Late For the Party

Mt 02 01-12 Late For the Party

Have you ever opened up a Christmas gift and thought, what in the world is this?

Why in the world would anyone ever give a gift like this?

Did I tear the paper, or can I tape it back up and re-gift it to somebody else?

Mary and Joseph must have been wondering something similar.

"Who are these well-dressed wise men, and why are they bringing our poor baby these expensive presents?

Huggies? No.

Gold, frankincense and myrrh.

Gold – Joseph’s thinking, “College Fund.”

Gold is for kingship, earthly kingship.

You brought the king your very best, your most valuable possessions.

So the wise men brought gold.

OK, frankincense and myrrh.

This is so cool.

One of our members brought me hand lotion, “Frankincense and Myrrh.”

Staying moisturized – very wise.

Frankincense.

Now, there’s an odd little gift.

Spellcheck on my computer always wants to turn it into Frankenstein.

THAT would have made the Bible different.

Frankincense is a kind of very strong incense.

It was used by the priests who performed the rituals that brought the people closer to God (and vice versa).

The Temple reeked of frankincense.

So frankincense had a priestly significance.

It symbolized Jesus' priestly role as the one who would bring the people closer to God (and vice versa).

Which is exactly what Jesus does for us.

He brings us closer to God, and he brings God closer to us.

And something else about frankincense.

It was often used in religious services to anoint infants or individuals who were recognized as moving to a new phase in their religious lives.

In the baby Jesus, all the world was moving to a new phase in its religious life, hence, the frankincense.

Myrrh was another kind of incense, even stronger than frankincense.

Myrrh was incredibly valuable, worth more than its weight in gold.

But if frankincense was for the start of life, myrrh was for life’s end.

Myrrh was used for embalming, and was burned at funerals.

Myrrh symbolizes a foreshadowing of Christ's earthly death.

 

So the gifts were more than just Christmas presents.

They were part of the good news of the gospel.

They symbolized far more than they were worth because they described who Jesus was.

An earthly king - a heavenly king.

A priest, a mediator, a Messiah who would bring God and the people closer together.

And, they symbolized that this baby would grow up into a person whose death would be very, very significant.

OK, so why wise men?

Who were they, and why are they here?

This is a question that's bugged people for centuries.

The Bible says they were magi.

That's short for magician.

Actually, magi were more like what we'd call fortune-tellers; they looked at the stars and predicted the future.

We'd call them astrologers.

We kind of poo-poo astrology and horoscopes - except when they're right.

(“Oh look, Herb. Your horoscope says you’re an overweight middle-aged man who reached his prime his senior year of high school. Spooky.”)

But, more than mere fortune-tellers, the magi were men of science, at least as much science as you had back then.

They were the Ph.D.’s with facial hair.

It bothered people that such wise men had no names.

So around the Eighth Century AD, someone came up with Balthazar, Gaspar and Melchior.

They sound like friends of Sheldon on Big Bang Theory.

But still, that wasn't enough.

The idea that they were magi-icians bothered people.

Except for these few verses, the Bible says nothing nice about magi, magician-types.

Like, stone them to death.

So somewhere along the way, the magi were morphed into kings.

In 1857, the Rev. John Henry Hopkins, Jr. wrote the hymn, "We Three Kings of Orient Are," for a Christmas pageant in New York City.

And pretty much every Christmas pageant since then has had the three kings visiting at the manger, in their bathrobes.

But even that's different, because for the previous eighteen hundred and fifty-seven years, tradition had them arriving sometime after Joseph and Mary had moved out of the manger.

For more than a thousand years, the church had them arriving on the last of the Twelve Days of Christmas, which would be January 6, the holy day we Protestants call, Tuesday.

Christmas? That was a long time ago.

Back before the TaxSlayer Bowl.

Which explains why people would slide the three kings back to December 25.

But even that’s not quite right because the Bible never says there were three.

The Bible never gives any number.

There were three gifts, but there could have been any number of wise men.

There could have been more.

