How will you respond to Jesus?
Matthew 2:1-18
(If you feel this sermon is helpful, you are welcome to visit www.danachau.com for a free online course.)
What do you think of when you hear the reading of Matthew 2? I thought of the Christmas nativity scene. But if you were listening carefully, verse 11 describes the wise men kneeling down to worship Jesus the child in a house. Jesus was no longer a newborn in the manger. This is an error by the cultural portrayal of the wise men and Jesus.
A few years back, a missionary friend emailed me about Christmas in China: “As expected, the concept of Christmas [in China] is of a Big Fat American hauling gifts on a sled. So it was about 30 minutes of folklore-busting - Rudolph the Red-nose Reindeer, Frosty the Snowman, Santa & his elves, etc. - before I could get to Bethlehem.” People sometimes don't respond correctly to Jesus because Jesus and Christmas are not accurately portrayed.
The book of Matthew is one of four records of Jesus. These records are not biographies. They record evidences of Jesus as God’s good news to mankind. That’s why they are called Gospels. Gospel means good news.
Here are the four authors of the four Gospels: Matthew was a tax collector. Mark, we are unsure of his occupation. Luke was a physician. John was a fisherman. I believe God uses different authors to communicate to different audiences.
The Gospel of Matthew does not name Matthew as the author. The early Christians named Matthew as the author. Papias, a student of the Apostle John’s, also named Matthew as the author.
Matthew was a Jew who collected taxes for the Roman Empire. The Jews didn’t like tax collectors. They saw tax collectors as traitors who worked for the Romans and became rich from charging interest from their own people.
Matthew 9:9 recorded Matthew's turning point response to Jesus; we read: “[Jesus] saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth. ‘Follow me,’ [Jesus] told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.”
Matthew gave up easy wealth to follow Jesus. As we go through the book of Matthew we'll gain a better understanding of why Matthew responded to Jesus the way he did. In fact, Matthew throughout his writing will invite his readers to respond to Jesus. But how we respond will not always be based on who we discover Jesus to be. How we respond will sometimes be influenced by our own life experience.
I have a secret fear. I have the fear of congratulating pregnant women. I wasn't always this way. I used to congratulate pregnant women in the elevator, in the supermarket and just about anywhere. I congratulated pregnant women I knew and ones I met for the first time.
Then one afternoon at a party, I congratulated a pregnant woman who was a friend I had not seen for some time. Here was the problem: I later found out she wasn't pregnant. Ever since that incident, I have had the fear of congratulating pregnant women.
Back to the point. How we respond to Jesus will not always be based on who we discover Jesus to be. How we respond will sometimes be influenced by our own life experience. Let's look at the four different responses to Jesus.
First, there is the wise men's response. We see this in verses 1-2 and 9-11.
We don't know how the wise men knew about the star pointing to the location of Jesus, the king of the Jews. But here's what we do know. The wise men took action on that knowledge. They made the trip. They packed costly gifts. They worshipped joyfully at the sight of Jesus.
They were rightly called wise men. They were wise in their response. Wisdom is more than knowledge. Wisdom is taking action on knowledge.
Today we have more knowledge about Jesus available to us than was available to the wise men. We have the Bible. We have historical evidences. We have testimonials from eye-witnesses. Yet many don't read, research or take action on the knowledge available. These are unwise responses.
Second, there is King Herod's response. We see this in verses 3-9 and 16.
Herod, the human appointed king of the Jews, was also known as Herod the Great. He was troubled by the prophecy of God's appointed king of the Jews being born during his reign. He feared for the loss of his throne.
History records Herod the Great killed his own children and wives whom he thought plotted against him. So it is no surprise that Herod would kill innocent children to keep his throne. His fear for the loss of his throne blinded him to the love of God through Jesus Christ.
Napoleon, the French Emperor wrote in his diary, “Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and myself founded great empires; but upon what did the creations of our genius depend? Upon force. Jesus alone founded His empire upon love, and to this very day millions would die for Him.” Christ desires that we respond to His love, not respond in fear.
Third, there is the chief priests' and the scribes' response. We see this in verses 3-6.
The chief priests and the scribes possessed the Scriptures, God's written word of the Old Testament. They knew the writings of the prophets well. They knew more about the birth, person and work of Christ than the common people.
They knew the Christ would be born in Bethlehem. Yet, unlike the wise men, the priests and scribes were satisfied with knowing about Christ rather than worshipping Christ. Their response was one of knowledge without action.
Some are content with information rather than transformation. Some are satisfied with learning the rules in the Bible. They don't understand that the Bible was given to guide us into a personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
Fourth, there is Joseph's response. We see this in verses 13-15.
Joseph was not the father of Jesus. The angel did not say, "Take your son and his mother," but, "take the child and his mother." For Joseph was told by the angel in Matthew 1:20-21 that the child was the Son of God come to save the world from their sin.
Joseph understood God entrusted to his care the Christ child and the message of salvation. He obeyed the instruction of God's angel. Joseph responded faithfully for Christ's sake.
Many people obey God for different reasons. Some out of fear. Some to avoid guilt. Some to be self-righteous. But Joseph did it for the sake of Christ and the salvation of the world.
Joseph understood Jesus differently than all the others in Matthew 2. That in part explains his different response. But we also see people, the wise men, King Herod, chief priests and scribes, who had the same understanding that Jesus was God's chosen king of the Jews, and they responded to Jesus differently.
Here's why. How we respond will not always be based on who we discover Jesus to be. But how we respond will sometimes be influenced by our own life experience.
Some people respond differently to Jesus because they understand Jesus differently. Some understand Jesus to be a Jewish rabbi, learning from his teachings. Some understand Jesus to be fire insurance, trusting Jesus to keep them out of hell. Some understand Jesus to be God, experiencing miraculous answers to prayer in Jesus name.
Some people respond differently to Jesus because they have different life experiences. Some have been church-hurt and want nothing to do with Jesus. Some have an authority issue and don't want to believe in a higher power. Some have taken the time to study and reasoned that Jesus is Lord and worthy of worship.
C.S. Lewis is one of many who studied and reasoned that Jesus is Lord and worthy of worship. Let me close with his words:
"A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic--on the level with a man who says he is a poached egg--or he would be the devil of hell. You must take your choice. Either this was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us."
How will you respond to Jesus? And is your response more influenced by your own life experience? Or is your response more influenced by who Jesus really is?
(If you feel this sermon is helpful, you are welcome to visit www.danachau.com for a free online course.)
