Monday Morning Musing: Epiphany Followings

I remember that in 2021, while we watched democracy under attack in ways that seemed, at that time, unfathomable, it occurred to me that January 6th would now be known as both the date of an Insurrection and the Feast of Epiphany. I was mad about that then and I'm not happy about it now, either. The bad guys have taken far too much of the good from the world, and now they'd done it on a day whose very meaning is to make Christ, the ultimate Good, known.

The magi in our family's nativity scene have found their way at last to the manger and soon we will take down the Christmas trees and move our thoughts toward the more ordinary things of Ordinary Time.

Of course, these are not ordinary times at all. They are times and seasons that will require us to defend the common good and fight again and again and again for what is right. In the darkness and stillness of this morning, I am already weary thinking about it.

But.....we are not left without a guide. The light shines brightly in the darkness and as the writer of John's Gospel reminds us, the darkness does not overtake it. And it will not overtake goodness either. Like the magi, we follow the light of Christ, the ultimate Good, in the world. We do not pledge our fealty to the Herods of the world and that is a costly stand to take.

Scholars think that Jesus would have been about two years old when the magi finally made their way to him. For convenience, we have compressed this story into thirteen days. But I long to linger at the manger, awe-struck that the star that was guiding the magi to the Savior of the World landed at the feet of a toddler. In Matthew 2:10, we read that "when they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy."

And that's where I'd like to land, for just a moment, just a day, even, before we must re-engage with the powers and principalities that threaten all that is good and noble in our own homeland.

In Matthew's story, the magi get to linger for exactly one verse. They kneel before Jesus and his mother, present their gifts, and pay him homage for one verse (10: 11). And their very next act....the very next thing they do....is defy Herod. The unjust ruler, the unfaithful shepherd, the murderous, enraged, threatened, insecure, narcissistic......Herod. Who had instructed them to return to him and tell him where Jesus was. Herod told the magi he wanted to pay homage also, but the reader knows he really wants to kill Jesus. And the magi are warned of this in a dream, and told in that dream to return home by another way.

This January 6th, this Epiphany, this anniversary of the Insurrection, I am holding onto following what is revealed in light and in dreams. That sounds so simple and I know it will require much. But what I've learned from those wandering magi is that it takes persistence to find the Greatest Good and it takes courage to defy the darkness. The story of the magi is not a post-script to the Incarnation. The story of Epiphany is our marching-order story. And so we go, and follow the light. And so we go, and defy the darkness. But go, we must.

The magi have arrived safely on our sideboard. Already they are determining an alternate route home.

Post-Script: Although the Epiphany story is not a post script, I have one for those post. I was installed as Senior Pastor at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church one year ago on this date. I find in that, a call in itself. And I am so very grateful. +PJH