Nazareth By Way of Egypt

 

January 3, 2021             NOTES NOT EDITED
Nazareth, By Way of Egypt: God’s Detours Are Not Dead Ends!
Mat. 2:12-23

 SIS—In times of chaos and challenge we can be certain God is still at work in our lives to protect us from harm and prepare us for ministry.

An axiom in mathematics says, “the shortest distance between two points is a straight line.” (Archimedes).  Well, that might work out in mathematics but if 2020 has shown us anything, that axiom does always represent life.  On the journey of our corporate happiness as a nation, 2020 was a “huge detour.”  People don’t like detours.  The take us out of our way.  They hinder our travel.  At least that’s how a detour looks at first glance.  But, what if we looked at detours as a “solution” to our problems rather than a problem?  In fact, that’s exactly what a “detour” is:  a way around an obstacle before us.  Today, we are going to examine a detour in the life of Jesus Christ.  My message is titled:  “Nazareth, By Way of Egypt: God’s Detours Are Not Dead Ends.”  We will learn three important lessons about the Egyptian Detour in the life of our Lord.  ❶God Always Has A Plan.  ❷Things Often Get Worse Before They Get Better.  ❸God Uses Divine Detours to Prepare Us for Greater Ministry

First, lets read of the Lord’s travel to Nazareth By Way of Egypt

❶ God has a Plan (12-15)

Let’s examine first the issue of “dreams” which were a significant element in the birth narrative of Jesus.  Joseph had 4 dreams.  There are only 21 dreams identified in the Bible (not counting visions in the prophets which is something different). Joseph had 20 percent of all the dreams recorded in the Bible.  That makes this a significant part of the birth narrative of the Lord.

 If God as spoken through His Word, first the O.T. and now both Old and New, and He has, why the need to speak in “dreams.”  The idea of divine inspiration coming via dreams has been problematic for philosophers throughout time in both religious and non-religious settings.  Homer, the Classical Poet, said dreams came through two gates.  Good dreams through two gates.  Good dreams came through Ivory Gates and deceitful dreams came through Gates of Horn.

There have only been 21 identified “dreams” in 1,189 chapters in the Bible.  This makes them “rare” but that does not mean “dreams” are insignificant.  Incredibly, of the 21 times dreams are mentioned in the Bible, 4 are in regard to Joseph, the care-taker of Jesus Christ.  Joseph knew the written Word of God which was the Old Testament.  The Bible calls him a “devout and righteous man” (Mt. 1:19).  Yet, God supplemented His guidance of Joseph with dreams.  This is problematic for many evangelical theologians who believe that the “canon”—God speaking to man—has been closed.  Evangelicals rightly reject any “extra-Biblical” material as untrustworthy and unauthoritative. 

Yet, Joseph alone received four dreams.  The Bible also quotes Joel (2:28) the prophet by saying, “And it will be in the last days, says God, that I will pour out My Spirit on all humanity; then your sons and your daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, and your old men will dream dreams” Acts 2:17 (modified by Peter).

 As I mentioned before, even pagan poets like Homer were skeptical of “divine revelation via dreams.”  We should be also today, but that doesn’t rule them out completely.  Always keep in mind that there are only 21 dreams recorded in 1, 189 chapters in the Bible.  That’s instructive.  There can never be any “new doctrine” created by a dream.  In fact, nothing in Joseph’s dreams involved doctrine at all.  The best way I can evaluate “dreams” are: as “special accents in our lives to draw us to listen carefully—very carefully—to God.” Notice that after each of Joseph’s four dreams, they are connected and anchored in a text from God’s Holy Word.  When dreams lead to heresy as they do Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses, Christian Scientists, Seventh Day Adventists, and a plethora of false cults, such dreams, and dreamers, should be soundly rejected. 

Now, as I said, Joseph’s dreams are always tied to prophecies concerning God’s plan for Jesus Christ, the Son of God.  Nothing was happening—indeed nothing ever happens—that is not according to God’s eternal plan.  Note verses 15, 18, 23.  All these speak of God’s foreordained, prophetic plan.  At first glance, the entire birth story of Jesus looks chaotic and without any plan.  Remember, Joseph was a carpenter and worked according to precise measurements and blueprints.  Having his “bride to be turn up pregnant” was not according to “the plan”—at least not Joseph’s plan.  Not having a reservation in Bethlehem having to spend the night of the Lord’s birth with animals in a stable, was not according to “the plan”—at least not Joseph and Mary’s plan.  Having to flee with a young child to Egypt because a wicked ruler wanted to kill him was certainly not according to “the plan”—at least not Joseph’s plan.  What seem chaotic and without any discernable plan, was happening EXACTLY according to God’s plan.  Each dream pointed Joseph back to God’s eternal plan prophetically declared centuries, even millennia before. 

