Dennis Tuuri

# Sermon Transcript
## Reformation Covenant Church | Pastor Dennis Tuuri
## January 6, 1984

Today’s sermon text is found in Matthew 2:1-11. While we had originally decided to preach on something else a week or so ago, John S. prevailed upon me last Sunday after church to speak on Epiphany. So I have changed the topic. Let you know by email. Those of you that have email, we don’t want to flip from this baby boy, flee away or leave him too soon. We want to conclude the Christmas season with a consideration of the coming of the magi and the implications of this to what we do today, the celebration of Epiphany.

So, please stand for the reading of Matthew 2:1-11, a very familiar set of scripture to us.

Now, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the east and have come to worship him.”

When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled and all Jerusalem with him. And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. So they said to him, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it is written by the prophet, but you Bethlehem in the land of Judea are not the least among the rulers of Judah. For out of you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.”

Then Herod, when he had secretly called the wise men, determined from them what time the star appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the young child. And when you have found him, bring back word to me that I may come and worship him also.”

When they heard the king, they departed, and behold, 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 exceedingly great joy. And when they had 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 gifts to him, gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Let’s pray.

Father, we thank you, Lord God, for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you for this account and for the coming of the wise men to worship him. We pray, Father, that as we begin our new year liturgically here at this church and as we look forward to the opening of yet another year in our lives, that you would bless us, Father, with an understanding of Christ, what he has accomplished. Help us, Father, to determine to be with that boy, that king, that priest reigning from the manger for the rest of our lives. Help us to love him, Lord God, as our savior and to serve him as our king. And to that end, we pray that you would bless our understanding of this text now to us. In Christ’s name we ask it. Amen.

Please be seated.

Well, hopefully you noticed that the songs, the Scripture readings, call to confession, call to worship, assurance of forgiveness, all have to do with light. Today, got my tie on to remind you all that Epiphany is a celebration of the revelation or manifestation of the Lord Jesus Christ, the appearing. And it’s celebrated in different contexts. You know, we’re a very impoverished people culturally and liturgically because of our failure to understand the church calendar and the associations it makes between the times of our lives and the life of the Lord Jesus Christ and the implications for the world.

I think that we’re impoverished because we don’t know these things. So, New Year’s becomes just another time to sort of do what the rest of the world does and enjoy. That’s good following Christ’s birth. But, you know, we don’t think for instance that one of the great associations made in church history is between the coming of or the new year rather January 1st, the 8th day after December 25th and the circumcision of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And circumcision represents the rolling away of the old and the coming of the new. It represents clearly in scripture a new creation. And so every year is marked or should be marked I think by a consideration of that in the circumcision of Jesus 8 days after the celebration of his birth. We have this festival reminding us of the rolling away of the old man and the coming of the new man. Not that Jesus was sinful but he took upon himself the uncleanness of his people and so submits to circumcision as a tiny boy.

Showing us that God has definitively rolled away the curse and the coming of the new man has been accomplished. The work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Of course, circumcision also points to the beginning of the letting of blood, so to speak, the sacrificial work of the savior that will find its fullness on the cross in the wounds to his hands, his feet, and his side. And there are medieval songs about this.

We tried to sing one here a couple years ago, I think, at a New Year’s Eve service or something, and it didn’t work too well. The tune is “Greensleeves,” but in one verse, it talks about this that let’s celebrate the circumcision of Christ, and let’s think about his sorrowing for our sin and taking care of that sin by his death. And then it speaks of the wounds to his hands, feet and side.

So this fullness of man, four points of the human body represented by our savior suffering for us. And as a result, a renewed call to sanctification in the new year. It’s the kind of things that would serve as proper and useful meditations for our celebrations of festivals. Because we don’t know these things, we’re sort of impoverished.

Well, it’s good to remind ourselves of Epiphany. Now, what I was going to talk upon today which is teachability and humility before God at the beginning of the new year. I’ll speak on this next week if you’re taking notes today. I’ll have Isaac send this out as an email as well. But this will be a topical sermon in two weeks. We’ll talk about teachability. We’ll use some of the scriptures: Proverbs 17:10, 9 verses, chapter 9:8 and 9 of Proverbs 13:1, 15:5, 19:25, Proverbs 27:22, and then Psalm 141:5, and Revelation 3:19. We’ll put these out early in the week as an email.

I know that some of you prepare for the sermons by reading the scripture text. And those will be texts that you could read in family worship or devotionally on your own to prepare for the sermon next week as we consider what this desire to be in union with Christ as we enter into this new year, this finding not from the baby boy means for us today.

Today we’re talking about Epiphany. Epiphany literally means manifestation or revealing. Used to be in some books you’d read, oh, I had an epiphany. You know, the light bulb turned on, the light comes, you move from darkness to light in terms of an understanding of something, you have an epiphany. It’s an appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now the way the church has developed over time is you have the western church and the eastern church. Now by the way I’ve talked about the fixed cycle and the fixed feast and the movable feast of the church, right? So we know the Epiphany is always a set day January 6. What set day is Ash Wednesday or Good Friday or Lent or Pentecost Sunday? We don’t have them because it moves in relationship to the feast of the resurrection. But the feasts that move in terms of the advent of Christ is incarnation. Those are fixed by date: December 25th. Epiphany is the conclusion of the Christmas season.

So the church has taught over the years: December 6th or January 6th rather, the 12th day of Christmas. This is where the whole origins of the 12 days of Christmas are. Goes from December 25th to Epiphany, January 6th.

