The Epiphany

January 5                                NOTES FOR REFLECTION                         The Epiphany

Texts: Isaiah 60:1-6; Ephesians 3:1-12; Matthew 2:1-12*

[*Technically we're on the Eve of the Epiphany, but come on!  Who celebrates the Eve of the Epiphany?  And just look at these readings!]

Theme:  We could just go with "The Epiphany of our Lord Jesus Christ".  I'm tempted to go with "Seek and You Shall Find", to continue the idea of Christmas-Epiphany as the archetypal start of the faith journey.  Perhaps something about light – "Seeing the Light"; or something about dawning – "And the Truth Dawned on Them".  But please, if you are tempted to go with "A Star is Born", pray urgently for the grace to resist that temptation!

Introduction.  What wonderful readings with which to start the New Year!  First, Isaiah on peak form and in joyous mode, as he looks ahead to the great in-gathering of the Gentiles at the end of the age.  Then St Paul still bubbling over with excitement at the discovery of the real purpose of God, kept hidden for so long, that salvation is for the Gentiles as well as the Jews.  And to cap it all, this beautifully constructed story from Matthew, so subtle and subversive when liberated from Christmas cards and excruciating carols and allowed to speak its real message direct to our hearts.  The ham and cake may have run out, but the real feast is only just beginning!

Background.  On the Third Sunday of Advent (December 15) I preached at St Peter's, Caversham on the two questions that were asked in the gospel passage set for that day (Matthew 11:2-11): the one asked of Jesus by emissaries from the imprisoned John ("Are you the one who is to come or are we to wait for another?"); and the one asked by Jesus ("What did you go out into the wilderness to look at?").  And I said this:

Two seemingly short and clear questions given to us today as early Christmas presents.  For we all have highs and lows on our faith journeys.  We all have times when it all seems so obvious – and we all have times when we are tempted to dismiss it all as wishful thinking.  Particularly at this time of the year – at Christmas.  When we see the decorated tree, when we hear our beloved carols, when we and others try our hardest to be nice to one another – when we see the baby in the manger – when all this surrounds us perhaps we can believe again in the goodness of ourselves and others – perhaps our hope is reignited like our Advent Candles.

But oh how early in the New Year all that can wear off!  That, perhaps, is when we need to unwrap these two questions and see what they hold for us.  Is he the one who is to come into my life, or am I waiting for someone else?  What drew me to this place this Christmas?  What did I come to see?  A fine church looking especially lovely at the midnight mass?  What did I come to hear?  Beautiful carols that feed my hunger for nostalgia?

Or did I come to hear again a message – a call – an invitation...

So here we now are – early in the New Year.  With the benefit of hindsight (and "hindhearing") are we any more able to answer those questions?  As I reflect on Christmas 2013, what did I see and hear – underneath all the surface tinsel and make-believe?  That seems to me to be the reason why we have this important Day today.  Have we seen – have we heard – have we experienced a new epiphany of our Lord Jesus Christ?

And what better story to help us face this question squarely could there be than this much-loved (and much-misunderstood) story of the Magi or Wise men?  Matthew wastes not a moment nor a word in telling his story.  It is set "in the time of King Herod"; but this time is now interrupted, for the time of Jesus the Christ is beginning.  What is the sign of that?  The arrival of "Wise Men from the East" – or Gentiles, as he could equally well have indentified them: the great "in-gathering", so long forecast by the prophets as the major event of the coming of the Messiah.  Who are they?  We might call them seekers, for they have come to Jerusalem asking for directions to the new-born Messiah.  Notice the wonderful irony that begins here and runs through this whole story.  Gentiles, by definition, non-Jews, non-believers, are the ones seeking God, and they have come to the Jewish holy city to be enlightened.  Why?  Because they have recognised a sign in the heavens – a sign pointing their way to the glory of God.  If they were astrologists (as is often surmised) how wonderful that they have seen in the stars a sign of the one through whom the stars and everything else are created!

And just look at the picture we are given of Herod.  A bunch of strangers in fancy dress have turned up in the city in search of some baby or other and the King is "frightened" – this brutal, murdering King on his home turf is spooked by the arrival of these guys!  Stranger still, Matthew records that "all Jerusalem" shares the King's fears.  Notice the echoes here: Matthew, of course, is writing very much with the benefit of hindsight.  He knows about the later Herod being cajoled and tricked into the murder of John the Baptist; he knows about the fickle crowds at the so-called Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem who so quickly became the mob calling for crucifixion; and he knows about the vacillating Pilate who asked Jesus if he was or was not "the King of the Jews".  Those themes are all there in this "early" episode in the gospel narrative.

