Jesus' Gift to the Magi

This past Sunday, on Christmas, I preached a sermon entitled "The Savior Adored" from Matthew 2:1-12 (audio here).  While reviewing for it that morning (rather than opening presents like you sinners... just kidding!), I received an insight from Scripture that amazed me.  I guess that was my own little gift from God.  It's too good not to share.  It won't be too long (three short parts), and I really think it's worth the read.

Part 1: On the Magi
We are all familiar with the story of the magi--modern cultural misconceptions and all, of course.  But I had better not let myself get sidetracked.  Incidentally, John MacArthur has a fantastic teaching on the magi, which you can find here.  (Strongly recommended, by the way.)  OK, now, back to it.  We are all familiar with the fact that they brought their three gifts to Jesus.  We know that they were Gentiles (even if they may have been of some Jewish descent) from far off in the East.  In fact, they were probably from the Parthian Empire, the empire immediately to the east of the Roman Empire.  The Parthian Empire's territory was, basically speaking, the territory of its great predecessor empires: the Assyrians, Babylonians, and Medo-Persians.  In fact, the region of Parthia is adjacent to the regions of Media (the Medes), Persis (the Persians), and Babylonia.

Part 2: On Gift Giving
Having laid the necessary foundational geographical-historical information, let us now consider a second piece of our "information puzzle" that will soon come into view.  Writing in his commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, Dr. D. A. Carson says

Bringing gifts was particularly important in the ancient East when approaching a superior....  Usually such gifts were reciprocated....  That is not mentioned here, but a first-century reader might have assumed it and seen the Great Commission (28:18-20) as leading to its abundant fruition.*

Part 3: On Pentecost: Jesus' Gift to the Magi?
For whatever reason, in light of such information, the words of the account of Pentecost in Acts 2 came to mind; I've never memorized them, per se, yet there they rang in my ears:

They were amazed and astonished, saying, "Why, are not all these who are speaking Galileans?  And how is it that we each hear them in our own language to which we were born?  Parthians and Medes and Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia...  Acts 2:7-9 (NASB, emphasis added)

Do you see it?!  Does it excite you?!  Is this Jesus' way of subtly reciprocating the magi's gifts and acknowledging or rewarding their worship?  While I certainly cannot be dogmatic, I think it is, if not in actuality then perhaps by virtue of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and the order of the words in the Scripture.  I find it very interesting and compelling that the Parthians and Medes are the first ones mentioned in the list by not Matthew, but Luke.  Even if one argues that the peoples mentioned in Acts 2 are listed generally from the far reaches of the East to the West parts (in the Roman world), the point still stands: Luke starts from the East, and in particular first mentions the likely origin regions of the Magi.

This is fitting, isn't it, given that the magi were the first to worship Jesus in a land filled with the Jews (and remember this is in Bethlehem, just five or six miles south of Jerusalem, where Acts 2 is set).  This is even more beautiful if the magi were of Jewish descent and traced their influence back to Daniel as Dr. MacArthur believes is true--and, for the record, I think he is right--since at Pentecost these were Jews in Jerusalem for the feasts of Passover and Pentecost.  At the least, it lends credence to the hypothesis that these magi were directly influenced by and descended from the Jews of the dispersion from Daniel's day (cf. Daniel 2:48; 5:11-12; et. al.). Thus you would have the magi's native people present at Jesus' birth, crucifixion, resurrection, and the giving of the Spirit.

An abundant fruition of the magi's three gifts indeed.

*Bibliography: D.A. Carson, "Matthew" in The Expositor's Bible Commentary, vol. 8, ed. Frank E. Gæbelein (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1984), 89.