I. Astrologers
The Christmas story is full of familiarity. It is something that we are used to. It is something that we know. Because of this I find that I often don’t pay attention to the things in the story that should stand out and make me wonder. We’re used to Jesus being born in a stable so we don’t realize what it must have truly been like for Mary and Joseph as they entered Bethlehem. We’re used to the angels appearing to the shepherds, so we don’t catch the power of the moment, the fear that the shepherds first had, then the excitement as they went to see this thing that they had heard about. We’re used to the star in the sky and the three kings coming from the east and we miss the real strangeness of their arrival.
And so, this morning, I’m going to set you straight a bit by going back and looking at the magi and what they bring to the Christmas story. First of all, I need to correct a few misconceptions about them. I feel that I end up correcting these misconceptions every year and so they might be getting old to you, but I’m going to do so anyway. First, there weren’t necessarily three of them and they definitely weren’t kings. The wise men who came to visit Jesus were Magi. We’ll talk a bit about what that means in a minute. But first we need to talk a bit about the timing. You see, the Magi didn’t come on Christmas Eve, or even on Christmas Day to worship Jesus. They came sometime in the first two years of Jesus’ life. How do we know this? Because when they visited Jesus he was living in a house with Mary and Joseph in Bethlehem. The first day he was in a stable. And also, Herod wanted to have Jesus killed and so he ordered all boys under two years old in Bethlehem and its vicinity to be killed. Another thing that helps us to see this is that when Jesus was dedicated when he was 40 days old, his parents had to give the offerings of the poor, showing that they were without means at the time. After the Magi gave gifts of gold, frankincense & myrrh, they most likely would have used this to buy a better offering to give for Jesus’ dedication.
And so the story is not exactly how we see it in our Christmas programs. And yet it definitely has something to teach us. But to understand the message of the Magi, we need to understand who they were. Think about it for a bit. Can you think of an English word that begins with Magi? Perhaps magic or magician? That’s what the Magi were, magicians. And not the kind who do tricks, either. These were people who were known as wise men, who were advisors to kings, who used astrology to come up with their predictions of the future.
The Magi who visited Jesus to welcome him to earth were astrologers. Let that sink in for a moment. They weren’t Bible scholars, they weren’t kings or rulers, they were people who looked at the sky and attempted to tell the future based on what it said. They were charlatans who practiced a form of sorcery that is outlawed in the Bible. They were pagans, or a better word for it today, witches.
II. Following a Star
You see, this is what makes the story of the Magi visiting baby Jesus stand out to me: the fact that the very people to welcome Jesus when he is born are people whose job is one that God doesn’t approve of. Most synagogues in Jesus’ time would have the same reaction. They would refer to them as sinners and pagans and believers in superstitions and would do what they could to keep them away. And yet these are the people that God reaches out to in his own way by putting a star in the sky that will draw them to Jesus. God sees these Magi not as someone to keep away from his Son, but instead pulls them to his Son. God calls out to the Magi in their superstitions and brings truth to them. And when they come to see Jesus they are welcomed by Jesus and the holy family, and God even speaks to them in a dream on the way home. God’s response to the Magi in the story of their visit to see Jesus is exactly the opposite response to superstitions or pagans that I see in the church today. We do all we can to avoid superstitions. We do all we can to avoid things that seem to be not of God. And in doing so we end up excluding people who do practice these things.
Now I’m not suggesting that you should begin reading the horoscope. I’m not suggesting that you should take up witchcraft. We don’t need these things because we have God in our lives. But we shouldn’t be scared of these things either. Instead, we should be finding ways to reach out to people who believe differently than us. Instead we should be finding ways to invite them in to the relationship we have with God. This is what God did in Jesus’ birth. He came to people who weren’t ready for him. He came to people where they were, in their own belief system, in a way that made sense to them, and he took away the superstitions they believed, and pointed them to scripture and led them to Bethlehem. It should be noted that the star, the astrology didn’t lead them to Bethlehem. It wasn’t until the Magi consulted scripture that they found the path to Mary and Joseph in Bethlehem. We, as Christians, are called to move people past their own beliefs, past their own superstitions, and lead them to Jesus as well.
III. Epiphany
We are celebrating Epiphany today. I am making somewhat of an effort this year to spend time focused on the church year calendar. I think it’s interesting to follow the church calendar and see where it takes us. And Epiphany is about the coming of the Wise Men, the Magi after we have finished celebrating Christmas, the coming of the Savior. And Epiphany is symbolized in the church calendar by a focus on light. We are reminded that Jesus is the light of the world. We are reminded that it is light that allows us to see. We are reminded that light pierces the darkness, causing it to end completely. Darkness cannot swallow light. Rather, the opposite happens. You can go into the darkest place and when you light a light, the darkness will dissipate. And if the light is strong enough, the darkness will disappear completely.
We believe that Jesus is the light of the world and we believe that we are called to carry that light into the places where there is darkness. And yet we seem to be afraid that the darkness will overtake us. We seem to think that if a place is too dark, Jesus won’t be able to shine enough to keep us in the light. And so we hold our light, and huddle in a room with other people holding lights, living lives that are afraid of the dark.
But if we live our lives in fear of the world around us, how can we reach out to the world around us at all? No, we are called to shine the light that God has given us, to illuminate the darkness, to bring those around us out of the darkness.
In seminary, a professor talked about it this way. He said that the mindset in Jesus’ day was that sin was contagious. All the purity laws that the people of Jesus’ day followed were designed to keep yourself from being infected by the sins of those around you. Sin was like a germ, and you didn’t want to get what it might give you. But Jesus in his life wasn’t about avoiding germs. No, Jesus lived a life where he went out and lived among the sinners. He ate with them. He drank with them. He stayed at their places. The Pharisees derided him for this, we often think that they did so because they thought he might give people the wrong impression. I mean, if he was fellowshipping with prostitutes, how could he prove that he wasn’t doing something else with them as well. But this isn’t really the problem that the Pharisees had with Jesus spending all his time with the sinners. He wasn’t living a holy life in their eyes. He was surrounding himself with sin, and it was going to get him. He was going to be contaminated by it.
But Jesus didn’t see sin in this way. He saw it not as a disease that was contagious but as darkness that could be dispersed by the light of the world. When Jesus spent time with prostitutes, they were the ones that were changed by it. When he ate with tax collectors, they were the ones that went away different. Jesus, instead of being scared of sin and darkness, reached out to sinners and people living in the darkness and brought them light. And this is what Jesus calls us to do as well.
Don’t live in fear of witches, instead talk with them and show them they don’t need superstition and spells when they can have a God who will hear their prayers. Don’t live in fear of astrology, instead point the astrologers to the one true light, Jesus. Don’t live in fear of people who are different than you, instead, introduce them to Christ so that you may have something, the most important thing, in common. Don’t live in fear of the kids these days who do all sorts of strange things and dress so very weird. Instead shine a light in their darkness so that they can come in contact with Jesus. It’s what Jesus did, it’s what God did through the Magi. Our light has come. Light doesn’t grow weaker when it is shared, instead it grows stronger. Let’s share the light this year with those around us so that it can truly become stronger and illuminate this whole town and this whole area with Jesus’ light. Amen.
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