Sermon Tone Analysis

Good morning!

Can you believe that we are just three days away from Christmas Day… We are in our series on the Cast of Characters of Christmas.

If Steven Spielberg were the director for the Cast of Christmas, I don t think he would have chosen the Characters that we have in the Advent Story..

Joseph and Mary came from humble backgrounds… Mary a teenage mother with a child conceived outside of wedlock… The Shepherds were barely tolerated in the first century …they were lowly and dirty and untrusted…

Then we have another group of unlikely people… A Caravan of Wisemen from the East who arrive on the scene… They are the Magi a bunch of “Star-led Wizards,” magicians of sorts…

These Astrologers are a Quest to find the King of the Jews…

A quest is a journey toward a specific mission or a goal....

We all can relate to the Magi travels because like their journey much of our life is about seeking and discovering of our Purpose…

-- We are born with this internal compass that is longing for significance and Identity… We want to know Why we were born? and we want to know who we are?

We were created for purpose...Just like every inventor and creator creates tools with specific intentions.

So God created man with a purpose.

When we are fulfilling God’s purpose for us, things go well, but when we are outside that purpose, things dont go as well..

Purpose speaks of intentional plan and outcome… Purpose is like a guide that is leading us down a particular path… Paul tells us that we can have knowledge of his purpose...

As a believer there comes this awareness of bigger picture… knowledge of a calling that is according to His Purpose…

So those bigger questions like Why am I here?

Who am I? where am I going… is ultimately found in God purposes..

One of the big failures of Atheism is that it doesn’t adequately address the our need for purpose… For example the... atheist Carl Sagon ...said we are just made up of star dust..we exist and then we go back to star dust… Well, in an accidental universe that would be true...

The problem with Atheism is the fact that every human being has this inner compass… This Quest to understand purpose and find meaning in life....Atheism simply doesn’t satisfy this inner compass for meaning..

God as creator has designed us with this internal compass with the desire to find out where we fit into the big scheme of things... God has given each of us gifts, talents, abilities to be expressed in the world… As per design… those needs can only be realized and satisfied within himself…

T/S We are going to learn from the Magi that Wisemen are on a Quest to seek after the King...

In Matt chapter 2 we have the only record of the Magi journey to find the King… Where Matthew tells of the Quest of the wisemen.

Before we get into this we need to Clarify a few things up about the Wisemen… If we are honest we don’t know as much about them as we think… the only record we have is this section in Matthew...

And there have been some creative liberties taken when it comes to retelling of the Christmas story...

I don’t want ruin your Christmas… but I have to give you a spoiler alert .... here…not everything that we do at Christmas fits with the Biblical account..

For example...

Have you noticed that every Christmas card the artist has portrayed 3 wise men and 3 Camels… right.. that is what we comes to believe… this idea is reinforced by the carols we sing…

John Henry Hopkins wrote the amazing Carol “We Three Kings” … But The truth is that there is nowhere in our text where mentions that there were 3 Kings — we have three gifts presented to Jesus Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh.... But, Matthew mentions that there were 3 Magi.

In fact Scholars believe there were many more because their presence caused a great stir in the city of Jerusalem..

The other idea is that they were Kings....

At no point are we told that these guys were kings.

They’re wise men were scholars of the day who studied the stars... they were astrologers…who interpreted the stars….

One last misconception is the timing of their coming… We have these beautiful nativity scenes with the shepherds…and the Magi.. but Matthew tells us that Jesus is found in a house… more likely a young infant.. Magi come much later....

What is incredible is that your have 3 Gentile --- Astrologers.. coming seeking for Jesus…

Why does Matt include the visit of the Magi in his account of the Birth of Jesus?

What is in Matthew’s mind is that Gentiles, those considered alien to God’s purposes, exhibit an openness to God’s purposes (even through the instrumentality of their own craft) and an eager receptivity toward the newborn king..

We have the elite opinion of the nations coming and acknowledging the true wisdom is Jesus Christ.

That indicates that the coming of Christ was bring in a new era.. of grace.. where Christ was going to be for all nations… and all people groups and Nations..

Lets read the Story of the Magi quest to find Jesus --- the King of Jews...

T/s What we learn from the Magi is what it means to actively seek after Christ… And there are three movements that I want to point out in our text… .

The first is the...

1.

The Quest of Direction: What am I Pursuing?

The first thing we learn from the Magi is that they are on specific journey....The are head in a definite heading and direction… When they come to Jerusalem they immediately reveal the purpose of their Journey… they have come to Worship....

How did this happen?

What we learn is how the Journey began in the first place..

The begining of the quest… started with rising of an unusual Star rising in the East and start moving in a Westwardly direction… We need to remember that these men were astrologers… they were looking intently at the Sky… they were seeking to find meaning in the heavenly bodies interpret life from the perspective of the stars..

The Start of there journey is really full blown paganism… You don’t get much further from God than this....

