We're in the book of Matthew.
If you'd like to turn there. Matthew chapter two. I titled this message, who is
a wise man? Who is a wise man? This is the
only account in God's word that we have of the wise men that
came to worship the Lord. Wednesday night, we saw the birth
of Christ being foretold unto Joseph, said that the child that
the mother is bearing is holy unto the Lord. Thou for thou
shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from
their sin. That's why that's who he is. It was his name. It was his birthright. He was the Savior, the Redeemer,
and he saved his people from their sin. Now we know by the
first verse, it says, now when Jesus was born, that this is
after Christ had been born. So sometime after, and we find
that out later on in verse 12, because the wise men came to
worship him. It says he was a young child.
He's no longer a babe. You remember whenever the angel
of the Lord appeared unto the shepherds in Luke chapter two.
We'll be looking at that later, but they went and they found,
they said, let us go see this great thing that the Lord hath
revealed unto us. And they came and they found
Mary and Joseph and they found the babe lying in a manger. You
remember that account? He's no longer a babe here. He's
now a young child. Why is that significant? Because
men like to put emphasis on a certain day. certain day. And I have, by way of intro,
I would briefly like to tell us a word of warning to those
of us who are interested in learning, those who are interested in knowing
something that the Lord has definitely revealed throughout scripture
and unto his people. The only emphasis God ever puts
on a day is whenever he says, this is the day that the Lord
hath made. Today is the day of salvation.
See, the emphasis is not just one day back then, the emphasis
is today. Today is the day of the Lord.
The Lord puts the emphasis on that day when the Lord Jesus
Christ redeemed his people, but we don't worship that day, do
we? We worship the person, the Lord Jesus Christ. Men like to put emphasis on Christmas
Day, and that's definitely what this would be an account of.
If you look in the previous chapter, it's the Virgin Mary, it's the
birth of Christ. They put emphasis on Christmas
Day and call it a holy day, a holiday. That's what holiday is, is a
holy day. It's a set-aside day. It's supposed
to be sanctified, but the Lord didn't ordain that. Christmas
is not in the Bible. You'll never find the word Christmas
in the Bible. It was ordained by the Roman
Catholic Church, Christ's mass. And so we see men taking something
that is beautiful in that God sending forth his son, born of
a woman, born under the law, and they turn it into something
totally different than what it is. We don't worship a day. We
worship a person, don't we? Wise men, wise men and wise women. worship the Lord Jesus Christ
in spirit and in truth. Wise men ask, where is he? Where
is he? We're going to hear this. We're
going to read this together. That was the question they asked.
Where is he? Not what day was he born on? That wasn't the question.
They didn't care about that. Now, where is he? I've got to
get to him. Where is he at? We saw his star. We know he's been born. Where
is he? I've got to have Christ. That's the question that the
Lord's people ask, isn't it? Lord, where are you? Are you
here? Pass me not, Lord. I've got to have you. I've got
to have you. I need thee every hour. See, worship is daily. Worship
is daily. Worship is never by demonstrating
something externally. Now, I want to be clear on something. As your pastor during the conference,
I was sitting there and I was feeding off of the words of the
gospel and I began to cry and it wasn't an outward expression
intentionally. I was boiling up inside out of rejoicing and
joy and it was coming out, so to speak. But my intention is
to never draw attention to myself and a believer's intention is
to never draw attention to their self externally because of the
joy that they express. Am I saying don't ever cry when
you hear good news? No, that's not what I'm saying.
Even in the Lord Jesus, he wept, didn't he? And he's always perfect
in everything that he did, but we see that it's not what we
do externally is our worship. We worship the Lord in spirit
and in truth. That's how we worship the Lord.
Now, to be clear, I have no knowledge of anyone in our congregation
having any of these things. So if you take offense to what
I'm about to say, I have no knowledge of it. This is what the Lord
laid on my heart to deliver in love. It's just in love. That's
all my intention is. This is what I've learned of
Him. This is what I want to teach us this morning. The Lord's people
never worship the Lord by putting out nativity scenes. We never
hang crosses on our walls or around our neck to adorn ourselves
to identify with. That's not honoring to Him. That's
dishonoring. He calls those things graven
images. That doesn't honor Him. That's not our worship. Here's
our worship, brethren, the preaching of the gospel. There's where
we remember Him, not in just a day. Jesus is not the reason
for the season. He's the reason for every season.
