Kopp Disclosure
(John 3:19-21)
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Christmas Letter to the Wise Men
“Wise men asked, ‘Where is He who has
been born king of the Jews?
We saw His star and have come to
worship Him.’
Herod the king was troubled to hear
the news; saying to them,
‘When you find Him, let me know where
He is
so I can worship Him with you.’
After leaving Herod, the star that
they had
seen when it rose went before them
until
it came to rest over the place where
the child was born.
They rejoiced exceedingly with great
joy!
They worshiped Him!
Then, opening their treasures, they
offered Him gifts,
gold and frankincense and myrrh.
Warned in a dream about Herod, they
did not report back to him.”
Dear Wise
Men,
Knowledge
is different from wisdom.
Anybody
can accumulate knowledge from books, newspapers, libraries, television, movies,
schools, workshops, conferences, cyberspace, and countless other catalogues.
I’ll never
forget the student who said he didn’t feel he had what it takes to finish a
graduate degree. I told him to look at
people who have done it before him. I
said, “If they can do it,…” He was
relieved, encouraged, and completed the courses.
Anybody
can get answers to fill in blanks.
Meaning
is harder to
grasp.
Degrees
and diplomas don’t guarantee it.
Graduating from gathering information about someone or
something to comprehending someone or something requires wisdom.
It happens when knowing about someone or something
matures into knowing them.
Knowledge without wisdom is like Christianity without
Jesus by the book – more hollow than holy…style without substance…form without
content.
Knowledge is right in front of us. We can grab it for ourselves.
Knowledge, by itself, is like those pieces of paper hung
on walls with no purpose other than hanging on walls to prove we’ve got lots of
information stored up about someone or something.
It’s useless without wisdom.
Wisdom is knowing what to do with what you know.
Wisdom is mysterious…Spiritual. We can’t get it without God. That’s why we pray for it; asking God to take
what we know and employ it.
Knowledge with wisdom is taking what’s been accumulated
and doing something with it for God’s sake; and when something’s done for God’s
sake, it always ends up benefiting others including the ones who did it.
How too many people have talked about you over the years
is pret’ near perfectly illustrative.
They gather facts and details and then don’t know what to
do with them.
They dig and dig and dig trying to discover where “from
the east” you came from as if it mattered then or matters now to Him who never
respected class, color, or culture.
They try to estimate your wealth – people, especially
Americans, are into that – because you must have had enough of it to open your
treasure chests and give part of it to Him; again, as if money mattered then or
matters now to Him who said to get rid of everything that gets in the way of
following Him.
They talk about how smart you were; as if He’s ever been
into astrology, magic, and the other stuff that would get you kicked out of
lots of churches today with more litmus tests for salvation than Jesus ever
had.
Annnnnnnd by spending sooooooo much time on
all of that knowledge not to mention laboring over those symbolic
gifts ad nauseam, too many well-
meaning but misguided folks have missed what made you so
notoriously wise.
You looked for Jesus at the Spirit’s leading and worshiped
Him as soon as you found Him.
That’s wisdom making the best use of the most important
knowledge of all.
People are so easily distracted from what’s really
important.
Those gifts come to mind: gold for king as if Jesus
ever demanded being treated like royalty at the expense of anyone else and even
made a very big deal about serving rather than being served after the example
that He set which comes as a big surprise to churches and clergy who are into
expensive ornaments and clothes at the expense of the poor; incense for a
priest as if Jesus needed anything but Himself to enable holy communion and
made a very big deal about religious things getting in the way of direct holy
communion with Him by grace through faith; and, finally, myrrh, a gooey
substance used to help embalm the bodies of the dead, which probably bothered
mom and dad in an Isaiah 53 suffering servant kinda way as a preview of coming
attractions.
Come to think of it, except for Jesus, I haven’t ever
heard of a mom getting myrrh for a baby shower or baby getting it on her/his
birthday.
Of course, this baby was different from every other baby
that ever entered time – “Before you were born,” He said of all of us, “I knew
you. Then I made you. I knit you together in your mother’s womb!” –
which is a good thing because everybody knows salvation had to come from out of
this world.
So it wasn’t your money or education or any other
accumulation of anything else that made you wise.
It was worshiping Jesus as Lord and Savior that set you
and people like you ever since apart as wise.
I remember Dean Adams being asked if it’s possible to be a
Christian without worshiping regularly with other Christians. He paused, pondered, and then said, “Well, I
guess it’s possible to be a Christian without worshiping regularly with
other Christians; but I’ve never met a Christian who didn’t worship regularly
with other Christians.”
One more thing.
Matthew says you were “warned
in a dream not to return to Herod.”
I remember you asking him for
directions to the child; and he pretended that he wanted to know where he could
rendez-vous with you to join you in worship.
We know he wasn’t really
interested in Him as Lord and Savior; only interested in getting Him out of the
way as a rival to his control over people.
Maybe that’s where that “Wise
Men Still Seek Him” bumper sticker originated.
When we’re wise, we look for
Him alone.
When we’re wise, we’re not
distracted by anyone or anything else from who He is and what only He can
offer.
When we’re wise, we manage
everything that we are and have accumulated over time in ways that honor Him.
Time.
Talent.
Thoughts.
Treasures.
We place all of it on an altar
of sacrifice before Him; knowing that what we’ve just given up in time can’t be
compared to what’s been given to us by Him forever.
That’s wisdom.
Thank you for accepting it from
Him to share with us.
Affectionately,
Part of the Family
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Blessings and Love!
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