For our scripture reading this morning, please open to Micah chapter 5. We're reading now from an Old Testament prophet, one of the minor prophets. And as is often the case when these prophets are speaking for the Lord, they are incorporating various prophecies that look far into the future. Sometimes there's an immediate fulfillment. Sometimes there's a distant fulfillment. Sometimes it's kind of all woven together. And in fact, that's really the case that we have here in Micah chapter 5. This is going to look forward. There's a messianic prophecy here, well-known one in Micah 5, 2. And that's in the context of a near-term fulfillment for Israel and an even more distant future fulfillment when Messiah comes back the second time and reigns over all the earth. So all of that is woven into this single chapter here in Micah chapter 5. Follow along now as I read. Now gather thyself in troops, O daughter of troops. He hath laid siege against us. They shall smite the judge of Israel with a rod upon the cheek. But thou, Bethlehem, Ephrathah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me, that is to be ruler in Israel. whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting. Therefore will he give them up until the time that she which travaileth hath brought forth. Then the remnant of his brethren shall return unto the children of Israel, and he shall stand and feed in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God, and they shall abide. For now shall he be great unto the ends of the earth. And this man shall be the peace, when the Assyrian shall come into our land, and when he shall tread in our palaces. Then shall we raise against him seven shepherds and eight principal men. And they shall waste the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod in the entrances thereof. Thus shall he deliver us from the Assyrian, when he cometh into our land, and when he treadeth within our borders. And the remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many people, as a dew from the Lord, as the showers upon the grass, that tarrieth not for man, nor waiteth for the sons of men. And the remnant of Jacob shall be among the Gentiles in the midst of many people, as a lion among the beasts of the forest. as a young lion among the flocks of the sheep, who, if he go through, both treadeth down and teareth in pieces, and none can deliver. Thine hand shall be lifted up upon thine adversaries, and all thy enemies shall be cut off. And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord, that I will cut off thy horses out of the midst of thee. I will destroy thy chariots. I will cut off the cities of thy land and throw down all thy strongholds, and I will cut off witchcrafts out of thine hand, and thou shalt have no more soothsayers. Thy graven images also will I cut off, and thy standing images out of the midst of thee, and thou shalt no more worship the works of thine hands. And I will pluck up thy groves out of the midst of thee, so will I destroy thy cities. And I will execute vengeance and anger and fury upon the heathen, such as they have not heard." Our Father in heaven, and we read the words of this prophecy and our minds are just filled with all of these prophetic thoughts, all mixed together and woven together in this one chapter. And it's helpful for us to just step back and consider that you are the sovereign God. That all of these things that are foretold by the prophet are things that you entirely control. You are sovereign over your people, Israel. You are sovereign over your church. You are sovereign over the heathen and over the nations of this world. And you will accomplish your purposes. And Lord, as we look into this, prophetic announcement of the Messiah's coming, being born in Bethlehem. We just marvel at your wisdom, at your grace, at your love in sending your son into this world. And may we at this time of year, especially, be mindful of the fact that your son is your gift of love to the world, that they might be saved. Be with us today as we worship you and may our Savior be high and exalted up. We pray in Jesus name. Amen. Please open your Bible to Matthew, chapter two. On our church marquee, you may have noticed all this month, we've had a statement out there that say, wise men came from the east, dash, dash, wise men still seek him. Very good message to give to our community here to encourage people to be seeking after the Lord Jesus. The hymn, of course, refers to the infant Jesus. The wise men came seeking Jesus. And so that statement about the wise men coming from the east comes from our very passage today. So we'll be looking at Matthew chapter 2, verses 1 through 12. Now, when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, In the days of Herod the king. Behold there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem saying where is he that is born king of the Jews. For we have seen his star in the east and are come to worship him. When Herod the king had heard these things he was troubled and all Jerusalem with him. And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together he demanded of them where Christ should be born. And they said unto him in Bethlehem of Judea for thus it is written by the prophet and now Bethlehem and the land of Judah are not the least among the princes of Judah for out of these shall come a governor that shall rule my people Israel. Then Herod, when he had privily called the wise men, inquired of them diligently what time the star appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem and said, Go and search diligently for the young child. And when you have found him, bring me word again that I may come and worship him also. When they had heard the king, they departed and lo, the star which they had seen in the east went before them till it came and stood over where the young child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy. And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary, his mother, and fell down and worshiped him. And when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. And being warned of God and a dream that they should not return to Herod, They departed into their own country another way. Our Father, I do pray that you will help us as we look into this passage this morning. Pray, Lord, that you will help us to examine the biblical account closely to make sure that our understanding of the events correspond with what we read in our Bibles. And I pray that you will also teach us from the example of these wise men who came from the East. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, in 1857, General Theological Seminary in New York City decided that they would have a Christmas pageant. And they wanted some music written especially for the occasion. So they called upon one of their graduates, John H. Hopkins, Jr., who was rector of Christ Episcopal Church in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. And so he, for that occasion, wrote the words and music for that Christmas pageant, including the now familiar Christmas carol that we sing, We Three Kings. You'll find that carol in our hymnal on page 220. The first stanza of the hymn reads this way. We three kings of Orient are bearing gifts we traverse afar. Field and fountain, moor and mountain, following yonder star." Well, at least he got the star part right. And the gift, I think. He got that right, too. But unfortunately, what this hymn does, at least this stanza of the hymn, incorporates a long tradition of myth that has been added to the biblical account. All of these myths and legends that are layered on top of what we actually read in the Bible. And so what we have to do is we have to peel back those layers of myth in order to get back to the biblical account. So let's do that. Let's start with the word three. Were there three? Well, the gospel account does not mention how many there were. Did you notice that? So where do we get this idea of three from? Well, it's thought that probably it came up because there were three kinds of gifts that were brought. Gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And so therefore, maybe there were three, but we really don't know that. The biblical account is silent. There might've been four or five or 22. We just don't know. And so again, we need to be careful not to add to the biblical account. The Bible does not tell us how many there were, and we have to leave it at that. All right, let's go on to the next word in that stanza of the Christmas Carol. We three kings. Are they called kings here? No, they're not called kings here. We three kings, strike that. It should read, we untold number of wise men not to be confused with kings. That makes it very clear. You see, the coming of the three wise men was not a fulfillment of Psalm 7210, as some people teach. In that psalm, the verse reads, the kings of Tarshish and of the Isles shall bring presents. The kings of Sheba and Sheba shall offer gifts. Well, there's a big problem with seeing that as fulfilled in the coming of the three wise men. None of those places lie to the east of Israel. None of them. Tarshish is to the north, the Isles are to the west, Sheba and Sheba are to the south. So, none of them fall to the east of Israel. Clearly, this is not the fulfillment of Psalm 7210. There are also other Old Testament prophecies that some people will quote, referring to the kings of the earth bowing down to the one who is to come. But you see, that doesn't really find its fulfillment until the second coming of Christ. And so, none of those prophecies apply in this case either. Well, let's try to understand what term is being used here. We have this term, wise men, as it's translated in our King James Bible. It translates the Greek term magoi, which we get our word magi or magi. That's the plural form. Magus is the singular form of the word. And it refers to those who are great, especially those who have great insights. Now, we can go back to secular literature. The Greek historian Herodotus, writing in the fifth century B.C., identified the Magi as a cast of meat who had priestly function in the Persian Empire. And so that helps us. It gives us a historical reference point to help us to understand what these men were. So, we have also the book of Daniel, which of course was written in Hebrew, but there was an early and ancient Greek translation of Daniel where this word is used, magoi, is used, referring to the astrologers there in the Persian Empire with Daniel. So, based on the biblical evidence, you can call these men wise men, you could call them astrologers, you could call them Magi, but you can't call them kings. Scratch that. Well, let's go on in that carol. We three kings of Orient are. What do you think of when you hear the word Orient? Well, it's true that the word has kind of a general meaning. It just means to the east. It's a vague reference that has shifted in meaning as people have discovered more and more parts of the world. But by the time that Hopkins penned the words of his Carol, the word really meant all the way over there in India and beyond, even to China. Is that where these men came from? What does the biblical account tell us? Where did they come from? What's the answer? From the East. That's all we're given. So any point to the east on the compass of Israel would satisfy our biblical account, would meet the requirements. We really don't know exactly where they came from. But based on what we know about this word Magi and where it originated, mainly in the Persian Empire, it'd be an educated guess to say that they came from the region of ancient Babylon. But that's just a guess. We just don't know. E.E. Ellis really summarizes the whole situation for us very well. Quote, apparently the Magi were non-Jewish religious astrologers who, from astronomical observations, inferred the birth of a great Jewish king. After inquiring of Jewish authorities, they came to Bethlehem to do homage. Whether the east from which they came is Arabia, Babylon, or elsewhere is uncertain. End quote. Now, there's one other myth that we need to deal with that's associated with the wise men. It doesn't actually come from that Christmas carol. It comes from what you normally see in a traditional manger scene. Right. We have this little tabletop manger scene that we like to set up in our home at Christmas time, and it came as a complete kit. You know, there's a manger there, there's the farm animals, you know. There's, of course, Joseph and Mary and the baby Jesus. It came with an angel with a trumpet, palm trees. Of course, it came with shepherds and the shepherds are there with their sheep. And you guessed it, it came with three wise men bearing gifts. And so the question here is based on the biblical account, where should we place those wise men? Well, the answer is not in the manger. In fact, I'm very tempted when I set that up each year to go to my neighbor to the east and say, here, will you keep these for a while? They don't belong over here in our house. You see, the problem is that putting the wise men in the manger on the night of Jesus' birth does not fit the biblical account. Let me give you four reasons. Number one, the wise men had seen his star in the east. and had to journey a number of days before they arrived, even in Jerusalem. And then they had to ask before they knew to go to Bethlehem. So there's a lapse of time. Reason number two, in verse 11, the wise men came into the house. The word that's used there refers to a private dwelling, not a manger scene. Remember, there was no room for them even in the inn. That's why they were out in the barn, if you will. Third reason, in verse 16, Herod diligently inquired, he pressed the Magi for the precise time and then determined to kill all children under the age of two years old. Not two days, not two weeks, not two months, but two years. Now, undoubtedly, he's padding it a little. But if Jesus had just been born, if it was the night of his birth, he would not have extended it to two years. And the fourth reason, and I think this is a very good one, If you think it through, there were two events that involved the infant Jesus just after his birth where he was presented and brought to Jerusalem. The first event would have been his circumcision on the eighth day and then his presentation in the temple on the 40th day after the days of Mary's purification. Now, it would have just been impossible for Mary and Joseph and the baby Jesus to go publicly to Jerusalem if Herod's threat were in effect, right? So logically it follows that those things must have happened before the Magi show up, start asking questions, get Herod all concerned, and Herod issues his decree to kill the babies. So we would conclude from all of this evidence that when the Magi arrived, Jesus was at least 40 days old, less than two years old, somewhere in that age span. And for this reason, I would say that we need to peel back these layers of myth that have been added to the biblical account. We need to reexamine our Bibles. We hear these things. We sing these carols and we see these manger scenes and so forth. And we're just we don't question these things enough. We need to go back to our Bibles and examine what our Bibles actually say. Those three magi were simply not there. in the manger with the shepherds on the night of Jesus' birth. The Baker New Testament commentary summarizes it well, and I'd like to read this quotation to you. Quote, How many wise men there were is not recorded. The fact that they presented the child with three gifts has given rise to the theory that there were three men. Whether this inference is justified is doubtful, though there may indeed have been exactly three men in the party. We simply do not know. There is no basis whatsoever, not even in Psalm 70, 10 and Isaiah 60, verse 3, for the notion that these men were kings. The line, we three kings of Orient are, belongs to the same vast collection of legendary Yuletide lore to which belongs also, quote, but little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes. And many other similar bits of fancy add also The mythical names of these three wise men, Melkor, Balthasar, and Caspar. The belief that one came from India and one from Egypt and one from Greece, that they were subsequently baptized by Thomas and that their bones were discovered by St. Helena, were deposited in the Church of St. Sophia at Constantinople, were later transferred to Milan and finally brought to the great Cathedral of Cologne. One must be gullible indeed to accept all this, end quote. I love it when the commentators come out with a statement like that. Yes, it would be gullible to believe all that. But see, folks, what I really wanted to do is walk us through this this morning as an exercise to help us to be students of the Word of God, to really be able to separate fact from fiction, biblical fact from myth and legend. So we want to be careful to do that. We want to be careful as we study our Bibles to peel away the things that we have picked up along the way and go straight to the Bible as our ultimate source of truth. Well, having dispensed now with all of these myths, what I'd like to do is focus our attention now on what is admirable about these wise men. Why are they called wise? What is wise? Why are they in our Bibles? I think there are things that we can learn from them. What is it that makes them worthy of the title wise men? Well, number one, they were wise because of whom they came to see. They were wise because of whom they came to see. Now, they called Jesus the king of the Jews. You have to understand that these wise men came here to the capital city of Jerusalem, wanting to know where is he that is born king of the Jews, because that's about all that they had to go on. They had seen his star. They knew something special had happened. They were clearly unfamiliar with the Jewish prophecies that Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. So they had to ask. Really, all they probably had to go on was some oral tradition that had been passed along from some ancient Jewish settlements there in the region where they came from. Now this title, King of the Jews, is an unusual title. It's not often used in reference to Jesus. Jesus never just out and out called himself that. He responded to people who would call him that. And let me just mention a few accounts where this comes up, and just very few. All of them at the very end of Jesus' earthly ministry. For example, in Luke 23, verses 1 through 3. This is where Jesus is on trial. It says there in the whole multitude of them arose and led him to Pilate and they began to accuse him saying we found this fellow perverting the nation and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar saying that he himself is Christ the king. And Pilate asked him saying art thou the king of the Jews. And he answered him and said thou sayest it. In other words Jesus is giving assent to that title. Later on in that same chapter, Luke 23, verse 37, Jesus is hanging on the cross. The Roman soldiers are mocking him as he hangs there. And they say to him, quote, If thou be the king of the Jews, save thyself. And the only other time where this shows up, I'd like you to hold your place here and turn over to John chapter 19. Again, this is this takes us to the crucifixion account in John's gospel. I just want to take a look at where another place where this title King of the Jews is used. John 19, verse 17. And he, bearing his cross, went forth into a place called the place of the skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha, where they crucified him to other with him on either side, one and Jesus in the midst. And Pilate wrote a title and put it on the cross and the writing was Jesus of Nazareth the king of the Jews. This title then read many of the Jews for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city and it was written in Hebrew and Greek and Latin. Then said the chief priests of the Jews to Pilate write not the king of the Jews but that he said I am king. of the Jews. Pilate answered, what I have written, I have written. So, we have this title, King of the Jews, that's what the wise men came, they were inquiring, where is he that is born King of the Jews? How does Herod respond? If you go back to Matthew chapter two, I want you to look at verse four, because something happens here that's a little subtle and we could be tempted to read right by it, but something very significant. We read here, when Herod had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he demanded of them where Christ should be born. What had Herod done? The wise men came saying, where is he that is born King of the Jews? But Herod is now asking, where is the Christ to be born? Herod, at least, was a pretender who liked to pretend that he knew about Jewish things. And he did, indeed, study the Jewish scriptures and knew enough about them. He knew who to go to. He went to the experts and he asked them, where is the Christ to be born? So, Herod, at least, in the passage here, is equating the king of the Jews with the Christ. The word Christ is actually a title, it's not a name. It means the anointed one, the promised one, if you will, the anointed one. And it's linked to the Old Testament concept of Mashiach in the Hebrew tongue or Mashiach, Messiah, as we would say it today. And let me just mention to you several New Testament places where people give wonderful confessions of the fact that Jesus is The Christ. He is the Messiah. He is the promised one. And the first one is a bit surprising. Comes from Luke 4.41. It comes from demons. The demons say, Thou art Christ, the Son of God. And Jesus rebuking them, suffered them not to speak, for they knew that he was the Christ. Even the demons know that Jesus is the Christ. Of course, we have in Matthew 16, 16, Peter's great confession of faith, thou art the Christ. The son of the living God, and Jesus on that occasion says, blessed are you, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood has not revealed this unto you, but my father who is in heaven. That's a confession of faith, believing that Jesus is the Christ. We have the disciples in John 6, 69. They say, we believe and are sure that thou art the Christ, the son of the living God. We have Martha in John 11, 27, Yea, Lord, I believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the world. And then we have Jesus himself when the high priest says to Jesus during his trial in Mark 14, verses 61 and 62, Art thou the Christ, the son of the blessed? And Jesus said, I am, and ye shall see the son of man sitting on the right hand of power and coming in the clouds of glory. And so we have all these confessions in the New Testament that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Promised One, the fulfillment of all those messianic prophecies of the Old Testament, including Micah 5.2, which prophesied that Jesus, the Messiah, would be born in Bethlehem. And indeed, that's where he was born. In fact, the entire gospel account in our New Testament, all of the gospels give testimony that Jesus is the promised Messiah. John, in concluding his gospel in chapter 20, verses 30 and 31, says in many other signs, truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written that he might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing he might have life. through his name." What a wonderful summary of the gospel account. It was written that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ and that believing we might have life. And so, these wise men were wise because of whom they came to see. And you, likewise, are wise to seek after Jesus. Anyone in the world is wise to come and seek after Jesus. You are wise to come to church. You are wise to open your Bible. You are wise to learn about Jesus. And ultimately, each and every one of us has