Why the Virgin Birth Matters - Matthew 1:18 – 2:12 (Session 2)

Why does the virgin birth of Jesus matter? Matthew 1 does much more than tell us the circumstances surrounding Jesus’ birth. It identifies Him as the Savior who will save His people from their sins and as Emmanuel - “God with us.”

In this session, Glenn and Steve examine Joseph’s difficult situation when he learns Mary is pregnant, the angel’s explanation that the child was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and the textual evidence supporting the virgin birth. They also discuss why the virgin birth is theologically important to understanding both the humanity and deity of Jesus Christ.

Then Matthew 2 introduces the Magi, who travel in search of the newborn King of the Jews. We consider what the Bible actually tells us about these wise men, why the star appears to be a supernatural act of God rather than an ordinary astronomical event, and the striking contrast between outsiders who travel to worship Christ and religious leaders who know the prophecy but never go to Bethlehem. 

The session closes by examining Herod’s hostility, the Magi’s worship of Jesus, and the significance of their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Matthew 1:18–2:12 | The Book of Matthew — Session 2

 Questions discussed in this session include:

• What is the main reason Jesus came to earth?
• What is the importance of the virgin birth? 
•  Who were the Magi (Wise Men)?
• What does fulfilled prophecy tell us about the messiah? 

Transcript

Starting Matthew With Jesus’ Birth

SPEAKER_00 0:16

Welcome to Reasoning Through the Bible, and we are starting our study of the book of Matthew. When we left off for our last session, we had gone through Matthew chapter 1 through verse 17. So today we're going to pick up in verse 18 of Matthew 1.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

And I'm going to read Matthew 1, starting verse 18 and going down through 25. Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows. For the child who has been conceived of her is of the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet. Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and shall bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which translated means God with us. And Joseph awoke from his sleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and he took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a son, and he called his name Jesus.

Betrothal And Joseph’s Dilemma

SPEAKER_01 1:38

It says in verse 18 that they were betrothed or engaged to be married. They were legally promised to be married, but had not yet been married. At the end of verse 18, what happens to Mary? She is bound to be with child by the Holy Spirit. And this is the virgin birth. It's a miracle, miraculous birth. And then in verse 19, Joseph's actions tell us something about what he was thinking.

SPEAKER_00 2:01

What was he wanting to do? Well, he was a righteous man, but he didn't want to disgrace her by divorcing her because they hadn't had any relations yet.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

And he was obviously assuming what? That she had had relations with somebody, he'd probably lying to her. So he wanted to divorce her, to put her away secretly, he said, didn't want to make a public show out of her. He probably still loved her. Sure, he did.

SPEAKER_00 2:23

It says that. So In verse 20, it says when he had considered

Mercy Toward Those Who Wrong Us

SPEAKER_00 2:26

this. That's what you're referring to.

SPEAKER_01 2:28

How should we treat those who sin against us? Should we make a public example or what exactly? Because that's what's going through his mind. This is somebody I loved had sinned against me. How should we treat people that sin against us?

SPEAKER_00 2:41

Well, but that's what he's saying is he's saying not wanting to disgrace her. So he's thinking about taking care of it from a standpoint of divorce, but he's wanting to do it discreetly.

SPEAKER_01 2:51

So Matthew 18 gives us a pattern of how to treat people that sin against us. First, you go to them individually, individually, privately. And if they don't resolve, then you go to group. And then the third step is go public. That's our pattern. So what do you think is going through their mind, Joseph and Mary?

SPEAKER_00 3:09

Pretty strange things that are happening. And of course, the visitations that they have from the angels that are telling them what's going

Angels And The Weight Of Expectation

SPEAKER_00 3:17

on. It's hard to kind of imagine. The Messiah was somebody that had been waited for. We're 400 years between Malachi, the prophet that had been dealing with Israel. They're under Roman occupation. And all of a sudden, here you have an angel through other accounts in the other gospels that come to Mary's cousin, Elizabeth, Mary herself, now Joseph. So they're having these visitations and reassurances through supernatural means to calm them and let them know this is what's happening and this is why it's going to happen. And to tell them he's going to be called Emmanuel, which means God with us. So I can imagine their emotions are running the gamut from a human emotion of disgrace and what are other people going to think to possible elation in that God has selected us to raise this child that's going to be a Messiah.

