Celebrations, Worship, and Weeping | Matthew 2:1-23

INTRODUCTION

Wish you a blessed Christmas. As the world remembers and celebrates the coming of our Lord Jesus into this world, may you experience the message of Christmas – Joy, Peace, God’s presence and comfort, and redemption from your sin be true to you today. The following will show how differently people responded during Christ’s birth with Celebration, Worship, and Weeping.

Matthew 2:1-23

¹ After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem ² and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”

³ When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him.⁴ When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born. ⁵ “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written:

⁶ “‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,

are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;

for out of you will come a ruler

who will shepherd my people Israel.’”

⁷ Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared.⁸ He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.”

⁹ After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. ¹⁰ When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. ¹¹ On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. ¹² And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.

The Escape to Egypt

¹³ When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.” ¹⁴ So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, ¹⁵ where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

¹⁶ When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. ¹⁷ Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:

¹⁸ “A voice is heard in Ramah,

weeping and great mourning,

Rachel weeping for her children

and refusing to be comforted,

because they are no more.”

The Return to Nazareth

¹⁹ After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt ²⁰ and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child’s life are dead.” ²¹ So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. ²² But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, ²³ and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets, that he would be called a Nazarene.

• This is the account of the Birth of Jesus from Luke’s perspective.
• Joseph and Mary go to Bethlehem for the census ordered by Caesar Augustus.
• While they were staying in Bethlehem, in Joseph’s ancestral home, Mary gave birth to her firstborn.
• That night shepherds who were watching their flock at night had an angelic visitation. They were celebrating out of Celebration, Worship, and Weeping
• They come to see Jesus as he was wrapped in clothes and laid in a manger.

Luke stops here and Matthew takes it from here

• As Joseph and Mary were with their son, Jesus was staying in Bethlehem, and magi from the east came to Herod.
• Herod is afraid to hear about a new King.
• He summons his priests and teachers of the law to find out about this King.
• They talk about the prophecy of Micah 5:2
• The star leads them to Bethlehem. They worship the king and present Jesus with gifts. They were choosing to worship out of celebration. (
• They go back in a different route.
• Herod was furious and ordered to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were 2 years and younger.
• The angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and asked him to escape with Jesus to Egypt.
• They come back after Herod dies but goes to live in Nazareth in Galilee.

Today we are going to look at: The Magi’s Worship & Rachel’s Weeping.  Isn’t it true that today as we celebrate Christmas, many are worshipping him, yet many are indifferent to Jesus like Herod and the teachers of the law, and many are weeping because of pain? We are going to briefly look at these aspects from Matthew 2 today.

Wise men’s worship and Rachel’s weeping

 The story of the Wise Men is a story of mystery, for it presents questions that we cannot answer.

They just seem to come mysteriously out of nowhere to pay homage to Jesus & then just as mysteriously they are gone.

Men of Faith Worship

They were men of faith. They were willing to step out in faith & follow wherever God led them.

Why were they following the star? How did they know of its importance?

The Bible does tell us that the wise men came from the East. The major empires to the east had been the Babylonian & the Persian empires. We also know that the Babylonians specialized in studying the stars.

We also know that during the Jewish exile Daniel, a faithful Jew & prophet of God, rose in such prominence that he became chief of the wise men of Babylon & the third-highest ruler in the kingdom. Then when the Persians conquered Babylon, Daniel became president of the presidents under King Darius.

Therefore, many scholars suggest that the wise men of the East had ample opportunities to know the O.T. scriptures & prophecies(Celebration, Worship, and Weeping). Maybe they were familiar with

Numbers 24:17

I see Him, but not now; I behold Him, but not near; A star shall come forth from Jacob; a scepter shall rise out of Israel.

So when they saw the star come from Jacob, they were ready to go & worship Him who was to wield the scepter in Israel – to be the King of the Jews – the King of Kings & Lord of Lords.

Whatever the case was, the important thing for us to realize is that they were ready to go – to follow wherever God would direct them. And God has always been faithful in His leading.

ILLUSTRATION

God led the children of Israel across the wilderness, providing a pillar of cloud by day, & a pillar of fire by night. He provided them food when they were hungry, drink when they were thirsty, & clothing when they were naked. And now he was providing a star to lead these wise men to the place where the Christ child lay.

