Good morning. Thank you so much for being here. This is the Bermuda Triangle of Weeks. Like we're not really sure what day it is. You're not sure. Is it Christmas? Is it no longer Christmas? You've probably been wearing sweatpants or pajamas for the last few days for some of you ourself included. This is the first time we've come out of the house since Christmas. And so because it's kind of a family Sunday it's also slightly awkward because if you come to the nine and you have like a seat that you always sit in, there's probably someone that comes to the 10 30 and that same seat is the one that they always sit in. And so we had fist fights earlier that we had to break up, but since it's only mainly family, I mean, the people that come to church on this Sunday are like, give yourself a round of applause. Like, super Christian, good job. All right, but since it's more of a family Sunday, here's what I want you to do. We're gonna all stand up. I'm gonna tell everybody stand up and you're gonna greet your neighbor. And, and I want you to tell them, marry almost New Year's. Alright? You can go ahead and take a seat. It was interesting yesterday Bronson, our executive pastor, he texted me and Myron in the afternoon and he says, Hey, we're working on the snow plan for the morning. And I texted back, man, it is sunny and 60 degrees outside. Like, I, I am a little confused that you're working on a snow plan. But he was right. And can I just say big round applause? Our, our facilities team crushes it when it comes to snow removal. Like they, they decided About a year and a half ago at a staff thing, they said, Hey, our, our plan is we're gonna be the best people in all of the Denver area when it comes to snow removal. And, and they do that. So if you're ever like, Hey, two things. If you're ever like, are they going to have cleared the snow? The answer is yes. They will have cleared the snow. They get here on a really snowy day. They literally get here at like three o'clock in the morning. Sometimes they will snowplow all night. They do an amazing job. And then the other thing is, if you're ever curious, if there's a Sunday and you're like, Hey, is Cherry Hills going to have church? The answer to that is always yes. Like, we're gonna have church. There might only be three of us here because there's a blizzard and it's crazy, but if it is Sunday, we are going to have church. And, and this Sunday in particular is always one of those interesting Sundays because you're coming right on the heels of Christmas. It's not New Year's yet. And so you're in this in-between. And so it kinda leads you to this question of Will Christmas is over? What now? And some of that feels like, like just in your own personal life, you had all this expectation leading up to this day and spent all this money of the day, and then the day is over, and then you're looking at receipts and bills. You're like, man, that's, there's a lot going on now. And you start to turn the page into a new year and start to turn the page into what's next. And yet, at, at some the same time, like it still feels a little bit Christmasy. And so as we wrap up this Christmas series, we're gonna look at one that fits perfectly. And the reason it fits perfectly is because today we're gonna look at the wise men and the wise men come after Christmas that they weren't there at the birth of Jesus. It says that after he was born, after Christmas happens, that's when the wise men show up. The wise men are, are an amazing part of the story because there's so much unknown about the Wiseman, which leads to a whole lot of misunderstanding. So for example, there, there's the famous song about we three kings. And Matthew doesn't call them kings. Matthew calls them magi that Greek word for magi. We, we find it a whole bunch of different places in old Greek manuscripts, but it's, it's something that basically says that there were some type of an Eastern scholar. They likely studied the, the stars were some kind of as astrologers, and they advise rulers most likely when, when we see that term that's what we often see it associated with. There's also no number mentioned. So we're not sure how many wise men are there. It could have been three, it also could have been two. It also could have been a hundred. All we know is that they gave three specific gifts. Now, when you say that it, it causes you to say, okay, well then why, why is there this idea that the three wisemen could have been three kings? And and there is some biblical argument to be made for why we might say they were kings. There's a guy in, in church history named Tertullian. Tertullian was in the second and third centuries really important Christian figure. Did some amazing things for the kingdom of God. And Tertullian was the person that, that developed this idea that the three wise men were kings. Now, now, Howard, someone who's this biblical scholar whose brilliant theologically, how would he come to that conclusion? Let's look at how he came to that conclusion. He takes a few passages from the Old Testament. One of them is Psalm 72, verse 10 and 11. And it says, this, may the kings of Tarshish and of the coastlands render him tribute. May the kings of Sheba and Siba bring gifts. May all kings fall down before him. All nations serve him. So he took that passage from the Old Testament and said, well, hey, that's, that's what we see. Matthew W right about that. You have these, these other nations that show up. And it says in, in that psalm that, that they were kings. And so maybe therefore they were kings. I'm not saying that Churchillian was right, it, it, it could be that that passage in Psalms had nothing to do with the birth of Jesus whatsoever. But there is some argument to be made that, that maybe they were in fact, kings. The, the big caveat going into this passage is we really dunno. We're not sure. Were they, were they wise men? Were they kings? We don't know. But what we do know, Aziz, this group of people showed up from a far off country. And something amazing happens in this story. So if you've got a Bible, turn with me to Matthew chapter two, Matthew chapter two. We're gonna look at 12 verses and then we will unpack them a little bit at a time. Matthew chapter two, starting in verse one. It says this, now, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea and the days of Herod the king, behold wise men from the east came to Jerusalem saying, where is he who is born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him. When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled and all Jerusalem with him and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people. He inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. They told him, in Bethlehem of Judea, for, so it is written by the prophet and you, oh, Bethlehem, and the land of Judah are by no means least among the rulers of Judah. For from you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people. Israel. Then Herod summoned the Wiseman secretly and ascertained from them what time the star had appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem saying, go and search diligently for the child. And when you have found him, bring me word that I too may come and worship him. After listening to the king, they went on their way and behold the star that they had seen when it rose went before them, until it came to rest over the place where the child was. And when they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. And going into the house, they saw the child with Mary, his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then opening their treasures. They offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way. Now, there's a number of fascinating things that happen in this. The, the first is that it, it doesn't say that people that are local religious leaders that are local show up to worship Jesus. But you have these wise men from the far east, from the distant land that they do in fact show up, which just seems a little bit backwards at the same time that there's this, this star that, that happens throughout the whole story. And we don't know a whole lot about the star. We, we don't, obviously God uses a star. We don't know whether it was just purely miraculous like a star that normally is not there and God used it, or, or maybe it's a star that, that God used the existing stars as they were, we're, we're not really sure one way or the other. What we do know that, that in the text, it's always a singular star, and it sure seems like this supernatural star, that that is guiding them, that they see this singular star and they start to follow the singular star, and then the singular star shows up above the house like that. That seems like something that's out of the ordinary when it comes to stars, and yet they're the only ones that notice it. But like, you think people local would be like, what's going on with that thing? But they don't. And yet something about the wise men causes them to, to recognize something unique and different is going on, and it affects who they are and what they do. I, one of the things that, that I recognize is we don't have kids church today, so we've got a lot of kids in the service. Typically what I would do is I would, I would bring all the kids down but there's a lot of people in the room, and if I brought all the kids down, I'm pretty sure we'd have 300 kids down here. And that's probably a little more than, than I'm comfortable with being all by themselves down here. So the good news is we got an I mag, and so I'm gonna do some, some kids stuff that, that also, the adults won't understand how I do some object lessons. But, but kids stay where you are. And in a moment, I I, I will kinda roam the room, which, which the guys in the back hate it when I roam the room because it's bad for camera. It's bad for my mic, it's bad for everything. And I'll come to you and get some, some question and answer. But, but the first thing that I think we can learn from the Wiseman is this, is that worshiping Jesus starts with seeking from a far off place. It says that they start to seek this king in order to worship this king. And Jesus picks up on this. He tells these parables about seeking, he talks about the lost coin and how the kingdom of heaven is like a lost coin. That, that you seek it, you search for it, you try to find it. That seeking is a really important part of worship. And I think sometimes we, we, we don't grasp that piece of it, but but there is a continued attitude of seeking that we need in our lives that it, it doesn't just show up at worship, that there's, there's some work that has to take place beforehand. I I, I like it to getting engaged. And when you get engaged, you don't just like haphazardly decide one moment to pop the question, or, or at least most of the time, that's not the way that it's supposed to work. Like, like there's this buildup to it that you've gotta go find a ring and you've got to ask the parents and you've got to plan something romantic. Like there, there is some anticipation leading towards the thing that actually happens that there is effort involved that if one of the parables that Jesus talks about is he talks about losing something and then going and trying to find it. And have you ever had a moment in life where you lost something? I remember when I was on a, a trip that was going to Israel and I had just gotten back from a different trip. I was on a mission trip and then got back and then 10 days later was supposed to go to Israel. And the night before I'm supposed to leave, I can't find my passport. And, and can I just tell you, I searched like crazy for that thing? I, I searched. We had just moved, which, which bad timing. I mean, looking back, there was a lot of bad life choices