Each week during Advent, Rick Court and Randy Petersen are getting together to reflect on one word that represents the Advent season! This week's word is "GIFT." Join in to be encouraged and help center your spirit on the reason to celebrate the season!
Thanks for being a part of the HOPE community as we continue conversations about faith and hope! You can learn more at meethope.org or find us on socials @meethopechurch. Join in for worship on Sundays at meethope.live! Have a question? Contact us at podcast@meethope.org.
Each week during Advent, Rick Court and Randy Petersen are getting together to reflect on one word that represents the Advent season! This week's word is "GIFT." Join in to be encouraged and help center your spirit on the reason to celebrate the season!
Thanks for being a part of the HOPE community as we continue conversations about faith and hope! You can learn more at meethope.org or find us on socials @meethopechurch. Join in for worship on Sundays at meethope.live! Have a question? Contact us at podcast@meethope.org.
Speaker 1:
Welcome to the Meet Hope podcast, where we have conversations about faith and hope. Hope is one church made of people living out their faith through two expressions in person and online. We believe a hybrid faith experience can lead to a growing influence in our community and our world for the sake of others. Welcome to Hope.
Speaker 2:
Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Meet Hope podcast. My name is Rick and I am happy to be here with Randy Peterson. Hi Hi, randy, how are you I'm doing well. So we are doing a third episode in our Advent series where we're looking at different characters from the Christmas story. We started out looking at the star, and then we talked about the wise men or the magi, and today we're going to talk about gifts, the gifts of the magi, right?
Speaker 1:
The gifts of the wise men.
Speaker 2:
But before we do that, you have a story about gifts that you share in your book, so why don't you tell us about that?
Speaker 3:
Well, yes, we are sort of following the book the Wonder of Christmas that my brother and I wrote. My brother, ken Peterson, is a long time editor and writer. He is actually more of a devotional writer and I am more of the, I guess, scholarly writer and somehow we came together and it kind of worked for this without too much fisticuffs. But he wrote an introduction in which he told a story about our mom and I'm glad he wrote it. It was something I had forgotten until I read it again. But mom was a giver. She passed away about 12 years ago but we remember her with great fondness and love that she loved to give. I think that was her love language, that she wanted to give All year long.
Speaker 3:
she would go to yard sales and she would see this thing or that thing and say, oh, this would be perfect for Randy or this would be perfect for Katnare and she would amass these things that she bought at yard sale and hide them in the attic or somewhere. But she would get close to Christmas and she'd be wrapping those things up and then she would be struck with guilt because she would suddenly realize I am giving my beloved children these castoffs from other households that these are things people didn't want anymore, so they sold them at a yard sale and I bought them cheaply.
Speaker 3:
And I'm giving these to my kids, and so then she would rush out to the mall and get us all a whole bunch of more things and so we would have just tons of packages under the tree at Christmas time. I'm not complaining about that at all. That was a wonderful thing, but it would take all morning to be opening up and a lot of things from yard sales there. But we knew very much that she loved us greatly. But we did kind of keep wanting to say it's okay, you don't need more stuff to give us. We love you, just let's be with you. But it was a lesson of love that we all learned from that. So I am grateful for the gifts that mom gave.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and so we thank mom Peterson as well for doing that, because that story Ken shares in the beginning of the book and I think I mentioned this in the first episode that I did read it and really did enjoy the book and it did kind of lead to these conversations that we're having. And so what we've done in every episode is I've read a piece of scripture that is connected to the story, and so I want to read again from Matthew, chapter two, and it says they and it's talking about the wise men which we talked about last episode entered the house and saw the child Jesus with his mother Mary and they bowed down and worshiped him and then they opened their treasured gifts and gave him gifts of gold, frankincense and mern. So, Randy, I had a couple of questions. First, is they entered the house? What house are they at?
