It's good to see you again. If
you want to, turn to Matthew chapter 2. Matthew chapter 2. I want to
read what is likely a very familiar story to everybody in this room. Matthew chapter 2 and pick up
in verse 1. Matthew 2 verse 1. Now when Jesus
was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king,
behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying,
where is he that is born king of the Jews? For we have seen
his star in the east and are come to worship him. When Herod
the king had heard these things, he was troubled. and all Jerusalem
with him, the whole town. And when he had gathered all
the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he demanded
of them where Christ should be born. And they said unto him
in Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it is written by the prophet,
and now Bethlehem, in the land of Judah are not the least among
the princes of Judah, for out of thee shall come a governor
that shall rule my people Israel. Then Herod, when he had privily
called the wise men, inquired of them diligently what time
the star appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem
and said, go and search diligently for the young child. And when
you have found him, bring me word again that I may come and
worship him also. He's lying. He did not seek to
worship Christ. What he wanted to do was kill
him. Herod hated him, and Herod wanted him out of the way. That's
what he wanted to do. Verse nine, when they had heard the king,
they departed and lo the star, which they saw in the east, he
went before them till it came and stood over where the young
child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding
great joy. And when they were coming to
the house, they saw the young child with Mary, his mother,
and fell down and worshiped him. And when they had opened their
treasures, they presented unto him gifts. gold and frankincense
and myrrh. And being warned of God in a
dream that they should not return to Herod, they deported into
their own country another way. And when they were deported,
behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream
saying, arise and take the young child and his mother and flee
into Egypt and be thou there until I bring thee word. For
Herod will seek the young child to destroy him. When he arose,
he took the young child and his mother by night and departed
into Egypt and was there until the death of Herod, that it might
be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet saying,
out of Egypt have I called my son. Many miraculous events have occurred
on this earth since the beginning of time. And when I think of
those miraculous events, many of them occurred. Some of the
most miraculous, as far as I can see, occurred during and directly
after the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus Christ. You read Luke's
account, there are four great things that occurred during his
crucifixion and after his death and after his resurrection. It
says that the sun, as he hung on the cross between noon and
three, it stopped shining. And the whole earth was engulfed
darkness. You think about that and I bet
that darkness was the same darkness on the night of the Passover.
It was darkness that could be felt. Everybody's in great darkness.
That's an illustration. It gives us some understanding
of what was happening on that cross, the wrath that was falling
down on Christ from his father because of sin. That's a great
miracle, a great happening. It says that the earthquakes
and the rocks rent these mountains and These great mountain ranges
that have been around since the beginning of time, they crumbled
down to the ground, just pebbles. Greatest earthquake anyone's
ever known. That's a miraculous event. Would have been very,
very interesting to see, but once again, an illustration.
Speaks of what happened on that cross, the separation between
God's people and God himself, destroyed, removed. All his enemies
placed under his feet, the sin of his people. Satan crumbled
to the ground, put away. It says the veil in the temple,
that big thick curtain that separated the holy place from the holy
of holies. You couldn't go back there. You
couldn't go back to the holy of holies. That huge veil hung
in the center there. Can you imagine being a priest
upon the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus Christ? That curtain, that
veil was ripped from the top all the way down to the bottom
and that place they could never go. That place they could never
see into, they did not have access to, that curtain ripped open
and now they had free access. Once again, an illustration,
what happened on that cross? All God's people, we now have
free access to God in the person of Jesus Christ. The separation
being completely and utterly removed. And this last one, it's
mysterious and it's amazing. It says, upon the death of the
Lord Jesus Christ, graves were opened. These sepulchers that
house these bodies, these people who have been dead, it opened.
And upon his resurrection, people were actually brought back to
life. And they walked out of those tombs, and they appeared
to many. And you think about that. Imagine
being a parent who had just lost a child and had to bury them
in that tomb. And you're at home, and you're
grieving. And all of a sudden, that child just comes back, walks
through the front door. Would have been the best day
of your life. Once again, an illustration.
What happened upon the death and the resurrection of our Lord
Jesus Christ? We now have life. All God's people, we have an
everlasting life before God, the very life of Jesus Christ.
