In the 1843 familiar Charles Dickens classic, "A Christmas Carol", Ebenezer Scrooge has a very gruff and self-centered view of life. He is a miser and sees any and every interruption as a blatant attempt to disrupt his routine. He feels that everyone is interfering with his ability to make money.
We know the story; in his sleep he is visited by the three ghosts of Christmas; past, present and future. Throughout the visits Scrooge sees what his life has been and how it is going to end... unless he changes his ways. Of course he does change... when he wakes up his whole outlook on life has taken on a new attitude. He immediately begins restoring the difficult relationships he has created for himself. He gives generous gifts to all those he had been so stingy with for so long. He makes a tremendous change in how his life is going to go.
If you remember the scene, Ebenezer wakes up from his dream, looks out the window and asks a boy in the street what day it was. When he is told it is Christmas morning he shouts for joy that he still has time to make a special visit to the Cratchit household. He is so excited to have the opportunity to change his life.
It is that excitement we want to learn about this morning... let’s turn to...
Scripture
"He sent them to Bethlehem and said, "Go and make a careful search for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him." 9 After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. 10 When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. 11 On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh. 12 And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.
"Over the years we have all received a number of wonderful gifts that we have really been able to use and enjoy using. For some of us it might be clothing; for others it might be some type of kitchen gadget, maybe tools is your thing, or books or movies. Whatever it is for you, you have probably received those particular things more than once.... and it makes you very happy, indeed.
I remember a Christmas very long ago; I was probably about 7 or 8 years old. I had this old, red bicycle that had been through a number of other people before I had it. It was scratched and banged and dented and the handle bars were from a different bike and didn’t fit real well. I don’t think it even had a kick-stand; or it just didn’t matter. When I rode somewhere and came to a stop I would just jump off the bike and let it fall. If it got scratched no one could even tell.
I asked for a new bike and on Christmas morning... there in front of the tree was a brand new, shiny red, big kids bicycle. It had a chain guard and a white seat and hand grips and fenders with stipes on it. I was so happy... I just sat and admired it; I lived in Salt Lake City and there was probably at least a foot of snow in the yard on Christmas day; there would be no riding that bike for a few weeks.
Even as I was opening other presents that year, I was focused on that bicycle. I would open a gift, then set it aside and stare at my new bike. It was a very happy Christmas.
Over the next ten years I rode that bike to a lot of places. It became my main way of getting around. I always used the kick-stand and always parked it out of the way of any disaster that might befall a bike. When I got home it always went into the garage for the night. I can’t remember ever leaving it out in the weather. That bike was a very good gift that lasted many years and had many, many miles on it.
Today is Epiphany Sunday. We’ll talk more about what that means in a moment. Tradition says that there were three Wise Men that came to Bethlehem... no one really knows for sure how many there were. We surmise three because three gifts are specifically mentioned; gold, frankincense, and myrrh. There could have been two who brought three gifts each, or there could have been a dozen that all contributed to the collection of gifts for Baby Jesus... we just don’t know.
Each of the three gifts has a very interesting place in the story of Jesus. Some scholars suggest that when the angel told Joseph to take his family to Egypt that they used the gold to live on while they were there. Some suggest that the myrrh was offered to Him while He was hanging on the cross as a sedative; to take some of the pain away and help Him endure the suffering. The frankincense could have been used in anointing Jesus’ body after He was crucified. The idea being that these three gifts were prophetic in nature... they foretold a part of the story of Jesus, even from His birth.
Epiphany means a sudden perception of the essential nature or meaning of something; an illuminating discovery or realization. In the church, Epiphany is celebrated the closest Sunday to January 6th and commemorates the visit of the Wise Men to baby Jesus. This is important because this is really the sudden realization that Jesus is the Messiah, not just to the Hebrew people, but, as these men from a far away place attest to, for the Gentiles, too. With the Wise Men we discover; we have an epiphany; that Jesus came for us, too.
The main thing we want to focus in on, this morning, is the attitude of the Wise Men. Take a look at the Text we just read, verse 10, "... When they saw the star, they were overjoyed." There are two Greek words put together when translated comes out as ‘overjoyed.’ One is "sphodra" (sfod-rah) and means exceedingly, greatly, to a high degree, much. The other is "chairo" (khah-ee-ro) which means cheerful, happy, well-off, often used as joyfully rejoicing.
This means these men were rejoicing exceedingly. One of the things I have never understood about sports; when a local team wins a championship; no matter what sport, baseball, basketball, football, college/pro... doesn’t matter. When a local team wins the fans go out and somehow in the spirit of their partying they begin to turn cars over and break store windows and do all sorts of damage to things. It would make more sense to me if the losing fans came to the home town of the winners and trashed their town... but to trash your own town just because your team won??? I don’t get it....
But this is what exceeding rejoicing looks like. People whooping and hollering and running and shouting... this is what the Bible says the Wise Men were doing when they discovered the star stopping over the house where Jesus was. Their search was over; they had finally found what they were looking for and they were overjoyed; exceedingly rejoicing.
This is the attitude that Ebenezer had when he woke from his dream and discovered that he hadn’t missed Christmas; he still had time to change his life. This is the way we are supposed to be looking at our own faith. This is the response we ought to see when someone comes to the Lord.
We may not run out and turn cars over and we may not run through the church shouting, but we ought to be overjoyed that we have accepted Jesus and have had our names written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. We ought to be overjoyed; exceedingly rejoicing, that we have been set free from our sins and from death. We ought to be letting everyone around us know that we are excited about our faith. We should be telling everyone what we have and inviting them to join in.
Conclusion
Ebenezer was a grouch and was overjoyed that he had a chance to change his life. None of us is, or ever has been, perfect. We all could be better. We have a chance to change our lives, but instead of a dream full of ghosts we have Jesus and the Holy Spirit to help us.
The big question for each of us is this: how happy are you about the gift of eternal life? Are you overjoyed? Are you exceedingly rejoicing?
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