Speaker 3:
I thought it was a manger no-transcript yes this is an indication that the timing of the Christmas story may be different from what we've always assumed, that we've basically assumed that there's a traffic jam at the stable and that wise men and their camels are jockeying for position with the sheep and the shepherds and there are some donkeys around and it's just they're all cramming to get in at the same time. No, it's likely that the magi came quite a bit later, a year or two later, and that this process of census taking that Joseph and Mary were involved with was not just an overnight thing.
Speaker 3:
They were coming to stay for a while there. And so in the days after the birth they probably found more permanent lodgings there. It's also quite possible that the manger itself was part of a house complex, that often there was a stable area on the first floor and the heat from the animals would heat the upper rooms there. So the word for in in Scripture could also mean just the upper room of a house, and so we don't know there are a lot of things.
Speaker 3:
We don't know for sure about the story, but it's likely that they were in a house to begin with, but in the major area of the house where the animals were capped, and it's likely then that the magi came sometime afterward. And one great clue with this is that remember that the magi went to King Herod first and then so he knew about this birth, and then they went on and he inquired of them, of when they had seen the star, and so allowing for the travel time and everything later, when Herod, when Herod was in this murderous rage, he ordered the death of babies in Bethlehem and it was babies between one and two years old.
Speaker 3:
And so we assume then that that you know he may have added a little more time there just to make sure, but it was at least a year earlier that the birth had actually taken place and that Joseph and Mary were still there, just in a house, and no longer just staying in a stable.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, so I want to pause there before we get to the gifts. You have a theory about these magi that they journey from far away, and why don't you share that theory? Because I find it interesting.
Speaker 3:
Well, yes, now this again. I want to keep saying we don't know things for sure about who the magi were, where they came from, their different theories. I like the theory that they came from the area of Persia or Babylon, which are right next to each other, and actually in modern times Iran and Iraq are those territories. They had a long tradition of astronomy, astrology and actually those things in ancient times. Nowadays we see astronomy as the serious science of gazing at the stars and astrology is kind of a mystic, pseudo spiritual thing about what's your sign and all of that stuff. There are warnings in scripture about letting astrology run your life, basically, and sort of worshiping the stars, and so we realize that the magi were looking for signs in the heavens from the God who created the heavens.
Speaker 3:
I mean that's what brought them to before the Christ child. But I have a theory, because one of the major magi astrologers of previous times was Daniel.
Speaker 3:
He is identified as one of the magi in the court of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon at first, and then Belchazar of Babylon, and then the, the Medes and Persians took over that country. But Daniel was still there with King Darius and so he was there for a long time and in fact it says in one place in the Daniel story he was in charge of all the magi. So I keep thinking what if he had started kind of a school of magi? What if he had taught them, instead of looking for signs from all their different gods? What if he had taught them about the one true God, the creator God? And what if he passed down a tradition for them of maybe, you know, being familiar with the Hebrew prophets? Maybe his own writings they were familiar with? I'm sure they were.
Speaker 3:
And actually here's another little bit here Daniel, in some of the weird prophecies of Daniel he starts talking about weeks and there are like 70 weeks between this happening and this happening, or 63 weeks or whatever. And I'm not going to get into interpretation of that at all and you'll be happy about that. But that the weeks, pretty much everyone assumes that they stand for years, and so these are batches of seven years and if you, if you count up the years from this to that.
Speaker 3:
Well, those magi may have been counting up the years and saying oh, it's about this time, now that the the Savior will be born.
Speaker 3:
They may have been looking especially for those signs in the heavens, because this is the time that Daniel said that the Savior would be born, and so they were especially attentive to what was happening in among the stars, because they were expecting that the creator, god, was going to send a sign that they could follow to see the birth of this Messiah. It's a theory, we don't know for sure, but I like the idea that maybe something that Daniel had planted way back when came to fruition, 500 years later, when the magi visit the Christ child.
Speaker 2:
That's great. And so for all your questions, you can send them to Randy. No, just teasing. No, you have, we will have. You can email me.
Speaker 3:
I don't want to lead anyone astray so please don't base your life on my silly theory.
