The Annunciation of Messiah's Birth - Part 2

PDF

Well, I invite you to turn with me to Matthew chapter 2 as we continue our study of this wonderful passage in Matthew 2.  As you are aware, in the United Kingdom, there is a monarchy, and in that monarchy, there are clear and inviolable rules for witnessing a royal birth, for recording a royal birth, and for announcing a royal birth.  An article in the BBC observes this: 

The practice of politicians acting as witnesses and verifying royal births began with the birth of King James the Second’s son in the year 1688.  There had been rumors that the baby had been stillborn and replaced with an imposter smuggled into the royal birth chamber in a warming bedpan.  So, with the birth of kings, as many as eighty witnesses have been present at the birth (Ladies, imagine that!)  in order to confirm that a legitimate son had been born, and the value (The article goes on to say.) placed on succession and lineage, means it is vital for all royal births to be officially recorded as well.  (The article also points out that, Centuries ago.) The rules governing the announcement of royal births were practically set in stone centuries ago  Shortly after the birth of someone who is in the line of the monarchy, the formal notice is posted outside Buckingham Palace, specific cannons must fire, and the bells of Westminster Abbey and other churches ring, and other centuries’-old traditions follow.  And all of that is to ensure that the birth of the king is properly announced. 

In Matthew chapter 2, we're discovering how God orchestrated the official and proper announcement of the birth of His Son, Israel's Messiah.  Matthew writes to prove that Jesus is, in fact, the promised Messiah, the divine Savior and King.  And in the first two chapters of his Gospel, we find “The Messiah's Arrival.” In the first 17 verses of chapter 1, “His Royal Ancestry;” the end of chapter 1, “His Virgin Conception and Birth.” And we're looking at chapter 2, verses 1 through 12, “His Formal Annunciation.” Last week, we began to study this account. Let's read it again together. Matthew, chapter 2, beginning in verse 1.

Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, “Where is He who has been born King of the Jews?  For we saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him.”  When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.  Gathering together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born.  They said to him, “In Bethlehem of Judea; for this is what has been written by the prophet: ‘AND YOU, BETHLEHEM, LAND OF JUDAH, ARE BY NO MEANS LEAST AMONG THE LEADERS OF JUDAH; FOR OUT OF YOU SHALL COME FORTH A RULER WHO WILL SHEPHERD MY PEOPLE ISRAEL.’”  Then Herod secretly called the magi and determined from them the exact time the star appeared.  And he sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the Child; and when you have found Him, report to me, so that I too may come and worship Him.” After hearing the king, they went their way; and the star, which they had seen in the east, went on before them until it came and stood over the place where the child was.  When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy.  After coming into the house they saw the Child with Mary His mother; and they fell to the ground and worshiped Him.  Then, opening their treasures, they presented to Him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.  And having been warned by God in a dream not to return to Herod, the magi left for their own country by another way. 

We're learning in this paragraph that God used the magi to identify and to formally announce Jesus as the Messiah.  This passage reveals His identity as the promised Messiah in three ways. Last time, we discovered just the first of those ways in verses 1 and 2, and that is, “The Surprising Annunciation of The Messiah.”  It's surprising because it came through a group that are referred to as “The Magi.”  So, we took some time to look at this group.  We started by considering “The Magi's Arrival.”  Verse 1 says, they arrived “After Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea” and “In the days of Herod the king.”  We also learned last time that it was “At least 40 days after Jesus' birth” that the magi arrived.  They were not at the stable the night of Jesus' birth, but it was “Less than 2 years after Jesus' birth.”  And when they arrived, they didn't come to Bethlehem; they came instead “To Jerusalem.”

 Now we also considered “The Magi's Identity.”  They were members of a Persian priestly caste, teachers of science and religion. Their religion was Zoroastrianism.  In other words, they were pagan idolaters who had been involved in practices that the Old Testament forbids, such as astrology and divination.  But as we'll learn next time, they were amazingly changed. But this caste had one unique duty. In their own culture, they were often responsible for anointing new kings, which makes them very important to this story.  What was “The Magi's Purpose?”  Verse 2 says they came asking, “Where is He who has been born King of the Jews?”  That's why they came.  And they weren't asking about the birth of just any Jewish king; verse 4 makes it clear that they were asking where “The Christ, The Messiah” had been born, and that prompted Herod to ask the same question.  These men came to Jerusalem because they were convinced that Israel's divine Messiah, one destined to be a world ruler, had been born.  That was their purpose. 