God is sovereign and He always has a plan for His people—a plan for you.  One of my Scripture memory verses (among many others) reminds us of this fact:  Jeremiah 29:11.   “For I know the plans I have for you” —this is the Lord’s declaration—“plans for your welfare, not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.” (Jer. 29:11, HCSB) 

 When Job’s life fell apart and literally disintegrated before his eyes God reminded Job:  Job 42:2.  “I know that You can do anything and no plan of Yours can be thwarted.” (HCSB) 

The detours in our lives are not “dead ends” because God always has a plan.  Now, there is another important lesson we must learn about detours.  Even though God always has a plan, often 

❷ things often get worse before they get better.

Is there any among us who has not come to the realization that life can get very bad, very fast?  Look at verses 16-18:

“Then Herod, when he saw that he had been outwitted by the wise men, flew into a rage. He gave orders to massacre all the male children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old and under, in keeping with the time he had learned from the wise men. Then what was spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: A voice was heard in Ramah, weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children; and she refused to be consoled, because they were no more.”

The CSB captures the character of Herod in the words, “flew into a rage.” Herod is one of the most despicable people ever to be born. Think of the vilest term to describe a human being (using that term loosely in regard to Herod the Great), multiply it by 1000 and you have almost described Herod. Most people know Herod the Great as the villain in the Christmas story who murdered all the babies two years old and younger in Bethlehem.  Herod’s murderous bent in life began decades before Bethlehem’s slaughter.  In an interview with famed historian, Dr. David Maier, Herod is described like this:  “[Herod is a] paranoid tyrant who ended up killing three of his sons on suspicion of treason, putting to death his favorite wife (of his ten wives!), killing one of his mothers-in-law, drowning a high priest, and killing several uncles and a couple of cousins. They also talk about Herod’s plot to kill a stadium of Jewish leaders.” Murder was his primary political strategy.

As tragic as Herod’s brutal murder of innocents in Bethlehem was, it was not as large a scale as one might imagine.  The Eastern Orthodox Church places the number of babies killed at 14,000 and Syrian tradition puts the number at 64,000.  Both of these are exaggerations.  At the time of Jesus Bethlehem was a very small town of only about 300 people.  The number of two years old or younger boys would have been 7 to maybe a dozen (Paul Maier).  We know from Josephus, an ancient Jewish historian, that only a few years earlier (7BC) Herod had 300 military leaders killed because Herod suspected the “might” be planning something against him.  Josephus does not record the death of the babies of Bethlehem.  There are perhaps many reasons for this.  For one, even though the murder of one innocent is a horrible tragedy, the fact was, Josephus wrote for a Greco-Roman audience and infant deaths, especially of Jews, would not even raise an editorial eyebrow. 

Consider for example the fact that an innocent baby is slaughtered in the U.S. every 96 seconds and it doesn’t make the news, and that’s about 61 million plus since Roe v. Wade made abortion legal in 1973.

God is pro-life.  He would have made mention of Herod’s slaughter if it had been but one child.  Matthew, in characteristic style, pulls a verse from the prophet Jeremiah to highlight this horrible tragedy (Jer. 31:15; Mt. 2:18).  God put the Holy Family into a detour to protect Jesus from this horrible man Herod.

 Herod died in 4BC.  Verse 19 says, “After Herod died, an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, saying, “Get up! Take the child and His mother and go to the land of Israel, because those who sought the child’s life are dead.”

Notice Scripture calls Jesus, “the child,” not “your” child because Joseph is not the father, and the birth story of Jesus always emphasize the identity of Jesus as God’s Son, the Son of God. Notice also “child” is mentioned before mother.  Again, this is to highlight the divinity of Jesus as opposed to the humanity of Joseph AND Mary.

Remember, “often things get worse—sometimes much worse—before they get better!”  Look at verses 21-22, “So he got up, took the child and His mother, and entered the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. And being warned in a dream, he withdrew to the region of Galilee.”

There’s an old adage describing the connection between a child and a parent that says, “The nut doesn’t fall far from the tree!” Archelaus was the son of Herod and was as much a murderous monster as his father.  There’s another adage that describes a worsening situation.  It says, “Out of the frying pan and into the fire.”  That’s the situation Joseph found himself in:  from Herod the frying pan to Archelaus the fire!

How about one more cliché? I’m sure you’ve heard the old, “I have some good news and I have some bad news.”  Well, here’s what happened one day when the Doctor entered a patient’s room.  The Doctor said, “Mr. Jones, I have some bad news, and I have some very bad news.”  Mr. Jones sighed and said, “OK, what’s the bad news?”  The Doctor replied clinically, “You have only one day to live.”  Mr. Jones gulped and asked, “Well, what’s the very bad news, Doc?”  The Doctor sort of hung his head and said, “I’m sorry, I forgot to tell you yesterday!”