that happened all at the same time. So getting back from one international trip and then immediately going to another international trip, well, in the middle of that moving houses, like, like bad, bad, bad but somehow in that I had misplaced my passport. And so we're, we're in the new house, and I looked literally everywhere. And, and I can just tell you, depending upon how big your house is, it, it only really took maybe two hours to look in every single corner of that house. And yet I searched without exaggeration for 12 to 18 hours straight. And when you start to look that long, like at that point you're looking in places that make no sense. I, I remember looking in the freezer like, maybe what if, what if somehow, and I looked everywhere and then guess what happened around hour 18? Still didn't find it. Yeah, never found it didn't go on that trip. That one did not happen. Pretty disappointing. But, but I remember that feeling of just searching with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, trying to find something desperately. And, and that's what in the New Testament that Jesus presents to us as this idea of seeking after God, that there is this seeking component where we don't stop, we don't slow down, we are pursuing it. And yet simultaneously, here's what the wise men show us, that, that worshiping Jesus can be hard. That their worship didn't start when they bent the knee. No, their worship started long before that. When they recognize, Hey, we've gotta travel to a distant country, to a distant place, having lots of questions, not a whole lot of answers. There was a faith involved, and yet what they did was really, really hard. Like for most of us, if those were the barriers to worship, it probably means that we, we tap out pretty early, like, well, hey, I wanna worship, but man, that makes it really inconvenient. That makes it really hard. I'm not sure that I want to do that. It, we e even sometimes we really like convenience associated with it. I mean, on a day like today, when it snows, it's so much easier when it's snowing outside to say, wow, should I go worship? Because I can turn it on tv. And it's just so much easier. Like, there, there is a difficulty sometimes that is associated with worship. A good example of that to me at at least is when you first start reading the Bible, the Bible is really, really hard. Like I, I remember as a kid when, when you start opening up and, and the very first type of Bible that I had was a King James Bible. And so I didn't understand half the words that were in that thing. It, it was one of those I remember still, I don't have it anymore sadly, but I remember it was just a New Testament I got when it was a real small kid at church. It was just a New Testament. It was like that big, and it was in King James. And, and I still know from, from my childhood, there's like, there's like five verses that I have memorized in King James. And then at some point, I, I switched over to NIV and now I use ESV. So yeah, it's like a lot of changes that have happened over the course of my life. But, but there's a few early on that was all King James. And even memorizing passages, I, I didn't really know what I was saying. So you start reading the Bible early on, and, and maybe you're in here and you're an adult and you've had that same experience. Maybe you've, you've just recently become a Christian. And so you open the Bible and you start reading it, and you start trying to learn it. And, and here's what happens. When we first start reading the Bible, it just feels like there's nothing there. Like, like, it just feels completely blank. Like no matter how much you read or no match, no matter how much you try, it's just like, I, it's not making sense. Like there's some words in here that, that I don't quite grasp, and that you're at church and you're having conversations with people and you, you don't understand the words that they're saying. Or, or maybe you're in a Bible study and the person on that's teaching the Bible study, they say, okay, let's, let's all turn to the book of Obadiah. And you're like, there's a what book in this thing and you're trying to flip through. But, but here's one of the beautiful things about pursuing God and seeking after God, that, that, although at first it feels pretty empty, that the more we seek after God, all of a sudden at some point it starts to take shape. Like all of a sudden it, it, it starts to, to fill in some of those blanks that before it felt like I didn't understand at all. And now it's like starting to fill in the gaps and there's some structure and, and hey, I'm starting to get a little bit more comfortable. But, but here's the beauty that we see throughout all the scripture, that when we pursue God, that God is also pursuing us. That's what James four eight says, draw near to God. And he will draw near to you that really famous verse that, that people like to quote Jeremiah 29 11, I know the planes I have for you, declares the Lord, planes to prosper you and not to harm you, planes to give you hope in a future. That's a verse. We take outta context all the time, but we, we often skip the verse that comes right after that. And that verse says, then you will seek me and you will find me when you seek me with all of your heart. And so there's this challenge, this difficulty sometimes in worshiping this difficulty, sometimes in pursuing God. But if we don't quit and we keep pursuing it all, all of a sudden one day when it comes to scripture, like it doesn't make sense at first, and then it starts to take structure, and then all of a sudden one day it's like, boom, it starts to come to life. And something that before made no sense, all of a sudden feels like it's alive and it's God color. So worshiping God, it starts with seeking, worshiping God can be hard, but, but here's the other thing that we find from the Wiseman, and that's