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00:00 uh on on the Christmas service on the 25th uh two weeks from now and today's
00:06 sermon is the the third installment in this series and the title is uh the Lord
00:11 worship and our text uh this morning from uh Matthew chapter 2 is about the
00:17 wise men from the east coming to Jerusalem to look for baby Jesus in
00:22 order to present him gifts and to to worship him. Now many of us are already
00:27 very familiar uh with this uh account. In fact, I think we are all over
00:33 familiar. Uh but nevertheless, we will try to dig deeper into the into the verses in order to try to understand uh
00:40 what uh they are really saying. But before we start, let's uh clear up a
00:45 a minor technical matter. Um sorry.
00:54 In the King James version, uh the first verse of our text uh reads, "Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in
01:01 the days of Herod the king, behold, they came wise men from the east to Jerusalem."
01:07 But in the New International Version that was read to us. Now, uh the word spelled M A Gi was is used to refer to
01:15 these wise men. Now, how do you pronounce M A GI?
01:22 And some people pronounce it as uh magi because uh maybe because the hi is high
01:29 so gi could be guy so they say magi or is it magi as in magician m a g-i c i n
01:40 but please don't pronounce it as maggi which is my favorite uh brand of instant noodles.
01:47 Actually the right way of saying this is the magi uh you pronounced the G as a J uh during scripture reading was it was
01:54 rightly pronounced. Thank you very much. And so verse one should read the magi from the east came to Jerusalem. Now
02:02 with that settle, shall we commit this time to the Lord in prayer. Our father in heaven, humbly we ask with
02:09 much uh anticipation and eager expectation for your spirit to move in our midst to
02:15 illumin our hearts as we study your word. Open the eyes of our faith as we
02:22 receive your truth from this passage in Matthew chapter 2. For we ask this in the precious name of our Lord Jesus.
02:29 Amen. In the uh first two weeks of uh last
02:34 month, uh my wife and I made two back-to-back trips uh first to Guangjo
02:40 uh China or should I say Guangzo in Mandarin and then to Hong Kong. We spent
02:46 a couple of days holidaying in in Guangjo and then uh a couple of days later we traveled to Hong Kong and we
02:54 were there for another couple of days. Now while in Guangjo we found ourselves
02:59 uh in fact we were recommended to go to this place uh known as Sahur which is a
03:06 which means uh uh sand river if you know Chinese and it was an amazing site. Um,
03:14 it was a crazy mess of of people and goods and entanglement of of of humanity
03:22 and merchandise as I watch shoppers and and and and sellers and tourists and
03:29 traders uh in a frenzit scene of of buying and selling. And I was so mesmerized by this
03:38 all these human activities that I actually stood at a spot for about 20 minutes, you know, looking at this
03:45 chaotic crowd going about their business. It was it was a sea of of people and
03:53 vehicles. You know, in Chinese we say lan people, mountain people see. This is literally a sea of people and vehicles
04:01 moving and and carrying you know uh rushing and hauling.
04:08 And this scene was repeated in the other commercial centers of Guangjo that we visited. This is a huge city with a
04:14 population of 12 million. Hong Kong was no different with it mash
04:20 of shops and and restaurants and and and
04:26 patrons and shoppers. And Hong Kong is a city of 7 million uh
04:31 within a small piece of land and put together Guangjo and and Hong Kong they
04:38 represent the economic powerhouse of southern China. In short, what I saw was an unfiltered
04:47 display of a purposeful pursuit of the material
04:53 and uh somewhat surreal uh spectacle of this continual chase of of what is
05:01 physical. You know the Chinese huh everything is very material.
05:08 But amidst all this is it was therefore rather surprising that from my from my hotel window on the 25th floor uh
05:16 somewhere in Cosway Bay, Hong Kong, I saw this huge sign perch on top of a
05:23 neighboring building and it says
05:28 meaning Jesus is Lord. And he stood like a beacon of light on
05:34 the busy people below. Although I'm not so sure how many could see it from from
05:39 the street level. It was like serving notice to the masses below that there is
05:45 more to material living that there is much more to life than mere physical
05:52 existence. Now some of you may wonder what has all this got to do with our text today? Uh
05:58 how is this related to the story of the magi? Well, I shall come back to this later at the end of the sermon. So I'll
06:04 just park this picture aside. Okay. And so much for the introduction. But before we dive into the text, I wish to spend a
06:11 couple of minutes uh to to address some common misconceptions uh surrounding the
06:17 story of the magi. The first uh misconception is that there were three
06:22 wise men. As a matter of fact, the Bible doesn't tell us how many they were in the group.
06:29 Verse one merely says magi from the east came to Jerusalem but there is no mention of the number and I discovered
06:36 that in the traditions of some east eastern Orthodox churches they have as many as 12 wise men and some early
06:44 church paintings of the magi show anywhere between two to eight wise men
06:50 and somehow in the western churches however it always been assumed that there were three of them and this is
06:57 because uh they were there were three gifts mentioned in the verse 11 gold
07:02 frankincense and and myrr so three gifts and therefore three wise men well it
07:08 sounds quite sensible h okay but the bible doesn't say how many and centuries
07:15 later these supposedly three wise men were even given actual names uh belaza
07:22 malor and and and and casper but this is totally unsupported by scripture Okay.
