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00:00:00.000 | I am James Hong and welcome to the Surpassing Value Podcast.
00:00:15.620 | The fuel and desire for this podcast was born out of a compulsion to flesh out what's
00:00:19.740 | been going on in the midst of an ocean of megaphones that may not actually withstand
00:00:24.600 | the test of scrutiny.
00:00:26.620 | As a signpost theologian, I will do my best to filter out the impurities and point people
00:00:32.340 | in the right direction.
00:00:39.360 | In this bonus episode of the Surpassing Value Podcast, I wanted to talk about Christmas
00:00:45.300 | from a historical and biblical perspective.
00:00:49.620 | It's a bonus episode because I'm recording this after Episode 10 and by the time this
00:00:54.900 | episode drops, we should be on Episode 3.
00:01:00.180 | Today is December 12th of 2020.
00:01:04.020 | So for this episode, we're going to be talking about the birth of Christ and the Magi because
00:01:11.580 | quite frankly it is relevant to Christmas.
00:01:16.060 | If you're hearing this, it might be Christmas Day because my plan is to drop this on Christmas
00:01:20.300 | Day and for most of the nation, Christmas invokes rom-coms, presents, hot chocolate,
00:01:27.780 | Santa Claus, reindeers, and the like.
00:01:30.500 | For another significant portion, this might even include a nativity scene.
00:01:35.340 | However, for Christians, it should invoke a lot more.
00:01:40.300 | The reason it should invoke a lot more is because the very nature of the day is based
00:01:44.980 | on the birth of our Savior.
00:01:48.260 | To be clear, we're not exactly sure on what exact date Christ was born, so this day is
00:01:53.700 | more of a commemoration of his birth than it is an anniversary of sorts.
00:01:59.500 | For Christians, this day celebrates the day that God took on human flesh, entered the
00:02:06.780 | world by condescending to where we were, was praised by a few, and entrusted to people
00:02:14.500 | of low societal value.
00:02:18.620 | What is extremely noteworthy about this grand paradox of God taking on human flesh is the
00:02:23.900 | sheer exhibition of the immense power of God as he holds all things together.
00:02:33.100 | Colossians 1:15-20 states, "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all
00:02:40.140 | creation. For by him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible
00:02:45.380 | and invisible, whether thrones or dominions, or rulers or authorities. All things have
00:02:50.780 | been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold
00:02:55.860 | together. He is also the head of the body, the church, and he is the beginning, the firstborn
00:03:01.060 | from the dead, so that he himself will come to a first place in everything. For it was
00:03:05.740 | the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in him, and through him to reconcile
00:03:10.940 | all things to himself, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through
00:03:17.020 | the blood of his cross."
00:03:22.180 | Consider these few verses in light of the power of God, this all-powerful and holy God.
00:03:32.660 | The God who destroyed the world with an apocalyptic flood.
00:03:36.820 | The God who humbled unbelieving Pharaoh and made his own people to suffer because of this
00:03:41.860 | unbelief.
00:03:43.380 | God turned water into blood, thunder and hail to envelop Egypt, a darkness so thick that
00:03:49.780 | the Egyptians couldn't see in front of them, and caused the death of their firstborn.
00:03:57.260 | The God who parted the Red Sea and allowed only Israel to pass.
00:04:01.780 | The God whom Moses couldn't see, but only could see the trail, because Moses or any
00:04:08.220 | other man would have died thus, causing Moses' own appearance to physically change.
00:04:14.540 | The God whom Elijah called upon when he battled the prophets of Baal.
00:04:19.200 | The God who destroyed the Assyrians and the Babylonians, the two international world empires
00:04:24.420 | that took turns dominating the globe.
00:04:28.980 | Christ is the image of that God, but also the firstborn of all creation.
00:04:37.760 | So one of many aspects we learn from the Incarnation is that this same all-powerful God is also
00:04:46.980 | a loving God who cares for all humanity deeply and profoundly.
00:04:55.500 | Or else why would he send his only begotten?
00:04:59.180 | Imagine the power of Christ that in him all things were created, both in heaven and on
00:05:04.380 | earth.
00:05:06.120 | He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
00:05:14.260 | I want to illuminate this aspect of holding together because I do think it is profound.
