Seeking the Bethlehem Star
Sermon
Facing the Future with Hope
Cycle B Gospel Text Sermons for Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany
Object:
The Moravians, a small but influential Christian denomination, have a distinctive symbol known throughout the world. It is a large many-pointed star. This unusual star found in many Moravian homes is carefully preserved from year to year. As the Advent season approaches the star is brought out and hung in the hall or on the porch until the Festival of Epiphany, January 6.
This cherished Moravian star reminds the faithful of the star that led the wise men from their home in the distant East to Bethlehem where they presented gifts to the Christ Child.
When we examine the biblical story recorded in Matthew 2:1-12 about the original Bethlehem star a number of questions arise. One of the questions is: Can we identify the star that led the wise men to Bethlehem? We do not want for scientific explanations. Some say there was a conjunction of the planets Jupiter and Saturn. Others say the star was the spectacular Halley's Comet. Still others argue that it might have been a nova, an exploding star. All of these theories, while intriguing, are not foolproof.
Some biblical scholars see the Matthew birth narrative as a poetic or imaginative account to convey the important gospel message that God made himself present in the Messiah. Other believing Christians are content to accept the Bethlehem star as a supernatural event, not necessarily connected to any specific scientific explanation.
A second question that invariably arises is the identity of the wise men. Who were these men who had traveled from afar? The Greek word for the wise men is "magi." They probably were astrologers from Persia (modern-day Iran) who had a habit of exploring the skies. There is no hint in the text that they were kings as some of our Christmas carols imply. Nor can we be certain that there were three of them. The fact that three gifts are mentioned might suggest that number. Of course, the names later attached to them by tradition -- Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar -- are entirely fictitious.
Finally, there is the question of the age of Jesus when the wise men appeared in Bethlehem. If we are to believe the numerous manger scenes at Christmas time, the shepherds and the wise men were present at the same time. Almost all biblical scholars, however, agree that the wise men came later, possibly a year or two after the birth of Jesus. Matthew 2:11 reads, "On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother…" (Matthew 2:11). Apparently by the time the wise men arrived on the scene the holy family was living in a house and not in a more primitive manger setting.
What was the reaction to the birth of Jesus that is exhibited in Matthew's telling of the story? We see both negative and positive reactions. The negative reactions were displayed by King Herod, the chief priests, and scribes. King Herod was scared when he heard about a pretender to the throne being born. The last thing Herod wanted was the prospect of a new king challenging his throne. He was determined to stamp out the usurper before he could get started. The chief priests and scribes had a negative reaction too but it took more the form of a lack of interest. It is true they helped King Herod by telling him that according to the prophet Micah the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem, but they didn't get too excited about the whole affair.
The positive reaction is seen in the attitude and actions of the wise men. According to Matthew, "On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure-chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh" (Matthew 2:11). All these gifts were fit for a king. If we could find one word that would describe the wise men's positive reaction it would be "adoration."
A little boy did not say his prayers one night before going to bed. When asked why he did not pray, he replied candidly, "I didn't want anything last night."
Adoration is the opposite of this "gimme" prayer. Someone has said that adoring God is simply saying, "God, I love you." To adore is not to ask God for anything but to simply adore God as God, to love God as God.
Brant D. Baker in his provocative book, Teaching P.R.A.Y.E.R.: Guidance for Pastors and Church Leaders, has a chapter on adoration. He uses the insights of Chester Michael and Marie Norrisey to show how different personality types express their adoration in different ways. Being the good Catholics that they are, they have chosen four prominent church fathers to demonstrate four distinct types: Thomistic, Ignatian, Augustinian, and Franciscan.
Those who have the characteristics of Thomas Aquinas tend to be logical and rational in their prayer life. People with this temperament might want to study adoration from every possible angle asking a series of probing questions to get at the real heart of adoration.
Those who have the characteristics of Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order, tend to enjoy ceremony and ritual. In particular they seek to use all five senses in imagining themselves in a particular scriptural story. For example, they imagine themselves to be Mary as she receives her guests, the wise men. What does she say? How does she feel?
People who have the characteristics of Augustine tend to be verbal, outspoken, and have a desire to discover what meaning in a given scriptural passage speaks to them. They also are apt to keep a spiritual journal of thoughts and inspirations that they record for future praise and adoration.
Those people who have the characteristics of Francis of Assisi tend to be free, unconfined, and impulsive. They prefer action and live very much in the present. Their adoration often sees God in the whole creation. Also, they like to use music, art, or dancing to express their praise of God.1
This is a helpful exercise for us to understand. While everyone should express adoration to God, it is possible to do so in a rich, variety of ways according to our individual temperaments.