APPLICATION

God may not lead us in quite as dramatic a way today, but God promises to lead us – if we will let Him. Someone said, “The eye of faith is willing to take the next step, & trusts God to direct that next step.”

We don’t know what tomorrow holds – or next week – or next year. But we know that when we are in His hands, He does lead, & He will guide each step if we will let Him. Jesus said, “I will not leave you alone. I will send you the comforter, the Holy Spirit, to guide you into all truth.”

God’s Spirit guides us

So we have God’s Spirit to lead us day by day, dwelling within us – on the throne of our lives – leading & directing & guiding each step. Even so, wise men of every generation have been divinely led, listening to & heeding the Word of God day by day.

But let us go back to the wise men as they were preparing to leave their homes & follow the star.

ILLUSTRATION

Can you just imagine how their neighbors reacted?

“O, are you going on a journey?” “Yes, we are.”

“Where are you going?” “We don’t know.”

“Well, how long are you going to be gone?” “We don’t know.”

“What are you going to do when you get there?” “We are going to worship the king.”

“What king?” “We don’t know.”

“Why are you going?” We have seen a star in the sky, & we have a strange stirring within our hearts to go.”

I imagine those neighbors shook their heads and said, “And we call you, ‘Wise Men’? How foolish to take off on a journey, not knowing where you are going, what you are going to find when you get there, or how long you are going to be gone.”

Yet, the journey of faith always has those characteristics.

Faith responds to the challenges of the unknown

They must have said the same thing to Abraham when he left the Ur of Chaldees to go to the land that God had promised him.

Men of faith who have been willing to respond to the challenges of the unknown have heard the same kind of things over & over again.

ILLUSTRATION

William Cary was a shoemaker. One day he heard of the millions in India to whom no one had ever gone with the good news of Jesus Christ. He believed that the great commission to “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature” included him. So he volunteered to go to India but was told, “Young man, sit down. When it pleases God to convert the heathen, He will do it without your help or mine!” He went anyway, supporting himself. For 7 years he worked without seeing a single person come to Christ – but he lived to see hundreds of churches and thousands of people come to Jesus. Today he is called the “Father of Modern Missions.”

APPLICATION

We cannot keep our lives, people. It is ours for a fleeting moment – a vapor that appears and then disappears. When you “give up what you cannot keep to gain what you can never lose” – Indeed you are no fool! These were men who responded in faith, & wise men in every generation have always responded in faith!

Matthew 1:1-8

¹ After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem ² and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”

³ When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. ⁴ When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born. ⁵ “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written:

⁶ “‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,

are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;

for out of you will come a ruler

who will shepherd my people Israel.’”

⁷ Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. ⁸ He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.”

 Seek God in Celebration, Worship, and Weeping

Matthew records that the wise men ended up in Jerusalem. I guess it was the most logical place – the center of Judaism – the temple of God – the high priests of God. And of course, the palace of Herod the King. “If anybody would know of the birth of a new-born King it would be the present King – Right?” Wrong!

They went to King Herod & asked their questions. “We understand a king has been born. We have followed His star & have come to worship Him. Where is He?”

But King Herod knew nothing about it. Herod summons the teachers of the law to find out about the king.

Herod’s Reaction

But the most amazing thing of all was that when Herod finally had the answers, he decided to try to kill the Messiah of God. Incredible! He was like a child standing before a locomotive and saying, “Stop!” Or like a man standing before a hurricane and saying, “Stop blowing!”

You cannot stop God! You cannot stop His Messiah! King Herod, of all people, should have been first in line to worship Jesus. Yet, he tried to kill Jesus, to stop God’s program.

Herod was a wise man in the eyes of the world. He had the glory, the power, and the accolades of the world as king – but he was a fool.

Also, Herod summoned the Chief priests. They were wise men and knew the scriptures and read what the prophets had to say. Well acquainted with prophecies backward & forwards, & when they were asked about the newborn king they answered without hesitation – “He is to be born in Bethlehem!”

They knew it! They had it memorized. Yet, even though they knew it, they didn’t bother to go and find out if it was true. They were wise men in the eyes of the world – but they were fools!

