Epiphany Homily 2012
Isaiah 60:1-6, Psalm 72:1-7, 10-14, Ephesians 3:1-12, Matthew 2:1-12
We woke up this morning having left behind 2011, a year filled with tremendous events: Conservative majority, NDP official opposition, a seat for the Greens! The Arab Spring with Riots in Egypt, resignation of Hosni Mubarak, a Tsunami in Japan, Nuclear reactor meltdown, Revolution in Libya, the death of Moammar Gaddafi, the Assassination of Osama Bin Laden, wedding of William and Kate, Vancouver riots after the Canucks loss to Boston, sadly, Jack Layton and Apple co-founder Steve Jobs passed away, Occupy Wall Street Movement, Canada withdraws from Kyoto Accord. And we had our own changes here at St Lukes – new friends among us, the passing of others, new experiences, new traditions.
All of these stories, these people, relate a world that will never be the same. For many, and for many in our own community, the roads they once knew are gone forever, a new way to journey home must be found.
Today we are celebrating the feast of the Epiphany. An epiphany according to Wikipedia, “(from the ancient Greek, epiphaneia, “manifestation, striking appearance”) is the sudden realization or comprehension of the (larger) essence or meaning of something. The term is used in either a philosophical or literal sense to signify that the claimant has “found the last piece of the puzzle and now sees the whole picture,” or has new information or experience, often insignificant by itself, that illuminates a deeper or numinous foundational frame of reference.”
Like the 3 wise men, each of us come to faith, to the scriptures, with our own sets of questions, we each travel from distant lands with our own questions of meaning – maybe questions of justice, or questions of liberation, of feminism, of spirituality, of science, or of our own pain, our own questions of belonging – and we follow our questions and have arrived here – to a manger, where Almighty God appears as the babe of Bethlehem who points to his cross at Jerusalem – opening us to a deeper paradox, answering a question with a question – offering an epiphany, illuminating and drawing us into a deeper relationship, a deeper mystery, changing, transforming us – like moths dancing around a flame, each epiphany singing our wings until we are utterly consumed.
Sometimes our epiphanies are of great beauty, and sometimes Grace delivers an awakening where we are invited to let something go, to shed a way of being, to follow a new road and leave an old one behind. St John of the Cross describes our spiritual journey as a series of consolations and desolations where we are invited into a deeper relationship, a maturing of our faith, where we leave a previous understanding behind for a greater one – sometimes painfully, for in the absence of all that we once knew, God can seem far away.
I can remember the epiphany I discovered on my Father’s knee that changed my world forever. The discovery of the true reality of Santa Clause. I had heard about it in the school yard, but refused to believe what they told me – I loved Santa Clause, and that magical world that it sustained, I held on tightly to it, until I confronted my father. For a boy of 5, my world was changed forever, an innocence gone, a painful epiphany which made me leave a self understanding behind and to continue my journey in a new cold world, but a new road which opened new horizons of meaning and maturity.
I have some friends who have an extraordinary story to tell, a story of deep seeking, carving a path towards God in a great wilderness. For some, their story began in Iran. Through the 1970s and into the Iranian Revolution of 1979, they operated a network of vegetarian restaurants. These vegetarian restaurants, quietly made Yoga classes available, for those interested. They had to be very careful, for the political and religious climate made this kind of activity dangerous.
The community operated the Yoga classes, and made available, further teachings, the philosophy of yoga to those students who were interested. They were even more careful about who they invited to the philosophy classes, because this was the entry point into a growing community of Hindus secretly living in community throughout Iran.
Some of them lost their lives during the revolution and persecutions of their community, but under these tremendously difficult conditions, they speak of the forging of a tremendously empowered spiritual community based on love, compassion, fellowship, justice and hope. They served one another, helped the poor, and yearned for the freedom to live openly and so secretly planned a great escape to India, to the home of their leaders, a paradise over the mountains.
Eventually the conditions in Iran became too much to bear, so many in the community left everything and made a harrowing escape to the promised land. Right out of a movie, they set off on a life and death journey to their longed-for paradise. When some of them share this story, it is with great sadness for they lost many sisters and brothers, in the name of hope, in their journey to a greater world – but even more so, because of the realization that awaited them.
Arriving in India, they discovered their fellow devotees living in poverty, selling holy books on the street, and flowers at the airport while their celebate holy gurus drove around in Mercedes Benz with entourages of young western women. After all they had been through – their hopes and vision vaporized before them – They experienced a true epiphany – and “they left for their own country by another road.”
God is greater than any religion can contain, and the truth is surely revealed in different robes – and we are invited not to cling too tightly even to our own tradition and language, structures of faith, for God may invite us to let go of everything we think of as true, in order to reveal a greater vision of God’s self – a burning away of all that prevents us from being utterly consumed by the heart of God.
The whole Epiphany of Christmas with its cast of characters: shepherds, wise men, angels, even enemies – is testimony, says Martyn Percy “to a mosaic of perspectives, insights, encounters, revelations, and projections.” This is the beauty of the narrative of scripture and tradition – it holds us in a tension of absurd irony and paradox, we bring ourselves to these stories of revelation and slowly, epiphany by epiphany they change us, the veils of our perception are lifted, gently drawing us closer to the light of life.
Emily Dicknson put it like this in her poem, ‘Tell all the Truth’?
Tell all the truth but tell it slant:
Success in circuit lies,
Too bright for our inform delight
The truth’s supurb surprise.
As lightning to the children eased
With explanation kind,
The truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind.
“In God is there is a deep yet dazzling darkness,” continues Martyn Percy, a deeper mystery and relationship that always awaits us, so take courage, and have faith. Perhaps this Season of Epiphany you might consider how God has opened your heart and eyes. What do you need to leave behind on your journey home? What remains to be said, forgiven? What habits, or behaviours no longer serve you on your journey, what relationships, what directions need to be adjusted or changed?
As you gaze upon the crèche, as you come to the Altar bringing your gifts, meeting the God who offers all of himself, Do you need to travel back to your country by another road?
