An Attempted Assassination of the King

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Growing up in the 1960s, as I did, some of my most vivid memories, sadly, are assassinations.  I remember the days in 1968 when Martin Luther King Jr., and Robert Kennedy were shot. Although I was only three at the time, too young to remember, I certainly grew up hearing about the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963.  As you know, tragically, he was only one of four presidents killed in office. The others, Abraham Lincoln in 1865, James Garfield in 1881, and William McKinley in 1901.  Throughout human history, the assassination of political leaders has been all too common.  Perhaps the most well-known is that of Julius Caesar, who was killed by a group of senators including his friend, Brutus. 

But today in our study of Matthew, we come to history's most infamous failed attempt; the attempt to assassinate Jesus of Nazareth.  Just to remind you of context, the theme of Matthew's Gospel is that Jesus of Nazareth is the promised Messiah of the Hebrew Scripture; He is the divine Savior and King. The first two chapters of Matthew's Gospel record “The Messiah's Arrival.”  We've studied “His Royal Ancestry,” His genealogy that qualifies Him to be the Messiah. We studied “His Virgin Conception and Birth,” the second half of chapter 1.  In the first part of chapter 2, we've studied “His Formal Annunciation,” an annunciation by God through the magi who came from the east.  Today we come to a hard, difficult passage, but in this passage we discover “His Divine Preservation,” his divine preservation. Let's read it together.  Matthew 2, and I'll begin reading in verse 13. 

Now when they (That is the Magi.) had gone, behold an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up!  Take the Child and His mother and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is going to search for the Child to destroy Him.”  So, Joseph got up and took the Child and His mother while it was still night, and left for Egypt.  He remained there until the death of Herod.  This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: “OUT OF EGYPT I CALLED MY SON.”

Then when Herod saw that he'd been tricked by the magi, he became very enraged, and sent and slew all the male children who were in Bethlehem and all its vicinity, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had determined from the magi. Then what had been spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled. 

“A VOICE WAS HEARD IN RAMAH,

WEEPING AND GREAT MOURNING, 

RACHEL WEEPING FOR HER CHILDREN;

AND SHE REFUSED TO BE COMFORTED,

 BECAUSE THEY WERE NO MORE.”

The message of this paragraph that we've just read together is that God sovereignly intervened and preserved the life of Jesus, His incarnate Son from Herod's, satanically inspired, attempted assassination of the King.  Matthew's record of this assassination attempt on Jesus' life unfolds in three remarkable scenes that I want us to examine together this morning. Let's call the first scene “The warning from God,” the warning from God, in verse 13.  Now verse 13 first points out “This Warning's Unexpected Timing.”  Verse 13 begins, “Now when they (That is, the Magi.) had gone.”  Matthew uses the Greek word here translated ‘had gone,’ elsewhere in his Gospel to mean ‘to withdraw from danger.’  For example, in chapter 4, verse 12, when Jesus heard that John the Baptist had been imprisoned, “He withdrew (same word) to Galilee.”  In chapter 12, verse 15, when Jesus learned that the Pharisees intended to kill Him, “He withdrew from that area.”  Here, the magi withdrew; they withdrew from the danger to their lives from Herod because back in verse 12, God warned them in a dream not to return to Herod as they had initially promised to do. 

Now get the flow of the time in this passage.  Back in verse 9, it's implied that after hearing about Jesus' location in Bethlehem from Herod, they set out that same afternoon for the six-mile trip from Jerusalem, south to Bethlehem.  Then after finding Jesus in Bethlehem and giving Him their gifts, acknowledging Him, worshiping Him, they apparently spent the night there in Bethlehem probably intending to return to Jerusalem the next day, but were warned in a dream not to go back to Herod.  So, think about the time frame.  The magi's arrival at the house where Jesus was there in Bethlehem, in verses 8 to 11, and their departure another way, in verse 12, all likely happened within a 24-hour period of time.  