Now the two churches as they grew up geographically, they didn’t have planes and trains and buses and automobiles. So there was a development of church in more of a regional area. The eastern church tended to celebrate Epiphany as the baptism of Christ when he was 30 years old. And you can think of that John saw the dove descending, spirit of God descending like a dove. Jesus is manifested to the world. It begins to do his works. So the manifestation of Christ in the eastern church is celebrated at in terms of a remembrance of his baptism in the Jordan River.

In the western church, however, the Epiphany celebration is tied to the coming of the Magi. And here the idea is pretty clear: you see the Gentiles coming in some form whoever they were whatever they were doing coming and then the light of Christ represented by the star being manifested to them. So it’s the manifestation of who Jesus is at the beginning of his life as opposed to the beginning of his ministry.

The third event that people will also celebrate in various communions at Epiphany is the wedding feast at Cana in Galilee because it says in John’s gospel this is the first incident where Jesus begin to show forth who he is to reveal to cause an epiphany to occur of what’s going to happen. And that’s pretty good for reasons as we’ll see as we get through the text a little bit. This focus on the marriage feast at Cana in Galilee fits right in, I think, with an understanding of our text today and what happened.

There are many places you can go on the internet for customs and practices of Epiphany. Some of them are very explicitly related to the story we read today, and some not, all around the world. Different Christian communions have celebrated Epiphany as a way to remember certain things about the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and what it means.

So Epiphany is January 6th. The celebration of Epiphany is the Sunday closest to that or just before that. So January 4th is Epiphany Sunday in the church calendar at this point of time. It’s the conclusion of the 12 days of Christmas. And as I say, for our purposes, we want to look at the coming of the Magi.

We stand more in the tradition of the West than the East. We could do either not being bound to either of these traditions but today I’ve decided to talk on the coming of the magi a very familiar story and one that has great significance for us and what I want to do is first of all talk about some of the Old Testament prefigurements that are fulfilled in the coming of the magi and then help us to kind of fill in the story then I want us to kind of correct some misperceptions about the story some things that we probably don’t have right or we don’t know that they’re right or not and then I want to talk about kind of the implications of what the story really is telling us in terms of the meanings we should draw from the account given to us in Matthew 2.

So first we have some Old Testament prefigurements of Matthew 2:1-11.

We sang you know Psalm 97, Psalm 98 the coming of the Lord. By the way Psalm 98 is a very strong testimony in favor of the use of musical instruments in worship because at the center of Psalm 98 which is at the center of the fourth book of the psalter there is a breaking forth in joy accompanied by musical instruments.

Now, that’s said in the context of the rest of the psalm that talks about the coming of Jesus not just to the Jews or the priestly people, but to all the world and all the ends of the earth are seen as being affected by this coming that’s described in Psalm 98. And so, the time of the incoming, the infilling of the Gentile nations as Jesus comes to affect the final fulfillment of the covenant is a time that’s supposed to be celebrated with musical instruments and joy.

And so this joy is more enhanced if we understand the significance of what the coming of Christ meant. And all too often today in the Christian church, we sort of that significance is kind of blurred because we don’t understand the fulfillment of these Old Testament texts.

Well, we know that first of all that the prediction that Bethlehem would be the place of his birth is from Micah 5:1-4. Where we read that you Bethlehem of Ephrathah, house of bread, place of fruitfulness, picture through the Lord’s supper through you. Though you are little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall come forth to me the one to be ruler in Israel. So this is one of those texts that they would look at and they could tell Herod, well, here’s where he’s going to be born in Bethlehem in the land of Ephrathah or Judea, which is the larger region.

And what will come forth from there to be ruler in Israel whose goings forth are from of old and from everlasting. And then very significantly, what does that text tell us will be the result of Jesus coming and being born in Bethlehem?

“He will come therefore he shall give them up until the time that she who is in labor has given birth. Coming of Christ and birth. Then the remnant of his brethren shall return to the children of Israel. He shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the Lord in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God and they shall abide for now he shall be great unto the ends of the earth.”

So we have the magi coming from you know typically or pictorially literary device from the ends of the earth. The fulfillment is that Jesus has come and once he comes the increase of his kingdom will continue. He’ll be great unto the ends of the earth. There’s no picture here that we’re going to look at something that doesn’t have worldwide impact. And in fact, just the reverse is very explicitly told to us.

The end result of the one who was born in Bethlehem will be that he will be great until the ends of the earth. So all the world will be affected by the coming of the one in Bethlehem.

In Numbers chapter 24, we have this prediction of this star that the magi see. This is from Balaam in Numbers 24:15-23 and this is the picture of one and it’s interesting that it starts the utterance of the man whose eyes are open and then again the one who falls down with eyes wide open. So Balaam is a picture of a man who has been in darkness but God sovereignly oversees him and his predictions and prophecies. He’s been asked to curse Israel. He cannot curse Israel. It will be blessed. He is the man who’s had eyes wide opened by the coming of the great light, so to speak.

“I see him, Balaam says, but not now. I behold him, but not near.”

So, this is a prediction of something will happen some years from when Balaam gives this prophecy.

“But a star shall come out of Judah. A scepter shall rise out of Israel and batter the brow of Moab and destroy all the sons of tumult.”

So, the star will come out of Israel, the star that will lead the wise men to there. And this star will then branch out and begin to destroy all the enemies of God’s people.

