Rediscover the Worship
Rediscover Christmas

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Good morning church! We’re in part three of our series, “Rediscover Christmas.” Today, we’re going to be talking about “Rediscover The Worship”- what does it really mean to worship the one born King, the true King? What is worshiped, by the way, is whatever you value or love the most. It’s whatever you put first place in your life. It’s where you spend your time, talent and treasure the most, with the most focus. It’s the greatest source of significance and security for you. That’s worship; it’s whatever you ascribe the greatest value and worth to.

Tim Keller says that, “Worship is pulling our affections off our idols and putting them on God.” In other words, we’re going to worship something – from dinosaurs to dandelions. Humans are the only ones who worship; we are built for worship. God made us that way, but sin causes us to worship wrong things, so there’s a battle for our worship, especially at Christmas, ironically. You would think at the time of the year when we would really be able to focus our worship, but there’s a battle for our worship; a war for our worship. We’re tempted to put our affections and our love on something other than Jesus, because our affections tend to go towards material things, spending money and these kinds of things. This creates so much anxiety in our lives, because, after all, what’s happened to Christmas is, Christmas has become a big business, according to Forbes magazine. As well as being the most important day on the Christian calendar, it’s become the most important day on the financial calendar. According to Forbes, retailers in America can expect to make $1trillion from Christmas sales, accounting for one quarter of their yearly profits.” According to one report, that’s over 25%; one quarter of their annual profits are made between Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day.

I used to work retail for twelve years before I was a pastor. We knew that 40% of our bottom line came in the Christmas season. Christmas has become a big business; it hasn’t always been this way, but that’s what it’s become . Don’t you feel the tension? Don’t you feel the pull to somehow create “the perfect Christmas?” If you’re a parent with little kids, you’re thinking, I just want it to be the perfect Christmas. All during the year you’ve probably been trying to do your best to watch your budget and to to put money away in savings. Then something happens like the day after Thanksgiving, we have “Black Friday.” Then, we have “Cyber Monday” and we just blow our whole budget, because we somehow think that it will make me happy; it will make it better. We end up being tempted to spend, spend, spend on things that don’t really bring joy, They don’t really bring happiness. How can we pull our affections off of this crazy chaotic season and put them where they really belong, so that we worship what really matters?

In the book of Matthew, chapter two, we read about the story of the birth of Jesus and how He was born in the middle of a political backdrop of the times. There were two kings in this story. There was the one political king, King Herod, and then there was the one born king, King Jesus. There’s a pull for all of us, even all the way back to that day, to either worship the world’s king or the true King. I believe, as we look at the scripture today, we’ll see three steps on how to rediscover our worship of the true King.

Let’s look at Matthew 2:1-12 (ESV) 1”Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, 2saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” 3When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him; 4and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. 5They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for so it is written by the prophet: 6 “‘And you, O Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.’” 7Then Herod summoned the wise men secretly and ascertained from them what time the star had appeared. 8And he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, “Go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him, bring me word, that I too may come and worship him.” 9After listening to the king, they went on their way. And behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was. 10When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. 11And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh . 12And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way.” This is God’s word.

WE CAN REDISCOVER THE WORSHIP THAT BELONGS TO JESUS BY…

1. Recognizing the battle for our worship.

There’s a battle for what we will give first place in our lives. I want you to notice the word, “worship.” It’s in our text today three times; therefore, we’re going to “unpack” it in its three places, in the first three verses. We want to “unpack” that occurrence of the word, “worship,” in verse two. In verse two, we see why the wise men came to Jerusalem. They came searching for the one born King. Let’s look at it again, in verse two, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” So they came to Jerusalem, probably thinking that, if there’s a king born in Israel, he should be in a palace. He should be in Jerusalem, the capital city. When they get there, they find out he’s not there. Instead, they find in his place the false king, King Herod. King Herod was not the one born king. They came looking for the one born king.

When they came in and announced this, it says in verse three, 3 “When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him;” In other words, he was agitated. He was spooked by this. We have to understand who he was. He was called Herod the Great because he had built so many grand structures by the sea. He was named after Caesar Augustus. He had “supersized” the Temple Mount. He was one who had built great works, so they called him Herod the Great, but he wasn’t great morally. In fact, he was a paranoid old man. As he got older, he got more and more paranoid .