to come to that place in our lives where we make that decision of faith. Do I believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God? And if you come to that point, you do have life. You have abundant and eternal life. So these wise men were wise because of whom they came to see, and secondly, they were wise because of why they came. Why did they come to see Jesus? Well, we could say that they came because they saw his natal star. That's the cause. That's the impetus. That's what drove them to go westward in search of this new king. This was the triggering event, if you will. Now, these were magi, don't forget. These were astrologers. They're studying the heavens. They're looking at the stars. Something unusual happened. that led them to conclude that this is the natal star of the king of the Jews. What about this word star? Now, when we use the word star in English, we can use it in a technical sense, referring to a star like our sun, right, that is burning and giving off light. It could be many, many, many miles away. But sometimes we'll just use that word star in reference to, say, anything that's shining up there in heaven. And so in a casual sense, we would say the stars of heaven, and that might include the planets, which you can see on a good clear night. It might even include a comet that you might be able to see at a certain time of year. And then we might also use that word in a completely non-technical sense when we say, oh, I saw a shooting star. Was it really a star? No. It's a meteor. But nevertheless, we would call it a shooting star. Well, that same broad use of the word star happens in the Greek as well, in our Greek New Testament. And so the Greek term that's translated star here is the word that we get our English words astral or asteroid or asterisk. You know what an asterisk is, don't you? A little star symbol, right? And so all of those words derive from the Greek word. And the Greek word has a very broad range of meaning. It can refer to the stars like our sun. It can refer to all of the shining objects in the night sky, the stars, the planets and comets. It can refer to anything, anything shining really in the heavens. Now, the fact is, as we read this biblical account, we don't know exactly what this star was. It most certainly was not a star in the technical sense, because stars don't behave in the way that we read in this account. The Magi had seen something unusual. So this has led some to speculate, you know, what unusual event might happen in nature? Well, you can have what's called the conjunction of two planets. That's where you're looking up into the night sky and two planets have actually lined up and they're coinciding. And so the light given off is much brighter than you would normally see. Could have been that. It could have been a supernova, right? We know what supernovas are. The star explodes and there's this great big pulse of light. Maybe it was a supernova. Or maybe was it a comet? We have another Christmas carol. Do you hear what I hear? And the star is described in that Christmas carol as quote, dancing in the night with his tail as big as a kite. Well, that sounds like a comet, doesn't it? But again, we go back to our Bibles and what do our Bibles say? How do they describe this star? How does how is it described here? All we can see is how it behaved, right? We're told that the star appeared, it began to shine. It wasn't shining before, but it appeared that it went before them. It led the way. We're also told that it stood still over the place where Jesus lay. Now, that doesn't describe a star in the traditional sense. Folks, we read our biblical account and we look at it from the lens of a biblical worldview and we believe in a supernatural God who does supernatural things. This was a supernatural event. There is absolutely no reason to try to explain this in terms of a natural phenomenon. It was supernatural. God did it. And we need to accept it just that way. So they came because they saw his star. That was the cause. But that doesn't really answer why they came. What was their purpose in coming? They came, as we see in verse two, they say it themselves. We have seen his star in the east and are come to worship him. They have come to worship the king of the Jews. Now this really troubled King Herod. You see King Herod was an egotist. He wanted all the attention. He didn't like the idea of someone else coming along and stripping away the title of king and having people bow down to him. He wasn't going to share that glory with anyone. So he asked the experts you know where was Christ to be born and without hesitation they say in Bethlehem. And then they quote from Micah 5 to And so you have Herod at least being informed that these wise men, the purpose in their coming was to worship this newborn king. The wise men were wise because they came to worship Jesus the Christ, the one born king of the Jews, the one of whom the prophets wrote Isaiah in chapter 9, verse 6, for unto us a child is born. unto us a son is given and the government shall be upon his shoulder and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. That's who they came to worship. So they came to worship him. The wise men were wise because of whom they came to see, because of why they came to see him. And thirdly, the wise men were wise because of what they did. They followed through with their desire to worship him. We read down in verse 11 of the account. And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary, his mother, and fell down and worshiped him. And when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. They had come from afar from the east to worship this newborn king. And that's exactly what they did. And from this account, we can observe two things about their worship, two characteristics of their worship that we also should follow. Number one, they showed reverence in their worship of the king. They bowed down. They humbled themselves. They showed