All those miraculous events, wonderful, but all of them, at
least in my opinion, pale in comparison to the miraculous
event we have chronicled in our text here, and that is the birth
of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is a wonderful and awe-inspiring
and mysterious event. God, God himself, was manifest
in the flesh and he dwelt among us. All the eternal, infinite
vastness that God is, he was encapsulated in a human body. And this is so mysterious that
when the angel Gabriel came to Mary, said, you're great with
child, And that's the Son of God. He couldn't think of a better
phrase to word what was actually growing in her womb. All he could
say was, that holy thing. That's the best he could come
up with, and he was an angel. That holy thing. I don't even know
exactly what to call him. A holy thing that's growing in
your womb. This is a mysterious, a miraculous,
an awe-inspiring event. The birth of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now I want to talk about that
for a second before we get into our text. Turn over to Galatians
chapter four. Paul addresses this in detail.
I want to look at what he says. Galatians chapter four, and look
at verse four. Paul says, but when the fullness
of time was come, God sent forth his son. made of a woman, made
under the law. Now, he gives us four things
to chew on right there. He said, in the fullness of time,
when the fullness of time was come. You know what's something
I'm thankful for? That's when everything happens. Everything
occurs in the fullness of time. Everything occurs right on time.
There are no missed opportunities. There are no missteps. There
are no unfortunate events. Everything happens according
to God's purpose, happens exactly when it's supposed to happen,
right on time, never a mistake. In the fullness of time, the
birth of our Lord Jesus Christ was no exception. It all happened
according to God's purpose, exactly on time. And he says, in the
fullness of time, God sent forth his son. Now you think about
that. God sent him. And if he sent him, that means
he must have a purpose. Why did the father send his son
into this world? Why would he do that? Let me
read you this. This is John 17, verse one. It
says, these words spake Jesus. and lifted up his eyes to heaven
and said, Father, the hour has come. Glorify thy son that thy
son also may glorify thee. Now this answer, why he sent
him, it's twofold. Here's the first reason right
here, the glory of God. You want to know what God the
Father is consumed with, what he is interested in, his endgame
in all this. It is the glory of his son, Jesus
Christ. If you want to know what the
son is consumed with, The thing he is interested in, his purpose
right here, it is the glory of the Father. He sent him to reach
the epitome of glory for the Godhead. How can God get more
glorified than he actually is? I don't know, but that's why
he sent him. To achieve that epitome of glory for the Godhead. How's he gonna accomplish that?
Through what means? Here's the other purpose. This
is verse two of John 17. As thou hast given him, power
over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many
as thou hast given him." How is that glory accomplished? How
is that pinnacle of glory achieved? The Father gave him a people,
a particular people. He gave them to him before the
world began. He said, I've chosen these, I
love these, and I'm giving them to you. And here's what you're
going to do. You're going to live for them. You're gonna die
for them. Everything I require of them,
I'm gonna look to you for 100%. I'm not gonna look to them for
anything. Everything I require of them,
I'm gonna look to you for, and you're gonna return them to me
without a scratch on them, safe and sound. And when you do that,
when you accomplish this great feat, you will have reached the
epitome of glory for the Godhead. What a gracious and wonderful
purpose. the glory of God, and who reaps
all the benefit for that? We do. Sinners do. And I think
this is interesting, too. Who did God send? It says, in
the fullness of time, God sent forth His Son. Why His Son? Because only His Son could do
salvation. Salvation involves this. It is
the justification of unjust men and women in a manner to where
God remains just. Righteousness and peace must
kiss each other. There can be no salvation, there
can be no mercy at the expense of God's justice, and there couldn't
be no justice at the expense of his mercy. All his attributes
must move in union. They must all agree with one
another, and only the Son of God could do this. He could only
justify unjust men and women in a manner to where God permitted
just. He had to send his Son. And I want you to think about
this. In the fullness of time, God sent forth his Son. What
manner of love does God the Father have for the elect? He was willing
to send his Son. Who would you sacrifice your
children for? Not a person. God loved his people
so much he sent forth his son. He was willing to give his son
to have his bride. It says in the fullness of time
God sent forth his son and he said he was made of a woman.