Think about the impact of this on Joseph and Mary.  You can only imagine how thrilled they were when the magi arrived, when here are these powerful men from the east, as I said, probably with an entourage, maybe with a small army, they were impressive, important men; they show up and when they come and find Jesus, they fall on the ground in front of Him, and worship this Child who is now less than two years old, and they give him gifts fit only for a king.  Imagine being Mary and Joseph.  You already know who He is; it's been told to you, and yet here are these powerful men, from long away, who have come and acknowledged His birth and that He is the Messiah.  If there were like most young couples, after that evening, they finally got Jesus to sleep.  I'm sure they talked for hours rehearsing all that the magi had said to them about their Son. And then, undoubtedly exhilarated but exhausted, they drifted off to sleep.  It's likely that same night that Joseph received this warning.  Within a few short hours, Mary and Joseph went from sheer ecstasy at the arrival and worship of the magi to sheer terror over the threat to the life of their Son.  This was “The Unexpected Timing” of God's warning coming immediately on the heels of one of their greatest joys. 

Consider secondly, “Its Unusual Channel.”  This warning comes to them in a most unusual way.  Verse 13 says, “Behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream.” As he was sleeping, Joseph had a dream, as we all do, but in this one as in chapter 1, verse 20, this is a divinely initiated dream; he had in the dream a vision of an angel.  Now as I mentioned, in the Old Testament, God only rarely used dreams to give new revelation or to give providential direction.  Almost all of them are in two Old Testament books, Genesis and Daniel. In the New Testament, they are even rarer.  There are only five such dreams and all of them are in Matthew 1 and 2.  One, the magi have a dream, but no angel is mentioned in that dream in chapter 2, verse 12.  And then Joseph has a dream four separate times:  chapter 1, verse 20; chapter 2, verse 13; chapter 2, verse 19; and chapter 2, verse 22.  And in three of those four dreams, an angel appears to him in his dream.  These were unusual times; they have had the incarnate Son of God, and God intervenes to make sure that His Son is safe.  This was the unusual means that God chose to warn Joseph.

Thirdly, this warning from God contains an “Unmistakable Directive.”  The angel begins with its urgency, notice, “…an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream and said, “Get up!”  The Greek verb translated ‘get up’ contains two ideas. On the one hand, it means ‘to wake up from sleep,’ and on the other hand, it means ‘to get up out of bed.’  And obviously, all of that is intended here; Joseph was to get up that moment, in the middle of the night, this was an urgent directive.  And notice the content of this directive, “Take the Child and His mother and flee to Egypt.” The angel, notice as he does throughout this chapter, refers to the “Child and His mother.”  That's very unusual.  I mean, if I were to come to you and speak to husbands here, I would say, “Hey, you need to get up take your wife and your child or your wife and your family and leave.” But throughout this passage, it's the “Child and His mother” because this unique Child, from the moment of His birth, was superior even to His parents.  “Take the Child and His mother,” and notice, “flee to Egypt.”  The Greek verb translated ‘flee’ is a word we get an English word from; the Greek word is ‘phuego’ from which we get our word ‘fugitive.’  The angel says to Joseph, “Get up and flee like you're a fugitive from justice out of the land and go to Egypt.” (Paraphrase).  And notice verse 13 ends, “and remain there until I tell you.”  This directive ends with those words, “remain there until I tell you.” 

Verse 13, then, truly ends by explaining the warning’s “Unthinkable Reason” why.  “Why do we have to get up in the middle of the night after all that just happened with the magi, and flee as fugitives into Egypt?”  “For,” verse 13, (because) “Herod is going to search for the Child to destroy Him.”  Herod, as best we can tell from the from the Gospel record, had told no one of his plans, but God knew, God knew his heart, and God tells Joseph.  By the way, this is a reminder that God knows the thoughts of every heart.  Psalm 139 says God knows your thoughts before you think them, He knows everything you have ever thought, everything that's ever flitted across your mind, God knows! There's also a reminder here that man's plots can never frustrate God's plans, God intervenes. 

Now, notice the angel said that Herod intended to search for the Child, and having found the Child, to destroy Him, to kill Him.  Why?  Because Herod was extremely paranoid; we know this from biblical history; we know this from secular history, extremely paranoid about his position.  He didn't want to lose his power, his rule, and he didn't want any threat to a Herodian dynasty that would follow him.  So, the first scene then, in our text, is this warning from God.

