"When Herod the king had heard these
things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him."—
Matthew 2:3.
So quietly had the Son of God stolen into
our world, that his arrival was unknown in Jerusalem till these wise men came
from the East. Either the Shepherds had not told their tale of the heavenly
vision, or they had been unheeded, perhaps ridiculed as fanatics. As the
morning star rises without noise; as the seed shoots up and the flower opens in
silence; so was it with the Christ, the rose of Sharon, the bright and morning
star. No thunder woke up the hills of Palestine; no trumpetpeal went through
its cities; no herald went before him, nor royal salute greeted him.
His mother, and the few of her circle who
believed in "the child that was born," made no proclamation of the
heavenly wonder; they received all in silent happy faith, and pondered the
things in their heart, leaving it to God to bring them forth in his own time
and way. They did not get excited; it was too great a thing to excite, and they
were too calm and child-like in their faith to be fluttered, or agitated, or
elated. They allowed these great things that had happened in their family
circle to take their course, assured of their truth and magnitude, and
therefore confident that they would ere long grow till they could not be
hidden, but must perforce make them selves known. Such is the confidence which
faith has in the great things of God! A man who has got hold of something which
is great and true, need not be afraid but that it will spread. Let him hold it
fast.
These wise men come with a tale, and a
vision, and a miracle. They are not of Israel, though more ready of faith than
Israel. They are not from Nazareth, or Bethlehem, or any part of Palestine.
Their testimony is independent of Israel's; it is a Gentile testimony; from the
land of Israel's enemies. They are recognized as "wise men,"—magi,
Chaldeans, perhaps; or men from the land of Balaam or Job. Men of the East, the
seat of all human science; the wise and far-seeing East; the thoughtful and star•gazing
East. They come, not with an uncertainty, or an opinion, or a fable, or a
vision of the night, but with actual and personal eyesight,— "We have
seen"! Yes, it is with "we have seen" that they come,—a word
like that of John's, "We beheld his glory,"—"That which our eyes
have seen." They come to Jerusalem! They come seeking
Jerusalem's King; as if Jerusalem were to
them the center of hope; as if there were nothing in their own land like what
they expected to find in Jerusalem; no king worthy of the name, or to whom they
could pay homage, but the King of Jerusalem! This is Gentile faith, fixing its
eye upon the star of Jacob.
But Jerusalem has not heard of Him, and is
amazed; nay, her king does not know where He is to be born till he has
consulted the scribes. The visit and errand of these Eastern Gentiles take
Israel by surprise. Nor are they roused to take any interest in the matter,
save, as we shall see, that of being troubled. He was in the world, yet the
world knew Him not; would not recognize Him when pointed out! He came unto his
own, and his own received him not!
This is strange. Had the like happened
elsewhere,—in Babylon, or Rome, or Egypt,—it would not have surprised us. Or
had these been "troubled," it would have been natural enough. But it
is Jerusalem! She is troubled! Nay, it is "all Jerusalem." Troubled
at the news of her King's arrival! Not excited, or agitated, but
"troubled." Had it been said, "rejoiced," we could have
understood it, but "troubled,"—how strange!
Let us inquire into Jerusalem's trouble
and its causes. The simple visible cause was the statement of the wise men that
one had been born King of the Jews. And how this could trouble Jerusalem is not
easy to see. For,—
1.
It contained nothing alarming.
It was but of a babe that the wise men spoke; only the birth of a babe,—no
more. They did not come to tell that some Eastern King had espoused the cause
of this babe, and was on his way, with an army, to secure a throne for him.
Their question simply pertained to a babe whom they desired to worship. It was
a religious act entirely that they had come to perform. The name they gave the
babe, "King of the Jews," might trouble Herod; but surely there was
nothing to alarm Jerusalem. Herod was a tyrant,—a foreign tyrant, moreover,—only
indirectly a Jew; he might be troubled; but it ought not to have awakened fear
in any Jew, especially in any citizen of the royal city.
2.
It was good news. A king born
to Jerusalem; this was a good report, even had it afterwards turned out untrue.
The people might have said, it is too good news to be true; but the very
mention of it ought to have called forth gladness, not trouble.
3.
It was just what they were
expecting. Messiah, King of Israel, Redeemer of the nation, son of David, heir
of David's throne, He was the great national hope; a hope that had been
cherished age after age, and had not died out; nay, was now more cherished than
ever because of present oppression, and because the time foretold was fast
running out. Now wise men came from the far East telling them they had seen the
star of their new-born King; now the Gentile came to say that he had heard of
the glorious birth. Should they be troubled? Should they not rejoice? Should
they not say like Jacob, "I have waited for thy salvation," or like
Simeon, "Now let thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy
salvation." But the announcement that their hope is realized, their great
national expectation fulfilled, occasions only trouble!
How is this? Why are they troubled? Some
might be troubled because the tidings had come upon them in this strange and
unlooked for way; others might be so because they did not know what such
tidings foreboded. But the chief trouble, and that of the greatest number,
would arise from the consciousness of their not being prepared. The tidings
would go through Jerusalem,—poor and rich, Priest, Levite, citizen, Scribe and
Pharisee,—the Messiah has come; and then this would awaken within the immediate
question, am I ready for his coming? For every Jew had, more or less, an idea
of Messiah, according to the prophets; so that carnal as many of their notions
were, they yet knew He was coming on an errand against evil,—on a righteous
mission,—and they could not help asking, in such a case, am I ready for Him?
