The Wisdom of The Wise Men - Joel Schrock

Good morning. I also want to greet everyone and Jesus'

name and we say that. We'll say that a lot.

And this time of year, we tend to think whether

or not this is the right time of year, but

we tend to think about Jesus and is coming to earth,

and we'll look at a little bit of that this morning. Actually,

thank you all for being here today. I want to

look at a story in It's only in one of

the Gospels. It's a story that captures the imagination some

people have. There's traditions and stories and names and places

attached to this story go back well over a thousand years,

close to two thousand years, but we don't know all

of those details. So it's an interesting it's interesting to

think about. But you can turn to Matthew chapter two,

and I'd like to think of this as Jesus coming

to earth and what all that entailed and what came afterwards.

In the knowledge of what came after his coming, I

believe is the greatest gift of humility and sacrifice and

love imaginable. And I believe the song we sang, I

didn't catch the number, but I believe that song they're

the last song was saying talked about leaving scepter and throne.

And that's interesting here because Matthew, the different gospels portray

Jesus a little bit differently to different audiences, portray him

as the son of Man, the son of God, different things.

As a servant. Matthew portrays Jesus as a king and

as as a messiah, as a savior, as Christ. And

it tracks the kingly line in chapter one. It tracks

that kingly line to his adopted father. So it uses

that line in Matthew here. And it's and this is

the only book of the Bible, and it's not that

many verses. It gives you account of wise men, these

foreign dignitaries, magi coming to worship Jesus. I said, it's

a pretty it's a pretty short account. There's been a

lot added to it over the years. But I like

to think about this morning. And I guess I don't

have a good title. You could use this for a

title if you need one, but the wisdom of the

wise men. And and I'd like us to think about this.

We know we know these verses well. We've memorized a

lot of these verses, probably in school or just from

hearing it so often. But I like to think as

we read these verses, the amount of action and initiative

that these wise men took. And I'd like to think

about that for our own lives. What that means, what

steps these wise men took. So let's look at that.

We'll read Matthew two verses one through twelve, and let's

think about see if you can pick out the decisions

that were made, the actions that were taken. And one thing,

you know, we read through twelve verses and this whole

process took likely months. We don't know. There Again, there's

all sorts of times assigned to this. We don't really know.

But you don't see all of the dust and the bandits,

and the hunger and the thirst and whatever, all whatever,

all companied this journey and what their decisions meant when

they when they, when they, and what their actions meant.

So starting in verse one, now, when Jesus was born

in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the King, behold,

there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying,

where is he that is born King of the Jews.

I'd like us to also think of the action or

the inaction of the other characters of the story, the

King Herod, and the chief priests and scribes Jews, for

we have seen his star in the east and are

come to worship him. When Herod the King had heard

these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.

And when he had gathered all the chief priests and

scribes of the people together, he demanded of them where

Christ should be born, And they said, unto him, in

Bethlehem of Judea. For thus it is written by the Prophet,

And thou Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, art not

least among the princes of Judah. For out of thee

shall come at governor that shall rule my people Israel.

Then Herod, when he had privately called the wise men,

inquired of them diligently what time the star appeared. And

he sent them to Bethlehem and said, go and search

diligently for the young child, and when you have found him,

bring me word again that I may come and worship him. Also,

I'll just point out here we all know this, but

we won't get this far in the story. We know

that his intent was to destroy any threat to his throne.

So that is a part of the story verse nine.

When they had heard the king, they departed, and lo

the star, which they saw in the east, went before

them till it came and stood over where the young

child was. And when they saw the star they rejoiced

with exceeding great joy. And when they were coming to

the house, they saw the young child with Mary, his mother,

and fell down and worshiped him. And when they had

opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts gold and

frankincense and myrrh, And being warned of God in a

dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed

into their own country another way. So that's as much

as we know for certain about the wise men. So again,

it's a familiar pasa short passage, but it recently stood

out to me as an important one. It's given not

in all the Gospels, but in the one depicting Jesus

as king, and after sort of the genealogies and a

few other things, we have this story after the birth.

