I am so sorry that I am sending this out late today! Unfortunately I have not recovered from Wednesday night and still am sick...so please pray that I would get better. Normally I will post each study the night before you guys will do it. That way the study is ready for you to do it first thing in the morning if that's what you desire.
Summary...
I must say I learned some cool stuff today about Christ's life that I never knew before. Matthew tells us that Jesus was born in a town called Bethlehem, which was a very small town south of Jerusalem. The author, Matthew, tells us that right from the start of Christ's life there are people who already don't like Him. Matthew is the only one who tells us about this jealous King named Herod. This story is not listed in any of the other gospels...Mark, Luke or John. Herod is the one who dislikes Jesus, and wants to get rid of Him. Did you catch Herod's sneaky little plan involving the wise men? Herod was afraid that Jesus would turn out to be a King, he was afraid that Jesus would steal his throne...so he tries to use the wise men to find the location of our precious baby Jesus, so he can kill Him! To me what stands out is for His entire life, Jesus always had people looking to kill Him. I mean here He is a baby, and someone is after Him, looking to kill Him. He has not said a word yet, or performed a miracle...but people are already threatened by our Jesus!
The other thing we read that stood out to me was the gifts the wise men brought to baby Jesus. Do you remember what those gifts were? Gold, frankincense, and myrrh were the gifts these wise men brought to Jesus. I have to admit I have often looked at these gifts and thought our little Lord, baby Jesus got ripped off by these wise men! I mean where are the little tonka dump trucks, or hot wheels set. What about lego's, or a bike or even clothes...something that baby Jesus could use instead of gold, frankincense and myrrh.
As I dug deeper in my study I found that these gifts had a much deeper meaning. Back in those times gold symbolized royalty, and if you ever wanted to meet with a King you would have to bring them a gift. Of coarse there was only one acceptable gift for a King and that was gold. We now often refer to Jesus as a King or Ruler. Jesus is known as the King of the Jews, and so a very appropriate gift to our baby Jesus or to our King was gold. Frankincense was a proper gift to give to a priest. It was used by the priests and burned in the temple during times of worship. We now know our Jesus as our "High Priest" and we read things like Colossians 1:22 that tells us we have been brought back to God through Christ, our High Priest! Myrrh was a gift to someone that was to die. It was used to embalm or preserve the bodies of the dead. What was Jesus whole purpose to come and to walk on this earth but to die for you and for me!
The gifts that the wise men brought have way more of a symbolic meaning than I ever knew. These gifts really symbolize who we now know our Jesus to be...our King, our High Priest, and our Savior who gave His life up for us!
Questions...
- What town was Jesus born in?
- Who was the King who wanted to kill Jesus and what ever happened to Him?
- What stands out to you most about the gifts the wise men brought to Jesus on the night He was born?
- We read in Matthew 2:10-12, about the time the wise men had with Jesus...the Bible says these men worshipped Jesus and that they were joyful when they found where He was. Take a moment to picture this scene between Mary, Joseph, the 3 wise men and of coarse baby Jesus! Can you feel the joy of the wise men? Can you feel the faith of the wise men? They believed this baby was to become their King, Priest and Savior!!! Is Jesus all 3 of those for you...King over your life? Your High Priest (Hebrews 4:14-16) who has enabled you to have a relationship with God Almighty? And the Savior of your life, the One who offered up Himself for you...is this your picture of Jesus?
I pray that it is...I too am praying for all of you! I'll talk to ya tomorrow!!
tom
9 comments:
Hello everyone!!
Yayy!!! It's day two! Well when I read my bible today i was just amazed by how The Wise Men myrrh because if I where there I most likely wouldn't have even known that Jesus would die for us, I would have thought he was going to live forever. I know that might have sounded like the stupidest thing ever but that is what really came to my mind after reading the bible and the blog. Also I thought that Jesus having so many enemies as a child was crazy They should learn to love Jesus.
Jasmine Arab
Hey everybody! Hope you guys are having a good day. No more school!!!
This passage really had a lot of things that stood out to me. The three gifts' explainations really changed the way I thought about Jesus' birth. I knew gold meant a lot, but I never knew about frankincense being a gift for a priest, and myrrh for the dead. That really amazed me.
Personally I love prophetic scripture. Stuff that you have record of, and then later, it comes true. The gift of the myrrh was definatley a prophecy type deal, predicting the death of our Savior.
I also noticed that this chapter of Matthew has many fulfillments of scripture in them. 4 actually. One telling the birthplace of the Messiah (verse 6), another for their stay in Egypt (verse 15), another for Herod's brutal action (verse 18), and the last one saying that the Messiah would be called a Nazarene. (Verse 23) I feel as though Matthew really wanted us to know that this baby Jesus was the real deal. The One and Only Son of God. The only way for us to have salvation and to be free. That is just another thing that I personally got out of today's passage.
Hope you all have a great day!!
drew
I had no idea about the gifts meaning what they meant. It's really cool to see how those gift were like prophecies for my King, Priest, and Savior.