Now I got stuck on that for a minute, that word made. Isaiah 9 verse
6 says this, it says, for unto us a child is born, unto us a
son is given. Strictly speaking, Christ was
never made. He always has been the eternal God, the second person
of the blessed Trinity, God forever. Unto us a son was born. Unto
us a child was given. In time, though, a child was
given. God was manifest in the flesh.
Altogether God, altogether man. He was made on this earth. Now
why? Why was it so important that
he was made man? Why did he have to come in the
flesh? You remember the kinsman redeemer?
Remember the book of Ruth? Boaz, he's the kinsman redeemer.
This was the law in Judea. If you had lost everything, You'd
become destitute, and you had to sell off everything you had,
and you'd become impoverished. If you had a kinsman redeemer,
they could redeem you. They could buy back everything
you lost, and they could restore you back to where you were before. But there were three conditions
that kinsman redeemer had to meet. Three. Number one, he had
to have the ability. He had to have the money. He
had to have the means. He had to be able to go and he
had to be able to buy back everything you lost and make it right with
that person who had it at that time. Everybody had to be made
right. This all had to be done justly.
He had to have the ability. Secondly, he had to be willing.
If you were impoverished, you had found yourself in that destitute
state, that was your problem. You put yourself in that position.
That kinsman redeemer, he was under no obligation to redeem
you. He had to be willing. No coercion. Out of love, he
had to be willing. And this was the third thing
he had to have. He had to be near of kin. He had to be bone
of your bone. He had to be flesh of your flesh.
Had to be the same blood coursing through your veins that was coursing
through his. He had to be near of kin. For the Lord Jesus Christ
to be the Savior of men, he had to be made a man. Bone of our
bone, flesh of our flesh. Listen to this, this is Hebrews
4.15. It says, for we have not an high priest which cannot be
touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points
tempted like as we are, but listen to this, big difference here,
yet without sin. Lord Jesus Christ was made a
man. God was encapsulated in human flesh and he took on the
human limitations of a man. He knew what it was like to be
cold, and He knew what it was like to be hungry, and He knew
what it was like to be tired, and He knew what it was like
to be betrayed. He knew all those things. He suffered all those
temptations, but here's the big difference between Him and us.
He was always without sin. He always did those things that
was pleasing to His Father. He always kept the law, every
jot and every tittle, every single time. But to be the savior of
men, he had to be made a man, a God-man. And he was born of a virgin. When Mary came and told Joseph,
she was great with child, and the angel had told her that he
was the son of God. Joseph pondered on these things
as any man would. The angel appeared to him and
said this, it said, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife,
for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost. Joseph, you're his earthly father,
but he didn't come from you, he came from God. God is his
father. Why is that so important? Why
is this such an important issue that he was born of a virgin? The issue is the nature. If he
was born of Joseph, if he would have came from Joseph, he would
have had Joseph's nature. What nature did Joseph have?
He had the same one you and I have. That same one Adam had. That
fallen, evil, sinful nature. But he wouldn't come from Joseph.
He came from God. And that means he has the nature
of God. And the reason he has the nature
of God, don't miss this, because he is God. Jesus Christ, the
God-man, he is God. Make no mistake about it. with
a holy nature, a sinless nature, a perfect nature. And it says here that he was
made subject to the law in the fullness of time. God sent forth
his son, made of a woman, made under the law. And you can look
at that in two respects. Number one, he was made under
the law. He had to keep it. He was born in this world and
he had to keep the law. And you know what? Wasn't hard
for him. He's a righteous man, and a righteous man keeps the
law. He kept it. He kept it every
jot, every tittle, in the little creases of the heart, those deep
spaces where the motives are, where the deepest of the thoughts
are. He kept it every single time. But here's the beauty of
that. If you're a believer, you did too in him. When he was made
under the law and he kept God's holy law, You kept it too in
him when he walked the paths of righteousness, every step
he took, you took it too. That's your history in him. And he was made subject to the
law in another way. Now you're there in Galatians
4, turn over to Galatians 3 real quick and look at verse 13. It says this, Galatians 3.13, Christ hath redeemed us from
the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. For it is written,
cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree. What is that curse
of the law? What is that? It's what the law
exposes. What does the law expose? Sin.
