Matthew 2:13-23 Commentary

Well this is a real “Merry Christmas!” story, isn’t it? While not all of us have had a warm and fuzzy Christmas, many of us have had the privilege and joy of spending time with loved ones, relaxing, and enjoying the holidays. This story shocks us out of the feel-goods and brings us back to the reality of struggle and suffering.

Too many around the world find the harsh reality of evil all too familiar, even during “the most wonderful time of the year.” No time or place is safe. Just as soon as the Son of God is born and worshipped by the visiting magi, evil threatens. Just as soon as the houseguests go home, God sends another messenger to Joseph’s dreams. Wars continue to rage, cancers continue to metastasise, relationships continue to drift… you get the drift.

When things feel cozy for the little holy family, an angel appears to Joseph in a dream and tells him that they are not safe. Those of us who were in the gospel text last week know the pattern by now: the messenger from God will tell Joseph what to do, and Joseph will be obedient– again, I might add, without Joseph even speaking a single word. Joseph does no verbal reasoning it out, nor does he make any proclamations of faith. He shows instead of tells.

Joseph, Mary and Jesus flee from the terror of Herod, but this too is a pattern as we are reminded of all that God’s people have been through. Each of the prophetic fulfillments that Matthew highlights are touchstones of pain and suffering for Israel. God’s people came “out of Egypt” where they had been enslaved for generations. The massacre of innocents that Jesus escapes but other Jewish children are subjected to, leads to Rachel weeping: generation after generation of God’s people mourning their losses at the hands of outside rulers. Even the social ostracism of being someone from Nazareth weighs on the heart and mind. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” They’ll ridicule Jesus before even meeting him…

This Christmas story of the road out of Israel and then home again reminds us that though the promise of victory is real, evil continues to put up its rebellious fight. We continue to look for the fulfillment of all God’s promises and for Jesus’s return, hoping and praying for the time when God will make us all safe and there will be no more reasons to fear.

Herod feared the threat to his power. Herod feared what the hope of the promise of Jesus would do to the people under his rule. Herod feared and it led to awful, awful violence and murder; we might even say genocide. Evil breeds in fear. And even when one source of danger and fear is gone, another will be there to take its place. As the text says, Herod’s death did not bring an end to the danger, just its own little reprieve. Like Herod took his father’s place as a fear-mongering ruler, Archelaus takes Herod’s place.

In the face of ever-present evil, we need an ever-present Messiah who cares even more about making his love known than evil cares about fear. So this Christmas, feeling quite sure of my ability to speak of the evil I see being perpetrated in the world around me, I’m wondering how many times God has sent a messenger into people’s dreams and told them what to do to escape danger. I’m wondering how many times God has sent a messenger into people’s dreams and told them what to do to help others escape the snares of evil. I’m wondering how many times God has made his presence known in those darkest moments when everything looks unbearably hard and impossible. Just as fulfilling of these Old Testament prophecies is the promise that our Saviour is the Suffering Servant.

And I can’t help but remember John in his prison cell, having to come to terms that his suffering would not end, but that there was so much good news for others. That though his hope for the ever-present power of God would not come to be, it did not mean that such ever-present power did not exist: that somehow, it was still near unto him in the valley of the shadow of his death.

Finally, I’m wondering how many times we’ve ignored God’s messengers—in our dreams or in the news or on our social media feeds. Because we know that even though they aren’t mentioned, there were a lot of people who helped Joseph, Mary and Jesus along the way to and from Egypt. Perhaps it is in this untold part of the story that the “Merry Christmas!” vibe still rings true.

Textual Point

Jesus becomes the New Israel from the get-go. All of these notes about Jesus’s situation fulfilling prophecy have less to do with orchestrating scenarios to cross off some boxes and more about showing how Jesus is our Emmanuel. Jesus is God-with-us in all of the circumstances we go through, good and bad. As Donald Hagner writes, Jesus is the one who “relives, sums up, and brings to fruition all the history and experience of his people.”

Illustration Idea

Artists have been depicting Joseph, Mary and Jesus’s journey to and from Egypt for as long as there have been artistic renderings of New Testament stories. For many years, the title matched the added title in many of our Bibles: “Flight to Egypt.” However, in the last few years, a different title and scene has come to the fore—that of the family as refugees. Like some of the pieces in this gallery from Kelly Latimer, the holy family can be easily recognized in modern scenes and yet we still know them by their halos and the worried-yet-resolute looks on Joseph and Mary’s faces.