As the young family entered the temple, Simeon was waiting. He had received a promise from God that he would see the Messiah before he died. As Mary, Joseph and their little one arrived, Simeon was right there, and received a nudge from God that this child was from Heaven.
Following after the shepherds there was the visit of the magi who brought very expensive treasures for this newborn king. After their visit Joseph was warned in a dream to flee from the jealousy of Herod. So they made the trip south to Egypt where Herod would have no authority.
Mary bore her son and laid Him in a manger. This young family were far from home and most of the people they knew well. So there would be no visitors to see the little one. Suddenly onto the scene came some shepherds saying they had had an angelic visitation!
We suppose that Mary was not the sort of young woman who was sleeping around. If she had been raped, she would surely have shared the shock of that with her family, as well as with Joseph. In the following verse we read of the dream that brought Joseph peace.
This is the first mention of the first Mary this month. She probably deserves a month to herself. They all do! Often people get confused about which things happened to which Mary, it is not always clear. So a month looking at all of them seemed like a good idea.
As we read the gospels, there seem at certain moments to be too many Marys! Three of them are mentioned in this verse. So we will attempt this month to decipher which Mary is which and look at the roles they played in and around the life of Jesus Christ.
Jesus is introduced in this passage as the one who is Faithful and True. And we could easily spend a few more days looking at those names for Jesus. But the KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS sounds a good and complete name to finish our study with.
In Jeremiah 51 we read that the prophet is pleading with the people to escape from the place of evil. God had promised to destroy Babylon because of their false gods and their injustices towards His people. And if the Israelites did not flea they too would be destroyed also.
The Revelation of John calls Jesus the Faithful Witness. What a great name that is. Jesus witnessed everything about life on earth, and through every one of His trials, difficulties, disappointments and pain, He remained faithful to His Father. And to the mission He was sent to earth to accomplish.
These verses come at the end of the conversation that Gideon, a very scared young man, had while hiding in a winepress to thresh the grain. He was terrified of the Midianite army who were causing fear and chaos amongst the Israelites. The change began when Gideon obeyed the instructions.
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