I know that the nativity scenes around my house (yes, there’s more than one . . . been a tradition in our house since I don’t know when), though they are meant to remind me of “the reason for the season”, are in reality a muddled portrayal of the historical facts. A baby, a mother, a menagerie of animals, and some magi didn’t actually all congregate around a manger — but it makes for a heart-warming, and even a praise-invoking scene. And ask me about the magi — the wise men (not necessarily three) from the east — and I would have said they arrived in Bethlehem a couple of years later and that they were led there by a star. And I would have got part of that wrong too.

Then Herod summoned the wise men 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.”

(Matthew 2:7-8 ESV)

And he (aka Herod) sent them to Bethlehem. For some reason that’s what captures my imagination this morning. Not the account of Noah entering the ark which I read in Genesis. Not the account of the Spirit descending at Pentecost which I read in Acts. Not even the account of the LORD sustaining David who’s surrounded by his enemies which I read in one of his psalms. No, instead I’m led to chew on the hardness of heart of the man who directed to Bethlehem those seeking “the king of the Jews”.

The wise men’s trip could have been a “direct flight” with the star leading them straight to “the place where the child was” (Mt. 2:9). Instead, by God’s sovereign determination and according to His providential purposes, it led the wise men to stop first in Jerusalem and to inquire of the king there so that he might ask too “where the Christ was to be born” (Mt. 2:4). They were seeking the promised Messiah, and now Herod was as well.

He calls the chief priests and the scribes and wants to know where the promised Branch was to be born, where the foretold Lion of the tribe of Judah might lay. And the king’s counselors did their job well for they knew their bibles well, telling the king that God had revealed to the prophet, Micah, that from Bethlehem in the land of Judah would come “a Ruler who will shepherd My people.”

Bethlehem, just a few miles down the road from Jerusalem. Herod could have gone there that day had he really wanted to “come and worship Him” too (Mt. 2:8). But among the kaleidoscope of reactions evoked by the birth of the promised Messiah, Herod’s would be included as an example of what an anti-Christ response to the good news might look like.

Think of the arrogant audacity to inquire after “the Christ” when he knew all along he would seek to put to death the foretold Son of Man who would come to reign. Think of the hypocritical hardness of heart which portrayed a religious interest only to protect his self-interest. Think about the deception as he faked submission to bowing before the King of kings. Oooh . . . you’re a mean one, Mr. Grinch! (Oops, got my Christmas stories mixed up).

But as I noodle on Herod, what hits me is how quick I was to skip over Herod. To pass quickly over his story because I want to think of my story as somehow more like the shepherds’ in my serene nativity scenes. I want to think that I would rejoice at the news, run to the inn, marvel at the stable. I want to gasp in disgust at Herod and wonder how his heart could have been so stone cold to such good news of Immanuel’s coming.

Well, I should gasp, but in amazement. Not that Herod rejected Jesus, but that anyone else received Him. Not that Herod was so evil, but that anyone might be counted as wholly righteous. Not condemning his failure to believe but pausing to consider their faith which was gifted.

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

(Ephesians 2:8-9 ESV)

The gift of God, wrapped in swaddling cloths and laid in a manger at the center of my many nativities. The gift of God, evident in every heart that came to Him, that were opened to believe the truth that the Christ had come, and that His name was Jesus, for He would save people from their sin. The gift of God, found even in Herod as a reminder that there but for the grace of God go I. A reminder of not how different he was from me, but of how scarily similar. A reminder of why I bow in wonder and worship.

“You think they are decent only because your standards are so low. You thought you were decent until you saw the chasm, did you not? . . . By thinking men better than they are, you make the King’s grace seem less amazing than it truly is.”

(Alcorn, Randy. Edge of Eternity. The Crown Publishing Group.)

O what wondrous grace to behold the King of glory.

Amen?