Mary gave birth to, and neither do they. They don't know who Christ is and
they don't know why He came.
Instead, they're ignorantly preoccupied with the mundane and the
meaningless. How sad it is that so many people live their lives in pursuit of
tinsel, only to wake up one day in an eternity without God
In Matthew 2 we meet another man who missed Christmas:
After Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king,
behold, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, "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." And when Herod the king heard it, he was troubled,
and all Jerusalem with him.... Then Herod secretly called the magi and
ascertained from them the time the star appeared. And he sent them to
Bethlehem, and said, "Go and make careful search for the Child; and when
you have found Him, report to me, that I too may come and worship Him"
(vv. 1-3, 7-8).
Herod was the king of the land. He pretended a need to worship Jesus
Christ, but he was fearful because One had been born who was called the
King of the Jews. The Greek word translated "troubled" in verse three means
"to be agitated" or "stirred up." It carries the idea of total panic. Herod
panicked. Why? He was afraid of Jesus-afraid of another king. Let's see
why.
Julius Caesar appointed Herod's father, Antipater, to be governor of Judea
under the Roman occupation. Antipater then managed to have his son
Herod appointed prefect of Galilee. In that office Herod was successful in
stopping the Jewish gangs who continued to fight against their foreign rulers.
After fleeing to Egypt when the Parthians invaded Palestine, Herod then
went to Rome and in 40 B.C. was declared by Octavian and Antony (with the
concurrence of the Roman senate) to be king of the Jews. He invaded
Palestine the next year and, after several years of fighting, drove out the
Parthians and established his kingdom.
Because he was not Jewish, but Idumean (an Edomite), Herod married
Mariamne, heiress to the Jewish Hasmonean house, to make himself more
acceptable to the Jews he now ruled. He was a clever and capable warrior,
orator, and diplomat. But he also was cruel and merciless. He was incredibly
jealous, suspicious, and afraid for his position and power. Fearing a potential
threat, he had the high priest Aristobulus, his wife's brother, drowned-after
which he provided a magnificent funeral where he pretended to weep. He
then had Mariamne herself killed, and then her mother and two of his own
sons.
Five days before his death (about a year after Jesus was born) he had a
third son executed. One of the greatest evidences of his bloodthirstiness and
insane cruelty was having the most distinguished citizens of Jerusalem
arrested and imprisoned shortly before his death. Because he knew no one
would mourn his own death, he gave orders for those prisoners to be
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