“Home by Another Way”

Matthew 21-12

January 6, 2008

St. Paul United Methodist Church, Little Rock

Reverend John Fleming

My mother put inside of me a love for authors and poets and their works of novels and poetry. I don’t mind admitting to you that I was an adult before I came to appreciate the gift. When I was in junior high and high school, I thought poetry was boring. I memorized lines for grades and tried my best to compose my own using things like iambic pentameter. And then there were those poems I was to read and then to tell my teacher and the class what the poet was trying to communicate. I often begged them to make things a little more clear. My English classes were devoted to these poems and tests were given on them.

My mother’s favorite poet, I think, was Emily Dickinson. I have never thought to ask her, but I wonder if she named my sister for her. Me? Well I have several favorite authors and a couple of favorite poets. One of them is Robert Frost.

One of his poems has the title The Road Not Taken. Some of Robert’s most famous lines can be found in this poem. The last of the poem has these famous lines, “I shall be telling this with a sigh. Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged into a wood, and I – I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.”

Here we are, friends, at the beginning of a new year. 2008 is only six days old. If you made a resolution on New Year’s day, there is a chance that you have already broken it. Here we are on the first Sunday of the New Year. I hope one of your resolutions is to attend worship services more often! Here we are, like the wise men from the east. We have come to worship Jesus Christ, the newborn king! Next week Jesus will have grown up. He will be thirty years old and standing in line at the River Jordan for his baptism. Before we know it, Easter will be here. Easter is early this year, the earliest it can be.

Last Saturday morning, Annie Grace and I made our way to Conway to have breakfast with my mom and dad. Annie was in the back seat when she said, “Daddy, I miss the baby Jesus.” I said, “You like baby Jesus?” She said, “Yeah, and I already miss him.” Many of us love Christmas time and the stories of his birth. If you’re in that camp, then you will might like this next line. For us Christmas did not come to pass. It came to stay.

So before we get too far along in Jesus’ life, let’s visit the baby one more time. This morning I would like for us to ponder the story of the wise men’s visit to Jesus. Matthew is the only gospel writer to tell this tale. He writes words that have taken up residence in my mind. These are the words, “And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.” Here is the question I want us to think about this morning, “What would it mean for you and for me to take a new road home in 2008?”

Before we answer that, let me remind you of some of the details of our lesson. Like many of you I watched our church’s Christmas pageant a few weeks back. I noticed the angels and the shepherds. I saw Joseph and Mary and the baby Jesus. I watched as the wise men came down our center aisle and headed toward the manger scene. I couldn’t help but to wonder who these men really were. Were they kings? Some have suggested they were. Were there three of them? Matthew doesn’t give us a number. We have come to believe there were three of them because they offered gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Each one had a gift. That makes sense!

We don’t know where in the east they came from or how long it took them to arrive in Bethlehem. Some have guessed that Jesus wasn’t a baby by the time they arrived, that he was a toddler. I’m not sure about that. Matthew doesn’t mention any of those things. What he does tell us is that by the time they arrive, Joseph and Mary have moved into a house. Matthew also tells us that the three stopped by the palace in Jerusalem to ask for directions.

Their question got Herod all riled up. They asked, “Where is the baby who has been born the king of the Jews?” That upset Herod. He was the king of the Jews and liked his life just fine. Matthew tells us that the question also upset all of Jerusalem. They were used to the way things were, with Herod at the helm.

This, of course, was the first Herod had heard of any baby being born who would be king. Since he didn’t know the scriptures all that well, he consulted with those in the palace and learned that there was a passage from the prophet, Micah that might help. Micah’s words are these, “And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who is to shepherd my people, Israel.” Herod had a plan. Since the wise men had come this far, he sent them on with the instructions to return to the palace on their way home with good directions so that he, King Herod, could visit the child and worship him.

So the wise men set out. They followed the star until it stopped over the house. They were overcome with joy when they realized they were in the right place. They went inside the house, bent down on their knees, and worshiped him. That night they slept well. After all, their journey was a long one. As they slept they dreamed. All three of them had the same dream, the one that warned them not to return to Herod. Matthew tells us that when it was time for them to go home, they, “…left for their country by another road.”

