7 Ancient Wonders

Last Friday night we had the Christmas Office party at Alexandra Park. It was a good night, plenty of food and entertainment paid for by the company. I had to leave a little early to pick up Joshua from Maraetai as some of his school friends were having a party - it’s that time of year. Travelling over, I was treated to the spectacular lighting storm - every few seconds the night sky and dark country road would be lit up like it was the 2nd Coming. It wasn’t hard to imagine the angels and the shepherds driving through the Whitford hills with the sky lighting up. And the music was going in the car so the picture was complete. I was filled with wonder as I remembered what it’s like to be a kid when you’re seeing everything for the first time and Christmas is the most exciting day of the year.

The dictionary says that wonder the noun is;

1. “a feeling of amazement and admiration, caused by something beautiful, remarkable, or unfamiliar.” 
2. “a person or thing regarded as very good, remarkable, or effective.” 

 That doesn’t really define it for me ! A wonder is more than a feeling more than good, remarkable or effective. In the Christmas story the wonders are reason to worship God.

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World were:

1. the Great Pyramid at Giza, Egypt. 
2. the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. 
3. the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, Greece. 
4. the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus. 
5. the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus. 
6. the Colossus of Rhodes. 
7. the Lighthouse of Alexandria, Egypt. 

Only one is still standing - the one built by slaves out of straw - now that IS a wonder 😉

As a child there are many things we don’t know and we spend our days in wonder. But as we grow older, we get world weary and we think we’ve seen it all before and lose our childlike wonder.

Christmas is a tough time for a lot of people. Buying things that we can scarcely afford, queues, dealing with difficult relationships, tensions over child custody, loneliness, emptiness. The Christmas present doesn’t measure up to the Christmas past.

We have the story of Jesus to come back to. The tinsel and Christmas lights are a shallow distraction from the completely amazing story of the birth of Christ which split time in two - BC and AD. We can be filled with wonder again, just like when we were kids.

There are 7 wonders in this story that even now cannot be explained. That is why they are wonders. If we knew how they happened, if science could explain them, then we wouldn’t be wondering anymore. This story still takes us back to our childhood.

1. The New Testament opens with a revelation - that all those stories of heroes (and villains) in the Old Testament weren’t random - they were all part of the incredible story that led from Abraham 14 generations to David, 14 generations to the exile and 14 generations to Jesus. How did God make that happen ? Someone calculated the odds of Jesus of Nazareth fulfilling just 8 out of the 60 major prophecies fulfilled by the life of Christ as 1 in 10^17. It has been claimed that that many silver dollars would be enough to cover the face of the entire state of Texas two feet deep. Texas is a very big state. Who in his right mind would suppose that a blindfolded man, heading out of Dallas by foot in any direction, would be able, on his very first attempt, to pick up one specifically marked silver dollar out of 100,000,000,000,000,000? It is a wonder...

2. The Virgin Birth
It is part of the Apostles' Creed
“I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary...”
Scientists say it cannot happen in humans - other species can, just not humans. But Science has in the past also said that heavier than air flight, black holes, invisibility and instant communication around the world is impossible. You cannot rely on what Scientists say today. Science tries to explain everything and rules out the possibility of miracles despite people’s testimonies. But some things I think God wants us to smile and shake our heads and say “God you are amazing !“. It was a miracle, a wonder. Knowing it’s impossible we still acknowledge it is true and a reason to worship him.

3. The Shepherds and the Angels
Something Billy Graham said in the video shown 2 weeks ago struck a chord. The Gospel is a Proclamation. The Good News was first announced to the Shepherds. God didn’t send the angels to Jerusalem or to the King Herod. From the time of the Kings, God has previously made his announcements to the King via the prophets. Not this time ! This time he made the announcement to the Shepherds, the low working class of the time. That’s good news for you and me !
And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear. And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” 
Luke 2:8-15

The angels appearing truly was a wonder. That was more awesome than the wildly spectacular lightning storm last Friday night !

4. Immanuel
From Isaiah 7:14
“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). 
Matthew 1:23

Yes God became a man for all eternity By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 1 John 4:2

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” Matthew 28:19-20

Immanuel means “God with us” and Jesus is with us always as we go into the World. God is with us, he’s not distant, or coming once a year at Christmas like Santa Claus, he’s here in the midst of us, every moment, every difficulty we are facing, when there seems no way out. That is a Wonder to remember every day. Sometimes we wish for Jesus to return, like the Jews were waiting for the Messiah but Jesus said he is with us always.

5. The Wise Men and the Star
It doesn’t say how many wise men nor explain how the star led them to the exact place where Jesus was. Some say it was Halley’s Comet, some say an alignment of Jupiter and Saturn or Venus but there appears something more miraculous than that. The story tells us the Stars spin around their Creator !

Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” 
Matthew 2:1-2

But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days. 
Micah 5:2

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.
Matthew 2:9

The star was a fulfilment of prophecy that led them precisely to Jesus in Bethlehem. Beat that Google! They came from the East, my guess is from Babylon where Daniel that very wise man had been. That’s possibly how they heard about the coming King but the star is a wonder, we can only be in awe of how it rose at exactly the right time and how it pointed the way precisely to where Jesus had been born.

6. The gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh
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. 
Matthew 2:11

Last year I shared how there is some reason to believe that the Wise Men were merely returning some of the treasure of gold, spices and perfumes as mentioned in Isaiah 39, stolen from the temple by the Babylonians at the time of the exile and Daniel.

Gold for the King, Frankincense for the worship of a deity, Myrrh a key ingredient for burial.

After these things Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him permission. So he came and took away his body. Nicodemus also, who earlier had come to Jesus by night, came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds in weight. So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as is the burial custom of the Jews. 
John 19:38-40

The wonder is how did the Wise Men know to pick the right gifts for Jesus - King of Kings, Son of God the One who would die for us ?

7. The Dreams
God speaks to us through dreams, that is a wonder. But it is up to us to respond. In this story at least 3 dreams are noted;
 ⁃ A dream telling Joseph to take Mary as his wife and call the child Jesus. It was great faith on Joseph’s part to believe the angel in the dream in spite of his troubled thoughts on how Mary had gotten pregnant.
 ⁃ The wise men were warned in a dream not to return to Herod after visiting Jesus in spite of all Herod’s charm for which they would otherwise been fooled
 ⁃ The dream telling Joseph to take his family to Egypt to spare Jesus from what Herod was about to do.

Joseph knew that Herod was a bad guy, everyone in Israel knew that. Every good story has a villain. Israel was under occupation from Rome just like the Nazis occupied Europe in World War II. King Herod the Great was the Roman client King of Israel. He was not the true King from the House of David. He was an imposter from the Edomites, a descendent of Esau and so not part of the 12 tribes of Israel. He was called Great because he rebuilt the temple and many other great building projects. Hence the reason for all the tax that the people hated. But he was a brutal murderer who would kill anyone in his way or who threatened his rule including 3 of his own sons. Without the miracle of a dream Joseph would not have known that Herod was about to send his troops to murder all the children under 2 years old.

What would have happened if Joseph or the Wise Men hadn’t responded to their dreams ?

The Christmas story tells you to park your doubts and fears and simply believe and come and worship him. Are you ready to do just that ?