The Psalms contain many prayers of adoration. Psalm 148 is a prime example. In verses 1-6 the psalmist calls upon the heavens to praise the Lord, that is, the angels, the sun, the moon, the shining stars, even the waters above the heavens are to praise God. Everything in the heavens is called upon to praise the Lord, their Creator.
In verses 7-14, the remainder of the psalm, the earth is called upon to praise the Lord, all sea monsters, fire and hail, snow and frost, strong winds, mountains and hills, fruit trees, wild animals, cattle, creeping things and flying birds, kings and princes, ordinary people, young men and women, and older people. In a word, everything on earth is to praise the Lord, with special recognition of the people of Israel, God's chosen people.
The prophets also expressed adoration.
Jeremiah exclaimed: "There is none like you, O Lord; you are great, and your name is great in might. Who would not fear you, O King of the nations? For that is your due; among all the wise ones of the nations and in all their kingdoms there is no one like you."
-- Jeremiah 10:6-7
John Muir was born in Scotland. In 1849 his family moved to Wisconsin. He attended the University of Wisconsin but he did not graduate. He only took courses that interested him. Botany fascinated him. Soon Muir felt called to experience the world of nature firsthand. He walked 1,000 miles from the heartland of the country to the coast of Florida. This was just a tune up. He faced westward and walked all the way to California where he explored the gorgeous Yosemite Valley as no one had done before him. Still later, he explored the magnificent Alaskan glaciers. He was always on the move and no one was thrilled more than he was simply to be in the wilderness that God had created.
One of my favorite stories from Muir's journals happened in December 1874 when he took a trip into the Sierra Mountains of California and he was caught in a violent windstorm. Instead of camping he decided to climb to the top of a tree to see what it would feel like in the center of the windstorm. He selected one of the tallest of the Douglas Spruce trees, over 100 feet high. He climbed to the top of the tree, and he said, "… never before did I enjoy so noble an exhilaration of motion." He clung to the tree with muscles firmly braced as the slender top flapped and swished in the passionate torment of the driving wind. He estimated the sweeps of his treetop described an arc of from twenty to thirty degrees.
"I kept my lofty perch for hours," he wrote, "frequently closing my eyes to enjoy the music by itself, or to feast quietly on the delicious fragrance that was streaming past." When the storm began to abate, Muir dismounted and sauntered through the calming woods.2
What Muir teaches me about God's creation is that it is to be experienced to the hilt. Perhaps we will not climb a tall tree in a violent windstorm like he did, but adoring God by walking in the splendor of the great outdoors is surely one way of expressing praise to God. God is not nature, and nature is not God. To think that way would be to think like a pantheist and not like a person of biblical faith. But God is in nature. God comes through it like electricity through a wire. The wire is not electricity, but it can be a vehicle through which the electricity flows.
With the prophet Jeremiah, we all can shout, "There is no one like you, O Lord; you are great…" (Jeremiah 10:6).
In other words, the prayer of adoration does not praise God because we have received help or our prayers are answered. We love God simply because God is God. We are happy to be in God's presence with a sense of awe and reverence. Adoration intensifies our relationship with God and reminds us that God is not to serve us but we are to serve God.
Best-selling author Philip Yancey lives in the mountains of Colorado. He is a mountain-climber who thrills in attempting to climb the 14,000 foot peaks around his home. From the vantage point of the summit he realizes how small he is and he gets a fractional glimpse of what God must see all the time.
In Yancey's entrancing book, Prayer: Does It Make Any Difference?, he recalls a passage from Thorton Wilder's play, "Our Town." Jane, one of the characters in the play, gets a letter addressed to her farm, town, county, state, and the envelope continues, "The United States of America; Continent of North America; Western Hemisphere; the Earth; the Solar System; the Universe; the Mind of God."
Yancey asks if not it would be best if we reversed the order and began with the mind of God. If we did this, perhaps the rest of our lives would fall into place. Yancey concludes by stating, "It occurs to me, thinking about prayer, that most of the time I get the direction wrong. I start downstream with my own concerns and bring them to God… Instead, I should start upstream where the flow begins."3
Adoration, as the wise men knew long ago, is an essential beginning for genuine prayer, in fact, for life itself. Amen.
__________
1. Brant D. Baker, Teaching P.R.A.Y.E.R.: Guidance for Pastors and Church Leaders (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2001), 105-109.
