“Then Herod called for a private meeting with the wise men, and he learned from them the time when the star first appeared. Then he told them, “Go to Bethlehem and search carefully for the child. And when you find him, come back and tell me so that I can go and worship him, too!” Matthew 2:7-8 NLT
The finality of a perfect plan that God had intended to be played out long before the earth or humans were ever created was now in plain sight. The child, the Messiah, son of man, son of God was born. Born in human contentiousness and controversy, but he was here.
Satan, the traitor, and enemy of God, a created being leading a rebellion on the planet that he was cast down to be imprisoned to and exist on. It was on this global prison domain that God created us to live and work and glorify God. For thousands of years, Satan would take every opportunity to try and make life difficult and nearly impossible for us to enjoy life and love their creator. Satan spent every resource, even a third of fallen angels with him, to thwart God’s plans – lying, stealing and killing humans just to lash out at God.
Now the son of God was living as flesh on the prison planet of this domain. And since God was here as a baby, he may have thought it would be easy to kill God before the plan was fulfilled to permanently rescue humanity. Baby Jesus was born in perfection, living on the dark prison planet, but had a long ways to go to end up on a cross, giving his own life as the sacrifice necessary for our freedom.
Every person that desired to be god themselves, would participate with this criminal, Satan. And there have been thousands of people who signed up to join him to overthrow the Kingdom of God here on earth. Each one may live in human infamy, but are waiting in isolated darkness until the final judgment, where they will be thrown into the place of torment, never designed for humans, but reserved for only Satan and his gang of demons.
This is why Herod believed it would be easy to kill God while he was weak, innocent and vulnerable. Plus, this baby, Jesus, had stolen his own self proclaimed title he had deviously clawed his way to the top of Roman rule to arrogantly flaunt – Herod, King of the Jews!
Herod the Ascalonite, the son of Antipater was determined that this baby would not destroy his own legacy. This Herod, Herod the Great, went mad with an excruciating illness and died alone in his paranoia. This Herod, another pawn on the prison planet, is now in solitary darkness, awaiting the final judgment.
Prayer
Dad,
We are living such a remarkable story on this dark, prison planet! Here we are just plodding along while the kingpin of the prison continues to plot his plans to destroy every one of us while he also attempts his scorched earth policy to enact his revenge. He knows he can’t overthrow you or your will, but he will try to destroy and drag as many of us as possible to that final judgment and eternal separation for you. Creepy! I stand with you in redemption. I want nothing to do with false claims and promises of a “god-like” existence here or in heaven. I’d rather just be your son and make you proud.