[0:00] Take your Bibles, if you would, and turn with me to the book of Matthew. Let me real quickly help you understand this problem that we got going on in India. Same thing will be true in many of the other countries, but especially in a place like India, they need wives, and that probably comes across to you as like really weird that you pray for wives.
[0:19] When I started the Bible college in Peru, I had a basic philosophy. I'd only let men come to the Bible college, and so I never let any girls come to the Bible college.
[0:29] And the reason was I was there to train men to be preachers. Then one day I woke up and realized they're going to have to get married. And so what I'm going to do. And so Ronald Tobias, you know, his wife was the first girl student.
[0:43] And she came down, and they went to school. And before it was finished, they were married, and they've been in ministry here. And they're right here in Norcross, been doing things for a long time. In India, they're coming out of families that hate God, hate Christianity.
[0:57] And so this young man, the philosophy is that the way their culture works, which is totally different than your culture, they have to go and make a deal with the other family to get them a wife.
[1:08] They have to go over and basically buy the wife, get the family put together, and the wife wants to come. What woman wants to come and be married to a Christian? And they don't have a lot of Christians, and so it's a pretty hard thing.
[1:22] They really do need your prayer. It is a pretty hard thing for them to be able to get wives for those guys. I want to show you something else maybe before we go to Matthew.
[1:33] And I just, when we're in the, when I was reading the story with the young people there, I skipped the, I had it written or I had it copied in to read it to them, but I went ahead and skipped it. You know that when, in Matthew chapter 2, we don't know how old Jesus was when the wise men found him.
[1:52] But he was somewhere between newborn and a month, with months or whatever, up to two years. And so Herod hated God, and he didn't want there to be this king, Jesus.
[2:08] And so he went out to kill all the children under the age of two. And it really goes all the way back to Genesis 3.15. I just think this is interesting for you, because I know you love Jesus and you love the Bible.
[2:20] So if you would, remember what it said in Genesis 3.15. I will put enmity, I'll make enemies of you and the woman and the woman's seed. Satan and that Satan's seed, that'll be the Antichrist.
[2:33] That'll be those that would love Satan and follow Satan. I'll make y'all enemies. And then he said, but that woman, she'll have a seed. She'll have a boy.
[2:44] She'll have a baby, which will be a miraculous thing that can't possibly be done. But she will, because it's the power of God that does everything. And so we stand in awe at all times.
[2:55] We're like, man, what a great God we have. So if you happen to have your Bible, just real quickly, before we go to Matthew, look if you would at Genesis chapter 4 with me. Genesis chapter 4.
[3:07] Now, you remember what it said in chapter 3 and verse 15. It said, I'm going to give you a seed. I'm going to give you a seed. And in Genesis chapter 4 and verse 1, Adam and Eve have a son.
[3:20] And the Bible says in chapter 4, verse 1, Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she conceived and bare Cain and said, he did it.
[3:33] I have gotten a man from the Lord. So she's like excited. I just got a promise. I just had a baby. I got a man from the Lord. But of course, that man is not the man because the man will be Jesus.
[3:46] And Eve doesn't understand that. And then he kills his brother. And the whole thing's messed up. So look over with me, if you would, to Genesis chapter 4 and verse 25. When Cain messed up, maybe it could have been Abel that would have been the one, but Cain killed Abel.
[4:02] Chapter 4, verse 25. Adam knew his wife again. And she bare a son and called his name Seth. For God said, she has appointed me another, and there's that word, seed.
[4:14] God gave me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew. And of course, he's not the seed either. But when they read the Bible, they just fully expected whatever God said to happen.
[4:30] When they read the Bible, they just fully expected whatever God said to happen. Well, they didn't read the Bible. They heard God say it. But they believed him. And I want to challenge you to be a lot like that.
[4:40] I want to challenge you to become that. Go with me, if you would, to Matthew chapter 2. And I'm really just going to chew the fat with you tonight. But I wonder where we are on the second coming of Jesus or the rapture of the church.
[5:00] And I wonder that because of what I read in the Bible that happened. In Matthew chapter 1, there's a whole lot of really astonished people.
[5:11] There are people that are in shock that such a crazy thing is happening in Luke and Matthew. But, you know, she's shocked. Eve is like, angel talking to me?
[5:26] Angel talking to me? And I'm going to have a baby? Now, by the time you get to Luke chapter 2, she's started worshiping and she's realizing, boy, all God ever promised.