That's the only purpose of law. Law was not given as a mechanism
of salvation. It never has been. It never will
be. The law does one thing. It exposes a man's guilt. It
exposes his sin. And this is the curse of the
law, the sin that the law exposes. But for this us, he was made
a curse for us. That means our sins were lifted
off of us. And they were put in him, and
he bore those sins in his body, and he hung on the cursed tree.
And here's what he did through his death. He took that curse
away. And for everyone who he became
a curse for, and for everyone he hung on the cursed tree for,
they have no more curse. The curse is gone. They have
full acceptance with God. Now here's my question. Who is
this us? Because I want to know whether
I'm under this curse or not. This is either the best day of
my life or it's the worst, one of the two. I'm either under
this curse or I am not and Christ has taken away my curse. How
can I know? Look at verse 10. For as many as are of the works
of the law are under the curse. Now here's how you can know right
now whether you are currently under this curse or Christ has
taken away this curse. as many as are of the works of
the law are under the curse. What does it mean to be of the
works of the law? A man who is of the works of
the law, when he looks inside himself, he sees something good.
He sees some merit before God. And a man may say, I'm the greatest
scoundrel to ever live. And a man may say, I've never
done that which is good. But if he's of the works of the
law, he at least believes this. He believes, if I want to, and
if I try hard enough, I can at least get better. If I want to,
and I try real hard, I can at least do something. I can get
better if I want to. That's what it means to be of
the works of the law. There's something God can look
at in you and he can be pleased with. But I'll tell you what,
if that's you, if you are of the works of the law, it says
here you're still under the curse. You still bear your sins before
God. But the reverse of this is true.
If you are not of the works of the law, now what's the inverse
of that? If you're not of the works of
the law, what are you? You're a faith. When you're looking
inside yourself, you can't see one reason God will be merciful
to you. I got nothing I can bring before
God. Nothing good about me. I don't even have the capability
to do better. given my best circumstances,
put me in the best circumstances possible. I can't take one inch
toward keeping the law towards pleasing God. I am not of the
works of the law. If you're not of the works of
the law, you're a faith because that means Christ and him crucified
is your only hope. I tell you what folks, if you're
not of the works of the law, if you're a sinner, There's nothing
good in you. I want you to understand this.
Christ bore your curse on that cross and he put it away and
you bear it no more. It's gone. Now look over at Galatians 4
and look at verse 4 again. I want to look at the outcome of
everything Paul has to say here, the conclusion of the matter. He said, but when the fullness
of time was come, God sent forth his son, made of a woman, made
under the law, listen for this, to redeem them that were under
the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. Now, if
you're one of these ones that is not of the works of the law,
Christ has redeemed you. He has put away your curse. And
this is the truth about you right now. You're an adopted son or
daughter. You have true sonship, daughtership
with God himself. That means you are joint heirs
with Christ. I read that a couple weeks ago,
and the best word I can come up with to describe how I felt
is this, excited. Excited. This is the case presently,
right now. If Christ has put away your sin,
if you are not of the works of the law, you're of faith, you're
looking to Christ alone, that means this, you're a son or daughter
of God himself. And that means everything Christ
has right now with his Father, you have those exact same things
too. You inherit them. You inherit them. You have free
access to God through our Lord Jesus Christ. You have real righteousness
before God. It is the very righteousness
of Jesus Christ, and it really is yours. And that is an unchangeable
state. That is an immutable righteousness.
You have sinlessness. Think about this. You actually
have the ear of the King. I don't know if we ponder this
enough. Right now, every believer, you have this blessed command
and this blessed ability. You bring all your troubles,
everything you're thinking about, and you bring them to the King
in prayer. And the Lord Jesus Christ takes your prayers, and
as your great high priest, he makes those prayers acceptable
to God to where he actually hears you. He actually grants requests. You actually have the ear of
the king. As much as a son can go to his
good father and crawl up in his lap and say, Dad, here's my problems. And he says, OK, let's talk about
it. Let's work this out. You have
that exact same thing and so much more right now because you're
a son or daughter of God himself. That's real. That's real. Now
I want to take the rest of our time to look at our text. Go
back to Matthew chapter 2. I just want to make a few comments
about this. This story deals with three people,
only three people. The first person it deals with
is this, the king, and that's not Herod. The king is this,
it's Christ. He's the king, the born king,
that's what it says. And while he is the child in
this story, you also understand this, he has a type in this story.