07:29 Now, the second misconception is that the wise men were there with the shepherds on the on that first Christmas
07:36 day. Now, this is not accurate. Verse 11, it says,
07:44 so let me backtrack a bit. I got some pictures to show you. Uh uh that's why
07:49 when we see some common uh nativity scenes uh we see three wise men because this is uh western church's uh uh
07:56 tradition or this one or or even this one. This is very interesting because it is a complete set of nativity figurines
08:03 uh with even the three camels supposedly used by the the three wise men. Okay.
08:08 For the second misconception, as I said, uh the three wise men may not have been
08:14 there with the shepherds on the first Christmas day because in the in verse 11, it says on coming to the house, they
08:21 saw the child uh with its mother Mary. Notice they they came to a house, not a
08:27 stable. So because you see by the time they got to Jesus, a period of time had already
08:33 elapsed. How long was Jesus when the magi uh visited him? Well, young Jesus
08:40 could have been as old as 2 years because further down in verse 16, which
08:46 is outside our text today, King Herod gave orders to kill all the boys who were 2 years old and under. Okay? And so
08:54 the the nativity scenes that I show you just now, okay, let's let's take a quick look uh backtrack a little bit. You look
09:00 at all these uh common nativity scenes uh
09:06 they are not entirely accurate because the wise men were not there together with the shepherds that day. All right.
09:14 And by pointing this out, I have made I may have made the life or the work of the Sunday school teachers a little
09:20 easier because if they are planning a nativity play in the near future, they can have three fewer children to act as
09:26 the wise men. Now, this would be a more accurate uh
09:33 nativity scene, just the shepherds without the wise men. Although it's hard
09:38 to imagine how a newly born baby Jesus could sit up, you know, and look at the shepherds with such intense eyes, you
09:44 know. And this painting would also be more accurate. We have now just the wise men
09:52 without the shepherds but the artist added a angel in the middle even though it's not mentioned here anywhere in in
09:59 chapter two and this is I found a couple of these paintings uh uh this is also quite
10:05 accurate uh again the wise men without the without the shepherds but now the wise men accompanied by what looks like
10:11 an army you know some of them armed with swords you know so I cannot understand it makes you wonder why you come to
10:18 Jesus uh visit baby Jesus you an army, you know, armed with swords, you know, I I don't understand what's what the
10:24 artist is trying to convey. Now, the third misconception is that the wise men are kings because they often referred to
10:30 as uh the three kings. If you remember the popular Christmas carol, we three kings, you know, we three kings of
10:36 Orient are uh bearing gifts. We travel a far and so we sing we three kings, you know. So, we think they are kings. But
10:43 in all likelihood, the wise men are were not kings. And the reason the wise men
10:49 are thought to be kings is because of two verses from the Old Testament. Isaiah 60:3 and Psalm 72:10, which some
10:57 people consider to be prophecies concerning the Magi. Isaiah 60:3, nations will come to your light and
11:04 kings, you see, and kings to the brightness of your dawn. And Psalm 72:10, which was read to us earlier in
11:09 the ser in the service, may the kings of Tashis and of distant shores bring tribute to him. May the kings you see
11:16 kings of of Sheba and Sabba present him gifts. That's why these three these wise
11:22 men are often uh referred to as the three kings but kings they were probably not.
11:28 Actually they were they were there were only two kings in this passage who were really kings. One is king Harold and the
11:34 other one is king Jesus even though they are not kings in the same category. As for the last misconception, I just
11:41 want to suggest partly in jazz uh that the wise man may not be really so wise.
11:48 I mean, if you're looking for the newly born king of the Jews and you go to King
11:53 Herald and you ask in verse two, where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? I think that's not exactly very
11:59 smart because for your information in the 40 BC, uh the Romans had already
12:05 installed Herod as king of the Jews. So if you're looking for Jesus, the newly born king of the Jews, the last person
12:11 you go to is the reigning king of the Jews, the current king of the Jews, right? And ask him where is the newly born king of the Jews? And he's not a
12:18 very nice person. I chance upon a a children's story book
12:23 entitled the not so wise man, which is a Christmas story for kids about an
12:29 absent-minded uh wise man. And this story may not be so far off the mark.
12:35 Well, we have so far discussed uh what or who the wise men were not. They were not with the shepherds on the on the
12:42 first Christmas. They were not kings in all likelihood and so on and so forth. So the question before us is who then
12:49 were the magi? Well, since they studied the stars, I suppose they would be some sort of
12:56 astronomers. But because astronomy wasn't a science in those days as it is today and because
13:02 the wise men also interpreted dreams and did other stuff like that, they would be more accurately described as
13:09 astrologers. You might also think of them as uh some sort of caught magicians or or
13:14 sorcerers. And you may be right. The important point to note here is that the Bible doesn't tell us a lot about the
13:20 about who they were. And Matthew when writing chapter two here didn't bother to give us a lot of details about the
13:28 magi. Perhaps the focus of this passage is not the magi.
13:34 Perhaps it is not so necessary to know so much about the magi. And this is
13:40 where things get really interesting. This is where we we want to start to unpack uh these verses. uh much like a a
13:48 child uh eagerly unpacking her Christmas present.