• Scripture Told The Magi Where To Go. Micah 5:2
• But The People Who Knew The Bible Best Did Not Go.
• Knowing The Bible Is Not All We Have To Do. We have to obey the Bible. Take it seriously to act upon what is written in the Bible. A generation later, the successors of the scribes and chief priests wanted Jesus dead.

The true wise men still come seeking Him & they are wiser than the men of the world!

Worship and Sacrifice 

Matthew 2:10-12

¹⁰ When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. ¹¹ On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. ¹² And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.

True worship is sacrificial worship

Wise Men came to worship Christ. People are worshipping lots of different things today. Some are worshipping men. Others are worshipping things. And all of them are worshipping different things.

That is rather amazing, isn’t it? They were pagans and worshipped pagan gods and stars. They were religious, sincere men – but their lives were unfilled. Despite everything they had – wealth, prestige, power – there was a deep emptiness in their life. Yet, when they came to the house & saw the Christ Child – they worshipped Him.

What are we worshipping today? 

There will always be an emptiness unfilled until you can come to where Jesus is & find Him for what He is – the Messiah, the Christ, the Son of God. Then, and only then, will the deep longings of your heart be met.

When the wise men came to worship Jesus they brought gifts of gold, frankincense, & myrrh. These gifts have given rise to a lot of speculation about the symbolism of these gifts.

“Gold” represents wealth and royalty for a king. This signified that Jesus was King. Solomon sat on an ivory throne, inlaid with gold. Solomon’s temple was plated with gold.

“Frankincense” is derived by cutting a slit in the bark of an Arabian tree. The yellow sap has an agreeable fragrance, & is hardened & used as incense in worship. So frankincense represents worship – worship of the new king.

“Myrrh” comes from stunted trees. It is a brown, fragrant perfume that is used to anoint dead bodies – to embalm & preserve them. Myrrh represents the work & mission of Jesus. He came to die for us upon the cross.

Gold, Frankincense, and Myrrh: Wealth – Worship – Work. But I doubt if the wise men sat down to figure all that out before they gave their gifts. I imagine that when they saw the star, they grabbed whatever was available & made haste to find the newborn king.

APPLICATION

Love never really sits down & carefully calculates the symbolism of a gift. Doesn’t love just give because it must give? And it gives whatever it has available to give.

They gave to express their adoration and worship. We need to learn to do the same thing.

Isn’t it amazing that we give to everyone at Christmas time – except to the one whose birthday we celebrate? We squander more. We waste more. And we forget that the treasures laid up in heaven are laid up forever – drawing dividends for all eternity. We, too, need to give as the wise men gave.

They went home a different way

Vs. 12 tells us that “They departed for their own country by another way.” Men who have come to worship Christ throughout the generations have always gone home another way. You can’t go the same way after worshipping Jesus. You can never be the same again!

Saul before he became Paul

Saul of Tarsus was “breathing out fire and threatening the church.” He was willing to kill Christians to preserve the purity of the Jewish religion. But one day he met Christ – & he was never, ever, to be the same again. He went a different way!

Hardcore fishermen transformed

Vacillating, cursing, hard-boiled fisherman – Peter, Andrew, James & John. Yet when they met Jesus their lives were changed & transformed. They were never the same again.

It’s Christmastime & we think of the Wise Men. And they were Wise Men! Not in the way the world thinks – but they were Wise Men because they were willing to follow wherever God led – they were wiser than the men of the world. They worshipped Christ, gave their gifts, & went home a different way.

Matthew 2:13-15

The Escape to Egypt

¹³ When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.” ¹⁴ So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, ¹⁵ where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

Despite the evil God is still working on his redemptive purposes.

Weeping at Christmas

Rachel weeps over Israel during the exile. Rachel weeps over Israel in Matthew 2. 

 Matthew 2:16-18

¹⁶ When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.

 According to statistics somewhere between 25-50 boys were killed that night in Bethlehem. It is horrific. You are fleeing on an animal back through the desert and you are hearing that other babies are killed. The first thing that we get when we hear this is that God does not exist and if he does exist he just abandons you.