homage by prostrating themselves. And of course, this posture is used repeatedly in the Bible to indicate worship. People would bow down in worship. And Jesus, later on in his ministry, welcomed such worship from other people. So they showed reverence in their worship. Psalm 95, verses six and seven say, Oh, come, let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the Lord, our maker, for he is our God and we are his people. And the sheep of his pasture. So, folks, we bow down to God, Jesus is the son of God. He received that worship. Only God is to be worshiped like that. So they showed reverence in their worship and they showed honor in their worship of the king. They honored this newborn king with their costly gifts. These are very costly, very precious gifts that they brought. Gold, the costliest of metals, most precious. Frankincense. This is a precious aromatic extract. of the boswellia tree. And when they extract from that tree, they get this kind of white stuff and they cook it down and it creates this very aromatic oil, frankincense. And then myrrh. Myrrh was a precious aromatic extract of another tree, of the camphora tree. And it produced this red resin that they would prepare. And it was also very fragrant as well. Now, the important thing that I think is stressed in the account that we have in Matthew's Gospel is that these were precious and costly. That's the important thing to come away with. But it may also be that these gifts had certain symbolic importance as well. In fact, this idea of ascribing symbolic importance goes all the way back to the third century to a man named Origen. who said the Magi brought, quote, gold as to a king, myrrh as to one who was mortal, and incense as to God, end quote. Now, Origen is also the father of the allegorical method of interpretation of the Bible. He is not someone that we would hold up in high esteem and say, here's a good scholar of the Bible, because he would approach the scriptures And yes, he would give a literal understanding of the scriptures, but he would layer on top of that some kind of a mystical spiritual understanding. And so he has all these imaginary spiritualizing interpretations of the scriptures. So was Origen right? Well, my answer to that is even a broken clock is right twice a day. So let's examine the biblical facts and then compare them to what he's saying. Well, as we look through our Bibles and we see where gold shows up in the biblical record, very often gold is associated with kings. In fact, very often in the Old Testament, we see that people would bring gold as their tribute to the king. That's what that king deserves. You think of King Solomon and all of that tremendous amount of gold that he accumulated. People were bringing him gold from all over the world. So gold is very often associated with kings. Secondly, frankincense. This was an ingredient that was used to prepare incense by the Old Testament priests. Look over to Exodus chapter 30. Look at two more passages and we'll be done this morning. Exodus chapter 30. Of course, this is in the giving of the law and all the commands that the Lord gave. All the instruction that was given, we're jumping in the context here where God is giving to Moses instruction about the incense that was to be prepared by the priests and used for worship. Exodus 30, verses 34 through 38. And the Lord said unto Moses, take unto thee sweet spices, stacti and ancha and galbamin These sweet spices with pure what's the next word frankincense. Of each shall there be a light weight and thou shalt make it a perfume a confection after the art of the apothecary tempered together pure and holy and thou shalt beat some of it very small and put of it before the testimony and the tabernacle of the congregation where I will meet with thee. It shall be unto you most holy. All right. So we have this Old Testament practice of preparing this incense and it included this ingredient of frankincense. So this is associated with worship. Any Jew would immediately have thought of this passage when mentioned when frankincense is mentioned. And then thirdly, we have myrrh. Turn over to John chapter 19. Again, going back to the crucifixion account, we're going to see mention of Myrrh. John 19, verses 38 through 40. This is after Jesus' death on the cross. Verse 38, and after this, Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, Besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus. And Pilate gave him leave. He came therefore and took the body of Jesus. And there came also Nicodemus, which at first came to Jesus by night and brought a mixture of, what's the next word? Myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pound weight. Then took they the body of Jesus and wound it in linen clothes with the spices as the manner of the Jews is to bury. And so myrrh was part of the burial process in the Jewish customs. And so it turns out that Origen might not have been too far off the mark in seeing the symbolic importance of these three gifts that were brought. The Magi honor Jesus with gold for his royalty, frankincense for his deity and myrrh for his humanity. And I hope we recognize that only Christ is worthy of all three. So the wise worship Jesus, that's our point this morning, the wise worship Jesus, these wise men came, they were wise because they came to see Jesus. They came to worship him and because they worshiped him with reverence. and with honor. So, the wise worship Jesus. Let us worship him this Christmas season. Our Father, we thank you for this passage. Thank you for this account that is recorded only in Matthew's Gospel. Thank you that you have given us some insights into what really makes a wise person. I pray, Lord, that we would seek to worship the Lord Jesus Christ, to give him honor, to show reverence to Him, to commune with Him, to openly profess that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. May that be our profession as well. We pray in Jesus name. Amen.