13:54 And before we look into today's text, I just want to say uh something in general, a point that I've emphasized uh
13:59 often during the Bible studies that I've led or in the sermons that I've delivered in the past. And that is most
14:06 parts of scripture uh should be studied diligently
14:11 rather than read casually. Of course, it is it's fine to pick up your Bible and
14:17 to read it as you would a newspaper. There are many biblical narratives or
14:22 stories that are instructive through plain reading without the need for interpretation or analysis. There are
14:28 many psalms that that speak to our heart uh without the need for explanation or
14:33 clarification. Yet at the same time there are many many more passages in the
14:39 Bible that contains multiple layers of meanings and truths which require
14:45 careful study and reflection so that we can better understand the word of God and this should be done of course under
14:51 the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Often the verses in such passages uh are like
14:57 a box within the box within the box. You know, much like the the Russian nesting dolls and often the verses need to be
15:04 unpacked or unfolded so that the hidden part can be seen so we can get to the
15:10 bottom of the matter, so to speak. And often the text at hand has linkages to
15:15 to other parts of the Bible. linkages that point to a larger picture. The larger picture that awaits discovery by
15:22 the inquiring mind illumined by the spirit. And so it is with this in mind
15:27 that we wish to approach Matthew chapter 2. And you will soon see that when it comes to God's word, often there is
15:35 more, much more than meets the eye. Now we must first understand that when
15:40 um when Matthew wrote his gospel, his primary target were the Jews. It was for
15:47 the Jewish readership that he wrote this book. He he would never imagine you know
15:53 Malaysians reading you know his his his gospel today you know but those days when he was writing he was he had the
15:58 Jews in mind because during the first century as Christianity spread began to spread throughout the Roman Empire. the
16:06 the Jewish population uh they were was relatively slow to to accept or to
16:11 embrace Jesus as their Messiah. And hence uh we find Matthew very eager, you know, to portray Jesus as the Messiah
16:18 foretold in the in the Old Testament. The word Messiah literally means anointed one, someone they've been
16:24 waiting for. And Matthew wanted to to to present Jesus to the Jews as the fulfillment of scripture. Here you are,
16:30 the Messiah that you all been waiting for. the Messiah that the scripture said would come has already come.
16:37 And out of that desire to persuade the Jews, the Jewish readers that Jesus was the Messiah prophesized in the Old
16:42 Testament. It is worthwhile to note that compared to all the other books in the New Testament, Matthew is the one who
16:49 made the most number of references uh to the Old Testament. He he quotes a lot from the Old Testament
16:55 because the Jews were very familiar with the Old Testament. And time again he would use the phrase so was fulfilled
17:02 what was spoken through the prophets or something to the effect. And for example further down in verse 15 which is
17:08 outside our text uh it says and so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through
17:14 the prophet. And again in verse 17 just a little bit down uh further down the
17:19 then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled. And again in in verse 23 so was fulfilled what was said
17:25 through the prophets. He goes on and on. He'll quote the Old Testament say was fulfilled what was said to the prophets.
17:33 And these three verses in this chapter 2 give us a a good
17:38 glimpse of what was going on in in Matthew's mind when he wrote chapter 2.
17:44 Another point that is worthy of note is that out of the four gospel writers, Matthew is the only one who quoted Jesus
17:50 as saying uh this is Matthew 5:17. Jesus said, "Do not think that I've come to abolish the law or or the prophets. have
17:57 come not to abolish them but to fulfill them. And so if you were to approach uh
18:03 Matthew chapter 2 from this angle of fulfillment, fulfillment, then the whole text becomes alive and it will lead us
18:09 to a deeper truth. And so let's now see how the the chapter unfolds as we look
18:15 beneath the surface and beyond the narrative of the magi.
18:21 Now you see it was uh highly intentional on the part of Matthew when he opened we're talking about verse one here when
18:27 he opened this chapter with after Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea Matthew 2 verse one
18:34 after Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea the key word here is Bethlehem
18:40 that Jesus was born in Bethlehem and this is uh what Bethlehem looks like
18:46 today quite a big town now uh unfortunately ally it's it sits uh within the area
18:54 under the authority of the uh Palestinian Authority the PA and so it is in the West Bank and uh if you want
18:60 to go to Bethlehem from Jerusalem uh you have to go through Israeli checkpoints
19:05 uh which is quite a hassle but back in those days uh it was it was
19:10 just a tiny little village and and this is what Bethlehem might have looked like at that time
19:16 and although an obscure place just five miles outside of Jerusalem You know you say in Malaysia ulu place
19:24 you know it's a place a forgotten place a small little village but at the mention of the name Bethlehem the Jews
19:30 would immediately recall is a trigger mentioned Bethlehem the Jews will will
19:36 recall this prophecy in Micah chapter 5
19:41 in the old testament this is very important okay when you mention Bethlehem they would immediately recall
19:48 one prophecy In the book of Micah chapter 5 because in that prophecy
19:55 it was foretold that there would be this great king the word is ruler you know
20:01 this messiah or the anointed one coming out of Bethlehem. That prophecy
20:06 specified Bethlehem as the birthplace of the coming Messiah and the and all these
20:12 chief priests and and the teachers of the law. They were all familiar with this prophecy. And hence in verse two
20:20 when a wise man asked King Herod where they might find the one who has been born king of the Jews uh he couldn't
20:26 answer because he he didn't know his Bible very well. He was like a half Jew, you know, not a pure Jew. His mother was
20:31 Arab and and uh so he couldn't answer the wise man. But the wise man knew the
20:37 answer. So he he immediately uh uh uh what they call summon all the chief priests and the teachers of law. And in
20:43 verse four, he he asked them the same question. And to which the teachers of the law and
20:49 the the chief priests, they answered immediately. They knew the answer in Bethlehem in verse 5 because they knew
20:57 well about the prophecy in Micah chapter 5
21:02 about this ruler coming out of of of of Bethlehem. And in verse six, as if to validate
21:09 their answers, they quoted from Micah chapter 5 for for for King Herod before
21:15 before King Her ask them, "How do you know?" So they they say, "Okay, this is why we know how we know." They quoted from Micah chapter 5. So please remember
21:22 verse six of our text is a quotation of Micah chapter 5.