They went home using another road and a new way, hmm. What would it mean for us, for you and for me, to take a new road home from the manger scene this year? My guess is that you haven’t had a dream telling you to go another way. Maybe you have. I hope our sermons before Christmas sent you the message that changing our ways is a good thing. That is what I was trying to preach. Did you hear those sermons?

Well, with all of that in mind, let me suggest a couple of new roads that we might take home this year. Here is the first one. How about we taken the road of spiritual awareness or to use a bigger theological word, spiritual discernment. Matthew writes that the wise men were warned in a dream.

Let me ask you this, do you have dreams? And if you do, do you remember them? I don’t know what it says about me, but I rarely remember the dreams I have when I sleep. Someone has said that dreams are windows into our souls. I believe that. I also believe that dreams are revelations for our future.

If you read your Bibles carefully, you will see that God uses dreams over and over again. Jacob wakes up from a dream and exclaims, “Surely the presence of the Lord is in this place and I did not know it.” Joseph had a dream that his brothers would bow down to him. That dream, by the way, wasn’t well received. Some dreams are left best deep in the heart. Solomon dreamed that God would give him a wise heart. God came to another Joseph in a dream and said that it was all right to take Mary as his wife, that things would work out. Peter preached a sermon based on the prophesy of Joel and said that sons and daughters will prophesy. Young men will see visions. Old men will dream dreams.

If you don’t mind me asking, what hopes and dreams dance in your heads? What fantasies of a divine kind are in your souls? Our hopes and dreams have to be tested, of course, using things like scripture and reason and tradition. That’s our United Methodist way. Some dreams are guidance while others are the result of burritos at bedtime!

Here are some things I know. There is a will of God. Our lives have a purpose. The will of God can be figured out. The desire to please God pleases God. Everything doesn’t happen for a reason. Some times things just happen. And finally, God is at work for good for those who love God and are called to his purposes.

So I invite you to take the road where your hopes and dreams lead you. That’s the first road. Here is another road. Take the less traveled road. As Robert Frost put it, taking this road, “….has made all the difference.”

I invite you to take the road of faith. Matthew reminds us, “And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own county by another road.” It would have been a road riddled with Herod’s lookouts. It was a road less traveled. There wasn’t a global positioning service or a GPS on the noses of the camels. The wise men started out in faith and so should we.

Personally starting out in faith isn’t my first preference. I don’t like surprises. I tell everyone that. I don’t even like them on Christmas morning. I want to know where the road is going to take me. I want to project what will happen. I want to set goals and achieve them. How do you know where you’re going otherwise.

The New Year brings resolutions. Maybe you have made one or two. We make these resolutions pretending the new year will bring us exactly what we tell it to bring. We promise to better ourselves, to lose weight, to exercise more. Down deep we know that we cannot know what 2008 will bring. The truth is that by the end of the year, some of us will have died. Some of our jobs will have changed. Some of us will get promotions we only dreamed of getting. The truth is that some of our best moments, some of the best meals, some of the best memories of our entire lives will happen this year!

But if we don’t step out in faith, if we return the same way we came to the manger scene, things probably, will be the same. Do you want that? I remember what a preacher preached at Annual Conference one year. He said, “If we always do what we’ve always done then we will always get what we’ve already got.” Let that go through your mind more than once and it will make sense.

I don’t know about you, but I want more. I want more for myself. I want more for our church. I want us to go places we’ve never gone. I want us to grow like we’ve never grown (and I’m not just talking numbers here!). I don’t want us to worry about money. I don’t want us to worry. I want us to pray more. I want us to study more. I want us to trust God more. I want us to fret less.

Reach out your hand and take God’s hand and let God lead us! So here we are at the beginning of a new year. Let us determine, by God’s grace to take the road less traveled. Let’s see if Robert Frost is right. Let’s see if it makes all the difference. Let us pray.