Jesus is not the reason for Christmas. He's the reason for January through
December, 365 days a year and 366 on leap year. He's the reason
for every day. And the believer worships His
birth. His life, His death, and His burial and His resurrection
every day of the year is all their hope and salvation. Wise
men still seek the Lord to worship Him in spirit and in truth, not
based on emotion. That's what a lot of holidays
do, isn't it? It makes us emotionally stirred. We have traditions that
we keep. My encouragement is keep the
traditions that you have with your family. Certainly me and
my family have traditions. There's not a thing wrong with
that. Decorate your house, illuminate it, whatever we choose to do,
sing jingle bells, but don't make it about the Lord. That's
not his day. Every day is the Lord's day.
His worship's done right here. And it's done in here, in the
heart, in the heart of his people. The Lord's given us the ability
to enjoy these things physically, outwardly with our family, but
don't allow the flesh and Satan to deceive us. We're not honoring
God with graven images. We're not honoring God by adorning
ourself. And you see, everybody gets religious
around Easter, don't they? Everybody gets religious around
Christmas, don't they? And when do we get religious? Well, we have true religion.
True religion is this. We worship God in spirit and
in truth, His way. We do it right here. We don't
worship man's traditions with Christ. We don't mix Christ's
worship with man's traditions and call it good. We worship
him every day in spirit and in truth. That's a word of warning to those
that wish to learn. If you've never heard that before,
I was impressed to tell us that. I mean, even my children, I don't
know if I've ever explained all that to my children in that detail,
but that's my intro and that's the end of the intro. So let's
look in Matthew chapter two. Matthew chapter two, we have
the wise men who come from the East to worship. They were not
Jews. It's very clear to us because
in verse 12, it says they depart back to their home country. Now,
who told them Who told the wise men of the Lord? Who told the
wise men that the Messiah would come? Who told the wise men to
be looking for Christ? These were men that were not
Jews. It was not the promise. The scripture
is not very clear on this. Now we can definitely easily
assume that it would have been Babylon where they would have
came from. And they heard Daniel whenever Daniel's prophecy was
given. And some believe, we know Nebuchadnezzar believed, don't
we? Nebuchadnezzar believed God in Babylon, so some others we
would like to think believe, but the Spirit's silent on these
things, so we must be silent as well. And we can dig, and
I began, I found myself looking and digging and searching and
researching, getting man's opinion, getting man's opinion. I thought,
what if I could tell you their names? What difference does it
make? It doesn't have anything to do with them, does it? It
had to do with the work in the heart. See, that's what the picture
is here. These men had been given faith.
to believe that Christ was coming, and for what purpose? Well, they
declare why they were coming, to worship Him, which is called
the Christ. They believe that Jesus Christ
was God, that He was the Savior. Is that not what we believe as
well? Is that not why we come to worship, is because we believe
He is Christ? What we know is that God led
them to Christ by His star, His light. His light, it always points
to Him, doesn't it? That's what His light does. Let's
read a few verses here in Matthew 2. Now, when Jesus was born in
Bethlehem of Judah 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 in all Jerusalem. Now, there
is two kinds of people. There are two kinds of people
in this world. There are wise men, and when
I say men, I'm encompassing ladies as well, I'm not sexist. There's
wise men and women, and there's Herods, and it's that simple.
Either we're a wise man seeking to worship the Lord, or we're
a Herod, and at the word of the Lord coming, we're troubled.
We're troubled. It's really that simple. There's
those that seek to worship in spirit and in truth, and those
that seek to worship by their own will. Paul called it will
worship, worshiping according to the flesh. See, God can't
be worshiped by our emotion because it's something that we exhibit.
Do we understand that? God cannot be worshiped by our
emotion because it's something, it must be worship in spirit
and in truth. It's not that we are waving our
hands or we're clapping. There's churches that exhibit
those, that's not worship. That it's done in the heart,
isn't it? We know that to be true. These wise men wanted to
come to physically bow. Yes, but it was in the heart.
They had already bowed and Christ was physically upon the earth
at this time. And we would have done the same as his people.
So how do we worship now? We come to him now in the heart
without moving a muscle and we bow to him. Not because of an
emotional stirring, not because we are excited. Of course, we're
excited to come to service. Don't misunderstand what I'm
saying, but that's not the root of it. We're excited because
of what he's already done. They were excited to worship
him. I have no doubt of that. But we don't worship based upon
emotion, do we? We worship in spirit and in truth.