This fact should give us so much hope… That God could use their magical arts and practices to lead people to truth....

Out of all the stars in the night sky that they were studying and looking at… This particular Star stood up above the rest....

The Magi refer the Star --- AS HIS STAR..

What is His Star....

There seems to be consensus among Scholars who agree that the star is most probably the fulfilment of the Star that is mentioned in the book of Numbers 24:15 ....

We are told that a Star shall come out of Jacob… it thought that it is possible that Magi were familiar with the prophecies of the OT..

The word star or comet would rise out of Jacob was a reference to coming of a deliver of Israel…

What were the Magi looking at?

There are also various ideas of what magi saw; whether it was some supernova, or whether it was a brilliant comet such as Halley’s Comet, or whether it was a brilliant conjunction of planets such as Saturn and Jupiter...

We Can’t Get lost in details Here…

What we are told in Scripture is that there was a brilliant star that appeared, and the magi, seeing this star, were convinced of an act of God in which the entry of a great king was being heralded to the world....

It is what they did next is what is really important… That after identifying the Star they began to follow the Light that God had revealed...

We see that God has provided a means for them to Follow Him…

There are these wonderful promises of guidance in the Scripture…For example…After David receives forgiveness from his failure with Bathsheba.. God gives this promises and blessing of Guidance… God says to David....

One of the wonderful things about Scripture is that we can know his voice.. God has given us his word as means of instruction and guidance…

God says that He will instruct David through His word… but he will also Guide him with my eye....

This is amazing imagery of how God guides us with his very presence..Just like the Magi had to be willing to follow the Star…

Guidance comes from both seeking and willingness to follow… the same message is given...

In Psalm 23

The Lord is the Shepherd — he is providing Direction… The Shepherd is the Provider He is providing pastures… The Lord is providing the Energy — He is restoring our souls… alls those things have been made available..

all the systems are in place… What is needed is the willingness to follow.. if we keep our eyes upon Him… He will willingly lead us ...

Another aspect of Guidance is that it is more about the Direction wer are heading in than all the details...

God will Point us in the right direction and the details will take care of themselves…

We don't have all the information or the details… But what we can trust is that when we walk in the light of God that we are going to be heading in the right direction.

But here is the the thing.

If we are honest we love the convenience of an automated life… We living in the “Smart” Generation.. where we have smart watches.. smart tv’s we have smart cars… we have smart Houses… The thought of everything being automated is somehow welcoming… less hassles more convenience.

We love the automated life… when it comes to the spiritual life… you can't do it on auto pilot...

The first part of their quest is Awareness of the star… Awareness comes through observations...

--The Magi observed a star in the eastern sky .... they examined and studied the Star.. and after much time and everything pointed to the Birth of a King..

The second part is to follow…

-- The Magi have followed the Star of the King.

These men were learned men they had been studying an unusual star in the eastern sky and had interpreted it as sign that the Jewish King would be born..

We need to ask whom or What we are following?

The Magi teach us that Wise men still seek after the King!

T/s What we learn from the Magi is what it means to actively seek after Christ… And there are three movements that I want to point out in our text… .

The first is the...1.

The Question of the Direction

2. We Quest of Threats: What are my challenges ?

James Emeory White Wrote a book entitled Christ among the dragons.... he tells of

Medieval cartographers (mapmakers) sketched hic sunt dragones (translated "there be dragons") on the edges of their maps.

Those three words were used by the medieval cartographer of the famed Lenox Globe (c.

1503-1507) to describe the outer boundaries where knowledge ended and speculation began.

After drawing on all of his knowledge, the mapmaker could only write those three provocative words to convey that these areas were at best unexplored, and at worst, perilous.

There is a point when these Magi loose loose sight of the Star… and unknowingly… travel into some perilous territory…

Magi stop being led by the Star.. and turn to their own logic to try and connect all the dots....They put two and two together By their own reason and thinking, they came to the conclusion that there was a king to be born..the most logical place would be in the Capital of Jerusalem.

They are headed into some dangerious waters… it doesn't take long before news of their arrival gets to the palace..

When Herod hears what the Magi had been asking… He is disturbed and disturbed/ terrified with the rest of the city...

The word troubled... means to have great mental distress... throw into confusion...

Here is the thing about Herod he was really a nasty piece of work… Though an ambitious builder and efficient administrator, Herod also had a dark side.

He was a paranoid, cruel, and ruthless ruler Throughout his reign he feared that people would revolt against him, including members of his own family.

Already by this time, Herod had killed several family members, including some of his own sons, because he suspected that they wanted his throne

Fear drove Herod to action He lost no time gathering top leaders and scholars -- lets fix this problem....

The laid forward the thesis the proposition... “Where is the Messiah supposed to be born?”

They didn't have google to find stuff out you had to find the actual scholars... get the best minds in the Theology... religion-- lets figure this out...