“Verse 9, out of Jacob, one shall have dominion and destroy the remains of the city.”

And he looks upon various enemies to God, then Amalek and others, and said, “You’re all going to be destroyed with the coming of this star.” And the star then shining forth and conquering all of God’s enemies.

So the prediction of Bethlehem is a reminder that Jesus will be great to all the ends of the earth. The picture of the star is a reminder that one has come who will batter in pieces all of his opponents.

Then we have Isaiah 60, which we read responsively. This is the one that speaks most explicitly, I suppose, as a prophecy of the coming of the wise men. And I’m sure you noticed that as you read it responsively.

“Verse 3, the Gentiles shall come to your light.”

The magi are Gentiles, not Jews. They come to the light that leads them to the Lord Jesus Christ.

“The wealth of the Gentiles shall come to you in verse 5. The multitude of camels over your land, the dromedaries of Midian and Ephah, all those from Sheba shall come. They shall bring gold and incense.”

So, here we have it, right? The Gentiles are coming to the light. They’re bringing gold and frankincense. They’re riding on camels. Now, there’s no note of camels in the Matthew 2 text. But this is why we always think of the wise men as riding on camels because Isaiah says the camels will cover your land and they’ll bring those Gentiles to the light of what God has accomplished here in the coming of Christ. And they’ll bring presents. They’ll bring gold, gold and frankincense for this one who comes.

“So, they’ll glorify the house of my glory, God says in Isaiah 60.”

And again here, the whole point of this is that what’s going to happen in Bethlehem with the coming of the star is something of worldwide significance. It’s a postmillennial section of scripture. It teaches that the coming of Christ is the beginning of the visible manifestation of the reign of Christ upon the whole earth and all the earth will be affected by this.

So the coming of the magi is a little prefigurement of what everything else will happen in history. All the Gentiles will flow up to the house of the Lord at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. So these are the Old Testament prophecies that are fulfilled in the account we just read from Matthew 2. And what they teach us is that something that is great has happened. It teaches us just what the church has celebrated for 2,000 years.

That Epiphany is the revelation of Christ to the world because of this world missions is also a frequent theme of Epiphany celebrations and sermons because the clear implication of all the texts is the gospel will go out the nations will be discipled the way Matthew begins the Gentiles are coming to the light of Christ representing all the nations the way Matthew ends is a commission to go into all the ends of the earth and to take the light of the Lord Jesus Christ with us so this has been a common association until more modern times when things become more sentimentalized because we don’t want to believe that Jesus has come and affected victory in the context of the whole world.

So Micah talks about Jesus being born in Bethlehem. Isaiah talks about the wise men coming on camels. Another profitable association I mentioned on your outline is this looking at how the gospel of Matthew is structured and there is this presence to the Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew chapter 2. And you remember that Joseph of Arimathea anoints or actually he’s anointed by others with him placed in an expensive tomb at his death at the end of Matthew’s gospel begins with the system of genealogies looking at the past concludes with the great commission looking toward the future begins with Christ with the account of Mary at Jesus’s birth and it ends with Mary after his resurrection it begins with gifts being given to Jesus at his birth the story we’re reading now and it ends with gifts as well in the context of the tomb what happens next of course is that Herod’s going to kill all the kids the angels have warned Jesus’s parents and the wise men.

So Jesus is then taken to Egypt and “out of Egypt I’ll call my son.” So the roles are kind of reversed. We have Gentiles worshiping Christ, the Jews represented by Herod trying to kill Christ at the beginning of this gospel and as a result he has to go to Egypt for safety. Then he comes out of Egypt, right? As a picture of the exodus of God’s true son, Israel, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Well, at the end Jesus is going to affect a greater exodus, the final and definitive exodus, the final and definitive movement away from slavery to sin, death, the result of sin. We’re going to come out of Egypt definitively as the Lord Jesus dies and then is raised up for his people. So, in preparation for this first exodus, so to speak, we have these gifts given to him to perhaps help with the cost of the journey. And at the last, the great exodus that this is a prefigurement of, we have gifts given in the context of his tomb as well.

So, we have this wonderful picture in terms of the whole presentation of this opening gospel account that the Lord Jesus will provide an exodus, a defeat of sin and death and hell, a rolling back of that will have its impact upon all the corners of the earth from the magi to the great commission.

So we have a wondrous text here. We have a text that we can look at and contemplate and remain with Jesus as we think about it the way John was one of those who remained. Peter was to follow. John pondered the things. Mary ponders the things. These are wondrous truths of this text we’ve just read that we ponder and we think about we give God praise and glory for and we delight in, we rejoice in.

But we want to go a little further than that and make our pondering a little deeper. We want to clear up some misconceptions of the story of the wise men that we have. And most of our associations, I suppose at least a lot of them come from the song “We Three Kings of Orient Are.”

And the picture is the wise men come the same that night as the shepherds. And you have nativity scenes that put shepherds and wise men and everybody there at the same time. Now that’s not a bad thing to do. As long as you recognize that there’s a time gap. The shepherds aren’t there the same time as the magi. In all indications, the magi are there probably when Jesus is about a year or so, between a year and two years old, maybe 6 months at the earliest, because Herod then goes and slaughters all the children, the slaughter of the innocents, those who are 2 years old and younger.