Speaker 2:
But so seriously, back to the back of the story, though. It says they brought three gifts gold, frankincense and myrrh and I know there's not a lot to share with that, but why don't you just tell us a little bit about those things?
Speaker 3:
Actually, there's some really interesting things in the words used for gifts and notice that it talks about they, they I think this talks about their treasured gifts, but actually the Texas they brought out of their treasury gifts, and so there are two words here. The word for gifts, dorah, is the same word used for when people came and brought gifts to the temple in Jerusalem there that they would. The idea is it's not a payment, it's not a bribe, it's not anything you're expecting to get anything from it's a free will gift.
Speaker 3:
It's just something you want to give and the emphasis is on the giving, and so clearly that was. You know the, the magi were were giving gifts of that nature. In the temple, people would bring those free will gifts and put them in a box that was called the treasury in. In Greek the word is thesaurus and as a word guy myself, I love the word thesaurus.
Speaker 3:
That's the reference book that you look up when you try you want to find a synonym for whatever word you're you're thinking of and so so, but it comes from an ancient Greek word for treasury, for for a or a box, a safe deposit box kind of thing. And so the box at the temple that people would bring their dorah, their gifts, to, was called the treasury. But here in this story the Magi come and they have their treasury. They pull out of their treasury the gifts.
Speaker 2:
They take the door out of the.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, yeah, and so, and who are the door are going to the Christ child, and so it's an indication that the gifts that people give to God in the temple are now being given to the Christ child in the place of God in the temple, that this is God in the temple who is in this manger and receiving the gifts of these, these magi.
Speaker 2:
That's really good.
Speaker 3:
An interesting word study there from all of that.
Speaker 2:
But so you know, we've been ending these with a so what, so, so, so what?
Speaker 3:
Good question, and the thing is I don't have any gold or frankincense or myrrh on me right now.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, we don't carry those things in our wallets.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, but the the question, I think, for us is what are we? What are we giving to the Lord? What are we giving to God, to Christ? What kind of gifts do we bring him at Christmas or any other time? And that's a deeply personal question. What do you have? What do you have to offer?
Speaker 3:
that that he wants you know one of one of my favorite Christmas songs. It's not in the me, it's not on the big playlist, I think we probably won't hear it at our Christmas Eve service, but it's the little drummer boy, where you have this kid who who drums, and he says you know, what do I have to give to the Christ child? Well, I'm just going to drum my heart out here.
Speaker 2:
This is.
Speaker 3:
I'm going to give him my talent, I'm going to give him the music that I make, and I think that's great. I think that's one thing that we see in scripture again and again. What God invites us to do is to sing a new song to him, to make joyful noises for him, to use the, the trumpets and the drums and the symbols and all of that stuff at our disposal to to make music for him, but also all of our creative gifts to to offer to him in praise that Whatever kind of creativity we have, give that to him. But I think that's probably not all that. That just, you know God.
Speaker 3:
Well, jesus was asked what's the greatest commandment? And he says to love God, love others. And so it is that love that sometimes we show in creative forms and sometimes we show in very ordinary ways of of praying, of paying attention to what God says in scripture, of doing something good for the person next door or the person we meet on the train or or whatever that just the loving people. So, yeah, I would say that the creative expression of all that God has given us, to give that back to God and then just to show love to the people around us, that those are gifts that we can give that on a par with Gold, frank and sense and murals.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, yeah, of greater value in many ways, right, according to Jesus's economy. Yeah, hey, listen, randy. Thank you so much. I've really enjoyed, enjoyed this time that we've had and listener. I hope you've enjoyed this as well and we look forward to seeing you in the new year with some new episodes, and I'm sure Randy will be back again doing doing something as well. So thanks again.
Speaker 3:
Thank you.
Speaker 2:
Have a great day everybody.
Speaker 1:
Thanks for being a part of the Hope community as we continue our conversations about faith and hope. If you don't already, please join us for worship on Sundays or on demand. You can learn more at meethopeorg or find us on socials at Meet Hope Church.