I am intrigued by the story of Jesus’ birth from Matthew. Most of the time, we read the nativity story from Luke, and it includes all the familiar characters: angels and shepherds and sheep and a manger and no place to sleep that night. But Matthew’s account is completely different—no sheep, no shepherds, no angels. It almost seems un-Christmaslike. How can you have a Christmas story without sheep and angels!?

As it is, this story occurs some time after Jesus’ actual birth, maybe as much as two years. By this time, Mary and Joseph and Jesus (who is no longer a baby) are in a house. They are still in Bethlehem, but no more manger for Jesus. He’s toddling around. This story has an entirely different cast of characters. Luke’s story is sweet and unassuming and celebratory. An actual birth takes place. But Matthew’s story has an air of intrigue. There are some sinister events that take place. There is a jealous king and some clueless priests and astrologers from the east and an inexplicable star that just shows up at crucial times. Let me explain.

The passage (you can look it up in Matthew 2) tells us that magi came to Jerusalem from the east, probably Babylon. We don’t know if there were three or not; tradition says there were simply because there were three gifts mentioned. In fact, this was probably quite a caravan, with guards and servants and attendants and supplies for an 800-mile journey, and who-knows-how-many magi. These guys were probably that era’s version of a scientist. Now, when I say scientist, don’t think telescopes or microscopes or the Pythagorean theorem. Science then wasn’t what it is now. They studied the stars and tried to interpret them. They analyzed dreams. They studied sacred writings from all kinds of religions. They looked for truth, and in that day, truth was found in the spiritual world, in the world of the supernatural. At some point, they saw a star, and it must have been a rather unique star. These guys would have known the normal pattern of the stars in their sky, and this was a new star, a different one. And somehow, they interpreted this star to mean that a new king had been born, the king of the Jews. The Bible doesn’t tell us how they knew this, but they did. Something was so compelling about this star that it convinced them that something big had taken place. Something crucial, something monumental had happened, and they had to go investigate. They had to follow this star.

But they didn’t simply go on a fact-finding mission. They didn’t go to Jerusalem as scientists, or even astrologers. They went as worshippers, believers, supplicants. These were men of faith that went on a pilgrimage. In fact, the only recorded words that we have of these men are these. They went to Jerusalem asking anybody they could find, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.” They travelled from Persia to Jerusalem to find this new king in order to worship him. This was a heart mission, not a head mission.

Well, Herod was currently the king, and he was jealous and insecure, and he determined to find out who else was being touted as king of the Jews. So, he gets his priests and scribes together and they search the Old Testament and tell him that the Messiah, the prophesied King, would be born in Bethlehem. So, he sends the magi to Bethlehem. But he also asks them when they first started seeing this star. If he could figure out when this new king was actually born, he may could find him and eliminate the competition to his throne. So, the magi head to Bethlehem, which was only about 6 miles south of Jerusalem. But as they begin their journey, the amazing star appears again, and it settles directly over the house where Mary and Joseph and Jesus were living. And when they get there, they give him their gifts–gold, frankincense, and myrrh–and worship this toddler who is king.

Now, I’ve got a lot of questions. Why didn’t the star lead them directly to the house? Why did it take them to Jerusalem first? And this must have been an incredible star. I’ve seen stars in the sky, but nothing like this. I mean, how do you have a star that actually moves across the sky and leads you somewhere? And this star led them to an actual house. Matthew says that it rested “over the place where the child was.” Did the star drop down from the sky and settle close enough to that particular house so that the magi would know precisely which house Jesus was in? And what happened to the star after the magi got to Jerusalem? Did it disappear? It seemed to only appear when the magi needed it. And did anybody else see the star? You would think a star that unique, that incredible (that low to the ground!) would have drawn some attention.

The only thing I can figure is that God gave the star to those that needed it, to those that wanted to see it, maybe even those that were looking for it. Herod was blind, and the priests and scribes were blind. The magi were not. Herod and the priests and scribes were Jews. The magi were Gentiles. They were likely from Babylon, where the Jews had been held captive for 70 years. Herod treated Jesus as an enemy. The magi, as Babylonians, were seen by the Jews as enemies, but treated Jesus as the King that he was. Herod and the priests and scribes had the Scriptures and didn’t use them. The magi simply followed a star, a star given to them by God. Herod looked at Jesus as competition (later in the story, he would murder all the male children in Bethlehem who were two years old or less; by that time Joseph had taken his family to Egypt and escaped Herod’s madness). The magi looked at him as the King. The passage says that they “fell down and worshipped him.” Jesus was born the King. Herod had to fight for his throne with a sword.

The Messiah was 6 miles away from Herod and the priests and scribes, and they didn’t even know it (and probably for two years!). They weren’t looking. The magi were looking, and God gave them a star.

God made a point to announce the birth of his Son to, of all people, pagan astrologers from Babylon, and they responded appropriately. They fell down and worshipped. Herod’s response was rage and violence. The question for us is this. How do we respond to the coming of the King? A king has authority. He tells you what you can and can’t do. And there can be only one king; there can’t be two. Herod knew that. Will we respond with apathetic ignorance, like the priests and scribes? Will we respond with resistance and fury—“Nobody’s going to tell me what to do”—like Herod? Or will we bow down and worship.