The second scene in the assassination attempt on Jesus’ life is in verses 14 and 15, it's “The Flight to Egypt,” the flight to Egypt.  And I love the way verse 14 begins because it begins with “Joseph's immediate obedience;” “So Joseph got up and took the Child and His mother while it was still night, and left for Egypt.”  It's interesting, many of those words are simply a repeat of what the angel said; Joseph meticulously obeys.  It shouldn't surprise us.  Back in Matthew 1, Joseph is called “a righteous man,” meaning he's a true Old Testament believer, and so it's not surprising that his life, then, is marked by immediate, complete obedience to God.  If you're a true believer in the true God through His Son Jesus Christ, your obedience should be no less.  God doesn't speak to us today through dreams; He speaks to us through His finished, complete Word, but our obedience should be like Joseph's–immediate and complete! 

So, they leave, they leave Bethlehem hastily, in the middle of the night, probably leaving some of their belongings there, and they fled the country. Now, when you read the Scripture, you need to imagine, for a moment, what this was really like; these were real people, these were real circumstances.  Imagine if you're Mary and Joseph, Joseph is not likely older than about twenty years of age at this point; it’s when most Jewish men of the time married.  Mary, probably in her mid-teens when most Jewish women of that time married.  So here is this young couple, they have just experienced one of the greatest highs of life as from the magi, the identity of their young Son has been further confirmed–He is the Messiah, He's the One God promised.  And then on the heels of that comes one of the deepest and most profound trials you can imagine.  Think about the variety of ways this was a severe trial for them; they had to leave their new home; they had to leave their country; they had to escape quickly at night, in the middle of the night; they couldn't tell others.  And they didn't know, at the time, what would happen to the other children–nobody knew Herod's plot except Herod and the Lord. But they knew some of these families undoubtedly whose children would be killed.  Of course, the greatest trial for Mary and Joseph was the threat on their own Child's life.  Only one time in my life have I seen the life of one of my children threatened by disease; I can't imagine what it would be like for that life to be threatened, a young Child, an infant, to be threatened by violence.  That's what they faced. 

And add to that the amazing weight of knowing that you, at a human level, were responsible for preserving the life of Israel's Messiah, the incarnate Son of God! That's your job, that's your responsibility.  So, with their child less than two years old, Mary, possibly pregnant with James, their second, they traveled to Egypt.  Why Egypt? Well, first of all, it was much closer than the other alternatives, than Babylonia over the Fertile Crescent or Persia. It was just 75 miles from Bethlehem to the border with Egypt in the first century.  And it was only 312 miles from Bethlehem to the largest city Alexandria, on the Mediterranean coast.  In addition, Egypt was out of the reach of Herod because Egypt was under the oversight of the emperor himself, there wasn't even a Roman governor.  And so, there was no way Herod could reach them there. Also, Egypt's population was extremely cosmopolitan; it was a place where Jews were welcome.  The port city of Alexandria, where the Septuagint had been translated 100 or 200 years before this, was the second largest city in the Roman Empire, and according to the Jewish philosopher, Philo, writing about 40 A.D., it had a community of a million Jews.  It's possible that's where they settled. 

Verse 14 adds, “He remained there until the death of Herod.”  Now, we know that Herod died in April of 4 B.C.  Jesus was born in 5 or 6 B.C., Herod dies in April of 4 B.C., likely within about a year's time of their flight to Egypt. So, Mary and Joseph and Jesus probably lived in Egypt less than about 18 months.  We don't know what they did while they were there; we don't know what Joseph did to support them.  He may have used his trade as a carpenter or in God's providence; he may have sold the gifts that the magi had just given them and used that money to support his family. 

But Matthew tells us there was another reason God told Jesus' family to go to Egypt; it was because of “Hosea's Unlikely Prophecy,” Hosea's unlikely prophecy. Look at verse 15, “This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet (and this comes from Hosea): ‘OUT OF EGYPT I CALLED MY SON.’”  Now, I want you to notice, first of all, the view of the Hebrew Scriptures that Jesus taught Matthew, His disciple, to have.  What was the view?  Notice the Old Testament was “spoken by the Lord through the prophet,” that was Jesus' view of the Scripture, that was Matthew's view, and if you're a follower of Jesus that should be your view as well.

