The Birth of Jesus the Messiah^(A)

¹⁸ This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah happened. His mother Mary was engaged to marry Joseph. But before they married, he learned that she was expecting a baby. (She was pregnant by the power of the Holy Spirit.) ¹⁹ Mary’s husband, Joseph, was a good man. He did not want to cause her public disgrace, so he planned to divorce her secretly.

²⁰ But after Joseph thought about this, an angel from the Lord came to him in a dream. The angel said, “Joseph, son of David, don’t be afraid to accept Mary to be your wife. The baby inside her is from the Holy Spirit. ²¹ She will give birth to a son. You will name him Jesus.^[a] Give him that name because he will save his people from their sins.”

²² All this happened to make clear the full meaning of what the Lord said through the prophet: ²³ “The virgin will be pregnant and will give birth to a son. They will name him Immanuel.”^[b] (Immanuel means “God with us.”)

²⁴ When Joseph woke up, he did what the Lord’s angel told him to do. He married Mary. ²⁵ But Joseph did not have sexual relations with her until her son was born. And he named him Jesus.

Wise Men Come to Visit Jesus

2 Jesus was born in the town of Bethlehem in Judea during the time when Herod was king. After Jesus was born, some wise men from the east came to Jerusalem. ² They asked people, “Where is the child who has been born to be the king of the Jews? We saw the star that shows he was born. We saw it rise in the sky in the east and have come to worship him.”

³ When King Herod heard about this, it upset him as well as everyone else in Jerusalem. ⁴ Herod called a meeting of all the leading Jewish priests and teachers of the law. He asked them where the Messiah would be born. ⁵ They answered, “In the town of Bethlehem in Judea, just as the prophet wrote:

⁷ Then Herod had a private meeting with the wise men from the east. He learned from them the exact time they first saw the star. ⁸ Then he sent them to Bethlehem. He said, “Go and look carefully for the child. When you find him, come tell me. Then I can go worship him too.”

⁹ After the wise men heard the king, they left. They saw the same star they had seen in the east, and they followed it. The star went before them until it stopped above the place where the child was. ¹⁰ They were very happy and excited to see the star.

¹¹ The wise men came to the house where the child was with his mother Mary. They bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened the boxes of gifts they had brought for him. They gave him treasures of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. ¹² But God warned the wise men in a dream not to go back to Herod. So they went home to their own country a different way.