SPEAKER_01 4:16

So I think there's probably a lot

Why The Name Jesus Matters

SPEAKER_01 4:18

going through their mind. In verse 21, his name will be Jesus because why?

SPEAKER_00 4:22

He's going to save his people from their son. So again, Joshua means God saves.

SPEAKER_01 4:27

One of the first things mentioned about Jesus is that he will save his people from sin. Jesus was born to die. That's why he came, was to save people from sin. Now out of that came love and healing and all these other things. But the main reason he came was to save people from their sins.

Text Clues For Mary’s Virginity

SPEAKER_01 4:43

So then in verse 20, an angel appears to Joseph and confirms the miracle of the virgin birth. How do we know Mary was a virgin? From these passages, is it possible we just misunderstood the word after all these years? And really she might have been just a young girl. Some church person just made up this whole account of her. How do we know from the textual clues here that she was really a virgin?

SPEAKER_00 5:07

Well, and from other gospel accounts too, it specifically states that Joseph hasn't had relations with her.

SPEAKER_01 5:14

I'll just go through these. Verse 18, before they came together. So they had not had sex yet. Verse 23, the virgin shall be with child. The Greek word here, Parthenos, means virgin. Some people get wrapped around the axle over the original Hebrew word. Again, the Hebrew vocabulary was more limited. In Hebrew, the original word can mean young woman. But in those days, uh, young woman was a virgin, or else you were married or you're a prostitute. There wasn't an in-between. They weren't as cultured as us, so they had a little more moral society. But verse 25, Joseph knew her not until she had brought forth a son. So when it says no, it means no carnally. Verse 16, all the genealogy says the man begot the son, but in verse 16, it does not say Joseph begat Jesus, but rather that Jesus was born of Mary. Key term here. So there's no issue here with misinterpreting the words or what the original Hebrew word meant or any of those things. Mary had not yet come together with Joseph. She was a virgin. Matthew is quoting Isaiah 7:14. The skeptics try to make much of that, but there's no question here of whether she was actually a virgin.

SPEAKER_00 6:29

One other thing that might be brought out too is that when Matthew is writing this, this is several years after Matthew being with Jesus for three years, with his death, burial, resurrection. So the recording here is also in retrospect in regards to Matthew's personal knowledge of the miracles that Jesus had done, who he was, what he said he was, and his belief that he was the Son of God, and etc. It's not him just writing at the very beginning and saying, Well, how can somebody believe in a virgin birth and stuff like that? There were things that had already happened that Matthew was an eyewitness. He was with Jesus for three years, and we're told that Jesus operated in a profound way. He spoke with authority. Matthew witnessed resurrections of people from the dead and lame people being recovered and being healed. As he's recording this, it's an established fact that Jesus is who he is. And so it's not him just speculating this is a virgin birth and it's it's just rumor or just something logical significance. Yeah, or a myth or something like that. He knows that it's an actual fact. So the things that he's writing are factual things.

SPEAKER_01 7:47

The quote comes from Isaiah chapter 7, verse 14. And in the original Hebrew, if you look at the verb tenses there, it's more properly rendered that the virgin will be the one having the child while she's a virgin. That's what it's saying. Not that the virgin will become pregnant, but that the virgin is going to have a child. I mean, that's what it's saying. It's not that this virgin's going to ultimately conceive one day. No, it's saying while she's a virgin, she's having a child. And it could not have been Isaiah's wife, since if you read the chapter back in Isaiah 7, verse 3, Isaiah's wife already had a child. She wasn't a virgin anymore.

Why The Virgin Birth Is Essential

SPEAKER_01 8:23

Now, here's a question: The virgin birth in the New Testament is only mentioned a couple of times, but yet it has a profound theological significance. What is the theological significance? I've heard people in churches saying, Oh, virgin birth, no big deal. What happens if it's not correct? Well, no, this is a significant theological point. So let's spend just a quick minute talking about that. What's the theological significance of the virgin birth? What would be the case if he was Jesus was born just a natural birth like everybody else? What an impact with sin?

SPEAKER_00 8:56

Yeah, he yeah, he he would be born under the same sin that had been brought about through the fall of Adam, as with every other human being.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

And the theology holds that the sin nature fell from Adam through the Father down to all the sons. So people inherit this sin nature from their parents, especially the father. So being virgin born, Jesus was fully human, had a fully human mother, but without inheriting the sin nature from his father. He had a divine father, so he had a divine nature and a human nature. Virgin birth means Jesus is not under the guilt of Adam. He was fully human, but without sin. If we deny the virgin birth, then Jesus inherited sin, which is blasphemy. And he couldn't save himself, let alone us. That's the significance. This is only mentioned in a couple of passages, not at length. It's not expounded upon for long passages in the epistles. No, no. But it's extremely theologically important.

