You may or may not know it, but today, January 6, is Epiphany. It is the day the Church from very early in its history has celebrated the appearance of Jesus as Immanuel, God With Us. In western Church tradition, the celebration came immediately after the twelve days of Christmas and focused particularly on the manifestation of Jesus to the Magi after their long journey to Bethlehem (Mat 2.1-12).

The Bible tells us little about the Magi. Tradition holds that they came from the Persian Empire to the east, and this appears to be the case. Persia had a governing body known as the Megistanes which was divided into two houses – the Magoi (“powerful ones”) and the Sophoi (“wise ones”).  The Maggoi, the upper house, was comprised of the nobility, the kingmakers of the Persian Empire. There is a primitive painting of the Magi on the walls of one of the catacombs of Rome. If it is accurate, there were quite a few Magi, not just three, and they were accompanied by a large entourage of soldiers.* Whatever the case, the Magi were important enough that Herod, a master of the political game, granted them an audience and took seriously their claims of a newborn king (Mat 2.3-4, 7-8). The Magi stood in marked contrast to Herod.  The Magi, Gentile rulers from so far away, wanted to worship Jesus.  Herod, king of the Jews, from nearby Jerusalem, wanted to kill him (Mat 2.13, 16).

After the Magi met with Herod, the Star which beckoned them from Persia in the first place reappeared, led them down the road to Bethlehem, and hovered over the house where Jesus, Mary, and Joseph dwelt (Mat 2.9). The behavior of the Star indicates that it was not an astral body, as often supposed, but almost certainly the Shekinah glory cloud – the pillar of fire by which God manifested His presence to Israel in the Old Testament.* When the Tabernacle and later the Temple were constructed, God filled them with His glory cloud, thus indicating His house, His dwelling place among men (Exo 40.34; 1Kings 8.10).  Thus the Temple was where heaven and earth met, where God and man met – it was truly the center of the world.  But with the birth of Jesus, the glory cloud dwelt not over the Temple in Jerusalem, but over the house where Jesus was. The message is unmistakable – Jesus is the true Temple, he is where heaven and earth meet, he is where God and man meet, he is the center of the universe (John 1.14, 51; 1Tim 2.5; Rev 21.22-24). All who want to worship God must, like the Magi, come to Jesus.

In the Magi, we see the beginning of the fulfillment of the glorious Old Testament prophecies that foretell of the rulers of the earth coming to worship Jesus as King of kings.  As Solomon prophesied:

He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, And from the River to the ends of the earth.   . . . The kings of Tarshish and of the isles will bring presents; The kings of Sheba and Seba will offer gifts. Yes, all kings shall fall down before Him; All nations shall serve Him.  (Psalm 72.8, 10-11.)

In our modern secular age, it is hard to imagine the rulers of the nations streaming to the Church to worship Jesus as Lord.  But was it any easier 2000 years ago to imagine Persian rulers traveling vast distances to worship an infant boy in Bethlehem?  What is impossible with man is possible with God (Mark 10.25-27).  It is not only possible, it is inevitable, for the zeal of the Lord of Hosts will accomplish it:

Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end, Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom, To order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform this.  (Isaiah 9.6-7.)

Happy Epiphany!

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* Duane Spencer, Word Keys which Unlock Christmas, Word of Grace, San Antonio, Texas.

1Cor 12.31 – 13.3

Love, the Measure of All Things

Part 1

Introduction.

Paul’s famous chapter on love comes smack in the middle of his three-chapters long treatment of spiritual gifts.  Thus 1Cor 13 is often seen as a digression.  If so, it is a digression which does not digress.  Rather it progresses the discussion by revealing Paul’s real theme — love.  “Spiritual gifts” is but the context in which the Corinthians’ real problem, a lack of love, has been displayed.  “Spiritual gifts” is thus necessary to Paul’s discussion in ch. 12 and instructions in ch. 14, but the real subject is love.

