WISE MEN STILL SEEK HIM
TEXT: Matt 2:1-12
INTRODUCTION
1. Beloved of Jesus Christ, we are gathered here today to worship the King of Kings, that Babe that was laid in a manger. That Babe that was born into hardship and grew up in difficult times. That Babe that would one day stretch out His arms and accept the cruel nails for your and my sake.
2. Friends as we continue in our time of Christmas, let us take a few moments at this time to adjust our focus to where it really needs to be at this time of the year.
3. I have yet to finish my Christmas shopping, and as we all know, even though Christmas shopping is fun, it can be often times difficult. Did you hear about the guy that bought his wife a beautiful diamond ring for Christmas? A friend of his said, "I thought she wanted one of those sporty 4-Wheel drive vehicles." "She did," he replied. "But where am I going to find a fake Jeep?"
(Fresh illustrationhttp: //www.freshministry.org/illust
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4. We are here today to worship the Messiah of the World, named Yeshua, and yet this Messiah is of old. He is God in the flesh, Emmanuel.
5. Friend, I want you to take a few moments and consider your life’s actions. Have your actions always been pure and selfless, or have you ever foolishly gone against what God disired for you in your life. Have you ever done what you want, regardless of what God or anyone else wants? Has it ever been about me, me, me or I, I, I. (PAUSE TO LET THEM THINK)
RO 3:23 "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,"
6. This foolish attitude of the flesh that you have had in the past, and perhaps some of you are even plagued with it today, is not the wisest way to conduct our lives. In fact choosing this selfish way of life, is possibly the dumbest attitude that we could adopt, as it is this attitude that distances us from the Creator of all Heaven and Earth, and guarantees us a place in Hell. RO 6:23 "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."
7. Many who foolishly have this attitude, will often times in the flesh, try to earn their way out of punishment and back into relationship with God. This too is foolish, as there is no way that we can in the flesh, earn our way into the good graces of God. EPH 2:8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God-- 9 not by works, so that no one can boast.
8. Our text today is taken from MATTHEW 2:1 "After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem 2 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." 3 When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. 4 When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Christ was to be born. 5 "In Bethlehem in Judea," they replied, "for this is what the prophet has written: 6 " `But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will be the shepherd of my people Israel.’ " 7 Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. 8 He sent them to Bethlehem and said, "Go and make a careful search for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him." 9 After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. 10 When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. 11 On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh. 12 And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route."
9. These men are called wise men, or in our text, they are called magi, which is the short for the word magician, or one who watched the stars and did divination. They are not wise because they did these things, but they were wise because they searched for the King of kings, the Messiah, even though they were not Hebrew.
Transition: The sermon today, is entitled “WISE MEN STILL SEEK HIM”. So immediately three questions come up. I. Who is wise? II. Who is seeking? III. Whom do they seek?
I. WHO IS WISE?
These questions remind me of a story that I read about an angel that appears at a faculty meeting and tells the dean that in return for his unselfish and exemplary behavior, the Lord will reward him with his choice of either infinite wealth, wisdom or beauty. Without hesitating, the dean selects infinite wisdom.
"Done!" says the angel, and disappears in a cloud of smoke and a bolt of lightning. Now, all heads turn toward the dean, who sits surrounded by a faint halo of light. At length, one of his colleagues whispers, "Say something wise."
The dean looks at them and says, "I should have taken the money."
A. Worldly Wisdom
1. The world has its own ideas of wisdom.
a. Philosopher Cicero: “The function of wisdom is to discriminate between good and evil.”
b. Educator Elbert Hubbard: “To know when to be generous and when firm—that is wisdom.”
c. Immanuel Kant distinguishes between science and wisdom, saying: “Science is organized knowledge. Wisdom is organized life.”
d. Martin Fischer: “Knowledge is a process of piling up facts; wisdom lies in their simplification.”
e. Norman Cousins: “Wisdom consists of the anticipation of consequences.”
f. Robert Green Ingersoll: “It is a thousand times better to have common sense without education than to have education without common sense.”
g. Robert Heinlein: “Goodness without wisdom invariably accomplishes evil.”