SPEAKER_00 9:57

Believing and confessing that Jesus is born of a virgin is a key doctrine and a key belief. If you don't believe that he was born of a virgin, then what are you actually believing in?

SPEAKER_01 10:09

It's one of these things where you can become a Christian without ever having heard of the virgin birth or the Trinity or things like that. But if you profess yourself to be a Christian and understand those teachings and then deny them, then you're not a believer. You're not a Christian. Let's talk about this other significance of this virgin birth piece. Verse 23, they shall call his name Emmanuel, which means God with us. Here Jesus is called God. From the virgin birth, Jesus has two natures. He has God's nature and a human nature. He is God with us, but he's also a hundred percent man. The two natures were distinct, they weren't combined into some third thing that's a mixture of the two, and they were not separate in the sense that you could separate them from the person. You couldn't remove the human or the divine nature from the one person, Jesus Christ. So he was one man, one person with two natures. Christ was the mediator between God and mankind. First Timothy 2, 5, one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. To be a mediator, Jesus had to be both God and human. He had to have both natures fully. So here we have some essential doctrines of the Christian faith, the virgin birth and the deity of Christ, and the dual natures of Christ. And it's all right here in these one of those passages. Wonderful stuff. A person can become a Christian and having never heard of these things, but we really need to study them. If a person understands them and denies them, then they're not Christian.

Fulfilled Prophecy Builds Confidence

SPEAKER_01 11:40

Verse 22, that it might be fulfilled. Look for this phrase as we go through the book of Matthew. He points out a number of these of fulfilled prophecies as we go through. What is the significance of fulfilled prophecy? Why is that important? What does fulfilled prophecy tell us about, in this case, Christ?

SPEAKER_00 11:56

It's a confirmation of God's promises that he had given and the things that he had said were going to happen. So the more times that that prophecy is fulfilled, the greater confidence that we have as humans that God is who he says he is and he can do what he says he can do, that the promises that he's given are things that are actually going to happen.

SPEAKER_01 12:18

So there's people today standing on street corners claiming to be lots of things. There are people in mental institutions claiming to be God. How do we know whether it's true or whether it's false? Well, it's really good if there's some miracles going on and there's some this was predicted many years ago. Try to predict the date of your own birth. That's a pretty neat magic trick. It's not a magic trick at all, it's fulfillment of prophecy. Matthew's going to be pointing these out as we go through. Then we get to chapter

Magi Arrive And Herod Panics

SPEAKER_01 12:46

two. And in chapter two, I think, Steve, if you could just read the first twelve verses.

SPEAKER_00 12:51

Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, Magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star in the east and have come to worship him. When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. Gathering together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. And they said to him, In Bethlehem of Judea, for this is what has been written by the prophet, and you, Bethlehem, land of Judah, are by no means least among the leaders of Judah. For out of you shall come forth a ruler who will shepherd my people, Israel. Then Herod secretly called the Magi and determined from them the exact time the star appeared, and he sent them to Bethlehem and said, Go and search carefully for the child, and when you have found him, report to me, so that I too may come and worship him. After hearing the king they went their way, and the star which they had seen in the east went on before them until it came and stood over the place where the child was. And when they saw the star they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. After coming into the house, they saw the child with Mary, his mother, and they fell to the ground and worshipped him. Then opening their treasures, they presented him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned by God in a dream not to return to Herod, the Magi left for their own country by another way.

SPEAKER_01 14:23

Verse 1, Jesus was born at Bethlehem. Later down in verse 23, it talks about him being raised in Nazareth. We have here where Jesus was when he was born and things like that. So note Matthew here is not presenting where Joseph and Mary's home towns were, only that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, but he started his ministry in Nazareth. Doesn't actually say where they, at least this passage doesn't actually say any more than that.

Who The Magi Might Be

SPEAKER_01 14:50

So then we have these wise men, these magi. What do we know about magi? Do we know very much? Not really from the text alone. There's some speculation they do come from the east. And this is east of Israel, by the way. Everything is in relation to Israel.