We all know this lesson too well, “things often get worse before they get better.”  Life is just hard.  So hard sometimes that even a great day of golf can take a bad detour.  Fred came home from a day of golf and his wife said, “Fred, you are home late and you look totally exhausted.  What happened.  Fred said, “It was a horrible day at the golf course.”  Fred went on to explain, “Everything was going fine," he said. "Then Harry had a heart attack and died on the 10th tee." Fred’s wife’s eyes got big and she shrieked, "That's just awful!"  Fred replied, "You're not kidding. For the last nine holes it was the same routine: hit the ball, drag Harry, hit the ball, drag Harry."

If we are going to maintain our trust in God when life takes a detour, we need to realize:  1.  God always has a plan; and 2. Often things get worse before they get better.  There’s a third lesson we need to learn.

❸God Uses Divine Detours To Prepare Us For Greater Ministry

Look at verse 23:  “Then he went and settled in a town called Nazareth to fulfill what was spoken through the prophets, that He will be called a Nazarene.” 

All throughout the birth narrative of Jesus, God has directed Joseph according to a Biblical prophesy accented by a dream.  In  22-23 we see that same pattern, but something is a little different.  There is no specific text tied to the prophesy Matthew refers to.  The prophesy of which Matthew speaks seems to be a word-play on the name of the town of Nazareth.

This is most probably an allusion to the “branch prophecies” referring to the Messiah in the O.T., such as Isaiah 11:1.  “Then a shoot will grow from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots will bear fruit.”  The word “branch” and the word “Nazareth” share the same Hebrew consonantal root: nzr (נָצַר). All Hebrew words are built on three consonants called the root.  So, consistent with the other “dream accented prophecies” of Joseph, Matthew does the same thing with the reference to a reference to the “branch (nzr) prophecies of the Messiah in the O.T.  Notice Matthew refers to “prophets, plural” rather than a specific prophesy. (See also Isa. 4:2; Jer. 23:5; 33:15).

Another nzr root word (same consonants, different vowels) is, “natsar” (nazar, ts=our z). This means to “watch, keep, or guard” which is a significant theme in the birth story of Jesus.  In Nazareth Jesus would grow (branch) and be guarded until His inauguration into public ministry 26-30 years later. 

It is significant for us to realize that Jesus prepared nearly three decades for 3 years of ministry.  Jesus did not despise the time God sequestered Him away building the Lord’s spiritual strength.  God did this for Moses who spent 40 years tending and leading sheep for his father-in-law before spending 40 years tending and leading God’s sheep in the desert. 

Here’s what one Bible student observed about the life of Paul:  It’s insanely fascinating that Luke, the author of Acts, spends only 16 verses (Acts 9:19-30; 11:25-26, 30; 12:25) describing the first 14 years of Paul’s work in ministry after his conversion and then spends 16 chapters detailing the next 10 years of his life (https://john.do/st-paul-and-14-years-of-preparation).

Benjamin Franklin said, ““By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” The older I get the more I realize that everything I’ve ever done has been to prepare me for what I do next!  Every twist and turn in the detours of life have been God preparing me for what lies ahead.  We only see Jesus at his birth and babyhood, and again when He stayed behind at the Temple on one family pilgrimage to Jerusalem when He was twelve. Here’s how the Bible sums up the life of Jesus in Nazareth—about 26 to 30 years: 

“And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and with people.” (Luke 2:52)

There simply is “no substitute” for preparation if you want to be successful in ministry—and, by success I mean that you will one day hear the Lord say, “Well done, my good and faithful servant!” (Mt. 25:23).

The best intentions are no substitute for great preparation.  The story I am about to tell is so shocking it will certainly sound like it is made up simply to make a point. It is not. The news story ran in the Orlando Sentinel on April 5, 1988, and also the L.A. Times.  Ivan Lester Macquire was a 35 years old veteran parachutist and camera man.  He was making his third jump of the day, one of over 800 jumps. The camera equipment was bulky and heavy on his back.  Here’s what one person reported:  He (Macquire) had jumped from a plane along with numerous other skydivers and filmed the group as they fell and opened their parachutes. On the film shown on the telecast, as the final skydiver opened his chute, the picture went berserk. The announcer reported that the cameraman had fallen to his death, having jumped out of the plane without his parachute. It wasn’t until he reached for the absent ripcord that he realized he was freefalling without a parachute.” I am sure you know what happened next after a jump from 10,000 feet with no parachute.

This tragically proves the point that “preparation for ministry is absolutely essential.” God protected Jesus and prepared Him for almost three decades to complete a three-year ministry.

Never despise the detours in life but look for the lessons God is teaching you and listen for His voice to tell you your next step. 

Jesus and His family arrived at their destination, Nazareth, via a detour through Egypt.  God’s detours are not dead ends.  ❶God always has a plan;  ❷Things often get worse before they get better;  and ❸God uses the detours of our lives to prepare us for greater ministry.