Word of Salvation – Vol.52 No.46 – December 2007
Jesus: King Of The Jews, King Of The Nations
(A Christmas sermon)
A Sermon by Rev John De Jongh on Matthew 2:1-12
Reading: Luke 2:1-20
Songs: 264; 257; 270; 255; 282; 265
Dear congregation, family and friends…
What is Christmas all about? Isn’t it about remembering Jesus born in a stable to Mary and Joseph, laid in a manger, and celebrated by angels and shepherds? A surprising thing is that Matthew doesn’t even mention most of those things. In fact he doesn’t even describe the birth – it gets a quick mention in the last verse of chapter 1, and now in the first verse of chapter 2 the time could already be up to 2 years after the birth.
But in spite of that, Matthew says an awful lot about who Jesus is. From chapter 1, you see that Jesus is a new beginning – a fresh start who makes good where Adam failed. He’s a new king of the Jews, descended from King David. And most importantly of all he’s the One who will save his people from their sin. And so God gave him the name Jesus, which means ‘He will save’.
And having introduced all of that, where do you go from there? There are another two questions that Matthew answers in this passage: If Jesus is really king of the Jews, what about King Herod? And then secondly, is Jesus only the king of the Jews, or is his kingdom even bigger than that?
Point 1: Jesus or Herod?
The first verse here already brings up the first question: Who is the real king of the Jews? Jesus was born at the time of King Herod. Apparently Herod was king. Maybe Jesus was the rightful heir to David’s throne, but there hadn’t been a king on David’s throne for 600 years. As far as the rest of the world was concerned, Herod was king of the Jews. And so, when you get to chapter 27 of Matthew’s gospel where Jesus stands before Pilate on trial for his life, the question Pilate asks is still, ‘Are you the king of the Jews?’
Herod here is officially, as far as the Romans are concerned, the king of the Jews. But Herod is dead-scared that he won’t he holding on to that title for much longer! As soon as he hears the news from the Magi about the birth of a new king of the Jews, he’s worried.
Why should he even trust the Magi, who are they anyway? And as far as we can tell, they were probably astrologers from Babylon. There’s every chance they got their information about a long-awaited king of the Jews from the Jews who stayed there after the exile, and who also still looked forward to the coming Messiah.
As well as that they May have known something of Balaam’s prophecy in Numbers 24, ‘A star will come out of Jacob; a sceptre will rise out of Israel. … A ruler will come out of Jacob… ‘
It’s likely that they put various pieces of information together to come to their conclusion, and God used it to lead them to the belief that they’d seen a sign in the heavens, a star, that meant that the new king was born.
How realistic is it to believe the account of this moving star? There actually have been a number of ancient historical accounts of particular stars that were believed to announce the birth of great men. So the idea wasn’t exactly something new. The fact that it moved isn’t something that happens every day, but God simply provided in a miraculous way, in the same way that he’s done so many other times in history, to work out his plan.
Who is this king Herod? And he was actually Herod the Great, the first Herod in his short dynasty.
And you might know that he had problems. One of them was that he wasn’t actually a Jew himself. And so he wasn’t really accepted as king by the Jews. The Roman Empire had given him his position and they had no choice. As well as that he was a ruthless murderer. Whoever might be a threat to his throne risked losing their life – and it only got worse as he grew older. So you can understand why he wasn’t the most loved man in Israel.
But getting back to the question of who was the true king of the Jews. You can understand why the Magi come to King Herod. The obvious place to look for a new born king is the royal palace. But Herod didn’t know anything about it.
When Herod asks the religious leaders where a new king might be born, they take him to Micah 5:2 – the Christ would be born in Bethlehem, in the land of Judah.
So who was the true king of the Jews – Herod, or Jesus? And as far as God was concerned, it was Jesus. So Herod should have been willing to accept that, and bow to this long-awaited Messiah, born king of the Jews. He should have been willing to give up his throne to the rightful king if that was what it took, even though, as it turned out, Jesus’ kingdom wasn’t of this world anyway. But true to his nature Herod’s only concern was to get rid of the competition. Fortunately God had other ideas. But what Herod should have done was follow the Magi’s example, find the child, and acknowledge him as king, rather than try to get rid of him.
