The Promised Ruler

Anna was a widowed prophet who ministered in the temple in Jerusalem. Day and night she worshiped in the house of God, praying for his promised Messiah. Anna recognized the answer to her prayers the moment Mary and Joseph entered the temple with their young son. She praised God for allowing her to live long enough to see the Savior. Then she embarked on a one-woman crusade to help others in the temple recognize the truth she’d been given. Anna wanted everyone to know that the child Jesus was God’s promised King—the One who would deliver Israel.

Two years later Magi arrived from the east. The fact that these wise men referred to Jesus as the “king of the Jews” suggests they were Gentiles. The book of Matthew doesn’t tell us how these God fearing non-Jews knew about the world-changing birth that had occurred; Matthew only reveals that they followed a star.

When they got to Jerusalem, they asked  everyone they saw where they could find the young ruler. They must have been stunned to discover that no one knew who they were referring to. How could the  Jewish people be unaware that their King had been born?

Jesus’ birth may have been largely  disregarded, but someday every  person who has ever lived will fully acknowledge Jesus as the powerful King that he is (Romans 14:11). In today’s world, wealthy or influential people are often viewed as the wielders of power. Industry magazines and websites love to publish lists of the “most powerful people” in a given business universe. These lists are wildly subjective, of course. Quantifying a  person’s power and influence is hard enough. Ranking people’s relative power is nearly impossible without resorting to bias or guesswork.

What’s indisputable, as the apostle  Paul asserted, is that absolute power is found only in Jesus. Any comparative analysis between Jesus and those who top the “world’s most powerful” lists will be decidedly one-sided. The most powerful ruler or most influential person in all  human history will pale next to Jesus. 

More to the point, every powerful or  influential figure who ever lived will one day kneel before Jesus in absolute submission.

See also: Matthew 2:2; Luke 2:38; Colossians 2:10

The above article was adapted from JESUS which my team created for Time Inc. It appears in the winter of 2014-2015 as a special edition magazine within the USA.