“THE MAGI”
December 11, 2011 ~ The Rev. David Moore
Scripture: Matthew 2:1-12 | PDF print version

Israel, from the time of God's creating it, had always been a people set aside to be the people of God. God gave them His laws to know how to please Him. They learned what God is like through Him revealing Himself to them. They were different from the people groups around them. Israel’s history, as you might be aware, is one more of conflict than of peace with their neighbors. In fact, even more than the wars with the surrounding people groups, as we read through the Old Testament, we read that it was the influence of the surrounding people groups that often caused Israel to leave the worship of Yahweh and chase after the fertility gods of the other peoples. You’ve heard about Ba’al and Molech and the other gods that Israel chased after. You’ve likely read the lengths God went to, through the prophets, to bring Israel back to Himself.

So over time Israel came to see itself as not this blessed, joyous people because of God, but they became very protective of God, very careful. This makes sense to me as the penalty for walking away from God’s covenant was the loss of their land and sovereignty to Babylon. Over the centuries the Jews had largely given up the idea of being blessed in order to be a blessing, and had concentrated on themselves. They became very insular, distrustful of outsiders. Even in the Temple in Jerusalem there was an outer court for non-Jews, but past that court, there was a sign on the wall which basically said, if non-Jews pass this point, their deaths will be on their own heads. So it is odd that Matthew goes out of his way to include several non-Jews in the list of Jesus’ ancestors, people like Rahab who was a prostitute. It is interesting, who the Jews believe are invited to God’s party, and who God shows us He is going to invite. Many Jews I’m sure believed that only Jews would be invited into eternal life; and Jesus explodes this thought on several different occasions, one being his birth.

So this morning we’re going to take a look at some non-Jews who have come to worship the Jewish messiah born in Bethlehem.

In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.” When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet: ‘And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who is to shepherd my people Israel.”

Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, “Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.” When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

Let’s pray

So let’s review a little. I talked last week about Matthew being focused in his writing of the gospel on Jewish people. Matthew focuses on Joseph, the Jewish man, rather than on Mary, the Jewish woman. Matthew quotes Scripture to say to his readers, this baby fulfills the Old Testament prophecy, and then today we look at how some outsiders are invited in to the worship of Christ, into the celebration of His birth. These are not common outsiders, but important, learned men. Wise men, not shepherds, come in Matthew to bring gifts to the little baby.

First, I want to give us a little background on the Magi. We don’t know where they come from other than the “east”, which, if you look at a map, there is a whole lot of the world that is east of Bethlehem. There is Jordan, then the top of Saudi Arabia, then Iraq, then Iran, Afghanistan, then Pakistan and then India and China. West of Israel, of course, is the ocean. But East of Israel, there are all sorts of nations, and within the nations are all sorts of different people groups. So to say they were from the “east” isn’t very specific information. In the second century a very important Church leader named Tertullian decided they must have been kings, so that’s where that information comes from, and that there were three of them was based on the number of gifts. One gift per king; so that works out. In the 6th century someone decided their names were Melchior, Baltazar and Gaspar. No ideas where the names came from, but you’ve probably heard those names before as being the king from the east.

The word in the text, magi, comes from an Iranian word ‘magoi’ that described odd characters who were interested in the stars, spells and incantations, and dressed in odd ways. The word ‘magi’ is the root of our word ‘magician’, which if you’ve seen old movies that have magicians, they have funny pointed hats, wear different clothes than everyone else. They have those one-piece long robe things, which isn’t a cape and not a smock, but I can’t think of a technical term for their weird clothes. Maybe a robe is the word I’m looking for. Anyway, this is kind of what magi were. Stargazers, learned men who were looking at the stars and trying to figure out life.

One of the people I admire is Dr. Ken Bailey, a writer and seminary teacher who lived for decades in the Middle East, who feels that the wise men actually came from the Arabian Peninsula. Gold is found everywhere wealthy people are, but frankincense and myrrh are the products of southern Arabia. That seems to be clue number one. Clue number two is the very earliest commentaries are written by Justin Martyr, about 150 AD, in a book called Dialogue with Trifle the Jew, and in it Justin says Jesus was born in Bethlehem, in a cave, and to that place the wise men came from the Arabian Desert. The early Christians knew the wise men came from the desert. Clue 3, in the 20’s, a British research met a Muslim Bedouin tribe called the Cal ka bani’s. Translated, it means The Planeteers, or the followers of the planets. He asked them why they were called the Planeteers, and the old men of the tribe told the British researcher that their ancestors followed the planets until they found the birth of the great planet Yssa, (the Muslim word for Jesus). They offered Him gifts, and paid Him homage. Now it would be hard to prove now, since this encounter took place in the 1920’s, but there is a tribe out in Arabia who remembers in their tradition, that some of their great men followed the planets and found the baby Jesus.

So it seems very possible that the magi were Bedouin stargazers who followed the stars to find the Messiah. Again, these are not mysterious people who come up from the ground and disappear after interacting with Jesus, but they were somewhere, and came to the Messiah, and then left rejoicing having met baby Jesus. In our telling and retelling of Jesus birth these events can become mythologized, and carry an air of untruth to them. Part of what I always try to impart to us on a weekly basis is that these were real events, which happened to real people, in real time.

Having said that, let’s get into the text and see what’s there.

In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.”

It makes sense that the Magi would come to Jerusalem looking for the new born king. After all, Jerusalem was where the kings of Israel lived. But Jesus is not that sort of king, the sort of king born to important and powerful people, born to wield a scepter with a knowledge of war and politics bred into him. He is a different sort of king, this Christ we bow down to. Born to a young couple, born in Bethlehem, which was a pretty insignificant place, born around.