Herod the Great was brought into power in 37 BC. He was only half Jewish and half Idumean,which meant he was really from the land of Israel. He wasn’t one that was even qualified to be the king, but because he had learned to be politically wise, he had come under Augustus Caesar as a client-ruler in 37 BC. He had found his way and he was over all of the Judean province under Caesar Augustus, but as he got older, he got more and more paranoid Anybody that threatened his throne, he would kill them. It didn’t matter if it was a son or a wife, he would kill them. . He killed a couple of his sons that he was worried about.

Caesar Augustus uttered the famous pun that\ he would rather be Herod’s pig (hus) than his son (huios) because Herod was notorious for being willing to kill some, but now, he’s stirred up . He is stirred up because these Magi, which is the Greek word, “magoi, came from the east.

Where did these wise men come from? The scripture doesn’t say exactly, but they probably came from Persia. “magoi” is a Persian word and it would make sense that they would come from Persia because, centuries before this, the Jews had been carried off into captivity by the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar. Then, some 70 years later, the Persians, under King Cyrus, had overthrown the king of Babylon and now he carried the Jews over to his place. We see people like Daniel, the wise man, the Hebrew prophet. Daniel was under king Nebuchadnezzar and Belshazzar. He’s carried off to Persia under Cyrus and then King Darius of Persia.

Why am I telling you this whole back story? Because it shows how the Persians would have had access to the Hebrew scriptures and the wise men would have been part of their background. They would have known the Hebrew scriptures so, when they saw this star arise, they thought there was something in the Jewish bible about a king that would be announced by a star. Verse 2, “When the star rose, we come looking for his star, the star of the one born king.”

What are they talking about here? What are these wise men looking for? If you look in the book of Numbers 24:17, you’ll see that there was a prophet, ironically from another Gentile “dude” because these Persians are Gentiles. The Jews don’t even recognize their own king. Here comes these guys and there’s another prophet. His name was Balaam. If you don’t remember who Balaam was, he was the guy with the talking donkey, back in the book of Judges. Balaam is the one who, every time he would try to prophecy a curse on Israel, God would cause him to to prophesy a blessing. Here, he prophesied something about the coming Messiah. He says in Numbers 24:17 (NIV) “ … A star will come out of Jacob; a scepter will rise out of Israel…” Just imagine this – here are these Persian wise men, these Magi; they were students of the heavens and of the stars and, I believe, also students of the Hebrew scriptures. They put it together, they saw the star rise and, from their perspective, it’s rising west of them. They start making plans to make the trek.

The scripture doesn’t tell you how many Magi there were. How many were there, according to tradition? According to tradition, there were three, right? Where do they get the number “three?” Probably, from the three gifts– gold, frankincense and myrrh. That’s probably where the idea of three comes from, but it’s not in the scripture anywhere. I think it would be more likely to be 30 than three because it caused quite a stir in Jerusalem. Ifthe caravan was traveling from a far distance from Persia, three guys would have never made it with all that gold, frankincense and myrrh. That land was known for robbers, pirates and that kind of thing. I think it was a caravan of people and when they came into Jerusalem, it caused quite a stir, to the point where they were invited into the palace to talk to the king. I don’t know how many there were. The bible doesn’t say, but I believe it was enough to cause a stir.

We see that there was a battle for the worship. Will they worship all the lights and glory and riches and the big, great king on his throne in Jerusalem or will they continue to look for the one born king? That’s the battle here in the book of Luke. We read Jesus saying this, Luke 16:13 (NKJV) “No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the oneand despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.”

The word, “mammon,” has the idea of money and material possessions. It’s a word that describes worldly wealth. You can’t worship both. That’s the temptation every Christmas, isn’t it, but not just at Christmas. The temptation is all year long. Have you ever gone on Amazon? You’re looking at something and pricing something. Maybe you went to walmart.com You go to Amazon and you’re pricing some things; you hadn’t bought anything yet. You are just kind of thinking about it. Then, you go over to a social media site, like Facebook, and the first ad that pops up is the very thing that you were looking for. There’s some kind of algorithm going on in the background right there; there’s something out there. The big business is always trying to convince you that you need this; you must buy this. There’s this warfare, constantly trying to get you to spend your thought life, your time, your talent and your treasure worshiping Herod, the false king,worshiping the false king the world. Worshiping the false king rather than the true King, Who wasn’t born in a palace, but in a humble stable. That’s the way God sent His Son.

We always have this temptation, this battle for our worship. In the book of 1 John, it talks about this,1 John 2:15-17 (ESV) Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.

Where are you putting your worship? Where are For the believer, we pull our worship off of our idols, off of those temporary, worldly things and we put them on Jesus.

