Following that Star - BTS

Text :

Sermon Title : Follow that Star - BTS…

Occasion : English Youth Service

Location : Paya Lebar Methodist Girls’ School Agape Hall

MPP : We need to have the right posture of being ready and pointing people to God while waiting for God’s return

<Pray>

Hi guys…

This morning, I am going to share with you how to follow the star…

And talk about BTS…

Talk about BTS?

Yes talk about BTS…

And if you’re thinking about these guys when you hear BTS… <slide>

Well, you are partially correct…

And why I’m talking about BTS?

Well, firstly, I kind of made a promise with someone over here who is a big fan of BTS and I kinda promised her I would preach as sermon at least mentioning BTS…

So, here I am, a man of my words, fulfilling my promises…

And if you are not familiar with who BTS are,

They are a South Korean boy band that was formed in Seoul in 2013,

Have 7 members in the band, and had taken the world by storm…

They have sold more than fifteen million albums and they are the best-selling artists in South Koran of all times…

They have a huge fan base, have more than 17.7 million followers on their Twitter account alone,

Mentioned nearly 600,000 times a day on Twitter alone…[1]

Of course, BTS is not the only ones with fan base,

There are soccer stars with fan base,

actors with fan base,

musicians with fan base,

computer gamers with fan base,

even politicians with fan base…

And of course being fans,

many of the fans would like to meet those celebrities…

And while I couldn’t find the statistics on the fans actually being able to see those celebrities…

And while I couldn’t find any information on how long the BTS fans have to wait to meet their stars,

but a check with one website gives you a step-by-step guide on how to meet your stars…

and from what I can see in the websites, fans really put in a lot of effort and work in communities to be able to meet their stars and engage in lots of strategies…

and for the BTS, there’s even a Tweeter account called Chasing BTS to give them possible information to be able to catch their stars…

Nevertheless, most fans have to wait for hours and sometimes overnight at a location where they are rumored to appear…

and even so, they are not even able to be sure they get to meet them…

sometimes only to be disappointed…

and I kind of know how that kind of disappointment feels like…

and no… it’s not that I was looking for stars and celebrities,

but during the day after national day this year,

when Singapore had the de-centralised celebration on the 10th of August,

the military vehicles were going to drive past one of the main roads near my house,

and while I was preparing my sermon,

I was determined to catch the drive past…

So I was tracking the movement of the convoy on the google app that they set up,

and I calculated such that I had enough time to go walk the distance to the road and catch the convoy…

but one thing I didn’t anticipate…

I didn’t do enough research and didn’t realise those heavy tanks were able to move at that speed and hence by the time I got to the main road,

I could only see the last vehicle while I was still a good 400m away…

I missed pretty much the entire convoy…

Unlike those fans who did their research, prepared themselves,

And go themselves ready,

I didn’t prepare myself sufficiently to catch the convoy…

I wasn’t prepared and I missed out…

That’s why this morning, I would want to teach us all this morning how to catch the star,

By following BTS…

But I’m not talk about the pop group…

but am going to use their acronym to bring home three points for us to take home today…

and as to telling us to catch the star,

this is significant at this time of the year,

Because we are now in the season of Advent…

Which comes from the Latin word Adventus which means “coming”

And hence the season that we are in right now is to remember how the birth of Jesus Christ was the fulfilment of the prophecy of the salvation by the prophets…

But it is also of Jesus Christ will come again in the final victory and end all the sufferings and pain in the world today…

And if we’re not prepared and not careful…

We’ll be like how I missed out on being able to see the military convoy because I wasn’t prepared…

And we don’t want to be unprepared…

And to prepare ourselves, we’re going to go all the way back to the birth of Christ and the passage that we’re going to look at today is from …

We’re going to read from Joshua’s favourite translation, the Passion Translation

“Jesus was born in Bethlehem near Jerusalem during the reign of King Herod. After Jesus’ birth a group of spiritual priests from the East came to Jerusalem and inquired of the people, “Where is the child who is born king of the Jewish people? We observed his star rising in the sky and we’ve come to bow before him in worship.” King Herod was shaken to the core when he heard this, and not only him, but all of Jerusalem was disturbed when they heard this news. So he called a meeting of the Jewish ruling priests and religious scholars, demanding that they tell him where the promised Messiah was prophesied to be born. “He will be born in Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,” they told him. “Because the prophecy states: And you, little Bethlehem, are not insignificant among the clans of Judah, for out of you will emerge the Shepherd-King of my people Israel!” Then Herod secretly summoned the spiritual priests from the East to ascertain the exact time the star first appeared. And he told them, “Now go to Bethlehem and carefully look there for the child, and when you’ve found him, report to me so that I can go and bow down and worship him too.” And so they left, and on their way to Bethlehem, suddenly the same star they had seen in the East reappeared! Amazed, they watched as it went ahead of them and stopped directly over the place where the child was. And when they saw the star, they were so ecstatic that they shouted and celebrated with unrestrained joy. When they came into the house and saw the young child with Mary, his mother, they were overcome. Falling to the ground at his feet they worshiped him. Then they opened their treasure boxes full of gifts and presented him with gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Afterward they returned to their own country by another route because God had warned them in a dream not to go back to Herod.” (, TPT)