h. Sam Levenson: “It’s so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and say the opposite.”
i. Stephen Sigmund: “Learn wisdom from the ways of a seedling. A seedling which is never hardened off through stressful situations will never become a strong productive plant.”
j. Theodore Roosevelt: “Nine-tenths of wisdom consists in being wise in time.”
k. Vernon Cooper: “These days people seek knowledge, not wisdom. Knowledge is of the past, wisdom is of the future.”
l. William Saroyan: “Good people are good because they’ve come to wisdom through failure. We get very little wisdom from success
m. Author/historian David McCullough distinguishes between information and wisdom, stating: “Information isn’t wisdom. Information isn’t learning. If information were learning, you could be educated by memorizing the world almanac. If you did that, you wouldn’t be educated. You’d be weird. (INC. magazine, May 2000)
n. Anonymous: “Age doesn’t always bring wisdom. Sometimes age comes alone.”
o. Frank Whitmore: “The biggest difficulty with mankind today is that our knowledge has increased so much faster than our wisdom.”
http://home.att.net/~quotations/wisdom.html
p. Walter Lippmann: “It requires wisdom to understand wisdom: the music is nothing if the audience is deaf.”
q. Naguib Mahfouz: “You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers. You can tell whether a man is wise by his questions.”
r. Socrates: “The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.”
2. One truth, for sure, is that wisdom is not to be confused with knowledge, nor does wisdom come from truth, or even from experience. One needs to be willing to learn to gain wisdom.
3. I use wisdom not to put my hand in the fire, or to play with Portuguese men of war, or to grab a wild dog by the ears, or to approach a wild elephant. These are worldly wisdoms that I have learned well, and so I am wise concerning certain things.
B. Godly Wisdom
1. Worldly wisdom and Godly wisdom differ considerably as worldly wisdom is based in the flesh, and is based on evidences seen. I will not play with snakes, as this has taught me that one usually gets bit. I will never again ask a woman if she is pregnant and ever get the look of shock. I will never again borrow money, as this will get you bit. This wisdom is learned wisdom from experiences that I have had or read about.
2. Godly wisdom is not based on experiences of the flesh, but is based on faith, and so therefore can only be given to us by God, as how can we get wisdom about something that we know nothing of. It was not until God shared His wisdom with the shepherds that they could act wisely.
3. The brother of Jesus, James writes to us, JAS 1:5 If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. This is wisdom from God to fulfill His good and righteous plan for our lives.
C. Who Is Wise
1. Friends, this life that we live is very fleeting, and we are but on this earth a short time. What we accomplish in the flesh here on this earth amounts to very little. One of the most powerful and one of the greatest builders of the ancient world was Herod the Great. They called him great because of his great accomplishments in building and conquest. Where are his buildings today, where are his accomplishments today? He is not known for them, only for his murdering of babies.
2. Beloved, where is the wisest men in the eyes of men. Is it Socrates, or perhaps King Solomon. Beloved, they are not so great. King Solomon, for all his earthly wisdom, did not use the wisdom of God. In his old age, his heart was swayed by his many wives, to follow their gods, and he left God to follow idols.
3. The ones who were wise, are the ones Matthew tells us about, the ones who endured hardship by coming from afar. I call them wise men, because they came and in Godly wisdom, knelt at the crib of what looked like a normal baby, and they worshipped Him, because they were wise, looking to their eternal lives, and not just the now.
TRANS: The one who comes and worships the Christ, is the one who has Godly wisdom. The one who secures their future in eternity through Emmanuel is the one who is the wisest. The second question that is raised, is who may come and seek Him. All may come and seek Him.
II. WHO IS SEEKING?
A. Wise Men Seek Him.
1. Friends, the statement, “wise men still seek Him,” is a statement that encompasses all mankind, and it should read, “ It is the wise man, woman and child that seeks to build a relationship with Emmanuel, the Savior of the world.” Incidentally, the name Emmanuel means “God with us” or “God in the flesh”.
2. It may be the most severely mentally handicapped person that has ever lived, and yet when they seek the Savior, they have become wiser than the wisest person who does not know Him.