But God's purpose in sending them was to announce the birth of the Messiah to the leaders of Israel as well as to the Jewish people.  How did the magi know?  Well, we considered, fourthly, “The Magi's Sign.”  Verse 2 says, “For we saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him.”  At the time of Jesus' birth, in their own country, they had seen a supernatural phenomenon that resembled a star.  We can't be sure what it was, but as I mentioned last time, it was likely the Shekinah, the Glory Cloud, that blazing manifestation of God's presence that we read about in the Old Testament.  How did they know all of this?  We considered, finally, “The Magi's Source.”  For nearly 600 years before the birth of Jesus, since the Babylonian captivity, devout Jews had lived among the Persians and had shared their scriptures with them and the promise of a coming Messiah.  In addition, as we learned last time, it's impossible to overestimate the impact of Daniel and his prophecies about the Messiah in the book that bears his name, on the magi of Babylon and then on the magi of Persia, as he continued to have a powerful role in the Persian empire.  And that influence continued down through the generations and included those men who arrived in Jerusalem in the first century in our text.  So, these men then, the magi, were responsible for “The Surprising Annunciation of The Messiah.”

Today, we come to “The Startling Confirmation of The Messiah,” the startling confirmation of the Messiah.  We see this in verses 3 through 8.  The confirmation of Jesus as Messiah comes from three sources that are indeed startling, in fact, we could even use the word ‘shocking.’  Let's look at them together. 

First of all, it's confirmed “By Israel's Religious Leaders,”  by Israel's religious leaders.  Now before we meet the religious leaders themselves, we meet in verse 3, Herod the king, and he is the one who will introduce these leaders to us. So, let's first look at this man, Herod the king.  In the year 40 B.C., Rome appointed Herod King of Judea, and within three years, he had crushed all opposition to his rule.  This is the man who came to be known as “Herod the Great.”  His greatest achievements and what lay behind that title, “The Great,” were all architectural.  He built, for example, magnificent cities like the beautiful port city of Caesarea Maritima on the Mediterranean.  I've visited there as have many of you from our church with me.  You've seen the ruins of that magnificent city.  What you see on the screen is a rendering of what that city would have been like in its heyday described by contemporary sources.  It was truly a magnificent city, and he, Herod the Great, was behind it.

He also built incredible palaces like the palace at Masada.  Again, I've been there, as have many of you, and today it's in ruins, but here is a rendering, a re-creation of what it would have looked like when it was first built and in its heyday.  But his crowning achievement was the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem.  He actually initiated a large surface area on which the Temple would be built.  On the Temple Mount, he created an artificial platform. Picture a hill running through Jerusalem, and on top of that hill, a kind of upside-down shoebox that was the platform for all that would go on with the temple.  That platform was 35 acres in size, and on that platform, he then built this magnificent Temple.  It was begun about 19 B.C.  He was “The Great,” but trust me, it was solely because of his architectural abilities because he was at the same time a conniving and cruel ruler.

Let me just give you a couple of examples.  He had at least ten wives and he had more than twelve children.  But the wife that he said he loved most of all was a woman named Mary Omni. Mary Omni, his favorite, but in his insane paranoia, he thought that her relatives were after his throne; and, so he secretly had her brother, and her grandfather killed.  Later, he actually came to suspect Mary Omni herself of infidelity against him and he had her killed, and then her two sons, and then her mother.  Here in Matthew 2, he orders the execution of all the male babies two years and younger in Bethlehem.  In the year 4 B.C., after the incident in our text and five days before his death, he had his favorite son executed.  And just a few short days before his death, he ordered that hundreds of leading Jews be arrested and that on the day of his death all of those Jewish people be killed.  His reason: because he wanted, on the day of his death, there to be real mourning in the land.  This is the kind of man Herod was.  Clearly, he was insanely paranoid about losing his position, and rightly so, because you see Herod was not Jewish.  He was Edomian; his father was an Edomite.  In other words, he was not a descendant of Jacob; he was a descendant of Esau.  He had connived and flattered and bribed and fought his way into this position in Israel.  By the time the magi arrived in Matthew 2, he had reigned for thirty-five years and was about seventy years of age.  More than twenty-five  years before, the Roman senate had given Herod this title, “The King of the Jews.”