SPEAKER_00 15:05

They're astronomers, not astrologers, but astronomers, because they're viewing this star in the sky. And this star is telling them that a king of the Jews has been born. So there's a story behind this somewhere for them to recognize this star and associate it with a king of the Jews being born. So a question is that comes up is well, where is this story? I mean, how did it come about? Why are they looking in the sky? Why are they noticing this? So those are some of the questions that have come up. I've got an idea why it might be, but do you have anything?

SPEAKER_01 15:43

I don't have anything definitive. I can know that the term is used by several people, and we can pick up the term, the original term Magoy in Daniel, where the king has the dream. It says we wanted the interpretation of the dream. He called the astrologers and the magicians and the counselors, and I think there were three or four groups in there. Well, one of them was the Magoi, the magicians is what it's usually translated as. But that term was used for these educated people that were in Levi's Nebuchadnezzar's kingdom, his counselors, if you will, that he had around him when he needed questions from experts. Then that same term was used in there. Another place the same word is used over in Acts, there was Simon the magician, the magoy. Sometimes it is translated magician. Sometimes it's just trained in magi. Sometimes it uses it in different words. But it these were typically, as you said, educated people that were focused on the stars and studying things and their meaning. These would have been people that knew or at least had access to the Jewish scriptures. We are not told exactly how they made the connection, but we can tell a little bit about the star. A lot of times you'll hear people today try to what was the star? Was it an alignment of some of the planets? Was it a supernova? Things like that. And I take it that it was none

Why The Star Is A Miracle

SPEAKER_01 17:16

of those. And from the passage, you can be pretty clear that it's none of those for the simple fact that in this passage it talks about the star moving. And it says here that when Herod sent them out, verse 8, go to Bethlehem and see, then in Matthew 2, 9, after hearing the king, they went their way, and the star, which they had seen in the east, went on before them until it came and stood over the place where the child was. Now, in between Jerusalem and Bethlehem is seven miles. And if there was something, whether it was a supernova or something way out in outer space somewhere that was what we would call a star, the human eye is not going to see the difference in it in seven miles. You just can't with human eye tell, oh, it's over that house. So what we have here is that this star was low enough in the atmosphere. The sense you get here is that it's moving down the street and it around the corner turn left and it stops over this one house. That's the sense. This was the glory of God. That was another supernatural event that had led these people, wherever it was, east of Israel, and had revealed to them enough to where they knew this lines up. There is a verse in the Old Testament that talks about a star. Whether or not they made that connection or not, we can't tell. God had revealed enough to them to where they could follow this thing. And it then it departed from them enough to where they arrived in Jerusalem and said, Where is this king? Oh, Jerusalem. And then the star reappears, leads them down the road to the exact house where he was staying at that point. So I take it it's another miracle. God was guiding them. My question is is we have here God giving specific guidance to people that are outside of Israel. We don't have any clue here that these guys were Jewish. Of course, we couldn't count Christians now because it's technically before Christ, at least before Christianity. But they had people that were outside of God's chosen people that were giving direct revelation from God and leading them. Does God ever do that? And I would say yes. Oh yeah. Uh Book of Isaiah gives prophecies to people outside of Israel.

SPEAKER_00 19:29

Yes. And Daniel was made ruler over all the wise men and things like that from what you mentioned a while ago of his interpretation of the dreams and stuff. And we know that Daniel was a devout worshiper of God. That's one theory of who they were. But regardless of whether or not that's the correct theory, these men were looking and waiting for something that had been communicated to them that when they see this sign, it's going to be a sign that there is a king of the Jews that have been born, and that they decide to then go make that trek. So how that originated, unknown, but it is something that they were expecting.

SPEAKER_01 20:09

And the passages I think we were looking for a while ago, Simon the magician in Acts 8 is called a Magoy. And then in Daniel chapter 2, Nebuchadnezzar called the Magoy in the Greek translation of the Old Testament Hebrew, the Septuagint is called a Magoy there. So the term is used other places. Here it just says these men came.

How Many Wise Men Really

SPEAKER_01 20:29

Here's a question, Steve. How many wise men were there?

SPEAKER_00 20:32

It doesn't say why do we think there were three according to the Christmas hymn when I was three.

SPEAKER_01 20:38

When I was in fifth grade and we had our Christmas play, I was one of the three wise men. So why were there three?

