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"Reliving Giving Life"
We just got done with our Christmas services, and I’m sure
you have all heard your share of Christmas music, and seen
the Christmas specials. And we’ve all heard The Christmas
Story, where we see the serene picture of Christ and the
shepherds and the Wise Men, peace on earth, a moment of
tranquility. All is calm and bright.
Then we read this week’s passage and everything falls apart.
Mary and Joseph have to flee for their lives with their baby
down to Egypt because the tyrannical king Herod was killing
all the babies in the village of Bethlehem trying to get to
Jesus, and when Mary and Joseph returned to their homeland
from exile they had to live in hiding, fearing the tyrant’s
son would also try to kill their child. Not a silent night
in the lot.
We see the king of the universe, master of creation, born
as a human, with his early years nothing but terror and
discomfort. And what’s so bizarre about the Gospel lesson
for the day is that each of these dramatic and disquieting
events somehow fulfills a prophecy from the history of the
world. Somehow they are all connected. What’s difficult to
understand is that God didn’t have to bring His Son into the
world like this, God could have done it any way He wanted. So
why did Jesus have to suffer these things? Why did Mary and
Joseph have to flee to Egypt and go into hiding? Was it just
to fulfill prophesies? Was it just circumstantial prophecy or
was there something deeper going on beneath the surface? Is
there some added plan of God working in this Scripture text
in ways we can’t understand, in ways beyond our human eyes?
Let’s actually look at the physical text together. The
suffering and odd situations Jesus endured seem tied to
Israel’s past somehow. The first prophecy in the day’s
text comes after Mary, Joseph, and Jesus flee to Egypt.
At the bottom of the first paragraph it says “Out of Egypt
I called my son.” You know, this is not the first major
time Egypt is mentioned in the Bible. In fact, the Story
of the Old Testament revolves around an event that happened
in Egypt. The whole book of the Exodus is about this. Some
1500 years before Jesus was born the Israelites were slaves
in Egypt, and God through Moses brought them out of that
slavery to be His people. It’s really interesting that this
prophecy about Jesus here also has to deal with being
delivered out of Egypt.
The next bizarre prophecy from today’s text comes after Herod
was outwitted by the Wise Men after they visited Jesus. Herod
slaughtered the babies in Bethlehem hoping to kill Jesus in the
mix. The prophecy that was fulfilled by this awful event is
about a voice of mothers weeping for their children. But again
this terrible event is not the first time in the Story of the
Old Testament where mothers weep for their murdered children.
Some 550 years before the birth of Jesus the Israelites were
led into exile to Babylon, and then women wailed over their
dead children who were casualties of that exile. Much of the
book of Lamentations in the Old Testament is about this very
thing. This is not to say that God commanded the slaughter of
the babes of Bethlehem, but that when they did happen, what
had been foreseen by Jeremiah came to pass. Again, it is
interesting how Jesus and the history of Israel are tied
together here by prophecy.
The last strange prophecy from this section comes at the
very end of the reading, when an angel tells Joseph to
travel back to Nazareth to avoid Herod’s son who was continuing
the search for this baby king of the Jews. The prophecy
mentioned in the Gospel lesson was that Jesus would be a
Nazarene, meaning He would be from the town of Nazareth.
What’s so odd about this passage is that it is not like
the other two prophesies that were tied to a specific
prophet and specific time. This one was given by the
“prophets” collectively and concerns not necessarily
the place Nazareth, but what went along with that title.
You see, Nazareth was a little Podunk border town, where
nothing good, famous, exciting or even interesting ever
came from. But we also see Isaiah, some 700 years before
the birth of Jesus, prophesying that the Messiah, though
He would save the people from their sin and reign king of
everything, would also accomplish this in an unassuming,
unexpected way as a servant. How are the three prophesies
from this text connected? Why did Matthew write them down
this way in the Bible?
In the early life of Christ, in these prophesies, we see
something mysterious, majestic, wonderful at play here. We
see God reenacting the Story of Israel in the life of Jesus.
More so, Christ reenacts the Story to fulfill the Story for
us. Just as the Israelites, the sons of God were delivered
out of Egypt, Jesus, the Son of God was brought out of Egypt
in safety. Just as Israel wept over the death of their children
in captivity in Babylon, we see the life of Jesus in the midst
of, yet surviving, the bloody slaughter of the innocent babies
in Bethlehem. And just as the Israelites were nothing in the
eyes of the world, just some loose tribes or a small kingdom
of no account, so Jesus was from a town of no account, little
in the eyes of the world yet destined to do great things.
In this text we see the ministry of Christ is one of His taking
on our flesh, and living out the story of the sons of God, the
Israelites, to walk in their shoes, experience what they
experienced, but not to fall short, but to fulfill. Whatever
this sinful flesh could not accomplish was mastered by Jesus.
And on the Cross, He fulfilled all things promised, from the
beginning of time, as the Son of God, for us. He single-handedly
bridged the gap between God and man, reliving the story of
Israel, and humanity, but to its fullness, so that the people
of God now have the promise of the perfected, originally
intended life in the hereafter.
But Jesus didn’t just come to earth to live out the destiny
of the Israelites, he came to fulfill our story as well. That’s
why Matthew in the Gospel lesson goes to so much trouble to
point out the details of how Christ relived and revisited the
places and events from the past: He did so to take our place.
This is the story of God’s plan for salvation. We don’t read
the Bible stories just to see how God used to work. We read,
mark, and study the Story of the Bible to see how God lives
that out for us, through Christ, in our daily lives. This
story of God reclaiming His lost creation through the Cross
of Christ is beyond time, and it’s for you.
That’s why I’m excited for the Thy Kingdom Come sermon series
beginning next week. This text serves as a preview of all of
next year. The story of God creating, losing, and reclaiming
this broken world presents the greatest hope of all time. And
more than that, it is living, breathing, working in and though
us through the Holy Spirit. Just as Jesus came as a baby,
spoken of through prophecy, to reenact and perfect the Old
Testament story of Israel, so now He comes to us, lives in
us, reenacting His salvation for us by the cross day in and
day out, and perfecting us to do His glorious work on earth.
Though life may seem bleak at times, and we can sure sympathize
with Mary and Joseph when we ask why things happen the way they
do, we have the sure hope that in Christmas we are reclaimed for
the Kingdom of God, given as a gift in Christ. Merry Christmas.
Amen.
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