2. The Wilderness World of John Muir with an Introduction and Interpretive Comments by Edwin Way Teale (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1954), 186-190.
3. Philip Yancey, Prayer: Does It Make Any Difference? (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2006), 23.
This cherished Moravian star reminds the faithful of the star that led the wise men from their home in the distant East to Bethlehem where they presented gifts to the Christ Child.
When we examine the biblical story recorded in Matthew 2:1-12 about the original Bethlehem star a number of questions arise. One of the questions is: Can we identify the star that led the wise men to Bethlehem? We do not want for scientific explanations. Some say there was a conjunction of the planets Jupiter and Saturn. Others say the star was the spectacular Halley's Comet. Still others argue that it might have been a nova, an exploding star. All of these theories, while intriguing, are not foolproof.
Some biblical scholars see the Matthew birth narrative as a poetic or imaginative account to convey the important gospel message that God made himself present in the Messiah. Other believing Christians are content to accept the Bethlehem star as a supernatural event, not necessarily connected to any specific scientific explanation.
A second question that invariably arises is the identity of the wise men. Who were these men who had traveled from afar? The Greek word for the wise men is "magi." They probably were astrologers from Persia (modern-day Iran) who had a habit of exploring the skies. There is no hint in the text that they were kings as some of our Christmas carols imply. Nor can we be certain that there were three of them. The fact that three gifts are mentioned might suggest that number. Of course, the names later attached to them by tradition -- Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar -- are entirely fictitious.
Finally, there is the question of the age of Jesus when the wise men appeared in Bethlehem. If we are to believe the numerous manger scenes at Christmas time, the shepherds and the wise men were present at the same time. Almost all biblical scholars, however, agree that the wise men came later, possibly a year or two after the birth of Jesus. Matthew 2:11 reads, "On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother…" (Matthew 2:11). Apparently by the time the wise men arrived on the scene the holy family was living in a house and not in a more primitive manger setting.
What was the reaction to the birth of Jesus that is exhibited in Matthew's telling of the story? We see both negative and positive reactions. The negative reactions were displayed by King Herod, the chief priests, and scribes. King Herod was scared when he heard about a pretender to the throne being born. The last thing Herod wanted was the prospect of a new king challenging his throne. He was determined to stamp out the usurper before he could get started. The chief priests and scribes had a negative reaction too but it took more the form of a lack of interest. It is true they helped King Herod by telling him that according to the prophet Micah the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem, but they didn't get too excited about the whole affair.
The positive reaction is seen in the attitude and actions of the wise men. According to Matthew, "On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure-chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh" (Matthew 2:11). All these gifts were fit for a king. If we could find one word that would describe the wise men's positive reaction it would be "adoration."
A little boy did not say his prayers one night before going to bed. When asked why he did not pray, he replied candidly, "I didn't want anything last night."
Adoration is the opposite of this "gimme" prayer. Someone has said that adoring God is simply saying, "God, I love you." To adore is not to ask God for anything but to simply adore God as God, to love God as God.
Brant D. Baker in his provocative book, Teaching P.R.A.Y.E.R.: Guidance for Pastors and Church Leaders, has a chapter on adoration. He uses the insights of Chester Michael and Marie Norrisey to show how different personality types express their adoration in different ways. Being the good Catholics that they are, they have chosen four prominent church fathers to demonstrate four distinct types: Thomistic, Ignatian, Augustinian, and Franciscan.
Those who have the characteristics of Thomas Aquinas tend to be logical and rational in their prayer life. People with this temperament might want to study adoration from every possible angle asking a series of probing questions to get at the real heart of adoration.
Those who have the characteristics of Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order, tend to enjoy ceremony and ritual. In particular they seek to use all five senses in imagining themselves in a particular scriptural story. For example, they imagine themselves to be Mary as she receives her guests, the wise men. What does she say? How does she feel?
People who have the characteristics of Augustine tend to be verbal, outspoken, and have a desire to discover what meaning in a given scriptural passage speaks to them. They also are apt to keep a spiritual journal of thoughts and inspirations that they record for future praise and adoration.
Those people who have the characteristics of Francis of Assisi tend to be free, unconfined, and impulsive. They prefer action and live very much in the present. Their adoration often sees God in the whole creation. Also, they like to use music, art, or dancing to express their praise of God.1
This is a helpful exercise for us to understand. While everyone should express adoration to God, it is possible to do so in a rich, variety of ways according to our individual temperaments.
