I Knew Him-The Wiseman

[Cloudwalker]

The Wise Man

My friends and I are scholars.  Wise men some call us, Magi others, and Kings still others.  We live far to the east of Israel.  In Persia actually.  And over there we are rich, powerful and influential men.  We spend the majority of our time studying.  Most particularly we study the stars for in them we believe it is sometimes possible to glimpse bits and pieces of what is about to happen. 

Most nights it’s the same old thing.  We routinely chart the stars in their courses, knowing that in most cases, they don’t mean anything.  But if we don’t watch we may miss something important.  It’s usually the same old thing.  Except for one night.  One night something truly wondrous happened.   That night a new star appeared and we couldn’t have missed it if we had tried.  I called my friends over and they, too, had witnessed the star.  What did it mean?  A star that amazing suddenly appearing must mean something.  But what?  When we charted its position we realized what it meant.  A king had been born.  A king born to be king of the Jews.  There was no doubt.  We had to go.  That star was calling to us to follow it.

A trip of that magnitude takes a while to organize.  After all, it would take us months, perhaps over a year, just to get there and then we would have to find the child.  And you don’t visit a king empty handed.  You must bring gifts.  And you can’t bring just any gift.  They had to be gifts fitting for a king whose birth was announced in the heavens.  Gold is always appropriate for a king.  A king whose birth was heralded by a star must be divine, so Frankincense was chosen.  I don’t know why, but we also chose Myrrh.  Myrrh is a spice often used in burial.  With its association with death, it normally wouldn’t be thought of as a gift for an infant.  But, somehow, we knew that it was appropriate.  And so we set off on our long trek.  And the star, that hadn’t moved as we prepared, went before us and guided us to Judea. 

I don’t know what we expected but nothing could have prepared us for what we found when we arrived.  When we found the child we gave him our gifts and then we did the only thing we could.  We fell down and worshiped him.  Many kings around the world claim to be divine.  This child truly was.  We may be kings but he was THE king.  Nothing can prepare you for meeting the King of Kings and when you do nothing is ever the same.