00:05:20.380 | A hydrogen bomb is 1000 times more devastating than an atomic bomb.
00:05:26.220 | A hydrogen bomb is 1000 times more devastating than an atomic bomb.
00:05:34.180 | The atomic bomb was what was dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki that killed 129,000 and 226,000
00:05:42.700 | people, respectively.
00:05:45.480 | This is how a hydrogen bomb works, and I'll be quoting from Science Drug.
00:05:50.860 | "A hydrogen bomb basically works with the help of fusion reaction, but it includes fission
00:05:56.900 | reaction as well.
00:05:58.940 | Fission reaction releases a lot of energy, whereas fusion reaction requires energy to
00:06:05.820 | take place.
00:06:06.820 | Hence, the reaction starts with the fission reaction, where the neutrons collide with
00:06:11.500 | the uranium or plutonium and release excess amount of energy which creates high pressure
00:06:17.380 | and temperature.
00:06:18.880 | This gives a perfect environment for hydrogen and helium to fuse with each other.
00:06:24.920 | This generates even more energy and results in an explosion.
00:06:30.680 | Enormous amount of energy is released, which can be highly destructive.
00:06:35.340 | Hence, we can say that hydrogen bomb has greater power than the atomic bomb."
00:06:44.800 | Enormous amount of energy is released, an enormous amount of energy is released that
00:06:51.720 | is highly destructive, much more destructive than the atomic bomb.
00:06:58.440 | This is all being held together on this molecular level that we cannot see with the naked eye.
00:07:11.700 | God holds all of this together.
00:07:15.940 | Doesn't that give you a deeper understanding and appreciation for the God who descended
00:07:23.980 | and took on human flesh and holds all things together when you consider His power?
00:07:35.500 | God is holding all these things together and if you were to just let it go, things wouldn't
00:07:43.180 | just spin out.
00:07:47.140 | A more accurate logical next step would be an explosion, an unfathomable one.
00:07:58.820 | Circling back here to the birth of Christ, for the rest of the episode, I want to point
00:08:05.140 | out some interesting tidbits that could each be expanded upon further, but we'll have
00:08:13.620 | to settle for a flyover.
00:08:17.260 | Consider the genealogy of Christ in Matthew 1.
00:08:20.840 | You have Abraham who amongst other things twice refused to recognize Sarah as his wife
00:08:25.180 | due to him being afraid of his own safety.
00:08:28.100 | You have Jacob who deceived Esau out of his birthright so fled for his own safety.
00:08:33.000 | You have Judah who slept with Tamar the prostitute and wanted her dead because she had become
00:08:36.940 | pregnant out of wedlock and then relented when finding out that he was the father of
00:08:40.780 | the child.
00:08:42.020 | You have Ruth the Moabite who was not even Jewish.
00:08:44.820 | You have David who murdered Righteous Uriah.
00:08:47.820 | You have Solomon who had a harem of wives and concubines and completely disobeyed God's
00:08:52.060 | commandments in the latter portion of his life.
00:08:54.900 | You have Manasseh who led Israel into wanton sin and gross idolatry, worshiping every other
00:09:00.620 | God as opposed to the one true God.
00:09:04.420 | You have the Messiah, the King, born to a teenager of very low societal status.
00:09:13.580 | Right from the beginning, you have God showing he works through imperfect people.
00:09:21.260 | Don't get it twisted, many of the people named were in fact righteous people.
00:09:26.940 | But my point is, while being righteous, they were also clearly flawed and imperfect.
00:09:35.860 | God brought forth the Messiah through what could easily be deemed the riffraff of society.
00:09:43.700 | Moving on into Matthew 2, you see the Magi coming from the East.
00:09:50.180 | And contrary to Christian cartoons, it doesn't say that there were three of them.
00:09:55.000 | If you saw my post for this episode, my Facebook post, I hope you noticed that I didn't choose
00:09:59.300 | an image that had three individuals on camels, despite the fact that I was tempted to do
00:10:04.060 | so because so many of them were so well done.
00:10:07.060 | It could have been three, but there was probably at least a little more than three, we just
00:10:11.380 | don't know.
