Christmas Pop Quiz

So, with the second course of our delectable spiritual delights, we have our pastor, Mr. Jim Tuck.

Well, happy Sabbath, all of you! Good to see you all. Hope that you've had a great week. My wife and I, by the way, coming over here, we had a dust snowstorm. I just washed the car yesterday, and it was really nice to get over here. My car is brown most of the time. It's gray, but with the dust on it, it's this icky brownish gray. But anyway, hopefully the rain will wash it away. That's my hope. We are at that time of year, again, with the lights, the music, the trees. Of course, all littered. They even had the palm trees out at our neighborhood. They've got them decorated from top to bottom. My wife and I have been doing a little carpentry-type work, and I mentioned that in the note I sent this past week.

We've been in and out of Home Depot, practically own that place now. They were playing the Silent Night and Jingle Bells and all that stuff. Boy, that gets stuck in your head, doesn't it? I got to the point where it just made me sick because it kept me awake all night. I had it just reverberating around my brain. I remember many, many years ago when God was calling me, seeing movies like The Ten Commandments.

I remember the first time I ever saw The Ten Commandments. It was in Van Buren, Arkansas. I remember The Marquis. Charlton Heston, of course, was the movie star at that time in that, in other big names, in other shows that were like it.

One that really stuck in my mind was the greatest story ever told. Maybe some of you saw that. It had Charlton Heston, it had Telly Savallis, and some other big names. If you don't know who Telly Savallis is, if you saw the old detective movies, he was the one that was sort of a slick, bald-headed guy, and he sucked on a lollipop all the time.

He would pop it out of his mouth and he says, I'm always looking to you, baby. That was a part of the show. He was a very interesting person to watch in a detective-type show. But anyway, those were some of the things that sort of stuck in my mind. The Ten Commandments, the greatest story ever told. Those things began to reverberate with me when I was very, very young, and I began to ask the question, you know, what difference does it make? And eventually I determined it made a very big difference. And of course, we've learned a lot, haven't we, since we've been in the church?

One thing we do do in God's church is we learn. God's people learn about the Bible. They learn about scriptures. I want to give you, by the way, today a pop quiz. Now, you should do really well with this one, because, I mean, many of you here have been in the church for many, many years. It's a pop quiz about Christmas. Now, you should ace this one. It may be the first one you ever, ever aced in your life, but you should ace this test.

We are all, of course, biblically literate, and so we shouldn't freeze up. I'm not going to give you any trick questions here today. And, in fact, you don't even have to write anything down. You can just, you know, you can make a note of what the answer is in your head. I have five questions. Twenty points per question, by the way, if you want to grade yourself. And I grade pretty harshly. If you get 80%, you get a B.

If you get above 90%, which, you know, is, of course, you have to get all of them, right? You will get an A. Okay, question number one. The Jews had no idea of when the Messiah was to be born. True or false? Okay. Question number two. Jesus grew up in Bethlehem. True or false? Question three. There were three wise men in the biblical account of the birth of Jesus Christ. True or false? Question number four. The Magi were Gentiles from India. True or false? Question number five. The Christ child was born on December 25th. Now, if you listen to the first message, you might get that one right. You know, I think you would get it right.

Now, how many of you think you scored 100% on that? Could you raise your hands? Okay. Well, if you said false for every one of them, you made an A today on that. But I want to make a sermon out of this. I want to talk about these things. I think it's really good not only for those of us that have been taught these things through the years, but I think it's always good for our young people to have these things taught to them, reminded, in fact, about them just as we have been.

The fact of the matter is, brethren, that most don't know the truth, and frankly, most think it doesn't really matter about these things that we're talking about. They don't think it makes any difference. They're indifferent. Some, in fact, openly admit, as Mr. Miller was talking about, that Christmas has pagan origins. I've seen the article, so have you.

I've seen the programs on television where they talk about Christ was born at a different time. I listened to somebody, in fact, this morning who was saying that Christ was born in March. So, there are interesting ideas and theories that have been promulgated by different ones about the birth of Christ. But, frankly, most don't care. Some will tell you that they've cleaned Christmas up, and today it's about Christ. It's not about the old pagan stuff.