[5:37] When he said that the woman would have a baby, I'm the woman. When he said, a virgin will conceive and have a child, he's talking about me.
[5:49] And see, that's how women got their dignity back. Eve messed up. But God gave the dignity right back by saying, I want to let you be the portal through which I bring back everything.
[6:01] You'll give birth to Jesus. So Eve was shocked. Mary, Eve wasn't. Mary was shocked. Joseph was shocked. When the angel shows up and talks to Joseph and says to Joseph, look, buddy, your wife is pregnant.
[6:18] But you don't need to be worried about that. God did it. God has worked a miracle. The woman has had her seed. She is going to have a baby. The Bible's already prophesied that.
[6:31] This is what's going to happen. And God has worked in a way to bring that about. Completely interrupting time and history and nature. There's a baby going to be born without an earthly father.
[6:45] I think the ones that bother me the most, though, I think might be us in this story. And I want you to read with me just Matthew chapter 2, if you would.
[6:55] Matthew chapter 2. And we'll start. We'll just start in verse 1 and work our way to it. Matthew chapter 2. And work our way down to verse 4, which is where we're going to focus just a few minutes and talk.
[7:09] The Bible said, Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, Where is he that is born?
[7:22] King of the Jews. We have seen his star in the east and are come to worship him. And I have no idea how they knew so much except God.
[7:34] Of course, most everything in the Bible, I just look at it and go, Wow, just God. But they came. And they show up at the palace. And they ask the king. Now these are big guys on camels loaded down with wealth.
[7:48] They've come with gold and frankincense. And myrrh, which is an interesting thing, gold, like a king and frankincense, like to worship him with. And myrrh like to bury him with.
[7:59] And it's all really kind of like set up because I don't even know how they knew or if they knew what they were really doing. But God was saying, That's my son. He is the king.
[8:10] And God was saying he's going to die and he is to be worshipped. And it's all just kind of included in the nuances of the language and in the little parts of the story. But look at verse 3.
[8:22] When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled and all Jerusalem with him. So it's like a new president just showed up or some dignitary showed up in the White House and said, There's a new president on his way.
[8:37] And the president's like, Now hold on here. You come from a far country and you tell me, Is there fixing to be an insurrection here? What's about to happen? And they said, Oh, he's the king of the Jews. This has not been prophesied.
[8:49] God's showing us this. And the king does a very wise thing. He says he gathered all, verse 4, he gathered all the chief priests and the scribes of the people together.
[9:02] And he demanded of them where Christ should be born. And I find it interesting, if you're a Bible reader and a studier, which I know you are, that he's not been being called Christ in this passage.
[9:16] He's been called Jesus and king. But immediately, Herod said, He's the one. Here he goes.
[9:27] Christ. That's the Messiah. That's the anointed one. And that's the special one sent from God. He said, Get in here, Bible people. Get in here.
[9:38] Find out where that guy's going to be born. And I think probably the saddest part of this story is they were as much in shock as Herod was.
[9:50] What in the world? They have a Bible. And they know what's going on. They understand their Bible. They don't have Esword or Google or Logos.
[10:02] They can't just say, Oh, he's coming. He's going to be born somewhere. Somebody run in and type in Google. Where will the Christ be born? Run back out and say, He'll be born in Bethlehem. They can't do that.
[10:13] But apparently, it didn't take them very long to know where he was going to be born. But none of them were even thinking about it happening. None of them were even prepared for it to happen.
[10:27] Not quite the truth. There were two old people. There was, we like them old people. What old man said that? Thank you. Us old people. So Simeon and Anna, however you say it in English, they were both waiting for Jesus.
[10:43] They knew he was coming. And they were expecting him. But I find it funny that in verse 4, he said he gathered all the chief priests and the scribes and said, Hey, these boys just showed up in town telling me there was a new king coming.
[10:58] I want to know where the Christ will be born. I think that's funny. I think him calling him Christ is just interesting to me. Herod, how do you know he's the Christ?
[11:08] Did you go to Sunday school? Or did you go to Saturday school, I guess, because he would have been back in Jewish days? How do you know he's the Christ?
[11:19] But he said, I've been kind of worried about that. I've been kind of worried about somebody else coming to take my place. And Jesus, this whole deal from now to the day he dies is all going to be that king stuff's bothering people.
[11:30] Nobody wants him to be the king. Everybody wants him to be the little baby at Bethlehem. Everybody wants him to be the baby God. But no one was ready. So I would ask you a couple of questions before I talk to you about some of the other folks in the story.