So I'd like to think about and walk through, like

I said, these different steps that I think the magi took,

and why they were indeed wise men in the setting.

We don't know what happened afterwards. We don't know what

choices they made afterwards. We don't know what interactions they

may or may not have had with Jesus afterward. But

I'd like to ask ourselves, are we wise men? Are

we wise men and women? So this list of decisions

and actions could look if we'd all write them down,

they'd probably all look a little different. But some of

the things very simply that I see here is that

they were watching, they were searching for something. They were looking,

and because of that they saw they saw something, and

then they took action, and they went and probably might

be getting ahead of myself here, but as they went,

you know, they missed the mark. They went to Jerusalem

instead of Bethlehem. I don't know what was going on

with the star at that point, but they didn't get

the right place. But they asked the and they followed directions,

and again the star another action they followed. And because

of all that they found, they found that they were

looking for, they worship. They opened their treasures and gave,

and they obeyed. There's quite a bit of action packed

into these few verses. Now, again, we don't really know

who these men were. Some think, you know, they were,

and and there's probably some truth to this. Gentile astrologers

from somewhere Asia, Persia, et cetera. I mean Arabia, Persia.

One place I read said the Magi was a was

a priestly class in the Parthian Empire, which would have been,

as I understand, centered kind of around Persia or current

day Iran, right east east of Palestine, aways, which would

be a correct direction. At least, the Magi were a

hereditary priesthood that held great political power in the Persian,

Babylonian and Median and Parthian empires, an important, important group

of people. Now some think here again it's a little

bit conjecture. Some think they may have had some Jewish connections.

You know, after all, Daniel would have been a pretty

important man in Babylon a while back, would have would

have made some prophecies. He would have been Daniel. Two

verse forty eight says, then the King made Daniel a

great man, and gave him many great gifts, and made

him the ruler over the whole province of Babylon, and

chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon,

chief of the governors over all the wise men. So

whatever that means, does seem plausible that Daniel could have

generations before. The way God moves and gets people in

the right places, influence been an influenced, a generational influence

on these wise men from the east. Now there's ancient

traditions that they came from Persia, Arabia and India. Again tradition,

but the Parthian Empire would have been centered around Persia

and reached into the western part of edges of India.

Likely there was a whole caravan. It wasn't very likely.

Not three people carrying a lot of precious things through

the wilderness very unlikely. So there's a lot of things

we don't know. But here's but what we do know

is what they did, the actions they took. So we'll

go through these again. They were watching, they watched, They

were searching for something for some reason. Now, whether again

they had connections to Jews, exiled generations before, or just

pagan gentiles with the belief as I understand it, there

was at this time some Roman historians wrote about people

from the east having a tradition of a great ruler

coming from this area. So there was some oh whatever

all that had to do with him whatever combination it was,

these magi watched, were watching skies intently for a sign,

maybe many signs. Again, what they were looking for, we

don't know. What you know, if they had access to

ancient prophecies like in numbers twenty four seventeen there shall

come a star out of Jacob and a scepter shall

rise out of Israel, don't know. Don't know if they

had that or not. But what we do know is

they were looking. They were watching. Now, by the way,

that prophecy was given by Baalim, who did not follow

the star that he spoke about, met a terrible end

as a result. So again, because they were watching, they saw.

And I believe it's significant that God chose to speak

to people with open hearts in a manner that had

meaning to them. The shepherds are likely Jewish people, not

all that wealthy, and they were told of the birth

of Jesus by an angel, which should have all kinds

of significance to them. There's a lot of angels appearing

even to poor people in dire circumstances throughout the Old Testament.

Be a lot of significance to that, be a lot

of significance to anybody have a host of angels around,

but that's how God spoke to those people, apparently open

hearts for the magi. Again, astrologers of some kind from

somewhere were shown that something heavenly had happened on earth

by a sign in the heavens, a star, a light.