It's about Christ. But, as was pointed out already in your homework, you need to again go to Deuteronomy 12 in verses 29-32, where God commanded Israel and told them not even to inquire about pagan ways, not even to inquire about them, and not certainly to worship God with those customs that were done by the nations around about them. And Jeremiah 10, of course, tells us, learn not the way of the heathen. The Bible should be the guide, the Christian guide for us.

And yet, so often, brethren, so many are steeped in tradition that oftentimes the truth is obscured. You don't see the truth. It's darkened. People are so caught up with their traditions that they can't see their way clear to see what the Bible actually does say. But, you know, brethren, the truth should not be obscure or unknown to us. We who are God's people should know the truth. We should be able to give an answer when somebody asks us about something. Now, that doesn't mean we're going to convince anybody. You know, if that were possible, I would have convinced my brothers and sisters of it. I have nine that are in our family, eleven, in fact.

My mother and father, I could not convince about Christmas, and not one of my brothers or sisters. Could I convince about Christmas? And that's a very small subject when you look into the Bible. So let's talk about these five questions in this pop quiz. Could the Jews have known about the time of the birth of the Messiah? Could they have known that? In fact, were someone aware of it? You know, when scholars, for instance, of Jesus Christ, they have known the approximate time when the Christ would appear.

The answer is yes. In fact, they were looking for the Messiah. In fact, some of it had risen up and had caused quite controversies in Israel, at that time among the Jews, on a number of occasions. That some thought that they were the Messiah, and of course, some of them were imprisoned or put to death, because their idea was to establish the kingdom right away. Not, of course, as Jesus Christ did when he came in his earthly ministry. Messiah, by the way, in the Old Testament, this word means anointed one.

It means anointed one. And Israel's kings were anointed with oil. The Messiah would be of the line, by the way, of David. Now, that's very, very important to know. He would be of the line of David. These things, by the way, the religious leaders of the time of Christ knew. You know, if anything, if the Jews knew anything, brethren, they knew lineage. Have you ever talked to anybody that says, I traced my lineage back to this king or that king? Usually it's that royalty.

The some are able to do that. I know Mr. Armstrong often spoke about how he traced his lineage back to David. So people, that's not unknown to do that, to be able to do that. And the Jews were very good at that. You remember when they returned from Babylonian captivity? They had an all-outline who everybody was related to. And it was registered that way. So they were very adept at lineage. And they could have been watching the various lines of King David. Now, certainly there would have been many, but they could have been doing that. Let's go to Matthew chapter 1 over here.

I'm sorry, Matthew chapter 2. Matthew chapter 2 here, in answering the question, could the Jews have known about the time of the birth of the Messiah? Let's notice here in verse 1, it says, 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. So these wise men, or magi, as they're called in the King James version, And saying, Where is he who was born king of the Jews? For we have seen a star in the east, and have come to worship him. Now why would these people, these wise men, or magi, Why would they care about who was born to be king of the Jews?

Well, I think it's quite obvious, isn't it? King David ruled over the Jews only? Is that a true or false? That's false, right? Who did he reign over? All of Israel. And so naturally they would have been interested in the birth of the king of the Jews. And it says, For we have seen a star in the east, and have come to worship him.

And when Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. And when he had gathered all the chief priests and the stripes of the people together, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born, where the Messiah was going to be born. And so they said to him, in Bethlehem of Judea.

And then they, of course, gave a prophecy. It says, For you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are not the least among the rulers of Judah. For out of you shall come a ruler, who will shepherd my people Israel. So that was why they were interested in this. It was very important to them. No, the Jews knew, and not only did the Jews knew, but other Israelites peoples knew, that a Messiah was going to come along.

The prophecies about it were in the Scriptures. And not only that, that he would come from David's royal line. They knew that. And yet they were, of course, oblivious when he came along. Even though all the miracles that Christ did, and all the things that they did, they were oblivious to Jesus the Christ when he came. And today, they're still looking. In David's line, by the way, they're still looking for the Messiah to come along.

Every once in a while in New York, they have some guy spotted up there that is the Messiah, until he dies and they wait until he gets resurrected, and he never gets resurrected. But anyway, they'll still probably be weighed in when Christ appears in all of His glory. Let's go to Luke 2. So again, could they have known? And the answer, of course, is they could have known. It was not something that was not on the minds of the people. Luke 2, verse 25. It says, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon. And the man was, it says, just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel.

