Worshipping Wisely- Matthew 2:1-12

Well, good morning again, everybody.

You know, just one, one Clemson lost to South Carolina and Alex is suddenly sick.

It's the weirdest thing.

I told him I would say it.

Love you, Alex.

We are going to be passing around sympathy cards for all the Clemson fans at the end

of the day.

Now I say that, now anyone who knows me, I'm from North Carolina though, so I'm actually

wearing this color for NC State because they won their rivalry game against UNC.

So more than South Carolina, I know Jessica's family, but NC State fan, go pack.

Here's the thing though about football.

I know Alex is taking notes about how much he's going to talk to me about that later,

but it's fine.

I have the microphone, I have the power.

Speaking of football, yesterday was an exciting day for a lot of people, unless you're an

Ohio State fan.

But with it being rivalry Saturday, it really made me think though, it was funny watching

the people on social media, seeing people with banners of football teams everywhere.

We even took my parents and Daniel to spare time to have a fun afternoon yesterday.

And oddly enough, in the middle of Greenville, they were having a walk party for Ohio State.

Whatever.

And they had had a big tailgating party.

It just made me think of how much energy and effort football fans pour into, especially

those rivalry games, really any game, but especially rivalry weekend.

And as fun as it is to play fun at the different teams, it's fun to have those rivalry games,

right?

And it's fun to watch people pour their energy into those things.

Fans get crazy over their teams.

If you want a real fun time, if you have ever wondered what it's like to see Sandra Berryhill

raise her voice.

Watch, she is so embarrassed.

Watch her watch the Clemson in South Carolina game.

We couldn't even have a phone conversation with her as she was just screaming.

We were trying to ask her a question and she's going, run, run, run, run.

It was incredible.

But it's really funny and when you watch people get so into these teams and into these games,

it's almost as if, and not that this people here are because I know the hearts of people

like Sandra, Alex, and the people who watch these things, but for some of these fans,

it's almost an air of worship at these teams.

Would you agree?

When you see the way that some people pour all of their effort, their time, their energy,

their money into going and supporting these teams, and especially here as we kick off

the Christmas season, I think that's a good reminder for us when we think about what we

pour into our time at church.

See the wise men in this story, it was very clear that when they came to Jerusalem, they

came for one ultimate purpose and that purpose was for worship.

They said we are here to worship the one who is born, King of the Jews.

And once they found him, what did they do?

They bowed down and they worshiped him.

Well, my question for us to start off this morning is why are we here at church today?

There's a lot of different reasons that we could be here or listening online or wherever

we're watching this.

Are we here only because our family wanted us here?

Are we here because a friend invited us here?

Are we here just because we work here?

Are we here because church is just where you go in the Christmas season?

And while none of those reasons are bad in and of themselves or as added on reasons,

ultimately if we are here for anything other than the purpose of worshiping Jesus, then

we're missing the point.

That's why we should be here.

The really good news is if you came in here this morning for any other reason, you can

leave here worshiping Jesus.

You can leave here for the right reasons.

And I pray that that's what happens for each of us this morning.

Because it is actually shockingly easy to fake our worship, right?

Even the wicked King Herod fooled these wise men when they came to ask of him.

At first they didn't know that he was faking it.

So he tells them, hey, listen, when you go and find this baby, come back and tell me.

Because I want to worship him too.

And the wise men had no reason to doubt this King of the Jews at the time.

And it can be really easy to be like Herod and fake our worship.

And so we want to make sure that we're not offering fake worship to God because we might

not even be intending to offer inauthentic worship to God.

But that might be what's happening to us.

We might not be actually antagonistic like Herod was, but we might not have our hearts

truly in the right place.

And I really believe that looking at the way that the wise men came and what they did when

they met Jesus really shows us a way to worship God with our whole hearts.

And that's what we're supposed to do.

Our worship is supposed to be true.

Look at what the Bible says in John chapter 4 verses 23 and 24.

John 4:23

This is what it's supposed to look like.

But the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the Father

and Spirit and truth.

The Father is seeking such people to worship Him.

God is Spirit.

And those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth.

It's not enough just to say we worship Him.

We've all seen people that can stand and worship through a song, but it's nowhere on their

face, right?

And sure, not everybody is expressive.

I understand that.

