The uncomfortable visitors - who & why are the seekers and dreamers
Later today we will once again sing that favourite carol for this time of year “We three kings of orient are” . It’s a carol full of errors and assumptions but I will still sing it with gusto. Scripture never calls these visitors kings, never specifies their number and doesn’t even specify their gender. The significance of the gifts is never mentioned in our text but our carol-writer has used a sanctified imagination to imbue them with significance. Have you ever thought that those wise people were the worst gift-givers ever - gold, frankincense and myrrh for a new baby! My niece is expecting her first baby any day and I assure you I plan to buy them something much more practical! - if our story occurred today perhaps Mary and Joseph would be on trade-me on boxing day trying to on-sell those gifts so they could buy something more practical! It is surely a difficult story to read today - a story of foreign travel when so many have had to cancel planned travels during the year and so