And the Holy Spirit was upon him, and had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Messiah, the Anointed One. So here's a man that was waiting, and he wasn't going to die until he saw the Christ. And so apparently God was revealing to some when this would occur. And Simeon was waiting, of course, for the Christ in his lifetime.

And he was thankful when he saw him, because then as an old man he could die. He knew that that time of waiting was over for him. Now how would they have known the time? Of course, we're talking about approximate time here when Christ was going to come along. This would be, by the way, a very good Bible study in itself. I'm not going to go through very much of this, but over in Daniel 9 over here, the prophet Daniel is given this incredible prophecy. Remember, Judah was in captivity in Babylon, and they were there for 70 years.

And the time began to roll around that Daniel himself had been praying about these things, wanted to know, again, how the discourse of prophecy would unfold. And yet he probably never understood completely the things that were revealed to him. Perhaps he did this to a degree. But in Daniel 9, let's notice here in verse 23, Daniel was actually told to shut up the prophecies and that it would be understood in the time of the end, at the close of the age. It was a little wonder that in our time we do have a certain understanding of this.

But in Daniel 9, in verse 23 here, notice it says, God says to Daniel, who had been fasting, remember wanting to have certain things revealed to him. In verse 23 it says, And at the beginning of your supplications the command went out, And I have come to tell you, for you are greatly beloved, and therefore consider the matter, and understand the vision.

Seventy weeks are determined for your people and for your holy city to finish the transgression, to make an end of sins, to make an end of sins here, to make reconciliation for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy. Now this is quite a prophecy here, isn't it? So in other words, this vision, a 70-week vision, would carry us to the time of the arrival of the Messiah. And it says, Know therefore and understand that from the going forth of the command, to restore and build Jerusalem until Messiah, the Prince, there will be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks, and the street will be built again in the wall even in the trouble of times.

And after the sixty-two weeks, the Messiah shall be cut off and not be himself, not for himself, and the people of the Prince who is to come. And it carries you actually to the events that are going to take place, that are going to bring this entire world to desolation.

So this prophecy not only deals with the time of the arrival of the Messiah, but in time events that are going to take place as well. But this 70-week prophecy could have given them an idea when the Messiah was going to come along. You know, of course it's divided into sixty-two weeks and seven weeks. I won't go into the discussion of that. But a week in prophecy, by the way, is seven prophetic years. And so you multiply seven prophetic years times the prophecies that are involved. You come up with again the time period when, in fact, the Messiah was going to come on the scene. I'm not going to go over to Chronicles, but over there it talks about how Cyrus gave the decree to rebuild the wall, and to rebuild Jerusalem. And by the way, all scholars agree that was around 457 B.C. And when you do your arithmetic with the, you know, sixty-nine times seven, you come up with 483 years, and when you do the subtraction, you come up with 26 A.D. And you have to add a year in passing over from B.C. to A.D. because there is no year zero. You come up with 27 A.D., which, by the way, was the time, the approximate time that Jesus Christ came on the scene and began to preach the gospel. That's when His earthly ministry began. And they could have been watching for that. They could have been aware of that. The Bible even says He was cut off in the midst of a prophetic week. So His ministry was three and a half years, and of course, as we understand, He was crucified on Wednesday, which was the middle of the week. And if they were looking for a baby in 27 A.D., they were looking in the wrong way, in the wrong manner, of course, because Christ was not a baby. Unfortunately, during this time of year, people like to keep Jesus Christ a little tiny baby, don't they? It's the little child in the manger. I found it kind of interesting that I was reading last night some of the news that they have just found in Egypt a nativity scene, you know, the father and mother and child. And you know how old they say it is? 5,000 years old. So the concept of mother and child and the nativity goes clear back, probably, to the beginning of man. The time after Adam came on the scene. Paganism, of course, really the idea of Madonna and child, mother and child, has been around for a long, long time. Of course, you have Simramus and Nimrod and all of that imagery that was predated, in fact, the imagery that has been foisted off on people, you know, by the Universal Church in the pagan adaptation of December 25th as a day for Christmas. Today, by the way, is Christmass, or mass for Christ. And of course they say it's the birth of Christ, but it's a mass for Christ that they have on this particular day. So here we go. I mean, they could have known, again, the truth about it. And we know that Christ came along and He shed His blood, and the Bible does tell us that without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. And so Jesus Christ's blood caused the need for sacrifices to cease.