We can make the same mistake. We can make Christmas so sentimental that we forget about the earth-shattering significance of who Jesus is – the claim he has on us. A part of celebrating Christmas is enjoying family and friends, good food, presents, lights, carols, and all of that. But at the heart of that we need to be celebrating that Jesus is King – the rightful king, then, and now, and forever. Herod should have accepted that, and we need to accept it. We need to live for him, in everything, giving him first place in our lives, obeying him in everything! Or else we make Herod’s mistake, going through the motions of being interested, but all the while really just doing our own thing. What is your relationship with Jesus like?
Point 2: King of Jews only, or more?
What about the second question before us? Is Jesus only the king of the Jews, or is he even more than that? A good place to start answering that question is to ask why Matthew includes this trip of the Magi in his gospel at all. None of the other gospel writers have it. And as you read his gospel with that in the back of your mind, you start to see that Jesus isn’t only born King of the Jews, he’s born King of the nations, King of the world, King of creation.
After all, where do these Magi come from? They come from another country, in fact a country that not too long before controlled Israel, but now Magi from there are coming to bow down and worship Jesus.
Matthew’s emphasis here continues a theme that runs through the whole Bible that the nations will one day be blessed through Israel. It’s there already in God’s covenant promises to Abraham in Genesis 12, ‘that all nations of the earth will be blessed through you.’
And even though it’s often hard to see in the Old Testament, there are sparks here and there of the nations being blessed. Like when the Queen of Sheba came to visit King Solomon after she’d heard about his fame and his relationship with the LORD, and his wisdom. She came to see for herself, bringing a huge amount of spices, gold, and precious stones as a gift. Solomon shared his wisdom with her, and she praised God because of it all. As a present to her, Solomon gave her whatever she wanted. The end result was at least one nation blessed by God through Israel.
In fact, Jesus referred to the Queen of Sheba again himself during his ministry. The religious leaders were asking him for a miraculous sign to prove he was the Messiah, ignoring everything else he’d already done and said. Jesus said, ‘The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon’s wisdom, and now one greater than Solomon is here.’
And so in Jesus all of this is coming to fulfilment. Psalm 72 also says about him, ‘He will rule from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth. … All kings will bow down to him and all nations will serve him.’ Isaiah 60 says, ‘Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD rises upon you. … Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn.’
And as well as that, Psalm 72 mentions that gold from Sheba will be given him. Isaiah 60 mentions that all from Sheba will come, bearing gold and incense. Psalm 45, another psalm fulfilled in Jesus, shows that myrrh is another gift fit for the Messianic king.
These prophecies begin to be fulfilled in the Magi from the east, with their gifts of gold and spices. They’re the small beginning of the nations acknowledging Jesus as their King, the King of the world.
In the birth and ministry of Jesus, God’s blessing continues to go out to the nations – at first just a trickle to people like the Samaritan woman, the Garasene demoniac, and the sick and demon possessed in Phoenicia as Jesus travels there with his disciples.
And then at Pentecost the trickle of blessing bursts into a flood as the gospel is heard by thousands of Jews from Gentile countries who took it back home with them. And then a church springs up in Antioch. And Paul takes the gospel out into the Roman Empire. And it begins to go out to the ends of the earth. And that process continues even today.
Revelation 21 shows the completed work of God in Christ. It says that after Jesus comes again, ‘The [New Jerusalem] doesn’t need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendour into it.’
And so you start to see here in this passage about the Magi that God’s promise of blessing to the nations is fulfilled in Jesus. The whole world is ultimately blessed through him, so that the angels that visited the shepherds could sing ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favour rests.’
Conclusion
The message of Christmas does include a baby born in a stable, angels, shepherds, wise men, and all the things that we normally remember at Christmas. But more important than the details is their significance. Matthew in his first chapter helps us to see that Jesus is a new creation, a new Israel, a new King of the Jews – in Jesus there is a new beginning. And today we’ve seen that he’s not only King of the Jews, but King of all nations, king over the whole world.
And so the call to everyone of us, to everyone around the world, is to bow to him, serve him, commit to him, live for him. Herod is an example of someone who wouldn’t do that. The Magi are a pointer to those who would. The question for us is: Whose example will we follow?
Amen