Welcome to 2022! This month we’re continuing with Sunday School and Worship Service on Sundays, Food Pantry and Soup sisters on Tuesday evenings, and Bible Study on Wednesday evenings. Saturdays will be busy too, with the church Board meeting on 1/15, Women meeting at church on 1/22 at 11 am, and Men meeting at Lee’s Diner on 2nd St. on 1/29 at 8 am. Welcome to church!
Father of Heaven and beyond, today Lord we humbly come to you with great thanks for all of the miracles you work in the universe each and every day. We thank you Lord for our very being, as we pray that you would forgive our manifold sin, and help us to grow closer to a deeper walk with and in you. Amen!
What is Epiphany? Enter The King
What is Epiphany? Epiphany, directly follows Christmas, which follows Advent the time of preparation for the big event the birth of Christ. All are a part of the Church to serve to remind us of the importance of Christ, and His reality to you and me.
The word Epiphany, is one of those words I used to use as a trigger. There once was a time, when if someone would say; I have had an Epiphany (you know like a big breakthrough of an idea), I would flick that switch I used to flick. Which bobbed my head up and down as if I were listening and in reality, I was going over reruns of Gilligan’s Island. I was just doing time, but really just wondering which episode of Gunsmoke would play that night, and if I were going to have microwave popcorn with the show. Pretending to listen but not really engaged because I wasn’t interested in talking with someone who had Epiphanies or even used words like Epiphany. Hey I didn’t know if having an Epiphany was contagious or not.
Let’s face it, something that sounds like Epiphany-7 in my ears, resonates like the latest variant of Covid-19.
But things changed when you have been saved. You are suddenly more open to things God is doing in this life of ours. Like Abraham of old, we are open to the promptings of the Spirit, and available to God’s plan.
Epiphany; that great awakening in all of us, and all of humanity. That God has done something unique, awesome, elegant, and ultimately, kind in the utmost dimension. That Heaven has actually come down to earth with God to love you, and all the creation, along with you!
I can almost hear the words being proclaimed in the Highest of Praise to all who are willing to listen to the glorifying Angels on high worshipping God in the Highest of Glorification, and perhaps singing something David wrote. Maybe a love song to God in the Highest of Magnification, which is what happens when the family of God get together to proclaim: God’s glory, beauty, and majesty! Here is an example from Psalm 29:1-9
1 Ascribe to the Lord, you heavenly beings,
ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.
2 Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name;
worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness.
3 The voice of the Lord is over the waters;
the God of glory thunders,
the Lord thunders over the mighty waters.
4 The voice of the Lord is powerful;
the voice of the Lord is majestic.
5 The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars;
the Lord breaks in pieces the cedars of Lebanon.
6 He makes Lebanon leap like a calf,
Sirion like a young wild ox.
7 The voice of the Lord strikes
with flashes of lightning.
8 The voice of the Lord shakes the desert;
the Lord shakes the Desert of Kadesh.
9 The voice of the Lord twists the oaks
and strips the forests bare.
And in his temple all cry, “Glory!”
Epiphany; that great awestruck moment when you, me, anyone of us who begins to get a glimmer of an understanding of what is happening in the universe, and how we are a part of something so much larger than ourselves. If you were listening to the Psalm that I read from David, and started to get a new insight, or an additional understanding of the majesty that is our God… well, that is a kind of Epiphany, big idea, or perception.
Epiphany; … the name comes from the Greek epiphaneia, meaning “appearance” or “manifestation,” and refers to the manifestation of the Lord Jesus Christ to the world. To and for Jews and Gentiles. In English, people saw God walk with people, be with people, redeem, renew, and save humanity, and continues to sustain humankind with Grace.
Epiphany; … this holiday or observed time, is also called the Feast of Epiphany, remembering the Theophany (which means people and God in the same place at the same time), as happened with the giving of the Ten Commandments on Sini with God, Moses, and the children of Israel. Some just call this time the Three Kings’ Day, hence the song “We Three Kings” … to celebrate and observe God coming into the world and being recognized by some of the people.
Epiphany; is what makes Christians different from our Jewish and Muslim brothers and sisters. Of all three World World-wide Faiths, only Christians have the chutzpah, the boldness of faith to believe that God would actually be willing to dirty Himself by being willing to be in Epiphany (actually in the same location with us filthy sinners, humanity), to enter into the cesspool of human activity. That’s how much we believe God loves His creation.
I believe when Epiphany is practiced right, humanity is bringing great joy to our Creator by praising, glorifying, and magnifying His Holy and precious name above all others. That also means that we love our brothers and sisters even if they do not believe in our Epiphany, a belief in God among His creation in the life of Jesus. Our love does not come with conditions, because we serve a real God with real plans for our eternity.