The battle for worship began even before the earth was formed. There with an angel, named Lucifer, whose name means, “son of the morning.” Lucifer said, “I will be like the most high god.” Isaiah reports this “before time” story. He was cast down from heaven, along with a third of the angelic host, because he decided to worship “self.” That’s a real mark of modern culture, to worship self above God. It began with satan, but satan wasn’t finished. He crawled up in the garden of Eden and there was Adam and Eve. He says to Eve, ‘Look at this fruit. You know, if you eat it, you’ll become wise like God. Your eyes will be open and you’ll be like God.’

It’s the same temptation; you can worship yourself. You can have what you want. You can have, like the advertisement said, “You can have it your way.” That’s really the attitude of sin, isn’t it? Sin begins with an attitude of the heart that says, ‘I want it my way rather than God’s way.’ That temptation for wrong worship began even before the earth was formed and it continues. It was the reason for the fall of Adam and even for the fall of mankind.

In the book of Romans, chapter one, Paul says that instead of worshiping the Creator, we’ve lowered our eyes to worship the creation and we’ve made idols of creeping things, animals and things of the earth. We’ve lowered ourselves in worship. There’s a battle for our worship. There’s a war going on for what you will worship. We’re going to worship something.

I think of what has been quoted of Pascal. He says, “There’s a god-shaped vacuum in the soul of every man that can only be filled by the person of Jesus Christ.” There’s a hole in our soul. We’re going to put something in it, but nothing fits except Christ Jesus. We were made for Him. Will you recognize the battle for your worship? That’s the first step. There’s a battle.

WE CAN REDISCOVER THE WORSHIP THAT BELONGS TO JESUS BY…

2. Overcoming the temptation to spend our worship wrongly.

There’s a battle. Recognize it and then overcome your temptation to worship wrongly, to worship the wrong king. We’ve covered the first three verses. We are on verses four through eight now. We know that Herod is troubled and all Jerusalem with him because this idea of one being born king could “overturn the whole apple cart. “ This is a situation. The first thing that Herod inquires of is he brings in the scribes and the priests. They are the experts on the Old Testament. He asks them, ‘By the way , where was that one born king supposed to be born? Where was Christ to be born?’ The word Christ is the Greek word, “ christos,” which means “Anointed One.” The Hebrew version of that same word is “Messiah.” Where was the Messiah to be born? They didn’t have to think about it; everybody knows that. Come on, King Herod, you should know this. He’s going to be born in Bethlehem. He’s in the line of David. He’s going to be born in the city of David.

Later, Jesus says, “I am the bread of life.” It makes sense that the “bread of life” will be born in the “house of bread. The “bread of life” will be born in the “house of bread,” Bethlehem. In Hebrew, Bethlehem means “house of bread.” Of course, the “bread of life” would be born in the “bread house,” Bethlehem. He’s being born in the city of David and they quoted it to him in verse six, “‘And you, O Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.’” They’re quoting Micah 5:2, who wrote centuries before Jesus came, so they knew what city He would be born in.

This is one of over 300 Messianic prophecies that were fulfilled in Jesus; this is just one of them. They knew it. He’s going to be born in Bethlehem. They announced that to the wise men, to the Magi and so, they’re ready to move out.

Notice what he does next in verse seven, “Then Herod summoned the wise men secretly and ascertained from them what time the star had appeared.” You know that this is not good. This is not a good situation. Now, why does he want to know that? We don’t know here yet and we don’t know at this point in the story what they told him. But we can find out later in the chapter what they told him, because if we go to verse 16, we find out that they told him the star had appeared about two years ago.

How do we know that and why did he meet with them secretly? It’s the second appearance of the word, “worship,” here. He said in verse eight, “And he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, “Go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him, bring me word, that I too may come and worship him.” His idea for “worship” was that he wanted to murder the one born king. He wanted to kill him.

What do we find in Matthew 2:16, “Then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, became furious, and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the wise men. “ That’s how we know it was two years later. That’s how he worked it out; that was his plan all along. That’s who Herod was; He hated the idea of giving up his throne.

That’s how we still are to this day. We don’t want to give up our “throne.” We want to say, ‘I sit on my “throne,” rather than surrendering.’

“Proskuneo” is the Greek word for worship. It means to fall face down– to kiss the floor as it were, to kiss the feet. “Proskuneo” means to lie prostrate before the one you worship. We don’t want to do that. We want to stay on the “throne.” We don’t want to surrender the “throne” to King Jesus.

