Micah 5:2-5a; 1 Peter 1:3-9; Matthew 2:1-12
With complete credit and much appreciation to Rev. Kevin Golden and Concordia Publishing House's "Behold the Child" Advent series, and with slight revisions for my proclamation.
Joy can be hard to come by. Where will you find it? Right here. This Advent season brings joy as you wait for and anticipate Christ’s birth. We are four days from the Third Sunday of Advent, the day called Gaudete. That’s Latin for “rejoice.” Even the Advent wreath will call you to rejoice this Sunday when the rose candle is lit. But it takes time to arrive at His birth. We are tempted to jump the gun, skip over Advent, and get right to Christmas. But that’s not how life works. The things that bring us joy are worth the wait. The things that bring us joy don’t come easily; they require patience. And as we wait, distractions sneak in to rob us of joy. Then sorrow fills the void. When joy should be flooding upon us, it escapes us. If joy can be elusive, sorrow takes hold far too easily. But you are blessed as the Magi come full of joy.
Rejoice with the Magi, because Jesus answers your sorrow.
Rejoice. You do have reason for joy. Consider everything you enjoy. God provides you with daily bread—everything that has to do with the support and needs of your body and even more than you need. You have reason for joy. But it’s too easy to be distracted from joy.
Herod was distracted. The Magi arrive in Jerusalem looking for the One who has been born King of the Jews. Herod calls the scribes so they can tell him where The Christ was to be born. They find the answer in the prophet Micah. God’s promise delivered by the prophets is fulfilled in Christ. Generations of the faithful had been longing to see it. Many had spent their lives desiring it. Now it stands fulfilled. That’s reason for joy. But not for Herod. He is distracted from joy. He is distracted by power and love of the status quo. He plots to kill the Christ Child to safeguard his own power. He is quite content with the way things are. He will not tolerate a rival to his throne.
When joy departs, sorrow finds a home. You know how that works, perhaps in the opposite direction of Herod. You have been distracted from joy by your lack of power, and so you sorrow over things never going your way. “Why can’t things just work the way that I want them, at least this once?” Then notice what happens. You focus on what you don’t have. You lose sight of what you do have, and so joy flees. Rather than rejoicing in all that God provides for you—your daily bread and more—you are distracted by frustration with the status quo. You covet more; you covet what others enjoy. Instead of seeing the Lord’s bounty bestowed upon you, you see what others have and you do not.
When joy departs, sorrow moves into your heart. Sorrow exceeds sadness, both in duration and in intensity. Sadness comes and goes, but sorrow remains for longer periods. The longer it stays, the more piercing it becomes. Sorrow is the opposite of joy. Joy requires patience as you wait to realize what you desire—waiting for graduation, waiting for marriage, waiting for a birth, waiting for Christmas. But sorrow feeds off your impatience. The longer you must go without having what you desire the deeper sorrow becomes. Sorrow tells you that joy does not come from waiting; it says your desire must be satiated right now. How has sorrow robbed you of joy?
However it has happened, Jesus answers your sorrow by who He is. He will not be who Herod wants Him to be. He will not be a rival who can be killed so that power can be preserved and the status quo maintained. He will not be who you want Him to be either. He will not be a servant who bows to your every desire. He will not treat you as if you were the king or queen. He will not be the one who upends the status quo so that you can have your dreams right now. Jesus will only be who you need Him to be. And He will be far more than you want.
When the Magi arrive, you get to see who He is. Matthew says that when they saw the child, the Magi fell down and worshiped Him. A more accurate translation would be they fell down and prostrated themselves to Him. Thirty years later, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary will find Jesus outside an empty tomb. They will do the same thing, fall down and prostrate themselves. Then the Eleven will meet Jesus in Galilee and they will also prostrate themselves to Jesus. You only prostrate yourself before God. The Magi knew it. The women at the tomb knew it. The disciples knew it.
That act of prostrating oneself reveals joy. The women at the tomb were overjoyed to see Jesus resurrected, and so were His disciples. This is the God you have: the God who chooses to humble Himself to be born not in legendary Jerusalem but in lowly Bethlehem, the God who chooses to die and rise so that you may receive what you need—forgiveness and salvation—rather than what you want. The King’s greatness is found in His humility. So Matthew tells us, literally, that the Magi “rejoiced a great joy greatly.” That’s two joys and two greats. Matthew is making the point that there is reason aplenty for joy, and it’s all because Jesus is who He is. He is the God who gives you not what you want but what you need—His coming in the flesh, His dying and rising in the flesh, all that you may have forgiveness, that you may be saved, that you may have joy.
“He whom sages, westward faring,…Humbly worshiped, off’rings sharing.” Why worship this child? Because the Lord has revealed to the Magi who this Child is and why He has come. “Lying helpless in a manger, poor and bare and lowly, To set you free from all your sorrow wholly.” Amen.
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