When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born.

They told him, 'In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet: "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."'

Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, 'Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.'

When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy.

On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road."

Matthew 2:1-12

Still, if it doesn't feel bleak on the outside, perhaps for some of us these days still feel a little bleak in the inside. Christmas has come and gone, leaving us feeling like deflated balloons, first stretched to the breaking point with stress and excitement, and now limp with fatigue.

Others of us may feel plain old sadness. Our families have gone home and our homes have gone quiet, no longer filled with the laughter of our children and grandchildren. We've taken down and stowed away the lights until next year; the wrapping paper has all been put away and we've recycled the Christmas tree.

Christmas has dazzled us once again, yet at the end of the day, or rather at the end of the season, we realize that perhaps not much has changed in our families or ourselves, except that we maybe weigh a little bit more now than we did a month ago!

Liturgically minded people call this patch of the Christian calendar --- the period between the excitement of Christmas and the somber reflection of Lent --- "ordinary time". But we don't need liturgical specialists to tell us that, do we? It's ordinary time. We know that in our souls.

That's why I like today's text so much. Not just because it's gives us a backward-looking glance at Christmas. But because at heart, it is a story about light, and about perseverance. The story of these wise men, these ancient travelers, is an archetypal story about the journey of faith. The journey we're all on.

And as we've seen before, this faith journey, like all true faith journeys, this one starts not with answers but with a question: Where? It is the very first word of human speech in the NT. Where? "Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews," asks one of the magi of Herod.

"Where is the Christ in this dark world?"

That, of course, is what this story is trying to tell us. But to understand its message of hope, we first have to get a few facts right.

Traditionally we think of these men as kings, three of them to be precise. But we actually don't know how many there were. Matthew doesn't tell us.

And they're not kings at all. Tradition and our Christmas carols have made them so, but in truth they are magi --magicians and astrologers, not kings.

We've domesticated these mysterious travelers, first turning them into royalty and later dressing them in yellow bathrobes for our Christmas pageants. But in truth, they are pagans from the East, and they are indispensable to the story just as they are, in all their dark and wild mystery.

They are, first, astrologers. They studied the stars for a living, to divine the meaning of life from the cosmos. The moment they saw that new star rising they packed up their camels and set off for points unknown. Their journey reminds us that the search for meaning is at heart a search for God. It reminds some of us bookish Presbyterians that this search is not always centered around texts, even Biblical texts.

In fact, quite the opposite sometimes. In contrast to the Magi, the high priests and the scribes in this story are anchored in the biblical texts. They know from reading the book of Micah that the Messiah is to come from Bethlehem. And yet it seems to be an intellectual abstraction for them. They are unmoved by this information; they take no action. It seems they studied the holy texts so hard they missed the point; that it's God who animates these texts; who calls to us from them to come find the One born the light of the world.

Maybe most of all this story reminds us that our religion is not a local faith. Yes, Warren Wilson Presbyterian is essentially a neighborhood church, and all the better for that. We find God and meaning here in the comforting, beautiful glow of the sanctuary on Christmas Eve, in the feel and smell of our hymnals, in the familiar phrases and melodies of our hymns and carols.

We find God and meaning in the Passing of the Peace -- at least some of us do! -- and obviously we find God and meaning in the sharing of bread and wine, which we will do again today.

But that said, this is no local religion we're tied into. This story reminds us that the God we worship in here, this same God is out there, and has always been out there, roaming the night sky, shining starlight down on pagan astrologers in a region more recently governed by the likes of the Ayatollah Khomeni and the late Saddam Hussein.

So, these men and their long journey remind us that ours is not a local faith, and that God's revelations are not limited to texts but also come in starlight and dreams. Matthew famously tells us at the conclusion of this passage that the Magi are warned in a dream not to return to Jerusalem. And in response to that nighttime message, these travelers left for their own country by another road, as the text puts it.

Wouldn't you love to know more about that road? About where they went -- where home was for them, and how they got there? It's a captivating question, to be sure. But I think there's an earlier question, one that predates even that first "where" that launches human speech in the NT.

And that question is how did they get to Jerusalem in the first place? It seems to me that their journey to the Christ child is essential to this story, essential to their discovery of God and of the very meaning of their lives and profession.

But like the Magi themselves, their journey is a mystery. Matthew tells us almost nothing about who these men are, and even less about their trip. No one is sure where they come from, exactly.

Somewhere in the East--Persia (today's Iran) is an often-mentioned possibility. But perhaps they came from what is now Iraq, or Saudi Arabia, or even Afghanistan.

Wherever they came from, surely it was a long, hard trip. At times they must have been hungry, thirsty, cold, tired, depressed, disillusioned, bored, cynical, hopeless. They must have faced physical hardships and geographical challenges--threats from wild rivers and wild animals and wild people.

And still they pressed on in their journey. I don't say this because the idea of "journey" is a trendy concept these days. I say this because it's the truth. I believe in my bones that God is everywhere, always. God is in your breath and in your body, and in and through and behind the stars. Everywhere, always.

But I also know from my own experience, and from sharing with you in yours, and from the witness of this text, that finding God, and finding meaning in the events of our lives, is sometimes anything but easy.

At the start of this new year, I can virtually guarantee you that at some point on your journey you'll hit a sandstorm with no shelter to hide in. You'll come to a river with no bridge in sight. Eventually you'll be hungry and thirsty and tired. Disillusioned, bored and perhaps even hopeless.

Maybe you can see the light of God's own star shining up there in the night sky, but you're tired and tempted to quit the journey; to just give it up and go home and watch TV.

But I trust you won't. Like these famous Magi, I trust you will press on through the sometimes harrowing challenge of it all And you'll do that because it will be worth it.

Because you will find, finally, that Christ has been born in your darkness, that God has come in the night and not in the day. Not in the day when everything is so clear and so bright and so obvious, but in the night when your faith feels so small and your fears feel so large.

And when you do find this Christ, when your journey has led you to that divine manger, I trust you will join these mysterious travelers in opening up your treasure chest. I promise you, you'll be amazed at what you find there. Tears as precious to you as rubies. Grief born out of hard, beautiful losses that you wouldn't trade for money or happiness.

Memories--both joyful and sad--that rise in your mind like temple incense, absolutely holy, for they are your memories, the treasure of your life.

All of that an appropriate homage to offer the God you have finally found; this God who was born in your night, whom you've found because you tried to find the Holy One and you wouldn't quit until you did.

After the Magi arrive at court in Jerusalem, Herod counsels them to "go and search diligently for the child." He says it for the wrong reasons, but it is profound advice. Go and search diligently for the Child. And when you find him, I invite you to open up your treasure chests and pay him homage with everything you have.

Amen