This is how wise men worship. There's those that choose to
worship based upon their self, for self-praise, for popularity,
power, for pleasure, the lust of the flesh. On the other hand,
you have those that will bow to the Lord, not for praise,
not for popularity. We just want the truth, don't
we? Now, when I say that, out of the other side of my mouth,
I know my flesh is saying, no, we don't. "'cause as soon as
you give me the truth, "'I'm gonna bow up against it. "'I
have the new man. "'We have the new man now that's bowing, truth
Lord. "'We have this old man that's bowing up, "'flexing all
of his muscles like Goliath, "'just wanting to build a 60-foot
statue of himself "'like Nebuchadnezzar. "'That's us, isn't it? "'Not
wise men. "'No, that new man, he comes
right down to the child, "'the Lord Jesus Christ, "'and kneels
way down before him, below him. "'What would cause someone to
worship a baby We do it all the time, though, don't we, in our
heart? We don't see Him as just a baby. We see Him as God the
babe, the Lord Jesus Christ, and God the successful Redeemer
on the cross of Calvary, the God-man. We see Him no different
in the manger as we did on the cross. We see Him no different
on the cross as we do in glory now seated. From the time that
He was born to the time He was seated, we see Him as the same.
He is God. That's a revelation of the Lord
only. That's what these wise men had. That's why they had
to come and worship Him. They had saw this. Now on the
other side you have Herod. Herod, like most, were troubled
in all of Jerusalem. Do you know why? They thought
their power was being threatened. Herod liked being king. He was
promoted by the Romans to be in that position. Herod liked
to be in charge. He liked the authority. Now,
he was an old man at this time. What threatenings would he have
had with this young baby, other than he had just had a son of
his own, or he was rearing up a son to take his place, to carry
on his name, to carry on my lineage, so to speak? What do most men
want to leave behind when they die? A legacy, a legacy. That's
what he was looking for, and he couldn't do that. Christ was
a threat to his legacy. We can't have anything in our
heart separating us from the Lord. There's no room for a legacy.
There's no room for power. There's no room for popularity.
No, Christ has got to be King. And if you're His, He will be.
Not because you made Him. He will be Lord. Not because
I allowed Him to be Lord, because He is. Because He's God. What does Herod do in response?
Well, like most, he panics and he demands to know where Christ
was born. He goes to the scribes, the high
priest. He says, where is he going to
be born? Where's Christ going to be born? They say Bethlehem,
Judah, verse four. Bethlehem, Judah. Well, that
was five miles away from Jerusalem, which is where Herod was. He's
in the capital of Israel, that's Jerusalem, the capital of Judah.
And now we see that the Lord is going to be born five miles
away from there in a little place called Bethlehem. Herod wants to take Christ by
force. wants to take Christ by force.
He sends away, and I'm getting ahead of myself a little bit,
but he sends away the wise men. And he says, he's going to be
born in Bethlehem, Judah. When you find him, come back
and bring word to me that I may worship him. Did you know that's
what men are saying today, that they want to worship baby Jesus
in a manger. They want to worship Jesus. That's
what they're saying, but truly what they're saying deep down,
it's the same for every man, woman, and boy. that has ever
been born left to themselves is the same as Cain and Abel.
They want to offer up the works of their hands. They want to
be good enough. And yet, whenever God says, I'm
not pleased with you or your sacrifice, what do they do? They
raise the fist in rebellion and say, I crucify him. Only the
Lord's people say truth, Lord. Truth, Lord, nothing in my hand
can I bring. Simply to your blood, your cross,
your work do I cling, simply to Christ. Only by the Lord's
faith can we do that. Otherwise, we are going to slay
our brother, the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what Abel represents.
We will not have this man reign over us. I understand that this
phrase has changed in our society, but it's still the same. It's
still the same, or the same meaning, I guess I should say. You know
what the saying is now? We've made Jesus our Lord. We've
made Jesus our Lord. Well, that makes you Lord, don't
it? We've made Jesus our king. Well, that makes you king. We've
made Jesus God because we've let him do something. Well, that
makes you God. Is that not true? It's simple,
isn't it? There's no hope in that preaching
for the Lord's people. We're not our own God. Yet these
men would say, well, Abraham's our father. You can't tell us
we're not of God. Abraham's our father. Now they're
looking at their heritage, aren't they? They're looking at their
pedigree. Abraham's our father. Christ said, if Abraham was your
father, see, Abraham saw my day coming and he rejoiced. He said,
if Abraham was your father, you would rejoice. But he says, Abraham
is not your father. You're of your father, the devil.