That star, that star that appears to the wise men when they're
in the east, that's a type of Christ in this story. You have
the king. Then you have the would-be king.
That's Herod. He thinks he's king. He's not
king. He represents the natural man. And then you have these
wise men, and they represent every believer, every one of
God's people. Now, look real quick and take
a look at verse one of your text. Now, when Jesus was born in Bethlehem
of Judea, in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came
wise men from the east to Jerusalem. saying, where is he that is born
King of the Jews? For we have seen his star in
the east and have come to worship him. Like I said, it deals with
three people. The first person I want to talk about here is
Herod, this type of the natural man. Now I'm going to give you
a little history on Herod. I read up on him. So Herod was
the king over Judea. Judea is over Roman dominion,
Roman rule. He's the puppet king they put
up. And Herod was a very suspicious man. He always thought people
were trying to undermine him and take his throne from him.
And so at some point, he thought his wife was conspiring against
him. So he had her killed. And then a little while later,
he thought his sons were conspiring against him. So he put them on
trial, and he had them killed. I told you that because I want
you to understand what type of man we're dealing with. This is a very
wicked, a very evil man. Who does he remind you of? He reminds me of me. And he reminds
me of you. because he is a type of the natural
man. He's a man that was shown no
restraining grace. The Lord took his hand off him
and let him do what he wanted him to do. And apart from the
restraining grace of God, folks, we would do the exact same thing
because there's no difference between men. This is Herod's theme in this
story. He hates Christ and he wants him dead. And this is the
reason that he wants him dead. This is the reason he hates him,
because Christ is the born king. And if Christ is the king, that
means Herod is no king at all. That means there's one that rules
sovereign over Herod. He rules and reigns over Herod,
and Herod doesn't like that. So he wants him dead. He wants
to wipe him out. And from this point forward,
these wise men meet with Herod. He concocts this scheme. This
scheme, he's going to wipe out the Christ. That is his purpose.
That's what he wants to do. He hates him because he's sovereign,
because he's king. He concocts this scheme, but
this is an evil, a wicked, and a very foolish thing to do. I'll
tell you why. Because the Lord was Herod's
king, and he reigned over Herod's sovereign, and there wasn't a
thing Herod could do about that. just like He reigns sovereign
over every man. He is their Lord and He is their
King, whether they like it or not, and there is absolutely
nothing a man can do about that. Herod here is tangling with sovereignty
and absolute omnipotence, and he is sure to lose. But this
is how sovereign Christ really is. This is how in control He
actually is. This whole scheme that Herod
plans out, this wicked, evil scheme to kill the Christ, you
know what he's doing? He's doing the will of God. Nothing
more and nothing less. It's wicked. It's evil. Herod
is doing exactly what Herod wants to do. Herod is held responsible
for it. And Herod is held accountable
for it to this very day. But he was doing nothing more
and nothing less but the purpose and the will of God. God is sovereign
and man is responsible. And that's the way it is. I'll
tell you this, there's a purpose behind this. Herod has a purpose
in this whole story. Now it seems here that Herod
causes all kinds of problems. The wise men go to Herod, and
after that the star leads them to Bethlehem, and they go and
they worship Christ. And they present these great gifts. And
then as they're leaving, the Lord appears in the dream and
says, don't go back to Herod. Don't go back there. You go back
another way. Herod means ill will for the
child. Go another way. Then he appears to Joseph. He
says, Joseph, you take your wife, you take the young child, you
go down to Egypt. You've got to flee because Herod's coming
for you. Ask that. The Lord's in control of all
this. He purposed all this. Why do you put Herod in the mix?
Why would he have this star that appeared to these wise men in
the east? It didn't take him to Bethlehem. Not initially.