The Psalms contain many prayers of adoration. Psalm 148 is a prime example. In verses 1-6 the psalmist calls upon the heavens to praise the Lord, that is, the angels, the sun, the moon, the shining stars, even the waters above the heavens are to praise God. Everything in the heavens is called upon to praise the Lord, their Creator.
In verses 7-14, the remainder of the psalm, the earth is called upon to praise the Lord, all sea monsters, fire and hail, snow and frost, strong winds, mountains and hills, fruit trees, wild animals, cattle, creeping things and flying birds, kings and princes, ordinary people, young men and women, and older people. In a word, everything on earth is to praise the Lord, with special recognition of the people of Israel, God's chosen people.
The prophets also expressed adoration.
Jeremiah exclaimed: "There is none like you, O Lord; you are great, and your name is great in might. Who would not fear you, O King of the nations? For that is your due; among all the wise ones of the nations and in all their kingdoms there is no one like you."
-- Jeremiah 10:6-7
John Muir was born in Scotland. In 1849 his family moved to Wisconsin. He attended the University of Wisconsin but he did not graduate. He only took courses that interested him. Botany fascinated him. Soon Muir felt called to experience the world of nature firsthand. He walked 1,000 miles from the heartland of the country to the coast of Florida. This was just a tune up. He faced westward and walked all the way to California where he explored the gorgeous Yosemite Valley as no one had done before him. Still later, he explored the magnificent Alaskan glaciers. He was always on the move and no one was thrilled more than he was simply to be in the wilderness that God had created.
One of my favorite stories from Muir's journals happened in December 1874 when he took a trip into the Sierra Mountains of California and he was caught in a violent windstorm. Instead of camping he decided to climb to the top of a tree to see what it would feel like in the center of the windstorm. He selected one of the tallest of the Douglas Spruce trees, over 100 feet high. He climbed to the top of the tree, and he said, "… never before did I enjoy so noble an exhilaration of motion." He clung to the tree with muscles firmly braced as the slender top flapped and swished in the passionate torment of the driving wind. He estimated the sweeps of his treetop described an arc of from twenty to thirty degrees.
"I kept my lofty perch for hours," he wrote, "frequently closing my eyes to enjoy the music by itself, or to feast quietly on the delicious fragrance that was streaming past." When the storm began to abate, Muir dismounted and sauntered through the calming woods.2
What Muir teaches me about God's creation is that it is to be experienced to the hilt. Perhaps we will not climb a tall tree in a violent windstorm like he did, but adoring God by walking in the splendor of the great outdoors is surely one way of expressing praise to God. God is not nature, and nature is not God. To think that way would be to think like a pantheist and not like a person of biblical faith. But God is in nature. God comes through it like electricity through a wire. The wire is not electricity, but it can be a vehicle through which the electricity flows.
With the prophet Jeremiah, we all can shout, "There is no one like you, O Lord; you are great…" (Jeremiah 10:6).
In other words, the prayer of adoration does not praise God because we have received help or our prayers are answered. We love God simply because God is God. We are happy to be in God's presence with a sense of awe and reverence. Adoration intensifies our relationship with God and reminds us that God is not to serve us but we are to serve God.
Best-selling author Philip Yancey lives in the mountains of Colorado. He is a mountain-climber who thrills in attempting to climb the 14,000 foot peaks around his home. From the vantage point of the summit he realizes how small he is and he gets a fractional glimpse of what God must see all the time.
In Yancey's entrancing book, Prayer: Does It Make Any Difference?, he recalls a passage from Thorton Wilder's play, "Our Town." Jane, one of the characters in the play, gets a letter addressed to her farm, town, county, state, and the envelope continues, "The United States of America; Continent of North America; Western Hemisphere; the Earth; the Solar System; the Universe; the Mind of God."
Yancey asks if not it would be best if we reversed the order and began with the mind of God. If we did this, perhaps the rest of our lives would fall into place. Yancey concludes by stating, "It occurs to me, thinking about prayer, that most of the time I get the direction wrong. I start downstream with my own concerns and bring them to God… Instead, I should start upstream where the flow begins."3
Adoration, as the wise men knew long ago, is an essential beginning for genuine prayer, in fact, for life itself. Amen.
__________
1. Brant D. Baker, Teaching P.R.A.Y.E.R.: Guidance for Pastors and Church Leaders (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2001), 105-109.
2. The Wilderness World of John Muir with an Introduction and Interpretive Comments by Edwin Way Teale (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1954), 186-190.
3. Philip Yancey, Prayer: Does It Make Any Difference? (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2006), 23.
