offered up to God during sacrificial worship.

It could only be offered to God by a priest. Jesus is called our high priest in the Bible.

Lastly, myrrh was used as an oil to prepare a body for burial.

In fact, myrrh was used to embalm Jesus when he died.

It was a gift symbolizing the preservation of life after death.

It was a gift for a Savior who would die for us all. Each of these gifts came

at a significant cost and with a significant meaning, and worship should cost us something too.

And finally, we need to continue to be open to God's Spirit.

The wise men obeyed God's direction by not returning to Herod.

There must have been something in their encounter with the Christ that turned

them to respond to the leading of God.

While they had been led to the Christ child by an astronomical wonder,

they were cautioned and led away by a dream sent from God.

The journey to the Christ and the reward of faith had taught them to remain open to God's leading.

There's never a point in our lives when we can say that we have arrived in the

sense that we've got the Christian life all figured out.

In fact, Paul said, not that I have already attained all this,

but I pressed on toward the heavenly prize that is set out before me.

Scripture concludes, the scripture that we read concludes in verse 12 of Matthew

2, and it says, and having been warmed and agreeing not to go back to Herod,

they returned to their country by another route.

Now, I think there's one translation that says they returned another way,

and I think both are true.

I mean, way means route in this case, or do you say route?

Okay, thank you. I just wanted to know. I'm in Wisconsin. But they returned

to another route, but one translation says they returned, they went back another way.

And I think there's something that happened in that encounter with Christ that

they went back completely different people.

They went back in a way in their mind and their bodies and their beings that

was completely different than when they started out.

Even though the wise men had found the Christ child and had worshiped him, they weren't done.

They didn't say, okay, I did my duty. I'm glad that's over.

Let's get back to regular life. Their seeking God didn't end with meeting Christ.

They continued to remain open to God. They were changed by having been in the presence of God.

I wonder, shouldn't that happened to us too.

We should be changed by being in the presence of God. The point is close, is clear for us.

Just because we have sought Christ and found him doesn't mean we're at the end

of our journey. It's only the beginning.

God wants us to be open to the leadings of the Holy Spirit. One student at school

one day, actually, they started asking me some questions. I think I've told you this before.

And then one girl asked, what is sanctification?

This is a high school kid. What is sanctification?

When do we get that? And I said, well, according to my scriptures and what I've

read, sanctification is the presence of God, the being set apart for God,

and we receive the Holy Spirit when we accept Christ.

But he continues to fill himself up in us as we give him room in our lives.

And that sanctification is that process.

It begins with the event of accepting Christ, but it's that process of moving

through us and changing us into his image.

So at what place in your life are you now?

Where are you on your journey to find Christ?

Are you the one far away from God who is hearing the calling to come seek his son?

Remember, God continues to

seek you no matter where you come from and no matter what your background.

If you are here or if you're watching online, you're at a good place,

and you're here because you are interested in hearing the message of Christ.

Are you a seeker who has begun your journey to personally meet Christ,

to begin a relationship with him?

Don't give up on the journey because God has not given up on you.

Are you a worshiper of Christ already? Then what have you offered to him?

Have you given everything to him in complete and continuous surrender?

Or lastly, are you opening yourself up to God's continued leading in your life

and asking him to continually transform you into his image.

As Paul said, I die to self daily.

I follow Christ. Follow me as I follow Christ.

So God wants us to seek him and to find him and to follow him.

He wants us to be wise men and women because wise men and wise women still seek Jesus.

Would you pray with me? Heavenly Father, as we continue in this time and we

share in the Lord's Supper, this is what it's all about.

You have come to this world to reveal God to us in your person,

and you have come to this world to make us like yourself so that we can not

only be joint heirs with Jesus,

but we can be representatives of the living Christ, the King of kings, the Lord and lords.

Father, we ask as you, as we participate in this Lord's Supper,

that we will be reminded of the body and blood of our Savior,

that it is through his death, resurrection, and transformation of our lives

that we receive you and become like you. In Jesus' name, amen.