God’s planning

“We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.” Matthew 2.2

Today is the feast of the Epiphany, when we are encouraged to focus on the visit of the wise men to the infant Jesus. Sometimes this can seem a bit odd, like returning to Christmas when the decorations have all come down! However, there is never any harm in going back to Christmas.

We read that a star led the wise men to Jesus. Presumably this involved some planning on God’s part! Was this star specially created, and if so, when? It may well have taken the light from that star some time to reach the earth and taken some organising to ensure that it guided certain men across many miles to a specific village. We are not told of anyone else benefitting from it – so was all this laid on so that these men could find Jesus?

The truth is that this is the effort God has gone to for each of us. In Acts 17, Paul was preaching in Athens and told the assembled people that God had decreed the times and places where they would live ‘so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him…’ (Acts 17:27). In other words, God has gone to immense trouble for all of us.

It’s wonderful to look back over our lives and recognise the people and events that God has used to

bring us to a deeper knowledge of himself. Why all the effort? The answer is quite simply because it matters so much to him that we find a relationship with him. He wants us so much that he has gone to great lengths to lay markers in our lives in order that we might find him, and all because we are worth it.

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