Matthew invites us to consider another option, that despite this horrible thing of killing babies, what is God’s option? Once again Matthew quotes from the scriptures:

Matthew 2:17-18

¹⁷ Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:

¹⁸ “A voice is heard in Ramah,

weeping and great mourning,

Rachel weeping for her children

and refusing to be comforted,

because they are no more.”

The Return to Nazareth.

 Jeremiah predates Jesus by about 600 years.

Babylon surrounded the city of Jerusalem, burnt the city and temple took the people to Ramah chained them, and took them to Babylon 2000 miles. Much of the book of Jeremiah is about Jeremiah seeing this coming and then grieving and mourning. That is what this poem is about.

Survivors changed at Ramah and they started their journey towards Babylon.

Jeremiah 31:15-17

¹⁵ This is what the Lord says:

“A voice is heard in Ramah,

mourning and great weeping,

Rachel weeping for her children

and refusing to be comforted,

because they are no more.”

¹⁶ This is what the Lord says:

“Restrain your voice from weeping

and your eyes from tears,

for your work will be rewarded,”

declares the Lord.

“They will return from the land of the enemy.

¹⁷ So there is hope for your descendants,”

declares the Lord.

“Your children will return to their own land.

Jeremiah weeping

Jeremiah is mourning and lamenting this loss. But then he sees this hope of God’s promises and a remnant coming back to Jerusalem.

Rachel is the wife of Jacob. She dies in Genesis 35 giving birth to Benjamin. She is weeping and grieving during her childbirth and calls him “Ben-oni – son of my anguish.”  So Jacob changes the name to “Benjamin – Son of my right hand.” Rachel died right outside of Bethlehem.

Rachel weeping

Jeremiah depicts Rachel weeping from her Tomb over the centuries. Matthew takes this up and says that Rachel’s voice is weeping from the tomb even in Jesus’ time. It is a poetic expression, not real. Matthew says their voices weep still over the tragedies in our day.

Where is God amid this tragedy? What is God doing? God is speaking through his prophets that He grieves and mourns the tragedy of the human condition. He is not absent, and He is weeping or grieving. 

Romans 8:22-23

²² We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. ²³ Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.

God is weeping and grieving over the state of our world

It may seem like God is absent, but these stories tell us that God is present and He is grieving. 

Matthew 2:19-23

¹⁹ After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt ²⁰ and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child’s life are dead.” ²¹ So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. ²² But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, ²³ and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets, that he would be called a Nazarene.

 Again disappointment and tragedy but Matthew reminds us that God is still working on his redemptive plan. Can anything good come out of Nazareth?

John 1:45-46 

⁴⁵ Philip found Nathanael and told him, “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” ⁴⁶ “Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?” Nathanael asked.

Today, some of you may be here hearing this Christmas message and ask, “Can anything good come out of me? Look at my condition.

Jesus comes to address the human condition. God revealed in Jesus is Immanuel, but he is not here to make all our wildest dreams come true. Yet, there is hell on earth because we are bad. Matthew is inviting us to see that God becomes subject in Jesus to all of the tragedies we experience. He will suffer with us and redeem us out of the suffering in the kingdom he establishes.

Herod’s kingship was political office and he went to great lengths to protect his office. Herod’s unbelief and the scribe’s unbelief in Jesus tell us that many will still not believe in Jesus.

 Herod takes the newly acquired knowledge of Jesus to plot against Jesus. But as this chapter ends, Herod is dead and Jesus is alive. Jesus’s Kingship is genuine and legitimate.

What about you today? Will you come to Jesus like the wise men?

CONCLUSION

• God Is With Us In The Person Of Jesus.
• We have a call to sacrificial worship.
• Every Part Of Jesus’ Life shows how much He is disappointed in Human Existence.
• This Suffering Servant Will Bring Healing By His Wounds To The People Of The World.
• You Need To Believe In Jesus.
• The Hope For Our World Is In The Birth, Death, And Resurrection Of Jesus.
• God Has Promised A Day When Justice Will Prevail.

Things might get worse for some of us but hope in the resurrection of Jesus where there is true hope.

For more related sermons,

Christmas Responses 

How do you celebrate Christmas? | Matthew 2: 1 – 16

The Wise Find| Christmas Sermon | Matthew 2: 1 – 12