In this story, we have a group of Magi who came from the East to Jerusalem to look for Jesus Christ,

and worship him…

but who are these Magi?

Well, what we do know about them is that they came from the East of Israel

So, let us look at the map of the Middle East,

Now this is Israel over here…

This dot over here is Jerusalem

So, which means that East is anywhere this direction right?

Now, if we go back to the 722BC, we know that the kingdom of Israel became conquered by an increasingly strong empire,

the Assyrian Empire who came and took the people of Israel and deported them all across the Assyrian Empire…

this was read in which says

<point to map><slide>

“Finally, in the ninth year of King Hoshea’s reign, Samaria fell, and the people of Israel were exiled to Assyria. They were settled in colonies in Halah, along the banks of the Habor River in Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.” (, NLT)

This is shown by the blue lines

Now, I want to highlight to you that this place over here, is the capital of Assyrian during that point of time,

And I will come back to this place again later…

This is the first major batch of deportation…

The second deportation occurred in 586 BC which is recorded for us in which says

“Then Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guard, took as exiles the rest of the people who remained in the city, the defectors who had declared their allegiance to the king of Babylon, and the rest of the population. But the captain of the guard allowed some of the poorest people to stay behind to care for the vineyards and fields.” (, NLT)

This is shown in the red lines…

And you would realise that for those deported later, there was reverse deportation during the times of King Darius,

Which we read about in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah…

But not those deported by the Assyrian… the blue lines…

So, from here, you can see that

there many Israelites spread over the region over here…

And if we read in Daniel Chap 1:3 which says

“Then the king ordered Ashpenaz, chief of his court officials, to bring into the king’s service some of the Israelites from the royal family and the nobility—” (, NIV)

And , which says

“It pleased Darius to appoint 120 satraps to rule throughout the kingdom, with three administrators over them, one of whom was Daniel. The satraps were made accountable to them so that the king might not suffer loss.” (, NIV)

You will realise that the people of Israel were very well treated and in fact served in the royal courts…

And what were the service that was required in the royal courts?

gives us a glimpse of which one of them were astrologers…

And is a craft that had already been prevalent in the Egyptian courts way before the Assyrians and Babylonians came into prominence…

And is known to be similarly so in the Assyrian courts…

Astronomy is well developed science in the royal courts…

And that is how they were sensitive to the fact that there was an unusual astronomical phenomenon in the sky which they would otherwise have missed…

I mean even for most of us today,

Unless we read in the newspaper about some special phenomenon in the sky such as the blood moon or a solar eclipse or a super nova,

I’m sure most of us would miss them right?

I mean how many of us actually even look up in the sky?

Much less be able to notice if something were amiss…

These facts placed together make it quite probable that these Magi in our passage today were actually Israelites who were displaced during the first deportation and were likely to be waiting for salvation which is why you see that as soon as they saw the phenomenon in the sky,

They were willing to travel all the way across the dangerous deserts to Israel to look for their king…

That’s why when the unusual phenomenon occurred,

they were willing to drop everything they had to find their king…

Which they call the King of the Jews,

But which we know to be the king of the entire world…

And they were rewarded handsomely….

Well, at least according to our records,

they were the first people who recognised that Jesus Christ was the God who had come into our world,

and worshipped him…

they were at the front seat of the greatest event in the history on earth…

better than any concert or any computer game…

they were at the front seat of the time when the eternal God became mortal for a period of time…

they were at the front seat of the time when the boundless God became bounded in time…

they were at the front seat of the time when the infinite God became finite for us…

and they were able to do so because they were prepared…

And the first point that I want to extract from this story for all of us is that:

Be Prepared…

Just like how the fans were able to find out when their stars will be at,

By doing lots of research,

The Magi were able to almost immediately know the arrival of Christ and be confident enough to go through the dangerous track across the desert,

Across a vast area because they knew their scriptures,

And they knew what was at stake…

It wasn’t just learning about some interesting person that really has nothing to do with their lives…

But this was the very God Himself who created the world and is very interested in our lives…

That’s why they were diligent about learning about the coming Messiah who will deliver their from plight… from their exile and bring them home…