They knew He was to be great, glorious, just;—could they then meet Him face to
face?
Ah, yes, they are troubled, because they
are not ready! The news went to their consciences. They might desire his advent
on some accounts, but the thoughts of it troubled them because of others. He
was to be the messenger of a holy God. He was to be himself a holy one. He was
coming to do holy things and speak holy words. This could not but alarm them.
Hateful as was the Roman yoke and Herod's tyranny, these were better to them
than the scepter of a holy king.
The news of his coming searched them. It
awoke within them thoughts and fears that had lain dormant. They expected
Messiah, they wished him to come; but there were so many things connected with
his character and reign that made his presence undesirable, that they could not
hear of his arrival and not be troubled.
A man's conscience is sometimes more
enlightened and better instructed than his mind; and when an appeal is made to
it by some solemnizing piece of news, it immediately responds. Some sudden
stroke of God's hand upon a man, or his family, or his nation, hits his
conscience with special force; and conscience asserts her supremacy. As when
the Sareptan widow's son was taken from her, immediately her conscience responded
with, "O man of God art thou come to call my sin to remembrance, and to
slay my son?" A holy man of God enters a worldly man's house, or the house
of an inconsistent Christian, and immediately the man is uneasy. His conscience
is disturbed. He is troubled as was Jerusalem when the tidings came, He is
come!
Yes; Christ came not to send peace, but a
sword; and it was the flash of this sword that troubled Jerusalem. There is
something in Christ that troubles,—alarms. We know that it shall be so when He
comes the second time. They shall look on him and mourn; all kindreds of the
earth shall wail because of Him. But his first advent has something about it to
trouble, too. It is not all peace. Even apart from the glory, and terror, and
judgment of his second, there is something in the announcement of his first
that startles the man and rouses the conscience. The very grace that is in it
is of an awfully solemnizing kind; and no man can hear of that grace without
feeling that there is something in it from which he must of necessity shrink,
unless he is prepared to surrender himself unreservedly and believingly to Him
whose grace it is.
He comes as an infant, yet He comes as a
King. He comes, offering rest, and forgiveness, and life; yet He, at the same
time, makes a claim upon us which none will accept save he whose heart has been
touched by the Holy Ghost. He speaks to us in grace, he looks at us in grace;
yet in doing so He presents us with a cross which we must bear, with a yoke
which we must take on. He announces himself as Jesus the Saviour, yet, in doing
so, He lets us know that He is as a Saviour from sin, a deliverer from this
present evil world. Therefore it is that He is not always welcomed; nay, so
often rejected. Therefore it is that his presence in love and lowliness
troubles the sons of men. They are disarmed,— perhaps attracted, by that love
and lowliness; but the demands which these make upon their whole being and
life, their allegiance, their obedience, their affection, are such as they will
not submit to. So they are troubled, and bid Him depart out of their coasts.
The wise men were not
"troubled." They were eager and earnest in pursuit of Israel's King.
They saw his star in the East, and they made haste to seek Him out. They saw
nothing to alarm them, for they were prepared at once to own Him for what He
was revealed to be nay, to worship Him. And being thus minded, what had they to
fear? "Fear not ye; I know that ye seek Jesus." Being prepared to
take Him, at any cost, they had nothing to shrink from. For it is only they who
are not disposed to admit his entire claims that can be troubled at the
announcement of his advent,—either his first or his second. Take Him for what
He is; take Him for what He contains and offers; take Him for what the Father
testifies of Him,—take Him entire, and you have nothing to fear.
It seems strange to say, and yet it is
true, that Christ comes to trouble us,—"Be troubled ye careless
ones." Woe to those who have never been troubled by Him; into whose hearts
or consciences He has never looked with his solemn eye, as in that day when He troubled
Jerusalem. Elijah of old was counted the troubler of Israel, so is Christ the
troubler of the world.
He will not let men alone. He is ever and
anon announcing himself, coming into the midst of them, now here and now there,
and troubling them. He came to Corinth, and it was troubled. He came to
Thessalonica, to Philippi, to Derbe, to Lystra, and they were
"troubled." He did not come with fire, or sword, or sweeping
judgment, yet they were "troubled." Wherever He comes, He troubles.
He came to Germany in the 16th century, to Switzerland, to Scotland, to
England, and they were troubled. He comes to a town, a city, a village, or a
family, and they are "troubled." He comes to a soul lying asleep or
dead, and it is "troubled."
What is at the bottom of all the
persecutions of various ages? It is Christ troubling the world. If He would let
it alone, it would let Him alone. What means the outcry, and alarm, and
misrepresentation, and anger, in days of revival? It is Christ troubling the
world. What means the resistance to a fully preached gospel? It is Christ
troubling the world. A fettered gospel, a circuitous gospel, a conditional
gospel,—a gospel that does not truly represent Christ,—troubles no man; for in
such cases it is another Christ that is announced, and not the Christ, the King
of the Jews, that troubled Jerusalem. But a large, free, happy, unconditional
gospel, that fully represents Jesus and his grace, Jesus and his completeness,
does trouble men. It troubles all to whom it comes, in some measure. Some it
troubles and then converts; some it only troubles. But its announcement does,
more or less, for all who hear it, what it did for Jerusalem in the days of
Herod,—it troubles.
