Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Is Astrology in the Bible? | Advent | Matthew 2:1-12

Episode Date: December 1, 2022

The wisemen followed the stars to get to Jesus's birth, were they astrologists? Is astrology real? How can God reveal himself through astrology? In today's episode, Patrick uses Matthew 2:1-12 to discuss the ways God reveals himself to people. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it with others, so others can find it too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter@TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Matthew 2:1-12 Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now.

Welcome to 10-minute Bible talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Patrick Miller. So what do you think about astrology? I was talking to an incredibly intelligent Christian the other day who was telling me all about her personality and how she's naturally confrontational and direct. And so she did all the normal stuff, talked about her Myers-Briggs personality, her aneogram, again, all the usual suspects.

But then she dropped that she's a Leo, and that's part of why she is the way she is. Now, to be honest, she didn't go into much depth on the topic. And to be even more honest, it was a meaningless statement to me. I don't know anything about Leo's or astrology in general. I couldn't tell you what I am. And I can't remember the last time I looked at a horoscope. I mean, unless you're talking about those little placemats at Chinese restaurants, which all by the way, say that I'm a rabbit. And that's not very cool. So I kind of want to flub the numbers and pretend to be a dragon. But that's besides the point. Recent polls suggest that astrology is actually on the rise right now. That's especially true amongst Gen Z and people who don't

identify strongly with any religious tradition. Sociologists suggest that in the absence of a thick sense of religion or belief, many people are turning to astrology to give them a quick hit of religious dopamine. Now, you can probably guess where I fall on astrology just based on what I've already said. And that's partially because the Old Testament has some very, very not nice things to say about astrologers. The Old Testament, treats astrology as a power of darkness, not a power of light. But again, in the spirit of total transparency, I'm equally confused by astrology because I'm simply a modern person who believes in science. The idea that my future is determined by the Earth's relationship to different planets and stars

sounds kind of silly to me. And it's really easy to prove that idea false. Okay, now I know what you're thinking. Are we doing a series on Christmas right now? So what the heck is happening? Why are we talking about astrology. Well, it's just that I like to wrestle with the hard things in the Bible. And today's passage has, to be honest with you, caused me a lot of trouble because it's a story about astrologers. It's a story about a bunch of astrologers who use the planets and the stars to divine Jesus's birth and to find him. What in the world do I do with that? You're probably familiar with the story of the wise men or the magi. Now, Magi is literally the first few letters to the word magician. And that's because these Babylonian astrologers used magic and the stars to try and predict the future and also to

try and make wise decisions in the present. If astrology is nonsense scientifically, and the Bible is explicitly against its use, what in the world do we do with these astrologers? Let's just read the whole story. Matthew 2 verses 1 to 12. After Jesus was born in Bethlehem and Judea during the time of King Herod, Magi, these are the astrologers, from the east, came to Jerusalem. and asked, where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him. When King Herod heard this, he was disturbed and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called together all the people's chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them, where the Messiah was to be born. And this is what they said, quote, in Bethlehem, in Judea,

for this is what the prophet has written. Now they're going to go on to quote the Old Testament, but you Bethlehem and the land of Judah are by no means least among the rulers of Judah for out of you will come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel. Then Herod called the magi the astrologers secretly and found out from them the exact time that the star had appeared. So by the way, it turns out that Herod's kind of into astrology as well. And he sent them to Bethlehem and said, go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me so that I may go and worship him. After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen, when it rose, went ahead of them, until it stopped over the place where the child was.

When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshipped him. They opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route. Okay. What in the world? world just happened. For a long time, I used to just roll past this passage by saying that it was an example of what theologians call common grace. This is the idea that God makes the rain to fall on the just and the unjust. Common grace is the idea that people who don't know God are still gifted with the grace to find and know truth. Special grace, which is something different than common grace, special grace is

what God gives us to know him personally and to know the truth about Jesus and salvation. Common grace is what he gives to everyone else, to the believing and to the non-believing, to scientists, engineers, and more. So is astrology just common grace? Well, no, not really, because astrology isn't a form of truth. Sometimes it finds truth by accident. Sometimes it's powered by dark forces to find truth and dark ways. But in both cases, that's not common grace. It's something else. So what is this? Well, I don't have a fancy word for it, but I think this is just a story of God's radical kindness and generosity to people who were far from him. Sometimes God speaks through faulty means to draw us to himself. That doesn't mean that they're good or that they're correct.

It just means he so desperately wants us to know him that he'll give us a chance to know him in the most surprising ways. Let me give you an example of this. There's a revival happening right now throughout the Middle East. And I remember hearing the story of a Muslim man who came to faith through macaroni. I'm not making this up. He was eating his macaroni at home. alone and he looked down at his plate and he saw the face of Jesus. He does a double take, but it's unmistakable. Jesus is right there in his macaroni. And in that moment, he was struck by special grace. God revealed himself to that man through the macaroni and God called that man to himself. And I think that's precisely what happened to these astrologers. They were dabbling in

dark powers that they trusted and God condescended to step into that darkness and grab them by the heart and through special grace reveal himself and his son to them. Does that mean that we should trust astrology? Well, does the macaroni guy mean we should trust our macaroni for advice? Well, no, of course not. You see, in the story, the astrology only gets the magi part of the way there. They needed God's word to tell them that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. They trusted God's word, and then they acted on that. In the same way, God may use all sorts of wild things to reveal himself to you, but the point is not that those things are reliable or true. Maybe it's astrology, maybe it's your intuition, maybe it's your macaroni. But those are just a bridge for you to take to the one thing

that you can truly trust, God's word. In his word is true truth. That can't be divine from astrology or gurus or therapy or whatever else you think it may be. So praise God and thank him for the way that he works through our silliness to bring us to himself. Don't mistake them silliness for truth or for God. Instead, let it point you to His Word. Before you forget, sign up for the 10-minute Bible Talks newsletter. Hit the link in the show notes, and you'll get an email every Wednesday that's going to help you beat that midweek slump and go deeper in your walk with Jesus. Thanks for listening.