And I think the light, the light is really important

these wise men, and that there's just some real irony

in this story because these wise men from the east

recognize the Christ before Christ's owned people, many God's chosen people,

let's say, and many of them never did recognize Christ

as who he was. It's because they were watching, truly

watching with an open heart, I believe, and I believe

this is evidence of a couple things. If we search diligently,

we'll find, seeking ye shall find. I believe God will

speak to us where we are, and it may not

be in the way we imagined. I believe this also

signifies that Jesus is a light for the gentiles, not

just the Jews, which is very fortunate for us. There's

a prophecy in Isaiah forty two, verse six. Lord have

called thee in righteousness, and will hold thine hand, and

will keep THEE and give thee for a covenant of

the people, for a light of the gentiles. And here

it is, there's a light, and these gentiles, I presume,

are coming to worship. So somehow the poor Jewish shepherds,

the wealthy foreign wise men both saw the light. The

third thing that I that I wrote down here is

that they went. You know, they could have second guests themselves,

probably did. They could have debated about this, what did

this mean? Should we go? Were they all from the

same place. We don't know. They could have thought, you know,

surely we will hear about this if a true king

is born. The other thing is why did they care

if a king of the Jews was born? Why did

that mean anything to them? You know, we can wait

for some official message, but no, something they knew something

important had happened, and they needed to not only see

it for themselves, they needed to go give gifts and worship. Now,

in this story, it doesn't necessarily appear that the star

led them to a specific place in Jerusalem. I don't know.

Maybe they saw the star and they figured out the

significance of what this was. King of the Jews, Well,

where's a natural place to go to look for a

King of the Jews, probably like the Jewish capital, you know,

so away they went. You know, surely Jerusalem would know

about about a king of the Jews. That would be

a pretty logical place to go. But that's not where

the King of the Jews was. And so they asked.

You know, imagine their surprise again, the irony in this story.

Imagine their surprise as they entered into Jerusalem and no

one seemed to be aware that a king was born.

But that didn't stop them. That didn't stop them from asking.

They they knew they had seen a star, not just

any start says it was his star. We have seen

his star and have come to worship him. They had

seen the King's star. They fully intended to find him

and to worship him. So they got to the current

King of the Jews, we could say King Herod, and

Herod didn't know about a new king of the Jews.

Herod it was apparently some in some way descendant, a

descendant of Esau, and was put on the throne by Rome.

And he was a violently jealous man. Now you can

imagine as he took the throne, there was a fair

amount of violence to the Jews. As I understand, and

you can imagine the hatred that the Jews would have

for a man like this, not a Jew, not not

strictly a Jew, certainly mixed at best, put in place

by Rome, their their captors, let's say. And but yet

Herod was a crafty politician, and he did he did

many things. He built many things. The temple. He revitalized

and built this temple. And so the Jews had there

was some sort of admiration and awe, I suppose, and

even thankfulness perhaps to this man for some of this stuff.

But he was always worried about someone taking his throne

from him. He was so worried about this he had

his wife killed, he had three of his sons killed,

a brother in law, mother in law, uncle, and various

others put to death because he was worried they weren't

one hundred percent behind him and were angling for the throne.

The throne was his. The Emperor of Rome, Augustus, who

is no stranger to violence, he himself really had to

consolidate power through violence. Caesar Augustus said, it is said

that it is safer to be Herod's pig than his son. Now,

I think in the original the language he would have spoken.

