“For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage”(Matt. 2:2).
The birth of Jesus Christ took place “in accordance with the Scriptures” (as we say in the Creed), and by that we mean in accordance with the prophecies of the Old Testament. It’s a basic principle of coherence between the two Testaments, Old and New: they tell the same tale. In other words, the Christmas story unfolds from a script laid down many centuries before by the prophets of Israel.
“Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Emmanuel” (Is. 7:14): that’s the prophet Isaiah, writing in another time and in another context, with a future foreshadowing of the birth of Jesus Christ from the Blessed Virgin Mary. Or in our Gospel this morning, with reference to the prophet Micah, “And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who is to shepherd my people Israel” (Matt. 2:6; cf. Mic. 5:2). The prophet points to the birth of the Messiah in Bethlehem without knowing any of the other details. What takes place is in accordance with God’s plan, our Gospel writer claims, from a script prepared long before.
The visit of the wise men to Bethlehem is a part of this story. It says in Psalm 68, “Kings shall bring gifts to you” (Ps. 68:29), and in Psalm 72, “All kings shall bow down before him, and all the nations do him service” (Ps. 72:11). The gifts that the wise men brought were gold, frankincense, and myrrh, gifts fit for a king; and so the ambassadors from the east are seen through that lens. In prophecy, they were kings bearing gifts. Once again, the story of Jesus’ birth is in accordance with the Scriptures, the readout of a script written ages ago.
What we see with the wise men is a widening of the prophetic outlook to encompass the whole world. The wise men are gentiles, kings from the east: they don’t know the Hebrew prophets or their prophecies. They’re pagans who march to the sound of a different drummer. In spite of this, they become part of the story, whether they want to or not. God’s providence is such that it takes everything into its grip; as the song says, “He’s got the whole world in his hands.”
The magi didn’t know Jerusalem, much less the obscure corner of the world that contained Bethlehem; but what they did know is the stars. In the ancient world, knowledge of the heavens was the basis of civilization. The position and occurrence of the sun, the stars, and the moon told you when to sow and when to reap; this knowledge provided direction that guided commerce, and unlocked the mysteries of the calendar. Command of the calendar itself was a political tool: how else to know when to collect taxes?
The wise men, in short, represent the world of pagan statecraft and wisdom, now taken up and made a part of the story. Nothing in the world lies outside of the scope of the prophetic insight; nothing in the world lies outside the providence of God. God was unwilling, St. Leo of Rome said in a sermon centuries ago, that the knowledge of the Savior should be left in the narrow confines of Bethlehem, but desired that this knowledge should be shared with the whole world. Since he was born for all, he should be known by all (Ser. 31.1). God used the wisdom of the world, the wisdom possessed by the magi, in order to reveal the glory of Christ to the nations.
This widening out of God’s plan that includes the whole world also includes us. Today, our worship is shaped by the baptism of a new member of the Church, who will confess his faith in Jesus and receive the grace of new life in Christ. He will be joined by other members of the Church who will renew their own baptismal promises. All will be filled with the power of the Spirit through the laying on of hands. God is including us in the story.
The wise men came to worship, and so should we. “For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage”(Matt. 2:2), as it says in our Gospel. Again, St. Leo, “They adore the Word in flesh, the Wisdom in infancy, the Power in weakness, the Lord of majesty in the reality of man: and by their gifts make open acknowledgment of what they believe in their hearts…”. As we join our baptismal candidate and our confirmands and renew our own promises, revealing our own hearts, may we too worship the child who was born in Bethlehem, and become ourselves a part of his story.