Herod didn’t want to surrender his throne. In fact, he’s willing to kill babies, toddlers, in order to preserve his throne.

There’s a couple of places where you’ll hear the Christmas story most often– Luke, chapter two we will cover on Christmas eve, when we gather again on Christmas eve. It is the main story that we often read. That’s the nativity scene story, with the stable and the crib. Matthew, chapter two, is the other story, where we get the wise men, King Herod and the star, but there are other places in the bible. We could look at John, chapter one, where the Word became flesh. We can look at Isaiah, chapter nine, where we have the titles– for unto us is born, unto us, a son is given.

There’s a surprising place that you can find the christmas story, that maybe you never thought about. It’s really similar to what’s going on here in this story. It’s in the book of Revelation, chapter 12. The word, “revelation,” is the Greek word, “apokalupsis” or apocalypse, which means “to draw back the curtain.” The disciple John, John the apostle, was caught up into the heavens in the vision. God drew back the curtain and he was able to look back across time from the past to the future. In chapter 12, he sees a woman who is about to give birth, and then, he sees a dragon that was cast down from heaven. A third of the angels were cast down with him. The dragon positions himself so that he can devour the male child of the woman. That’s in the book of Revelation; that’s the story. I don’t know what your nativity scene has in it. You probably have some shepherds. Maybe, you have a mantle over your fireplace and you have some shepherds and the stable. On one side you’ve got the Magi, the wise men. Does anybody here have a dragon on the shelf? Well, you wouldn’t because that wouldn’t be seen in the real world, but in the supernatural, in the spiritual world where the curtain was drawn back and and the apostle John was looking at the christmas story, he saw the dragon that was whispering in Herod’s ear, ‘kill him .’ ‘Devour him. Don’t even let him get started because he’s going to change everything. He’s going to make everybody worship God again.’ There’s a dragon in the story that we can’t even see and he’s whispering in Herod’s ear, but the Magi don’t listen. They go ahead and they move forward.

In the book of 1 Timothy, it talks about how we can be tempted by material things and about how believers can be tempted. It says, 1 Timothy 6:9-10 (ESV) 9 But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. You see, when we’re tempted to put our worship on wrong things and we can do this even as believers. We say, “we worship the true king,” but then, we are pulled and we worship our idols. When we do this, we hurt ourselves, because that worship is not from God.

How can we overcome it? The book of 1 John talks about how we can overcome this temptation. 1 John 5:4-5 (ESV) “For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” Do you know how you can overcome the temptation to spend your worship wrongly? It’s by putting Jesus on the throne of your life; that’s how you do it and you have to just keep doing it because you just never know how your idols will creep back in and how you will end up putting yourself back on the throne again if you don’t watch out. We can overcome.

Remember how I said that Satan tempted Adam and Eve and how, even before the world was formed, he was saying that he desired to worship himself? Well, he continued when he tried to tempt Jesus. We see this in Matthew, chapter four. First of all he tempts Him for his desire. He tells Jesus that he has been fasting for 40 days and for 40 nights and isn’t He hungry? ‘If you’re hungry, you have the power. Go ahead and turn the stones into bread.’ Jesus answers with scripture from Deuteronomy; He says, “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” Satan decides that he can’t tempt Him with His desire, so he tempts Him with His identity. He says, ‘If you’re really the son of God, prove it by jumping down off of the corner of this temple and prove that the angels will save you and prevent you from being killed.’ Jesus tells him that the scripture says, “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God” and He overcomes His temptation against His identity.

These are the same temptations; the devil has the same “bag of tricks.” He tempts your identity and tells you to be something that you’re not; something that’s not true and you embrace it and then you worship yourself.

The third temptation Satan gives to Jesus is he said to bow down and worship me and I’ll give you all that your eyes can see. I’ll make you king of the world. Imagine trying to trick Jesus with that one, when He knew He was the one born King. Jesus says to him, “Be gone, Satan, for it is written, you shall worship the Lord, your God and Him only shall you serve.” Then Satan departed from Him and the angels came and ministered to Jesus. If you want the angels, you must put Satan out of your life and put Jesus on the throne.

How will you spend your worship of Jesus? I was just thinking about this story, of the babe in the manger and how God could have come any way he wanted. He could have come in any way. In fact , He could have said that when He’s the word made flesh. When He became flesh, why didn’t He just come as a man and skip over that hardship of having to be a teenager or being born of a woman and having to diminish Himself to the point where he depended on his mother, Mary, to care for Him. Why would the Son of God come in this humble way, so that He could become one of us and experience every detail as we experienced; all the hardships and temptations, yet without sin. That’s how He came. He came as a baby; He came in the smallest way possible. Born not in a palace, but in a stable. So, if I think about this, I want to pull my worship off of these great things. Instead of putting all of my worship on the bright lights and the palace of Jerusalem, I want to move my worship to the stable in the crib and the baby.

