When he had called together all the people\u2019s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born.
\n \u2014 Matthew 2:4<\/p>\n
Sometime (probably a few months) after the birth of Jesus, Magi from the east came in search of him. These \u201cwise men\u201d had seen a star that pointed them to the birth of a new king. So they came to the regional ruler in Jerusalem to ask about this.When King Herod heard about the newborn king, he was disturbed. And if Herod was disturbed, the people he ruled had reason for concern. He had a reputation for being cruel and was often suspicious of any threat to his throne. Yet at this point Herod needed more information in order to get what he wanted.So he asked the people\u2019s leaders and teachers about this king, and Herod\u2019s inquiries pointed the Magi toward the promises in God\u2019s Word. Centuries earlier, God had said that the Savior would come from Bethlehem, a town in the nearby countryside. The Magi then continued their search until they found the promised child.We often assume today that we can capture something of the \u201cChristmas spirit\u201d in our decorations and ceremonies of the season. This story about the Magi reminds us that the meaning of Christmas arises from God\u2019s promises. Though the devil may try to bring harm in various ways around us, we can trust in the Lord\u2019s promises. In what ways are you looking to God\u2019s promises for direction this Christmas?<\/p>\n
Father, direct us to your promises, and may our Christmas be filled with joyful discovery and new life in Jesus. Amen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When he had called together all the people\u2019s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born. \u2014 Matthew 2:4 Sometime (probably a few months) after the birth of Jesus, Magi from the east came in search of him. These \u201cwise men\u201d had seen a star that<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12940,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[238,885,3360],"class_list":{"0":"post-12939","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-devotionals","8":"tag-gods","9":"tag-promises","10":"tag-remembering"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}