DREAMS OF CHRISTMAS #4/5
Posted by: bhfbc <bhfbc@...>
DREAMS OF CHRISTMAS #4/5
JOSEPH DREAMS OF SAFETY IN EGYPT
December 23, 2007
Text: Matthew 2:13-18
"I'll Be Home for Christmas." Anyone heard that Christmas song? Of course you have. It is a sentiment that is expressed every Christmas. It is the theme of countless Christmas stories and shows. A consequence of so many people wanting to be home for Christmas is that this season becomes extremely busy with travel.
As we learned from first dozen verses of Matthew 2 last week, the Gospel accounts of the birth and early childhood of Jesus are filled with travel, too. There's Mary's trip to visit her cousin Elizabeth followed by the journey of Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem. The Wise Men travel hundreds of miles from Persia to find the Christ Child and to worship him. In Matthew 2:13, Joseph and Mary must hit the road again. They must urgently flee Bethlehem and travel to Egypt in order to escape the murderous plan of Herod to kill Jesus. A few months later, they will travel back to Bethlehem, and then sometime later from Bethlehem on to Nazareth, where Jesus will grow up. That's a lot of frequent donkey miles, or frequent camel miles, depending on the mode of transportation.
Once more, a dream is an integral part of the Christmas story. Herod had his spies and informers; Joseph had dreams. The dreams worked quite well. Joseph did not get to dream of being home for Christmas, but he did have a dream that kept Christmas alive for everyone.
As I noted in my last sermon, Herod intended to retain his position as king of the Jews no matter what the threat. His murderous plans are revealed to Joseph, who takes the dream seriously. It is no small matter to make this journey. It was two hundred miles to Egypt, twice as far as from Nazareth to Bethlehem. At 20 or so miles a day, it would have taken at least ten or twelve days to get there. In our day, it can be hard for a young couple to pack the diaper bag with baby things, load the minivan, and drive across town for a Christmas party. Imagine how hard it must have been walking two hundred miles with an infant, hauling everything you own, sleeping out in the open every night for nearly two weeks, and worrying about thieves and wild animals. Embarking on such a journey usually required serious consideration.
However, the alternative left them no choice. Foiled in his attempt to discover the location of the King of the Jews, King Herod ordered the slaughter of the male babies age two and under in the Bethlehem region. This is a horrible event. Some people even think it's so brutal it must be fiction. Skeptics point out that there's no record of such a massacre in the secular histories. But let us acknowledge that many acts of brutality in the ancient world are still known to us only through the slimmest of records that have been on the verge of being lost. We should remember that a significant portion of the world was ruled by Rome. The focus of many historians was upon events pertaining to Rome, not with sectarian squabbles in its troublesome outposts. In the Roman world, Bethlehem was insignificant. And Herod was just a petty tyrant allowed to rule so long as he kept order in his province.
Additionally, this brutal act is consistent with Herod's known character during the latter part of his life. I mentioned last week some of those characteristics, but there is even more. Early in his reign, Herod was not a bad king. He built aqueducts, public buildings, roads, new cities, and the port of Caesarea. He enhanced the prosperity of Palestine. During a famine, he personally sold his own dinnerware to buy food for his people. He endeared himself to many by rebuilding and beautifying the temple in Jerusalem. He was even known as "Herod the Great." But he also had the kinds of problems that were typical of ancient monarchs. He had ten wives and many sons. All of these sons and relatives were very busy trying to secure Herod's throne for themselves. Additionally, even though Herod did much good for the Jews, he was still mistrusted by them. He was certainly not accepted as a rightful heir to the throne of David.
With all of this going on, Herod exhibited increasingly paranoid behavior. Of course, not all of his paranoia was imagined. There is a saying, "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not really after you." In Herods case, someone was often after him. He lived in constant suspicion of being poisoned. The result is that Herod murdered one after another of his sons and other relatives, often seeking permission from Rome before he did it.
As he got older, his subjects yearned for the day he would die. He was even so concerned that no one would grieve at the time of his death that he ordered thousands of the most prominent citizens of his realm to be taken to the Hippodrome and executed when he died. That way there would be weeping on the day he died. Fortunately, the order was not carried out. Herod was more than capable of killing a few babies, maybe a couple dozen at the most, in a little town. Who would even notice such a trifle compared to his other atrocities?
Through his Christmas dream, Joseph is warned by an angel: "Get up. Take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you." So in the middle of the night, Joseph hurriedly rouses his wife and child. Hastily they grab a few necessities for the journey and together they half-run, half-walk through the dark and silent streets on their way out of town.
There is much more than emotionalism and sentimentalism for Matthew to include this account in his narrative. Matthew has theology in mind. There's a clear similarity here between the stories of baby Moses and baby Jesus. It is Matthew's intent to make that part of his account. Matthew shows us how much Jesus is like Moses. Jesus is far superior, of course, but it was important for Jesus to be shown to be one firmly in the tradition of the greatest Hebrew prophets. Moses as a baby barely escapes death at the hands of an evil king; so does baby Jesus. Moses grew up to lead the people out of Egypt, saving them from slavery and giving them the Law. So, too, Jesus would come out of Egypt to save his people from the slavery of sin. He gave them the Sermon on the Mount. Moses took the people to the edge of the Promised Land of Canaan; Jesus, through his death and resurrection, brings his people to the Promised Land of heaven.
There are similarities between Moses and Jesus, but there is also a huge difference which is really the point here. Moses comes out of Egypt but doesn't save us. Jesus comes out of Egypt and does. That's why Matthew is so concerned that we learn about the escape to Egypt. It demonstrates God's saving deliverance.
In Jesus, all of us escape death as we flee with him to Egypt. In Jesus, all of us are rescued from slavery to sin as we come out of Egypt with him. In Jesus, all of us are delivered from the Law that condemns us. Through the cross of Christ, we are saved. This is what Matthews account is about -salvation. The point is that if there were no story, if there were no birth of Christ, no suffering of the infant Savior, no flight to Egypt, no return to Israel, no death of Jesus on the cross, and no resurrection, we would be lost in our sins. We would die without hope. But these things did happen. And because of them, we are saved.
Joseph's dream in the night was not a vision of "sugar plums" dancing in his head. That would have been useless. It was, instead, a dream of warning that, once again, Joseph believed and heeded. Because of this and the other Christmas dreams of Joseph, you and I have a Savior. Praise the Lord for dreams of Christmas.
Rev. Charles A. Layne
First Baptist Church
PO Box 515
170 W. Broadway
Bunker Hill, IN 46914
765-689-7987
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