It took them to Jerusalem. That star led them to Herod.
The Lord was the one who got Herod involved in all this. The
Lord was the one who allowed Herod to concoct this scheme,
this evil, wicked scheme to kill the Christ. Why would he do all
that? What's going on here? You know the scripture tells
us. Look down at verse 14. Speaking of Joseph, When he arose,
he took the young child and his mother by night, and deported
into Egypt, and was there until the death of Herod, that it might
be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying,
Out of Egypt have I called my son. That's a quotation from
Hosea 11.1. You know why Herod was moved
and allowed to concoct this scheme against the Christ? You want
to know why the Lord involved him and purposed him for this
thing? Because the scripture said he's got to call his son
out of Egypt. So to Egypt he must go. And this
is the mechanism the Lord is going to use to get his son down
to Egypt just so Hosea 11.1 can come to pass. I've called my
son out of Egypt. Now here's the point. Everything
in this book must come to pass. And folks, it's already come
to pass in the purpose and the mind of God. But you know what
that means? That means this is the singular source of truth.
If you want to know who God is, it's right here. It's written
on every page. Everything the Lord has to say
to us in this generation about who He is, it's found right here.
And if it's in this book, it can be believed. It must be believed,
and if a man says anything that is more or less what is written
in this book, it's not true. Because everything in this book
must come to pass. This is the truth. And here's
the point of everything I said up to this point. Herod represents
the natural man, and he hates the Christ, and he wants to kill
him, just as all men are born in this world wanting to do.
Hating the Christ and seeking his death. That's it. And these
idols men create, The weak Christ, the Christ who has opened the
door of salvation to all men, and he desires the salvation
of all men, but he just can't pull it off. He needs your help.
He needs you to do something to make his work effectual. No
man fears him. No man respects him. He doesn't
care. He says, yeah, I'm fine with that God, because he's not
sovereign. He's not king. But this is who this man is,
Jesus Christ, this God man. Says this, Moses said this, Lord,
show me your glory. And he said, I beseech thee,
show me thy glory. And he said, I will make all
my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name
of the Lord before thee, and will be gracious to whom I will
be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. That's who he is. He shows mercy
to whom he will, and he passes by whom he will. And he's right,
and he's just, and he's holy in anything he does. And if you preach that Christ,
the true and living Christ, the Bible to a man, you see the enmity
come out. Unless the Lord does something for that man. That's
it. And here's my final thought on that. This sovereignty of
God in salvation. It will never be the sovereignty
of God that will hold a man off from coming to Christ. That's
what the world says. They read about election, they
say it's unfair. It's unfair as if there's this large choir
of men begging for mercy. The Lord says, no, I just didn't
choose you. Nothing could be further from
the truth. It will never be the sovereignty of God that will
hold you off from coming to Christ. The only thing that will keep
you from coming to Christ is your self-righteousness. That's
it. This man receives sinners and
eats with them. There has never been one sinner
that come to Christ that he didn't receive. The only thing that
will keep a man from Christ is his self-righteousness, that's
it. But the sovereignty of God, it won't hold a man off, but
it is the only thing that'll save a man. It's what pulls you
in. Because no man will come. No
man will be saved in this manner. No man will love him. God has
to do something for you. God has to intervene. Sovereignly,
he has to come and he has to grab you by the collar and say,
nope, you're coming with me. And he changes the whore. He
says, bow down. That's it. Now, let's consider
these wise men for a second. We get a piece of information
about these wise men in the text. And it says that they're from
the East. The East. They see this star. This star is Christ. Make no
mistake about it. But they're in the east when they see this
star. I was reading through Genesis
3. And in verse 24, it says this. It says, after Adam fell, the
Lord drove him out of the garden. He was driven eastward. And on
the east side of the garden, the Lord lined it with cherubims.
