For most of us, the round of large meals, presents, cards, decorations and family visits is over – or nearly over – for another year. Phew. At Christmas we celebrate that God has come among us in Jesus Christ. Emmanuel: God is with us. It’s tempting to think that as soon as Christmas itself is over, we can all go back to normal, and that we don’t really have to think about the incarnation again until next Advent, and we can start singing O Come O Come Emmanuel again.
But Christmas isn’t really over until we’ve finished the Epiphany season too. If Christmas is all about Emmanuel: God with us, it’s not until Epiphany that we start to work out what that means. Epiphany literally means ‘manifestation’ – it means the revelation of who Jesus really is and what he is about. And that revelation is only partly about today’s story, it’s also about the events we recall in the rest of the Epiphany season: the baptism of Jesus next week, and the miracle at the wedding at Cana the week after that, both of which will tell us more about Jesus’ mission and identity.
In today’s gospel we heard the story of the visit of the Magi – the wise men – to the Holy Family. It’s a story we know so well that it hardly needs retelling. The wise men from the East see a new star rising, a star that their charts and calculations tell them hails the birth of a new king. Something makes them leave what they are doing and travel hundreds, perhaps thousands of miles to greet this king. Something makes them bring with them certain gifts – not just gold for a king, but also frankincense and myrrh. When they find the child and present their gifts, something persuades them that the humble surroundings of the child don’t detract form his importance. And finally, something – a dream – persuades them that they should return to their own land by a different route.
It’s not only the star that reveals Jesus. We’ve already mentioned the gifts of the magi: they too are part of the process of revealing what Jesus is about. I wonder what made them choose these gifts? Gold is certainly about Jesus as King. But Frankincense seems to be more of a gift for a priest – over the centuries, we’ve come to see this as representing Jesus’ divinity. And myrrh? That’s the really odd one: it’s a painkiller, it was used in anointing, and it’s what they used to use for embalming the dead; it’s a very odd gift for a child, but it does speak both of healing, and of death.
I sometimes wonder what the Magi thought they were doing with these presents. I like to think that they weren’t really sure what they were doing either. Just as something told them that of all the strange things they’d seen in their years of stargazing, this new star was the one worth following halfway across the world, so also something had told them that these were the right gifts to bring, even if they didn’t understand why. I like to think that God chose the Magi to carry the three gifts as tokens of Jesus’ identity: his kingship, his divinity, and the healing that would be accomplished through his death and resurrection. And that the magi could carry these signs to Jesus, even without really knowing what it was that they were doing.
I also wonder what Mary and Joseph made of the visit, and of the gifts. I like to think that this is one of the many things that St Luke tells us ‘Mary treasured in her heart’ and pondered over. Perhaps the encounter became one of those family stories that people tell each other – perhaps it acquired a meaning for them, something that would help them make sense of it all.
And I wonder what Jesus made of it all, as he grew up, and his parents told him about all the strange events surrounding his birth. I know my own mother is constantly telling me stories that begin ‘well, when I was pregnant with you…’ or ‘you were too young to remember this, but…’ or ‘do you remember being given that by so-and-so?’ I don’t know about you, but although it’s great to get the Christmas presents that we’ve been hoping for, the Christmas gifts I like best are the ones that I didn’t know I wanted until I unwrap them. The things I’d never thought of getting, or didn’t even know existed. The ones that open out something in me, that give me a new idea, or that tell me something about myself. Perhaps you can think of times in your own life when you’ve been given things that have taken on significance for who you are and who you have become.
I like to think that the gifts that the Magi brought were helpful to Jesus as he struggled to work out his own identity and mission. I like to think that he discovered through them, and through the story of the visit of the Magi, something of his kingly and priestly identity, and something of the significance of his own coming death. And I like to think that he went on discovering more about himself through the other events that we recall at Epiphany: perhaps he somehow knew that he should be baptised, but didn’t really know why – and the experience of baptism ended up being a key moment in his journey of self discovery. And what did he think he was doing at the Wedding of Cana, when he turned the water into wine? – John tells us that this was his first miracle, and according to the gospel account it was Jesus’ mother who persuaded him that this was the time for him to come of age and start being who he was called to be. It must have been a huge leap of faith for her and for Jesus.