3. It is not the state of our wisdom before we begin the search that denotes our wisdom, but it is our decision to search and continue searching that makes us wise. Beloved, I have met some who are unable to add math, or speak coherently, or cannot tell you different things, and yet they can tell you about their finding the Messiah, and they are the wisest.
B. Mankind Seeks Him?
1. Friends, it is the need of mankind to find its Savior. The Angels pointed the shepherds to the stable, the star pointed the wise men to the Christ, and the servant of the Lord pointed you to your Savior.
2. Take a look around you, and see that there is still a great need in the world. There are many who are suffering, bleeding and dying out there, because no one has pointed them to the Christ Child, while I find us sitting snugly by the fire warming our toes, looking out the window clicking our tongues saying that someone should do something to help those people.
3. I did some research on the computer on this guy “Somebody” and guess what it came up with a picture of our church members. I searched again, and the same picture came up. I guess, you and I are the ones who need to point these people to the Christ Child.
4. It is warm and safe in the manger, and there are evil people out there, but we cannot stay in the manger, we need to get out there and show people Emmanuel. In fact the church should be active in its mission, and those who will not get out of the manger will be ejected by the Lord. Give me just a few dedicated evangelists and God will change our area for Christ.
III. WHOM DO THEY SEEK
A. They Seek The One Born King Of The Jews.
1. Friends, the wise men were wise to seek Jesus, but they did not fully understand what it was all about. They knew enough to follow the star as it pointed to a great event, the birth of a King, but they had preconceived ideas about where and who this king would be.
2. These wise men go to Herod and ask to see the King that had been born. They were not looking for a King in a stable. They had this idea of what He should be, and so they come seeking with their own ideas, and they were wrong. This is not the wisdom of God. The wisdom of God, was for Him to become man, and to be reachable to all mankind. All through Jesus ministry, we see Him with the people. Anyone could come to Him at any time, even the children. MT 19:14 Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."
3. There are many, who seek this Baby King, but for other motives, and with other ideas preconceived. They are going to be terribly disappointed in their self-centeredness. You see, we seek Emmanuel on His terms, not on ours. I am sure the wise men were shocked to find this King a commoner.
B. Wise Men Seek The Savior.
1. Do we seek the King of kings, the child born in the muck of the stable to lowly parents, without much. Or do you seek a rich ruler who can provide for you. Who Is Your KING? The clean pink faced happy cherub, or the lowly Christ? (LET THEM THINK ABOUT THIS)
2. Beloved, it is not wise to seek the Child King with a mission to satisfy your desires, either emotionally or physically. He has come to this earth for one purpose. The child that wisdom seeks, is the one who has been born to die. He was born to be sacrificed for the sins of the world.
3. When you come to seek Christ, come with wisdom and accept what He offers to us, not what we want Him to personally do for us. Jesus says it quite clearly what He has come to do. LK 19:10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost."
C. Wise Men Seek The Lord.
1. It is the wise who seek Jesus the Christ, as their Lord, and then strive to obey and imitate him. It is the wise who commit their love to the Messiah.
2. The wise will seek the way to conduct their journey, not the end of the journey itself. The one who seeks the way to conduct their journey, looks for a relationship with the Savior, and it is the relationship that matters, not the getting out of hell. If we focus your attention on the relationship, hen we will always be led to the right place.
3. It is the wise who seek God’s revelation in their lives, not their own will. It takes great effort to give over your life to God and bow to God’s sovereignty, but the gift you receive is greater than anything you could ever possibly give away.
CONCLUSION
1. Beloved, this Christmas, what gifts are you going to give to others. Have you purchased all the latest and greatest things and have you got them wrapped and ready to go.
2. Many years ago, the greatest gift was given to all of mankind. It is a gift that keeps on giving. It is given to us, and we share it, and it keeps on going and going. But all too often it does not.
3. This Christmas, will you give the gift of Christmas to someone who yearns to be wise, and yet cannot see the star or hear the angels. Perhaps they will listen to you. Pray about it before you share the Greatest Gift Ever Given, that Wise men still seek today.