So the time of the appearing of the star when Jesus is born until the time that the magi come is some period of time. So, you know, it’s okay to have a nativity set and set this stuff up as long as you recognize and teach your children that this all didn’t happen in one night. This is the coming of the magi a little bit later and we know that as I said from the historical account of Herod’s slaughter of the innocents.

We think of our children typically think that there were three kings we three kings of Orient are but the text doesn’t say that. The text remember last week when we looked at John’s description of what Jesus actually said about him and what he would do and how he would remain careful look at the details of the text of scripture and the text doesn’t say there were three kings. It says that there were wise men who came not kings and it gives them as an unnumbered group. We associate three kings because there are three gifts given and so we think that there were these three kings and we’ve even given names to them historically and that may be accurate but it may not be.

There’s an unnumbered group of priests not kings. It is possible that these men were Zoroastrians of some sort. At least they were gentile god-fearers. They were gentile men who wanted to worship the advent of Messiah. And they knew the scriptures that God had provided to the Jews as the people were supposed to give them to the Gentiles. They knew those scriptures well enough that this star would come and announce the coming of Messiah and they came to worship him.

So these are not some pagan guys. It’s representing the gentile god-fearing nations coming to the Lord Jesus Christ. Now they were wise men from Midian, from Persia, from the east. And so what we know about these guys is they were probably not kings. They were certainly not kings. They were a priestly class of men. They had a priestly understanding of things. This is what they were doing. Now they do come to worship the king of the Jews.

But right away in the story, if we think about who they are and we know our history and we know that the gentile god-fearers were represented by these priests that these are priestly men who come in terms of their understanding of the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. That don’t have significance for us. Much of the Old Testament can be fleshed out with a fuller understanding of how God worked in the context of gentile nations.

We know that Cyrus, for instance, who desired to have the temple rebuilt and take care of God’s people, was taught personally by this man named Zoroaster. Zoroaster worshiped a god of fire. Now, later on in later Zoroastrianism, it became dualistic and polytheistic, two different gods or many gods. But in its original formulation, this was probably not the case. Zoroaster himself was probably influenced heavily by the Jewish scriptures and by Jews in the context of the captivity.

And so Cyrus being taught by Zoroaster himself as a man who wants to help the Jews rebuild the temple to minister on the part of all the earth. So we have this association of the magi descended down from this priestly class of people that understood the significance of light and turning from darkness to light with the coming of Messiah and they come to celebrate the king who is born and so we have that kind of association with these men.

They’re not three kings. They’re a number of priests. We also think of the story about following this star and there’s certainly a star involved. The word used here means star. But this is a very unusual star, isn’t it? This is a star that the text just told us points out a specific house. It travels before them. It moves and then it stops. Right? So, you know, people have tried to say, well, what’s the astronomical significance? What conjunction of planets or stars happened here? And that’s worthwhile. It may well be that God used a conjunction of planets to put a particular bright light in the star in the heavens. But that is not the end of the story because no astronomical event like that will then move and guide and direct them to a particular place and then will certainly not has never in the history of the world pinpointed a specific location, even a city.

Nonetheless, a house in a neighborhood. So, we have a star here that is in a very unusual star. You know, I got this star here remind us of this. But, but the star means something else. John S. in our Christmas Eve service talked about this. And those of you who are there remember maybe what he said. I’ve got some scriptures listed for you that talk about the stars as a tabernacle for the sun.

The Bible says that stars kind of are a dwelling place for the sun by way of biblical symbolism. It’s like a house where the sun lives, right? So, the stars are kind of dwelling places. And there’s text in the scripture that talks about stars as a dwelling place or a tabernacle for a ruler. And I’ve got a citation there from Amos 5:26 along with Acts 7:43. In the Old Testament, isn’t quite as clear as in the Acts text. It’s very clear that the star is seen as a tabernacle for the ruler who dwells in the star.

Now, we don’t think that way. We’re good, you know, intellectual guys who don’t think in terms of biblical imagery, but in biblical imagery, stars are dwelling places for rulers. And so there’s that association. Ultimately it seems like this star, this light from God is one that is the dwelling place of Christ, so to speak, and represents where he is. And I think it could be reasoned, and John did this, I think, in his December in our Christmas Eve service.

It could be very easily taught here that what this star represents is the glory of the one who dwells in it. It represents the glory ultimately of the son of righteousness, the Lord Jesus Christ. He’s the star. The sun is risen with healing in his wings. He rises in the east. The word east here where the gentiles come from the east can also be interpreted correctly the Greek word as the rising up place.

So the picture is that Jesus’s star is in ascendancy. Jesus is rising. The star is his tabernacle or dwelling place and represents his presence with his people. Now in the same way in the Old Testament the presence of God with his people was indicated by a bright light a shining forth a star a tremendous light. You know when God indwelt the tabernacle and the temple bright light comes forth it shine your face cause your face to shine and we’ll be saved.

As they move into where the temple’s going to be built the star the light goes before them. The Shekinah glory of God. And when the tabernacle or temple was the tabernacle was completed. The Shekinah glory fills that structure. Not that light is God. God is not fire. But God manifests himself by way of contrast with our darkened understanding with the brightness of light and his presence.

So we can think of this star not just as an astronomical event as legitimate as that may be but then one that becomes essentially the meaning of all astronomical events that God dwells in the heavens. And the star represents then the presence of God, the Shekinah glory of God shining forth. The star is Christ. It’s his dwelling place. And so it helps us to think not just of some astronomical event that lead men to Jesus, but rather as the very dwelling of Jesus amongst men, which results in this epiphany, this manifestation, this revelation of the presence of God with his people.