Matthew heaps it on.  Herod summons the religious leaders for their advice on this important theological question: where was the Messiah to be born?  The religious leaders know their Scriptures: they answer the question correctly, but it is the Wise Men, the outsiders, the seekers, who continue on their way and find the one who is to come.  The religious ones remain in Jerusalem, blinded by their intellectual knowledge from seeing the great light that is trying to penetrate even their darkness.

And notice what happens when the Wise Men arrive at their goal.  They don't ooh-and-aaah, go weak at the knees, and start babbling in baby-talk: they don't congratulate Mary and Joseph or tell them that the baby has his mother's eyes or his father's chin.  They kneel down before the baby and worship him: and then out of their treasure chests they offer gifts that show beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are "seeing" with spiritual eyes who this child really is.  They are experiencing an epiphany.

So as we come to the end of the Christmas Season, what did we see?  What did we hear?  What did we experience?  What one thing spoke to us of the Ultimate Reality whom we call God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit?

Isaiah.  The image is one of universal redemption, joy, abundance and celebration.  And it is surely no accident that it comes in the closing chapters of this great prophetic work.  This vision is not one of a sudden all-encompassing event that "magically" transforms the world by divine fiat.  It is a vision of the end to which God has been working his purposes out from the beginning of time.  It is the universal Kingdom of God in its completion.  It does not replace what has gone before – it is all that has gone before gathered up and transformed into a new and glorious divine reality.  All Israel's failings, infidelities and sheer bloody-mindedness over the centuries will one day be seen as part of this extraordinary process of creation and redemption that God started in the beginning and will bring to completion in the end.  (And the same is true of our own failings, infidelities, and bloody-mindedness!)

Taking It Personally.

·        Read through this passage slowly, preferably aloud, several times.  Let the sheer poetry of it seep into you and lift you up.  Charge your batteries ready for all that this year may bring your way.

·        Notice the emphasis on "gathering" in verse 4.  Reflect on any gathering you have been part of over the Christmas period.  Did you enjoy the experience?   Are you more or less aware of the presence of God when part of a gathering?

·        Were you aware of any tensions within the gathering?  Were you able to ease any such tensions in any way?  Were there any lessons for you: might you do something differently in the future?

·        Could you describe any such gathering as a "foretaste" of the great In-gathering to come?

 

Ephesians.  A very different passage, yet no less inspiring and uplifting. Paul repeats much of what he said in chapter 1, as if the truth he is expounding is so overwhelming that he can't help but say it all over again.  God really does have the same good news for the Gentiles as for the Jews!  Moreover, this isn't some sort of Divine Plan B, hastily put in place because Plan A (the obedience of the Jews) hadn't worked out too well.  Universal salvation had been God's plan from the very beginning.  Which means that all of us have "access to God in boldness and confidence".

 

 

 

 

Taking It Personally.

 

• A good passage for lectio divina.  Read through it slowly: what word or phrase strikes you in particular?
• What do you make of verse 10?  Use it as a template to critique your own local faith community.  Is it manifesting the wisdom of God to the people in your own neighbourhood (let alone to the "rulers and authorities in the heavenly places"!)?  Are you?
• Think about the people flocking to the Holy Land on pilgrimage at Christmas.  Is this part of what Isaiah and Paul were talking about in today's passages?  There were about 120 believers on the Day of Pentecost.  Today there are about two billion.  What do you make of that?

 

Matthew.  Here is another story unique to Matthew.  Notice how he simply asserts that "Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea".  As we saw last week, he went to some extraordinary lengths in the next passage to explain how this could be so, given that Jesus was known as Jesus of Nazareth.  The Wise Men "saw" something they found irresistible; like the disciples they left everything to follow wherever they might be led.  (How did their families and associates feel about that?)  Why were they interested in a baby who was born to be king of the Jews – what was that to them?  Nothing much makes sense from a rational, intellectual point of view – yet from a spiritual point of view, it all makes perfect sense.  They were attracted, they responded wholeheartedly, despite whatever cost and hardship was incurred, they kept on to the end of the journey, they responded in worship and offering, and after that they returned home "by a different road".  Their life journey was now following a different course.

 

Taking It Personally.

 

• Review your own faith journey in the light of this passage.  What started you on your way?  How committed are you to the journey?  What obstacles and difficulties have you encountered?  From whom have you sought directions?  Is your life following a different course because you have encountered the Christ Child?  In what respect?
• Review last year's part of the journey.  Are you closer to Christ now than you were at the start of 2013?
• What are your hopes for the journey this year?  What gifts are you taking with you?  How committed are you?  Where do you hope to be in 12 months time?
• What might you need to discard to facilitate your progress on the journey this year?
• Talk to God about all this in prayer "in boldness and confidence".

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