Kenneth Copeland - The History of the Magi
— Welcome everyone, once again to the Believer's Voice of Victory Broadcast. And we're talking about Christmas, Christ Mass. The celebration of the anointed One and his anointing. Excuse me. And so let's go back to the book of Matthew. Now, Matthew kept records. He's a tax collector. I was thinking about this last night, and then you brought it up earlier that Jesus picked him. And then he recorded the Sermon on the Mount. Luke wrote it as a documentary, but Matthew was there, and he recorded it. He kept records. He's a tax collector and he kept records. Good choice. And so now let's talk about the "Wise men", Matthew Chapter two. "Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him. When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him". Why? Let's read on. "And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes... And they said unto him, In Bethlehem of Judaea: for thus it is written by the prophet, And thou Bethlehem, in the land of Juda, art not the least among the princes of Juda: for out of thee shall come a Governor, that shall rule my people Israel". Okay, that's Micah 5:2. "Then Herod, when he had privily called the wise men, enquired of them diligently what time the star appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem, and said, Go and search diligently for the young child; and when ye have found him, bring me word again, that I may come and worship him also. When they had heard the king, they departed; and, lo, the star, which they saw in the east, went before them, till it came and stood over where the young child was". So see the montage... they were not at the manger. He was two years old or older where the young child was. "When they saw the star, they rejoiced, exceeding great joy. And when they come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary, his mother".
— They're not in a cave, they're in a house.
— They're in a house. Now there's nothing wrong with that. I mean, it puts it all in one. It's a nativity scene, which is fine, but we might as well get it right. "And worshiped him. When they had opened their treasures," noticed that, treasures, "they presented unto him gifts, gold, frankincense and myrrh". So three gifts must have been three wise men. No. They were called Magi from the East. They were astronomers and in Rick's book for the audience, this is more like it. And they had to pass through. And you see a whole train of people back here. They had to pass through some very dangerous country and territory to get there. So they had troops. They were very, very wealthy men. Daniel was a Magi and dreams and astrology, so very, very, very wealthy people. They brought onto him their treasures. So there were upwards of 500 people in this group and they came and brought their treasures. Now, think about this... Exceedingly great joy, young child. "And when they were departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise, and take the young child into Egypt". They financed it. They funded it.
— He has to go to Egypt to fulfill Abraham and them coming out of Egypt. They'll come out of Egypt. Jesus will come out of Egypt the correct way, not in unbelief like the children of Israel did. Now, you got to go to history. If you go to history with these guys, first of all, Daniel and all the brightest and best young people of Israel were taken to Babylon in Assyria's captivity. And they did that on purpose. So we know they go back to their homeland with Nehemiah and all that, King Cyrus lets them all go back. But some of those people stayed. They had taught, Daniel had taught the best and the brightest in those lands. Now, Alexander the Great, there's a period of time of about 400 years called the Intertestamental period. And so many fabulous things happened right there to set Jesus up, coming from the end of Malachi to that first part of Matthew, there was a period of about 400 years of sometimes we call darkness. In those 400 years Alexander the Great... Well, this is where Hanukkah comes from, Antiochus Epiphany, the Judah Maccabee, rededication of the temple. In the Winter, Jesus celebrated, John Chapter ten. But inside of that, there are battles that happened between the Greeks and these Persians or Babylonians or Assyrians. They don't come straight across the desert of Iraq and Saudi Arabia. They'll go up and around to get there because nobody goes straight across the desert, it's crazy. So to this day, they rarely do that, they go around. Abraham went around, Rome feared them, Herod feared them.
— Oh, listen, that shook him up. One word in and then he's through.
— Well, Herod's on the throne illegitimately. He's not in the seat of David. He's not of the house of David. So if there's a king of the House of David, give me that prophecy. I want to know what this is about, because my time's up. Herod is very paranoid. He built these fortifications and temples and he built things for the Romans so that he could keep happy with them, appease them. Caesarea Philippi, Caesarea, where Cornelius will be, was built largely by Herod or Herod the Great we call him. He rebuilt the temple and made it look fancier. And so when these guys show up and they say who he is, they're not going to go into Roman territory with just three guys on camel.