 Now, go back to verse 2 and notice what the magi said that troubled Herod,  “Where is He who has been (What?) born King of the Jews?”  Where is the rightful King, not a usurper, not a conniver, not a deceiver who's manipulated and lied and brutally fought his way to the throne, but where is He who has been born King of the Jews?  “For we saw His star in the east and we've come to worship Him.”  Now you can understand Herod's reaction to the magi in verse 3.  Look at it, “When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled and all Jerusalem with him.”  Now the expression, “When Herod heard” implies that he heard this second hand.  In other words, when the magi arrived, they didn't ask for an audience with Herod.  Instead, they went around the city inquiring among the people of Jerusalem.  But of course, as I shared with you last time, the magi didn't sneak into the city of Jerusalem.  They arrived with an entourage, and they were the talk of the town, and so word reached Herod.  And when it reaches him, “When he heard,” notice, “he was troubled.”  That English word isn't nearly strong enough for the Greek word that's used here.  It's a word that means ‘to be stirred up, to be in a state of intense inner turmoil, even fear.’  This is how Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, responded when he went into the Temple that day to burn incense, and the angel Gabriel showed up.  This word is also used when the disciples were on the sea of Galilee and Jesus was walking on the water, and they thought they saw a ghost; this was their response.  So, Herod was in a state of intense inner turmoil.  He was afraid because he faced the real risk of losing his position and of the derailing of his plans for the one who would succeed him.  He was troubled, and verse 3 says,  “and all Jerusalem was troubled with him.”  For over twenty-five years, Jerusalem had learned to be troubled whenever Herod was because trouble was coming.  Verse 4, “gathering together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born.”  He called a high convocation. 

Notice the groups he pulled together.  First of all, the chief priests that included the current ruling high priest, the others who had served previously as high priests; it also included the head of the twenty-four courses of priests and key members of other noble aristocratic influential families.  These were the blue-bloods of Israel.  These were technically religious leaders, that's what it was on paper, but the truth is they function much more like politicians.  They were liberals who rejected, many of them, the supernatural altogether.  They didn't believe there were angels.  They didn't believe there was an afterlife, and they lived like it.  The scribes, on the other hand, in this verse, were truly spiritual leaders although not always in the right way, but they copied the Scriptures at times.  They certainly studied the Scriptures, but the scribes especially taught the Scripture to the people; that was their job.  These two groups, here in verse 4, constituted the Jewish Sanhedrin, the ruling body of Israel.  Seventy-one men, seventy plus the high priest, who governed the nation under the Roman rulers. 

Herod then assembled this prestigious group, the Sanhedrin, and he asked them if the Scripture prophesied where Messiah was to be born.  Verse 5, “They said to him, ‘In Bethlehem of Judea for this is what has been written by the prophet.’”  You see, the religious leaders knew exactly where the Messiah was to be born because they knew their Old Testament.  They knew it had been prophesied in the Old Testament.  They all agreed the place was Bethlehem of Judea.  

Now don't miss the point Matthew's making.  He's making point that that is exactly where Jesus was born.  Go back to verse 1, “Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea,” and of course if you're familiar with Luke's account of the birth narrative of Jesus in Luke 2, you know the same point is made there.  So, what I want you to see is a startling even shocking confirmation of Jesus’ credentials to be the Messiah comes from Israel's religious leaders.  They say, “The Messiah will be born in Bethlehem,” exactly where Jesus was born. 