that worshiping. Jesus has ACOs. There's always a cost associated with it. So I, for the wise men that the, the cost was more tangible. Like there was, there was a threat of death, there was a threat that, that, hey, they got wrapped up in some international politics that they had no clue about. They have to avoid Herod on their way back. They, they don't wanna get tortured, they don't want to die. So there's a real cost that was associated with their worship. But for all of us, there's a cost associated with worship, likely not as extreme as what their cost could have been, but there's some type of a tangible cost every time we're choosing to worship. The, the fact that you're here today there is some cost associated with that. There's lots of other things that you could have been doing right now in this moment. Probably some things that were more fun than a sermon. Like, like at Christmas time, you could be skiing today at Christmas time, you could be watching a movie at home. You could be watching Netflix. Like there are other things that you could be doing that probably would be more entertaining than the sermon that you are hearing right now. There's always a cost. And so here's what I wanna do for a second. I, I want you to pretend for a moment that this cup of water and I dyed it blue, there's nothing magical or, or, or special about the water. It's just easier to see when it's blue. And so let's say that this picture is your life, and these cups are all these different options that we've got of what we can do with our life. And so, so here's what I'm gonna do. Now, I'm gonna say that this is one of the cups that we could pour our life into. I'm gonna walk off the stage, I'm gonna look for some kids, and, and for a kid, I want you to raise your hand and I want you to tell me one thing in our life that we can pour our life into, meaning that you could spend your time doing. What's something you like to do? I saw your hand first. What video games. Play. Video games. I, I, that's so surprising that at Christmas time on your break, you've been playing video games. My kids, no screens. What? So, okay, they've done a lot of screen time in the last few days. Alright, so we're gonna put video games on here. I'm gonna write it right there. I don't have good handwriting in the first place, but when you're writing on a cup, it is so much worse like that. Oh, I don't know what's happening there. We're gonna try it and fix it. Alright, so video games. So let's say that this is your life. And, and I wanna point out, video games are not an evil thing. They're not in a bad thing. But if you take your life and all you do is pour your life into video games, that ultimately at the end of your life, all that time that you spent pouring time, energy, and effort into video games will come up empty. What? Alright, I got another cup. Well, what's something else you can do with your time? Let's come over this way. We got some kids. Alright, what's something else you can do with your time? Okay, family. I, I'm, I'm gonna say that's a good thing to do with your time. If that comes up empty, that, that sends some wrong messages. So family, that's a good answer. All right, what else do we got? What? Okay, sports. Now you wanna talk on about stepping on some toes with some sports? Hey, I didn't say it. The the he did. So we're gonna write sports on here. Personal, nothing personal. That's the worst. S we're just gonna cross that out. We're gonna start over here. We're gonna put sports. And I don't wanna say that kid sports has become an idol. I I don't wanna say that. That if your professional sports team loses and it ruins your week, like there could be a problem with that. Could be worshiping something that maybe we shouldn't be worshiping. And, and here's the thing. I like, I love sports. I like watching sports. I love playing sports. My kids have done sports, and so I don't want you to hear that sports is bad, but, but this is important for the kids in the room. It's also important for all of us adults in the room. Here's the thing about sports. I, I've never sat, I, I've, I've had the privilege to sit with a lot of people when they were towards the end of life and they reflect back on life. And they, they talk about life. And there's a natural part of talking about when you're at the end of life, that that talks about regrets. And, and you know what's crazy? I've never had a single person. It's like, you know what I regret more than anything? There was that one sporting game that, that was on tv. It was a nothing game, couldn't have made the playoffs, but I just wish I would've watched that one. Like never happened. No one looks back and says, that's the thing that was missing. So it's a good thing. But if I make it the ultimate thing, if I, if I pour my life and make it the thing that I pour all of my life into that, then here's the challenges that ultimately at the end of my life, it comes up empty. So, so let's, let's do one more. And, and on this one, let's, let's just make it me. Let's put on here me, we'll put myself and we'll put I, Because, because that's what typically we do. Typically what we do is we say, Hey, I I'm going to make my life all about me. I'm gonna choose the things that I like. I'm going to do the things that I wanna do. I'm going to make it less about the people around me and and more about me, myself, and I. Everything in my life revolves around my wants, my desires, my choices. And and there are moments where that will make you happy, absolutely undeniably. But ultimately, if we make our life entirely about us, and all we do with our time is pour our time, energy, and effort into us, it ultimately comes up empty. Now, there's this other option, and this other option is to do what with our life, to pour our life into Jesus. Now, right now, some of you in the room, you're trying to figure out how I'm doing the