And he put a flaming sword that turned every direction to keep
the way of the tree of life. That thing in the east, It has
something to do with sin and separation from God. Now, where
were these men when the Lord appeared to them, when this star
appeared to them? They were in the east. I'm so
thankful for this, folks. This is where the Lord always
finds his people. He finds them in the east. He
finds them in their sins. He finds them separated from
God. It's not that we take the first step toward the Lord and
we start seeking him. It's not that we start cleaning up our
act, we say, I'm gonna seek him, I'm gonna find out who he is,
I'm gonna believe on him, I just gotta figure it all out. Absolutely
not, we're in the East, in sins, in separation from God, and content
to be there, but in mercy and love, this star appears, and
it appeared in the East. He came to these men where they
were at, in their sin and their separation. And you know what
happens when the Lord appears to you there, in the East? You
find out where you're at, you're in the East. that my sins have
separated me from God. When you see Christ, when He's
revealed to you, what you see is this, I'm a sinner, and my
sins have separated me from my God, and it's all my fault. And my only hope, just as that
star is lifted up between the heaven and earth, my only hope
is that Christ was lifted up on that cross between the heaven
and earth for me. That's all I've got. And you
know what? When that star appeared to them,
They followed it. They followed it everywhere it
went. Wherever it was going to take
them, that's exactly where they were going to go. That's called
irresistible, invincible grace. What's going to draw a man to
Christ? Christ. That's it. That's what's going
to draw a man to Christ. And what'd they do once that
star hovered over top of Christ? What did they do? They worshipped.
They worshipped. If you ever see him, if the Lord
ever reveals himself to you, here's what you do. You worship.
Now I looked at this thing of worship. What's involved in worship? I think there's some things involved
here. I wrote some things down. I want to rattle these off. It
has something to do with respect and an awe-inspired fear for
the Lord's character. It has something to do with dependence. you being dependent on him to
do what you cannot do for yourself. It has something to do with confidence
in his ability. And it has something to do with
this, a knowledge that you're not owed anything. Now, where'd
I get all that from? See, that's a lot of words. Where'd
you get all that from? Matthew 8-2 says this. Behold,
there came a leper and worshiped him. Now I take it to mean that
everything this leper says and does after this, this is an act
of worship. There came a leper and worshipped
him, saying, Lord, there's the respect, there's the awe-inspired
fear. In another place it says he was
down on his face. He was low. Lord, I'm in the presence of
God himself. He's the Lord. He can do with
me as he sees fit. Lord, if thou wilt, you don't
owe me anything. You can pass me by, Justin Holey
is your name. If thou wilt, but if you're willing,
thou canst make me clean. You've got the ability. I'm sure
of that. I don't know whether you're willing
or not. But I know this, if you're willing, you can make me clean. There's the dependence. I need
one thing, I need to be washed from my sins. I need to be made
clean and I can't do that myself. There's nothing I can do about
it, only you can. That's what the scripture says
in the act of worship right there. You ever see him, that's exactly
what you do. You fall on your face and you worship just like
that. Now read a little more about
these wise men. Look at verse nine of your text. When they had heard the king,
speaking of the wise men, they departed and lo, the star which
they saw in the east, it went before them, till it came and
stood over where the young child was. That's exactly what the
Lord Jesus Christ did for his people. He went before us. I
thought of some scriptures on this. Revelations 13, eight says
this, it refers to Christ as the lamb slain from the foundation
of the world. The eternally sacrificed Christ. Before time began, in the mind
and the heart of God, it was already done. Christ was already
sacrificed for his people. You know what that means for
us? It means before we ever entered this world, before we ever committed
one sin, there was already blood shed by our Savior for those
sins. He went before us. He did the work before us. It
was already done before we ever showed up. Salvation is eternal. He entered in once, and he obtained
eternal redemption for us. Redemption without beginning,
and redemption without end. He went before us. He went before
us in the covenant of grace, that covenant I spoke of earlier,
where the Father charged the Christ with the salvation of
his people. And this is what it sounded like.
This is Isaiah 6, verse 8. It says, also I heard the voice
of the Lord saying, whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Who's speaking? God. You know who he's speaking to?
God. This is the triune God communing
with himself. And he says, who will go for
us? Who will I send? And here's where
Christ speaks. Then said I, here am I, send
me. Immediate. Send me. I'll go. I'm the only one who can do it.