Now, notice Matthew says Jesus went to Egypt and then returned to Israel “to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet,” Hosea.  What does he mean “to fulfill” it?  Well, let me make sure you understand.  Matthew's going to use a lot of Old Testament texts, and the New Testament quotes the Old Testament as a fulfillment in three primary ways.  First of all, at times, it quotes it as the unique complete fulfillment of the Old Testament text.  For example, we've already seen that back in chapter 2, verse 6, where Micah 5:2 is quoted and it only has one fulfillment, and that's the birthplace of Jesus at His first Advent.  And so, it was completely fulfilled in that. 

The New Testament quotes the Old Testament, secondly, as a partial fulfillment of an Old Testament prophecy when the complete fulfillment is still in the future.  For example, Peter, in his sermon on the day of Pentecost quotes from the prophet Joel, and part of that prophecy was fulfilled at Pentecost, the speaking in other languages, and part of that prophecy remains to be fulfilled at the second coming, when the sun will be darkened and the moon turns to blood and all of those signs in the heavens occur. 

A third way the New Testament quotes the Old Testament is as a picture, a type, or an analogy, of Old Testament events or persons.  In other words, it's comparing something in the Old Testament with something that's happened in the New Testament; it's a picture. The sacrificial system is the most obvious one of those, right?  The New Testament alludes to that, and the reality of Christ is pictured in those Old Testament sacrifices.  Here, Matthew quotes Hosea 11:1, and in the context Hosea 11:1, God was trying to persuade Israel of the depth of His love for her.  He reminded her that when she was still in slavery in Egypt, He had already set His love on her, and that's why He brought her out in the Exodus.  Listen to Hosea 11:1, “When Israel was a youth I loved him, and out of Egypt I called My son.”  God says Israel was like a son to Me and in the Exodus, I called her out and put her in the promised land.  So, why does Matthew use that text here?  Matthew's point is that Israel's sojourn in Egypt, at the time of the Exodus, and her return in the Exodus, that was a picture or a type of Jesus’ now flight into Egypt and His eventual return into the land of Israel.  You say, “How was that a type or a picture?”  Well, think about the points of similarity.  Like Israel in the Exodus, Jesus is also God's Son but in a unique way; He is the only begotten Son of God.  Secondly, just as Pharaoh tried to destroy Israel, now in our text, another king, Herod, is trying to destroy God's only begotten Son. And just as God protected Israel during her stay in Egypt, in the book of Exodus, and He returned her to her land; in the same way God would protect Jesus on His journey to Egypt, His stay in Egypt and His return to the land of Israel. 

But there's another reason that Hosea 11:1 is connected to Messiah.  Listen to William Hendrickson, I love this, he says: 

Had Israel been destroyed in Egypt (He's talking about now back in the time of the Exodus.), the messianic prophecies would not have been fulfilled.  It is therefore very true indeed that when Israel was called out of Egypt, Christ the Messiah, too, was called out of Egypt because He would come from that people, He would come from that nation.

So, we've seen the warning from God; we've seen the flight to Egypt.  The third scene in our text comes in verses 16 to 18, and it's “The Massacre of the Infants,” the massacre of the infants.  This is a hard passage but let's look at it together because there are important lessons for us to see here.  In verses 16 to 18, we learn that Herod slaughters the male infants in and near Bethlehem.  What drove such an unspeakably evil act?  Now, if you weren't here last Sunday, I encourage you to go back and listen.  I dealt with the problem of evil, a Biblical view of the problem of evil because of the evil in this text.  But let's walk our way through it, what drove such an unspeakably wicked act, specifically, in Herod's case?  First of all, it was “Conceived in Selfish Rage,” conceived in selfish rage. Verse 16, “Then when Herod saw that he had been tricked by the magi,” you remember back in verse 8, Herod sent the magi to Bethlehem only six miles from Jerusalem, about one to two hours travel time at the most.  He likely expected them to get there, find the Messiah, and report back to him the next day.  So, at the end of the second day, Herod grew suspicious.  He sent soldiers to Bethlehem, learned the magi had left without revealing the identity of the Messiah to him; so, he felt tricked.  The word ‘tricked’ here means both ‘to deceive’ and ‘to mock’ or ‘poke fun at.’  In fact, this word is used most often in the Gospel record of Jesus being ‘mocked’ at the cross. Herod felt he had been deceived, and he interpreted that deception as being mocked, being ridiculed.  Verse 16 says, “when he (Herod) saw that he'd been tricked by the magi, he became very enraged.”  The verb ‘become angry’ is used only here in the New Testament, and Matthew adds an adverb that means ‘very much,’ ‘exceedingly.’  Herod was furious, he was out of his mind angry.  You say, “Why?”  Well, Josephus, the secular first century Jewish historian, explains Herod's state of mind, at this very time, to us.  Again, this is Josephus writing, he says, “Despairing of surviving (Herod knows he's going to die.), he grew utterly savage, acting with unrestrained anger and bitterness toward all and the cause was his belief that he was despised and that the nation took pleasure in his misfortunes.  That's very telling! 