00:10:12.380 | Moreover, they probably didn't come right when Jesus was born.
00:10:16.980 | There's probably a bit of a time gap.
00:10:19.620 | We're going to talk about them anyway, since most of us associate the Magi with the birth
00:10:25.140 | of Christ.
00:10:27.340 | We don't know a ton about the Magi, but we do know this.
00:10:32.340 | They were probably extremely wealthy as indicated by the gifts they brought, being able to receive
00:10:38.500 | Herod as an audience, and the probable length of their journey having come from what Matthew
00:10:43.820 | describes as the East and not some nearby town.
00:10:47.780 | The Magi were actually a very powerful group of Medes, M-E-D-E-S, who were exceptionally
00:10:53.660 | learned religious men who also acted as king makers.
00:10:58.500 | They were a powerful priesthood with immense political clout.
00:11:04.860 | You could think of them as corollaries with the Pharisees, but replaced Judaism with some
00:11:10.080 | sort of astrological paganism.
00:11:13.820 | You see them in Jeremiah 39 and Daniel 2.
00:11:17.620 | In Daniel 2, Nebuchadnezzar has a dream and tells the Magi that they must interpret the
00:11:22.380 | dream or be killed along with all the other designated wise men.
00:11:27.060 | The Magi responded that they weren't able to interpret his dream, and even further that
00:11:31.380 | no man on earth could do so.
00:11:33.940 | Daniel is to be killed along with Hananiah, Misael, and Azariah, Shadrach, Meshach, and
00:11:39.340 | Abednego, since they were also considered to be part of the group of sages.
00:11:43.380 | Let me read to you Daniel 2 verses 10-30.
00:11:47.700 | It states, "The Chaldeans answered the king and said, 'There is no person on earth who
00:11:56.780 | could declare the matter to the king, because no great king or ruler has ever asked anything
00:12:01.780 | like this of any soothsayer priest, sorcerer, or Chaldean.
00:12:06.260 | Moreover, the thing which the king demands is difficult, and there is no one else who
00:12:10.380 | could declare it to the king except gods, whose dwelling place is not with mortal flesh.'
00:12:16.060 | Because of this, the king became angry and extremely furious, and he gave orders to kill
00:12:19.660 | all the wise men of Babylon.
00:12:21.660 | So the decree was issued that the wise men be killed, and they looked for Daniel and
00:12:25.820 | his friends to kill them.
00:12:27.500 | Then Daniel replied with discretion and discernment to Ariok, the captain of the king's bodyguard,
00:12:31.020 | who had gone out to kill the wise men of Babylon.
00:12:34.100 | He said to Ariok, the king's officer, 'For what reason is the decree from the king so
00:12:37.940 | harsh?'
00:12:38.940 | Then Ariok informed Daniel of the matter.
00:12:41.020 | So Daniel went in and requested of the king that he would give him a grace period so that
00:12:45.940 | he might declare the interpretation to the king.
00:12:48.820 | Then Daniel went to his house and informed his friends, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah,
00:12:52.900 | about the matter, so that they might request compassion from the God of heaven concerning
00:12:57.060 | this secret, so that Daniel and his friends would not be killed with the rest of the wise
00:13:02.060 | men of Babylon."
00:13:03.460 | "Then the secret was revealed to Daniel in a night vision.
00:13:08.060 | Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven.
00:13:10.780 | Daniel said, 'May the name of God be blessed forever and ever, for wisdom and power belong
00:13:15.780 | to Him.
00:13:16.780 | It is He who changes the times and the periods.
00:13:19.420 | He who removes kings and appoints kings.
00:13:21.580 | He gives wisdom to wise men and knowledge to people of understanding.
00:13:25.020 | It is He who reveals the profound and hidden things.
00:13:28.620 | He knows what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with them.
00:13:32.460 | To you, God of my fathers, I give thanks and praise, for you have given me wisdom and power.
00:13:37.660 | Even now you have made known to me what we requested of you, for you have made known
00:13:42.100 | to us the king's matter.'
00:13:43.980 | Thereupon Daniel went to Ariok, whom the king had appointed to kill the wise men of Babylon.
00:13:49.660 | He went and said this to him, 'Do not kill the wise men of Babylon.