[11:47] You got a Bible? Did you know he talks as much about his second coming as he did about his first coming? Maybe more about his second coming than he did about his first coming?
[12:01] And yet we are relatively ignorant of the fact. And if the rapture were to happen, we'd all be like, what is going on? We weren't expecting this.
[12:11] I know we had a Bible. And I know we went to church. But we're Pharisees and Sadducees. We carry a Bible, but we don't believe a Bible. We read a Bible and study a Bible, but we're not expecting the Bible to really come true.
[12:25] These Pharisees had an intellectual knowledge, but not a heartfelt faith. These Pharisees had religion and no relationship.
[12:37] They were unaffected by the truth that they knew. I think these scribes are the guys that write it down. They're the guys that are taking the notes. They're the guys that are making the copies.
[12:49] They know what it says. They know what it says. But somehow along the way, they kind of thought like this. Nah, probably not really going to happen.
[13:00] And if it really happens, it probably won't happen in our lifetime. It's not talking about us. And somehow Jesus coming surprised people that knew he was coming.
[13:16] And it had been clearly spoken in the passage that we read tonight. In the passage that we read tonight, the Holy Spirit said, you write this down so everybody know this was going on.
[13:27] From the Old Testament, they knew a virgin was going to have a baby. But they will reject Jesus, and they'll reject his mother, and they'll reject his dad, and they'll reject the whole virgin birth, and they'll call him a son of fornication.
[13:40] They will not accept that. But they knew they had a Bible, but they didn't evidently believe it, and they didn't apply it very much.
[13:51] Then Herod said, I need to know where he'll be born. And instead of going, we wouldn't know about that, they said, give us a few minutes. Give us a few minutes.
[14:06] We don't have Google. We don't have a fast way of finding out, but we've read enough. We know. Let us go check. And by the way, they had to go through scrolls. And this is in the scrolls of the 12.
[14:16] This is in the minor prophets, where he's going to be born in Bethlehem. And the Bible told them that. In the story, they had been warned by Jeremiah that everybody was going to try to kill the baby.
[14:31] And Jeremiah talked about how the whole country would be weeping and wailing because all the babies all across the country are getting killed. And the Bible said that Jesus would be called out of Egypt.
[14:43] And all that was in what we read tonight. I think what ought to shock us is that what we read tonight in the New Testament was all talked about in the Old Testament. And they all had a copy of the Old Testament.
[14:55] And they went to synagogue. And many of them memorized like the first five books of the Bible, the Torah, the law. And they didn't know. So I think about this.
[15:07] I think, I don't mean to be ugly to you. It's Christmas. I'm supposed to be nice tonight. But I think, do you really think he's coming? Do you really believe that at any moment, Jesus might come back?
[15:22] Do you really believe that, hey, King Herod, we've come to worship the King of the Jews. We have seen his star and we've followed it all the way to here.
[15:33] And we'd like to know where to go from here. And Herod says, y'all talking about the Christ? That's crazy. You need to just go read the passage again.
[15:44] He's the one that brings that word up. The lost guy brings up the word Christ. He knew. He said, y'all talking about the Christ? And they said, yeah, we're talking about the Christ. And then they sent the Pharisees and the scribes and the Bible students to come out and come back and find out where it was.
[16:00] It just bothers me. When I consider this, I was asked, we had a Spanish marriage retreat. And one of their icebreakers in the Spanish, with our folks here from the Spanish church, one of the icebreakers was everybody had a, they took out, they had like an offering basket and everybody got a question.
[16:21] And you had to answer the question about yourself. And so they asked questions like, you know, what's your favorite date? Mine was, they didn't plan this, but mine was, if you knew you only had one year to live, what would you do?
[16:41] And I'm like, the oldest person sitting there except. And I said, I don't think I'd change anything. But you know, you and I, if we knew Jesus were coming back, if we knew that like he came the first time, all of a sudden a star is going to come and angels are going to sing and shepherds are going to hear a message and Mary's going to get a dream and Joseph's going to get a dream and all this stuff's going to come together.
[17:10] If we really believe that, how would it affect your church attendance? How would it affect your Bible reading?
[17:22] How would it affect your giving? How would it affect your praying? How would it affect your talking to your friends? I think this is a crazy story here.
[17:33] You want to know about the king? Are you talking about the Christ? Are you talking about the one that they've been talking about since Genesis 3.15? Lord help me.