Just just let me think this through with you for a second. Worship is not just singing along with the worship team. Yes, that’s worship, but it is just a part. There’s another Greek word for worship besides “Proskuneo,” which means to fall down on your face before the Lord. There’s the Greek word, “latreía,” which means to serve; it’s also translated worship, but sometimes to serve.

The idea of worship could mean for mom or dad, changing your baby’s dirty diaper. It could be getting up at two a.m. for a feeding. Now, it might not feel like worship, but you can get up with thanksgiving and say, ‘Lord, thank You for a baby that can cry. Thank you for a baby that’s hungry. Thank You, Lord, that I have the provision to provide a diaper in a house in a crib.’ Then you begin with everything that you do with worship because you put Jesus on the throne of your life . There’s the mom or dad that goes to work; you have to get up. You have to go to the “daily grind.” No, you don’t. You’re getting up to worship because whatever you do you do ‘not as unto men, but as unto the Lord.

It says in Colossians 3:23, “And whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not to men.” Do it with all your heart; with all your worship, so that going to work tomorrow morning can be worship, if you do it for the Lord. Whatever you offer to the Lord is worship; how will you spend it?

Here’s some suggestions if you really want to stop thinking of yourself on the throne. Do something little instead of something big– serve in the nursery. There’s a bunch of little people back there. Do something little; serve with the Children’s ministry. Find a single mom that goes to our church that maybe needs somebody to babysit so she can go Christmas shopping or she may need some help in some other way. There might be a single mom needs some help around the house. There’s some strong men in the church that could help out there. There might be children in our city that need foster care. These are just some of the ways that we can pull our worship off of our idols. Sometimes it is good to get low and not to climb high. This helps pull the worship off of ourselves and our idols and put them on Christ.

WE CAN REDISCOVER THE WORSHIP THAT BELONGS TO JESUS BY…

3. Choosing to worship the true king, Christ Jesus.

There’s a battle for our worship. There’s a temptation that we must overcome. Then finally, choosing to worship the true king, Christ Jesus, so that we pull our affections and our worship off of our idols. We have to put them somewhere if we do or they’ll default right back to false worship. Put them on the true king, King Jesus.

We are in verses nine through twelve now. It says in verse 9, “After listening to the king, they went on their way.” They’re headed towards Bethlehem. Bethlehem’s only a two hour walk south of Jerusalem. It’s not far. So, they’re headed to Bethlehem. They were so close, but maybe the bright lights of the city and the palace distracted them, but as soon as they got back on track, the star reappeared. I don’t know where it was or if it was lost in the light or if there was a cloudy day. I don’t know what it was, but they saw it again. This star rose up before them and it came to rest over the place where the child was.

There have been many scientists throughout the years who have tried to identify the star. There was a comment that that was a new comet that appeared around 3BC, somewhere close to the birth of Jesus. Some have said it was during that time that there was an outstanding and perfect alignment of Jupiter and Saturn over the Middle East, which would have looked like a new bright star occurring. There are many who try to come with with natural explanations. Maybe God did cause some of those things to come into being at a perfect time, but I’m okay if He just produced a supernatural star. Besides, it has some unusual characteristics. It somehow appears right over the house where Jesus lives. It’s like God sent a special “GPS awareness” to the Magi. They hear the star go, ‘you have arrived at your destination.’

What was their emotional response? It says, in verse 10, “When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy.” You see, when you find the one true King, when you find Him and you put Him on the throne of your heart, there’s nothing like it. This is not happiness. “Happiness” happens because there’s some favorable happening in the external world, but joy is found in the exceeding gladness. Joy comes from within . It comes from knowing the Lord Jesus. They’re happy; they’re full of great joy.

Verse 11 just ruins our nativity scene. What do you mean, Gary? Why does it ruin my nativity scene? Because it says, “And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother,” It doesn’t say “stable.” Why is this? It is two years later. They didn’t stay in the stable for two years. This is about two years later. This is not a baby in a stable. This is not an infant in a stable. This is a toddler in the house. This is two year old Jesus.

Some years ago, I was preaching this message. This was a while back when my kids were still living at home. I said that the shepherds needed to be there, just like in Luke, chapter two with the stable, the baby, Mary, Joseph and the angel. All of that needs to be there, but the Magi, the wise men, they’re not there yet. It will be two years before they see Jesus. So, on the way home that day, I pulled up in the driveway (my kids rode separately in those days because we were portable. I would have to stick around to tear down everything and pack it up in the trailer)and I see my wise men lined up on the railing of my deck. I came into the house and asked, “Who’s the joker? Who is the person who put the Magi outside?” My children said, “Well, dad, you said it’s going to take them two years to see Jesus. We were just trying to make it accurate to the scripture.”

We find the third version of the word, “worship,” here. The third occurrence is found in verse 11, “…and they fell down and worshiped him.” There’s that word, that idea of worship, which means to lower yourself. They fell down and they worshiped him.

Do you know what else worship always includes? It includes opening their treasures and offering their gifts. It always includes offering. It always includes saying, ‘You know what? I’m going to give God the first part of my time, talent and treasure.’ You can tell a lot about a person by looking at two books, their date book and their checkbook. You can tell what they put first and who they put first.

The wise men had traveled from a great distance with these expensive gifts, gold frankincense and myrrh. They opened them up and they presented them there before little toddler Jesus. Can you see Him there with Mary and Joseph? They begin to present them and they bow down and they lay on their faces before Him.

Gold has been noted as a gift fit for a king, for a lion of Judah. Frankincense is a gift that’s a particular spice that was part of the recipe for what the priest would use in the temple. So, it’s a gift fit for a priest. Then, there was the gift of myrrh. Now, that’s the odd one. That’s a really odd gift to bring to a “baby shower.” Myrrh was a prime ingredient in taking care of one who had died, as part of the spices you would use to prepare a body for burial. Why that one? Because it’s a gift fit for a sacrificial lamb. All three are true in Jesus. He’s the king, He’s the high priest and He’s the lamb of God, Who takes away the sins of the world. They bring these three gifts.

Verse 12, “And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way.” They were warned in a dream. Don’t go back the way you came because Herod has some bad ideas. So, they went home another way, having worshiped the true King.

You know, worship always involves two kinds of moves. One is to recognize what He’s worth. You give recognition that He’s worthy and then give Him what He’s worth. You recognize, then you give. They recognized Him as the one born the true king. They recognized Him. God revealed it to them and then they gave Him what He is worth. They gave Him these gifts; they gave Him themselves.

It says in Joshua 24:15 (NLT) “ …Choose today whom you will serve …But as for me and my family, we will serve the Lord.” Have you decided today what you will give to the One who owns everything? What do you give to the King of the universe? There might be one thing He doesn’t have; it might be you. Perhaps, He doesn’t have you. You still have the throne. You’re still deciding who you are and who you belong to. It’s about me, me, me, me me. You’re the god of your own life. That’s your attitude and you don’t want anything to do with this Jesus, because if He comes in and takes the throne of your life, then you have to lie before Him, face down and say ‘You’re God and I’m not.’ That would be the best gift you could give Him this christmas.

What do you give to the One who owns everything? He might not have you because you’ve never given your life to Him. Have you given your life to Jesus? Have you chosen to give your life to Him?

It says in Romans 12:1 (NLT) “And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him.” There’s a battle for your worship. There’s a temptation to spend your worship wrongly. But you can put Jesus on the throne of your life and know exceeding joy and gladness. How will you respond today? How will you respond to King Jesus? Will you worship Him?

Let’s pray. Lord, thank You for Your word. Thank You for the Christmas story afresh today. Lord, I pray for that person that’s here today, that’s never given their life to You. Would you do it right now, my friend? Would you say, “Lord Jesus, I believe in You. I believe You died on the cross for my sins, that You were raised from the grave and that You live today. Come and live in me, forgive me of my sins and make me the kind of person You want me to be. Make me a child of God. I want You as my Lord and Savior. I give my life to You.” If you’re praying that prayer, believing, He’ll save you and make you a child of God. He will forgive you of your sins. Others are here today and you’re a believer in Jesus. You’re a follower of Jesus, but you recognize the temptation during this season to put your worship where it doesn’t belong, to worship wrongly. Right now, would you just confess that and say, “Lord forgive me, I’ve been anxious and I haven’t had peace this christmas because I’ve been focusing on wrong things. Lord, help me to pull my affection and my attention off of these things and to put them on You, Lord.” I pray it now, in Jesus’ name. Amen.