21:28 Okay? If you have a good study Bible, you will it will tell you, okay, Micah 5, you know what verse, you know,
21:35 and hence when you put verse one, verse five and verse 6 together, it is crystal
21:41 clear that Matthew is trying to tell the readers of his gospel that Jesus who was born in Bethlehem is the one foretold in
21:48 Micah chapter 5. Interestingly when Matthew wrote about
21:55 how the birth of Jesus came about uh towards the end of uh chapter one last
22:00 week I think we had a sermon about the genology of Jesus. So if you read if you start Matthew chapter one you have all
22:06 the long genealogy of Jesus and then towards the end of chapter one he start to talk about you know the the birth of
22:11 Jesus you know and but interestingly Matthew never once mentioned the town of
22:18 Nazareth even though many things were going on in Nazareth he was talking about uh Mary conceiving you know of the
22:25 Holy Spirit. He was talking about uh uh what do you call uh uh Joseph uh marrying uh sorry Joseph seeing a dream
22:32 you know all happening in in Nazareth. He was talking about uh uh Joseph marrying uh Mary all happening in in
22:39 Nazareth but he never mentioned the the name Nazareth. And in contrast if you if
22:44 you read uh uh Luke chapters 1 and two you know about how Jesus was born you you find the the the name Nazareth
22:52 mentioned uh here and there. But here in in in Matthew 1 and two, you don't me
22:58 you don't see the mention of Nazareth by Matthew until the very end until the very end of chapter 2 as if the writer
23:05 only wanted to highlight Bethlehem. Bethlehem which is mentioned at least four times
23:11 in our text. Do you see what Matthew is trying to convey?
23:17 So besides its significance uh Bethlehem uh as as as the prophesized birthplace of the Messiah, this little town of
23:24 Bethlehem is also important from another point of view. So let me shift your focus now. Besides being the prophesized
23:31 place, a birthplace of the Messiah from Micah chapter 5, there is another deeper uh significance. You see, Bethlehem
23:39 happens to be the birthplace of King David
23:44 from uh Samuel uh 16:1 Samuel 16:1.
23:49 Uh there is a name Jesse mentioned here who is the father of of King David. And
23:54 Jesse lived in in uh in in Bethlehem and by inference uh
23:60 David was born in Bethlehem. And Bethlehem was also where where David grew up and later he was anointed uh by
24:07 by the prophet Samuel in Bethlehem. And this is recorded in the 1 Samuel 16:13.
24:14 So Bethlehem the birthplace and the Kong you know we say in Malay Kong of King David and that's why Bethlehem is
24:21 Bethlehem is also known as the city of David. So what I think uh Matthew is also trying to convey here is that
24:28 he wants to link David uh Jesus to David's birthplace in Bethlehem and so is Jesus'
24:36 birthplace. And this link between Jesus and David is also implicit in the second
24:42 part of uh verse 6. Remember I told you verse six is quotation from Micah 5 and that deserves a a closer scrutiny. Now,
24:49 as I mentioned a while ago, uh I told you to remember that verse 6 is a quotation from Micah 5. But I just want to show you now uh that prophecy and
24:58 you'll realize that verse 6 in Matthew chapter 2 is actually only a partial quote because the whole prophecy in
25:04 Micah 5 from verses 2 to 6 stretches five verses.
25:09 So, so, so uh Matthew didn't quote the entire prophecy in verse 6, only quoted partially.
25:16 But I think it's reasonable when that when the when the teachers of the law when the chief priest uh you know was
25:22 was was summoned by King Herod. I think it is reasonable to think that they quoted the entire prophecy to to King
25:27 Herod. I'm sure King Herod wanted to hear the the whole thing, right?
25:32 But here in verse six of our text, which I think is by design, Matthew included
25:40 only two verses from this prophecy. So let's take a closer look. Let's now zoom into verse six of our text.
25:50 The first part of verse six of our text came from Micah 5 verse two. If if you
25:56 want me to backtrack, you look at Micah 5:2, the first one, the first verse that is quoted in in the in in our verse six,
26:04 the early part which provided the answer that King Herod was seeking.
26:11 Where was where is this uh uh uh uh uh king of the Jews going to be born?
26:18 Answer is in Micah 5:2 quoted in Matthew 2:6. The first part.
26:25 But Matthew added a second part in verse 6. Huh? Yeah. Verse six. And of all the
26:32 verses in this pro in the prophecy of you know five five verses long he picked and added Matthew Mcca 5:4.
