Getting ready for Sunday.

I remember the days when I sat in the pews.  I get to do it every once in a while now, but it's different for me now.  I hardly ever get to just sit and listen so now it's a very difference experience.  I see things differently and hear things differently now.  But I remember the days when I sat in the pew.  I was tired and often struggled to keep my eyes open.  I remember many a time when I walked away from church and wondered what we did for the last hour.  I remember struggling to pay attention and keep my mind on track.  Sometimes I was tired.  Sometimes I was distracted. Sometimes I was cold.  Sometimes I was hot.  Sometimes I was troubled.  Sometimes I was too comfortable.  There were all kinds of things that me from really giving my full attention to the worship that was at hand.

What is it for you?  What is that keeps your hears from hearing and your heart from absorbing that which God gives in Word and Sacrament?

Jesus had many important things to teach his disciples in those last hours of his life, many things that he wanted to stick to their hearts and minds long after he was gone.  But they were having trouble listening. They were having trouble understanding.  They were having trouble taking to hear the things that Jesus said.

But Jesus was so patient and loving with his deaf disciples. 

This Sunday we're going to look at John 14:1-14 and hear Jesus comfort his disciples who were so troubled and confused that they weren't hearing his words. 

As you come to church this Sunday say a prayer that God would use his words to open your hears and pierce your hearts that you might have the hope and comfort that Jesus gives us in these precious words on the night he was betrayed.  He was more troubled than all the rest but from the depths of his love he comforted his disciples and comforts us.

See you Sunday!

Beyond Sunday - What's next?

When my brothers started their ministries as pastors in WI, NY, and GA my dad got all of us boys the painting above.  And he preached a sermon to each of us that now sits above the fire place in our home.  I'll admit sometimes I forget about this painting; it kind of just blends into the wall.  But when John 13 is one of the readings, then it always pops off the wall for me again. It still preaches a sermon to me as I remember the words of John about what Jesus did for us that night.  It was a huge deal!

Jesus washes me.  Jesus washes you.  He got down on his hands and knees; he humbled himself and became a human being to make us clean and to bring us to God.  Jesus did everything that was needed to bring us home to our Father in heaven, the only place where we belong. This is a big deal! Jesus washes my feet.

And now he teaches us to do the same for each other. Jesus teaches us to love each other and served each other as Jesus loved and served us. This is a big deal.

Here are two questions for you today:

1) Who can I serve?  By God's grace and God's calling, through faith in Jesus, you are the hands, the feet, even the mouth of God in the world.  You are the hands of Jesus washing feet.  You are the mouth of Jesus proclaiming peace to the world.  Who can you serve? Whose feet can you wash?

2) How do you need to be served? Let someone do it.  I've hear this more and more lately.  "I am always glad to help other people, but have a really hard time letting other people help me."  I feel that way too.  I want to feel and even be self-sufficient; I want to get 'er done on my own.  And when someone has to serve me and help me, that's a jab at my ego.  But we can't do it alone.  We need the help.

That's why it's called grace.  We couldn't save ourselves, so God did it for us.  We could cleanse ourselves, so Jesus had to wash us.  We couldn't change our minds and choose Jesus, he had to choose us. That's why it's called grace.  God did everything - and I mean everything - to save us.

Peter didn't want Jesus to wash his feet.  But what Jesus doing? He was showing Peter grace and doing something that Peter need to have done.  It's just as much grace when other people help us.  God is working through them to help us, support us, strengthen us.  I don't really want someone else to wash my feet, but my feet get dirty and my feet need to be washed.  We need other people, other Christians to serve and help us as Jesus served.

Jesus keep you as you serve other people in his name!

Through the Gospels in 30 - Day 3

Day 3: Matthew 3, Luke 3, John 3.

How is it going? What has God taught you as he reveals himself in his Word?  I'd love to hear it.

Through the Gospels in Lent - DAY 2

Alright, for those of you reading through the gospels this lent. Here are your readings for today. Matthew 2, Luke 2, John 2. 

If you missed yesterday go back and read the first chapter of the same books. As I reread these sections it is amazing to me how God has this whole thing planned and organized, even orchestrated. It will go according to plan. In his grace, he lets people - us - be a part of his plan and sends messengers (in these accounts, angels) to get people on board. Yet, even when they are not willing God's plan is not deterred! God gets it done and our salvation is won.