It had some poetic form to it, like maybe we

would say in English literation. And I should have looked

how to say this. A pig be hus I don't

know if that's how you say that. Somebody can help

me out, if you know, And a son would be

hu iOS. So there was some poeticness to it. Nevertheless,

safer to be his pig than his son. So this wicked,

violent man didn't know, he didn't know about a new king,

but he was troubled. Now, did you ever wonder says

that all of Jerusalem was troubled with him. Now, it

could be that they were troubled because there's this elaborate

caravan coming through looking for a king that they don't

know about. That would be troubling, I suppose, especially if

it's your king and they know about him. Also, I

imagine that if Herod was troubled, there was trouble, and

so they were troubled. Jerusalem is troubled. But it doesn't

seem like the people of Jerusalem took any action besides

being troubled. The religious men, this Herod he brought in

and he had he did things to make so that

they didn't get too much power. You know, as I understand,

he'd swap out the chief priest pretty often so that

they didn't accumulate too much power. But he called the

chief priests and the scribes, and he says, where is

this king going to be born? You know, these are

the men that should know if a king of the

Jews is going to be born, They should know where

and how. And they did have some answers. They gave

the place Bethlehem of Judea. But you know, however full

of answers they were, these religious men. They were not

to be bothered to actually seek out this child. They

actually gave the correct answer. They had the correct answer,

but they didn't do anything about it. It's maybe a

lesson or so in there. You know. Surely they must

have thought we would recognize the Messiah if he showed up,

then surely he would come as a proper king. And

it's interesting, they said, you know, these wise men are

looking for someone born the king. They weren't looking for

a prince. You know, usually a child is born, maybe

their father is a king, they're born a prince. They

weren't looking for a prince or a future king of

the Jews. They were looking for someone that was born

a king. So interestingly, here they've actually followed the advice

of these religious men who didn't follow it themselves. They followed,

and as they did that, they begin their journey again.

As they did that, as the fire and the cloud

led the Israelites in the desert. Now, this star, and

it says, the same star, the star they had seen

in the east appeared. Let's see, I believe yeah, verse nine, Lo,

the star which they saw in the east, the same

star showed up and led them, this time very specifically

to a specific house. Now, well, all of drusal like

I'd like you to to to take a look at

the wise men's response to this star showing up. Well,

all of Jerusalem sat troubled, no action. The wise men

from the east, it says, rejoiced with exceeding joy as

they followed that leading. They were excited about this. Did

you ever wonder were the wise men the only people

that saw this star at this time? If so, why

was it because they were the only ones looking. If not,

if this star was visible to those around them, why

didn't others follow? Don't know the answer for sure, but

we do know that they followed. They followed the star,

and as a result, they found seek and you shall find.

They found after a long, tiresome journey, they finally found

the child. And I imagine when they left on their journey,

they they imagine that they would find this child in

some sort of royal situation. They've come, you know, probably

in a palace with servants and excited people around, some

sort of buzz, some sort of royalty. Yet here he

was with his mother. Doesn't even say Joseph was there.

We don't know. If they showed up in the day

and Joseph was at work, maybe he was there. It

doesn't say that he was there with his mother in

a humble house in a humble village, nothing particularly exciting

going on, except that they showed up. But we see

their response here. The response to finding him is that

they worshiped, and that in and of itself that's impressive.

You know, these proud, wealthy men that came all this

journey with expensive gifts. It says fell down and worship.

It doesn't say they, you know, bowed down. Verse eleven

says they fell down and worship. It seems like they

had no choice. It seems like they gave no second thought.

It seems like this was an automatic response to witnessing

a true king. And it's interesting it doesn't mention that

response when they met Herod, who would have had pomp

and glory surrounding him. So notice the response of the

different people here. Herod actively wanted to kill any threat

to the throne. The Jews, the chief priests, inscribes had answers,

They had the correct answer, but they seemed indifferent to

this child or the possibility that he was their king.

But these I assume pagan wise men from the east

joyfully worshiped him. And then they gave. And it says

that they in verse eleven again they had opened their treasures.

They gave of themselves. They gave something important and meaningful.

This was not a gift to obtain favor. Gold frankincense,

and myrrh. Gold. We all know what gold is. It's

it's a costly precious metal used for all sorts of things.