SPEAKER_00 20:45

Again, I think that comes from this the song, We Three Men of Orient are. But it doesn't give a number, it just says that there's three types of gifts that they brought. And then another thing to note here is that when we're reading this in Matthew, you could take from it that when they arrive, this is right after the birth, then Jesus is a small child. But through other gospel accounts, we see that this is several months and Jesus is grown a bit. He's one to two years old by the time that these magi come and visit. Because in other accounts, they're not seeing him in the manger, they're going into the house.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

And there's a different word in the Greek in Matthew 2.11 when it says child, there was a different word than the baby that's used in a different word. So this is older than a baby. We don't know how old. It could have been a few months up to a couple of years.

SPEAKER_00 21:40

So it it it's a good thing that we have different accounts. It's a good thing that we have the four gospels so that we can fill in different areas and get a more complete picture from

Outsiders Seek While Insiders Stall

SPEAKER_00 21:50

other accounts.

SPEAKER_01 21:50

Now, here's a question, though. It's interesting to me that these non Jewish people come in looking for the king, we're ready to go worship him and The Jewish leaders did not. Why is that? Especially when what did they come and ask? What was their question in verse four? They said, acquire to them where the Messiah was to be born. Herod calls the leaders, and what did they say in verses five and six? Oh, yeah, it's right over here in Bethlehem. Okay, so who believed it and who didn't? The Magi believed it. What is not here in the story? Who does it not record goes and finds Jesus? Well, Herod doesn't. Herod doesn't. Well, Herod wanted to find him, but he was a sly fox. Well, he's a snake.

SPEAKER_00 22:33

To find him through the magi, but none of these priests of the scribes that he called in, none of them went to go and look. They just come in and report. They didn't ask, or at least it's not recorded. Well, why do you want to know that?

SPEAKER_01 22:46

So think of it. These men come in, obviously educated people saying, We saw a sign. Where's the Jewish king? And you know, oh, it's supposed to be over in Bethlehem. And they go and you don't. You'd think you'd at least, hey, let's at least go check this out. These guys said they saw a sign. We ought to at least go look. No, they were more concerned with all their theological arguments and their theological hair splitting than they were the actual seeing the truth of it. There's no indication that they actually believed it. They knew the answer to the question. They just didn't believe it enough to get up and go look.

SPEAKER_00 23:21

Which gives a little bit of indication, again, as we get into the book and when Jesus starts his ministry, a little bit of indication of their mindset. Now you could say, well, the wise man came to Herod, and then Herod, after finding out where he went to them secretly, it tells them that he called them over secretly and told them. So you could make the argument that, well, these priests and scribes, they didn't know what was going on. But I would say is this when you have a king call you and ask you, where is it that the prophecies talk about where the king, the messiah, is going to be born. After you answer that, if it was you and me that were called, afterwards, as we're walking out, I'd go, Hey Glenn, yeah, why do you think the king is asking a question of where the messiah is born? So I don't think they're given a pass. Curiosity itself should bring it up that there's a reason why the king is asking. And we told them Bethlehem, maybe there's something there that's going on. Maybe we should go down and check it out ourselves. And they didn't do that.

SPEAKER_01 24:23

Now, these wise men were seeking Christ and God helped them find them. Herod was seeking Christ, God hid Christ from Herod. What's the difference? Why did he help the wise men find him and prevented Herod from doing it? Well, they were coming to worship him. Herod was looking to kill him. They were looking to worship him. If you come to worship Christ, God will guide you. If you're really trying to trick him or trying to destroy Christ, then God's going to hide him from you and you won't find

Herod’s Heart And Power Hunger

SPEAKER_01 24:52

the truth.

SPEAKER_00 24:52

Now, isn't this curious too? That here is Herod, and he specifically asked, Where does the Messiah? So again, there's meaning in the word, as we talked about in the first session. The Messiah is the anointed one, the one that's going to restore the kingdom to Israel. So it's not just some random child that's going to become a king. Herod's knowing that this is the one that's promised. And his reaction is, I need to kill him. It just shows exactly where Herod's heart is. There's no worship of God or anything in Herod whatsoever.

SPEAKER_01 25:24

Verse three When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled in all Jerusalem with him. So what I think of with this all the time is when mom's troubled, everybody's troubled. Okay. And so same thing. When when the kings got troubles, then everybody's got trouble. Why would Herod be troubled and why would he be trying to kill him?