And what about us? Where are we in the story? When I think about the Magi, I sometimes wonder about all the other stargazers in the ancient world, about who else saw the same star, but failed to accept its invitation. I wonder who saw the star, but decided to wait, and travel when the weather was better, or when they had finished some important bit of business, and whether, if I’d hesitated, it would ever have seemed like the right time. I sometimes wonder how many epiphanies each of us misses through looking too long and failing to leap?
I’m frequently being told at the moment that there’s never a ‘right’ time to start a family, and yet people do – they make that leap of faith, and step into a future that they cannot yet see. I wonder what opportunities we can glimpse – not only for ourselves as individuals, but also for us as a church? How is God calling us to grow as a church family? What risks might he be calling us to take? One of the cards I was sent at my ordination last year had the following poem on it:
God said: ‘Come to the edge’
And they said: ‘No, we are afraid’
And God said: ‘Come to the edge’
And they said: ‘No, we dare not’
And God said: ‘Come to the edge’
And they came.
And He pushed them gently.
And they flew.
If we wait until we can act without taking a risk, if we wait until we think we’re the masters of our own future, then are we not limiting the grace of God, and missing out on all the epiphanies that God in his grace is showing us?
I wonder what we have been invited to do this Christmas? What have we encountered? What have we seen and heard? What have we been given? And what have we given in return? These are all things through which God can and does reveal himself and his will to us. This is a very good time to be thinking afresh about what God might be saying to us – as individuals and as a church - about what he might be calling us to do, and to be.
But then again, sometimes the signs we see and hear aren’t what we’re expecting, or aren’t that easy to follow. While following a star sounds simple on paper, in reality it was probably rather hit-and-miss. After all, the magi didn’t find Jesus through the star alone, they had to ask for directions at Herod’s palace, with terrible and tragic results. In many ways the shepherds had it much easier – OK the angels were probably quite frightening at the time, but at least they did give clear instructions about where to find the child.
I suppose what gives us hope is that even with all their trial and error, when the Magi arrived and saw the baby Jesus, they at least had the wit to recognise that this was indeed what they had come for, and put aside any doubts about whether their journey had been worthwhile. I suppose what this feast-day can do to help us is to say: look, what the Magi saw was a baby – it was the potential for a lot of things, but it didn’t look anything like the finished product. They saw a baby, but something gave them the faith that it would come to more than that, that this was special, that this was, and would be, world-changing.
The rest of the Epiphany season, when we recall the baptism of Christ and the miracle of the wedding at Cana, this is where we just begin to see what it all means. Something enabled both the shepherds and the Magi to take the long view – God’s view – and recognise that in this child God had come among them, even if it would take years to work out what it meant. Can we not share in that long-term view, and learn to seize on the epiphanies and opportunities that God presents to us, and joyfully and faithfully to embrace the risk.
We are beginning to leave Christmas behind for another year, and in many ways, after Christmas everything goes back to normal. For most of us, our New Years resolutions give way to old habits, we go back to work, we settle back into our routines, we get used to being without all our extended families again, and we resign ourselves to the fact that we now have at least another two months of winter left with – now Christmas is over – nothing very exciting to look forward to.
In the meantime, God is with us. The feast of Christmas tells us so, but let us also be observant for the signs of the Epiphany, for the signs of God’s future breaking into and disrupting our present. Let us be ready to hear the invitation of God, to embrace the risks he is inviting us to take. And let us be alert to when it is our task to bring these things to fruition. For though everything may seem the same, we know that when the Word was made flesh, there was a new creation, and everything is different. This January is not the same as it was a year ago; the future is unknown to us. But it is in God’s hands. So let us, with the Magi, trust in God for whatever the next step may be, and be willing agents of his revelation.
Amen.