And they are probably familiar with which says

““I see him, but I don’t see him now. I view him, but he isn’t near. A star will come from among the people of Jacob. A king will rise up out of Israel...” (, NIrV)

As well as which says

“The Lord says, “Bethlehem, you might not be an important town in the nation of Judah. But out of you will come a ruler over Israel for me. His family line goes back to the early years of your nation. It goes all the way back to days of long ago.”” (, NIrV)

Which talks about the birth place of this divine king…

and they would likely be familiar with some of the prevalent teachings within the Jewish communities which we can see from documents like this…

<pic of scrolls>

found in the Qumran Caves of Israel,

written in probably between 300 to 100 years before this incident,

whereby a group of scholars called the Essenes lived apart from society to dig deep into God’s words,

and dedicated themselves to have lives that are set aside and are pleasing to God…

such as this document, known as the Damascus Document or also known as 4Q266… (meaning it is found in the 4th out of 12 caves, and is the 266th artefact found there)

which talks about the messiah who will be raised up and will come and deliver the people of God,

and another dead sea scroll document,

1QM 19:5 also known as the war scroll tells them and us that this messiah will establish the kingdom of God and liberate his children from the clutches of sin and death…

and in other scrolls 11Q13 2:13 who describes this messiah who “will carry out the vengeance of God’s judgments, and on that day he will free [the people of God from captivity]”[2]

which allows them to be prepared in their hearts the impending arrival for a king that will liberate the people of Israel from being captives by the various empires…

they were prepared in their hearts,

and they were prepared in their minds…

they knew who this baby was…

they knew where to go…

which is why as soon as they saw the star,

they went…

they were prepared…

So similarly, for us,

Though the Lord has already come into the world 2000 years ago to die on the cross for our sins,

And demonstrated for us his love for us,

And demonstrated for us how we can respond by looking out and caring for the poor, the vulnerable, the needy and the ones people dislike, among us,

By doing so himself…

That’s not the end of the story…

God is coming once again and this time,

It is to bring us home…

This, we know in when Jesus said…

“Look! I am coming soon! Blessed are those who obey the words of the prophecy in this book.”” (, NIrV)

And therefore, to prepare ourselves,

We need to equip ourselves by being familiar with God’s words through the reading of the Bible…

so that we can get to know God better…

We need to have a close relationship with God

So that we are able to know what is upon His heart and able to get His guidance…

We need to know Him so well so that when the He comes back again,

We’ll be ready and available and not miss it…

Just like how I missed the military convoy during National Day…

And how the early Jews missed the fact that Jesus was God…

Be prepared…

<pause>

So now that we now the first thing we can learn from the Magi is

B…

For Be prepared,

And the next thing that we can learn from the Magi is T for:

Travelling Together…

<pause>

Do you know something?

Even though we all know that these Magi really existed,

We knew roughly how they were brought to the presence of Jesus,

We knew what where the gifts brought to Jesus…

We even knew they interacted with Herod the King…

But we actually know how many Magi were there!

But for sure we know that there were more than one because the terms for them are always in the plural…

And some suggest that there were actually up to 12 Magi…

And that’s great because travelling in the desert along the long journey was uncomfortable, tiresome and dangerous...

This, we know from where Jesus was described as “being wearied” after a journey...

And that was only from Judea to a city in Samaria known as Sycar,

which is probably only 160km...

and the distance that was travelled by the Magi according to some estimates is probably closer to 650 km...

and you must remember that they didn’t have the comfort nor speed of vehicles we have today, aircon, suspension on the cars...

they would either be walking or riding on animals, on roads that go boing boing boing...

and in fact, during that time, the roads were probably not as well made yet,

and whenever there were rains, some parts of the roads would actually be unpassable, prolonging the journey...

That’s for comfort... or at least the lack of it...

Then there’s dangers that the are associated with journeys in the past...

This, we read in

Where Paul describes that in his travels, he was “in danger from river, in danger from bandits...”

Here, Paul reveals to us that there are many natural hazards along the journey,

And this danger from river speaks of how the river sometimes overflow and causes flash floods,

Having the ability to sweep people away...

Other natural hazards include the cold at night which may cause travellers to suffer from hypothermia or extreme cold temperature or in other cases,

The extreme heat of the sun can cause severe heat exhaustion

Then, in terms of man-made dangers,

There are the presence of bandits who hide behind rocks or bushes who pounce on unsuspecting passers-by, which we read in the parable of the Good Samaritan, can be quite ruthless, beating their victims up and leave them for death...

And as if that’s not enough, there are wild animals which lurk around, such as leopards, lions and bears which can make your journey really treacherous...

