Was Jesus a refugee?

This scene of gladness, I know, was quickly changed. But who changed it? Did the counsel of God, the hand and Spirit of God, who had formed it, repent? No: it was man who changed it. He that was born the Bethlehemite became, under man's hand, the Nazarene. The wise men from the east took their journey to greet the child that had been born, laden with offerings. And this they did, under the Spirit, led by the hand of God. But He whom they, as sent of God, came to worship, had quickly, through the enmity of man, to fly into Egypt. God had appointed Him to be a King in Judea; man makes Him an exile in Egypt.

It is a striking testimony to the value of God's Word that Herod, in the middle of his confusion, is obliged to turn to, and listen to Scripture. When he gets the knowledge, he turns it to bad account, like many another sinner. "Then Herod, when he had privily called the wise men, inquired of them diligently what time the star appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem, and said, Go and search for the young child; and when ye have found him, bring me word again, that I may come and worship him also." He had no thought of that. That was mere deceit on his lips. He was set on murder, not worship, in his heart. You know what took place. Although on his deathbed, as we are told, he sent out his headsmen, "and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men." Such is man's hatred, that he plots, as soon as he hears of His birth, to cut off the blessed Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now do you not think it startling when you come to look at Scripture, and at what God tells us about His Son? Yes, it is very startling! He was not wanted. Herod's awful project the magi did not aid in carrying out. When they had seen and worshipped the Lord, they repaired, warned of God, to their own country. Scripture tells us that "being warned of God in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed into their own country another way."

And when they were departed Joseph had a dream. Joseph got a word from the Lord. And the wise men got a word from the Lord also, and they are obedient. They are obedient as well as worshipful. That same night apparently Joseph had a dream, saw an angel, and heard this word: "Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word; for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him. When he arose, he took the young child and his mother by night, and departed into Egypt." Only think that the Son of God, come here to save man, must flee the land of His nativity in order to escape the murderous intent of man. In the darkness of night — to evade observation — a start is made for Egypt. But why Egypt? "That it might be fulfilled, which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Out of Egypt have I called my son." How wonderful are the ways of God! These words, "When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt" (Hosea 11:1), are to be fulfilled. You may say, How can that be? Christ retraces in His own Person the pathway of Israel, and He begins that history in Egypt, out of which He comes when Herod was dead. You then find Him at the Jordan, which Israel also crossed. And in the fourth chapter of Matthew we find Him in the wilderness, where Israel utterly failed, but He did not fail. In all this pathway of Jesus you are on truly historic ground. He was the true Israel — spoken of so often by Isaiah. Jesus was going to take up in His own history the responsibility of the people of God, and that is what enables Him to be a Saviour. Where every other man had failed, He glorified God, and then, in grace, died for those who had failed, and therefore needed redemption. His perfection as a Man qualified Him to be the Redeemer.

"Now they having departed, behold an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph, saying, Arise, take to thee the little child and His mother, and flee into Egypt, and be there until I shall tell thee; for Herod will seek the little child to destroy it. And having arisen, he took to him the little child and His mother by night, and departed into Egypt, and he was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord, through the prophet, saying, Out of Egypt have I called my Son" (verses 13-15). Thus the narrative continues. The child is the only prominent figure in it. There is a spurious gospel, called the Gospel of the Infancy of our Lord, (Evangelium Infantiae), in which the flight to Egypt is adorned with many miracles. We mention some of them. Idols broke to pieces wherever the child came; the three-year-old child of an Egyptian priest who was possessed by demons put a swaddling cloth of the child upon his head, and the demon fled; a woman possessed by a demon was healed by looking upon Mary; robbers fled in terror before the child; all manner of diseases were healed, including leprosy, etc. The whole book shows that it is a counterfeit, gotten up by some one who favored the worship of Mary and the child. How simple the story is here in Matthew. The child is dependent upon Joseph, who is now mentioned, and in poverty, under great danger, at night, they had to flee. God could have transported His Son by a miracle, but the Son of God had become man, and now it was for Him to enter into all. He has to go the long and weary road. The cause of the flight was Herod, who under the power of Satan sought the life of the child. He shows himself here as the murderer from the beginning. Satan is that still, the great red dragon with seven heads and ten horns, ready to devour the man-child (Rev. 12). The place of refuge is Egypt. There He is to go, to be called back after a while in fulfillment of the prophetic Word, "Out of Egypt have I called my Son."