Currency used to be used to you know, the dollar

used to be tied to gold till we needed more

dollars than gold. I guess uh use it for jewelry,

for all sorts of things. Gold is a very fitting

gift for a king, and gold points to and signifies,

I believe Jesus royalty, he's a king. Frankincense was an

expensive perfume made and as I understand, it from trees,

and that could be found in Arabia or India. Maybe

that's where some of the conjecture comes about where the

wise men came from. I don't know, but frankincense, other

than just being an expensive perfume, that would be something

you'd give to a king as thought to signify jesus

divine nature, his divinity and the fulfillment of his high

priestly duties. Murder is maybe is maybe the strangest of

the three gifts. Now, it was a rare and expensive gift,

so there's that, I think. I mean, it was used

and certainly later and incense and some things like that,

but mr and again it was it was came from

a little thorn bush made in similar ways as frankincense

from the sap. As I understand, h murr was commonly used,

had some medicinal use. Was commonly used as an antiseptic

anointing oil and also as an embalmbing fluid. So quite

a baby gift in some ways. But murr seems to

signified Jesus humanity and mortality and perhaps coming death. So

whether or not the wise men knew it, in some

ways their gifts that there's a gospel message in gifts

that they gave. Robert Hampshire wrote, whether they fully knew

it or not, their gifts told the story about God

himself came down from heaven as our king gold to

fulfill his priestly duties, frankincense, and eventually died for our

sins the murder m. What we do now for sure

is that these men opened their treasures and gave. And

then it's interesting to me that this story doesn't end

with them discovering Jesus. It doesn't end with them worshiping Jesus.

It doesn't even end with them giving to Jesus. Their

story ends with their obedience to God. After all this happens,

God speaks to the world wise men through a dream

and warns them to go home a different way Herod.

King Herod had had some pretty treacherous ideas in mind

with knowing where this new king was, and wisely they

followed God's command and simple obedience. Now, I think the

story here of the wise man is a beautiful picture

of the journey in some way that we all take

to Jesus. Now, the individual steps might look a little

different in some ways, but you know, and perhaps on

our journey we'll get it wrong sometimes and end up

in Jerusalem instead of Bethlehem. You know, maybe we'll oft

inquire and maybe we'll be given right answers by pious

people that have no action. But don't let that stop

your journey or your joy. You know, it was after

that where it says they had exceeding joy. I like

to contrast really quickly the inaction. Let's say, of the

people that should have been watching chief priests ascribes. You know,

they weren't searching. They would say they were, probably, but

they already had the answers. You know, they had him

written down, they had him memorized, They knew the answers,

and so they didn't see. And because they didn't see,

they didn't go, and they didn't ask because again, remember

they had the answers, so they didn't follow, you know,

and why would we take these Eastern magicians seriously anyways?

And so they didn't find here. You know, it's hard

to find if you don't search. And they didn't worship.

Somehow God's chosen people missed his coming, not all of them,

and certainly later more of them found out, and they

didn't give. They didn't even know that God himself in

the flesh was living a few short miles away. Bethlehem's

not all that far from Jerusalem, and so they didn't

really have the opportunity to obey, not truly, even though

they believed they were strictly obeying many codes in the

Old Testament references a couple times. But Luke eleven, verses

nine and ten says, and I say, unto you, ask

and it shall be given. You seek, and ye shall find, knock,

and it shall be open unto you. For everyone that

asketh receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth, And to him

that knocketh it shall be open. And so I'd like

to ask us the question, where are you today? Where

am I today? Are we on this journey somewhere? Are

we always searching for the way to God? Do we ask?

Do we follow? Have we found him? Do we worship him?

Do we truly worship him? Do we open the treasure

of our hearts and give? Do we rejoice exceedingly? And

do we obey, And so two final questions. Here is

Jesus our King? And do we have the wisdom of

the wise man? Mm hmm, thank you. I