— You can't do that.
— They had an army with them. And so when Rome would hear about them coming, this is the great forces that fought over this land for 400 years prior to Jesus coming. And so now, wait a minute, I've got an Assyrian, I got a Magi army showing up here. What's going on? Well, the king of the Jews has been born, and this is why he's talking so nicely to them. Tell me where he is. I want to worship him myself. No, he wants to put an end to all of it.
— And it said all of Jerusalem was disturbed when they came to town. Well, think who took them into captivity there in Daniel's day. It was these guys. I mean, it's not bad enough we have the Romans and we had the Greeks before them. And now here these guys are again. And what did those guys do? They destroyed their temple. So this is all that motivation of everything that's going on. This is why all of Jerusalem's upset. They're coming to destroy the temple again. These are the guys who offered pigs in our temple. You see how all of those past historical figures are coming to light for them. So when they show up, you can't think of three guys on camels.
— No, no, no.
— This is an army.
— With three little boxes.
— No, no, those camels would have been weighed down. Now, think about that. That's Genesis 12:3, all of what they had suffered. Remember, they came out of Egypt with silver and gold.
— Yes, that's right.
— And all the treasures of the Egyptians. Well, they didn't come out of that with Babylon, with all their wealth. All their wealth came to the king. They came later. But it came to Jesus and that family, that will fund their entire time in Egypt and going back. And they have to go to Egypt. They have to hurry to do that because they have to fulfill that, because Herod will become so freaked out and scared about this that he's going to have the kids killed. And he chooses two years and under because he doesn't know the exact time. So killing off children is nothing new. That's the pattern from Moses. That's the pattern with the firstborn and Passover. That's the pattern we saw just recently with Hamas invading Israel. What'd they do? They killed a whole bunch of babies. That's that same enemy. And it's the same thing. And it played out.
— The devil... Well, you have to go into his history, which possibly tomorrow we'll do that. But he has been after everything that belongs to God because he at one time was an archangel. The Scripture says he was perfect in the day that he was created, God created him. He was perfect in the day that he was created and he was the archangel of music, maybe we'll go into this...
— He's got anxiety and paranoia.
— Maybe we'll go into some of these things for next week because it set him off right there in the Garden of Eden. There's coming one. So he began to kill all the prophets. Is this the one? Is this the one? And he didn't know.
— Well, had he known, he would have never allowed Jesus...
— That's right.
— He wouldn't have...
— And he certainly wouldn't of crucified him.
— No. Which was prophesied centuries before it ever happened. And matter of fact, the words Jesus will say were prophesied in Psalm 22, I mean, long before it ever happened.
— And Jesus said, I saw him fall. He said, that's no big deal.
— Like lightning he said, how fast is a bolt of lightning. It happened that quick.
— He was cast down. Anyway.
— I think the battle when he defeated Satan, took the death, held the graves and was just as fast a battle, done, anyway.
— So all of this, the history of all of it from the beginning to the end is here. And there have been just enough. Now in the Tehillim, it says that a righteous person, the older they get the more heaven calls and it just gets to looking good. But when a righteous man, they list something like 900 different ways to die. But when you have finished your job, you've finished your course and you finish it to the end. Then it's called the Kiss of Death. In other words, come home. That happened to Mylon LeFevre.
— That's right. I talked with Christi on the phone and I mean, he was just as up... And then I found out later the rest of the story, she said, Mylon said, "I'm gonna die in my own bed. I'm not going to die out on a road somewhere". She said, "Brother Copeland, just before you called, he said, 'Christi, put me to bed. Put me to bed now.'" So she did. And when I was talking to them on the phone, that's where he was. Man, he was up. He said, "I want you to know, he's praising God". He said, "I'm expecting my miracle". Never did quit. And just a little while after that, he looked up at her and he began to give her certain instructions about things. And he said, "Christi..." she was holding him in her arms. He said, "Christi, I love you and I am healed". And those were the last words he said and he was gone. Pat Robertson, 93 years old. I visited him and he went in and gave instructions, talked to his daughters. They began to sing songs and he would finish them. And he just went to sleep. He finished his course. Mylon finished his course.