Again Joseph receives angelic instruction in a dream, being told to take the young child to Egypt until further notice from God. God would not put forth supernatural power to defeat Herod's wicked scheming, but would do so by the humbling experience of Joseph and Mary in fleeing to another country. It was lack of faith that led Abram to Egypt (Gen.12:10); and stubborn rebellion against God's word that led the remnant of Judah there in Jeremiah's day (Jer.43:1-7); but in Gen.46:2-4 God told Jacob to go there, and here Joseph goes by the word of God. This is our one safe guide at all times.

"And being warned of God in a dream, that they should not return to Herod, they departed into their own country another way. And when they were departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word: for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him" (vers. 12, 13). The unbelief that refused the word of God, is now allowed to show how thoroughly it was under the power of Satan, who proves himself, as from the beginning, to be a liar first, then a murderer. But God revealed Herod's purpose; and Joseph, in obedience to His word, takes the young child and His mother by night and departs into Egypt, "and was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Out of Egypt have I called my son."

I have a word to say about this prophecy, and the application of it to our Lord. We shall have to take into account many prophecies cited in Matthew, but the present quotation has evidently a remarkable character attached to it. It had been said that Israel was God's son, God's firstborn, in Egypt. To them pertained the adoption. The prophet Hosea, seven hundred years after their departure from Egypt, again applies this word to Israel; and now it is used of Christ, as that which fully came within the intent of the inspiring Spirit. How is it that God's taking Israel out of the land of Egypt should be so illustrated in Christ's history? Because Christ is the object of the Holy Ghost in Scripture. It matters not what may be the place of His people: in all their troubles or deliverances, Christ must enter into all. There is no kind of temptation (save, of course, of inward evil) that He has not known; nor of blessing on God's behalf that He has not proved. Christ goes through the history of His people; and on that principle it is that such scriptures as these are applied to Him. Christ Himself is carried into the very place that had been the furnace of Israel. There it is that He finds His refuge from the false king of Judea. What a picture! Because of the anti-king then reigning in Jerusalem, the true King must flee, and flee, into Egypt. Christ was the true Israel. Compare Isa. 49.

When at first it was thought that a great sin had been committed, Joseph (because he was a man of honourable principles, as the scripture explains) determined to dissociate himself from it at all cost to his personal feelings; yet privily, to avoid the infliction of unnecessary pain and scandal on one whom he loved; but when God reveals to him the truth, he acts in direct and implicit obedience, purity, and simplicity. Again when he is warned of danger to the holy Child, he directly takes the Child and mother to Egypt and shelters and protects them through the long, dangerous journeys subordinating all his own interests to their care and safety. It was a manly and honourable charge to protect a woman and child — quite as truly so, when it involved great and unceasing danger, as to lead in the van of an army, though it may receive neither notice nor applause. An upright, devout, gracious, simple labouring man, with royal blood in his veins and royal faith in his heart, Joseph was, by divine grace, in every way qualified for such an important trust. Again, we cannot help thinking of that illustrious chief whose integrity was so great that the people of the hostile countries through which his army passed would bring their goods to him to protect them from the marauding of their own soldiers; and who when his Queen gave him the Kohinoor diamond to get polished, never once let it go out of his sight, but would sit an hour every day whilst the jeweller worked at it, and then wrap it up in his silk handkerchief to take it home. The heart of his Sovereign could safely trust him. From various passages it is concluded that Joseph had died before our Lord's public ministry commenced.

And even while but a child, to escape the wrath of the false king, the true King has to flee unto Egypt, and be there till the death of Herod, that the prophecy might be fulfilled, "Out of Egypt have I called my Son" (Hosea 11:1). Thus the Lord began where His people began, but how different their pathway from His?

Then an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, instructing him to take the infant Jesus into Egypt to escape Herod’s wrath, and after Herod’s death the angel again appeared to Joseph instructing him to return to the land of Israel.