26:42 Okay. So the second part of of of verse 6 is a quotation from
26:50 Micah 5:4. So you can see how his mind was doing is thinking. The first part of verse 6 he took it from Micah 52. The
26:58 second part of verse 6 he took it from Micah 54. and he didn't bother to write about the
27:05 other verses of Micah 5. You can probably guess why
27:11 because of the word shepherd. He was he took Micah 5:4 because of the word
27:18 shepherd. Because as far as the Jews are concerned
27:23 at the mention of shepherd king, you immediately think of King David because
27:29 David was a shepherd boy when he was young.
27:35 Now, so from this explanation, what I'm trying to infer is that it seems to be a
27:40 Davidic theme cutting across uh Matthew chapter 2. Okay. from the use
27:48 of the word shepherd in verse six and the repeated mention of of the of the
27:53 name Bethlehem the birthplace and the hometown of David. So this Davidic theme
27:59 not so obvious know from the surface you know cutting across the the verses
28:04 serves to serves two purposes. One is to highlight the kingship of Jesus because
28:11 David was the greatest king in the Jewish Old Testament history.
28:16 You mentioned David. Oh, the great king, the great king that we had. So when you link uh David to Jesus to David, you are
28:24 actually trying to highlight the kingship of Jesus.
28:30 Now this Davidic theme in Matthew chapter 2 serves another purpose which is which is quite apparent. Uh if you
28:36 now shift your vantage point uh vantage view to Matthew chapter 1 verse one. Now
28:41 let me transport you back to the the starting of Matthew in chapter 1 verse one where Matthew began his gospel with
28:48 this. This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David.
28:54 The son of Abraham and normally it should be the son of Abraham. The son of David because Abraham precedes David but
29:01 he he rather mention David first then Abraham. Why? because he wants to link
29:08 the ancestry of Jesus to David
29:14 which also leads to Abraham. So why is it necessary to link Jesus
29:19 ancestries to David to emphasize that? Why is Matthew uh pointing his Jewish
29:25 readers to the fact that Jesus came from David's line? This the reason for is very important because there are many
29:30 Old Testament prophecies that foretold that the coming Messiah not only will be
29:35 born in Bethlehem but will be a descendant of David. I just give you a a
29:40 few. Isaiah 9:7, Isaiah 11:1, Jeremiah 23:5, Jeremiah 33:15,
29:47 for example, uh the clearest one is Jeremiah 33:15. I will make a righteous branch sprout from David's line. God is
29:55 talking here. And hence, Matthew is trying to impress upon his
30:01 Jewish readers Jesus qualification as the Messiah.
30:07 Not only was he born in Bethlehem, he is of David's line.
30:17 And besides that, of course, trying to highlight the kingship of Jesus. So we
30:22 detect a a Davidic theme cutting across this chapter beneath the verses. And the
30:29 intriguing thing is that it doesn't stop here. And if you continue to unpack the
30:34 verses, there is also another theme barely visible within these verses. And
30:39 that is a a mosaic theme. Now when I say the word mosaic, I'm not referring to
30:44 little square tiles that you use to cover your kitchen walls and and bathroom floors. the the the term mosaic
30:51 refers to Moses the adjective for Mosesh Mosaic and we're talking about about about Exodus
30:57 the book of Exodus okay now how do you see the mosaic theme here in Matthew 2
31:03 the clue is further down in in verse 16 which is outside of text uh where when the king Herod ordered the killing of of
31:10 all boys aged two years and under if you read further to verse 16 you you
31:17 find that he because the wise man escaped from another route. You know, he the wise man didn't go back to Harold to
31:23 tell him where Jesus was. So he he he was so angry that he in order to kill Jesus, he he he killed all the all the
31:30 uh the boys aged to and under in around Bethlehem. And this is clearly clearly a a parallel
31:38 with Exodus chapters 1 and two. If you recall, if you know your Old Testament
31:43 stories, when Pharaoh ordered all Hebrew male babies to be killed
31:51 and to extend the point further, the rescue of baby Jesus uh and the escape to Egypt further down Matthew 2 to if
31:59 you read verses 13 to 14, that is a mirror of Exodus 2 where baby Moses was
32:06 similarly rescued and then his subsequent escape. And thirdly, the return of Jesus to
32:13 Nazareth after Herod died. Uh further down in chapter 2, if you go if you read
32:19 19-23, that matches the return of Moses uh to Egypt in Exodus 3 and 4. So I want
32:27 to give you the summary of this parallel. Okay, parallel between Matthew chapter 2 and
32:32 the narratives in in in Exodus chapters 1-4.
32:39 It's a mirror of this account in Exodus. In fact, if you look further, if you go
32:45 further to to Matthew chapters 3 and 4, you get even more complete parallel
32:52 between uh Matthew and Exodus. And this is this is the complete uh parallel.
32:57 Unfortunately, we don't have time to to to to to go through this in detail, but from this table, the mosaic theme that
33:06 has been worked into into Matthew chapter 2 especially and beyond is now becoming more apparent. Oh, there is,
33:14 you know, something underneath the verses. He's trying to to point you to this parallel with uh with Moses.
33:22 And we earlier saw the Davidic theme and the reason for including such a a theme in these verses. But why the need for a
33:29 mosaic theme as well? Why what what was Matthew's intention of linking Jesus to
33:35 now Moses? Jesus to David. Now we understand. But uh why need why why do
33:40 we link Jesus to Moses? The answer thankfully is not so difficult to figure out. Just as God had Moses to lead the
33:49 Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, so also here God has Jesus to lead his
33:55 people out of slavery. Not physical slavery, but slavery to sin.