But there's a difference in just not being an expressive person and standing up and singing

an incredible song about the coming of our Savior like to the world.

The name of the song is Joy.

And you're just singing of Joy to the world, the Lord is come.

When are we going to lunch?

And we can...

It's really different when that's the case.

So here's the question I really want us to consider this morning.

How do we worship with our whole hearts?

And I don't have a handout for you, but if you can find some space on your bullets, and

I want you to write down some of the points from this morning.

And this is the question that I want us to consider.

How do we worship with our whole hearts?

And we're going to examine what these wise men did to see how to do that this morning.

The first way that the wise men worshiped was the wise men worship Jesus with their

comfort, or you could say their comfort level.

I want us to look at the way that they arrived here.

The Bible says that there were these wise men or Magi who came from the east.

Now we don't know exactly where they came from.

Many scholars believe it was the area of Persia or Babylon, probably Persia based on that

time period that they would have come from.

And that would not have been an easy journey for these wise men to make.

We have to remember the time period.

There were no cars.

At best they had camels that they were traveling and riding on.

But they would have made the long, hard trek to Jerusalem.

But to these men, doing that journey was a joy because they were going to see this newborn

king.

They went miles and miles, probably on camels, sleeping in tents.

They were at risk of being attacked by animals and thieves.

And seeing this newborn baby was worth it to them.

Now how many of us on a Sunday morning as we wake up have actually, truly questioned

whether or not to go to church because it was raining outside?

Let's be real honest with ourselves, right?

We ask questions or make statements like, well, I stayed up really late last night, maybe

watching a game, and I really need to rest at home.

Or it's too muggy and I just had my hair done.

Sorry, someone can hurt me later with that one.

We are really quick to make excuses when our comfort is threatened in the slightest.

I really wish we were like the wise men in the story, right?

Well, again, we don't know exactly where they came from in the east.

They could have traveled anywhere from 400 to 700 miles, depending upon about where they

would have been.

Now this would have been with a large entourage of people.

We need to remember this was not just three wise men as that beautiful Christmas hymn

says.

This was a large enough group of people that the Bible says the entirety of Jerusalem was

troubled when they showed up.

People saw a bunch of probably Persians march into this place and they're like, hey, this

is, last time this happened, this wasn't good.

Okay?

We kind of got attacked last time a whole bunch of Persians came into town, right?

This isn't good because these wise men were high ranking officials in their kingdom.

They would have had guards.

They would have had protectors.

They would have had servants coming in and they're traveling this extremely long distance

all to come and meet with Jesus.

So why?

Why did these Magi, these wise men, go to such great lengths?

Well, they told us.

We have come to worship the one who's been born king of the Jews.

The only reason they were willing to make that trip to go outside of their cozy, comfortable,

highly appointed palace position in their kingdom was to come and worship a baby.

And the crazy thing about that is, these Magi wouldn't have even understood the whole truth

of who it is that they were going to see.

Please make sure you understand these were not men, well they wouldn't have used the

word Christian yet then, these weren't Christian men, these weren't Jewish men coming to understand

this is the Messiah, the Savior of the world.

No, these were men who all they understood was that a Jewish prophecy had come true,

that this new king of the Jews was born, so we want to go and honor this brand new king.

They didn't even know the whole story.

They didn't know that Jesus would one day die for their sins and rise from the dead.

They didn't know that this newborn king of the Jews was also the king of kings and the

son of the living God.

They didn't know any of that and yet they still came.

So what about us today Christians?

Because it gets flipped on the other side for that, right?

You see, we do know the whole story.

We do know that that baby is the incarnated son of God, the Messiah, the Savior of the

world, Emmanuel, God with us.

We know that Jesus died on the cross, took the wrath of God that we deserve to offer

us salvation and peace with God.

And we know that Jesus rose from the dead to offer us the gift of eternal life with

him.

We know all of this, so why is it so hard for some of us to make the effort to gather

and worship him?

If these magi who didn't even know the whole story just knew the prophecy that there's

a newborn king, so let's travel miles and miles and miles and miles at much risk and

cost to ourselves to go and worship him.

And then when the slightest inconvenience pops up in our morning, we go, there's always

next week.

We don't have to go every week, right?

We go most of the time.

It's really sad when we're the ones, just like the people in Jerusalem, the Jewish people

there in that time, are the ones shamed by these pagans, these foreigners, these Gentiles

who come and get it right.