We might even say that love is the chief subject of 1Corinthians.  We might fairly say that what Paul has done up to this point is address the various contexts — of which spiritual gifts is just the latest — in which the Corinthians’ lack of love has been displayed.  In addressing the Corinthians’ problems, love has always been near at hand to Paul.  He has told them of God’s great love for them (1Cor 2.9-12).  And Paul has warned the Corinthians that while “we all have knowledge . . . [, k]nowledge puffs up, but love edifies. [Therefore,] if anyone thinks that he knows anything, he knows nothing yet as he ought to know.  But if anyone loves God, this one is known by Him.”  (1Cor 8.1-3.)  Behind Paul’s discussion of the Corinthians’ divisions, their immorality on the one hand and asceticism on the other, their lawsuits against fellow Christians, their public eating of idol food, their selfishness during the Lord’s Supper — beneath the surface of all these discussions has been the need for love.   But now love, which has peaked out from behind the clouds occasionally, breaks out into clear blue sky.  Here, Paul, in a kind of elegy, points directly and steadily at love.  This passage is like a fine Port or French Silk — it deserves to be savored. (more…)

[R]eligion always insists on special days like Christmas, while philosophy always tends to despise them. Religion is interested not in whether a man is happy, but whether he is still alive, whether he can still react in a normal way to new things, whether he blinks in a blinding light or laughs when he is tickled. That is the best of Christmas, that it is a startling and disturbing happiness; it is an uncomfortable comfort. The Christmas customs destroy the human habits.  And while customs are generally unselfish, habits are nearly always selfish. The object of the religious festival is, as I have said, to find out if a man is still alive.  A man can smile when he is dead. Composure, resignation, and the most exquisite good manners are, so to speak, the strong points of corpses. There is only one way in which you can test his real vitality, and that is by a special festival. Explode [fire]crackers in his ear, and see if he jumps. Prick him with holly, and see if he feels it. If not, he is dead, or, as he would put it, [he] is “living the higher life.”

G.K. Chesterton, The Illustrated London News (Amer. ed.), January 11, 1908, quoted in More Quotable Chesterton , pp. 412-13.

In this manner therefore pray: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come.  Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” (Mat 6.9-10.)

The perfecting of God’s kingdom and the perfecting of God’s children are connected. One does not occur without the other. (Rom 8.16-21; 1Cor 15.22-26.) Prayer and praying are central to both. I say prayer and praying for a reason. Not only are the perfecting of God’s kingdom and the perfecting of God’s children the proper objects of prayer (Mat 6.10; Eph 3.16-19), but they are also the bi-products of godly praying. As God’s children pray with understanding and sincerity for the perfecting of the kingdom, they themselves are being perfected. A mature child of God — a mature royal child — is one who understands that he has an ownership interest in his Father’s kingdom. His true interests and his Father’s interests are one. Praying “not my will but Thy will be done” is not the setting aside of our interests in favor of God’s, but the the recognition that God has forever joined our interests to his. Anything that is not his will is therefore not in our interest.

Let us therefore run with endurance the race set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross . . . and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (Heb 12.1-2.)

It was not the Father’s will to set aside the cross, for it was not the Father’s will to set aside the joy on the other side of the cross — for Christ or for us.

CALL TO WORSHIP

The earth is the LORD’s and all its fullness,
The world and those who dwell therein.
For He has founded it upon the seas,
And established it upon the waters.
Who may ascend into the hill of the LORD?
Or who may stand in His holy place?
He who has clean hands and a pure heart,
Who has not lifted up his soul to an idol, Nor sworn deceitfully.
He shall receive blessing from the LORD,
And righteousness from the God of his salvation.
This is Jacob, the generation of those who seek Him,
Who seek Your face.
Lift up your heads, O you gates!
And be lifted up, you everlasting doors!
And the King of glory shall come in.
Who is this King of glory?
The LORD strong and mighty,
The LORD mighty in battle.
Lift up your heads, O you gates!
Lift up, you everlasting doors!
And the King of glory shall come in.
Who is this King of glory?
The LORD of hosts,
He is the King of glory! (Psalm 24)

Lift up your hearts!
We lift them up to the LORD! (more…)

Secularists have successfully equated the thought of a Christian society with oppression. Yet in the Western struggle against tyranny, it was the assertion of Christ’s authority over all of life that effectively undermined the tyranny of kings, popes, and parliaments. The fortunes of individual liberty rose and fell with the degree to which Christ was owned as lord of all.  Ironically, it was secularism with its claim that power originated in man that always trended toward tyranny. The divine right of kings became the divine right of “the people.” But of course, the people themselves never govern, but always some tyrant, be it an individual or an assembly, in the name of “the people.” The genius of locating all power in “the people” is that it flatters the tyrannized while exalting the tyrant. Even after tens of millions have died in the name of “the people,” secularism remains fixed in the Western mind as the wellspring of freedom. But the data paint a very different picture. The ascendency of man qua man has subjugated more men than all the kings, popes, and parliaments in history. It is undoubtedly the most successful form of tyranny the world has ever known.

A conversation with Dr. Casey Christopher and Pastor Alan Burrow