34:03 And so in Exodus, it was a physical redemption.
34:08 Here is going to be a spiritual redemption. And this is the purpose of of Jesus
34:15 coming into this world as a savior
34:21 by dying on the cross by taking uh the penalty of sin on our behalf.
34:30 So this mosaic theme is to highlight the role of Jesus as the savior
34:38 just as Moses was like a savior leading the people out of Egypt. I'm sorry if
34:44 the discussion so far comes across to you as a bit too technical. after uh the
34:50 first service uh some of them came to see me said wow there's a lot to digest
34:56 but this is how it is with God's word the deeper you dig the more you get and
35:02 and tell frankly 40 minutes a sermon is very hard to to go deep and deeper you
35:08 give me 2 hours 3 hours I can use up all the time so I encourage you to go and
35:13 explore further there many more things in Matthew chapter
35:19 But I thought this would be a good way of looking at it. The more you dig, the more you get.
35:26 And Matthew when he wrote chapter 2, he was trying to put across a deeper
35:31 message by painting these two broad strokes of a of a Davidic theme and
35:38 another broad stroke of a mosaic theme across these verses. And if you miss
35:45 these two themes, then this chapter becomes mainly the
35:50 story of the magi. But the intriguing thing about Matthew chapter 2 is that beyond and beneath the
35:56 story of the magi, there lies the more important matter of who Jesus is and what he has come to accomplish. In other
36:02 words, the story of the magi in Matthew chapter 2 is not about the magi.
36:11 To use a computer term, the wise men were merely the peripherals.
36:16 They were just accessories to a bigger plot. The supporting actors so to say, you
36:23 know, the focus should be should therefore be on Jesus, not on the magi. The central
36:29 figure in the story of the magi is none other than Jesus himself because the the wise men came to worship Jesus.
36:38 So by we by weaving a Davidic theme into the text uh Matthew is trying to point
36:44 us to the kingship of Jesus by embedding a mosaic theme in the text. Matthew is
36:52 pointing us to Jesus' role as savior. In short, Matthew is trying to tell us that
36:58 this king and savior is also worthy of our worship.
37:03 The kingship of Jesus is symbolized by the gift of gold from the magi. His
37:09 atoning death on the cross is is represented by the gift of my from the
37:15 wise men. And now my requires some explanation. It is it is an oils
37:20 extracted from from a tree. Uh they take out the sap or the the gum from this
37:26 tree a myrr tree. And in ancient times uh this is used to embalm the body of
37:32 the departed. So it is symbolizes death. And hence even through the nature of the
37:40 wise men's gifts, Matthew is trying to portray Jesus as king and savior symbolized by the gold and the myrr. In
37:48 his first coming, which we are all going to celebrate in two weeks time, he came as a savior. But in his second coming,
37:56 which I believe will be in the not too distant future, he will come as the king
38:02 of kings and lord of lords. And that's why we always refer to Jesus as Lord and Savior. Lord and Savior. These two
38:08 titles always go together or to put it across symbolically
38:13 when Jesus first came, he came as the lamb of God to be sacrificed.
38:19 But when he comes again, he will come as the lion of Judah to rule as king.
38:26 And coming to the last part of the sermon, which is the most important part, what should our response be in the
38:32 light of what we have just learned? If we realize and we accept that Jesus is
38:37 Lord and Savior, what are we going to do about it? How are you going to to react to this truth? And I think that's the
38:44 biggest question. You know, it never ceased to amaze me
38:49 that many people when confronted with a with a deep biblical truth, they refuse
38:54 to do anything about it or or they choose to either suppress or or to to avoid the truth.
39:03 But if it is other truths in their lives, not spiritual truth, how fast
39:10 they will act to give you an analogy. Suppose a a a small tumor shows up in
39:15 your brain scan. Are you going to say oh my because I
39:20 think the scanning equipment a bit faulty. You won't say that. Or are you going to say no tiny tumor? You know it's no big
39:28 problem. You won't say that. When confronted with such a news you will take immediate action to have it
39:35 treated or removed. Why not? And to give you another longer
39:41 analogy, uh before our son left for Ireland at the end of August, I seem to
39:46 be talking a lot about Jeremy in my sermons. Maybe because I miss him.
39:52 No, actually he listened to the sermon from the website. So it's like the father hasn't forgotten him.
39:60 But anyway, uh uh uh uh uh before he left for Dublin more than three months ago, uh we we actually en enrolled him
40:07 into Monese uh here in Sunway in February this year. Uh that was be
40:13 before we got this idea of sending him far far away. So he he was in MES for one semester before we pull him out and
40:19 send him to Ireland. So one semester in Mesh. Okay. But it
40:24 but but at the end of that semester uh he had to sit for a test. He took about five subjects. I'm not sure. But he
40:32 didn't do too well in his accounting paper. It was the first time he was doing
40:37 accounting and and I suppose it must have been pretty confusing for him. And when he told me his marks, he started
40:44 with the subjects that he did well. I reported them very confidently. Oh, this one economics or you know, wow, I
40:50 got this and that. But he chose to to mention accounting last. And he said it very softly.