Oh no, Lord, don't let us be hereds and think that we're worshiping
you whenever we're not. He calls us to be wise men and
come and worship in spirit and in truth. Either we're Herods
or wise men. Now, it's an interesting thought
to me. Herod was five miles from Bethlehem. I've already said that. Herod
was five miles from Bethlehem and these wise men were from
the east. They were a long ways off. I
don't know how long they journeyed. The scripture doesn't say. There's
predictions. There's 400 miles. I've read
all kinds of things. I've come to the conclusion it
doesn't really matter. They were greater than five miles away
and yet they saw a star. Why didn't Herod see a star?
Why didn't Herod recognize the star of the Lord? Why didn't
he see the birth of Christ? All these wise men that were
supposedly wise men beside him, the Pharisees, the scribes, the
high priests, why didn't they notice the star? because they
were not looking for the Lord Jesus Christ. They were looking
for King David to come back and set up an earthly kingdom. They
were looking for a conquering king to come in and physically
kick down the door of all their enemies and physically sit upon
a physical throne. That wasn't the Lord's purpose,
was it? It wasn't the Lord's purpose. Why didn't they see
the star? Well, the scripture tells us
clearly, he that hath ears to hear, let him hear. He that has
eyes of faith, let him see. See, we don't imagine and believe
what we're seeing with our mind. Let me explain what I mean by
that. A lot of people, whether it's
in songs, did they not? You remember a movie several
years ago? It was in the early 2000s. It was called The Passion
of the Christ. Anybody remember that? And basically it portrayed
the biblical events in a person pretending to be Jesus Christ
and what he endured on the cross and making a way of salvation
for everyone. And that's why it was promoted so well. It didn't
offend anybody. There was no gospel in it. You couldn't show
what the Lord Jesus Christ was doing on the cross of Calvary
spiritually in a movie. It's not possible, but it stirred
emotions. And I remember at that time going down to the theater
and walking around the mall. That was popular back then. Me
and Bobby would go down there and walk in there. We'd see all
these people kneeling down in front of the theater praying.
There was mass quantities of them just kneeling. I said, what
are they doing? Oh, they just got saved. They watched the Passion
of the Christ. No, they didn't. No, that's not faith. That was
sight. It was an image. It's not possible.
See, we can't worship the Lord in an image. And what does our
mind want to do physically? We're so idol factories. What do we want to do? As soon
as you think of baby Jesus, do you not see an infant in a manger? Unless through the eyes of faith
you're looking. We want to make an image in our mind. That's
how we are. Christ is not to be worshiped
that way. It's the eyes of faith. Faith doesn't imagine what he
looks like. Faith knows what he looks like and looks to him.
You don't have details in your mind of his hair or his beard.
No, that's not it, no. That's a graven image that we
fabricated in our heart. We don't worship with what we
imagine in our mind. We worship through the eyes of
faith, truly seeing the finished work of Christ. Truly seeing. Faith does not look at the way
things looked with our physical eyes. It's not an imaginary thing
is what I'm implying. Faith just looks to Christ. Faith
just believes God. We don't understand and we can't
The greatest artists that ever lived could not draw a picture
that would represent Christ properly because it's through faith. It's
an inward work. It's nothing external at all
that we do. And it's not in our imagination.
What does the scripture say about our imagination? The imagination
of the heart of man is on evil continually. That's all that
we can imagine is evil. No, faith looks to Christ. Faith
bows to Christ. Lord, give us your faith. Don't
let me imagine that I'm worshiping you. Cause me to worship you.
Cause me to worship you in spirit and truth. Now look in verse
seven with me. After Herod had called these,
gathered information, found out it was in Bethlehem, it says
in verse seven, that Herod, when he had privily called the wise
men, inquired of them diligently what time the star appeared. He was curious to know when the
star appeared. He didn't even, Understand what
he's saying. He says, when did you see the
star? He didn't even see it physically. He didn't even recognize it.
It wasn't nothing spectacular to Herod even then. When did
you say you saw the star? Well, he would have saw it. I
mean, a magnificent star in the sky that the Lord had made. I
heard some writer, they were talking and they said, it's probably
a comet that went by. And I was like, You know, men
try to explain away the Bible, don't they? The Lord said it's
a bright star, it's a bright star, and it rested where? Upon
Christ. We're gonna find that out in just a moment. It stood
still where Christ is, and that represents his gospel. That's
what his light does, is it stands still upon the Lord, and it illuminates
him, shows us what we are, and causes us to flee to Christ.
That's what the star represents. But Herod couldn't see it. Why
weren't there thousands? flocking to Bethlehem, they were
oblivious to it. It was right in front of them.