[17:45] It ain't him, is it? Hey, run and find out where the Christ is going to be born. And they run and come back and say, he really is going to be born. He's going to be born in a place called Bethlehem of Judea.
[17:57] For real. Hey, you guys go down there and worship him and come back and tell me where he's at. So I can go worship him too. The Holy Spirit or the angels came and said, don't you go down and tell him.
[18:09] Because he just wants to kill him. So I leave you with a question tonight. I know you have a Bible. And I know that you attend a church that is probably the most unusual church you've ever attended.
[18:26] I mean, you're in a regular church service and you're going through books of the Bible. You're already halfway through the whole Bible. Then you're in Sunday school and somebody's going through another book. And then you're in discipleship and they're going through more stuff.
[18:39] Then whatever it is you're doing, everybody's teaching Bible, Bible, Bible, Bible, Bible all the time. But if we're not careful, we got a Bible and we hear all the things. And we fill up our heads with all the facts.
[18:50] And we get an academic understanding of what the Bible says. And like Herod, we know the Christ. They knew the Christ.
[19:01] He knew. You're talking about the Christ? I just think that's a weird question. Why didn't you say, you're talking about the king? He didn't say that. He goes, he didn't say, you're talking about Jesus?
[19:12] He said, you're talking about the Christ? I've been to Bible school. I've been to, I know about that stuff. But you and I, I think if I ask you in private and I said, do you really believe that Jesus is coming back to take us out of here?
[19:30] I think the majority of us would be like, yep. But then I'd say, well, does that affect your career? And you'd say, well, I don't really believe it. You'd never say that part. I don't really believe it.
[19:44] I don't, I mean, I believe it, but I don't apply it. I believe it, but I don't expect it to happen now. So in the story here in Matthew chapter 2, and when he gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he demanded where Christ should be born.
[20:05] Now, what's funny is in verse 5, I can't tell you if they had to leave or they knew. Have you noticed that? Have you ever looked at those verses? Look at verse 5.
[20:16] And they said. Now, was there a pause between 4 and 5? Or were they sitting there going, oh, we got that one. Is this Bible trivia? Is this Bible trivia?
[20:27] You want to know where the Christ is going to be born? We know that. We got that memorized. Because I'm looking and I'm seeing, in verse 5 it says, and they said. That's interesting.
[20:39] They didn't say, give us 10. Give us a few minutes to go study it out. They were like, oh, we know all about it. It ain't real to us, but we know about it. Not real, but we know about it. And they said unto him, in Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it is written by the prophet.
[20:54] And then they quote the verse. I just think it's amazing. And I hope, for my own good, to feel good about this, I hope they had to go look it up. But I get the feeling, reading it, they might not have even looked it up.
[21:08] I get the feeling he went, where's the Christ going to be born again? I go, oh, I can tell you about that. Don't believe it. Ain't looking for it. Ain't planning on it. Not ready for it. But I know. And you can say to me, well, I know all about the book of Revelation.
[21:21] And thou, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, art not the least among the princes of Judah. For out of thee shall come a governor that shall rule my people Israel. So in verse 7, Herod said, I better talk to these wives than being in private.
[21:36] I need a little private conversation. He called them in private. And he inquired of them diligently. Now, when did you see that star? You see, I need to do some mathematical calculations here.
[21:48] When did you see that star? Because I'm going to get rid of that king. So he's going to be born in Bethlehem. Not a problem. I'll kill everybody in the age group. We won't have to worry about it.
[22:00] And Herod, when he had privily called the wise men, inquired of them diligently what time the star appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem and said, go search diligently. Go search diligently.
[22:12] And they were warned in a dream not to go back. Verse 12. And they departed to their own country another way. And then when they had gone, in verse 13, told them, take Jesus to Egypt.
[22:27] For Herod will seek to destroy him. And then they said, verse 15. And while it was there and was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet out of Egypt, have I called my son.
[22:41] Verse 17. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the prophet. Jeremiah the prophet, saying in Ramah, was there a voice heard, lamentation and weeping in great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted because they are not.
[22:59] I think it's terribly sad. They knew. But they didn't apply. And you know what scares me? I love this church to death.
[23:10] I love you. I literally dream about you and you show up in my dreams. I think about y'all time, even when I'm places, I brag and I say, yeah, we got this family that goes to our church.
[23:21] I'm so pleased with them. So I'm just blessed. But do we know that it's not affecting us? Oh, he'll be born in Bethlehem.
[23:34] We better get down to the Waffle House.