I want you to write this down.

Our comforts become our captors when they keep us from worshiping God.

Our comforts become our captors when they keep us from worshiping God.

Listen, we are blessed to have the comforts that we have today.

We truly are.

We are blessed to live in a country where we can freely and easily gather as a church,

but I fear that that has made us complacent.

The early church would have been appalled at the modern church's apathy for worship.

They would be shocked when they look at how we act.

They had no comforts when they gathered the worship.

They gathered secretly in houses and basements in fear of being arrested, tortured, or executed.

Missionaries in some places today work in secret or else they'll still be arrested.

Jesus himself said of his own time here in Matthew 8.20,

The boxes have holes and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.

The Bible says we're called to be like Jesus.

Jesus himself, when he was gathering, the Son of God on earth didn't go out of his way

to be comfortable to serve the Father.

So why are we so caught up with it?

We just came out of Thanksgiving where we offer up to God our thankfulness for the things

he's blessed us with.

And again, I don't want you to feel bad about the comforts you have.

Thank God for those.

Bless God for those.

He's blessed you with those things.

But don't let those comforts hold you back from actually going and work up in God in

the first place.

Because that's what those blessings can inadvertently do.

We cling on so tightly to the things that make us comfortable, like that blanket that's

holding you in the nice warm bed and you don't want to get out and start the morning and

go to church in the first place.

Those things can hold us down.

They can go from being a blessing of God to something holding us captive from going and

worshiping him.

I mean, that never be the case with us.

Which really leads us into the second way that the wise men worshiped Jesus.

They worshiped him with their comforts, but they also worshiped Jesus with their money.

They worshiped Jesus with their money.

Look at what it says the gifts that they gave him.

It says this.

It says that when they arrived at the house, they opened their treasures, they offered

him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh.

Many people have talked about in tradition holds these really like special prophetic

ideas of these gifts.

And that's not what we're going to talk about today because honestly what it boils down

to is all three of those gifts were extremely expensive and very hard to find.

Gold obviously makes sense, right?

That that was obviously for money.

But frankincense and myrrh were difficult to find and very expensive to gather.

And one of the commentaries I was reading it said that the amount that they would usually

kind of give for a king of those kinds of spices in that big of a bottle, what most

likely they would have given would have equated to around $10,000 in modern day money.

That's a lot of money that these people are bringing for a baby.

Mary and Joseph themselves wouldn't have had much money.

So each of these gifts would have been extremely valuable to them.

And see these wise men were more than happy to give these gifts to.

King was all but required for special events in that time, especially if you're going

to go honor a king.

Sure, but not necessarily always at this value.

But listen, we again, we have to make sure we look at the purpose these wise men came.

We know in their hearts they weren't just here to come and bring attention to themselves.

They were there to worship.

And they gave of this money as an act of worship.

I want you to write this down too as we think about this.

We should give our money to God as an act of worship, not be.

We should give our money to God as an act of worship, not just duty.

And I know the pastor is going to talk about money.

And yes, yes I am.

Because you know who else talked a lot about money?

Jesus.

I actually talked a lot about money.

Jesus directly addressed finances across the four gospels about 29 times.

Here's some examples.

From Matthew 19, it's incredibly hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.

In Luke 21, he raised a poor widow, or sorry, praised a poor widow who gave two small copper

coins worth about a penny of modern money as a gift in the temple commending her heart

of sacrifice.

In Matthew chapter 19, when a rich young ruler asked what he must do to have eternal life,

Matthew 19 · chapter mention

Jesus told him to sell his possessions and give to the poor and follow him.

That guy didn't like that answer very much.

In Luke chapter 16, Jesus made clear that we cannot serve both money and God simultaneously.

Luke 16 · chapter mention

And then in 1 Timothy chapter 6, verse 10, Jesus noted how the love of money is the root

1 Timothy 6:10

of all kinds of evil.

So why did Jesus talk about money so much?

Well, it has to do with that last example.

Yes, we need money to live our lives and provide for our families.

We just do.

But it is so easy to fall in love with our money, is it not?

We put the work in, we earn the paycheck, so it's ours to do it as we please.

But listen, church, what we do with our money shows what we truly worship.

What we do with our money shows what we truly worship.