He, in fact, was the one that squared away, brethren, for the sins of all humanity, that if people repent they can be forgiven. Now, let's go to the next question. How was Christ born in Bethlehem? How did that happen? Most frankly don't know. They have no idea. Well, I'm not going to go to Luke 4, verse 16. But there we are told that Jesus Christ came upon Nazareth, where He had been brought up, and He entered into the synagogue as His custom was.

So the Bible clearly says that Jesus Christ was actually brought up 150 miles north of Jerusalem. Now, that's a long way you've got to walk it. Or if you have to ride in a wagon, or a donkey, that would even be worse, I think, to do something like that. But Jesus was a country boy. He was a country boy. Way out country boy! I've been to Nazareth, and it's a very mountainous area. So Christ would have been very tough, rugged. He was, of course, lived right by the Sea of Galilee. He was acquainted with fishing. So He would have gotten along well with Mr. Miller and his enjoyment of fishing. No, by the way, the tribes knew that Jesus, though, was going to be born in Bethlehem of Judea, which was five miles south of Jerusalem. But how was that going to be? Well, brethren, that had to be orchestrated of God. And God had to bring that about. Let's go to Luke 2. Luke 2. Luke 2. Verse 1, it says, It came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be registered. So everybody had to be registered. And it says, the census took place while Quenarius was governing. It says, Syria. And by the way, you can take some of these historical figures, and you could come up with again the times we're talking about here, an approximate time when Jesus Christ would have been born. And it says, so all went to be registered everyone to his own city. And so everybody went out to be registered, it says, in their own city. Now, when would they have done the registration for people? What would have been the best time for Jews to be registered? Wouldn't it have been during the festivals when they normally get together anyway? Certainly it would have been. And that is exactly what happened. That this time of taxation and census was done at a convenient time. And the best time, again, for that to be done for people, most would have come down to Jerusalem, was during the Feast of Tabernacles.

And so it was during that time, and the Feast of Tabernacles is not in the fall. It is not in March, by the way. As I mentioned, the one guy that was talking about how Christ was born in March, and there's a number of things that, of course, don't work out with March at all. But we know that Jesus Christ himself was born in Bethlehem according to the prophecies.

And interestingly, when Joseph went down with Mary, at the time that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, there would have been 2 million people that were gathering in Jerusalem to observe the Feast of Tabernacles. That's a big crowd. And people would come, and they would camp, of course, as close to the feast site as they could be, like we do, right? Most of us are the same way. Some had, though, to camp way out.

But Bethlehem was way out. It was 5 miles out. And I say that because of the fact that when you're riding a mule or walking, 5 miles is a long way to walk. Now, I know some members that will not drive 5 miles to church, or to the Sabbath, or to the Sabbath, or to the Sabbath. But walking would be even worse, wouldn't it?

But they, of course, had to lodge in Bethlehem. Now, an interesting thing I found is the word Bethlehem means the house of bread. And, of course, Christ is the bread of life. He's sent down, or to be born. And Christ was the true bread sent from heaven. Let's go on down through here in chapter 2. I think we're down to verse 4 now. And Joseph also went up from Galilee. So this is where Jesus was brought up out of the city of Nazareth.

In the Judea, in the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because He was the house of the lineage of David. Now, interesting, isn't it? If you were going to look for the Messiah, where would you go?

Bethlehem. This is where those that were of house of David would go. To Bethlehem. Kind of interesting, isn't it? Because He was of the house of the lineage of David. To be registered with Mary, His betrothed wife, who was with child. And so this is where they went. So it was that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered. And she brought forth her first-born son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

And so Jesus Christ was born. She had been great with child and she delivered Jesus. Now was this on December 25th? Practically no one thinks this. Who's aware of the climate of Jerusalem at that time of year? Luke 2, verse 8 down here, tells us that in fact the shepherds were in the fields by night. Adam Clark, by the way, one that all of us are very, very familiar with, in volume 5 and page 370 says this, It was an ancient custom among the Jews of those days to send out their sheep to the fields and deserts about the Passover, early spring, and bring them home at the commencement of the first rain.

During the time they were out, the shepherds watched them night and day. As the first rain began early in the month of Markesvan, which answers to part of our October and November, begins sometime in October as a notation here, we find that the sheep were kept out in the open country during the whole summer.

