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JOURNEY TO WHOLENESS

A Tale of Two Kings

And today a few stories to remind us that the spirit of Christmas continues even after the last gift is unwrapped AND a look at kings and queens—as we JOUR-NEY TO WHOLENESS.

Voice 1:

A cartoon shows three little boys in a nativity pageant coming to the manger scene bearing gifts. The first two boys bring traditional gifts, gold and frankincense. The third little boy, however, offers Mary a very large box of disposable diapers!

Voice 2:

A PEANUTS cartoon depicts Lucy coming to Charlie Brown and saying, “Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown. Since it’s this time of the season, I think we ought to bury past differences and try to be kind.”

Charlie Brown responds, “Why does it just have to be ‘this time of the season’? Why can’t it be all year long?”

Lucy stares at him and exclaims, “What are you, some kind of fanatic?”

Voice 1:

Kirk Kirkpatrick says: “Anyone who thinks Christmas doesn’t last all year just doesn’t have a MasterCard.”

Voice 2:

My friend, King Duncan, tells of a woman who had waited until the last minute to send Christmas cards. She rushed into a store and bought a package of 50 cards without really looking at them. Still in a big hurry, she addressed 49 of the 50 and signed them without reading the message inside. On Christmas Day, when things had quieted down somewhat she chanced to run upon the leftover card and finally read the message she had sent to 49 of her friends. Much to her dismay, it read like this:

“This card is just to say/ A little gift is on the way.” Suddenly she realized that 49 of her friends were expecting a gift from her—a gift that would never come.

Voice 1:

Santa Claus and an elf were having an argument. Santa said there were 49 states, and the elf said there were 50. Finally the elf went through Santa’s list of states and found the one that was missing. With a big smile, he said to Santa, “Yes, Santa Claus, there is a Virginia!”

Voice 2:

Someone has stated that the three phrases that best sum up the Christmas season are:

“Peace on Earth,” “Good will to men,” and “Batteries not included.”

Voice 1:

There was a little book from Doubleday titled, DEAR GOD, CHILDREN’S LETTERS TO GOD. One young man wrote, “Dear God, was there anything special about Bethlehem or did you just figure that that was as good a place as any to start a franchise? Your friend, Jim age 12.”

Voice 2:

As I explained to my wife last week when she asked if I was making any New Year’s resolutions: “I don’t want to brag, but here it is December and I’ve kept every one of my 1992 New Year’s resolutions. I’ve kept them in a large envelope in the middle drawer of my desk!”

Voice 2:

My Uncle Ted, whose stinginess makes Ebenezer Scrooge look like a philanthropist, went Christmas shopping. At Gump’s in San Francisco, he looked in vain for a gift for my family for under $25.00. Everything he saw was too expensive except for a $500.00 vase that was on sale for $20.00 because the handle had been broken off. He bought it and asked the clerk ship it to me by mail so that I would think he had paid $500.00 for it and that it had been broken in shipment. A week after Christmas I sent him the following note: “Dear Uncle Ted: Thank you for the lovely vase. It was so nice of you to wrap each piece separately.”

Voice 1:

Matthew 2:1-12

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.” When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Christ was to be born. “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written: “’But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will be the shepherd of my people Israel.’” Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and make a careful search for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.” After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.

A Tale of Two Kings

Voice 2:

They came in search of a king. We don’t know their names or how many of them there were or exactly where they came from.

They did not come to the stable where the Christ child was born. Jesus and his family were long since gone. Mary and Joseph had a house now. Also long gone were the celestial chorus, the shepherds, the crowds, and the gawkers. Yes, it was like the aftermath of any Christmas. The excitement dies down, the relatives go home, and life goes on.

They came in search of a king. Later tradition would call them the Three Kings, would give them names like Balthazar, Gaspar, and Melchior. Over the centuries, pious imagination would even provide distinctive personalities, life histories, and places of burial. Ten centuries after the story of the visitors was first told, relics of the Three Kings would reach Cologne.

But Matthew never said that there were three visitors. We have inferred that from the mention of three gifts. Matthew never said that they were kings. He called them magi—magicians or astrologers. Matthew never said that they had arrived at the manger as they do in present day Nativity pageants.

You see, Matthew’s story is not about three kings at all. It is about two—King Herod and King Jesus.

Herod the Great

The first king was known as “Herod the Great.” He restored much of the splendor of former times, conquered Idumea, Samaria, Galilee, and Jerusalem. He allied himself with the Romans, building the Mediterranean port of Caesarea, an elegant colonnaded city, “Roman in law, Greek in culture.” He rebuilt Samaria and renamed it “Sebaste” in honor of Augustus Caesar, whose Greek name was Sebastos. Throughout his realms, he constructed stadia, theaters, amphitheaters, and temples to the gods of the Hellenistic world. For his Jewish subjects, he rebuilt the Temple at Jerusalem, the world center of their faith and practice. But not matter what he did for them, they despised him because he was not one of them. He was an Edomite, a descendent of Esau, the brother of Jacob, and thus, the product of a race against whom the Hebrews had warred for centuries.

Herod ruled with an iron hand. His fear of real or imagined threats led him to murder Mariamne, the most beloved of his ten wives, as well as Mariamne’s brother, her grandfather, and many of his own children.

Through brilliance, boldness, diplomacy, and ruthlessness, he held on to power for more than forty years. His reign was almost at an end, when the party of Babylonian shamans came to town. These stargazers were an incredibly naive bunch to ask Herod the address of the one born “king of the Jews.” Herod was a dying man who knew his days were numbered. But as far as Herod was concerned, the Jews had all the kings they needed.

Kings and Queens Galore

And so do we. No single despot rules us. We have kings and queens galore. We have King I-Want-What-I-Want-When-I-Want-It and Queen My-Career-Comes-First, King I-Just-Want-to-Be-Like-Everybody-Else and Queen If-You-Promise-to-Like-Me-I-Will-Do-Whatever-You-Want. There is King Easy-Answers and Queen Who-Says-Money-Can’t-Buy-Happiness? We are governed by false expectations, prejudices, advertising, the media, unexamined assumptions, carelessness, and a host of other petty monarchs.

They came in search of a king. Herod knew a threat when we heard one. And he knew how to deal with it. The petty monarchs of today are just as easily threatened and every bit as murderous. They kill ability, creativity, individuality. Above all, they kill compassion. And once compassion is gone, they then do exactly what Herod did. They kill our children. Literally and figuratively, they kill our children.

The One True King

They came in search of a king. There was only room for one king then and only room for one now. There are the Herods of today, who would give us places of entertainment and power over the helpless and even houses of worship in exchange for our lives. And there is the child-king of Bethlehem. We find him today as the Magi found him then—in the midst of dependence, poverty, vulnerability, and powerlessness. In the midst of his dependence, poverty, vulnerability, and powerlessness. In the midst of the dependence, poverty, vulnerability, and powerlessness of others. In the midst of our own dependence, poverty, vulnerability, and powerlessness.

We have seen his star. Seen it in our quiet moments, in our yearnings for something

real, in our dreams of a better world, in our awareness that we are called to a higher

purpose, in our hunger for community, in our thirst for peace, in our commitment to

justice. They came in search of a king. And we come with them. For we have seen his star

and come to worship him.

Amen.