When All The World Is Persuaded To Rejoice [Epiphany 1]

Matthew 2:1-12

  

On Epiphany Sunday we remember that Jesus is the Light of the World.  He’s not a Jewish light.  Not a light only for people from ancient Middle Eastern cultures.  Not a light just for religious people.  He’s not a light for people who like going to church.  He’s not a light for people who obey the rules and keep their noses clean.  This holy one born to Mary is light for the world; light for everyone, everywhere.

 

Though we sang “We Three Kings” this morning, we have no reason to assume that there were three magi, nor that they were “kings.”  More likely, this was a traveling band of astrologers accompanied by their servants and supplies.  They were likely from Babylon (or what is now Iraq).  They may well have been of the Zoroastrian religion.  But the point of the story is that they weren’t Jewish.  They represent all of us who wonder whether there is a new light being born in us too.

So the caravan of Eastern astrologers makes its way to Jerusalem and asks for an audience with King Herod.  They ask Herod where the “King of the Jews” is to be born.  Herod was familiar with foreign delegations bowing to his authority.  He was not used to travelers appearing to ask about other powerful figures in his Roman territory.

We know that Herod was rattled by this delegation because he later orders the murder of all the young male children in Bethlehem.  But in the presence of this delegation, Herod gathers himself, plays it cool, and manages to disguise his fear long enough to summon the Jewish scholars.  Their study of the Scriptures reveals that the Christ child is to be born in Bethlehem.  So Herod sends the caravan on their way, with instructions to return with a report on their way back to Iraq. 

When the caravan of astrologers approach Bethlehem, they see the star again and are “overjoyed.”  And this time it leads them to the home where they found Mary with her child Jesus (who is probably a year or two old by this point).  Upon entering the house, they fall facedown in front of the toddler and his mother Mary – their bodies expressing their reverence and respect.  And then they presented the child with gifts.  Because they were spiritually open, God was able to speak to them in the depths of their dreams to warn them to bypass jealous, fuming Herod on their way back home.

What an odd scene.  And what an odd way of telling it.  Here we have a large, traveling caravan of astrologers and attendants from Babylon. They travel for weeks on end in order to worship this newly born light.  They fall down, give gifts, then leave.  Did the foreign travelers even speak the Aramaic of Mary and Joseph?  What was said or communicated between them?  Did the travelers try to explain why they had come?  How long did they stay?  Did they have lunch before they left?  Of these and other questions Matthew’s gospel shows no interest.

The gospels as we have them are not the eye-witness accounts of journalists.  They are, instead, something much better.  They are artful and inspired invitations to imagine ourselves caught up in the attraction to God’s new light, beckoned to our own adventures into unknown but exciting territory. 

This gospel story offers us the graceful possibility of seeing our own lives in a new way.  We too are caught in the tension between the pull of power politics and the attraction to this new and joyful light.  There will always be a king Herod, demanding, threatening, and afraid.  Yet the caravan of seekers did not find Herod’s agenda all that interesting.  They represent for us the possibility of a life that is centered not on raw power but instead on hope and joy.

This Jewish story reminds us that Jewish frameworks cannot contain the light.  This holy birth is the birth of light that bursts any narrow limits and illumines the whole world, even those who seem to us foreign, exotic, and different.  Put differently, the magi remind us that there isn’t anyone who doesn’t live within the intense, gravitational pull of the Christ light.

That’s why Jesus says to his followers at the very end of Matthew’s gospel: “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you” (28:19-20).   I believe that that all people want to be persuaded to rejoice.  Not all people like the idea of being “religious.”  Not all people want to sign up for all the expectations that come with organized and institutional religion.  But all of us share an intense, passionate search for what it is that will bring us joy.

There is a book on my shelves with the title, Persuade Us to Rejoice: The Liberating Power of Fiction.  Sometimes I buy books simply because the title knocks my socks off.  And that’s why I bought this one.  “Persuade Us to Rejoice.”  The book explores how good fiction and artful storytelling can lead us out of our deadness and into the pulsing joy of life.  And it suggests that artists are primarily in the business of “persuasion.”  Any work of art – be it a book or a painting or a poem or a song – has as its truest task to “persuade us to rejoice.”  Stories and movies and music and buildings call to us, beckon us forward, luring us into an infectious joy.

An “epiphany” is a revelation, a manifestation, or an appearance of light.  And on Epiphany Sunday this gospel story awakens us to the light in our own lives.  The warmth of this light, the illumination that makes new discoveries possible, the intense pull of its attraction – all of this now has a name for us: Jesus Christ.