written and preached by Rev. Natalie Shiras
January 1, 2012 Matthew 2:1-12
Epiphany is the festival of light, the festival of the three kings finding the light! Caspar is portrayed as a Moor fromAfrica. Melchior is portrayed as a European. Balthasar is portrayed as an Asian fromIndia. Black, white and brown skin representing the world. They came bringing gifts of gold, symbol of wisdom, frankincense, symbol of universal unity, and myrrh, symbol of death, rebirth and resurrection.
Epiphany means manifestation, a sudden realization. These three kings came to manifest to us the light of Christ and his message of love. They were guided by the star to a tiny stable inBethlehem. As they gazed on the baby, the stable was so bright with Christ’s light, that it lit up all the sky.
What does this Epiphany, light of the world, look like in a more contemporary setting? There is a well known short story by the American author, O. Henry called “The Gift of the Magi”.
Mr. James Dillingham Young (“Jim”) and his wife, Della, are a newly wed couple living in a modest apartment. They each have one possession in which they take pride: Della’s beautiful long, flowing hair and Jim’s gold watch, which had belonged to his father and grandfather.
On Christmas Eve with only $1.87 in hand, and desperate to find a gift for Jim, Della sells her hair for $20, and eventually finds a gold chain for Jim’s watch for $21. Happy to have found the perfect gift at last, she runs home and begins to prepare dinner.
When Jim comes home, he looks at Della with an expression that she cannot read, and it terrifies her. Della then admits to Jim that she sold her hair to buy him his present. Jim gives Della her present — an array of expensive combs for her hair. Della then shows Jim the chain she bought for him, to which Jim says he sold his watch to get the money to buy her combs. Jim and Della are now left with gifts that neither one can use. They both realize how far they are willing to go to show their love for each other.
The story ends by comparing the couple’s mutually sacrificial gifts of love with those of the Biblical Magi. They relinquish their cherished possessions to make manifest the love in their hearts through their generosity.
Thirty years ago I was led to become an ordained pastor in thechurchofJesus Christat this time of year, Epiphany. I was drawn by Jesus’ message in the Bible of love and by his generosity.
His generosity and extravagance are everywhere in the gospel stories: feeding the five thousand or receiving expensive oil from a poor woman who anoints him with her hair.
He seems not to count the cost. “Do not store up treasures on earth”, he teaches, “for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” (Luke 12:32)
He welcomed everyone and told a parable about a Samaritan, enemy of his people, who became the good neighbor, helping a victim of robbery. (Luke 10:25-37)
At the end of Jesus’ life, he even let go of life itself. “Not my will but yours be done, O Lord”.
Jesus poured himself out as the ultimate in love. This is the path I chose, this path of love that Jesus taught and walked, a path he called me to follow.
And what was that path? A series of illuminations in the first thirty years of my life that led me closer and closer to Jesus. A vision of Jesus when I was six years old smiling upon me. Another brighter vision of Jesus when I was fourteen that scared me in its intensity. Hearing the stories of Jesus over and over. A spontaneous attraction to music about the stories of Jesus (“I Love to Tell the Story”). Working with my parents in the Episcopal Church for the integration of Black people and white people into the fabric of society as a contemporary response to Jesus’ call to love one another.
God, where would you have me go?
What would you have me do?
It was a call, at first faint and then clearer, to the ordained ministry in the United Church of Christ. I had left the Episcopal Church and was drifting in my faith—when in 1978 the Social Justice and Mission Committee of the First Congregational Church of Palo Alto, California encouraged me to use my gifts of leadership and ministry. Three years later I was ordained in that church. In the last thirty years I have been a campus minister, a hospital chaplain, and now a church pastor. All have prepared me for where I am today.
Nearly two years ago, soon after my father died, Jesus came to me again in the summer of 2010, gazing tenderly upon me for four consecutive mornings. I was unnerved. I went to the Rev. Jerry Judd, a wise retired UCC pastor now in his 90’s.
He asked me, “Did you gaze back?”
“Not really”, I replied.
“Gaze back and gaze at your congregation. They need you. But you also need them to learn about love”.
I realized I had been holding back my heart. Expressing love can be dangerous. No wonder so many people find Jesus’ path of love so challenging. I released my fears to God and remembered the words of Jerry Judd to gaze back. I opened my heart. I’ve been practicing ever since to express and spread that love!
It gives me pleasure to know God’s love for you and for me expressed through our love for one another. I love you. I am happy to be your pastor.
As we come into this new year on this New Year’s Day let us remember the love and generosity of the three kings and of the couple who gave up their cherished possessions. Let us remember Jesus’ message of love. What are you longing for this New Year’s Day? What star are you led by?
We recognize that it is love that we truly yearn for and are led toward. We are the living Christ, manifesting our love for one another. Let us together walk the path of love which Jesus calls us to follow. Amen.