Now they come bearing gifts to the star. And here again, maybe a little bit of clearing up of what these things mean. These gifts are commonly taught in terms of kingliness that they’re coming to worship a king. These are kingly gifts and there’s some element of truth to that in the scriptures. Gold of course is the kind of crown the king would wear. Gold represents the glory of the king who reflects the glory of God in heaven. Frankincense and myrrh are common in the Song of Solomon for instance.

The king’s couch is paved with them or associated with them etc. But there are other associations I think that we can more properly make in terms of these specific things. We want to think what does the scripture tell us, you know, for a couple of reasons, right? One, any verse in the scripture has to be understood by the rest of the scripture. We don’t go and think, well, what does gold mean to us?

We don’t think, what does frankincense mean to me? No, we say, well, what how is frankincense used in the rest of the Bible? What associations has God established with gold, frankincense, and myrrh in the scriptures? And it would be profitable at least to meditate upon those and see if they have significance for what God is communicating to us here in these men bringing these gifts.

Secondly, remember that these men were men who knew the Old Testament. They were gentile god-fearers who understood the prophecies that were to come to pass. And we could expect that if they’re going to come and worship the one whose predictions came in the Old Testament of his coming, that their gifts are probably associated with that as well.

And third, these men are coming as priests. And if they’re coming as priests, giving priestly gifts to Christ, then it seems like we ought to try to think about those kind of associations in the Bible as well.

Well, if we think of the priestly associations It’s interesting that we come up with a couple of associations of these three elements coming together in one particular place. Gold of course was the was much of the tabernacle and temple was constructed of gold. Frankincense was burned on the altar, the golden altar of incense and myrrh was used as the anointing oil of both the priests and all the furniture in the tabernacle and temple.

So these associations that we have with these things are not necessarily always in line the scripture. Let me give you one example. Myrrh. We normally think of myrrh in relationship to the death of Christ, right? Because he’s anointed with myrrh as we saw in John’s gospel and others. But if we look at where myrrh is used in the Bible, a association with death is unusual. It’s out of sync with what myrrh has been associated with in most of the Bible.

And I’ve given you some verses that myrrh is typically associated in the Bible with nuptials, with a wedding feast. Song of Solomon has it over and over again that the bride is myrrhed up. Esther is anointed with myrrh for 6 months. Becomes a sweet smelling wife for the emperor. You see, and myrrh, as I said, is used in conjunction with temple services, not in terms of death, but myrrh is anointing things, bringing them to life.

Jesus is given myrrh at the beginning and myrrh at the end, beginning and end of his life. But it is not primarily an association with death. And everything else is unusual. What should seem unusual to us is that myrrh all of a sudden at the end is associated with death. Why is that?

Well, you know, I think that why that is that as we talked about in in our sermon on this portion of John’s gospel is that Jesus comes as the great bridegroom. He’s resurrected and in John’s gospel, he immediately is alone in a garden with a woman. You see, he’s all he’s murdered now. He’s like Solomon in the Song of Solomon. He’s ready for his marriage to the church of Jesus Christ. You see, he’s our great bridegroom. And those associations are what we’re supposed to make.

Jesus becomes king of kings through death and resurrection. And so that’s the association. And when we come to myrrh here, well, we should think of these kind of implications of myrrh in the scriptures.

Gold, you know, what’s the very first usage of the term gold? Well, it has to do with the gold that was not found here, but Adam was supposed to go downstream, get the good gold of the places where it is, and go in and then make things for God. And that’s the association I want us to think of.

I want us to think of these things in terms of where did these three elements come together. Gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And very specifically, I can think of two places and two places only. You might think of others, but I know of two that are predominant, at least in my understanding of these things. And the first one I’ve already touched upon. The tabernacle and then later the temple had two altars.

One was bronze, one was gold. Bronze was in the outer courtyard. The golden was right next to the holy of holies. On that golden altar, this is where the portion of the tribute that involved frankincense was burned. So, we’ve got gold and frankincense on this golden altar. Golden altar, frankincense being burned. And as I said, myrrh was part of this anointing compound, the major fragrance part that was mixed with the oil representing the work of the Holy Spirit.

That then was everything in the tabernacle or temple was then anointed with this myrrh. So, the golden altar has been constructed of gold. It’s been anointed with myrrh and frankincense is put on it to be burned and to ascend up as a sweet smelling savor to God representing the prayers of his people.

There’s where these associations come together. And while it’s perfectly proper to think of these things as with their kingly perspective and kingly emphasis, I think the greater emphasis given a whole Bible approach is to think of priests coming now, gentile priests to the advent of the Lord Jesus Christ that from the Psalms and every other place showed that all the world would come in now to this worship of God and now constituting this new golden altar of incense, so to speak, at the very center of the worship of God in the tabernacle and temple system.

The way you get entrance into the holy place is through the golden altar of incense, the last thing as you move forward. And what they’re doing is they’re bringing the elements of that item to the Lord Jesus Christ. And what I’m suggesting is what’s happening here is God at the very beginning of the account of Christ’s advent is telling us about the new priesthood that the Lord Jesus Christ represents.