Thank you, Lord God, our Father in heaven above for your wise and careful plan that you carried out powerfully and perfectly in the days of Jesus.  Thank you for not doing it secretly but doing it publicly and letting us know about it through your Word and through the messengers you send to us who proclaim that Word.  Amen.

Through the gospels in Lent - DAY 1.

Through the Gospels during Lent

People sometimes talk about “giving something up” during Lent.  To be sure, the 40 days of Lent have generally been treated as days for discipline.  At first, however, this “discipline” was first “discipling,” that is, instruction.  

This year I want to challenge you, instead of “giving something up” during Lent, “take something up” and read through the Four Gospels with me.  Get to know the life and works of your Savior Jesus better as we watch him go to the cross!

Monday through Friday, beginning today I will post the daily readings here and as time permits a brief meditation on those readings.

This is a plan from YouVersion.com.

Day 1: Matthew 1, Luke 1, John 1.

So, Lent is usually a focus on the Passion of our Lord, on his suffering and birth.  What could these readings about his forerunner, about his birth, about his person have to do with his passion?  Is this not where it all begins? Yes and no.

If we want to know where this all begins we have to go back to Genesis where God first proclaims the promise when he curses the snake (Genesis 3:15).  There God promises a Champion who will rise up from the seed of woman to crush the serpent's head and render him powerless and destroyed.  It all begins there.

Oh, how Satan must have screamed every time a child was born wondering, "Is this the promised Champion who will crush my head?"  And then, in the person of Jesus, in the baby born of Mary adopted, so-to-speak, by Joseph, proclaimed by John, the Champion was born. So, where does the passion begin, where does the cross begin to come into view? It begins the moment he was conceived, the day he was born.  This child was born to die!

For us! For you. For me.  This child was born to die for you and for me.

It all started there in a manger.  It all ends at the empty tomb!

Ash Wednesday - Our Lenten Journey Begins

Ash Wednesday Meditation

Ash Wednesday Meditation

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; 

according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions.  

Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.  

For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.  

Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.  

Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. - Psalm 51:1-5

In the Old Testament it was common practice for individuals to show sorrow over sin by wearing sackcloth and sitting in ashes.  It was an attempt to show on the outside the misery that was going on inside.  As Christians celebrate Ash Wednesday today, we continue to be sorrowful over the sins we have committed.

The writer of Psalm 51, King David, had reason to be sorrowful over his sin.  2 Samuel 11,12  paint an ugly picture of David the sinner.  He slept with Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah the Hittite, and she became pregnant.  After attempts to cover up the affair failed, he arranged to have Uriah killed.  David’s sin was horrible and damnable.

David asked for forgiveness that he knew he did not deserve.  So rather than trying to candy-coat his actions, he was honest.  He admits sin, iniquity, transgression and evil which had affected and infected him from the time he was born.  David did not deserve to be forgiven, so he simply threw himself on God’s mercy begging for forgiveness.  It was a forgiveness that God freely gave him.

Today is a day for all to be honest with God about sin.  We also need to admit sin, iniquity, transgression and evil that have come from our sinful hearts.  But this is also the start of Lent.  Lent is a Christian season when we consider the payment Jesus made for our sin.  As we follow Jesus to the cross on Calvary, we see God’s undeserved love and mercy which he offers to all people.

Join King David today in confessing your sin.  Be assured that through Jesus Christ you have been forgiven!

Prayer:

Almighty and merciful Father, you freely forgive those who, as David of old, acknowledge and confess their sins.  Create in me a pure heart, and wash away all my sins in the blood of your dear Son, Jesus Christ my Savior and Lord.  Amen.

Podcast Version.

This Devotion is brought to you by www.WhatAboutJesus.com

Getting ready for Sunday - Witness: Crossing Barriers.

February is black history month.  Our students and our kids are focusing on some of the important figures throughout history who have impacted and changed the world as they crossed racial barriers that once impacted our country.  USA Today asks the question: Is it still relevant?  I'll leave you to answer that question from your own experience.

