Come Boldly to God
When we picture the Christmas nativity seen, we picture Mary and Jospeh, Jesus, some shepherd, and three wise men, but the truth is, we don’t actually know that there were three wise men. We just say there were three because they brought three gifts to Jesus’ parents. What we do know is that these wise men were highly educated. They were very wealthy, and they were desperate to meet this little boy who might be the great Messiah that the Jews had been waiting for.
When they saw the star, they were filled with joy! They entered the house and saw the child with his mother, Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasure chests and gave him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
Hold on a second. I thought Jesus was born in a stable. Well, he was, and he was born in a stable because there was no room for his family in the inn well, actually it wasn’t an inn. It was a “Kataluma.” That’s a Greek word that can either be translated as “inn” or as “guest room,” and most modern scholars actually believe the latter translation is better. In fact, Luke uses a totally different Greek word when he’s talking about a commercial inn. That word is “pandocheion.” That is the word they would have used for a public motel.
Joseph & Mary had gone home to Joseph’s home town for a census, probably to a relative’s house. Do you think Mary & Joseph would have gone to a public motel to have a baby? No. And another thing the movies get wrong: Jesus’ family was actually in Bethlehem for a while before Jesus was born.
While they were there, the time came for her baby to be born.
But none of this explains why Matthew 1:10 says the wise men went to a house. The reason Matthew said that the wise men went to a house is because Jesus was probably two years old when they finally got there. They weren’t in the stable anymore.
When your kids were born, did you get them gold, frankincense, and myrrh? No. You got a baby snot sucker, and not the blue one with the squeezer ball. You got the kind where you physically suck the snot out of the baby’s nose…Why is that a real thing? People suck snot out of their babies’ noses, but they didn’t have those when Jesus was born, so He got gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Mary and Joseph would have been thankful for these gifts, because they were very valuable & useful, and with these gifts, these wise men, these very educated men, were foreshadowing what Jesus would become.
With the myrrh they demonstrated that Jesus was the lamb of God. In their day, Myrrh was used to embalm dead bodies, and this foreshadowing pointed to Jesus’ death, His sacrifice. The gold foreshadowed the kingship of Jesus. They were proclaiming that Jesus is King! With the frankincense they announced Jesus as the great High Priest.
The priests in the Jewish sacrificial system had two primary responsibilities:
- The priest sacrificed animals to God for the forgiveness of sins.
- The priest prayed prayers on behalf of the people to God.
Under the Old Covenant, an animal was killed as a sacrifice to God so that God would forgive the sins of the people, because for all of history there have been two opposing forces: the holiness of God and the sinfulness of men.
We live in a world that doesn’t believe in sin. They believe that we can all pick our truth, and if they believe something is moral, it is. They say, “what’s true for you is true for you. If it makes you feel good, do it.” Ask yourself, “who says what is right and what is wrong?”
Someone said the concept of sin is an outdated way of tricking kids into being good. Have you heard of the Elf on the Shelf? It’s a little stuffed doll that you put on a shelf in your house, and according to the superstition, he’ll watch your kids and report their behavior to Santa. He’s a spy. Who needs “sin” when Santa’s “making a list, checking it twice?”
If we don’t understand the holiness of God, we will always have a casual approach to sin. God hates sin because it separates us from Him. God is perfect, and we are sinful. For that reason, we can’t be in relationship with God unless someone is punished. Everything about God is perfect, so we can’t be in His life, because we are not perfect. Holiness isn’t simply one of God’s attributes. It’s the perfection of all His attributes. Everything about Him and around Him is holy. The problem is, we’re not, unless He makes us holy.
In the Jewish sacrificial system, every year on Yom Kippur (the day of atonement), the high priest goes into the holiest place in the temple, burns frankincense to create smoke that represents a prayer of repentance from the people, and sacrifices a spotless lamb. The innocent lamb dies so that the guilty people can be forgiven, and that’s just weird. They kill cute little sheep for their own sins? It’s gross and unfair, but God wants us to know how terrible sin is.
God is perfectly just, and He wants us to know that sin has consequences. It may be us who suffers because of our dumb decisions, or it may be someone else. But sin always causes pain.
The good news is that God is not only just. He’s also merciful. The sacrificed animal temporarily satisfied God’s justice, and at the same time, it extended mercy.
Thank God things have changed. Our high priest doesn’t kill lambs anymore. We live under the new covenant, and the new covenant says Christ’s single death was enough.
Since we have a great High Priest who has entered heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to what we believe. This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin.
I hope you know that whatever you’re going through Jesus understands. He relates to our trials. He empathizes with our pain.
If you feel overwhelmed, know that in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus said that He was overwhelmed to the point of death.
Have you ever had family problems? Jesus did. Jesus’ family had crazy people just like your family does, and if you don’t know who the crazy person in your family is, it’s you. Jesus’ family called Him crazy.
Have you felt judged? Jesus was conceived out of wedlock to a teenage mom. In his time, that was incredibly scandalous. Jesus lived in poverty, as a bastard’s son.
Have you ever been tempted to do something you didn’t want to do? Satan attacked Jesus in a dessert, when He was weak and vulnerable.
Have you ever had to endure the death of a loved one? Jesus’ had to experience the death of His best friend and his dad.
Have you ever been betrayed by a friend? Jesus was betrayed by one of His best friends, and he was killed for a crime He didn’t commit.
Have you ever felt like God abandoned you? Jesus hung alone on the cross and cried out “God why have you left me alone up here to die?” God is so holy that He even had to look away from His own son because of all the sin that was laid on Him.
The Word became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness.
Jesus came to live a hard life so that the Great High Priest could relate to us. He wanted to have a relationship with us, and the best relationships are built on shared experiences.
Let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.
You can come to Him because He cares. He understands! Come to Him boldly as you are. In fact, you don’t have to run to Him for Him to see you. He can see you where you are, and He’s running to you. He’s praying for you. In your weakness, His strength is perfect, so He came to you.