And after all, he is the temple, right? We learn that all over the Bible. The temple was a representation ultimately of Christ. “Tear the temple down, I’ll rebuild it.” He was the tabernacle, the dwelling place of God’s people. He’s the one who shines forth from the place. So, what we have are priests coming to a man who now represents and is the new tabernacle or temple of God. They’re bringing items that draw our understanding that he is the focal point of worship.

They’re saying the new priesthood has arrived. Remember, the Levitical priesthood was, we might say, a stewardship priesthood. priesthood that Jesus comes not as a Levitical priest. He comes as a priest after the order of Melchizedek. So the priesthood is changed and the indication of that change of priesthood is given to us here in this epiphany. It’s a revelation to us of how all those great postmillennial prophecies that told us about Bethlehem and the camels and the wise men and the gold and the frankincense where all that stuff comes together.

It’s an epiphany to us that transformation of the world happens in the context of the establishment of the great priest, the Lord Jesus Christ, the great temple. And from that temple, men will go forth and preach the gospel of Christ and take that light into all the world.

Did you notice that in Isaiah 60, it said in the responsive reading that the Gentiles will come in what? Be acceptable sacrifices. How does the word accept that? Verse 7 in your responsive reading.

“Flocks of Kedar come. The rams of Nebaioth shall minister to you. They shall ascend with acceptance on my altar and will glorify the house of my glory.”

The the magi are coming representing the arrival of the gentile nations who will ascend with acceptance on the altar that is the Lord Jesus Christ. And so it seems that the associations were to draw here is that what we have going on at the coming of the magi is the constitution of the new temple of the Lord and then the light that is the dwelling place the Shekinah glory of God that star then transmutes or transforms into as it leads them right to this particular place now the association is clearer now we’ve got the constitution of the new temple the work of the priesthood of the Lord Jesus Christ the Gentiles coming as acceptable offerings on that altar that is Christ and now we have the presence of God filling that new temple so to speak what all the temple and tabernacles signify that would come with the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ has come and now the glory of God fills that as it were shines over it and we see this Shekinah manifestation of the presence of Christ in his altar and at his particular place this I think is to be a tremendous association that we’re to make with the gifts of gold frankincense and myrrh the constitution of the new altar of God.

The temple is one place. Now, I mentioned that there’s another place where these three elements also come together. And if you turn to the Song of Solomon, we’ll look at one other place that I know of, the only other place where this association is made.

In Song of Solomon chapter 4, what verse is this? Verse 7. We remember that in the structure of the Song of Solomon, this is the center part of the book. This is the nuptials of Solomon to his wife. Verse 7 is the very center of the whole book of the Song of Solomon as a continual reminder to men to speak this way to their wives.

“Thou art all fair, my love, there is no spot in thee.”

But look at the verse just before that.

“I will get me to the mountain of myrrh and to the hill of frankincense.”

So again, myrrh and frankincense have a kingly association. This is Solomon, but more than that, they have a very direct association at the center of the book of the center of the song of Solomon with the wedding of Solomon to his bride. And so we have that association. But then earlier in chapter 3 6 go up a few verses.

“Who is this that cometh out of the wilderness like pillars of smoke?”

Is that the right reference? Make sure I’m always surprised that it’s so early in the book, the beginning of this nuptial season, but I’m sure it is. Yeah. Chapter 3. Verse 6 and this is the beginning of the progression of the wife up to that nuptial right that we read about in chapter 4.

“Who is this that comes up out of the wilderness like pillars of smoke perfumed with myrrh and frankincense with all powers of the merchant? Behold his bed which is Solomon’s. Three score valiant men are about it.”

So what’s going on here? Solomon has sent a coach, a chariot, a carrying place of transportation. And Mrs. Solomon is in that coach and she’s now coming to Jerusalem. And that’s being described to us here in verse 6.

“Who is this that cometh up out of the wilderness?”

The bride is ascending up out of the wilderness. She’s going from down to up. She’s going from the wilderness to Jerusalem, the high place. She’s going from east of Eden back to the garden of God where all these things are found. And this ascension of the bride is pictured as pillars of smoke perfumed with myrrh and frankincense with all powers of the merchant.

And this chariot is Solomon’s. And these men are carrying this about. They all hold swords, being expert of war. Every man has his sword upon his thigh because of fear in the night. King Solomon made himself a chariot of the wood of Lebanon. He made the pillars thereof of silver, the bottom thereof of gold, the covering of it purple, the midst thereof paved with love for the daughters of Jerusalem.

“Go forth, oh you daughters of Zion. And behold, King Solomon with the crown and they come up to the wedding place and then the wedding happens.”

So, we’ve got this coach coming and the bottom of this coach where the where the bride is sitting upon is gold and the coach is coming and ascending in pillars of smoke fragranced with myrrh and frankincense. What is it? Well, the coach is a picture again of this little temple place. And again, we have this association to gold, frankincense, myrrh wrapped together in the ascension of the bride for the wedding nuptials in Jerusalem.

It’s a picture of every Lord’s day. Every Lord’s day, we come out of the wilderness, so to speak. We’re making the wilderness into the garden of God through our work, but it’s still wilderness. The sin, the fall still affects it. We come up and ascend to the mountain of God. We come here primarily for the wedding feast of King Jesus. We come as his perfumed bride. We ascend up in frankincense and myrrh through the prayers and liturgy of the church.