On my part, I can tell you about my experiences with this.  Just a little over ten years ago, I myself was witness to how ugly racial tensions can become in our country.  Angry words exchanged.  Fires started.  It was ugly. Racial tensions were hot and heated.  But I haven't just had negative experiences.  I've experienced and still do experience great joy in relationships with people of all kinds of different backgrounds, races, colors, even languages.

But here's the question for us as we wrap up our series on witnessing: What is the Christian church to do about the barriers that exist?  What is Abiding Faith to do about it?

Before we can look closely at those questions, we need to answer two other fundamental questions clearly in our own minds and hearts:

What has God done about it? Simple answer: He sent his Son to die for all people of every race, language, tribe and nation.  God's Son crossed every barrier between people's that every existed!

What is God doing about it? Simple answer: He is overcoming the barriers that exist with the love of Jesus and the power of his Word.

This Sunday we learn from God about these very things as he teaches Peter and the early Christian  to cross barriers. We're going to study Acts 10:34-48.

As you prepare for Sunday I want you to ask yourself this introspective question: What biases and barriers do I have in my mind? Are they cultural? Are they economic? Are they religious? Do I have "issues" with people because of their color, their language, their social status, the religion?  What are the "issues" that I have with other people?

Then come ready to let God help you get over those "issues."

Getting ready for Sunday - We are his witnesses.

Two weeks in a row as we leave church on Wednesday night my kids have asked: "Dad, what's a witness?"  As I do, I like to turn it around on them, "What do you think it means?"  It always leads into a great conversation about what a witness sees and what a witness does.

It starts with seeing something with their own eyes.  They've seen what happened.  They can speak from personal experience. This isn't something "they heard about" this is something they saw with their own eyes and heard with their own ears.  This was not their version of the telephone game.

It continues with saying what they have seen and heard.  It continues with their testimony.  And not as a "he said" or "she said," but as an I saw and I heard.

They see it.  They talk about it.  The apostles saw.  They heard.  And they talked about it as they said in their own words, "For we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard" (Acts 4:20.

As we get ready for Sunday, think about and meditate on those things that you've seen and heard.  How did God work before you were born to save you from your sins? How did God work and rule in your life to save you from your sins? Where did God put you? Whom did God put in your life so that you'd know him? Where has God put you now so that you'd be in him and know him? Where has God put you now so that you could witness and testify about him?

This Sunday we're looking at the early Christian church in Acts chapter 8 (v1-13) and we get to see our God at work, ruling the church, always for the good, always for the spread of the Gospel.  This Sunday we'll get to see how God rules; how he ruled in the past for the spread of the Gospel; yes, even how he rules today for the spread of the Gospel.

God has a plan and we get to be a part of it!

Beyond Sunday - "the bystander effect"

"What would you do?" I don't watch the show much but it is always interesting to see the scenarios they create and the way that total strangers react.  Sometimes the scenario is the need of an individual.  Sometimes the scenario is the outlandish and sometimes even offensive behavior of a person.  It's always interesting to see how people respond to a given situation.

Psychologytoday.com describes bystander effect like this: "The bystander effect occurs when the presence of others hinders an individual from intervening in an emergency situation. Social psychologists Bibb Latané and John Darley popularized the concept following the infamous 1964 Kitty Genovese murder in Kew Gardens, New York. Genovese was stabbed to death outside her apartment three times, while bystanders who reportedly observed the crime did not step in to assist or call the police. Latane and Darley attributed the bystander effect to the diffusion of responsibility (onlookers are more likely to intervene if there are few or no other witnesses) and social influence (individuals in a group monitor the behavior of those around them to determine how to act). In Genovese's case, each onlooker concluded from their neighbors' inaction that their own help was not needed."

Dear Christians - what will you do?

We live in a world that whether they know it or not, whether they agree with us or not, whether they feel like it or not, is largely on their way to the greatest disaster, ever. As horrendous the Genovese case was, it is an even greater tragedy when we see people walking toward the end of a cliff, an eternity in hell.  What will you do?

We have just the Savior for them.

We have just the message to share with them.

We have a message that speaks for itself.  Share it and let that message loose on 'em.  Charles Spurgeon once said that we didn't need to defend the Bible because it was like a lion.  Nobody has to do defend a lion.  We just let it loose to defend itself.  So let the message loose and it will do its work.

Don't just stand there.  Stand up and tell them.