And as these shepherds had not brought home their flocks, it is presumptive argument that October had not yet commenced, and that consequently our Lord was not born on the 25th of December. When no flocks were out in the field, nor could he have been born later than September as the flocks were still in the fields by night. On this very ground, Adam Clark says, the nativity in December should be given up.

The feeding of the flocks by night in the fields is a chronological fact, he says. The Catholic Encyclopedia says this about Christmas. The December 25th observance predates the coming of Christ. I mentioned about the nativity idea 5,000 years before. The largest pagan religious cult, which fostered the celebration of December 25th, as a holiday through the Greek and Romans world was Mithraeism, as Mr. Miller mentioned it, who were sun worshipers.

Now, one of the problems, by the way, of the universal church is they love to syncretize paganism into Christianity. And by that, I mean they attach Christian names to pagan customs. And, of course, Christmas is just one of those. If you go down to South America, by the way, they have syncretized groups into the universal church. And some of these people are involved in, frankly, satanic practices. And people get into the spirit. But what they've done is they've said, well, that spirit that people get into, this spirit, even though we know it's an evil spirit, that's the spirit of God working in them.

So that's how they syncretize these things. And, of course, some of them are maybe less shocking than something like that. But I've read about these things, about some of the religions being syncretized down in South America in articles over the years. But it says, the chief deity, the Catholic encyclopedia goes on, the chief deity of this religion was a sun goddess called the Queen of Heaven. The season of the year when this goddess received her greatest adoration from the pagan world was at the time of the winter solstice in December. You notice the days are getting longer now.

And, of course, according to the pagans, they began to worship the sun because they thought at this time of the year the sun was dying. And so they would worship the sun and eventually sacrifice a few people. And all of a sudden, as the sun began to shine longer. And what do you know?

It works. Let's sacrifice several people here and we can get it really cooking for us. And we're not going to freeze to death. But anyway, going on here, it says that this festival is called the Nativity, for it had to do with the Nativity of the sun. You know, this Nativity, the birth of the sun that takes place at the time of the winter solstice.

When it begins to get stronger. In the book that was written by James Fraser, by the way, it's called The Golden Bough, if you have not seen this particular book. So I have it in my library, but this is a statement out of there from page 359. And it's a quote, had a lean to this festival. They took counsel and resolved that the true Nativity of Christ should be solemnized on that day. And you can go through the many books like this to tell you the facts about it.

But does it matter? Well, I think it does, doesn't it? God tells us not to worship the heathen, not to actually mimic them and what they do. So there are many sources that come to the same conclusion that Fraser does, and even the Catholic Encyclopedia, and Adam Clark, and a whole lot of other commentaries that say the same thing. It's evident that Jesus Christ was born nowhere near December 25th, but around September or October. Very possibly, we don't know. Of course, we'll find that out when he returns. He may have been born on trumpets, the visa trumpets.

Maybe he was born in the day he's going to return. He's going to come back in the future. If that, of course, indeed is when he's going to return as well. But also, I was going to mention to you the companion Bible says that it is possible that Jesus Christ was conceived around December, because that would mean he would be born around September or so. So it's possible that that was when Christ was conceived. He may have been conceived at that particular time. Nine months afterwards, of course, would be bringing you to September.

Next question. Were there three wise men at the birth of Christ? Usually, they choose three because there were three gifts. You know, gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

And, you know, interestingly, it doesn't appear that the Magi, by the way, were the ones that so much announced the birth of Christ. They were there to witness it, and they had to get out of town afterwards, or they might have ended up dead. But three is mentioned oftentimes, and even in the song, we three kings of Orient are bearing gifts, however it goes. I can't remember anymore. I used to sing that all the time, you know, in the Protestant churches. But when Jesus was born, brother, the announcement of it was very humble. It wasn't made by a governor. It wasn't made by the high priest of Jerusalem. But it was made by shepherds out of the field during perhaps the time of the Feast of Tabernacles. They may very well have been out in the field, by the way, talking about the kingdom of God. What's it going to be like when the Messiah comes? When the kingdom is set up? I mean, isn't that what we do during the Feast of Tabernacles? Don't we talk about what it's going to be like in the kingdom? Can you imagine, though, here you're talking about the Messiah coming, and little do you know that your life is about to change. Let's go on down here in verse 9 of chapter 2, if you're still there.