My answers to question:
Jesus was born in Bethlehem and King Herod was king, a king that was in fear of losing the throne so he wanted every male baby under two killed. Herod died.
Myrrh was the most astounding gift. It symbolized everything Jesus has done for the WORLD.
Picturing grown men worshipping a baby is kind of funny when I thought about it. But their future king was the baby which is great trust of a star appearing in the sky and following. I loved how the wise men didn't return to the king...that's why Jesus still lived!
I liked how Matthew proved Jesus' birth and starting of his life such as being a Nazarene. I think it's cool Drew pointed that out also. :) I definitely learned something new about Jesus today. :)
-Marissa!
Hey Guys,ok so i have read this passage plenty of times, but for some reason when i read this passage today and then read what Tom had to say about it, woah it amazed me even more!
The gift that the wise men brought that stood out to me the most was the Myrrh,cause it represents a symbol of death and nobody knew that Jesus was going to die for our sins, yet amazingly God arranged a way to show our people in this generation that he had the whole thing planned out!
It would just be BEYOND amazing to go back in time and be in the same room the moment the wise men walked in jesus front door and feel on there faces in worship! No one knew what was going to happen, and Mary and Joseph didnt know that there baby boy was going to be crucified and save everyone from there sins to have eternal life, yet God knew all along that he would have people bowing down to him, and he made the wise men aware that they were in the presence of a holy and precious king.
Jesus is the savior of my life. and he is my hero and no one else can ever compare to him. and this bible study is amazing so far i cant wait for what lies ahead!:)
Valerie
Wow-totally love reading all your comments! I'm going to jump on Drew's bandwagon(ha) What jumped out to me is now this is the 4th time that we have seen Joseph's immediate obedience. Each time he got the message in the middle of the night(check out Job35:10 our Creator gives songs in the night)and either he got up right away or early the next morning...So many times it seems like God has woken me up in the middle of the night & put something or someone on my mind and sadly my follow threw comes up short. Joseph's obedience fulfilled prophecy & carried out God's plan for our redemption. I don't want to miss out on what god has planned for me, help us to obey right away!
Hello Everyone.
The gift that stood out to me the most was the myrrh because the fact that Jesus was sent here to die on the cross for our sins and the wise men didnt know that yet and they still brought the myrrh thats kinda cool.
If I was in the same exact room as the Jesus I probably would just start worshiping and telling him that I love him because I mean Im in the same room as the God of the Universe!
If I was mary and heard that someone who didnt even know Jesus was trying to kill him I would try and do anything to get away from them. I would just have to trust God. I would also be praying for them (a lot).
-Emily
Day 2...wow! The purpose of the gifts from the wise men were awesome! I love symbolism and it is cool to know that my Jesus is my King, my High Priest, and my Savior all in one! Also, I believe the wise men had such extreme faith to travel miles and miles from looking at a star...I know I wouldn't have followed a star!
Something I want to point out is this is the story we read at Christmas time. Remembering Jesus' birth in a manger in Bethlehem. The way we receive this story seems nice and sweet because we look at Jesus as a baby, yet I think there was so much more to this moment. It is so powerful, hopeful, and exciting! Our Savior has arrived! Halleluiah! Yet at the same time their was chaos with King Herod and all the other Jews who were in fear of baby Jesus and His reign.
Talking about fear, this chapter shows me a lot about fear, especially coming from King Herod and the rest of Jerusalem. Look what fear can do--it can make you do ungodly, horrible things...such as plan to kill another human being...a baby for this instance!! Craziness! I don't think God nessisarily made fear a sinful thing but fear can definitely make us do sinful acts. I mean God intends us to fear Him. I think that is the only thing He plans for us to fear.
I enjoyed Chapter 2 a lot and I am excited to keep learning more about our Jesus! I hope you all have a great day and are learning lots too!!
Love, Lauren
I dont know if anyone will backtrack, but I couldn't help but add to the other terrific thoughts that my fellow worshipers have. My comments on Matthew 2: Even King Herod was smart enough to take heed of The Christ birth and ask the Chief Priests and teachers of the law whats up? How many people do we know that have been given such news and totally ignore it? It breaks my heart!!! The verse that stood out to me was verse 6 But you Bethlehem in the land of Judah are by no means least among the rulers of Judah, for out of you will come a ruler who will be the "SHEPHERD" of my people Israel. Not only do we have a King, a High Priest, and a Savior. We were given a loving, tender, caring shepherd who will lead us and guide us,in Love.
hey guys. :] I would have to say the gift that stood out most to me would have to be the myrrh. I just try to put myself in Mary's shoes. She just birthed Jesus, Immauel 'God with us'. Wow...thats a big event in itself, but I would be surprised at the three magi because they bring something that is used to preserve a dead body. Having just birthed Jesus, I wonder what went through Mary's mind when the man gave Jesus that gift. The last thing I would want to think about after giving birth to child is when it's going to die, and how.
Lauren
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