Epiphany Today
‘Epiphany’, the name of the day which is celebrated 12 days after Christmas, comes from a Greek word which means ‘revelation.’ God is truth. But unless that truth is in some way imparted to us as human beings, the truth will remain hidden. Jesus, Son of God, had been born at Christmas. Unless that fact had been spread abroad, it would have remained hidden and of no significance. It had to be revealed. Here in this verse from Matthew’s gospel the flashbulb has popped and the moment of revelation is forever frozen before the camera. It is revelation in more senses than one.
First of all, it was a revelation to the Jews, to Jesus’ own nation Israel. God had already revealed himself to the Jews; but he had been revealed in a way which was partial, in a way which was exclusive to the Jews – God was wholly Other, his very name YAHWEH could not be pronounced by the Jews. His presence was awesome: His revelation to the Prophet Elijah follows a great and powerful wind tearing the mountains apart and shattering the rocks, it follows earthquake, fire and paradoxically it is in the form of a ‘still small voice’. But this Epiphany revelation is ‘God with us’ in the shape of a little baby who can be worshipped. There is something very ordinary here, but at the same quite extraordinary; something very human, but at the same time divine. The hairs on the backs of our necks should be standing on end. The essence of this revelation of God is that ‘he too shares in our humanity’ [Hebrews 2.14]. The object of this birth is that eventually by his death ‘he might destroy him who holds the power of death’. In this moment of revelation then we see revealed God’s divine purpose for us through Jesus born as a little child. Here be incarnation.
Secondly, this child was a revelation to the Magi. We want to know about these Magi, but know nothing about them apart from the bare statement that they were ‘from the east’, and that they had studied the stars and seen a star which they had interpreted as ‘the star of the child Jesus who had been born king of the Jews’, and whom they came to worship. That in fact tells us a lot. God had revealed his purpose to people from a religion alien to the Jews: the reading of stars was anathema to the Jews who carefully excluded all astrology and magic. But here God had chosen to break into their seemingly alien world, had chosen them as the three men whom Jesus should be revealed to. Here two different worlds met. To this alien world God chose to reveal himself. Here two worlds met. Here potentially the wounds of the Fall, and of the Tower of Babel could be healed. The picture of men from an alien religion and culture worshipping the baby Jesus is tremendously potent. It is the beginning of the ‘destruction of the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility’ which Jesus desires [Ephesians 2.14]. It is said that when the Moslems conquered the Holy Land, the Church at Bethlehem was spared because on its front were depicted the Magi in eastern dress. We underestimate the power of Jesus to break through these walls of hostility; we overlook the fact that Jesus is a figure of huge importance to Moslems; we need to have our minds open to the common ground which exists between Moslems and Christians, and the possibility of future acceptance of this revelation by Moslems.
Thirdly, and crucially, are we in the frame too? For the Magi, there was an external and an interior journey. Matthew’s account rather suggests that their external journey may have taken as long as two years: Herod gives orders (v.16) for the slaughter of all the boys in Bethelehem and its vicinity ‘who were two years old and under’. We should beware of telescoping Matthew’s account with Luke’s – here in Matthew there is no stable and no manger, no ox and ass. It was hardly a straightforward journey: a star can hardly have been a very precise indication of Jesus’ whereabouts. The Magi come asking, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews?” Their enquiries lead them to King Herod, and eventually they flee after being warned in a dream about Herod’s true intentions. What of their interior journey? We know they came to worship Jesus, and did so. But what happened after they returned home? We can only guess from their reaction when they saw that the star had stopped over the place where the child was. They were overjoyed. The star marked the spot where their external and interior journeys came into synch. What of our external and interior journeys? Where are we on our search for meaning or fulfilment? How does our external journey – our job, our study, our commitments to family and friends and colleagues – relate to that interior journey, the search for faith, the search for the child Jesus? Are we at a point where they are in synch, or are they at odds, in tension, one perhaps eclipsing the other? Are we eager to bow down and worship the child, or are there other things which we pay more attention to? It would be a good New Year exercise to spend some time imagining ourselves with the Magi, and holding in our hands before the baby Jesus all that we have and all that we are. We should not shrink from this: we know of course that we should be standing at the back saying, ‘God be merciful to me a sinner.’ All that light is awe-inspiring. We feel we have nothing to offer. But we have. We have our scattered human potential to retrieve. That we can offer with outstretched hands to Jesus. We know that He will not throw it back in our face, that he wants to transform our poor gifts into gifts every bit as splendid as gold, frankincense and myrrh.
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