That murdered golden altar of incense has prayers ascending from it. So the fragrance of myrrh and frankincense combined together in that. And that’s who we are. The wise men come to remind us of the tabernacle and the temple furniture being fulfilled. And now worship will change because with a change of priesthood, the scriptures tell us in Hebrews is a change of the laws of worship changed as well.

This is why we don’t do all that temple stuff directly. We learn from it. It’s the worship of the same God instituted by him. But you see everything’s changed now and our worship has changed because new priest the magi points us to the new priesthood of Christ. The new temple being constituted the Shekinah glory will shine forth from it affect all the world.

Now one of the implications of this is that the way we see the manifestation of the kingdom of Christ increasing and becoming more manifest in the world changes as well. If the magi are about the anointing of a king who will rule with the sword, we look at 2,000 years of church history and say it didn’t work out too well.

But if the magi are about pointing us to the worship of the Lord Jesus Christ as being the thing that will drive everything else, if his reign is a reign not of brute force but of worship and of giving himself to his bride symbolically in the Lord’s supper every week, speak and of serving the bride and glorifying and maturing her. Then we see the kingdom advancing the way Scripture promises.

And the significance of a baby coming in just position either Herod or Caesar. We know the rest of the story that he wins and they lose and we know the rest of the story in terms of church history. No matter what it looks like outside the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, the worship of him, the transformation of our lives, the trials and tribulations that may occur, we are being perfumed for ascension to him as well.

And the world changes then in terms of service, prayer and worship, not in terms of the brute force of the sword providing the jurisdiction of the Lord Jesus Christ. That’s there. Christ wields the sword, but it’s secondary to the worship of the church. It’s a result of the church doing her work in the context of the world.

So we have here the worship of the Lord Jesus Christ, the constitution of the new tabernacle or temple. We have the same thing that happens with us in Lord’s day worship service have this beautiful picture of the work of the Lord Jesus Christ bringing his bride up into his wedding hall every Lord’s day and we have the effecting of the reverse the great reversal so-called by church history.

I’ve got two references in Genesis and it’s pretty interesting to me that you have two the first two references to the use of myrrh Genesis 37:20, 37:25 and 43:11 if you know your Bible you know that’s the story of Joseph Genesis 37 is when Joseph is put into the pit and then raised up from that pit. And here’s what we read in verse 25.

“They sat down to eat bread. Joseph is in the pit. They lifted up their eyes and looked and behold a company of Ishmaelites came from Gilead with their camels bearing spicery and balm and myrrh going to carry it down to Egypt.”

The treachery of the brothers and selling Joseph into slavery is accompanied here with merchants on camels going to Egypt bearing myrrh. That’s the first instance of the use of myrrh in the scriptures.

The second is in chapter 43. And after Joseph has been exalted to the right hand of Pharaoh and now he’s bread for the world, right? He’s feeding the whole world the way the greater Joseph would come and give his body for the life of the world. After Joseph’s been exalted, his brothers come. He puts money in their bags to sort of bring them to an understanding of the repentance of their sins they need to do.

They go back to their father and this verse happens in the context of that. Genesis 43:11:

“Their father Israel said unto them, ‘If it must be so now, do this. Maybe this will get Joseph’s favor upon you. Take of the best fruits in the land in your vessels and carry down the man a present, a little balm and a little honey, spices and myrrh, nuts and almonds, and take double money in your hand.’”

Money, remember, in the Bible, Old Testament is hard currency, silver or gold. So take silver or gold in your hand and take myrrh with you. And the money that was brought again in the mouth of your sacks, carry it again in your hand for adventure. It was an oversight. Take also your brother and rise and go to this man.

The reversal, right? Joseph sold into slavery, accompanied by myrrh, going to Egypt. And now Joseph ruling and being brought gifts of myrrh by his brothers who will be brought to repentance. The work of the Lord Jesus Christ begins and ends with myrrh. And the result of that is this great reversal that’s been affected.

The coming of the Lord Jesus Christ has provided repentance to his people, fitted a people to worship him, and he accepts that worship as we offer up our myrrh, our frankincense, and our golden altar of incense, our prayers to him.

What we have in the coming of the magi is gospel. It’s the great proclamation that causes us to ponder and delight in the tremendous implications of Epiphany for us as Jesus has seen in the context text of the declaration that he is the new tabernacle, the new temple, the new priest and all things will change and all the world will now come and represent themselves through the magi and then increasingly in history will come to his altar to worship him on the Lord’s day and be accepted on that altar through the work of the Lord Jesus Christ.

This is wonderful news for us and news that should fill us with a sense of optimism as hope as we look to the future. But there’s some practical applications as well. There’s some response to this gospel I think that we can make fairly directly and simply and quickly.

We’ve talked about John and Peter last week and if we think of John and the meditation upon these things these associations the scriptures make for us in the coming of the magi that’s delightful but Peter also as part of who we’re to be to follow the Lord Jesus Christ do what he commands us to do and to love him loving his people well we can think of the associations our proper response is tribute spirit consecrated prayer at the golden altar in the Old Testament.

The tribute offering involved this tribute as I said placed on the golden altar of incense. And so our tribute, our proper response to the blessing and glory of the Lord Jesus Christ is emphasized in this text as we think about what we should do.

The gold is always a representation of glory. The glory that we get through our work and our labor. Our proper response is to give God tribute by giving him the portion of our tithes and offerings that we’ve had committed to and the scriptures call for it, right? We’re to bring our gold the way the magi brought their gold and our worship to him.