There's a second startling source of this confirmation; it's confirmed secondly by “Israel's Inspired Scripture,” by Israel's inspired Scripture.  Go back to verse 5 and get a running start.  It says he's going to be born “in Bethlehem of Judea; for this is what has been written by the prophet.”  Verse 6, they now quote the Hebrew Scriptures, “AND YOU BETHLEHEM, LAND OF JUDAH, ARE BY NO MEANS LEAST AMONG THE LEADERS OF JUDAH; FOR OUT OF YOU SHALL COME FORTH A RULER WHO WILL SHEPHERD MY PEOPLE ISRAEL.”  So, they say, “Oh yes, we know exactly where the Messiah will be born because it's clearly stated in the Scripture” (Paraphrase).  They actually put together here and quote two key passages from the Old Testament.  The least familiar of them is that last phrase in verse 6, “…A RULER WHO WILL SHEPHERD MY PEOPLE ISRAEL.”  That actually is taken from 2 Samuel 5:2.  It says, “And the LORD said to you (David), ‘You will shepherd My people, Israel...”  A very similar wording is used in Micah 5:4, so they might be alluding to that, but likely to 2 Samuel 5:2.  Now 2 Samuel, the text there, was originally about David's becoming king of all Israel, but they use it to refer to the rule of David's greatest descendant, the Messiah. Messiah, and this is really an affront to Herod, Messiah would not be a King like Herod; He would gently shepherd His people.  That's the nature of His rule.

But the heart of verse 6 is the prophecy about where the Messiah would be born, and that is taken from Micah, the prophet, Micah, chapter 5, verse 2.  Here's what that passage says, “But as for you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you One will go forth for Me to be a ruler in Israel.  His goings forth are from long ago, from the days of eternity.”  That verse is describing the incarnation of the eternal Son of God when He would take on flesh, and specifically, that when that happened, He would be born in Bethlehem of Judea.  So, the fact that Jesus is the Messiah receives startling confirmation from Israel's religious leaders and from Israel's inspired Scripture. 

Thirdly, it's confirmed “By Israel's Political Leader,” by Israel's political leader, in verses 7 and 8.  Now, as I've already explained to you, Herod was not one to wait for events to take their course; he was one to act quickly and brutally!  So, when he heard about the magi, he launches a plan.  He knew where the Messiah was to be born; he'd learned that now from the religious leaders of the nation.  But he needed to know who the Messiah was and the easiest way to find that out would be to use the magi.  Verse 7, “Then Herod secretly called the magi and determined (ascertained) from them the time the star appeared.”  He is a conniving man.  In fact, Jesus referred to his descendant as, “Herod the Fox,” and Herod the Great was like that.  He's got a plan; he's working it out, the finding out when the star appeared is going to factor into his plan in the next passage we come to. 

But he sent a secret message, verse 7 says, “…to the wise men and he met with them in secret as well.” (Paraphrase)  Why?  Because he's covering his tracks.  He already has decided what he has to do, and he doesn't want it to trace back to him. When he kills the babies in Bethlehem, everybody's going to know it's Herod, but he wants plausible deniability.  So, he meets with them secretly.  Verse 8, “And he sent them to Bethlehem and said, ‘Go and search carefully (make careful search) for the Child.’”  Now don't miss the point Matthew is making here.  He's telling us that Herod knew that this king was promised in the Old Testament.  He knew he was divinely chosen.  He knew this child was Israel's Messiah.  But he was so concerned with his own agenda that he just didn't care; he was willing to do whatever it took to get what he wanted, even if it meant killing Israel's promised Messiah!  

At the same time, however, he pretends he feigns interest in Christ.  Verse 8, he says to them, “When you have found Him, report to me, so that I too may come and worship Him.”  Folks, this is a reminder not to be naive.  Unbelieving politicians will lie to get their way.  They always have, they always will.  But as disingenuous as he was, Herod convinced these men, don't miss again the larger point Matthew is making, Herod, the king of the Jews appointed by the Romans, believed the announcement of the magi.  He was convinced that the Messiah had been born.  He believed that He had been born in nearby Bethlehem, and he believed that He was born in fulfillment of what the Old Testament Scripture had prophesied.  In other words, Herod unwittingly confirms the magi's message as true.  Amazing passage!

