We're now just one week away from Christmas Eve and a reoccurring question about this time appears in the birth narrative of Jesus about that crazy star that appears in the sky to guide the wise men to the birthplace of Jesus. You know the story and Pastor John addressed it in his sermon "We Have Come to Worship Him" which you preached back on December 21st, 1997.

Here's how Pastor John explained it. I don't have a clue how this star worked. It's absolutely baffling to me. I read an article last night with four scientific explanations of how the star might have worked. I mean it says they saw a star in the east and then it says they showed up in Jerusalem.

Doesn't say the star led them to Jerusalem, just says they saw a star and boom they're in Jerusalem. So somehow or other, I don't know, they got to Jerusalem and then they asked where's the baby? And it says in the book Bethlehem. He's gonna be born in Bethlehem. So they walk out.

It's five miles to Bethlehem. That's what from here to 694 or so. And they walk and and the star shows up and it says goes before them and stands over the place where the child was. What kind of star is that? I mean these are not dummies. They walk out at night and see how far the stars are.

You can see five miles. You can see 20 miles on a flat space. They know the stars are in the heaven. So what's going on here? How does that work? Well you can go to the planetarium over at the university and find out how it works. At least one version.

Or you can read articles. I mean it's comets, it's supernovas, it's Jupiter and Saturn going into Leo. It's some special light. I mean reject the whole astronomy thing. It's just some special light that God miraculously did. I haven't a clue how it happened and it's a non-point. Now let me stress why I'm stressing this.

I'm stressing this because there's a mentality in the church that some people have which I call a mentality for the marginal. And you can't get too near these folks because they've always got a new tape for you to listen to. Or article. I'm really getting myself in trouble here probably.

Or book about some absolutely marginal issue. How did the manna get there? Where did the quail come from? What kind of special winds were blowing about 2,300 years ago to split the Red Sea? How does a man live in a fish's belly? How does the Sun stop in the sky without everybody flying off without any gravity or...

Now this is kind of serious because, here's why it's serious, I wouldn't point this out if there weren't a serious side to it. The serious side is this, as I have met a few people like that, the sad thing is they seldom have a capacity for deep joy in central truths.

The holiness of God, the glory of Christ, the horror and ugliness of sin, the deadness and barrenness and fallenness of human nature, the beauty of the crucifixion, the wonder of justification by faith alone, the precious work of the Holy Spirit sanctifying through the Word of God, the second coming with all the angels in fire, the judgment of the quick and the dead, eternal bliss at God's right hand.

If you try to get into a conversation with these people about these things, nothing. Just go back to the margin and talk about the manna. It's sad, it's dangerous, something's wrong. I'm sure there's a psychological name for this. So if you tend to be like that, I think the solution is not to be scared now to hand the pastor a tape, but to meditate on the cross, to meditate on God.

So what's the point here? What's the point in this text on this point? The point is this, these star, comet, planet, supernova, special miraculous light, whatever, are not doing this stuff of their own accord. God's doing this and the reason he's doing it is to get pagans to their Savior.

That's the point. He's got a big wide embrace and he's showing these particular people that he's focused on for 2,000 years, "I'm done focusing on you. I love you. Believe my son and you'll have everlasting life, but I'm after the nations with a passion from now on." At the beginning of the Gospel of Matthew, it is still a come-see religion and at the end of the Gospel of Matthew, it's a go-tell religion.

Still coming to see, just like in the Old Testament, come see the temple, come see the great King, come on Queen of Sheba, come on up here and see Solomon. He'll wow you. Same with the wise men. Come on! He's here in Jerusalem or in Bethlehem. But by the end of the purpose of Christ on earth, it is no longer come see, it is go tell.

Beautiful. That clip was from one of John Piper's many Christmas sermons over the years, this one from a sermon "We Have Come to Worship Him," which was preached back on December 21st, 1997. You can find that sermon and over 1,200 others right now at DesiringGod.org. I'm your host Tony Ranke, thanking you for listening to the Ask Pastor John podcast.

We will be back tomorrow with Pastor John himself and a question from a bride-to-be. Thanks for listening.