WHAT ARE WE LOOKING FOR?

Scripture for the day: Matthew 2:1-4 Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, saying, “Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we have seen His star in the East and have come to worship Him.”
When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born.
Thought for the day: When I was a child, my mother told me to make sure my room was cleaned and put in order because, to use her words, “Uncle Henry said he’s coming for a visit and we wouldn’t want him to walk into a mess, now would we?” I didn’t ask questions, but I got the impression Uncle Henry must have been someone of great importance in the family. Perhaps he was the rich uncle everyone wished they had. He would saunter in through the front door one day, bringing gifts beyond my imagination and everything would be wonderful from that day forward.
 Several years passed with no sign of uncle Henry. Still, my mom reminded me from time to time of the need to make sure I was doing well in school or doing my chores or cleaning my room, for “uncle Henry may come this week and we wouldn’t want him to walk into a mess, now would we?” Finally, as I moved on into high school, I began to think uncle Henry was perhaps more of an idea than a real person. Perhaps, just maybe, my dear mother had been using this ‘uncle Henry’ as a means of getting me to clean my room and behave.
 Well, finally, I began to worry a lot less about the appearance of my room or whether my homework was done properly, for fear of uncle Henry walking into a mess. Then, one day, with no notice whatsoever, I turned into our front yard and, to my surprise, sat a big shiny car with out-of-State license plates. Could it be? Could Uncle Henry have finally arrived? I ran toward the house, hoping beyond hope that all those warnings my mom had provided had finally come true. 
 I wonder, what of the people of Israel and Judah in the days when Matthew’s gospel was being lived out? Were they looking for the Messiah? Were they really? Everything we’ve read says that everyone, from the greatest to the least, was taught from a very young age that the Messiah would come and that they should be watchful so as not to be taken by surprise. Every girl grew up wondering if she might be the one whom God chose to birth the Messiah. Every boy hoped he might the be one God would choose to use for the deliverance of His people. Or did they? Had the coming of the Messiah become such a recurring story that the people, even those who should have known better, had begun to think of Him as more of an idea than a reality? Perhaps the Emmanuel was just a story mothers all over the land told to get their children to behave and clean their rooms.
 When the magi showed up in Jerusalem, the impression we get is that they were the only ones looking for the Christ child. Everyone else, despite hundreds of years of promises that He would come, were taken completely by surprise. And what of you and me? For years, generations even, we have been told of the second coming of the Lord. We’ve been warned to keep our “rooms” clean and behave ourselves because we wouldn’t want Him to walk into a mess, would we?
 There is wisdom in the old saying: “Plan as if He were never coming back; live as if He were coming today.”
Now go take on your world.  -  Bill