FINDING THE TRUE KING

Can I pray for you in any way? Send any prayer requests to OurChristianWalk@aol.com.

In Christ, Mark

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

** Follow The Christian Walk on Twitter @ThChristianWalk

** Like posts and send friend requests to the author of The Christian Walk, Mark Cummings on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/mark.cummings.733?ref=tn_tnmn

** Become a Follower of The Christian Walk at http://the-christian-walk.blogspot.com

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed.

On coming to the house, they saw the child with His mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented Him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.

Matthew 2:9-12

This ends today’s reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

It had been a quite a journey for the wise men. They started in a land somewhere to the east of the holy city of Jerusalem. The scriptures really don’t tell us where and perhaps that’s not what’s really important when we look at their story. For the focal point need not be on where they came from but rather where they were trying to go, something God’s word does spend a lot of time on and rightfully so since the Magi were trying to find Jesus, the newborn King.

The first stop in their quest was Jerusalem. After all, if one was going to look for a Jewish king, there would be no better place to begin looking because Israel’s throne was always seen as being in the divine metropolis. But when the wise men arrived, they found that the only king in Jerusalem was the appointed Roman ruler, Herod, who had his own interest in the news that a child had been born who was considered the King of the Jews. Unfortunately, Herod’s interest wasn’t to worship Jesus as he tried to get the Magi to believe but rather to eliminate him. As we learned in yesterday’s devotion, Herod has a murderous reputation and had killed even his own family members. Killing a young child who he saw as a threat would not trouble him at all.

And so Herod summoned his chief priests and teachers of the law, consulting them as to what the prophecies of old had to say about the Messiah, specifically where he would be born. Sharing the words of the prophet Micah, Herod’s advisors shared that the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem, a little less than five miles south of Jerusalem. With that, the wise men set out from Jerusalem to finally find the child they had traveled so far to worship and they were overjoyed when they looked into the night sky and saw the same star they had followed when they traveled from the east to Jerusalem.

But this time, the star’s path was different because the scriptures tell us that it moved ahead of the Magi until it was directly over the place where Jesus was. It was easy for them to find them from there, not in a manger as so many scenes get wrong, but in a house as Jesus was no longer a baby and Joseph and Mary were no longer without a place to stay. And when the wise men entered the house and saw Jesus with his mother Mary, the scriptures say that they “bowed down and worshiped him” before presenting Him with treasures and “gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.” Note they brought nothing but their best for Jesus because this Messiah, the Son of God and Savior of the world, deserved nothing less than that.

Friends, as we get set to enter into a new year, I pray that we take forward three main attitudes found in the Magi:

First, I pray we will never rest in our efforts to seek and find Jesus, our Savior, the One we are to model our lives after as Christians.

Second, I pray that we as we seek and find Jesus, we may do so with the primary ambition to bow down and worship Him.

And finally, I pray that as we bow down and worship Jesus, we’ll vow to bring Him our best treasures and gifts, willing to give everything up for Him just as He was willing to give up everything for us.

Amen.

Let us pray.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it.

Send any prayer requests to OurChristianWalk@aol.com