Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Come and See the Worship of God's Lamb

A Adams / General; Kids

Come and See the Wonder of God's Lamb

Introduction

Open bibles to know your bulletin says , but save till next week, today look at sory of wise men.

Perfect for 3rd week of advent, pink candle, joy candle, because at end of story, wise men "rejoiced exceedingly, with great joy.”

So this is the right text for today!

I know this is a story that you probably know, at least a little, even if you don’t know much about the Bible, chances are pretty good that you know something about the wise men.

Now, whether what we know is what the text says is another matter altogether

Take the song, “We Three Kings of Orient Are,” ¾ of the words in the title are wrong.

“3” – we don’t know how many there were.

3 gifts.

“Kings,” not kings, they were magi or wise men.

“Orient,” probably from Persia or Babylon.

Illust: So the story is like this – maybe you’ve got a place in your house like this.

My house is pretty old, built early 50s, and little spot where trim is so old, worn down – right on corner when going down into basement – anything taking into basement probably going to take a piece of that molding with it – repainted, repainted, repainted, until eventually, hard to tell what the profile of that molding originally was.

I don’t know what color it was, either.

And that’s what we’ve done with stories like this.

We’ve added layer after layer, and knocked off much of the original.

So, we imagine that they rode camels in – we don’t know.

We imagine they wore funny hats.

Funny names – Melchior, Balthasar, Casper.

But the details we acutally have in the Scripture are better than any of the ones we’ve made up over the centuries.

And it all wraps around the beauty of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God.

Last week, in Luke chapter 2, we saw that God chose to reveal the birth of Jesus Christ by sending an army of angels to a bunch of shepherds.

They heard the news that the savior had been born.

They went and found Mary and Joseph, and Jesus lying in a manger, just as the angel had declared, and the shepherds returned to their fields, glorifying God and praising Him.

Now, in Matthew chapter 2, in the court of the Roman-approved client-king Herod, the news arrives from a very different, but still surprising, source.

And the response is very, very different.

Now, in the court of the Roman-approved client-king Herod, the news arrives from a very different, but still surprising, source.

And the response is very, very different.

We wouldn’t expect the birth of the Son of God to be announced by these men.

Number 1, they weren’t Jews.

Number 2, these wise men were “magi,” which probably meant they spent their time trying to divine the will of all the gods for their kings off in their foreign countries somewhere.

But God chose to bring them to see this King.

And they did it.

They came to worship Him.

We see a different response from Herod.

Why do we see such a difference in the way that people respond to Jesus?

Some hear the Good News and worship.

Others hear the good news and do whatever they can to stop it.

As we look at this text today, just as it was for Herod, and for the wise men, you are here today because God brought you here.

He has brought us here to worship the Lamb.

The question is, will we bow with joy at this wondrous calling?

We’ll look at the whole text from 3 different perspectives.

First, the Promised King.

Second, the Petty King.

And third, and I hope you’ll forgive me for just using the term out of the song, we’re gonna look at the Prudent Kings.

Theme: Worship as humbling oneself, self-abandonment, commitment

Thrust: God has brought you here to worship the Lamb.

Will you bow w/ joy at this wondrous calling?

Q.

I.

The Promised King

the wise men have come by God’s calling to find the Promised King.

• opens up with Jesus already born in Bethlehem, and the wise men from the east have come to Jerusalem looking for the king of the Jews.

• most of our storybook Bibles skip straight to verse 7, to the part where the wise men come into the court of King Herod.

But that’s not how the story starts.

They show up in Jerusalem, and start asking around.

“Where is he who has been born King of the Jews?

For we saw His star when it rose, and have come to worship him.”

So this isn’t a diplomatic mission to Herod, they show up in Jerusalem and just start asking around.

So, why is it that everyone is greatly troubled? 2 reasons: One of them is called Rome, and the other is called Herod, and both of them have a temper and a reputation.

Herod’s already murdered his wife and two of his sons, and Rome routinely crushes royal aspirations with the most powerful armies in the world at the time.

So, why is it that everyone is greatly troubled? 2 reasons: One of them is called Rome, and the other is called Herod, and both of them have a temper and a reputation for crushing any upstarts with hideous violence.

By this time, Herod’s already murdered his wife and two of his sons, and Rome routinely crushes royal aspirations with the most powerful armies in the world at the time.

• and strangers have come to town w/ what sounds like a challenge to them.

(so, everyone troubled, because Herod troubled)

• Look how Herod responds: He gets all the religious authorities together to find out what the Bible say about the coming of the Christ, the messiah.

God’s promised anointed one.

The one who would sit on King David’s throne.

Now, Herod was a king in Judea, but he was not a king on David’s throne.

He was not from Jewish background, he had no hope of standing if the actual messiah had arrived.

So Herod gathered the scribes and the rest together to find out where the Bible said the Messiah would be born, and the unanimous answer is Bethlehem, six miles outside Jerusalem, just like David, the great king.

• Right in the middle of the text, the quotation of .

Elements of vv2-5.

• Micah was a prophet in Judah at the same time as Isaiah, prophesying judgment and exile for Israel and Judah.

• Through the prophet Micah, God told the people that the judgment was due to Israel and Judah’s idolatry, persistent rejection of their him, hatred of good & love of evil

• But in ch. 4, Micah prophesies redemption.

A future where Zion would be established as God’s dwelling place with his people again, that many nations would come and say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths."

( ESV)

• In Micah’s prophecy, the Lord promises to gather those who have been driven away into exile (v6), and the LORD will reign over them in Mt Zion.

Kingship will come back to Jerusalem, the Lord will redeem them (v10)

• And then in Ch. 5 – This Messianic prophecy - when the kingship comes back to Jerusalem, the king will come from Bethlehem, a little town, just like the song says, the town where David was from.

• Will also be “from of old, from ancient days.”

In other words, the Lord Himself come to dwell with his people, Immanuel, God with us, the eternal Son made flesh, in order to bring broken people back to God.

• End of , “He shall be their peace” (cf. )

• Matthew quotes /c it’s what the scribes and leaders brought to Herod, but this text actually fulfills a dozen or more Scriptures from the OT.

For example:

ESV

ESV

Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.

For behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples; but the Lord will arise upon you, and his glory will be seen upon you.

And nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising.

Here, we have the wise men, representing the nations coming to His LIGHT in Christ Jesus.

Have you ever wondered why God chose to use a star to guide the wise men, and why He sent them to Jerusalem before Bethlehem?

He could have sent an angel, like he did to Mary, and Joseph.

It was to fulfill .

Noble men, with kingly treasures, from far-off nations, saw His light rise, and came to his light.