In fact, let me make the application here very personal.  If you struggle with anger, if your life is marked by outbursts of anger, it may very well be because your pride has been offended because wounded pride is frequently the cause of human anger.  Maybe you feel you don't get the respect you deserve. Well, let me let you in on a little secret, “You don't deserve to be respected; neither do I!”  If everybody knew us the way God knows us, nobody would respect us.  So, get over that and recognize it for the sin it is.  In fact, if your life is a an unbroken pattern of outbursts of anger, according to Jesus, in 1 Corinthians 6, Galatians 5, you're not a believer.  Christians can struggle with anger, but if it's what marks you, what distinguishes you, then your heart's never been changed.  For years, Herod had been known for lacking all self-control and giving into his anger; so, it had grown in its intensity.  And by the way, so will yours if you don't deal with that anger; it'll grow in intensity and someday you'll do things and say things you never would have imagined yourself doing.  This unspeakable atrocity was conceived in selfish rage. 

It's interesting that liberal theologians argue that Matthew actually made up this story, but the truth is, it's perfectly consistent with Herod's well-known character, in the Scripture and in secular history.  I mean, this man had already killed his beloved wife, Mary Omni, because of a threat he felt.  And he'd already killed three of his own sons; he would certainly have no issues killing the sons of others.

Secondly, the massacre was motivated by “Satanic Defiance,” it was motivated by satanic defiance.  Verse 16, “He became very enraged, and he sent and slew all the male children who were in Bethlehem and all its vicinity, from two years of old two years old and under according to the time which he had determined from the magi.”  Notice the wording, “He sent and he slew.”  The wording shows that God held Herod responsible for the killings as if he himself had wielded the knife; but of course, Herod was too much of a coward to do that himself.  He sent his soldiers to carry out the deed; they murdered the male infants two years and under based on when the star had appeared to the magi; and considering Herod's paranoia, I can promise you he left himself a wide margin of error.  How many kids were killed?  Well, in a village the size of Bethlehem, it's likely up to twenty male children were killed, so, it's rightly called “The Massacre of the Innocents!”

Where did such an evil act come from?  Well, obviously it came out of Herod's heart, his own rage, his own paranoia, his own pride and love of power.  At the same time, it it came from beyond him.  In John 8, verse 44, Jesus said of Satan, “He was a murderer from the beginning.”  That's really where this comes from, “He was a murderer.”  Since he can't destroy God, since he can't kill God, Satan delights in attacking and destroying those made in God's image.  Tragically, that even includes the murder of children. Throughout history, Satan has led a relentless, ruthless war on children.  He's often used false religion to do so.  Read the Old Testament, and you see tragic reality that false religion often required worshipers to sacrifice their own children in the fire.  Other times, Satan uses governing authorities to advance his war on children.  At times, like here, the governing authorities sacrifice the lives of children against the existing law.  Other times, they murder children through legal means; they make laws to justify it, like when Pharaoh ordered the midwives to kill the male children in Exodus, chapter 1.  Tragically, many governments today have unknowingly embraced a satanically-inspired plot against children by legalizing and even promoting abortion.  So, make no mistake, behind Herod's attempted assassination of Jesus, was first of all his own willful defiance.  He knew that Jesus was the Messiah; he had talked to the magi, he had talked to the Jewish leaders, but in defiance of God's plan, he set out to kill Him.   So, Herod was responsible for his sin; but at the same time, he was also a pawn in Satan's murderous plan to kill Jesus. 