Who will you tell? Pray for them. Pray for opportunities to tell them.  Pray for the words to tell them.

Then, get up and tell them as God gives you the opportunity.

Getting ready for Sunday: Witness - Cross Examined.

If you were put on a witness stand in a courtroom and had to testify to your faith, salvation, forgiveness, and who Jesus Christ is, what would you say? If you’re friend, your neighbor, your co-workers asked you to share your faith, what would you say?  How would you say it?  God will give us opportunities to share our faith - we want to be ready to witness and testify about him.  God urges us to take opportunities to share our faith - we want to be prepared to take advantage of those opportunities.

The amazing and gracious truth is this: We are a part of God’s plan of salvation to get his Gospel out to the ends of the earth.  We get to be his light in the world; we get to be the salt of the earth. We get to be God’s mouthpiece, God’s messengers, God’s fellow-workers!  We get to be part of the way in which God saves people!  How awesome!  How gracious!  God has shown us such grace!  He saved us by his Son.  He calls us to share that witness with all the world.

In this series, we will take a look at what the Bible says about being a witness for Jesus in our neighborhood, community, and world.

So, as you come to church this week, ask this: Why is witnessing hard for me? What is the thing that makes me most afraid to witness and share my faith?  This week, Jesus calms our fears even as he sends us out into battle.  We'll be studying Matthew 10:26-34

Getting ready for Sunday - SHIFT in my role models.

There are 168 hours in a week.  If we sleep 7 hours a day (49 hours a week), then we're awake for 149 hours.  If we're in worship, growth groups (Bible studies), and in our private devotions then perhaps we setting aside another 10 hours or so on time specifically set aside for God, for his Word, and for prayer.  That leaves us with 139 hours in our week.  Who are you listening to during that time?

Paul Tripp writes: “No one is more influential in your life than you are because no one talks to you more than you do. You're in an unending conversation with yourself. You're talking to yourself all the time, interpreting, organizing, and analyzing what's going on inside you and around you.”

Kind of a scary thought, isn't it?  More than anyone else in my life, I'm preaching to myself.  I'm preaching to myself in my private devotions.  I'm preaching to myself when I'm at work.  I'm preaching to myself wherever I go and whatever I do.

Whose word are you preaching to yourself?  What message are you preaching?  What are you telling yourself?  Who influences the sermons you preach to your heart?

More than a little scary, isn't it?

That makes my time in God's Word all the more important.  It needs to go with me even when I'm not devoting all of my energies to meditating on it and praying about it.  God's Word needs to flow from my heart into my ears all day long.  It needs to be the thing I chew on all day long. The time we spend in God's Word on Sunday, in growth groups (Bible studies), and in our private, personal devotions are so important.  We want our Father's voice, which is loud and clear in the Bible, to be the voice ringing in our hears through our days.

That makes our friends so important, especially our closest friends and our advisors, especially our role models.  We need them to be speaking God's Word to us and redirecting us to the one thing needful, one thing true and certain, the one thing powerful and saving.  Our friends, our role models, our advisors and counselors, are so important.

This Sunday we will consider Hebrews 10:19-25 and remember why it's so important for us to keep showing up.

Beyond Sunday - SHIFT in my involvement.

Yesterday turned into an interesting but an awesome day. But it didn't go as planned.  Sunday morning was great! I always love the chance to share God's Word.  Lunch was awesome.  Got to visit with so many people.  Add to that the joy of seeing God's people connecting to each other - and not wanting to leave.  Then I got teach the basics of the faith.  All part of the plan, so far.

Then I came out to the car and had a flat.  Not exactly how I wanted to spend the next part of my Sunday.  But it turned out well.  I got home from getting the flat fixed and enjoyed a great evening with my family.  God gave me some down time that I hadn't planned on and it was just what I needed so that I could come home refreshed to be with family.

We're all busy.  I haven't met anyone in this world who isn't busy.  In fact, that is the common reason that something can't get done, someone can't meet... I can't do that because I'm busy.  Take a look at your day, take a look at your calendar and what do you see? You're busy. We're all busy.

We're all busy.  But don't be too busy for God.

Take just a moment today and thank God for the life that he's given you.

Take just a moment today and thank God for the grace that he's given you, the forgiveness that he's given you.

