Matthew 2:13-23
13 When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”
14 So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, 15 where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”[c]
16 When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. 17 Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:
18 “A voice is heard in Ramah,
weeping and great mourning,
Rachel weeping for her children
and refusing to be comforted,
because they are no more.”[d]
The Return to Nazareth
19 After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt 20 and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child’s life are dead.”
21 So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. 22 But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, 23 and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets, that he would be called a Nazarene.
Have you ever experienced deja vu? That feeling that you have experienced something before? I have often wondered when I get that feeling if it is God encouraging me to pay attention to what is happening around me, that there is some deeper and more importance significance to what is happening. As we read this passage you may get a similar experience of deja vu. Have I heard this before?
The answer is yes, especially if you are Jewish. There is another story where God’s prophet is born and the king is afraid of the blessing of God on the people of Israel. So, he decided to kill all the babies. That story is the story of Moses. The author Matthew is purposefully highlighting key details about Jesus in order to draw a parallel between him and Moses. This will continue as Jesus crosses through the waters of baptism and goes into the wilderness for 40 days Before climbing a mountain and presenting the new Torah, or teachings of how to live as the people of God.
Moses was the greatest prophet of the Old Testament. He represented God to the nation of Israel, rescuing them from slavery, giving them the Torah (laws), establishing the worship system of the nation and leading them to the promised land. More so than at any other time in their history, the people walked with God.
Matthew wants us to know that Jesus came to rescue us from our slavery. This is not the slavery of Egypt but the slavery born of sin. Jesus would come to rescue us from the slavery of our sins, show us how to live in a way that honours God and lead us to a promised land.
I watch a lot of debates on youtube about Christianity and politics. What you will realise quite quickly is that people use the same words to mean different things. The most obvious is the word freedom. This is described as the liberty to do what I want, when I want (provided it is not hurting someone else). I have the freedom to have a gun, says one American argued. Or I heard a woman say that I am free to have a relationship with whomever I choose. However, there is another more ancient understanding of freedom. It is the liberty to not do what I shouldn’t. Freedom in this way is not getting to eat whatever you want to but being able to not eat the things that you shouldn’t. It is not being allowed to lust after people but being able to stop. Too often our lives go round in circles, trapped in cycles of sin and unable to truly stop. Deja vu.
Jesus says in John 10:10 that he came so that we could live life to the fullest! That is freedom. The road to that kind of freedom lies through repentance, deliverance and faith. It is a path of holy living, loving kindness and Gospel impact. As we choose to trust in Jesus and follow his teachings we become more like him and do what he did.
Practice: Do something you don’t want to do. Do a chore for someone else and do not tell them.