trick up here and, and I wanna tell all the kids in the room, this is not magic. Like I, I'm not a magician. I can do some tricks. But, but it's just a trick. But the spiritual part of this really is true that, that we can pour life into all kinds of different things, and ultimately they come up empty or we can choose to pour our life into Jesus. And, and here's the thing. There is a cost associated with pouring our life into Jesus. That means that, that I'm doing this instead of doing other things. And at the time, that sometimes can be really, really hard to pour my life into Jesus. But, but watch this. It's okay. This whole stage is going away after today anyway, so it's totally fine. So, so some of you're like, well, he's got a sponge in the bottom of the cup. That's always the guess. So if there's a sponge, then if I pour more water in the there, then then the sun, the sponge would soak it up. But if I pour my life into Jesus, and then I allow Jesus to pour into me, something amazing happened. So, so this before was, it came up empty. Like I, I poured it over and nothing came out. But now, once I allowed Jesus to pour life back into me, guess what happens? All of a sudden that which was empty before is no longer empty. It gets way harder when you can do that. 'cause Now it's like your idea of how I was doing it starts to go away. Like, well, there's a sponge, but now it's hard to say. There was a sponge when the water can get poured back and forth and back and forth. And so there's a real genuine, true spiritual truth to this, that if I pour my life into so many different things in this world, it will come up empty. But, but for the kids in the room and for the adults in the room too, it's hard to make the focal point of my life. Jesus. There's a cost, there's a challenge, there's a difficulty. And yet, if I do that over the long haul, it's the most valuable thing I can do with my time and with my life. In well, seven days on January 4th, we're gonna kick off a 21 days of prayer and fasting as a church. And so next Sunday, end of following Sunday, when you come we're gonna give you a devotional that we're gonna give you a physical devotional that you'll walk outta here with. We'll also have a kid's devotional and a youth devotional that we will send you home with. And, and our challenge is gonna be for 21 days straight starting January 4th. What does it look like to really do this? And, and guess what? It's hard. Like, like spending time in prayer and reading God's word every day is hard. And at first it, it feels like, what am I doing? And yet I can promise you that ultimately it is fulfilling. Let, let me end with this. There's three responses that we see to Jesus in the nativity story. That first is you've got hostility. That's what Herod does. The Herod hears about the king of the Jews and he feels threatened. And he says, well, wait a second. There's this other king. I'm the king. And so what does he do? He ends up going and killing every male two years and younger hostility. And, and sometimes you see that when people look at God, when people think about Jesus, when people think about the church or Christianity, there is a hostility. Why, why Herod was hostile towards Jesus. Because Jesus would've stepped on at least he perceived that Jesus would've stepped on his toes, would've changed his life, would it would've changed the, the norm that he had grown accustomed to. And sometimes that's the truth of Christianity. That Jesus, there's no such thing as I'm gonna live my normal life and get Jesus to that. Jesus doesn't allow that. Jesus gives us, gives us this picture of if you wanna follow after me, you have to deny yourself, pick up your cross and fall after me. There is an idea that sacrifice is associated with falling after Jesus. The second response we see is apathy. Like, doesn't it bogle our minds that the religious leaders, that were right there in the city in the same region, they don't show up like there's something about them. It doesn't seem like they're hostile towards Jesus, and yet somehow they miss Jesus because they're just going through the motions. They're busy. They got all these other things going on, and somehow that apathy causes them to miss the fact that Jesus the Messiah, Emmanuel God with us, was right in their backyard. And then the third response that we see is worship. That you have these wise men that make a really difficult, challenging journey come a long way. That they have a, a cost associated with it, a risk associated with it in order to bow down and worship and to bring him gifts and end the end of this Christmas season. As we look ahead to next year, can I just challenge all of this? What, what does it look like in my life to be like the wise men to seek and to worship? What, what are those, those areas in my life that I'm really pouring so much time, energy, effort into that that ultimately will come up empty? How do I start shifting some of those things away from that into more and more about Jesus? Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for the Sunday after Christmas, the Sunday when it feels like we're in no man's land. And yet there's so much truth that we see when we unpack your word, when we come together and worship, when we make it about you. Lord, I pray for each and every person in this room that as we look ahead to the next year, that, that you would stir something inside of us as we start to ask where are the areas in my life that I can spend more time focused on? Jesus, that that, that it's so easy for us to buy into the lie that I don't have time. I'm too busy, and God, I just pray against that. Help us to realize that, that I have plenty of time if I will make you a priority. And so I pray that we as a church, each of us individually, would make you a priority in this coming year as the name Lord Jesus, we pray and all of God's people said, amen.