— There's no darkness in them Brother Copeland, they're children of the light. This is why... Think about this. I mentioned it a day or so ago about the light of the world. Jesus proclaimed it and light be at the very beginning. This is pointing to a person. And when they came, what were they looking for? His light, his star.
— His star.
— They saw in the East. Let me give you the verse. Numbers 25. It's prophesied... I'm sorry, numbers 24, numbers 24, verse 17. "I shall see him, but not now. I shall behold him, but not nigh: there shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel, and shall smite the corners of Moab, and destroy all the children of Sheth". That's what Herod's afraid of. Okay this Star has come out of Jacob. This Star that has come out, Jacob, David is out of this. Herod's not Jewish like that. He doesn't have that heritage, doesn't have that covenant. So he's going to try to snuff it out. But that star is prophesied right there.
— Praise God.
— So that light is in us. We are children of the light.
— If the Lord agrees to it, next week, we'll talk about Herod's death and some things about Lucifer and so forth. But right now, that's not the thing to do. But what here is important, in the 58th chapter of the book of Isaiah. "Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins. Wherefore have we fasted, say they," Now, if I remember correctly, and this is the fast not to deliver bread to the hungry, this is where Operation Blessing came from. Right there. We were talking about Pat Robertson. That's where it came from. And you read on down verse 13, "If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth". "The Word of the Lord came to me and he said, 'The day is coming when the airlines will not be fit to ride and you will not be able to carry out the things that I've called you to do and will call you to do.' This was early on, he took me to that". He said, "That's Jets, calls you to ride upon the high places of the earth". Well, airplanes that are flying, you know, the little pressurized 421 was a nice, nice piston airplane. But it just didn't have the altitude. But now some low type weather, but not the high places of the earth, not in the 40 to 50,000 feet. That's where I found my jet right there. And I had a plaque made of that scripture. You get in the Citation X, it's right there. You get in the Gulfstream, it's right there. And that was certainly prophetic because of the nations and being called to Africa and being called to South Africa, Nigeria and other places all over this earth. And when it came time to go to the dedication of the embassy in Jerusalem, which should have been all the time, the American embassy should have been there, then to do that, there was a prescribed route to Tel Aviv. We had to have an airplane that could follow that. And so I was very honored to sit there and see it for myself as that embassy was dedicated. Oh, Lord Jesus. See the book told me what to stand on. And I underlined it and then I put the other scriptures down there. Genesis 48:15, Genesis 49:25. But it's in here. So I've learned over the years Greg... You and I both learned from Brother Hagin. Find the promise.
— Yes, sir.
— Find it in the Book. Don't do anything until you can stand on his words. He's not a man that he should lie. He's not the son of man that he should repent. Has he not said it, will he not make it good? Yes, amen, absolutely.
— You know, you reversed the curse of the high places. When the kingdom split in Israel, the North in Dan, the highest mountain, Mount Hermon up there, they built a temple. They built their own altar for the nations in the high places. But it was wrong. God didn't tell them to do that. You went back to the Word and found the right way to take the Word, the covenant to the nation on the high places. You're fulfilling that.
— So in doing so, it's all in the sixth chapter of the book of Ephesians. We wrestle not with flesh and blood, but with principalities and powers, rulers of the darkness of this world and wicked spirits in the heavenlies. And having done all the stand, stand therefore, having on the full armor of God. So make your stand and don't quit. Praise God. Don't ever quit... How much time do I have Carol?
— 45 seconds.
— My very, very close friend, one of my flight instructors. It happened before I knew him. He was in a crash in Long Beach, California. And I won't go into all the details. I will... Well, why don't I just do that tomorrow instead of doing that here because it's very important and we will see you tomorrow. Praise God. We'll be back in just a few minutes.