Today is Day 16 in this series, blogging through the season of Advent. Welcome!
Our Scripture reading for today is Matthew 2: 9 - 12 ...
After hearing the king, they went on their way. And there it was—the star they had seen in the east! It led them until it came and stopped above the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed beyond measure. Entering the house, they saw the child with Mary His mother, and falling to their knees, they worshiped Him. Then they opened their treasures and presented Him with gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And being warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their own country by another route.
We've already seen the announcement of the birth of Jesus to the shepherds, and how their immediate response was to go to the stable to worship the newly born King. Now we see foreigners coming from the east to worship King.
The Gospels clearly portray Jesus as the universal Messiah: the Saviour for all people, irrespective of class or background or education or employment; and the Saviour for all nations, not just for Jews. In today’s Bible reading, the first worshipers are court magicians or astrologers - men not from Israel but from the East, perhaps from Babylon, or Iran. They were Gentiles. Unclean, andunworthy of the Messiah, in the eyes of the Jewish ruling class.
The arrival of the wise men in Bethlehem to worship Jesus not only opened the door for us Gentiles to rejoice in the Messiah, it added proof that he was the Messiah, because one of the most repeated prophecies in Scripture is that the nations and kings will, come to Him as the ruler of the world.
Just think of the end of Matthew,'s Gospel account, where the last words of Jesus are, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations." And the prophecy in Psalm 22: 27, “All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the LORD, and all the families of the nations will bow down before him ..." After coming into the house where Mary and Joseph were staying, and seeing the Lord Jesus, the magi fell to the ground and worshiped Him. These men knew that Jesus was no ordinary child. He was not simply born to be a king, but was the promised Prince of Peace. He was the One Who was anointed by God to be the King of kings and the Lord of lords – Who alone is worthy of worship and praise.
If these foreigners knew the correct response to being in the presence of Almighty God, how can we, His Children, possibly offer him anything less than all we have and all we are??!!
"They took their search to its logical conclusion. With wisdom and passion, they followed their clues and found the truth—the Christ child. When they found Jesus, they fell at His feet and worshiped Him. Their search may have begun out of sheer intellectual curiosity, but it ended in worship." (S. Briscoe)