And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone about them, and were greatly afraid. And then the angel said to them, Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which will be to all people. And it says, For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be the sign to you. He's talking to the shepherds here. This will be a sign to you. You will find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of heavenly hosts praising God and saying glory to God in the highest on earth, peace and goodwill toward men. It must have been an incredible experience that these shepherds had to see these things occurring and happening. Verse 15 going on. So it was when the angels had gone away from them into heaven that the shepherds said to one another, Let us now go to Bethlehem and see this saying that it has come to pass, which the Lord has made known to us. And they came with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the babe lying in a manger. And when they had seen him, they made widely known the saying which was told them concerning his child. So these men went about and they were talking about announcing the birth of Jesus Christ. And all those who heard were marveled at these things which were told them by the shepherds. Mary apparently did not fully understand, but Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. Then the shepherds returned glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen as it was told them. Remarkable again time. But God begins, brethren, with lowly shepherds to announce the birth of the Messiah.

And it must have spread like wildfire among the people during that time. It must have been an incredible thing. Let's go to Matthew 2 now. Matthew 2, let's talk about the Magi. No, these Magi or these wise men came from a far country, as it talks about. But notice over here when Herod began to put the screws on them, began to put the clamp down on them, that in fact, they headed out of town. They got out of town. In chapter 2 now, in verse 12, it says, Speaking to these wise men, then, being divinely warned in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed for their own country another way. So they got out of town. And no doubt they talked about the Messiah the whole way back in their journey back to their home. And they came, though, from a far distance to see Jesus. And they returned, spreading the news along the way. But who were these Magi? Who were they? Who were these wise men? Well, brethren, they were men, devout men, of very high distinction. They were not common people. They were magistrates from a far country. Because otherwise they would have not been welcomed by Herod. If you wanted, and I wanted to get in to see the President, if you said, Hey, I need to get in to see Mr. Obama, you know what they would probably bring? They would say, Yeah, we'll let you on in. And they would bring a straitjacket, a white one, and tie you up and carry you off. No, they wouldn't let you in. These men were of distinction. Of course, Herod invited them as well. And it was inquiring about it. But in verse 1 here, let's notice, chapter 2, verse 1, And after Jesus was born in Bethlehem, in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem. So these Magi, these wise men, were from the east. And if you look at the Greek word, the Greek word is M-A-G-O-I. Now, by the way, as I mentioned, the Catholics oftentimes think that these individuals were, in fact, Gentiles. They have some different ideas about these Magi. But it doesn't say that they were Gentiles. It doesn't say that they're here, as we've read. It doesn't say they're priests. It doesn't say that they're kings. It really doesn't say anything. But anciently, brethren, Magi, or these wise men, were a class of priests among the Medes and the Persians, forming the king's private council, and they dealt with astrology, medicine, or the occult sciences. And they came to be known as wise men. And, in fact, Daniel was a Magi. In fact, he was the top Magi. He was the the Rob-Mag, as he would have been called. I, of course, would know what the language would be, but that's his... He would have been the chief of the Magi. But the term Magi used to mean about magic or astrology. Obviously, Daniel was not into magic and that sort of thing. But the word Magi came to mean a wise man or an elder. And again, Daniel was a Magi, and he was the chief of them. Let's notice down here in verse 11. So they come and they see the Messiah, but let's notice here.

And when they had come into the house... Now, this is an interesting phrase here. But notice here, when they come into the house, they don't come to a manger here. They saw the young child with Mary, his mother, and they fell down and worshipped him. And when they had opened the treasures, they presented gifts to him, gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And so, here we see that they present what you would present to a king. And Christ, of course, is going to be the king of kings and the Lord of lords. And I don't think that they probably presented him with just a little bitty box of frankincense and myrrh, maybe a little gold. It probably was a lot, because after this, what does God tell Joseph to do? You know, after, of course, Herod is slaying all the children to and under, he said, I want you to go to Egypt. Well, how did they go to Egypt? And when they went down to Egypt, how were they received in Egypt? That's an interesting thing, by the way, to look into when it comes to history. But they had the financial wherewithal to live in Egypt until the death of Herod. So it was a considerable length of time. So what was presented here was a great deal more than just a little gold, a little frankincense and myrrh. Now, the number of Magi certainly are not known, but it's possible that these wise men, these Magi, represented the tribes of Israel that were scattered abroad. You read in James 1 and verse 1, it talks about where James is writing to the tribes that were scattered abroad. And we know that there were the lost tribes of Israel that they talk about today, but they were not lost during the time of Christ. They knew where they were. When the apostles went out to preach the gospel, they were sent to Asia Minor. They went to the far reaches of Babylon, clear over to Indri, India.

