The Gifts of the Magi (Myrrh)
Scott Bayles, pastor
Blooming Grove Christian Church: 12/24/2017
If you’re just joining us, we’ve spent the last two weeks talking about Christmas presents. Ever since the Magi arrived in Bethlehem bearing gifts for the infant Jesus, Christmas has been a time of giving, which, of course, means Christmas is a time of shopping!
If you’re still looking for a last-minute gift idea, Dave Ramsey put together a list of 10 extravagant Christmas gifts for you to consider. The list includes a pink Bentley with a price tag of $200,000. That’s what Paris Hilton bought herself for Christmas a few years ago. The dashboard is encrusted with diamonds, because who doesn’t love nicely built diamond-encrusted dashboards? For those with a flair for theatrics, Neiman Marcus can hook you up with a walk-on role in the Broadway musical Annie for only $30,000! If it’s a hard-knock life for you right now, then this isn’t the best way to spend your money. If you really want to go all-out for that special someone this Christmas, why not buy them an island in the Bahamas? For $15 million, the Caribbean island Sandy Cay can be yours. The island is a little more than 8 acres in size and includes four houses, a private harbor, five shipping vessels, two beaches, a fitness center and more. My favorite item on the list, however, is a trip to the moon. Excalibur, a start-up company in the United Kingdom, is planning to provide fly-by trips to the moon for $150,000. They say they have demand for 29 tickets over the next 10 years. You’ll need to put in for some vacation time, though, as you’ll need six months to train for the trip.
Unfortunately, those gifts idea are just a little outside most people’s budgets. According to a new Gallup poll, Americans plan to spend around $906 on Christmas gifts this year. That’s a Santa-sized bump from last year’s survey when $785 was the estimate. Of course, $906 represents the average. Some families will spend less and other families will spend more. But the truth is—the best gifts are not necessarily the most expensive. Rather, the best gifts are personal and meaningful. They take into consideration the uniqueness and individuality of the recipient. These kinds of gift often tell us something about the one receiving the gift.
This is true as far back as the first Christmas presents ever given—the gifts of the Magi. Once again, the story of the Magi is told in Matthew 2. There, we read:
“The star they had seen in the east guided them to Bethlehem. It went ahead of them and stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were filled with joy! They entered the house and saw the child with his mother, Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasure chests and gave him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh” (Matthew 2:9-11 NLT).
As I mentioned before, these three gifts were valuable items intended to convey honor and great standing upon the recipient. But beyond that, many scholars think that these three gifts were specifically chosen for their special spiritual symbolism. In other words, these gifts tell us something about Jesus. They send a meaningful message about the baby in the manger and the man he would become.
Two weeks ago, we examined the gift of gold, which symbolized the Kingship of Jesus. Gold was a treasure befitting royalty and that just what Jesus was—the newborn King of Kings.
Last week, we discussed the gift of frankincense, which points to the priesthood of Jesus. Frankincense was a key ingredient in the incense burned by Temple priests as a fragment offering to God. According to the book of Hebrews, Jesus is our Great High Priest. His dual nature as God and man, allow him to perfectly represent God to the people through his sinlessness and sympathy and also represent the people to God through his once-for-all sacrifice, atoning for the sins of the world.
That bring us to the third and final gift of the Magi: myrrh. The most bittersweet of the gifts, myrrh carried an ominous message.
Like frankincense, myrrh was derived from the sap of trees and imported to Judea from distant lands, making it quite costly. And, like frankincense, myrrh had a pleasing aroma. However, unlike frankincense, myrrh wasn’t used in worship. Rather, in the Bible, myrrh is most frequently associated with suffering and death.
For centuries, myrrh had been imported to Egypt in droves as an embalming fluid. This practice filtered out through the surrounding areas because, even without the mummification process, the potent aroma of the myrrh would help mask the stench of a decaying body. A disheartening gift for a new mother to hold, yet beautiful in light of Christ’s purpose and plan.
Many scholars agree that the gift of myrrh foreshadowed Christ’s suffering and ultimate death. The myrrh reminds us that beyond the cradle of Christ loomed the cross of Christ.
Long before the birth of Christ, the Bible predicted that Jesus would be “a man of suffering, and familiar with pain” (Isaiah 53:3 NIV). The amount of suffering He endured was unimaginable. His beard was ripped from His cheeks, and His back was torn with a whip containing barbs. He was spat upon, punched, mocked, and worse. Of course, his pain and suffering culminated at the cross. You might remember that Jesus carried his own cross to the site of his crucifixion. Having just been flogged, however, Jesus collapsed under the weight of the cross. It was then, Mark tells us, “They offered him wine drugged with myrrh, but he refused it” (Mark 15:23 NLT). Mixed with wine, the myrrh would have dulled Christ’s suffering as well as his senses, but he refused it, choosing instead to experience the full measure of pain and suffering.
For six hours, Jesus experienced the agony of the cross—an agony so unbearable and indescribable, they literally had to invent a new word to describe it: excruciating. Excruciating is a Latin word that literally means out of the cross. Think about that for a moment. There was not a single word in the Romans’ vocabulary sufficient to describe the agony and anguish of crucifixion, so they created one.