SPEAKER_00 25:42

He's thinking earthly, my kingdom, my reign is in trouble by having this Messiah that's going to come. The people are going to follow him, they're not going to follow me. Therefore, I'm not going to be king anymore. It's completely a human and earthly heritage.

SPEAKER_01 25:57

Herod was an appointed king. Yeah. By Rome. Now these people are asking for a born king, and he was jealous of the possible heir taking over his throne. Very selfish thing. This was a guy who killed his own family, so they wouldn't take it. So he's a very evil person. When people are in power, they tend to want to protect their own power from threats. And I submit that same similar thing happens in churches. People get in positions of power in churches. The power kind of gets to them and they try to protect their own position more so than further the kingdom of God. So they connect the king with the Messiah, obviously, as

Worship And The Meaning Of Gifts

SPEAKER_01 26:35

you pointed out. And they wanted to go worship him. And in verse 11, what do they do? What do they actually do with the baby, the child? They worshiped him. They fell to the ground. Who is the only one who can rightfully accept worship? God. God and God alone. Jesus told the devil to worship only God in Luke 4:7. All others, if they either accept worship, they're a false God, or if they're true followers of God, they say, No, no, don't worship me.

SPEAKER_00 27:03

And it's very specific. They worshiped him, meaning the child, meaning Jesus. They didn't worship Mary. They didn't worship Joseph. They were there to worship Jesus.

SPEAKER_01 27:13

That's right. Jesus accepts worship, therefore he is fully God. Matthew 14, 33, the disciples in the boat worshiped him. Matthew 28:8, the disciples on resurrection morning worshiped him. Luke 24, 52, the disciples at the ascension worshiped him. John 9.38, the formerly blind man that was healed, worshiped him. Jesus accepts worship. What are we to do? We are to worship him. So Herod's troubled. He gathers these people, sends out the wise men to Jerusalem, and they don't come back. Herod kind of gets upset. What do the priests and scribes? We said they fail to go there. We talked about that. They had enough information to be camped out in Bethlehem waiting on them, but they didn't have enough faith to actually go. I think that's very odd that they would be that educated about it and that uncaring. So they knew where the Messiah was going to come, but they weren't there.

SPEAKER_00 28:07

It's almost like they possibly were okay with the status quo, that they really didn't have an expectation or want or desire for the Messiah to come themselves.

SPEAKER_01 28:18

In verse 8, Herod says, Oh, come back and when you found him, report to me so that I too may come and worship him.

SPEAKER_00 28:25

Was he really wanting to worship him? Wink wink. No, he was wanting to kill him. And we know that because after they do worship him, the angel comes and warns Joseph and Mary to take him to Egypt.

SPEAKER_01 28:37

So some people lie. Some people lie. And I think Christians are sometimes very naive. Some people lie. And they're in the house, as we said. He was born in a barn, but he didn't stay there. They brought three types of gifts, verse 11. What were they?

SPEAKER_00 28:52

Gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

SPEAKER_01 28:54

And what's the significance? Gold is for loyalty fit for a king. Joseph and Mary were going to need money, so he gave them money to live on. God provides. What are frankincense and myrrh? What are those things?

SPEAKER_00 29:07

Frankincense, they're a type of oils, they're a type of spices and oils.

SPEAKER_01 29:11

The spices, perfumes, sweet smelling spices. These are incense that you can still get today. And they're the pure stuff is still to this day very expensive. And besides just something to perfume a room, what were these spices used for?

SPEAKER_00 29:24

They were, I believe, used to anoint in proceedings of anointing anointing kings and kings.

SPEAKER_01 29:31

Incense was used in the temple as a sweet-smelling aroma before God. So this was something that was used as part of worshiping God. The frankincense speaks of Jesus as being God and deserving of worship. The gold speaks of him as being king. Remember the women on resurrection morning? They didn't have time to properly prepare the body, so they brought what? Spices. They brought spices to anoint the body. They give him gold for the king, incense for God, and burial spices because he came to die. His purpose was to die. And he died for me, and he died for you. That's the story of Jesus'

Wrap Up And What’s Next

SPEAKER_01 30:16

birth. Amazing, amazing thing. Probably a good place to pull it to the curb for now. Next time we're going to learn about the flight to Egypt and how Herod reacts when he finds out that the wise men had not come. Hope you'll stay with us as we have this wonderful journey through the book of Matthew. And we're going to do it here on Reasoning Through the Bible.