Is that not true with our gospel? Is not our gospel right in front
of those that we love? Those that we pray for, we agonize
with the Lord for, that we care for, our family, our friends.
Do we not say it's right in front of you? Believe it, please. Can't see it. Can't see it. Not with these eyes. No, the
Lord has to give faith. That's why we're mercy beggars,
isn't it? Lord, give us your faith. Give our loved ones your
faith. Why weren't there thousands flocking
to Bethlehem? Why didn't the chief priests
and scribes go with the wise men after they knew the prophecy?
Here's the prophecy right in front of them. They tell Herod,
and the wise men are the only ones that he sends forth. These
three wise men, why didn't they go with them? If this is who
it's supposed to be, Herod says, well, you give me word and then
we'll, unbelief? divine providence of God to protect
Jesus Christ. There's no doubt about that,
but it was all unbelief, wasn't it, in these men's hearts? They
couldn't believe that's the Christ. The Christ's not going to be
born in a manger. That's silly. That's what they thought. His
ways are not our ways. He's chosen the foolish things,
the foolish things to confuse the wise, to confound the wise,
the weak things, the weak things to abase the mighty. Christ didn't match the image
that they had in their mind. Men have an image of Christ,
don't they? And our God in the preaching
of his gospel does not match that image. Why? Because it strips
every image that you have in your mind. Every image that I've
ever fabricated of myself. See, we see ourself really as
a 60 foot statue, as I mentioned a minute ago before God, thinking
that we've elevated ourself by our works. Unless the Lord comes
down and he shines that star of his gospel and says, no, here's
my Christ. Yeah, but he's just a baby. That's
God. That's God right there. Worship him. Wise men will say
truth, Lord, and bow. That's what we do, isn't it?
By faith, that's what must be done. Christ didn't match the
image in their mind. Christ didn't come the way that
they thought he should. Man cannot see God. Not with
the natural eye. It takes faith. Faith is bestowed,
not imagined. Now, isn't it true that men would
rather worship a day than worship a person? Why? Because they can
mark it on a calendar and they can say, okay, we're going to
remember this day as such and such. We're going to do this.
Isn't that the same as the golden calf? They saw the Lord's work
coming across the Red Sea. They saw the Lord's work bringing
them through the wilderness to here, giving them manna, giving
them water. Saw the thunderings of the mountain
of Sinai when God condescended upon the mountain. The smoke
heard the rumblings. Can you imagine how frightening
that would have been to the flesh? And what did they say? Did they fall on
their face and say, we got to worship. This is the Lord. He's there. Don't touch the mountain. No, they said, let's make a golden
calf. Men would rather have a day than a person. They'd rather
have a calf than King Jehovah. It must be done in faith. That's
the problem with men. We don't have faith by nature.
Faith is contrary. Faith does not look to self in
any way. I mentioned this to someone recently,
but I wrote an article, it may be in the bulletin next Sunday.
Everything that we are confident in, in the flesh, the Lord is
surely going to prove it is utter weakness according to the spirit.
But everything that the Lord has made us confidence in the
spirit will be our greatest hope, not in the flesh. There'll be
no boasting in the flesh. Do you know why? So that no flesh
will glory. in his presence. It must be spiritual. It must be by faith and he must
do it. He must do it. I mentioned this last Sunday. And the reason I mentioned this was
because somebody told me, you're telling me I don't have a will.
They said that to me. You're saying I don't have a
will. And I said, no, you have a will, but it's constrained
by your nature. Our will is constrained by our
nature. What do we hear when, I'm sure
some of you remember, what did you hear when you heard about
Jesus Christ, or you heard about God? We begin to fabricate something
in our imagination. And we know it to be true now,
because we've heard the truth. But no man in religion can come out
of religion because they've learned more and realized, oh, this isn't
true, unless they're taught of the Lord by faith. What's my
point? Lord, don't leave me to my will.
You're gonna have to give me a new will, a new nature. Otherwise
I'm gonna be like Herod and try to take you by force. I'll never
see the star and I'll never worship. Men choose to worship themselves
and they look for natural evidence for false spiritual choices made. One time I went to a Pentecostal
church And there were people running on the pews. I've seen
this stuff in real life. You hear about things. I've seen
it. They were, uh, they were talking in tongues. And I heard
somebody say one time, if you. Best way to speak in tongues
is just say, tie my bowtie, untie my bowtie really fast. Tie my
bowtie, untie my bowtie. And they call that talking in
a heavenly language. What is that? All that is is
looking for natural evidence for a false spiritual choice
made. It's not true, is it? The Lord
doesn't talk in gibberish. What does he say? Peace, be still. We don't have anything else to
say, do we? He shuts us up. He doesn't say, you understand
what I'm saying? No, it's not. It's not outward.