00:13:53.720 | Take me into the king's presence, and I will declare the interpretation to the king.'
00:13:58.140 | Then Ariok hurriedly brought Daniel into the king's presence and spoke to him as follows,
00:14:01.860 | 'I have found a man among the exiles from Judah who can make the interpretation known
00:14:07.940 | to the king.'
00:14:08.940 | The king said to Daniel, 'Whose name was Belshazzar?
00:14:11.300 | Are you able to make known to me the dream which I have seen and its interpretation?'
00:14:16.460 | Daniel answered before the king and said, 'As for the secret about which the king has
00:14:20.620 | inquired, neither wise men, sorcerers, soothsayer priests, nor diviners are able to declare
00:14:25.900 | it to the king.
00:14:27.180 | However, there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets, and He has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar
00:14:34.540 | what will take place in the latter days.
00:14:37.060 | This was your dream and the visions in your mind while on your bed.
00:14:40.880 | As for you, O king, while on your bed your thoughts turned to what would take place in
00:14:45.820 | the future, and He who reveals secrets has made known to you what will take place.
00:14:51.540 | But as for me, the secret has not been revealed to me, for any wisdom residing in me more
00:14:56.740 | than in any other living person, but for the purpose of making the interpretation known
00:15:02.180 | to the king, and that you may understand the thoughts of your mind.'"
00:15:11.060 | God goes on to interpret the dream through Daniel.
00:15:14.820 | Afterwards, Nebuchadnezzar gives glory to God.
00:15:18.660 | Daniel 2, 46-49 states, "Then King Nebuchadnezzar fell on his face and paid humble respect to
00:15:24.800 | Daniel and gave orders to present to him an offering and incense.
00:15:29.100 | The king responded to Daniel and said, 'Your God truly is a God of gods and a Lord of kings
00:15:34.620 | and a revealer of secrets, since you have been able to reveal the secret.'
00:15:38.380 | Then the king promoted Daniel and gave him many great gifts, and he made him ruler over
00:15:42.760 | the entire province of Babylon and chief prefect over all the wise men of Babylon.
00:15:48.860 | And Daniel made a request of the king, and he appointed Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego
00:15:53.780 | over the administration of the province of Babylon while Daniel was at the king's court."
00:16:01.060 | The God of the Jews is shown to be who He really is, which is the king of the universe,
00:16:11.100 | above the perceived greatest worldly sages known to mankind at the time, which were the
00:16:19.740 | Magi.
00:16:22.380 | The Magi also understood this as well, as they had previously just stated in this passage,
00:16:28.020 | that the Magi couldn't fulfill King Nebuchadnezzar's request, nor could any other man alive.
00:16:33.540 | It had to be, even in their own words, "heavenly wisdom."
00:16:39.940 | Undoubtedly these former pagan, worldly learned astrologers now begin to learn the one true
00:16:50.740 | religion of Judaism, the God of Daniel, the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
00:17:02.260 | Not only did faithful Daniel teach them this, but also many must have been converted after
00:17:08.820 | realizing that the one true God was not only all-powerful, but also kind and merciful.
00:17:21.100 | Despite the fact that they were immersed in their own pagan religion and not the true
00:17:27.580 | religion of Judaism, God shows them kindness through Daniel, and they are all saved.
00:17:35.380 | Psalm 103 8 states, "The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding
00:17:44.060 | in loving kindness."
00:17:48.940 | Daniel had undoubtedly discipled this group of men, and the faith of the one true God
00:17:56.380 | was passed down from generation to generation.
00:18:02.860 | When you skip ahead to Daniel chapter 9 verses 24-25, one would be easily able to generally
00:18:11.140 | tell when the Messiah would be born by estimating backwards.
00:18:16.880 | So if you can get the general time period down, you know the city because of Micah 5:1-2.
00:18:23.060 | So you have the general time, you have the exact city.
00:18:27.340 | And so these group of men who were discipled by Daniel pass down the faith of the one true
00:18:35.940 | God.
00:18:38.060 | And then the spiritual descendants, who were also probably the genetic descendants also,
00:18:46.660 | came from the East to worship the King of the Jews.
00:18:54.340 | What else is interesting about this time period when Jesus was born, was that the entire world
00:19:02.700 | had this expectation of a coming King.
00:19:06.260 | It wasn't just the Magi in the East, it wasn't just Israel, it was the entire world.
00:19:13.500 | Daniel Woodhead, Professor Woodhead, writes, and I quote, "Historians record for us that
00:19:19.700 | at that general time there was a strange expectation in the world for a coming king.
00:19:24.340 | The people in the East had it, which partly explains why the Magi came.
00:19:28.400 | People in many places were anticipating the arrival of a king, something even the Roman
00:19:32.540 | historians acknowledged.
00:19:34.660 | Suetonius wrote in the Twelve Caesars, "There had spread over all the Orient an old and
00:19:39.860 | established belief that it was fated at that time for men coming from Judea to rule the
00:19:46.340 | world."
00:19:47.340 | Writing during the second century A.D. about such things as Vespasian's conquering of
00:19:52.980 | Israel in A.D. 70, Suetonius looked back and said that the first century was a day when
00:19:58.380 | there was an expectation for men coming from Judea to rule the world.
00:20:03.180 | Consequently, people's eyes were focused upon that place.
00:20:07.060 | Tacitus, the famous Roman historian, tells of the same belief in the anals, that there
00:20:12.020 | was a firm persuasion that at this very time the East was to grow powerful and rulers coming
00:20:18.620 | from Judea were to acquire a universal empire.
00:20:22.380 | Josephus, in the Wars of the Jews, said that the Jews had a belief that, about that time,
00:20:28.380 | one from their country should become governor of the "habitable earth."
00:20:35.340 | Moreover, God must have given these faithful believers, these magi who believed, some kind
00:20:44.140 | of certain sign perhaps connected with Numbers 24.17.
00:20:49.460 | Numbers 24.17 says this, "I see him, but not now; I look at him, but not near.
00:20:56.220 | A star shall appear from Jacob, a scepter shall arise from Israel, and shall smash the
00:21:04.020 | forehead of Moab, and overcome all the sons of Sheph."
00:21:10.640 | Whatever the case these magi saw, whether it was a star or perhaps it was a manifestation
00:21:16.660 | of God's glory as alluded to in Matthew 24 and Zechariah 14, whatever it was, it caused
00:21:25.900 | them, as Matthew 2.10 states, when they saw this star or manifestation of God's glory,
00:21:34.260 | it caused them to rejoice with exceedingly great joy.
00:21:42.820 | To put it another way, when they saw that sign of the Messiah, they rejoiced upon rejoicing
00:21:50.580 | with great, great rejoicing, and then upon seeing the Messiah, they worshiped him.
00:21:58.860 | Even the gifts they brought showed an understanding of who Christ was.
00:22:04.380 | Gold as a symbol of kingship and royalty, frankincense was an incense as a symbol of
00:22:09.260 | deity, and myrrh, an embalming oil, as a symbol of humanity and death.
00:22:15.800 | You know how the rest of this portion of the story goes.
00:22:18.920 | After worshiping, they return to their own country without seeing Herod after being warned
00:22:24.140 | in a dream.
00:22:25.620 | Joseph and Mary escape to Egypt with Jesus.
00:22:29.260 | Herod slaughters all the babies under two because he had been tricked by the magi and
00:22:34.300 | was afraid of Jesus.
00:22:36.740 | An angel appears to Joseph in a dream after Herod dies, and they return from Egypt to
00:22:41.540 | Israel.
00:22:44.540 | As Christians, we commemorate this day as more than just materialism.
00:22:54.240 | Isaiah 9.6 states, "For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us, and the
00:23:03.620 | government will rest on his shoulders, and his name will be called Wonderful Counselor,
00:23:09.900 | Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace."
00:23:15.260 | The child was born, but the son was given.
00:23:19.580 | The child was born, but the son was given.
00:23:28.580 | Thanks for making it to the end.
00:23:30.700 | I'll continue to try to make the journey worth it.
00:23:35.820 | To Him be honor, glory, and eternal dominion.
00:23:40.100 | Merry Christmas.
00:23:41.100 | James Hall now.
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