Epiphany Bouquet
I am going to give a list of scenes from the Bible so we can identify what they have to do with each other. Think about this list:
Wise men led by the appearance of a star to find in the Judean town of Bethlehem a young child, born king of the Jews. (Matthew 2:1-12)
People come to the river valley and are baptized by John, son of Zechariah in the Jordan; Jesus too, comes and is baptized. As he is, while he is praying, the Holy Spirit descends on him in bodily form like a dove, and a voice from heaven declares, “You are my Son the beloved; on you, my favor rests.” (Luke 3:15-22)
Guests at a wedding in Cana of Galilee, Mary and Jesus become aware that the wine has run out. Jesus orders six twenty-plus-gallon jars to be filled with water, and tells the attendants to ladle out a cup and take it to the steward of the feast, He sips and discovers it is superlative wine. (John 2:1-11)
Jesus has three of his close followers with him, and they go up a mountain and begin praying. As they pray the appearance of the face of Jesus changed, and his clothes become dazzling white. In this flash of divine glory, two prophets of old, Moses and Elijah, then appear, talking with Jesus. (Luke 9:28-36)
What do these four pictures have that holds them together? Yes, they are all stories about Jesus. They are also stories that believers associate with Epiphany. This has been the case down through the centuries, starting with the early church. The word “Epiphany” carries the meaning of manifestation, revealing, and showing. The church looks upon stories from the Gospel in which the divinity of Jesus is made manifest. (These four are like stems with flowers: our Epiphany bouquet in the winter weeks of this season. But we will add another bloom at the end of this message.) In the four, notice how it was that the identity of Jesus as the Son of God was shown or revealed. In these stories, it dawns upon the people around Jesus that there is something remarkable and powerfully holy about him.
The showing of Christ’s holiness is evident in most stories about Jesus but the church has strongly associated the manifestation of Jesus’s divine identity with the journey of the Magi, the Baptism of our Lord, the first miracles of Jesus, and the Transfiguration of Jesus. These are the stories we hear, year after year on The Epiphany and the Sundays that follow, leading up to Lent, with its highlighting of the Cross. They are noted in one of our great Epiphany hymns:
Songs of thankfulness and praise, Jesus, Lord to thee we raise,
manifested by the star to the sages from afar;
branch of royal David’s stem in thy birth at Bethlehem:
anthems be to thee addressed, God in man made manifest.
Manifest at Jordan’s stream, Prophet, Priest, and King supreme;
and at Cana, wedding-guest, in thy Godhead manifest;
manifest in power divine, changing water into wine;
anthems be to thee addressed, God in man made manifest.
Manifest on mountain height, shining in resplendent light,
where disciples filled with awe thy transfigured glory saw.
when from there thou leddest them steadfast to Jerusalem,
cross and Easter Day attest God in man made manifest.
(Hymnal 1982, #135)
What excites me most about the Epiphany tradition of putting these images from the Gospels in front of us is the chance it gives us to open to an epiphany in our own lives. Noticing the lectionary pattern might not have much effect on our own spiritual experience. What would?… Opening our wills to the manifestation of the Holy Spirit and the glory of God: that does have an effect!
I am speaking about the encounters that God initiates with us, and our capacity either to open to them or to block them. The hymn declares the powerful record from the New Testament in which we see “God in man-made manifest”: the star, Jordan River theophany, water into wine, transfiguration-light on the mountain top. Now, what about God in YOU made manifest? This is the fifth stem and blossom in the bouquet.
You figure in. I understand how we are sometimes spectators at performances. We go to the ballet or the football game and stay in our seats. This is fine because we are not currently linebackers or principals in dance. We stay in the seats of the hall, in the stands for those events. We are rightly spectators for some things, but not for the manifestation of God upon this temporal stage. With the activity of God now, you are on the field, you…on the stage.
We know that God did not retire from the epiphany-making movement after the final New Testament document was scribed or after the death of the last Apostle. How do we open to God’s action and revelation in and through us? I don’t know everything about how. I do know that we begin to open by admitting that our baptism experiences and eucharistic experiences are Holy Spirit occasions. The same is true for our so-called normal activities. They are times in which we bear the Holy Spirit to the happenings of our lives. Not that every minute of the day is a constant series of epiphanies. God’s manifestations are particular and wondrous. Still, the Spirit within us and our openness mean any moment is ripe for God to move, and we, to perceive and respond.
In your baptism, people around saw the water that dripped across your sweet head, and back down into the font, or tank, or river, as it were. They might have seen the minister gently putting a track of holy oil in the shape of a cross on your forehead. What people could not see is the fire of baptism cleansing all sin, opening the gate to heaven, sealing your place in the family, issuing resurrection-life to you. People might not have taken in all of that with their senses but it all happened inwardly and spiritually. The water was visible, the grace, invisible. Both were real as real can be.
The wine and bread are visible, the grace, invisible. Together they convey renewal of your baptism, forgiveness, nourishment of the spirit, connection to eternity, bonds with God and Neighbor. If you admit by faith this is true, you are God’s candidate for epiphany. Get ready for it, my friend. God in you made manifest.
Get ready for a real epiphany in your experience. It is going to happen, and you can be ready through your will. I left out the third verse of Hymn #135 above, but I will close with it. The verse might have an intended application to the actions of Jesus and the Apostles in the New Testament, but it applies as well to you. You will, with God’s help, do all these things:
Manifest in making whole palsied limbs and fainting soul;
manifest in valiant fight, quelling all the devil’s might;
manifest in gracious will, ever bringing good from ill;
anthems be to God addressed, God in you,
specifically in you, God in you made manifest. Amen.