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

I have always been fascinated by the Magi.

When I was a child and we would put out our little manger scene, they were the ones I wanted to handle and place and ponder. And I remember being annoyingly and self-rightously angry when everyone laughed and thought it cute that my sister called them the “Three Wise Guys”.

You didn’t disrespect the Magi around me, even then.

I’m not sure exactly what it was about them, I guess I thought it was amazing that these three mysterious, different men traveled such a great distance, to arrive just a few minutes after the shepherds on that silent and holy night.

Then I went to seminary.

And I learned how to pay attention to what was really written in the story, rather than what I thought was there, or wanted the story to contain.

I learned to read that they didn’t show up at the stable where the infant was, they showed up at a house where the child was, and the words used were specific and clear, so the gifts were probably given a few years after the night of the singing angels.

And then I realized that nowhere in the Bible does it say that there were three of them, that is a testimony to the song-writing ability of an American Episcopal Priest, John Henry Hopkins, Jr., whose words “We Three Kings of Orient Are” are so deeply embedded in our minds! Scripture does mention three gifts, but if the number of gifts is an indication of the number of givers, well most of our Christmas morning scenes would make a lie out of that. I personally know of one little girl who must have a hundred or more grandmothers, based upon the number of boxes I saw with her name on them, in her grandmother’s handwriting, last week! So three gifts did not necessarily mean three givers, in fact some of the early Church legends identify 12 Magi, an echo of the tribes of Israel and foreshadowing of the Disciples!

But none of this fancy, technical stuff that I learned in Seminary did anything to diminish my affection for and attraction to the Magi. More than anything else I realized, in seminary, and I have tried to convey ever since, that if you and I want to really find ourselves in the Christmas story the Magi are the people we need to study.

They are the “us” in the story.

Foreigners to the Jewish tradition, that’s us.

Well-meaning and sincere, that’s us.

Willing to give generously, that’s us.

Enthusiastically seeking to follow God, that’s us.

Certain that we know where God is leading us, that’s us.

And yet, doing unknown damage to others with our enthusiasm for God and our certainty as to the mind of God, that’s us, as well, isn’t it?

There they were, nearing the end of their journey to the westward leading star and they found themselves in the land of the Jews. And Matthew gets vague here, why did they go to Jerusalem? Why not Bethlehem?

Well I’ve always had an answer for that mystery, I’ve always believed that when they got close they stopped looking for the star, they knew where they were and they knew that the only place around that would give birth to a King would be Jerusalem.

They trusted what they all knew rather than trusting God’s star to lead them.

This was the first, but not the last, incident in the life of Jesus where the words “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do” would be applicable.

That’s us, isn’t it?

I know it has been me at times, many times. I get so excited about what is coming up and I know, I know as sure as they knew that a King of the Jews would be in Jerusalem, I know where God is leading me and us, and so I barrel on, oblivious to the hurt and pain and disrespect that I leave behind me.

The Magi spent years following God’s leading and then, right at the end, they figured they knew what came next and stopped looking for the star. And the result was devastation and pain in Bethlehem as the crazy King Herod tried to stop this Incarnation business before it had a chance to get going and ruin his life and the lives of all such people, either destroying them or making them into something far better than they had ever been before.

And it seems to me that whenever we let ourselves stop following the star; whenever we trust what every one knows to be true, rather than trusting God; whenever we, ourselves, decide what is important and what is not in our lives and our families and our Church and our nation, rather than following the stars of scripture and tradition; bad things begin to happen and we open the way for people like Herod. Or, worse yet, we become people like Herod.

But of course, the good news is that Herod failed to kill Christmas and so we will too.

Christmas can’t be killed, not by our commercialism, not by our tacky decorations, not by people who choose to say Happy Holiday, not by arguments over manger scenes on public property being allowed or excluded, Christmas can’t even be killed by our stressing over making everything perfect and sorrow free.

Herod couldn’t do it, even with the assistance of the well-meaning, blundering wise men.

And that is good to remember as we look back on a Christmas season that was less than perfect for so many of us. Even God did not produce a Christmas which was perfect and stress-free and sorrow-free, God produced a Christmas that could endure all of the imperfections and stresses and sorrows of this life. A Christmas for blundering Magi and folks like you and me.

So Christmas lives on, and on, and on, for all those who will follow God to unexpected and familiar places and people. they left for their own country by another road.

And here is how I hope the Magi are still like us, or we are like them.

They didn’t go back to Herod, just because they were expected to, or just because they were told to, they didn’t go back to the old places and ways of power, they knew that there was a new power in the world! A power greater than Jerusalem or Rome or their own Persian king.

And so they went home differently, not just in terms of their directions, but in terms of their understanding.

The road they traveled was different, every road that they traveled would be different for that matter.

And can the same be said for us? Four days into the road of 2009, the road that will take us through the seasons until we make our way back to Bethlehem, again, are we traveling differently?

I know it popular for preachers to answer that kind of rhetorical question with a “no” and then urge us to do so, but I know the answer is yes, you and I wouldn’t be here today if the answer wasn’t yes. The tourists of Christmas Eve are gone, they’ll be back when lilies are in style in April, but the pilgrims are here.

And I have seen us, in years past, leave Bethlehem fully determined to do life differently. I have watched as we turn our Christmas Eve promises into New Year’s Resolutions and, for a while, we succeed, but then it fades not because it is too hard for us, but so often because it isn’t as interesting or as much fun as we want.

So perhaps this year we will realize that the uninteresting and un-fun stuff is exactly where we are tested the most. It is not in the crisis but it is in the routine things where we lose our faith, isn’t it?

I have seen so many of you and us together as a community of faith respond with amazing courage and stamina and faith when the crisis comes calling into our lives, but when the weary days come and the routine tasks, the boring things of life envelop us, we stop looking for stars, we figure it’s all the same old, same old and we know the direction to travel.

But isn’t one of the key lessons of this season that our God is the God of the sacredly ordinary?

A mother, a father and a child – a family, troubled and confused, not much different that mine or yours.

A place, Bethlehem, overlooked by many with nothing special to recommend it except for God’s presence, not much different than Clover Hill.

Lives to be lived and transformed by love given without measure and without precondition, not much different that our lives.

We travel into 2009 without some folks whom we knew and loved.

We travel into 2009 with some new folks who have become a part of us and our lives.

We travel a different road than we ever walked before, the only real question is will we expect to see and follow the star or will we leave that with the wrapping paper and gifts?

On Christmas Eve I ended my sermon with Howard Thurman’s words “I will light candles”, well that same great preacher and theologian and pastor has a contribution for us to start the year with, differently and together:

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