And especially talking about money in a church, it's basically impossible to bring it up

without talking about tithing and the importance of that idea.

Now, I've heard and found a lot of misunderstanding about the teaching of tithing lately, and

I believe it stems from having the wrong attitude about giving.

See, it is actually true that in the New Testament, in the New Covenant, we are no longer actually

technically under the command to tithe.

That was an old covenant mosaic law type of thing.

Here's my problem with that, though.

If you have neglected to give financially to God simply because we are no longer commanded

to by law, then we have missed the point of giving completely.

I'm not commanded to do chores for Jessica at home, but I do them anyway because I want

to sleep in my own bed.

Oh, because I love.

That's what I meant to say.

There was no part of our wedding vows that actually said, I'm going to do these chores.

I'm going to do the dishes because she cooks so wonderfully, right?

I do them out of love and service for my wife.

Just because if you're not commanded by Scripture to give financially to God doesn't mean that

we shouldn't do it.

You see, we have to see our money as a gift from God and giving it back to Him as a beautiful

act of worship to Him.

A challenging one sometimes, yes.

But what deeper act of worship than to give cheerfully to God even when it is difficult?

That old widow gave or who only had two coins to God still gave it to her or Him.

Long morning.

So that's all she had.

She gave it anyway.

She gave it cheerfully and Jesus praised her for it.

That's the kind of attitude we should have.

Look at what Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians chapter 9 verses 6 through 7.

2 Corinthians 9:6–7

He says, the point is this, whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly and whoever sows

bountiful, wait, yeah, whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.

Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion,

for God loves a cheerful giver.

You hear that last part?

Not under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

Being a cheerful giver doesn't mean that the giving will always be easy, but a cheerful

giver gives as this passage describes one who is pleased to give of their finances to worship

God despite their circumstances.

My church growing up participated in what they called the faith promise missions offering.

This was a special offering set aside for missions that was above and beyond their tide

that they would give.

They would make a pledge every single year that they would give a certain amount to go

to the missionaries that that church specifically supported.

And the gentleman who spearheaded that whole ministry there is Mr. Cahill Sr.

He travels to other churches and talks about this, and he has countless stories of months

where he and his wife Vanessa had no idea if they were going to be able to do it.

Finances were tight.

They weren't sure, but Cahill said, we made this promise to God and we're going to do

it.

And every single time God provided for them in miraculous ways sometimes, he came through

for them because for Cahill, it wasn't about I'm commanded to do this.

He loved giving his money to God.

That was worship for Cahill Sr.

And I've heard people argue, but I give my time and my talents to God.

That's my offering to him.

And that is a wonderful offering to God.

It is.

But here's my question.

If money is brought up and your first reaction is, but I do this, why are you defensive with

your money?

Any parent knows as soon as the kid gets defensive, they've lost the argument, right?

Because if at any point in this section of the sermon, in your mind, you were thinking,

well, yeah, but, or, but I do this, we need to question our hearts, don't we?

Why are we so defensive with our money?

And if that is what we're defensive with, we need to give it to God because it's become

something more than just something we use, it's become something that's holding us back

from worshiping God.

And so be willing to give that money in an act of worship back to God.

So the wise men worship Jesus with their comfort, they worship Jesus with their money, but then

they lastly worship Jesus in humility.

They worshiped him in humility.

He says when they came to the house, they offered him these gifts and they bowed before

Jesus in worship.

As we said, these wise men were most likely from Persia and they, they were highly appointed

men in that kingdom.

And the jobs that they had are important for us to know because these wise men that came

in this were, there was different versions of wise men.

We actually know well a particular wise man from the Bible named Daniel.

And many of them like Daniel were knowledge seekers.

They were gifted in doing specific things, whether it was stargazing for Daniel interpreting

dreams that God gave him.

He was extremely wise, obviously with the name of wise men.

Some of these wise men, these magi though, would go into the act and the art of astrology.

Some of them would actually seek out answers to, or do magic, basically that kind of thing.

I don't think that's where ours and this story kind of fall into, but what all of them were,

were also stargazers.

They were ones staring into the sky, studying the stars to answer the mysteries of old.

These wise men, as we said earlier, didn't know everything about Jesus when they came,

but they knew enough about him to bow before him when they came to him.

