Adoration of the Three Wise Men (Mt 2, 1-12)
The star did not guide them through sand dunes. The star appeared in the East (perhaps Babylon, or Persia...) and from there they set out for Jerusalem, where they thought the King of the Jews was going to be born. There was no desert of sand, but roads well made by the Romans and the star was not guiding them, they already knew where to go. The star appeared again when they left Jerusalem for Bethlehem and there it did guide them to the house where the Child was (since the census had already passed, there was now more room in Bethlehem to rent a house).
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A few years ago I said, as if mocking the Three Wise Men: "How wise they were! How could they ask Herod where the Child was if Herod, a murderous pagan Jew, killed the good Jews, simply because he hated God, and he killed his own children when he thought they were going to take the kingdom away from him?" But the good Wise Men may not have known what Herod was doing or perhaps they were naïve. One cannot go around looking at the defects of the other, because except God and Mary Most Holy, we are all imperfect. We would see mistakes everywhere all the time. It is better to imitate St. Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face (the little flower), she sought to look at the virtues of the nuns around her and praised God for the work He did in them.
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I think that when the Jews were deported to Babylon by King Nebuchadnezzar, who took even the utensils of the Temple, he also took scrolls of the scriptures that were there. And in one of them was the description of "the star of Moses," which Moses said, that when a great Prophet was about to appear (that he who would not listen to Him would be blotted out of the people) his star would appear again. All the peoples at that time knew about astronomy, they needed to know when a certain star appeared to know when to sow, when the religious feasts were, they needed to know how they were arranged in the sky to orient themselves in the sea... And I think that when the Magi saw that special star, which announced the Messiah, they began to look for information about it: when it had appeared before and, since they were pagans, whether it was a good or bad omen. And I suppose that studying ancient scrolls they saw that it was the star of the King of the Jews (Jesus Christ, the Messiah) and after getting organized, they arrived in Jerusalem two years later.
They left the comforts of their homes and set out with valuable things to honor the King of the Jews. But neither King Herod nor Jerusalem were happy to learn that the Messiah had been born, on the contrary, they were troubled. They were very comfortable with the pagan Roman empire... Thirty-three years later, the leaders of the Jews, full of envy for the miracles that Jesus performed and how the people followed Him, also used the Roman Empire as an excuse to put Jesus to death. Herod and the hierarchy of Jesus' time (and now so many more...) hated the light and did not go to Jesus, because their deeds were evil. That is why the feast of the Three Wise Men is so important, because they represent mankind that seeks and finds God. God created Adam and Eve, He is Creator and therefore Father of all men and He wants all to find and love and serve His only begotten Son: Jesus Christ.
I think they Three Wise Men were scientists of that time, who used their knowledge to surprise in the courts of kings, they felt comfortable in those environments, so they went straight to Herod's palace, and they had important virtues. The first is that they had faith in the scrolls that spoke of the star and set out to find God, as Abraham's family had left their land following God's directive.
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1) Looking to a particularly miraculous manifestation of nature, they began to look for the reason and then they set out to look for that Child who had been born, and they understood that this Child Jesus is God. They adored Him.
2) When Herod told them that the Child was to be born in Bethlehem, they left at once, at night, since the star they had seen in the east suddenly appeared and guided them till it placed itself on top of where the Child was. That's all well and good because the Old Testament teaches us that when we know we must do something, we shouldn't let time pass, that time is the enemy of truth. Now times are more difficult and Our Lady of the Roses commands us not to leave the house after dark.
3) When they saw the Child, they adored Him and offered Him valuable gifts: gold (for a king), frankincense (for God), myrrh (for a man). Instead, 33 years later, other Gentiles (non-Jewish people) offered Him nothing but took off His garments and did not worship Him but tortured Him with a horrible scourging and then amused themselves by playing with Him by putting a crown of thorns on Him.
And we: what gifts do we bring Him when we go to visit Him in His House? Do we bring Him fruits of virtues, penances for our sins, sacrifices that we have made to relieve His Cross? And remember that what we present to Him must be in "a clean vase", we must preserve the virtue of purity, the queen of virtues, the other tremendously important virtue is charity. If we have lost them, we must confess with sorrow for having made Jesus suffer on the Cross, for having offended Him when He was so good and we must strive to be Holy, as He wants. If we commit mortal sins, we lose the light and it will be very difficult for us to seek Jesus, who is the Light of the world.
In the Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St. John (remember that you must learn the Gospel of St. Matthew, St. John and the Apocalypse by heart, Our Lady of the Roses commands us), we read (automatically translated from Spanish:
Lk 3, 20-21
"For everyone who works evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, that his works may not be exposed; but he who works the truth comes to the light, that his works may be revealed as being done in God."
We are in this world to know, love, and serve God. Everything else is secondary.
The Three Wise Men were wise, they left everything to find God and paid homage to Him.