Take just a moment today and thank God for the way he is ruling your life and taking care of you, even if you don't agree with his plan.

Take just a moment and ask God to help you through whatever it is that is on your plate.

It's so easy for us to substitute our action and activity for trust in God's action and activity.  It's so easy to think, "I'm too busy to pray.  I'm too busy to read my devotions."  But take note at what we're doing... We're thinking that our work is more important than God's.  We're thinking that our will is more important than God's.  And we all know that that just isn't true.

Slow down and ponder God's will and work.

Slow down and ponder God's mission and ministry.

Slow down and pray.

Slow down and see how God get's involved in your life.

Slow down and see the opportunities that God gives you to be involved in the lives of the people around you.

Then, get off the bench and get into the game.

Getting ready for Sunday!

We live with people.  We live around with people.  We work for people.  We work with people.  We work next to people.  We interact with people more than ever before either in person or through some other medium.  We get phone calls, text messages, Facebook alerts, maybe even Voxer. Unless you are a hermit living on a mountaintop you interact with people all day long. What's that experience like?  Some people enjoy a tech free day off, a quiet day away from it all.  Many people would benefit from just a few moments unplugging.

That's what Jesus is doing with his disciples in the text we'll look at this Sunday (Matthew 14:13-21). They were going away by themselves to unplug.  The disciples had come off of a missionary trip.  Jesus had just received the news that John the Baptist had been beheaded.  They were worn out and tired and need a chance to unplug and to refuel in prayer and meditation on God's Word.  BUT THE CROWDS CHASED THEM THERE TOO!

Yet, what do we see in Jesus?  Pay close attention.  Jesus may have been worn out, but he was never too exhausted to give his love and care to that crowd that interrupted his quiet time.  He saw that they were harassed and helpless.

As you get ready for Sunday, learn this about Jesus - our Father in heaven is never too busy, never to exhausted, never empty to hear our prayers.  We are his children and he doesn't brush us off or view our prayers as too small a thing for him to be concerned about.  Jesus is the very same way.  He looked at this crowd and he was overflowing with compassion for them.

How do you look at the people in your life that enter it through a purposeful plan of yours or through God's purposeful plan (that you didn't know about!)? How do you see their intrusion into your day?

Jesus wanted to teach his disciples something that day.  He teaches us something too.  This Sunday we learn from Jesus about a SHIFT in our involvement in the lives of the people around us and learn to impact them in the same way that we have been impacted by Jesus himself.

Read Matthew 14:13-21 (for a fuller picture you can also read: Matthew 14:1-36; Mark 6:1-56; and/or John 6:1-70).

See you Sunday!

Beyond Sunday - SOAP journal entry

What joy God gave Sarah and Abraham in their old age. After a life of waiting, a life of pilgrimage (that wasn't done yet), God gave them a great joy - a son. This was nothing short of a miraculous gift of God. Their bodies were as good as dead, the apostle writes, yet God gave life in those bodies that were as good as dead.

Reminds me of Ecclesiastes 9: 9 Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun—all your meaningless days. For this is your lot in life and in your toilsome labor under the sun. Life is a struggle.  Sins curse makes work toil, the sweat if the brow.  Sins curse troubles relationships wherever we turn.  Sins curse makes our life a steady march to the grave.  Life then becomes pointless.  So, I can learn from Sarah to laugh in thanks to God for the gifts of  Ruth and our children, truly amazing gifts of God.

Lord, help me to laugh in thanks to you for your grace to me in my family. They are an amazing and gracious gift to me from you.  Thank you for this grace. Fill me with joy in this grace today and don't let me get bogged down with the other struggles that sin brings.  Let me laugh and play and enjoy the gifts that they are to me. Thank you especially for the faith that you've planted in them. That is your greatest gift it them and to me.  I pray you then, defend this house, our family, from the attacks of the evil one that nothing would cause them to stumble and trip up, so that they lose their faith.  Nothing would bring me more sadness.  Keep them in the faith! Thank you for hearing me Father and for walking with me today in all that I think, say, and do.

Getting ready for Sunday (Matthew 6:1-15)

SHIFT in your private devotional life.

