“When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him” – Mt 2:4
Jerusalem was a town that knew trouble coming when it saw it. Think about it. Jerusalem was always a bit of a town on edge in the New Testament times. You have multiple riots in just the book of Acts alone, to say nothing of Good Friday, or even 66 AD when they rebel and are utterly destroyed by the Romans. Things were always just a bit on edge in Jerusalem in the New Testament era.
So, when a bunch of magi from the East come into town looking for the new king, that sets off warning bells. We think of the magi as the noble wisemen of our nativity scenes, kindly old men with gifts for Jesus. That’s not how Jerusalem would have seen them – the magi were the court advisers of Babylon. These were the villains who had tangled with Daniel and Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. They were from Babylon, the town that had wiped out the old Davidic Kingdom – and Herod wouldn’t be one to just sit back and take that! What’s coming next!
Well, we know that ruthless Herod sets out his plans to protect his throne, that he ends up slaughtering all the young boys in Bethlehem. The people of Jerusalem were understandably and rightly troubled. Of course, whenever we look at the halls of power and wealth, whenever we see the mighty trying to protect themselves, we are probably often troubled ourselves, and rightly so! In this life there is much miscarriage of justice and violence and all that.
Yet, what else do we see when we see the wisemen. We see the old and ancient enemies of Israel come to Jerusalem, looking for the King of the Jews. The magi of old couldn’t beat Daniel; their followers had listened to him. They knew that a Messiah, a Savior, a true King of Kings would be coming from Judah, and so putting aside all politics and history, they sought Christ Jesus. They learned of Him from the Scriptures. And they lived in His peace, even if the troubles of the world meant they had to take the long way home.
Likewise, while we see the troubles of this world, we have been given faith to see Christ Jesus, our Savior, who conquers over the sin and death of this world with His own death. We learn to see not only trouble, but our Savior who will deliver us from all our sin and from all our troubles.