We’ll get into Herod a little more next week, but I will tell you in advance he wasn’t a nice guy. He was powerful and paranoid. This must have unnerved him even more to hear that a new king had been born. The Jews didn’t need a new king; the Jews had him. So to have these strangers, who would have stood out from everyone else in Jerusalem as they traveled out of the desert and up to Herod’s palace, come up into his palace and start asking about a new king? This isn’t going to sit well with Herod, and we know it doesn’t. Herod has slaughtered many people in his quest for power, and even killed at least one of his sons who dared show he was ready to become king.

This is a threat to a king who plays politics as life and death. This is not a time of celebration and joy for Herod, this is a problem that must be taken care of. These outsiders are upsetting the status quo in Jerusalem and order will be restored. These outsiders aren’t going to upset Herod’s party.

When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet: ‘And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who is to shepherd my people Israel.”

Again, as I pointed out last week, Matthew leads his readers to see Jesus fulfilling OT prophesy, even as He is born. Where Jesus is born matters, the scribes know this and are able to point the Magi in the right direction. At some point I’ll talk more about how statistically improbable it would be for any one person to fulfill all the prophesy of the Old Testament, let me just say its unbelievably improbable. This was on purpose, of course, so that only one person could be the Messiah. There is no mistaking this Christ child. He is the One they were waiting for, and Matthew wants them to see this clearly. This was the guy.

So Herod sends them out to go find this child, with the idea that he will visit this baby next, and not in a good way. God has called these magi out of the desert, I always think that creation hints at how great God is, and even the most hardened atheists have to admit this world is pretty great. I think when God calls people sometimes He uses His creation to lead people to the Creator, to Himself. This is sort of what we have here. God has used the stars, and the passion of these stargazers to pull them to Himself. It’s odd, like I said before, that God calls these outsiders, who come and worship, but then we look at the ‘insiders’, Jews like Herod here at the birth, and the religious elites 30 some years later and how they treat Christ, it should make the Jews reading Matthew rethink how much of a birth-right they really have. The Jews had the Old Testament, and many of them chose to ignore it. They had the Christ child, the Messiah, but He wasn’t exactly what they were looking for, and missed Him.

In God’s great mercy and forbearance, they did and we can say ‘no thanks’, but if we do that, we are missing out on the best part of being human, getting to know God on His terms, and living in His light and grace.   

When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

They found the house, the found the right baby, and worshipped Him. These outsiders are invited in, directed by God who created the star, to come and worship the King of the Jews. But not just the King of the Jews, but more, as we see, the King for all people.

As a side note, quickly, I’d like you to see that they worshipped him. No music, no liturgy, no OT reading, no communion. What I want us all to see is that worship, true worship, is not about the forms worship comes in, but is about our position before God, kneeling, bowing before God. That doesn’t always mean physically kneeling, but bowing spiritually before the God who created in the beginning, who came to save us, who loves us more than we can possibly imagine. I know some people like hymns, and some like praise music, some like liturgy, and some find it a distracting ritual; I would tell you that people worship in different ways, different people are wired differently, find different ways of getting to that place where they can bow down before Jesus again and admit their need for His presence in their life. We are the church together, there are different ways we worship, but we do it together. That requires all of us to be patient sometimes, but the result is a church together focused on living to God’s glory, committed to using our lives to proclaim His salvation. That’s a great thing.

They bring gifts. Gold, which I wonder if it might have been used to finance the flight to Egypt; and frankincense and myrrh, two valuable smelly substances. Both frankincense and myrrh are resins that come from trees, like I said earlier, from the Arabian Peninsula. There are other places that produce them as well, like down into Ethiopia. They come from specific trees that grow in the soil found on the Arabian Peninsula. Both myrrh and frankincense would have been involved at Jesus death; myrrh would have been mixed with wine and given to Christ on the cross, and frankincense was often burned to cover the smell of a decomposing body. So with their choice of gifts, the wise men were foreshadowing Christ’s death. Not the sort of gift I want to get from Kaidi this year, but very appropriate for Christ. Christ is going to be most valuable to us in His death, the sacrifice covering our sins, and His resurrection, which He invites us into.

They come, find the baby, worship, leave gifts, and head back home. Like the Old Testament prophecy, these outsiders point us to the Christ child. As impressive as it might have been to learn that these foreign dignitaries came and visited Israel, in fact, came from out of the desert to worship the King of the Jews, who was going to be King of the World someday, this is also a bit of a challenge to the Jews. Matthew, I think, says, look at these foreigners. They understood, they understood who Jesus was. And yet us Jews, who should have recognized Jesus, we still struggle to understand who He was, struggle to worship Him with everything that we are. We look at ourselves as well, who have the benefit of the Old Testament, the benefit of the New Testament and thousands of years of people thinking rightly about Jesus who thinking we can stand on, and yet, it is we who have to come to understanding that Jesus was for the Jews and the wise men, He was for Mary and Joseph, and He is for us as well.

To the Jews, we are the outsiders, and still are the outsiders as they wait for the Messiah. We have become insiders, invitees to God’s party because we have accepted the invitation. It isn’t because we are perfect, it isn’t that we have any more knowledge than anyone else about Jesus and God, but we have accepted the invitation to come and worship, come and bow down, come and give our lives over to the God who wants to transform them in His image even as we live life for Him. These stargazers took a chance, followed God’s star and found God Himself. We still have that same opportunity, to follow God, and find Him as well. Christmas is about the gift we have been given in Christ, but there is also the reminder to go and seek the Christ, who will be found.