40:57 Now I was I was a little surprised. I mean how hard could can accounting be? I'm not sure. I'm not an encounter. I'm
41:04 an engineer but I always think that accounting you know it's not so difficult. I could choose to say oh
41:09 nothing to worry about Jeremy. You know you you will soon get over it. You know just work a little bit harder. Oh I
41:15 could say oh the paper was much too hard you know don't worry about it. And I could choose to ignore the problem. No
41:22 when when confronted with this situation I had to do something about it. you know as parent you cannot ignore it and so I
41:28 quickly arranged for a for a accounting teacher to to give him uh to tutor him
41:33 privately and after I think about 10 lessons the problem was cleared up but
41:38 as parents you know we we react uh we concern right
41:44 so when I consider uh people's reaction in general when confronted with a serious uh reality or truth concerning
41:50 let's say a family or health and how fast you know they they will respond on that's why I I I say I said earlier that
41:57 I'm amazed how little action they take when they are faced with a with a with a deep spiritual truth
42:03 truth they they have the truth they have serious ramifications on their eternal
42:10 destiny and I'm not talking about non-Christians after all they they don't accept the Bible as truth I'm talking
42:15 about Christians believers you know when they when they study the Bible or when they listen to a sermon or when they
42:20 attend a Bible study and there is this spiritual truth truth staring at them. How how do they normally respond? And
42:28 Jesus uh says in Matthew 7:26, everyone who hears the these words of mine and
42:34 does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. And so coming back, I'm just preparing
42:40 you your mind for for for what I'm going to say next. And coming back to the biggest question, if the truth is that
42:47 Jesus is Lord and Savior, as Matthew is trying to convey here in chapter two, how are we going to respond to him?
42:56 And the answer as suggested by the title of the sermon is that we worship him.
43:04 The title is the Lord worship. And the term worship him
43:09 appears three times in our text today. And so he must be important. In fact,
43:14 it's the key to the entire passage in terms of application.
43:19 But what does it mean to to worship him? I'm not talking about Sunday worship. That's corporate worship. That's just a
43:26 part of worship or even a minor part of worship. I'm talking about 24/7 worship.
43:32 I'm talking about living a worshipful life. I'm talking about not just Sunday,
43:38 but every day of the week. I'm talking about worship that that permits every fiber of our being, every uh space in
43:45 our life. And just how do we do that? Now, to help answer that, I have to now
43:51 bring up the second gift of the wise men, the gift of the frankincense. Okay,
43:56 which I didn't address just now. I I talk about the the the gold pointing to the kingship of Jesus. I talk about the
44:01 myrr pointing to his death. Right? Now commonly uh the frankincense is taken to
44:08 symbolize Jesus' role as the great high priest or the mediator elaborated in in
44:13 Hebrews say chapter 4 or chapter 7 but I don't wish to go there but in general
44:19 the summary is this gold points to his kingship frankincense points to his role as great uh great high priest and then
44:26 the myrr points to his death on the cross okay but I I don't want to go there rather I want to connect the uh
44:33 frankincense to our discussion kind of worship. Just I'll show you a picture of of myrrh. Now the you may want to take a
44:39 look at what frankincense looks like and like myrrh is taken from a tree the gum
44:44 or the rain of a tree and used as a perfume in ancient times. Uh their
44:50 version of Chanel number five. Okay. And like my it was very expensive uh
44:57 slightly uh uh actually my is slightly cheaper than than than frankincense but but both are very expensive.
45:04 Now, interestingly, towards the end of Exodus 30, again back to Exodus,
45:10 Moses was once given detailed instruction by God. God told him to take
45:16 pure frankincense and God told him a few other ingredients which he's supposed to
45:22 mix grind into powder to make a special incense which the the high priest was
45:29 supposed to burn in front of the ark of the covenant within the the tent of meeting or the tabernacle.
45:36 And this in this special incense including frankincense which symbolizes
45:42 uh uh uh holiness and righteousness when it is burned it will produce a sweet aroma
45:48 rising up to God pleasing to him. That was what it's supposed to do at the
45:53 temple and also in the temple. And I think this is a beautiful metaphor
45:59 for worship. Our lives should be similarly offered to God as a sweet
46:05 aroma pleasing to him. And this is one illustrative way of understanding
46:10 worship. And perhaps it is in with this in mind that Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 2:15, for we are to God the pleasing
46:18 aroma of Christ. Pleasing aroma of Christ among those who are who are being saved and those who are perishing. And
46:25 further uh he wrote in Romans 12:1, "Therefore I urge you brothers and sisters in view of God's mercy now to
46:32 offer your bodies as a living sacrifice." Uh remember the burning of the the incense, holy and pleasing to
46:39 God. This is your true and proper worship. In other words, our lives in
46:45 its totality should be lived in a manner pleasing to God. He smells the way we live, huh?
46:52 Metaphorically speaking, and he likes it. And this would include our actions and decisions, our our speech and
46:60 conduct, our lifestyles and and and and and priorities to name but a few.
47:06 And this is what I mean by a worshipful life. Ask yourself, does it smell good to God?
47:14 And this uh topic of uh worship actually is a huge one actually requiring many servants if you want to dwell on it at
47:20 any length. Nevertheless, I want to just offer you two thoughts uh about worship
47:26 uh arising from from Matthew chapter 2. Okay. So I'm going to draw from Matthew chapter 2 and offer you two thoughts
47:32 about worship. Firstly, if we accept that Jesus is king, then
47:38 our worship will be marked by reverence and awe.