Here was a baby born to a poor family of no repute, yet they humbled themselves to bow

down to him in reverence.

But listen, the wise men, the visit of the wise men carries a much deeper and sweet relevance

for us today.

You see, the fact that they came at all is fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy that

the nations of the world would come to worship God.

Look at the prophecy from Isaiah chapter 60, verse 3 through 5.

Isaiah 60:3–5

It says, and nations shall come to your light and kings to the brightness of your rising.

Lift up your eyes all around and see.

They all gather together.

They come to you.

Your son shall come from afar and your daughter shall be carried on the hip.

Then you shall see and be radiant.

Your heart shall thrill and exult because the abundance of the sea shall be turned to you.

The wealth of the nations shall come to you.

It's not only an answer to that, but it's also a beautiful reminder of how God calls

all kinds of people to himself.

This prophecy is talking about people from all nations coming to worship God and even

to bring him the riches and wealth of the nations.

Think about these kind of men who came to see Jesus.

These were not godly Jewish men.

These were stargazing Gentiles.

In fact, actually the Old Testament speaks out against astrology and particularly mocks

the act of stargazing.

And yet these are the men that God invited to come and worship Jesus.

And I love this part.

How did God reveal himself to these stargazing Gentiles?

Did he do it by sending an angel to condemn them of their wickedness and command that

they journey to worship the Messiah?

No.

God spoke to these stargazers by showing them a star, a really cool star.

That's how he spoke to them.

And then we remind all the Christians in here today that you did not come to God on your

own.

God drew you to himself.

And he does that by speaking to us in a way that we understand.

And then as we're drawn to him, we are changed by him to be or like him.

And that's really beautiful news for us today, isn't it?

See this is what I mean by the wise men worshiping in humility.

I want you to write this down.

Humility is accepting that God is in control, not us.

Humility is accepting that God is in control and not us.

And that's shown to us in a couple different ways.

These magi had searched the stars for years for magic answers and mysteries, but only

God himself could lead them to the greatest discovery of all.

Yes, they were searching the sky, but without God placing that special star in the sky for

them to see, they never would have had the chance to worship Jesus.

Also these wise men were not above bowing down to a baby.

As I said, these were extremely powerful, highly appointed officials.

And while we don't know exactly what they were expecting to find, we know they were

looking for a baby, but they were probably expecting to not go into a poor family's house

and see a lowly family with nothing special, with not much money to their name, instead

of some highly exalted palace with people all around praising this child.

And even though that's what they found, they still bowed before this baby and worshiped

him.

So what does all of this tell us today?

Well, it reminds us of how we should view God compared to ourselves.

You see, just as God was the one who reached out and drew the magi to himself, he does

that for us as well.

If you're a Christian already, remind yourself that God did that work in you.

The Bible says that no one is good.

No one seeks after God.

That's an important reminder for us.

I didn't get saved because young Jordan said, man, I really need to find God.

It started because the Holy Spirit convicted me of my sin and pointed me to him.

The wise men got to worship Jesus because God called them, not the other way around.

And because of that, we should humble ourselves before God.

We should remind ourselves that our goodness is not what saves us, rather it is Jesus'

perfect goodness that saves us.

And without him, we are nothing.

So we should adopt the posture of the wise men and bow before him.

But it also gives incredible news to those who have not yet trusted Jesus.

Salvation is for you as well.

Salvation was not just for the Jews back then, and it's not just for good people today.

In fact, it's not for any good people today.

Salvation is for sinners.

And that's good news, amen.

Because that's every single one of us in this room.

It was for the shepherds.

It was for these Gentile, stargazing sinners.

It's for the Samaritan woman.

It's for the prostitutes.

It's for the homosexuals.

It's for every single person who God calls to Himself to be changed by him.

That's who salvation is for.

It's not just for church people.

It's for people God wants to draw to His church and change to be more like Jesus, amen.

And that's good news for us.

Because if He can save us, if He can save me, He can save anybody.

Maybe you're here today or you're listening online and you're wondering why you're here

today or why this even matters.

I can answer that for you.

It's because God's calling you.

He's calling you to repent of your sins, to follow Jesus with all of your heart.

He is calling you to join us and the wise men in this story in doing the best thing you

could possibly do this Christmas season, worshiping Jesus Christ.

Let's pray together.

Amen.