Recognize God

We are starting the New Year with a new sermon series. We are going to spend the next few weeks focusing on the life and ministry of Jesus. We are going to allow Jesus and those around him to help us look at what we should look towards as followers of Jesus.

We begin this week looking at the story of the magi and more specifically their ability to Recognize God. Our scripture comes from Matthew 2:1-12.

2 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 when it rose 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 Messiah 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 shepherd 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 search carefully 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 when it rose 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, frankincense and myrrh. 12 And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.

Please pray with me…

Our journey with Jesus begins with a journey. We have magi, or wisemen, or kings depending on the descriptor that you grew up with or that your favorite translation uses, taking a long journey to seek out and visit the King of the Jews.

There is nothing definitive about where they originally came from but the way that I have chosen to use has them starting in Babylon. Under this journey we would have had the Magi hear about the Jewish Messiah from Daniel during his time that he was held in captivity.

The Magi were astronomers and considered men of great knowledge. Despite being a slave Daniel was one of them. We have Daniel throughout the book of Daniel speaking of the coming Messiah. This occurred 700 years before Jesus.

We also have, after Daniel survives being placed into the lions’ den, King Darius, the king of Babylon, make this decree…

26 “I issue a decree that in every part of my kingdom people must fear and reverence the God of Daniel. “For he is the living God and he endures forever; his kingdom will not be destroyed, his dominion will never end. 27 He rescues and he saves; he performs signs and wonders in the heavens and on the earth. He has rescued Daniel from the power of the lions.”

Based off of this decree, The Magi would have been open to hearing about Daniel’s God, and Daniel would have had the means and the knowledge to let the Magi know of when the Jewish Messiah would come.

(Transition)

We have the Magi recognizing Jesus in three different ways in today’s text. First from a distance. Second, we have them seeking help so that they can become closer to him. And third, we have them worship him.

The first connection we find between these Magi and the Jewish God was their willingness to seek God, or search for God. They must have been informed in some way to look, possibly through Daniel, for a sign. They see the sign. They recognize that it is what they need in order to believe that the king of the Jews has been born.

(Transition)

This understanding sends them on a journey of exploration. They want to find the Messiah. They want to be able to connect with the one that they had heard would come and now seems to have arrived.

Each one of us is on a journey from the moment that we have heard about the possibility of a Messiah or, as he is better known to us, a Savior. For some that journey leads them closer to God while others struggle to understand or believe in the sign or signs

No matter if you are someone who has already become a follower of Jesus and believe that he is the Messiah or you are still struggling to understand the role that Jesus can play in your life, God wants to be on the journey with you.

(Transition)

Our first reading offers to us a great example how God is at work and also can show us that he may be speaking to us and we may be left unaware. It is possible for anyone to miss the voice of God.

Our story begins with a woman named Hannah. Her husband’s name was Elkanah and he had two wives. His other wife was able to conceive while Hannah was not. The scriptures tells us that Elkanah’s other wife “kept provoking her in order to irritate her” because she was not able to have a child.

This leads Hannah to make a promise to God that if he will give her a son then she will have that son dedicated to him. God fulfilled his promise and allowed her to have a boy who they named Samuel. Hannah fulfilled her promise by giving him to the Lord through the chief priest named Eli.

(Transition)

We move forward to Samuel working in the Temple for Eli. Samuel has fallen asleep when he hears a voice calling his name. He assumes that it is Eli and he runs to him to find out what he needs. This occurs two more times before Eli understands that it is God calling out to Samuel. He tells Samuel that the next time he hears the voice say “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” Samuel doeswhat he is told and receives a message from the Lord.

I bring this up because we have someone who was conceived with help from God. Was dedicated to service for God. But was unable to recognize the voice of God when God spoke to him. The scripture says this was because “The word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him.”

It is possiblethat you haven’t heard from God because he hasn’t revealed his voice to you yet. It also may be that you are like Samuel, and you haven’t discovered what the voice of God sounds like to you.

What I would add is that it is also possible that you are trying to hear an audible voice but that is not how God is attempting to speak to you. You may have heard from him and even responded to him without recognizing that it was God you were following.

(Transition)

We that recognize Jesus as the Messiah should be seeking out ways for us to connect with Jesus. We should be desiring to share with those around us about what Jesus has done for us. Just like the Magi from generation to generation believed they had a message worth sharing we also have a message to share with those around us.

We can also be like Eli and help someone else recognize that God is who is speaking to them. We need to seek to hear from God while also helping others understand that God has a message for them.

(Transition)

We next discover the Magi attempting to find Jesus by asking those that they believed would have the most knowledge about where they would find the King of the Jews. They wanted to be able to be as close to Jesus as was humanly possible.