Lots of studies show it.  Church attendance is down.  Biblical illiteracy is high.  Just google it.  Just look at what Barna studies reveal about church attendance, about Bible reading, about devotional reading.  As much as America wants to be a Christian country, we're not walking in God's Word publicly or privately as one would expect.

But this shouldn't surprise us.  In the early 20th Century (1919) one church leader (August Pieper) already wrote: 

“Spiritual life among us in a state of steep decline...There is little discussion of the gospel and the grace of God among our people in their daily lives.  Regular  morning and evening devotions no longer predominate.  Joint family prayers and no longer spoken, often not even table prayers. A worldly point of view has slipped in among our Christian people” (The Wauwatosa Theology, 59).

How would you assess our country?
How would you assess our congregation?
How would you assess yourself?

Is Pieper right when he writes those things above?

What should we do about it?  On Sunday we will study what Jesus says about our private devotional life in Matthew 6:1-15.

Meanwhile, chew on these words from Pieper as we seek to grow up in our walk with Jesus.  Here he comments on the encouragement of Jesus to pray for the Holy Spirit (Luke 11:11-13).

“We should and will want to pray, not for a specific measure of the Spirit, but for as much as is necessary, that we do not decline in spiritual strength, but grow stronger daily, for as much as is necessary to carry out our office properly, and to edify the souls entrusted to us and to make them rich in good works; as much as is necessary to carry his gospel into all the world and gather the elect; as much as is necessary that the church in our midst does not die out, but grows every stronger inwardly and outwardly, in short, Spirit and strength enough and in overflow for the adornment and perfection of his church - that is what he promised and will give us if we do not cease to petition him for it.”

See you Sunday! Pastor Nate

Getting ready for a new series!

Be honest: Are you happy with your life? Wish you could change something? Are you already making plans for what you’ll change in the New Year? New Year’s resolutions? We’d love to hit a grand-slam-walk-off home run.  We’d love to throw or catch the “hail mary” to win the football game.  We’d love to make that huge change that will have a huge impact.  The problem is that change is tough, especially if you try to do a 180 in a month.  That kind of change is really tough.

So what works? What can we do as we walk with Jesus toward heaven? What can we do as we grow together and walk with our fellow believers?

Small, steady shifts. Little, but powerful changes. Imagine feeling confident instead of fearful. Hopeful instead of despaired. Fulfilled instead of worthless. Small, steady shifts. God created us to walk with him every day and he guides us and helps us in making these SHIFTS: Small Changes that make a BIG difference. 

This Sunday - SHIFT in our worship experience.  We'll listen to Jesus teach us about how he wants us to approach him and his Word, how he wants us to listen and what he wants us to do with what he says.  And in so doing he helps us understand the purpose of our time with him.  Our worship experience, our time with Jesus on Sunday morning is our time to meet with God, to meet with Jesus, to hear from him, to be drawn closer to him so that our faith is built on the rock.  Jesus teaches us to shift our attention to him and to his Word in our worship and in so doing he works powerful in us.

So, let's get our year, our week and our year started built on Jesus and his words.  Our worship gets our week out of the blocks and sprinting toward the finish line.

Read the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) to read the whole context of what Jesus says.  We will give special attention to Jesus' words in Matthew 5:1-2 and 7:24-29.

See you Sunday!

Getting ready for church - A Tale of Three Kings

So...it's a new year and time for some changes.

What are the changes that you've resolved to make? What are the hopes and dreams that you have for the coming year?  What are you going to get done by God's grace and willing?

Lots of people do that.  Many people kick the new year off with resolutions, goals, and changes they want to make in their life.  In many ways they (you) want to transform your life in one way or another.  As you look forward to a new year what changes do you need and want to make in your life to live as God would have you live spiritually, emotionally, physically, even relationally?  In one week we're going to start a new series called SHIFT where we will discuss some of those little changes that God teaches us to make that will make a huge difference.

This week, however, we're asking the question: What must I keep in mind as I make my plans and move forward into the new year?  What do I have to remember?  Where must my faith be founded? Where must my heart be directed as we begin to follow through on our resolutions and make some of those small shifts that God teaches us to make?

Tomorrow, as we walk with the wise men, we will learn to understand what the wise men knew and believed AND what Herod knew but hated.  It's a tale of three kings: Matthew 3:1-17.

See you tomorrow!