The 3 Wise Men
Welcome Campuses!
It’s beginning to feel like Christmas around here! Busy working on Christmas services OVER 25,000 people will come though! GET HERE EARLY. Arts team iCampus exclusive! Gift cards from The Andersons for those in need, CAMPUS PASTOR will tell you all about. Night wrapped in RED! It’s starting to look and feel like Christmas! I LOVE IT! Who’s with me! …aaand the day after Christmas I can’t pack it all up quick enough!
Hopefully my opening video got you thinking, reminiscing. As I took a poll online and with my friends this week we’ve pretty much boiled down the WONDER of Christmas. Why did it feel so magical when we were younger? One word, unanimously: GIFTS!
Waking up Christmas morning and running to the tree, shaking things gifts, holding flashlights up to gifts from the other side like your own personal x-ray machine, ‘accidentally’ tearing a gift open and then re-taping it before mom and dad woke up.
GIFTS made it magical! It seems superficial but it’s ok, we were kids! Christmas is all about gifts from a Biblical perspective, not Xboxes and iPads but the whole idea of getting something special that you did nothing to earn is written all over Christmas!
God even gave His Son, Jesus gifts at Christmas. Have you ever thought of that? It took a little while for Him to get them there but when they arrived, Mary and Joseph knew these gifts were special!
We three Kings of Orient are, bearing gifts we traverse afar! Great song but there is little to NO evidence in the Bible that these guys were kings, we should stick with ‘Wise Men’ like the KJV indicates. Lets talk about their story, I bet there’s a lot you might not know, the fact that our God and GIFTS go hand in hand!
First of all it’s a myth that there were for sure 3 wise men. There could have been 20, there could have been 2. There were at least 2…and they carried 3 precious GIFTS, fit for a KING. You know, when you bring a KING a gift, you know it’s going to be the BEST gift you can offer!
Matthew is the only biblical author that mentions this situation.
MATTHEW 2:1-12 READ
Friends there’s a LOT going on here! You’ve got OT prophecies, angelic beings leading people, an attempt to KILL the Son of God, God directly helping someone avoid death by tipping them off!.....I mean, the story of the wise men just may be a bigger deal than you’ve ever thought!
Let’s break it down! (I’ll give the abbreviated break down)
WHO WERE THEY?
We, in the west have come to know them as Gaspar, Melchior and Balthasar. Yes they actually have names! I know, this is so exciting! Give me a robe and a fireplace and we’re in business!
Long story REALY short there as I said before there isn’t any evidence they were actually kings but more likely they were KING MAKERS. The top men of counsil for a King.
It’s highly likely that they came from The Babylonian Empire as they would have had plenty of access to Daniels teachings from the OT, so they certainly would have known all of the prophecies about this Savior. Daniel foretold all of that. They would have been waiting, watching around this time for signs and wonders of His coming!
Well they got it didn’t they! BAM…a “Star” they could follow! Not just any star, no this was obviously different to them and they knew it when they saw it! They were astronomers, NOT ASTROLOGERS and they knew the night sky well. THIS star was something special.
While we’ll never know for sure how God chose to guide these men towards his precious Son…it’s interesting how V2 in Matthew 2 the wise men say “we saw HIS STAR when it arose”…there are times, especially when speaking of ANGELS that the word star is used, JOB 38:7 and Rev 12:4&7…it’s quite possible an angel led the way! God certainly wanted to make this special!
Either way they end up in Jerusalem, after all, that’s where you would go to find a King, right? Except Jesus wasn’t there! These wise men must have been something special because Herod happily met with them. The problem is that Herod also didn’t like these “King Makers” telling him they’re here to see the King…and it’s NOT Herod. Herod figures out these men are headed to this Kings birthplace, Bethlehem and tells them they are to find Jesus and report back to Herod, so he can “come worship Him too”.
Obviously Herod’s desire was to kill Jesus and stop all this talk of another King. He was so intent on it that God had to intervene and tell the wise men in a dream to go a different route home to survive! So with the Star once again guiding them, they head out to find this King, to present him with GIFTS.
Off the wise men go on a 6 mile journey to Bethlehem. Now it’s not to proper “Nativity Code” for aesthetics but they were late to the birth of Jesus. Up to 2 years late, whatever, it didn’t matter. What matters is how puzzled they must have been. The Bible says the ended up at A HOUSE. Not a palace. Just a house, probably a row house along an alley, nothing special at all. Not on the outside but on the inside was something that would right every wrong humanity had ever committed.
And the wise men knew exactly WHO was on the other side of that door as they knocked. Scripture tells us they had EXCEEDING JOY in their hearts! Imagine what they felt when that door opened and there before them was God in human form! A child, A King, A Redeemer, A Lion and a Lamb. They fell down and worshiped this child. An act of reverence and submission.
I’m sure Mary and Joseph were astonished to see such high ranking men worshiping their son, I bet they were crying and full of exceeding joy too.
They understood how important this moment was!
The wise men knelt down before The King….and gave Him 3 gifts…who’s meaning go deeper than we could imagine.
GOLD – To represent purity and Kingship
FRANKINCENSE – To represent Jesus as the most high priest
And of course, MYRRH ( the gift that bore the heaviest and hardest meaning to stomach, for a mom and a dad ) What did MYRRH represent?
Much thanks to Pastor Troy Richards for some insight.
Way back in the OT in the book of Ruth, Naomi is at the lowest point in her life and she cries out “Don’t call me Naomi, call me Marah, because God has made my life bitter”. Another place in the book of Exodus there was a place called “Mara” and no one could drink the water there it was so bitter!
What did Myrrh represent? BITTERNESS AND PAIN…DEATH
The tree Myrrh comes from is nasty ugly too, look at that thing. It looks like it’s dying! To extract the Myrrh is brutal. They literally have to harshly wound the trees over and over by slashing them.
Myrrh. What did it mean when presented to baby Jesus? It signified His death, also a brutal one beaten and slashed. His life would end in pain and this gift of Myrrh was understood. This wasn’t the last time Jesus would be given Myrrh. 33 yrs later as He lay on the cross, dying for you and me…Jesus was once again offered wine mixed with Myrrh to help ease His pain. Perhaps Jesus gained strength in that moment, just knowing God had a perfect plan from the day He was born. Perhaps the room got somber as that gift was given? Perhaps the gravity of Christmas hit them in that reverent moment. There sure was a lot of meaning behind that gift.
It feels good to give a gift of meaning doesn’t it? When you work hard to plan it and pick it out just right…I don’t know about you but as I get older, the wonder of Christmas isn’t found in what I get, it’s found in what I can GIVE. I’d rather see the look on my child’s face when they get a gift I’ve really thought out.
You know, as a father, the only thing better than GIVING my child a gift…is watching them with joy, when they GIVE me, their father, a gift that they really worked hard on. I MELT. To see their little hearts give back to me, waiting in anticipation to open it…there’s NO feeling like it!
And so it is with our Heavenly Father. He loves to give to us. He gave His Son to save this world. That’s more than we deserve. Imagine the smile on His face when we give back to Him! He’s a dad. He knows.
Maybe the way to recapture the wonder of Christmas…is to capture its true meaning.
Give Jesus a gift that lasts. After all Myrrh has been found in Egyptian tombs and after 4,000 years it’s just as strong smelling as it was the day it was locked up!
What gift will YOU bring before the King this Christmas? Only you can answer that. I want you to think about it over the next week. You have a unique gift to give Him! He’s created you with certain GIFTS, talents and blessings! What can YOU give back to the King? Think about it this week. Lee’s going to help you do something about it at Christmas!