You understand that Satan's goal has always been to prevent or destroy the saving work of Jesus Christ?  How has he done that?  Well, let me give you a little list.  In the Old Testament, Satan attacked Christ by killing Abel, the first of the godly line in hopes to extinguish the godly line from which the Messiah would come. He polluted the godly line by having the godly and ungodly intermarry.  He tried to destroy the ancestral line of the Messiah to prevent His birth.  If you look at 2 Kings 11, you read there, there was a wicked woman that the daughter of Ahab and Jezebel; her name was Athaliah.  She took over the Southern Kingdom of Israel and she tried to exterminate the descendants of David, and it came down to one child, one child who had to be secreted away and hidden or the Messianic line would have been destroyed.  There would have been no Messiah.  During Jesus’ life, Satan attacked Jesus.  How?  He tempted Jesus to sin in order to destroy His qualification to be the Savior.  He incited the people of Nazareth to kill Him; he incited the leaders of Israel, on several occasions, to kill Him.  He incited Judas to betray Him.  He moved the Jews and Romans to crucify Him.  But Satan's work against Christ and His saving work didn't end with Jesus.  Throughout the Church Age, Satan has continued his onslaught; he blinds the minds of unbelievers.  If you're here this morning and you haven't believed in Jesus Christ, you may think it's because you've come to your own conclusions.  Paul says, 2 Corinthians 4:4, “No!”  Satan has “blinded your mind to the light; you don't see the truth because you've been blinded by Satan (Paraphrase).  He prevents the gospel from taking root in the hearts of those who hear; that parable of the soils where the seed falls on the ground and Satan comes and snatches it away.  He raises false teachers to corrupt the true Gospel and the true Christ, and he hinders the spread of the Gospel.  He provokes unbelievers to persecute and kill Christians–that's the lion roaring in 1 Peter 5.

But here in Matthew 2, Satan attempted to prevent the saving work of Jesus by killing Him as an infant.  Matthew reminds us here that the tragic death of these children in Bethlehem was not the first time nor the last time that Jewish mothers have had an occasion to weep and to mourn.  In fact, this event in our text is reflected in Israel's history.  Look at verse 17, “Then what had been spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled.”  This time, Matthew quotes Jeremiah 31:15.  Look at verse 15, “A VOICE WAS HEARD IN RAMAH, WEEPING AND GREAT MOURNING, RACHEL WEEPING FOR HER CHILDREN; AND SHE REFUSED TO BE COMFORTED, BECAUSE THEY WERE NO MORE.”  Again, Matthew cites this Old Testament text as a kind of picture, a type, or analogy of what was happening then in the first century.  But in context, Jeremiah 31:15 was about the mourning of the mothers of Israel as they saw the killing and exile of their children by Babylon in the year 586 B.C. And Jeremiah, there, pictures Rachel, that was Jacob's wife who had been dead for hundreds of years when that event happened, but he pictures Rachel mourning the fate of the exiles as they were led past her tomb at Ramah, as they were carried off to Babylon.  Just as Rachel pictures those Jewish mothers in 586 B.C., weeping over their children, these mothers also refused to be comforted.  Why?  Because in both cases, the children are no more, nothing can bring them back.

However, that's not the end of the story because the very next verse in Jeremiah 31; Jeremiah 31:16 says, “Thus says the LORD, ‘Restrain your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears…and they will return.’”  In other words, God was assuring the mothers of Israel, then, that out of their sorrow He would bring joy, He would bring them back into the land.  And in the same way, out of the sorrow of these mothers whose children Herod killed, God would bring great joy.  You say, “How?”  Because His Son escaped Herod's plot, and His Son would eventually accomplish redemption for all who would put their trust in Him; and ultimately, He would reign as Messiah and King.  It's a remarkable passage, this assassination attempt on Jesus’ life.