In those areas, what was ancient Parthia? In fact, built into many of the songs that people sing about Christmas, it talks about Parthian kings. Again, we don't know if they were kings, but very possibly they could have been magistrates.

But they likely were not Gentiles, but they were Israelites that had been scattered during the time of the captivity that took place. Up to this time, of course, they had been waiting, watching, as in fact Simeon was, and others were waiting for the Messiah to come along.

We know, by the way, that these men, no doubt, kept an eye on this young king that was born in Bethlehem and brought up in Nazareth.

Because when Christ was older, he began to mature probably some of the areas that he visited with. And he was well known in different parts of the world at that particular time that they would have been aware of him. This is the eighteen lost years leading up to, of course, the beginning of his ministry when he was about thirty years of age.

So where were the Magi from? Again, the popular lore is there from India. The Catholics have what they call is the Feast of Epiphany, which they say, basically, with the Feast of Epiphany, that these Magi were the first Gentile converts. So that's what that festival is about.

But let's notice here in verse 2 of Matthew, it says in saying, it says, Where is he who was born, king of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the east that have come to worship him. So they were from the east.

But let's notice on down here that we see that Herod asks these men, he asks them, at what time did they see the star?

And, you know, they, of course, had seen the star at a particular time. But Herod had said in his mind, such that he had a guess of understanding the slew, all the infants that were two years and under. So they may have seen the star that led them to the Messiah two years before. So they were a long way over there in this journey. A long way away.

And, you know, they possibly could have been from what, you know, was India, but it was probably from what was known as the Parthian Empire.

You know, the Parthian Empire was located far to the east.

And, you know, Parthian Empire, by the way, was the empire that was never defeated by the Romans.

And when we begin to read about the early New Testament church in Acts 2, the devout men that came there and were there on the Feast of Pentecost when the giving of the Holy Spirit took place, one of the areas that is mentioned among many that are mentioned there was Parthia.

And so these men that came devout there to receive that day when Peter preached his powerful sermon to receive the Holy Spirit, some of them were from Parthia. These were people who had been gathered, you know, in Jerusalem, devout-minted type of people.

Of course, it would come from a long way to be at the Feast of Tabernacles as well. Maybe others were not able to do that, but some were able to do that.

But Parthia was about 700 miles to the east of Jerusalem.

And it would possibly have taken a couple of years for them to journey along the way, told people along the way what they were going to do, and on the way back they told them what they had done.

So the Magi, again, were from the far eastern area, probably from Parthia area, where the Israelites would have been taken and made a part of the old Babylonian Empire, and they grew into the Parthian Empire that, again, went head-to-head with the Romans on a number of occasions.

The Romans, again, could not defeat them.

See, the problem in the world, brethren, is that most of Christianity has never let the baby Jesus grow up, so they don't know the truth about the Christ who, yes, indeed, was born in Bethlehem.

Though it's very probable, by the way, that when the Magi came, the wise men came, that they didn't even come to Bethlehem, they came to Nazareth.

Because if you read over in verse 11 here, it says that when they came into the house, it's very possible that the house they came into was the house that Jesus and Mary and Joseph lived in in Nazareth, because it may have been two years later, after the birth of Jesus Christ.

But again, most of the world doesn't know the answer to these five basic questions.

Christ, of course, was born. He was not kept in the manger. He grew up.

He conducted His earthly ministry. He was crucified and bore many stripes and shed His blood for the sins of the whole world, brethren.

And when He, you know, succumbed and He gave up His Spirit, He ascended to heaven to sit at the right hand of the Father in heaven.

I want to ask you, brethren, how well did you do on the quiz?

Did you make 100%? I hope you did. I really hope you made a perfect score.

But realize this, brethren, most of this world could not even pass this short five-question test.

They don't know. And as long as they have the closed minds that they do, you know, they will never know the truth. The true circumstances surrounding the birth of Jesus Christ. Be thankful, God. God has opened your mind so you can see the truth and you can know the truth and you can understand these five basic questions.