It's not a stirring of the flesh. It's not. These wise men didn't
come running up and down. I mean, I'm sure they were excited
on the inside, but we have to worship him. That's what they
thought. We have to worship him in spirit
and in truth. We've got to get to Christ. We've
got to have him. We don't wanna lay hold on him
by force. We must bow to him. Is that not why we come here?
Lord, we gotta bow to you. Calls us to bow to you. Give
us a heart to believe on you. Don't let us imagine anything,
any image. Don't let us think that we can
do something in the flesh that's worship. It's not. Worship is
in the spirit and in his truth alone. Christ tells us. Christ tells us why people do
this, looking for false spiritual evidences, you will not come
to me. This is why. You will not come
to me. Now, there's twofold in that.
They can't come, number one, because he must let them, but
at the same time, even if there was a door opened according to
the flesh, man would not choose God even then. We wouldn't. We hate him. Our flesh despises
him. Why? He's holy. He's perfect.
He's undefiled. He's separate from sinners. He's
precious. He's perfect. He must be our substitute. Men
say, well, I can do something. There's something I can do. I
didn't see the star, but there's other things. Look at what I've
done. Lord said, depart from me. I never knew you. No, you're
going to have to follow the star. You're gonna have to see it.
I can't see it, Lord. Give me eyes to see the light
of your gospel that lands upon your son alone. Give me hope
in this. Don't let me just see baby Jesus
meek and mild in a manger, cause me to see God laying there, who
is the successful savior of his people. Tells us, he says, you can't
hear my voice because you're not my sheep. But good news,
brethren, my sheep hear my voice. That's what he said. Can you
hear His voice? That's because you're His sheep.
Lord, I want to hear. Whatever you have to say, shut
me up and say it. Don't let me speak. I heard somebody
say one time, you can't learn anything while you're speaking.
Well, that's true, isn't it? If we're standing before the
Lord saying, I, I, I, and me, me, me, we're not learning anything
of Him. No. What does God's gospel do? It
shuts up the flesh. There's no glory in this flesh.
There's no more I. There's no more me. It's all
about Christ. It's all about him and his gospel. Christ makes it clear we cannot
see his star. The star represents his gospel.
I've made that clear, but that's his light that shines forth Christ.
It's a double illumination. It's the sun of righteousness
we heard about, was it last Sunday? The sun of righteousness that
shines forth Christ and also reveals us at the same time needing
a substitute. It's only for the Lord's people.
It must be revealed. must be revealed. Now quickly I want to look in
Luke chapter 2. I mentioned that so I want to
turn there and then we're going to come back to Matthew 2 in
closing. Luke chapter 2. Luke chapter two and verse eight
says, and it came to pass. Nope. I'm in chapter one. I apologize.
Wrong chapter. Luke chapter two, verse eight.
And there were in the same country, shepherds abiding in the field,
keeping watch over the flock by night. This is the birth of
Christ, the night that he was born. And these are the shepherds
nigh unto him. They were abiding in the field.
Verse nine, And lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and
the glory of the Lord shone round about them, and they were sore
afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not, for behold, I
bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior,
which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto
you. You shall find the babe wrapped
in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. And suddenly there
was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly hosts, praising
God and saying, glory to God in the highest and on earth peace,
goodwill toward men. And it came to pass as the angels
were gone away from them and to heaven, the shepherds said
one to another, let us now go even into Bethlehem to see and
see this thing, which has come to pass, which the Lord, now
get this last part, which the Lord hath made known unto us. He says, the angel of the Lord
came upon us. Now here's the glorious picture,
brethren. This is the Spirit of the Lord that condescends
according to the will of the Father, according to the will
of His purpose in salvation. This is the angel of the Lord
speaking to His people, illuminating. This is the same as the star.
This is what happens through the gospel. It speaks of what? The Lord Jesus Christ, the spirit
condescends, revealing God's glory, giving fear. And immediately
it says they were afraid, were sore afraid, were they not? Well,
that's repentance. You see God, you're going to
be afraid. If I see God high lifted up as Isaiah did, I don't
have anything else to say. Lord, I'm a man of unclean lips.
And I placed my hand over my mouth, as Job said, never to
speak again, never to speak again. These shepherds were sore afraid. But at the same time, when he
gives that repentance, he gives faith, doesn't he? What does
it reveal? What does this angel of the Lord
always reveal? Unto you. Unto you is born this
day. Unto you. Even I? Even me? We sing that song sometimes.
