Thought for Today
Genesis 1:16 God made the two great lights-- the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night-- and the stars.
Numbers 24:17 I see him, but not now; I behold him, but not near-- a star shall come out of Jacob, and a scepter shall rise out of Israel; . . .
Matthew 2:1 In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, 2 asking, "Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage."
Yesterday, in writing about the disciples, I asked the question, “who was the navigator?” That question prompted a friend to ask about Matthew’s account of the visit of the Magi. Evidently, currently Venus is prominent in our eastern skies in the early mornings. That friend wondered whether the Magi were journeying toward the planet Venus, the apparent ‘star’ they followed.
I am not an astronomer, professional or amateur. Having lived my life in and around large cities, I don’t spend much time looking at the night sky. Few stars are visible due to the ambient light of the city. I can recognize the Big Dipper, and that is about the limit of my knowledge of constellations.
My first inclination when asked a question about scriptures, is to look at the Greek text. The first thing I noticed is that Magi is a transliteration of a Greek word, μάγοι, wise men. That Greek word was from a Persian word. Both Israel and most of the lands north and east of Israel were at one time parts of the Persian Empire, which extended south and west of Israel into parts of Egypt.
I was initially trained as an engineer. Engineers are essentially problem solvers. We are trained to solve problems by first clearly defining the question or goal, then assembling all the relevant data. From that point on, it is simply a matter of rearranging the data, applying the appropriate scientific principles and presenting the solution. Of course, if it was always that neat and clean, engineers could not command enough money to eke out a living.
But in seminary and in my ministry, I still often think like an engineer. I try to analyze the question, assemble the data and try to come to a definitive solution. Engineering training often produces characteristic solutions that are a bit skewed; e.g., the glass is neither half full nor half empty, it’s merely twice as big as it needs to be.
Once again, I am reminded that reading the Bible as a history book, as a geography book or any sort of scientific text is counterproductive. The Bible is not a book of facts or data in the scientific sense. When confronted with a difficult Biblical passage, I often remind myself to first read Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth . . .”
The Bible is a book about God, a book about our Creator, God’s Creation, our place in that Creation and our relationship with our Creator. Start to finish, Genesis to Revelation, the Bible is all about God.
For us, the problem is trying to understand our infinite, eternal God with our finite, temporal minds. Like the Bible writers, we are reduced to using metaphors, similes and analogies. How can one describe, much less understand, God? To paraphrase one of the Patristic Fathers, whatever you think of as God is not God, because God is greater than anything you can conceive.
I may be an engineer, but I am also a minister. I believe in miracles. An internet search tells me a miracle is “a surprising and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws and is therefore considered to be the work of a divine agency.” When I read about the feeding of thousands from a few fishes and loaves, or about healings or anything else, instead of looking for scientific explanations, I find the work of God.
Whether those Magi followed the ‘star’ Venus in the sky or not, heir faith, their willingness to follow that ‘star’ is part of the miracle of Jesus, the Christ. I find the truth in John 3:16 and Ephesians 2:8 a miracle, the gospel miracle of God’s love.
To answer that question that sparked this whole discourse, God is the navigator who will lead us all back into Eden, to life eternal in the Kingdom of God.
Stay safe, follow God, trust God,
Pastor Ray