And with all these things that make travelling in the past so miserable,

I’m many people rather not travel...

Just think of the Israelites who wanted to go back to Egypt so many times…

After they had been liberated from Egypt while they were slaves…

Imagine that?!

They rather go back to a tyrant of a king,

Rather go back to life as a slave…

Than to travel to the promised land…

Well, with that kind of motivation not to travel,

How did the Magi overcome those temptations not to give up and how did they motivate themselves to continue on the journey?

They didn’t travel alone but travelled as a group…

That way, they could continue to encourage one another when the going gets tough…

They could encourage one another whenever one start to question why are they doing this…

By doing so, they were involved in a community that were able to spur one another on to press on towards the goal of reaching Jerusalem and see the Messiah whenever someone felt discouraged…

And hence by doing so, by travelling in numbers, they could overcome some of the dangers associated with desert travelling such as the wild animals and bandits by having critical number of people to scare the bandits and the animals away…

By travelling in numbers, they could band together and overcome any obstacles they may have along the way…

And this is a good advice we should take for ourselves too…

Friends, life is like a journey in the wilderness,

Sometimes we encounter things that may discourage us,

For example, you fail in your exams, you have a bad fall,

Your friend decide not to hang out with you anymore…

Or someone close to you passes away…

Or you come to some tough questions about life and you can’t quite figure it out…

Why do some things happen?

Life can be really rough…

And life can be discouraging…

Without friends and a community, sometime we lose our ways…

Sometimes we forget why we do certain things…

We forget that we have a great great God who loves us very much…

We forget that that is always sunshine after the rain…

We forget that there is always a dawn after a dark night…

But with friends, and your cell leaders and pastors,

With a community around you,

There is always someone around you to show the way and point us back to God and steer us away form the dangers that are around us…

So, always Travel Together with friends, church…

And let us spur one another on…

<pause>

Ok…

I’ve take about B for Being Prepared, T for Travelling Together, and so what’s S?

S is to

Show God to other people

So, what do you think the Magi did after they saw the incredible sight and found Jesus and had a great time worshipping him?

Do you think they stayed in Jerusalem?

No...

Verse 12 told us that they went home...

And friends,

Remember I told you that it is high probability that the Magi were Israelites who were exiled by the Assyrians in the 8th Century BC?

Remember I told you about the capital of Assyria, which is Ninevah over here?

Friends, let me show you who is believed to be one of the oldest (there’s a high probability it is the oldest) Church outside of Israel…

It is this church over here, called the Dura-Europos church in Syria…

It was probably founded in the year 232…

And if you compare the two maps,

You will realise that this is almost exactly where the Magi is probably from and is probably where the Magi returned to after the visitation to Israel…

In other words, the Magi didn’t keep quiet about Jesus…

Remember that the Magi were Jews and not Christians,

For the word Christianity – people who follow Christ…

(after all you know what’s does Christian stand for right? Christ I Am Now Serving)

Didn’t appear until much later…

But when the Magi saw Jesus, they knew Jesus was the messiah,

And they didn’t keep quiet about it…

They went back and shared with the people in their home land that they have seen the messiah..

The one that had been prophesied about in the Old Testament!

The one that had been talked about in the community for centuries…

The Saviour of the world is here…

And just like the Samaritan woman who cannot help but tell people the Jesus she met,

The Magi couldn’t help but tell the people that Jesus is alive and Jesus is real!

The Messiah is here!

The great liberator is here!

And because of that, they had a community who knows Jesus and this resulted in the earliest church outside of Israel,

And all they needed to do was to share with them what they saw…

They just showed people to God by sharing their experience and what they know…

And friends,

As we wait for the return of Christ,

You are ordained to do likewise…

You need to prepare others for the return of Christ

You are to show God to other people with the way you behave,

By sharing your life story of how God is real in your lives…

By doing good works, by helping others

And when you share your life stories with others, you don’t have to come up with really difficult concepts…

Just simple sharing about how God is real in your life…

About our God who is ever faithful and loves us so much…

About our God who cares for us so much he allows us to walk in the desert sometimes to allow us to grow…

Our God who is the creator of everything…

Of God who is supremely above us and yet came down into our lives…

So friends, there you have it…

Let’s learn to follow the star this advent season

Prepare ourselves for his return once again by:

Being prepared through reading his word, praying to him…

Travelling Together so that we can encourage one another

And

Showing people to God so that more may know the truth that our Saviour is here!

AMen!

[1] https://www.brandwatch.com/blog/react-15-amazing-bts-statistics-and-facts/

[2] Florentino Garcı́a Martı́nez and Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar, “The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition (translations)” (Leiden; New York: Brill, 1997–1998), 1207.

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