Even me? Yes. Even you. Unto you. is born this day in the city
of David. The Savior, Christ the Lord. What do we say to this? I've got to go worship him. I've got to go where he's at
and worship him. Let us go and see this thing, which the Lord
hath revealed. We're just shepherds in a field,
aren't we? We're just doing our job, going from day to day life.
Tonight's no different than any other night. Suddenly God shows
up and says, behold my son in whom I'm well pleased. And what
do we say? Oh, I got to worship him. Oh, there he is. It's the
Lamb of God, the Savior. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. There
he is. There's the star. The Lord has
to do the revealing. It's hidden. It's hidden. Christ said, search the scriptures
for in them you think you have eternal life. But oh, from Genesis
1-1 all the way to Revelation 22, it's all Christ, isn't it? It all spoke of him. This is
the difference between the wise man and Herod, the revelation
of Jesus Christ, all by his choosing, all by his doing. Herod couldn't
see the star. Herod couldn't rejoice, even
if he'd have physically seen it, he'd have said, ooh and ah,
and that'd been the end of it. That's what men do when they see this
gospel. They say, ooh and ah, and that's the end of it. They
can't rejoice, they've not been given faith. Lord, give us faith.
Lord, cause us to rejoice in this truth. Now turn with me
quickly back to Matthew 2. I've got to point out a couple
more things and we'll close. Herod sends the wise men to Bethlehem
and he says, come back and tell me so I can worship him. but
I wanna worship in my way, I'm gonna kill him. And that's called
man's worship. That's worshiping God according
to the flesh. See, whenever a man stands before God or a woman
stands before God with sin upon them, they will try to kill God
because God will destroy them. Any kind of sin in his presence
must be destroyed with his wrath. In knowing that, in learning
that, man will clench their fist and they will say, I will not
have that man reign over us. But on that day, it's too late.
It's too late. Now I want to read verse nine
through 12 quickly. When they had heard the king, they departed,
and lo, the star which they saw in the east went before them.
There it is again. The star appears back into them
again, doesn't it? What does it do? It 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. When
you hear this gospel, do you rejoice with exceeding great
joy? Do you know why? Because that star goes and it
just illuminates the Lord Jesus Christ. It is His light. That's
what it represents. It shows Him alone. And without
that revelation, without Him giving the revelation of Himself
by His light, we would be in utter darkness, wouldn't we?
Just like Herod, five miles away, couldn't see it. Didn't mean
anything to him. We have people all around this
church that I pass them, I wave at them. I've talked to some
of them. I try to invite them. I thought, well, maybe we should
send CDs out to them. Maybe I should go knocking on
doors. I'm praying about it. I don't know what all to do.
I'm certainly not against anything. I don't want to put a bad taste
in people's mouth, but Lord bid them to come. Here's the star
that's, it's not me. I'm not the star. Christ is.
And our hope is that we have his star, his gospel that shines
forth and illuminates the hearts of his people. Look in verse 11. When they were
come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary, his
mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. 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 departed into
their own country another way. And when they were departed,
behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto Joseph in a dream,
saying, Arise and take the young child and his mother and flee
into Egypt. Be thou there till I bring the word for Herod will
seek the young child to destroy him. That tells us he wanted
to kill him. We don't have to speculate. I said that before,
but I wanted us to see it too. Herod wanted to kill 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. A star. still shines over the Lord
Jesus Christ. But only His people, only His
people can see it. It reveals Christ and it's revealed
by His gospel. Every time we gather together,
I try to make it intentional in order to ask the Lord to send
His Spirit. And every time we gather together, I would ask
you to do the same. If you have one thing to pray
whenever you are about to pull up in this driveway, Pray, Lord,
send your spirit, or we're meeting in vain. Lord's spirit comes
down in power, and it reveals the Lord Jesus Christ by his
gospel according to his will. And what do we do when we see
it? What do we do when we see his
glory? Just like the shepherds, we rejoice with exceeding great
joy. Therefore, we come into this
house by his faith rejoicing. Now, when we come here, I got
three points to make really quick. When we come here, I can't stress
this enough that it's by faith. I must pause and say that again.