And we know His plans come to fruition in His time and in His ways. Just look at today’s Call to Worship, where Isaiah prophesied that the great Epiphany, manifestation of God in this world would indeed happen hundreds of years before it actually took place. Reading again from Isaiah 60:1-6, we are instructed;
“Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the Lord rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the Lord rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
3 Nations will come to your light,
and kings to the brightness of your dawn.
4 “Lift up your eyes and look about you:
All assemble and come to you;
your sons come from afar,
and your daughters are carried on the hip.
5 Then you will look and be radiant,
your heart will throb and swell with joy;
the wealth on the seas will be brought to you,
to you the riches of the nations will come.
6 Herds of camels will cover your land,
young camels of Midian and Ephah.
And all from Sheba will come,
bearing gold and incense
and proclaiming the praise of the Lord.
Epiphany; … means to me that in addition to the manifestation that God has shown His love for all of us by coming to this earth, living by example a life we should want to try and emulate, and then surrendered Himself up to die and take our sin away once and for all… In addition to all of that, we have the manifestation of His Holy Spirit to sustain and carry us in the here and now, which brings even more meaning to us when reading God’s word.
When reading Isaiah, I can’t help but get excited in my own right because I already know what happened. Jesus’ earthy walk among us brought a reconciliation for all who were willing to take God’s invitation to be family with Him. Confirming how much God loves us in spite of us. We who struggle just to do the right thing, and yet…
How some chose to receive God’s gift of Epiphany, and others who only accept God on their own terms. Meaning like much of society, and you and me at times, living on autopilot, and filtering out God’s presence in our lives, because we have our own ideas on just how God should operate. What He should look and sound like, and who God should accept into His family.
Which sounds strange, since you and I are the foster kids in God’s family. Us wild Gentiles who accepted the Epiphany of God’s grace, and have been adopted in. Grafted into Abraham’s family tree, all do to God’s grace for us outsiders. Making us outsiders no more! We are the last of people who should want to judge who is suitable for God’s Holy family.
Epiphany; is when God enters into this world to save the willing of humanity, and our ability to take off the blinders and actually comprehend what is happening as depicted in today’s Message Reading from the Gospel. Reading again from Matthew 2:6-11
6 “‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
for out of you will come a ruler
who will shepherd my people Israel.’”
7 Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. 8 He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.”
9 After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. 10 When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. 11 On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.
Too often, we focus on the gold, frankincense and myrrh that we are giving at this time of year, especially when the Visa Card account comes in the mail reflecting last month’s generosity, and not nearly enough on the real gift of Epiphany. Our salvation into eternity, through His salvation!
Yes, the Lord has declared through the Gospel that God will save the willing in His own way, and not the way we might visualize His greatness. I don’t know what the three Magi were thinking the King from heaven would be like, or really that much about Herod’s ideas on the subject. I do know, that any threat to his power would be met with any force of resistance he could raise.
The Zealots of Israel, were expecting a Warrior-King to rid them of Roman dominance. Many of the religious of Israel were expecting a Warrior-Priest-King to clean up the shoddy faith within God’s Temple. The Essenes were looking towards a war with the sons of light taking on the sons of darkness, and on and on it goes.
Fact is, I want God to be in my image when I am being selfish and on the automatic fleshful me. But that is not what Epiphany is all about. God comes in His glory, and if we are not in tune with our God, in relationship with our Lord, working on our lives in and with our shepherd, we will not recognize His voice, His image, His work, His plan, or our salvation, from the myriads of get rich plans, get well techniques, get back at schemes, and all the rest of the selfishness that pervades humanity at this time.
Epiphany; is the acknowledgment that the King has come to us (in this cesspool of our own creation), to save us, redeem us, love us, and be with us in eternity, if we will accept, believe, and live our lives with and in Him.
Indeed, the King has shown us that the real battles in this life are not the war-torn battlefields strung with bodies and limbs, blood and gore, so much more. No, the real battle for right and wrong are not even right and wrong, but beyond that. They are the celestial war concerning Holy and Evil. In many cases beyond our mere ability to comprehend the levels and platitudes that the war encompasses us.
Suffice to say, the real battlefield, where the true fight that concerns you today, what you have a say in, is the war that is raging within you! And in many cases, it’s uglier than the battlefields you see on the news at night on the TV. Because of the stakes involved (eternity), and the depth of the turmoil the battle concerns each of us in varying ways. Our individual battles are unique to each of us. The King knows this and its why He has come into our lives to walk with you and the two of you build and rebuild your lives together in and with Him. Fighting like the true Warrior-Priest-King that your savoir is, your battle over your sin.
Epiphany; is when you allow the King into the temple of your heart. The structure He created and owns outright but won’t force His will upon you, but offers you the free choice of accepting His grace of eternity. That’s when the manifestation of God and you in the same place (your heart, His Temple), becomes a reality, becomes Epiphany.
Amen!