This seems to be the opposite reaction when it comes to Herod along with the Jewish priests and teachers of the law. The priests and teachers have the knowledge and pass it on to Herod but none of this group seems interested in going to see Jesus.

This group of people were disturbed or troubled by what they had heard. The Magi have traveled around 800 miles to be this close to the Messiah. Herod and the Jewish religious leadership were not willing to even travel 25 miles.

(Transition)

I remember once when I was at a church a new follower of Jesus was telling how excited he was about telling his friends about Jesus. I remember the response someone gave after he left, “he will soon be like us.” Meaning, he at some point won’t be as excited.

That is where some of us may find ourselves today. We wouldn’t be willing to travel 25 miles to become closer to Jesus while others are willing to travel 800 miles. Many of us have become comfortable in our faith. We like our relationship with God as it is and we don’t see any need to change it.

Instead, I wonder if we should figure out how we can become closer to God. We should desire to get to know God better each and ever day. A lot of us might not even remember that time when we were excited to get to be close to Jesus.

(Transition)

We have spoken before about what I like to call spiritual exercises. Just like people will often make a new year’s resolution to work out more and get in better shape in the new year, we can decide that we want to improve our relationship with God in the new year.

This can look different for each person. For some it may mean a focus on reading scripture. For others it might mean setting up a time to be silent with God and allow him the opportunity to speak to you. For you it may mean finding a devotional to allow you to connect with God.

No matter the means, seek out a new way for you to become closer to God so that you can become the follower of Jesus that he desires for you to be. You may already recognize God, but you may discover a new side of your relationship with God that you hadn’t felt before.

(Transition)

The last aspect of the journey of the Magi that we will discuss is in regards to the way that they worshiped Jesus. We find three aspects of worship or reverence to Jesus in today’s scripture. They bowed before him.  They gave him gifts. They listened and responded to him.

Bowing is the ultimate sign of royalty. This would be the magi saying through their actions “you are the king and we are not.” What should be interesting for us is that these are individuals who would not be considered Jewish choosing this action.

That matters to us because many consider the Gospel of Matthew to be the Gospel that is directed towards the Jewish people. Matthew is letting his audience be aware that Jesus is being accepted and Jesus is accepting praise from those that are not Jewish.

We are seeing Gentiles accepting and worshipping the Jewish God. It leads us back to my belief in them being from Babylon. We had the king tell the people of Babylon to show “reverence to the God of Daniel. For he is the living God and he endures forever.”

We are here today worshipping God. In our case we are saying through our worship of him that “he is God and we are not.” We are acknowledging the power that he has and the ability in our cases to forgive us from the power of sin.

(Transition)

We next have the magi offering gifts to Jesus. We are not going to get into the meaning of the gifts at this time. That will be for when we have our Bible study after church on the Gospel of Matthew. But it does matter that he offers him gifts.

It is acknowledging that Jesus is not only a king worthy of acknowledgement but he is also worthy of receiving physical signs of the role that he plays in the world. These gifts are showing that Jesus is a physical ruler. He is someone that is ruling a kingdom.

We don’t believe that Jesus ruled here on earth after all if that was the case he would have been the king that the Jewish people had been waiting for. He would have been a physical king. A conquering king.

We see him as not the Savior of the Jewish people but the Savior of the world who saved us from the power of sin. We also offer him gifts through our offering. We give back to God because of all that he has given to us.

(Transition)

The last way that we have the magi recognizing God is through their willingness to listen to him. Again, this is an important part of the story because the writer of what many consider to be the Gospel to the Jewish people is stating that the Jewish God speaks to those that are not Jewish.

The magi who had followed the star to the king of the Jews choose to continue to follow the way that God takes them. They leave by a different way which allows Joseph, Mary, and Jesus to escape before Harod knows that they are gone.

We need to also listen and respond to God. This is true not only to us individually but also as the church. We have a God that desires to be in ministry with us and we allow him to join us when we give him time to speak to us and choose to follow his lead in the ways that we serve him.

(Transition)

What should all of this be saying to us? This story of the magi revealing Jesus to Harod and the Jewish religious leadership is here by no coincidence. This is Epiphany Sunday, the Sunday that we focus on the revealing of Jesus. We see this not only in the story of the magi but also in our story of Samuel where we have God’s voice being revealed to him.

This scripture should remind us that are followers of Jesus what we should choose to do to recognize and follow Jesus. We should follow the path that he sends us down. We should seek to become closer to him. And we should worship him.

If you are here today or watching through our You Tube worship experience these scriptures should point out that God is at work long before someone decide to follow him. God desires to be in a relationship with you. What he asks from you is to acknowledge him as your Lord and Savior and to ask for him to forgive your sins.

We have a God that is worthy. We have a God that desires to walk with us. Let us be open to the ways that he is reaching out to us.

Let us pray…