Send me. I love them. I've always loved
them. I've loved them with an everlasting
love. Send me. He went before us. He
went before us in his ascension. I go to prepare a place for you,
is what he told his disciples. He went back to his father, and
right now, he is our great high priest, and he pleads for every
one of his people daily. And I want you to understand
what he is pleading for. He is not pleading for mercy and for
grace for us. That is not what he is pleading.
He's pleading justice. Justice. Why? Because he justified
us before God. He looks to his father and he
says, do what comes naturally to you. Deal with them in justice
because you know what? They're justified. Look at them. They have no sin. They're completely
and utterly righteous. I've made them so. Do according
to your character and your nature, and do justice. And you know
what you'll have to do? You'll have to accept them, because
I've made them acceptable. He went before us in every way,
shape, and form. Salvation, folks, is something
that was done before we ever knew we needed it. Look at verse
10. Speaking of the wise men, it
says, when they saw the star, they rejoiced. with exceeding
great joy. Now, if you ever see Christ,
if he ever reveals himself, this is the response, joy, joy. And we talked about that joy
this morning. There's so much joy in the gospel.
There's so much joy in Christ. We're complete in him. We lack
absolutely nothing. We have the protection of God.
All our steps are ordered. There's nothing out of order.
Everything is right on time, in the fullness of time, just
as it's supposed to be. But like I said this morning,
this is my greatest joy in all of this. It's all for sinners.
Men who are not of the works of the law. It's just for sinners,
that's it. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation that Jesus Christ came to this world
to save sinners of whom I am chief. Best news I've ever heard. And these wise men, they brought
gifts. They brought three gifts, gold
and frankincense and myrrh. You know what gold is, it's a
precious metal. Frankincense and myrrh, what those are are
aromatics. So it's tree sap and they would
let it harden to a reason, crush it up, make perfume, make incense,
things like that. But the theme behind all these
things, why gifts? Why did they bring these things?
The theme behind all these things is they are very, very precious
and they are very, very valuable. I have a question. What does
God find precious? What does he find valuable? His
son. That's what's precious to him.
His son, his son's blood, that's precious to him. The death of
his saints, that's precious to him. But these men are coming
and they're bringing gifts. What does God find valuable? Let me read you this. This is
Psalm 51, and this is verse 16 and 17. Just listen. For thou
desirest not sacrifice, else would I give it. Thou delightest
not in burnt offering, The sacrifices of God, that which the Lord finds
precious and valuable, are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite
heart, oh God, that will not despise. Now we come to Christ,
what do we bring? We bring our brokenness. We bring
a broken heart. We bring a broken spirit. You
know what a broken heart and a broken spirit is? It's one
that doesn't work. It's one that's no good. We come with nothing
good. Everything's broken. We come
with just our sin and all our brokenness and not a thing more
because we don't have anything else. Asking him to do something
about it in the eyes of God, folks, that's valuable. That's
precious. A sinner is a valuable thing. It is a precious thing because
a sinner needs Christ and sinners are who Christ came to save. What gifts do we bring when we
come to Christ? Just our brokenness, just our sin. That's it, nothing
more. And in the eyes of God, that
is valuable. And I'm gonna give you one more
thing before we leave here. Why these gifts? I thought this was
very interesting. Henry Mahan pointed this out,
and it left me on a high note, so I'll leave you on the same
note. The Lord tells Joseph, you gotta go down to Egypt. You
take your family, you go down to Egypt. It's a place he's likely
never been. It's a place he probably doesn't know anybody, he doesn't
have a job lined up, doesn't have a shelter lined up, a place
to live or anything like that. You take your family and you
flee to Egypt and you're going to be there for an indeterminate
amount of time. Joseph's a young man and he's a carpenter and
he likely doesn't come from wealth because he's in his hometown
of Bethlehem and he's got nobody to stay with. Nobody. So he's
likely just on his own. I'm guessing he does not have
a fat savings account to rely on. How's he going to put food
on the table? How's he going to support them?
How's he going to support that young family when he's down in Egypt? Gold
and frankincense and myrrh. The Lord always provides. In
everything, he provides for his people. Temporally, right here
in this world, he's already provided everything we need for salvation.
It's all done. We're complete in him. That's
where I'm going to leave you.