It's all by faith. I'm not telling you to bring
any gifts on your own. I'm not talking about presenting
anything with the hands that you have. I'm talking about all
by faith, what the Lord has given us. When we come here by faith,
we present what he has given to us already. If we present
anything else to him, Anything else, he won't be happy, he won't
be satisfied. He's only satisfied, he only
accepts what he's provided. Now, the three things that these
wise men brought, and I've mentioned this to us, I was actually studying,
and look back, I said, I remember saying something about this to
you all, and it was actually a year and a half ago, I preached
on the gold, the frankincense, and the myrrh. We were still
meeting in the community center, of course, had no idea I'd be
your pastor at that time, and here we are. But I wanna reiterate
everything that we heard then, just very briefly. When we come,
we present gold. What does that mean? Well, we're
acknowledging and believing in his deity. That's what the gold
represents, is his deity, the God-man, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Gold was the most precious metal, and it was reserved for the king,
was it not? Very few peasants had gold, if any. The king had
plenty of gold, and gold was a measure of the king's power.
You remember when they came to view Solomon, Solomon began to
parade the men around that were coming. They were spies, but
he thought they were just ambassadors from a foreign country. And he
says, here, look at my gold. Look at everything. The Lord
sent the prophet and said, you didn't show them everything,
did you? And he says, yeah, I showed them everything. Look at my gold.
It was just incredible. And what'd he say? He says, Oh,
it's not yours anymore. They're going to take it by force
because you were bragging about what the Lord had done for you
and he humbled him. And that's what the kings did at that time.
That's what this gold represents is the Lord's deity, his power,
his authority. This is what they were confessing.
Christ is all, he has all authority, sovereign authority and chooses
to do whatsoever he will. He's king. Why is he king? Because God is his father. God is his father. That makes
him the king. And the second thing they gave was frankincense,
was used for the oil on the skin. It was fragrant. They literally
would use this to burn incense before the Lord. This is what
would be his precious smelling savor. And is that not what the
Lord called the sacrifice of Noah all the way to the sacrifice
of Christ? When Christ died, it went up
as a sweet-smelling savor unto the Father. That's what the frankincense
represents. It's His sacrifice alone. It's
His atonement alone. It's by His body and His blood
alone is our hope. So it's a confession that is
His deity by the gold, that He's the God-man, and it's His sacrifice
alone, His body and His blood that was a sweet-smelling savor
unto the Father when His soul was made an offering for sin.
Lastly was the myrrh. Myrrh was used from embalming.
In John 19, 9, Nicodemus brought myrrh into the tomb right after
the Lord had died in order to embalm him. What are they saying
here? Well, Lord, you're the God-man,
the Lord Jesus Christ. Here's gold. Here's the frankincense. You're going to be offered up
as a sweet-smelling savor and were before the foundation of
the world. Before the foundation of the world, this is our hope.
And lastly, it's by your death alone do we have life. by your
death alone. God had to die to save wretched,
vile sinners, to save three wise men and to save all, save every
one of his wise men and wise women, every one of them. That's
what they're confessing. This gold frankincense and myrrh
is all bestowed to us by the faith the Lord gives us. And
what do we do by that faith? We just present Christ again
and say, he's our righteousness. He's our hope, his deity, his
humanity, his life, his sacrifice, his death, his resurrection,
nothing of myself. Now we bow to the Lord Jesus
Christ. Aren't you glad for the light
of his star that's revealed all of that? Hey, I can't get over
here. It was five miles away and couldn't
see it. These men were hundreds of miles away. And then they
saw it and they saw it. And they bring the gifts that
we still are bringing today. The gold, frankincense and myrrh.
And now we worship because he is all. Salvation by his purpose. Salvation according to his grace.
Salvation according to his will alone. How else can you explain worshiping
a baby in a manger? How else can you, that's what
they did, the shepherds worship a baby in a manger. How else
can you explain the wise men coming so far to worship a child?
It was all by faith, the same faith we have, no different,
no different. Have you ever speculated why
they called them wise men? Why did they, why did the Lord
call them wise men? It's lowercase w, so it wasn't
a title that they had. Why did the Lord call them wise
men? Why didn't he call them by name like he did so many others?
Why didn't he call them a king if they were a king? Why did
he call them wise men? Well, who is a wise man? They that confess. They that
confess that he is God. It was His offering alone, and
it was His death alone. Is that not what they presented
to Him? That's why they're wise men. God hath made unto Him,
made Christ unto us and them, the wise men, all our wisdom,
all our righteousness, all our sanctification, and all our redemption.
Who's a wise man? Those whom God has made Christ
their wisdom. They're the wise men. Our prayer
is that the Lord would make Christ our wisdom. He wouldn't look
at us for our wisdom, but that we would look to Christ as all
our wisdom. Amen.