Now, before we leave this section, I want to draw out some key lessons for you. I want to do so in a little longer than I normally would because I want you to think about what's going on here. Three key lessons we learn from what we've just studied together.  Lesson number one, “This account proves that Jesus was qualified to be the Messiah because, as the Scriptures had prophesied of Messiah, Jesus was born in Bethlehem.”  This is really important because Matthew is giving an apologetic to the Jewish people here. Throughout Jesus’ life, one of the most common objections to him as the Messiah was what?  That he was from (Where?)  Nazareth!  He’s from Nazareth.  Turn over to John, John's Gospel, and look at chapter 7; John, chapter 7, verse 41. As the people are sort of debating who Jesus is, John 7:41 say, “Others were saying, ‘This is the Christ’” (Messiah).  They were tempted by His works and His words to say, “Maybe He is the Messiah.”  “Still others were saying, ‘Surely the Christ (Messiah) is not going to come from Galilee, is He?’”  The implication is that's where Jesus is from; He's from Galilee.  “‘Has not the Scripture said that the Christ (Messiah) comes from the descendants of David, and from Bethlehem, the village where David was?’  So, a division occurred in the crowd because of him.”

Folks, that same division occurred even after Jesus had ascended.  The Jews continued to debate the reality of His qualification to be the Messiah because he wasn't from Bethlehem; He was from Nazareth.  And this text reminds us that, “No that's not true at all!”  You see, Matthew, chapter 2, verses 1 to 12, proves two crucial facts.  Crucial fact number one, the religious leaders and the Scriptural experts of the first century in the Jewish nation agreed, they all agreed, that Scripture taught the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem, the birthplace of David and the Davidic dynasty.  The second crucial fact we learn in this passage is that Jesus was born and originally lived in Bethlehem.  He was born in the right place to be the Messiah.  This is an apologetic for who Jesus really is.  Christian, you can rest in your faith; He was not only born in the right family as we learned in chapter 1; He was not only born in the right way to a virgin who conceived Him and a virgin who gave birth to Him; but He was born in the right place.  He is qualified to be all that He claimed to be. 

There's a second lesson in this text and this one is more about us; that one was more about Jesus; this lesson is more about us.  “This account serves as a mirror to help us see our own response to Jesus.”  Amazingly, in this passage. the primary ways that people always respond to the Biblical Jesus are all evident here.  In fact, you can look at this passage, and I don't care who you are this morning, every person in this room can see your reflection in this passage.  You're here, your response to Jesus.  What are the possible responses to Him?  The first possible response is “Settled Indifference,” settled indifference.  I mean think about what goes on in this passage.  The magi show up announcing the birth of Israel's Messiah; they show up in Jerusalem, the capital city, at that time about 80,000 people, and those people either didn't know or didn't care.  They didn't travel the six miles to Bethlehem to figure this out!  There's nothing but disinterest.  Our world is filled with people who are either ignorant of their King or utterly indifferent to Him.  Oh, don't get me wrong!  In another month, they will have holiday meals and Christmas parties, and they'll creatively celebrate Christmas, and they'll give gifts to one another, and they'll do all of this while ignoring Jesus Christ and His right to be their King.  My question to you this morning, friend, is, “Are you like most people?  Are you like the people in Jerusalem in the first century?  Do you live your own life blissfully indifferent to your rightful King?  Why would anyone do that?  Why would you do that?”  

Well, the reasons are many but there's only one root cause.  It's always the same.  The only reason you would ignore your rightful King is because you have no real sense of your sinfulness and what that sinfulness deserves from God.  I mean, think about it practically, if you have terminal cancer and you know you have terminal cancer, what do you do?  The whole world stops until you have a chance to fight for your life.  The same thing is true spiritually; if you really understood your sinfulness and what that deserves from God and what you will one day receive from Him, your world would stop until you found the only One who could cure your spiritual cancer.  But most people are unaware of their true condition because they're spiritually dead, and so, they remain indifferent to the only One who can treat it.  But sadly, this is a typical response to Jesus, “Settled Indifference.”