47:44 We will readily and willingly honor him and exalt him and magnify him.
47:51 If we accept that Jesus is king, his will will be so important to us. His
47:58 words will be so important to us. But is that the case in our walk with
48:04 Jesus? Now to to use uh the example of my family again, I've always taught them
48:12 that we live by a value system based on Judeo-Christian principles. Very clear
48:18 teaching upbringing. They know very well our principles based on Judeo-Christian
48:24 traditions. Uh including honoring your parents.
48:30 And I tell them that if you honor me as your father, then you would take what I say seriously.
48:36 Because often what I say to them they just brush aside or they ignore and sometimes they do listen but only if
48:42 it is convenient or agreeable to them. You those of you are parents you you you
48:49 have gone through the same thing and so I have to remind them that that if you listen to me only because you agree with
48:56 me then you are then I am a friend to you not my not a father to you because
49:01 you know with friends you can agree or disagree right? So you treat me like a friend. I know. You can agree or don't
49:06 agree. If you agree, you listen. If you don't agree, you brush aside. Parenting 101.
49:14 So I come from this angle. You know, you you agree, you listen to me whether
49:20 or not you agree with me or not. I'm not asking for your consent or agreement. You do it because I am your father.
49:29 You know why I talk about this? Because we like to sing the song. What a friend we have in Jesus.
49:37 It's a favorite among Christians and the lyrics are so comforting and encouraging especially if you're going through a
49:42 tough time. And I love the words of this song and also the tune. But if we sing this too much or if this only thing we
49:48 sing then we may lose our balance in terms of our perception of who Jesus really is. Yes, he is a friend. I I
49:56 fully agree with you on that. But at the same time, don't forget he's also the king of kings and lord of lords.
50:03 and we must approach him with reverence and all. So this is the first lesson on worship
50:08 from Matthew 2. Secondly, if we acknowledge that Jesus is savior, then
50:15 our worship will be characterized by thanksgiving and uh praise. We'll be so
50:22 grateful and appreciative of what he has done. Our hearts will leap in joy and in
50:27 songs when we realize that when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. We were
50:33 wretched sinners, lost and condemned. But yet God extended his grace and his love to us.
50:39 But unfortunately, none of this, you know, uh shows up in the in the way we worship for example during uh Sunday
50:47 corporate worship. I think we are generally too stiff. I
50:52 think I have to reflect on that too. Now to use a simple analogy, if if
50:59 you're drowning in the sea and you are seconds from death and and someone comes and saves you, you will be grateful to
51:06 him until the day you die. Correct? And the psalmist writes in Psalm 9:1, I
51:12 will give thanks to you, Lord, with all my heart. I will tell of all your wonderful deeds.
51:20 And Hebrews 13:15 says, "Through Jesus, therefore, we continually offer to God a
51:25 sacrifice of praise, the the fruit of lips that openly profess his name."
51:33 So in summary, uh although worship encompasses many aspects as an extension of what we have learned today from our
51:39 text, our worship or rather our our life of worship must be typified by reverence
51:45 and gratitude. Reverence will lead to obedience.
51:51 Gratitude will result in humility. And then only will our lives rise up like a
51:58 sweet aroma pleasing to God. And you think of the frankincense.
52:04 In closing, I would like to uh revisit uh what I saw from my hotel window in
52:09 Hong Kong. I promise to to address this at the end of the sermon.
52:15 Up on this building was this sign that says Jesus is Lord.
52:21 Down below on the streets were the multitudes going about their busy lives and their pressing schedules. Any one of
52:28 us could be one of them. I wonder how many looked up and saw the
52:34 sign. I wonder I wonder how many saw the sign but ignored it. And I wonder how
52:41 many saw the sign and responded to it. You see, the wise men saw also saw a
52:47 sign, but in the sky, the star of Bethlehem. They responded to it by
52:53 coming to worship Jesus. I also wonder if there were other people
52:58 at that time who also saw this star. If they did, I wonder if they ignore it or
53:03 they responded to it. But the wise men made the thousand-mi journey from
53:08 possibly Persia or Babylon all the way to Jerusalem looking for baby Jesus so
53:14 that they could bow down and worship him from verse 11 of our text. And during
53:20 this Christmas season as we celebrate the birth of Jesus, perhaps God has a sign for you.
53:27 It may be in the form of a verse or or passage of scripture or the lyrics of a
53:33 Christmas carol or the spoken words in a sermon or perhaps just the quiet
53:39 prompting of the Holy Spirit when you see this sign. Would you respond in
53:45 worship like the wise men? Or are we like the people in Guangzo and Hong
53:50 Kong, too engrossed in our buying and selling, our going and coming, our
53:57 eating and drinking that we fail to see this star. Shall we close in prayer?
54:04 Father in heaven, in the final analysis, the story of the magi is not about the
54:11 magi. is all about your son who came as savior and who will come again as king.
54:18 At the end of the day, what really matters is not the activities that crowd our lives, but how we ought to respond
54:24 in worship of our Lord and Savior. May your spirit lead us in sober reflection
54:30 as we usher in this Christmas. For we ask this in Jesus name. Amen.