I want to end our time by considering a couple major lessons in this remarkable account.  Let me just give you the list.  Number one, “Christianity is not a new religion but the fulfillment of Old Testament Judaism, the oldest monotheistic faith.”  In other words, Christianity didn't just come on the scene in the first century; it was the fulfillment of all that's written in the Hebrew Scriptures, going all the way back to Abraham.  And God revealed Himself before that to Noah and others.  So, understand that Matthew quotes the Old Testament, the Hebrew Scriptures, to prove the continuity between the Testaments; ours is not a new faith, ours is the fulfillment of the oldest faith.

Number two, “As with Jesus, God has not chosen to protect us from the trials that come in a fallen world but He has promised to preserve our souls through them.” Think about what the writer of Hebrews says about Jesus in Hebrews 5:8, he says, “Although he was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.”  It doesn't mean Jesus was ever disobedient; it means as he matured, He learned what it was to obey God in all circumstances through the things He suffered in this life, and this is the beginning of many.  At this point, He's not old enough to put it all together, but as He grows, He will be able to do so.  Listen, God didn't protect, think about this, when He was in the world, God didn't protect His own beloved Son from the troubles and trials of life in a fallen world.  And He hasn't promised, Christian, to protect you either.  So don't feel like God's abandoned you when you encounter various trials; so did Jesus.  But God has promised that He won't abandon you in them; that He will preserve your soul through them.

Number three, “When things happen that we don't understand, we must learn to trust God and His all-wise, sovereign providence.”  Listen, imagine yourself as Mary and Joseph, imagine the trauma of those few hours as they're trying to get their belongings together and leave in the middle of the night, and all that they're thinking, they had a couple of choices. One was to trust God; the other was to live in fear and worry.  So do you, you have those same choices.  Romans 8:28 says, “God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, who are called through the Gospel to know His Son” (Paraphrase).

Number four, “The schemes of men and their rulers can never thwart the plans of God.”  It's sad, isn't it Christians, that we worry so much, that we worry so much about what goes on in the world, and you know, wars and leaders and Putin and China and on and on it goes.  Listen, Herod was essentially taking the role of those against Christ in Psalm 2.  Listen to what David writes in Psalm 2, “The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the LORD (Yahweh) and against His anointed (His Messiah) saying, ‘Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us!’”  How does God respond?  “He who sits in the heavens laughs, the LORD scoffs at them.”  He says, “How tragically sad that puny human beings think they can thwart My purposes and plans” (Paraphrase)?  And then he says, “I have established my King and He will reign” (Paraphrase).  Christian, trust the God Who is on His throne!

And, number five, “Our salvation was the reason Jesus could never be killed by Herod or anyone else.”  Turn to John, chapter 10, I want you to see this, John, chapter 10, here's why Herod couldn't kill Jesus; here's why none of those other attempts during His life were successful.  John 10, look at verse 15:

Even as the Father knows Me and I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep. (Verse 17)  For this reason the Father loves Me, because I lay down My life so that I may take it again.  No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative.  I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again.  This commandment I received from My Father.

You know what Jesus is saying, “Nobody's taking my life,  whether it's Herod or whether it's the Jewish leaders or whether it's anybody else, I choose when to die!”  And Christian, He chose to lay down His life to commit His Spirit to the Lord after He said, “It is finished,” and the work of redemption on the cross was done for you.  No one took His life because He was moving toward the cross when He would lay down His life voluntarily, as your substitute to satisfy God's justice against your sins so that God could be just and still forgive you.  If you're here this morning and you've never trusted in Christ, that's the reason He came; He came to lay down His life; He came to offer Himself in the place as the substitute for all who would ever believe in Him, and my prayer is this morning, you will repent of your sins and believe in the Savior who accomplished salvation, who accomplished forgiveness, purchased it by His death on the cross, and then God raised Him from the dead.  This is the Lord we serve!

Let's pray together.  Our Father, we are amazed at this story, our hearts bleed for these mothers.  We thank You that in Your character, you've made it clear in Your Word that these children are with You, and that we will someday meet them.  Lord, we thank You as well that You brought such good out of this evil event, this evil satanically inspired plot by Herod, You brought our salvation.  No one could take the life of our Lord; He came to give His life as a ransom for many.  Thank You, Oh God, that You have saved us through His life, death, and resurrection. And I pray for those here this morning who've never trusted in Him, Lord, bring them to repentance and faith even this morning, we pray for the glory of His name, Amen.