Could have been six. Could have been two.

The Bible doesn't say.

All we know for sure is that they were foreigners from the East (Gentiles, pagans, not Jews).

We know they followed the star.

And we know they brought Jesus gifts fit for a king.

The Bible’s story of the magi is a lot simpler than we make it.

Christmas Season does NOT begin the day after Halloween.

The official church season of Christmas begins on Christmas Day and ends twelve days later, January 6.

Why is why some churches with unpopular pastors don’t sing Christmas carols until after Christmas Eve.

The wise men arrive during the work week and we don’t even notice.

But on the official church calendar, January 6 is the holiday, the holy day, called Epiphany.

About once a year, someone asks me, "What's Epiphany?"

This is one of those questions ministers just live for.

Someone will ask, "What's Epiphany?" and I'll say,

"It's the day when the unspecified number of unnamed wise men who weren't kings but were probably Gentile astrologers came late to visit the baby Jesus in a place that wasn't the manger."

Which explains why I'm only asked once a year, and never twice by the same person.

Epiphany means a flash of insight, an appearance or manifestation.

An epiphany is an “Aha” Moment, a God moment, when you “get it.”

An epiphany is a moment when you feel like your eyes have opened for the very first time,

when you may not be able to explain what you just realized about God

but when you know you know.

You just know.

Now.

The gospel writer, Matthew – who is the only gospel writer to include the magi in the Christmas story – Matthew was Jewish, like really Jewish.

Matthew was an Old Testament kind of guy.

For Matthew, if it wasn’t Jewish, it wasn’t worth much.

And yet, he’s the only gospel writer to include these Gentile, pagan magi.

Under normal circumstances, Matthew would have crossed the street to avoid these guys.

And yet, he not only includes them in the gospel, he has them helping define who Jesus is.

Imagine.

“Imagine there’s no countries… and no religion, too.”

It’s a very John Lennon kind of moment.

Matthew – good, Jewish Matthew – is sneaking in a little heresy, here.

It’s not just that on Epiphany the eyes of the world might have peeked open just a little bit to understand who the Baby Jesus is…

it’s also that the new Christian world, the people who remembered and wrote the gospels – Matthew – might also have had his eyes opened just a little bit to understand that maybe, just maybe…

some unspecified number of unnamed pseudo-scientific, strange-skinned, chronically late magicians… even people like these might have something to teach Christians about Jesus.

Epiphany.

What people, or what group of people, would you think would be the last people in the world to teach you something about Jesus?

Maybe they’re kings in disguise.

Maybe they’re gospel preachers, disguised as the absolute last people you’d expect to know more than you about Our Lord.

Those strangely wise people, strange-looking, strangely accented, strangely appearing from the East or some other place…

…the “Those People,” of the world.

Wouldn’t it be weird if, over time, they snuck into your personal manger scene?

Over time, you might have an epiphany,

You might see that all this time, it’s not the kings that were late for the party, but you.

Every year there’s this, “War On Christmas.”

These signs that say, “Keep Christ in Christmas.”

Because, if he broke out and got into Hanukkah, who KNOWS what might happen.

Oy vey.

I think what people are trying to say is don’t let Christmas get diluted or polluted by foreign substances or political idealists, or, God forbid, foreign people who don’t look or talk or dress like us.

But what’s weird is that the manger has always been visited by strangers.

The manger’s bigger than petty politics, even bigger than one religion.

A group of people figured that out a long time ago, and – guess what – they’re in the Bible.

And the Bible calls them, “wise.”

That’s kind of a mind-blowing epiphany.

As you put away the decorations, as you find places for the presents, as you calculate the re-gifting and good-willing, remember

Remember that there are going to be reminders of Christmas coming from strange people, in unexpected ways.

Remember that Christ won’t stay in Christmas, no matter how hard we try to shove him in that box.

Jesus is going to keep sneaking out, and sneaking into our days, on Tuesday, and Wednesday, and every other day.

Jesus might be late for the party.

But he’ll get there.