When it was all over with, the Bible says:
“Afterward Joseph of Arimathea, who had been a secret disciple of Jesus (because he feared the Jewish leaders), asked Pilate for permission to take down Jesus’ body. When Pilate gave permission, Joseph came and took the body away. With him came Nicodemus, the man who had come to Jesus at night. He brought about seventy-five pounds of perfumed ointment made from myrrh and aloes.” (John 19:38-39)
And so, the gift given to Jesus at his birth accompanied him at his death. The question, I think, we’re left wondering is—why? Why would Jesus bother coming into our world just to suffer and die? The prophet Isaiah provided the answer seven centuries before Christ’s birth. The prophet writes: “Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering… he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed” (Isaiah 53:4-5 NIV).
Sin led Jesus to the cross. Our sins. Our transgressions. Our iniquities. Jesus went to the cross to pay the price for your sins and mine. You see, every sin comes with a price tag. A lifetime of sin is enough to rack up some major debt in heaven.
You yell at your kids, cha-ching.
You covet your friend’s car, cha-ching.
You envy your neighbor’s success, cha-ching.
You lie, cha-ching.
You lose control, cha-ching.
You give in to temptation, cha-ching.
You doze off during my sermon, cha-ching, cha-ching, cha-ching.
Further and further in debt, we go. Initially, we might try to repay what we owe. We figure our account balances as long as our good deeds outnumber our bad. But that isn’t the way it works. The Bible tells us: “The payment for sin is death” (Romans 6:23 NCV). Simply put, the cost of your sins is more than you can pay. But the grace of God is more than you can imagine. After six hours of agony upon the cross, Jesus whispered “It is finished!” (John 19:30). What makes these words so meaningful is that the Greek word translated “it is finished” is tetelestai, an accounting term that means “paid in full.” When Jesus uttered those words, he wiped away all the debt racked up by your sins and mine. He paid the debt that we could never pay.
Marilyn Garcia knows what that’s like. For Marilyn, Christmas of 2014 was going to be sparse. She’d been working two jobs, and it was difficult to make ends meet. She ended up moving into a smaller house, which helped with bills, but also meant she wouldn’t have a Christmas tree that year. She didn’t mind not having a tree, but she wanted to give her granddaughter one special Christmas gift. Marilyn thought that if she could put aside a little money from each paycheck, she could afford the Hello Kitty toy car that her granddaughter had her heart set on. Marilyn put a deposit on the car at her local Wal-Mart, and agreed to make layaway payments over the weeks leading up to Christmas. But as the layaway deadline approached, Marilyn knew she wouldn’t be able to afford the remaining balance. When she asked for an extension at the customer service counter, she was surprised to hear the employee tell her that no extension was needed! “The balance has been paid in full,” the worker said. Marilyn couldn’t believe it. There had to be a mistake. “You’re sure its been paid?” she asked. “That’s right,” the worker told her. “Earlier today, an anonymous man came in and paid off a bunch of layaway account. Merry Christmas!”
Marilyn wasn’t the only one to have this surprising conversation with customer service. An anonymous group of “layaway angels” visited many similar stores to pay off Christmas presents. In Massachusetts, two Toys R Us stores reported receiving $20,000 each in donations to pay off layaway accounts. Marilyn Garcia’s Walmart received $50,000, covering approximately 100 layaway accounts that included toys, bicycles, and electronics. In an interview with CNN, Marilyn said, “I’m humbled by it. I’m grateful. I am blessed.”
Shouldn’t we all feel that way? What these layaway angels did for Marilyn and others, Jesus did for all of us… and so much more. He paid the debt that we could never pay. And in so doing, Jesus gave us the greatest gift we could ever imagine.
Have you received that gift yet?
Every year at Christmas, James Baxter watched people rip apart his company’s product and throw it away. All the hours of creative design and careful manufacturing are gone in a flash. But he had no regrets. As president of the nation’s largest maker of Christmas gift-wrap, Mr. Baxter said, “What we don’t want is our product sitting in somebody’s closet.” (OUR DAILY BREAD December 27, 1999).
I imagine, God feels much the same way about his gift to us.
The Magi travelled a long way to give Jesus some wonderful gifts. They gave Him a gift of gold that symbolized his kingship. They gave Him some frankincense that symbolized His priesthood, and they gave Him some myrrh that symbolized his suffering and death. But Jesus traveled even farther to give something even better.
This year, just like every year, millions of people, both children and adults, will open millions of gifts. Some won’t fit. Some will be the wrong color. Many will be returned or exchanged. But there’s one gift that meets everyone’s need, one gift that will never wear out, never break or need repairing. A gift that is appropriate for a small child, or a teenager, or an adult, or a senior citizen. Boy or girl, man or woman, it makes no difference. The gift we all need, the most valuable gift of all, is that baby in the manger—the one that this whole season is about. On Christmas, we celebrate the fact that God gave us the gift of His own Son, Jesus Christ.
Invitation
If you haven’t already, I want to invited you to accept, unwrap, and embrace God’s indescribable gift this Christmas. If you need help doing that I’d love to walk you through it. If you’ve already unwrapped and embraced God’s gift to you, I want to encourage you to share it with someone else this Christmas. After all, Jesus is the gift that keeps on giving all year long. Would you pray with me?
Holy and Heavenly Father, we come before you to thank you for the most precious gift of all—the gift of your Son, Jesus Christ. The Magi’s gift of myrrh reminds us of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross and the price that he paid so that we could live with you forever. We thank you for sending Jesus to pay the debt that we could never pay. Thank you for your indescribable gift. We are humbled by it. We are grateful. We are blessed. Amen.
Let’s stand and sing together church.