The second response is “Religious Distraction,” religious distraction.  Think about it, Herod called a high convocation of those who were supposed to be Israel's spiritual leaders.  He asked them where the Messiah was to be born, and they knew.  But not one of them sought out the wise men, not one of them sent a delegation to Bethlehem to investigate to see if it was true. Bill Mounce writes in his commentary:

The religious leaders of Jerusalem know from their own Scriptures where the Messiah is to be born, but not even the visit of foreign dignitaries piques their curiosity enough to travel six miles to Bethlehem to find out if there's any truth in the report.  What do they do instead?  Well, they kept studying the Scriptures, ironically the same scriptures that prophesied the Child.  They kept continually offering their sacrifices every day, a perfect picture of Him who would offer Himself for sin.  They were busy with their religious duties and their religious practices, their religious activities, and they completely ignored their rightful King. 

Friends, this is the response of many to Jesus.  They replace true submission and obedience to their King with some version of religion and religious activity.  This morning, churches across the Metroplex are filled with people who are happy to be religious as long as it doesn't infringe on their self-rule, as long as it doesn't conflict with their personal agenda.  From Scripture, they know about their rightful King, but they refuse to submit their daily lives to His rule.  Friends let me just say it as bluntly as I can.  “You can claim the Christian faith. You can faithfully attend a church like this one.  You can know your Bible just like they did, and be as lost as they were.”  In fact, Jesus warns about that in Matthew 7, right? Verse 21, “He says on the day of judgment many will profess to me, “‘I know you,’ and He will say to them, ‘I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WORKERS OF LAWLESSNESS.’” (Paraphrase)  The question is, “Have you ever truly acknowledged Jesus’ right to rule you?”  Jesus said that in Luke, chapter 6, verse 46, He says, “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?”  He says that doesn't make any sense, “You call me your master and you don't obey me?” (Paraphrase) 

A third typical response to Jesus as King is “Selfish Defiance,” selfish defiance.  The world is full of people like Herod who live solely to advance their own desires, their own pleasures, their own agenda.  They may pretend hypocritical worship to Jesus, and like Herod, they may even fool a lot of good people.  But inwardly, and often outwardly, they live in defiance of the demands of Jesus.  Herod is a perfect example.  He defied Christ, but he did so beneath a facade of hypocrisy.  Maybe you're like that this morning.  Maybe you know good and well, as you sit in your seat, that you're happy for people around you to think you and Jesus are good, but you have a heart that is defiantly rebellious against Him.  Listen, if that's you, if like Herod, your heart is defiant; Jesus Christ is not fooled.  He's not fooled by or interested in your hypocritical self-serving worship.  He is still your rightful King, and He's waiting until you acknowledge His right to rule.  “Settled Indifference,” “Religious Distraction,” “Selfish Defiance,” those are all typical, sinful responses to Jesus.  

But thankfully, those weren't the only responses.  There are also those who respond to Jesus like the magi, with “Wholehearted Devotion,” wholehearted devotion.  We'll see what that looks like next time in verses 9 to 12.  But let me just ask you to look at that list.  Every person in this room, your response to Jesus is in that list.  Which of those is a mirror to your own soul?  

There's a third lesson in this text and I'll just mention it.  “This account calls for personal repentance of our sins and faith in Jesus Christ like that of the magi.”  We'll see that next week, but that's what this passage reminds us. It reminds us that rather than those other responses, we need to repent of our sins, and we need to put our faith in the finished work of Jesus Christ, in His perfect life lived in the place of those who would believe in Him, in His substitutionary death in which He suffered the penalty that our sins deserve, and in His resurrection in which the Father accepted His sacrifice.  Your faith needs to be in Him, your rightful King!  That's what this passage reminds us.  So, every time you hear the story of the magi, look in the mirror and ask yourself , “Who am I?”

Let's pray together.  Father, thank You for our time together.  Thank You for Your Word.  Lord, use it in all of our hearts and lives; help us to hold the mirror of the Word up to our souls and see what our reflection is.  And Lord, I pray for those here this morning whose response to Jesus is anything less than wholehearted devotion.  Lord, may this be the day when they repent of their sins and put their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, their only rightful King.  May they humble themselves before Him, even today.  Lord, for the rest of us, fill our hearts with love and joy and adoration for our King, in Whose name we pray, Amen.