And now Joseph also is warned by an angel of the Lord of impending danger at the hands of Herod, and flees by divine direction with the young child and His mother into Egypt. There is no manifest display of power made. The angels that appeared, to announce a Saviour, do not encircle with chariots and hosts the infant King. Everything marks that He has come to take no exceptional place in this way from the common lot of men. Nay, it is a necessity of the work which He has come to do that He should stoop to this; and in subjection to these human conditions, manifest His exaltation above fallen man.

Prophecy, however, has marked out His course all through; and it is that this may be fulfilled that He goes down to Egypt. But just here we find what calls for special examination. The prophecy to be fulfilled is that of Hosea 11:1: "Out of Egypt have I called My Son;" but this does not, at first sight, appear to be a prophecy at all; and certainly not a prophecy of Christ. Any one looking at it would say that it was simply a rebuke of Israel as a nation, for repaying with apostasy and Baal-worship the love which God had shown in their redemption of old. He had them taken out of the misery of their bondage, and called them to adoption as His own family among the families of the earth. "When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called My son out of Egypt." But how had they repaid it? "As they [the prophets] called them, so they went from them: they sacrificed to the Baalim, and burned incense to graven images." This, of course, could only speak of Israel as a nation.

And yet the application of the first verse to the Lord is no mere application. It is not that such a thing took place now in relation to Him who was Son of God by a fuller title, as corresponded to that which had taken place of old in regard to God's "first-born," Israel. The manner of quotation is much too precise for that: the Lord going down into Egypt definitely to fulfil what is spoken by Hosea. Evidently there is here something deeper in the way of fulfilment than we are accustomed to. It is common to say that we have here an example of typical prophecy; but we must understand what we mean, if we say this. For certainly it could only be in fragments of the national history that there could be any typical reference to the Lord; and what follows in the prophet indicates only entire and emphatic contrast, as we have seen. We must, therefore, have some guiding principle to enable us to discern, with any certainty, what is typical from what is not.

In Matthew 2 it is significant that if rejection awaited Him in Israel, God had Gentiles from afar to own Him as "Born king of the Jews." By Herod's action gathering the leaders of the people together, the report of such an enquiry already troubling all Jerusalem would be still further emphasized. It gave occasion, too, for the prophecy of Micah to be pointed out as now having found its fulfilment in the birthplace of a "Governor that should shepherd" the nation, little as they knew it or cared to verify it — Herod's to destroy — the only action taken upon the production of the prophecy. The star that had started them on their journey now reappears to their exceeding joy and guides them to the house, where they "fell down and worshipped" the young child and "offered" (not "presented" as A.V.) — a sacrificial word — their gifts: gold and frankincense and myrrh. (Cp. Isa. 60:6 for the two first. Myrrh was the chief ingredient of the holy anointing oil with which the tabernacle, ark, and all its vessels, and the priests were anointed.) (Ex. 30:23-25, etc.) In the next scene, the departure into Egypt — it was in no sense a flight — but the revealed will of God, that, retiring thus before the hostile power in the land, He should begin again, as it were, in His own Person, the history of the true Israel. He being substituted for Israel according to the flesh (as in Isa. 49 He becomes the true Servant and John 15 the true Vine — positions that Israel once had had but had failed in), and that becomes the ground of their blessing in the age to come. (Ps. 18 may be compared with this, specially the change at vers. 15, 16, where, from the past deliverance through the Red Sea, the Spirit of Christ identifies Him with the people, "He sent from above, He took ME, He drew ME out of many waters," and passes on to that which is yet future — when He is made Head of the heathen: ver. 43 to end.) What meanwhile, when the born King of the Jews was thus in rejection, could be the circumstances of the people in the land, but the sorrow of which Jeremiah 31 had spoken, "Rachel weeping for her children," although "There is hope in thine end, saith the Lord, that thy children shall come again to their own border." The return of the young Child being likewise directed of God, even the selection of Nazareth to dwell in was also. Note that A.V. "Notwithstanding being warned of God" makes difficulty where there is none crematistheis de when fear operated with Joseph as to going back to Judea — prophecy being thus accomplished — "That (hoti see for force Gr. Test.) he shall be called a Nazarean" I suppose the general tenor of the prophets that He should be rejected. (Isa. 49 - 53, Micah 5:1, Zech. 13, Ps. 22)