We’re to work this year in consecrating that work for the purposes of God. We’re to recognize that if we bring our gold, it is it was a representation that what we did this week is to make the world more beautiful. We’ve gone down the rivers to the place where the gold is and we brought it back to the throne room of God and offering him what our hands have accomplished represented by the money that he has given to us in blessing for that work.

If we’re to give God our tribute in terms of our labor, then it’s not just bringing the tithe. That’s easy. But it’s consecrating the labor afresh at the beginning of this year for the purposes of the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. It means studying our vocations to see the implication for the manifestation of the reign of Christ. It means searching for vocations at which we can really at the end of the week praise God that he has gifted our hands to change the world and make it more like that garden image we can find the gold where God sends us brings it bring us back to worship him.

Our response to this constitution of the new priesthood of the Lord Jesus Christ properly is to bring God our labor.

Secondly, it’s to bring God our prayers to make us a people at the beginning of this year who are diligent in vocation. Vocation for the cause of the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ is a proper response to this gospel. And the second proper response is to remember that frankincense is related in the psalms in the book of revelation from the beginning of the scripture is to the end as the prayers of God’s people ascending on that golden altar of incense.

We should be people of prayer. We should be people who dedicate ourselves to the formal prayers of the church in worship. But more than that, take that out and end up praying in the context of all of our week. We should consecrate ourselves afresh in tribute in proper response to the tremendous work of the Lord Jesus Christ to his presence, his shine of glory burning forth in the midst of us.

We should consecrate ourselves afresh. We have people who are ones who are committed to prayer. We as a church are doing this. We have a number of initiatives on our strategy map that we’ll be discussing a week from tomorrow night. Specific initiatives about how we do this thing. How do we model the prayers of our church after biblical models of prayer by using specific portions of the scriptures in our prayers.

You know, we’ve been working on this. And then what resources can we provide to you and to your family and to your household to encourage you in your work of prayer in the rising forth of that incense that’s placed before God. Not just in the formal worship of the church, but in your homes individually, corporately, as families, we want to be a people of prayer.

If we understand that this is the purpose for what God has equipped us for, we’re to be those people who pray to him. And as a result of that prayer, we see then the incoming of the Gentiles to the altar of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And third, we should be people that are murdered up, that are that have sweet smelling lives of love for our groom, the Lord Jesus Christ. Gold represents our labors. Frankincense represents our prayers. Myrrh, must and its many, many associations in the Song of Solomon and other places in scripture represent our love for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Ultimately, our response to him coming and affecting his new priesthood is this great sense of love and devotion and commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ. What better way to start the year than reminding ourselves afresh that we’re called to be acceptable to Christ to be a sweet smelling savor to him to make him the first love again of our lives to reconsecrate our vocation our devotional lives and our families to the purposes of Christ’s kingdom the one who he loves we should teach our children a deep and heartfelt love for the Lord Jesus Christ that is absolutely the mark of the church of God and we do that with a renewed sense of love for one another in the context of our lives.

You know in the book of Esther gets ready for the nuptials to the emperor who represents Christ who will save God’s people the way that Christ will save his people ultimately in his coming. Esther gets ready for all of that by soaking for 6 months in myrrh now. There’s probably a process she went through, but the idea is that for 6 months she soaks. She opens up the pores of her body. That’s what happens when you when you soak in liquid.

And as those pores are opened, myrrh becomes more and more a part of her. After 6 months of the preparation of Esther to come into the wedding with her with her husband, the emperor. The end result of 6 months is I imagine she never had to put perfume on again. She was so she was so full of myrrh and representing love for the emperor that she was a sweet smelling savor to him.

May God grant us the grace to be people that are open and receptive to his word to believe the wonderful love that he has shown to us in his coming to affect the redemption from sin and death for us. May we become so filled the knowledge of that our lives are lived in a joyful response of love to the King of Kings, both in what we do in our labors and in how we present our prayers to him.

Gold, frankincense, and myrrh are a picture of the constitution of the great temple of the Lord Jesus Christ. The coming of Christ’s glory to us and his great love for us. Our result, our proper response to this gospel is to represent our labor to him, to give him our labor, to give him our prayers, and ultimately to give him our lives.

You know, kids, it’s about Epiphany is about light. “This little light of mine, I’m going to let it shine.” How do we shine in this world and be that light now? The presence of Christ that’s to draw the nations into the worship of God. We do it through dedicating our labors and efforts to the Lord Jesus by praying to him and by loving one another in word and in deed, in kind acts and in kind speech, one to the other.

May God grant us the grace this year to be lights for the Lord Jesus Christ, lights who shine forth his presence, the Shekinah of glory where we go and may we transform this world as a result of the great reversal affected by him.

Let’s pray.

Father, we thank you for this day. We thank you for consideration of the magi. May we Lord God be wise also giving the Lord Jesus Christ our tithes and our offerings and by way of picture and symbol all of our work this year. May we work Lord God for the Lord Jesus Christ. May we be men and women, boys and girls of prayer to you. May we remember that we can make things smell sweet to you as our prayers ascend like that sweet smelling frankincense.

Help us, Father, not to be smelly people in a bad sense of the term, but to be people who by everything bathe ourselves in prayer to you and as a result serve you and love you. Help us, Father, to be people of love. People who are myrrhed up to love you and to love each other in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Help us, Father, to be bright lights that shine in the midst of a place that will be completely dark apart from the light of Christ.

In his name we ask it. Amen.