Advent-ure Day 23: Wise Men Worship Jesus

In the Christmas narrative, we see that there are definite times where worship occurs.  Mary rejoiced at the news that she would be giving birth to Jesus, the Messiah.  The angels had shouted, "Glory to God in the highest," and the shepherds, we're told, responded in worship after they had made haste to visit the Child.  The Wise Men rejoiced at the sight of the star, and worshiped Jesus upon their visit.

Perhaps during this Christmas season, you would consider how you can engage in worship to God and enter into His presence.  Psalm 84 says:
1b How lovely is Your tabernacle, O Lord of hosts!
2My soul longs, yes, even faints For the courts of the Lord; My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
And, here is what verse 10 says:10For a day in Your courts is better than a thousand. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God Than dwell in the tents of wickedness.
As the song says, "Better is one day in your courts...than thousands elsewhere."  
We can be challenged to take time out - in the middle of our busy schedules, the preparation and the celebration, to prepare our hearts to meet with God and to rejoice in Him for sending his Son, Jesus, to bring us salvation. Thank Him for His great love and His faithfulness!

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We continue to approach Christmas Day as part of 25: A Spiritual Advent-ure, and we find those Magi, the Wise Men from the East, who have come to Jerusalem, visited King Herod, then followed the star - His star - to the house in Bethlehem where Mary, Joseph, and Jesus were staying.   We read in Matthew 2:
10When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceedingly great joy.11And when they had come into the house, they saw the young Child with Mary His mother, and fell down and worshiped Him. And when they had opened their treasures, they presented gifts to Him: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

There are several components to this visit in Bethlehem. Not only had they worshiped - rejoicing with exceedingly great joy - when they saw the star again, leading them to the place where Jesus was, but they worshiped at the house and present gifts to Him.  Now keep in mind that they didn't just run out to Target to pick up a few selected items to present to the Child - no, this was the culmination, apparently, of an intentional effort to show their appreciation to a special child to be born.

Their worship was intentional - it was deliberate, and I would say it was heartfelt.

I would dare say our challenge during this Christmas season is to take time to worship.

Make time to worship Jesus this Christmas...

This year marks the 100th anniversary of a remarkable event that took place across the front lines in World War I, just after the beginning of the conflict.  According to a CBS News report, the World War I Christmas Truce of 1914 took place "when groups of German and British soldiers briefly stopped shooting at each other and met and mingled in the no-man's-land between their lines -- before going back to shooting at each other."

"On the 100th anniversary, the encounter has been re-staged at one of the places along the old front line in Belgium where the truce originally occurred."

Chris Barker, whose three great-uncles were killed in the war, said the truce should be remembered because it shows a different side to a war more known for wholesale slaughter than humanitarian gesture.  He is quoted as saying, "I think it just shows the good in people that can be there...Whereas days before and afterwards it was barbarous and savage, but people can suddenly lay down their differences."

The CBS News report says that the truce is now "seen as a triumph of the human spirit, an interlude of reason in the madness of war. And it may have happened because the FULL madness of this war hadn't happened yet."

At the Imperial War Museum in London, historians like Alan Wakefield say the bitterness and hatred had not yet taken hold.

"The war hadn't got that sort of, as you say, dirty at that stage," said Wakefield. "It's really 1915 that things like poison gas comes along. Zeppelin airships are bombing London, Germans sink the liner Lusitania with civilian casualties. And the propaganda machine hasn't really fed on that and actually created those sort of hatreds between the two forces."

There are varying accounts as to what happened in the trenches along the front lines. The diaries of some British soldiers say they heard calling from across the way from the German line saying, "If you don't shoot, we won't, either."

It's unclear who stuck their heads up first, the British or the Germans. But before long troops were flooding out of trenches on both sides of the line and moving through the wire into "no man's land..." 

Then the story gets a little clouded, because there are reports, just a few, that a football, er, soccer game took place.  But, as CBS News points out, a British-German soccer game likely never happened.

Wakefield says, "If it happened -- and there's very few collaborative accounts -- there's second-, third-hand accounts of somebody hearing of a game going on somewhere."

Nevertheless, a commemorative game was observed last week in Aldershot, one of the sites where the truce took hold.   And, the carol, "Silent Night," was sung by soldiers on both sides in their respective languages.

I really love this story - and it's a reminder for each of us, during this Christmas season, to perhaps call a time out, and maybe even enjoy a Christmas Truce.  We read about the shepherds and Wise Men rejoicing, and that can challenge us to engage in worship ourselves.  Take time out to attend a special service.  Enjoy Advent with your family or friends.  Maybe take time out to serve someone else.  And, maybe you can carve out some personal time to worship the King of Kings, the Prince of Peace, who came at Christmas to bring you new life.

And, maybe it's time for your own Christmas Truce, with respect to relationships.  It occurs that for some, Christmas can be a time when you are placed together with family members with whom you disagree or just flatout don't get along with.  Maybe this Christmas, the Prince of Peace can work in your heart to mend broken relationships.  Perhaps when the anger or disgust rises within your spirit or floods your mind, you can call an internal truce to allow God's peace, that passes all understanding, to give you a clearer picture on how you can live peaceably with those particularly irritating people.  God is exalted when we place Him in the center of our hearts, the center of our celebrations, and in the middle of our relationships, even with those who do not know our Savior.