He won't Fit

Matthew 2:9-18

How often we ask but why did God not do something, as if we understood the mind of God.  The older I get the more clear it becomes we “time critters” are often, almost always, looking at things inside time.  We forget that our Father in Heaven created time for earth, it will not be of any value once you are removed from earth’s control.  God has been to the beginning and end of time, He is Omnipotent, (All-powerful, Supremacy, the Authority.)  He is Omnipresent, (always present everywhere, time has no control over Him.)  He is Omniscient, (all knowledge, has never had to be taught anything, and is aware of every detail of your life.)

Therefore, let’s look at the account of what is going on with our Lord, while in the form of a baby.  Verse 9-12, “After 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. When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. And 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. And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way. (Matthew 2:9-12)  Did you see they went into the house, Jesus is no longer in a manger, and it seems from the time the wise men got to Jerusalem till they found the child, the child is no longer in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger; this is the account from HCSB (Study Bible) “In contrast to the stable in which Jesus was born (Luke 2), Jesus’ family now lived in a house.  This shows that the magi visited Jesus after the visit of the shepherds.”   

You may ask why is it of importance, and the answer is found in verses 13-15, “Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, “Out of Egypt I called my son.” (Matthew 2:13-15 ESV)  Two things that jump off the page are; Joseph is obedient, he does what God has told him without questioning the dream.  And the other thing is God had already spoken to the prophet Hosea about Jesus coming out of Egypt, in Hosea 11:1, almost 785 years before the birth of Jesus.

It is also important to see what a fool will do when he has been tricked; “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. Then was fulfilled what was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah:

            “A voice was heard in Ramah,

            weeping and loud lamentation,

            Rachel weeping for her children;

            she refused to be comforted, because they are no more.”(Matthew 2:16-18)

Jeremiah gives this account in the book with his name as the title, in chapter 31:15, and this was more than 580 years before Jesus was born.  What should we learn from this?  Our God is always faithful, and we often try to place Him in our time box, and He won’t fit. 

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice