Drawn by light

The Epiphany 2013
http://www.lectionarypage.net/YearABC_RCL/Epiphany/Epiph_RCL.html


“Arise, shine, for your light has come.”

Today is the day we raise our eyes and let them be dazzled by the Christ-light. Today is the day we shake the dust from our shoes. Today is the day that we look around us, to the right and to the left, and realize that we are all pilgrims, all called, all led by the amazing, awesome Light shining from the ever-new face of Christ.

Draw strength and renewed wonder from fellow-pilgrims. That’s how the story is told today. In the ancient land of promise long ago, weary people slept and rose and lived their careful, fearful lives under the gaze of Rome’s soldiers and a brutal king. So many promises made by God, so long the wait to see them fulfilled. When would the Reign of God arrive? When would the faithful and the poor see their freedom?

And then, the unexpected: strange wanderers from the East, not the official people, not the rabbis, not the scholars from the Temple, not the High Priest. Strangers, outsiders, speakers of another language, suspicious people, magicians, astrologers, New Agers... Tradition calls them kings and counts them as three, but the Gospel makes it clear that these pilgrims were not the “usual suspects”, not expected, not even invited into the weary watchful quiet of Palestine.

They told a tale of their own wonder. Watching the stars, casting their horoscopes, they saw a star they did not expect. They could have catalogued the star, made some predictions about how the star foretold the success of their own king in some war or some new marriage for the Prince. But the wise scholars chose a different way.

They chose to admit they were amazed. They chose to lift their feet from their comfortable elegant cities and their predictable jobs making star-charts for the wealthy. They chose to be pilgrims, wanderers in the desert of the Middle East and in the desert of their own weary hearts. They chose to believe that a new thing could happen in their predictable lives, that a new road could open at their feet. They chose a new and unknown way. Legends tell of how long and weary was their path, and of how many people they met along the way. The Gospel tells of the frightening meeting they had with a paranoid king, and I feel sure they knew how dangerous was their conversation with Herod, how slippery were the lying words, how they were lucky to walk away with their heads still on their shoulders. Herod wanting nothing to do with stars and the newness that God brought to birth. In fact, he was willing to kill to keep things the same.

But the journey did not end with Herod’s tense throne room. The light, the star, led on to a strange place, a forgotten and poor place, where the final step for pilgrim feet lay ready for the wanderers from the East. We imagine it was easy for the wise pilgrims to recognize that the newborn Jewish baby was the wondrous end of their road. Was it? Or was that moment in the stable one more invitation of faith—yes here, in the ordinary truth of birth, in the fresh face of this poor baby born homeless, that he was the Now and the True and the Promised and the Hope that every lonely, desperate moment of their hearts needed and cried out for.

And so, they allowed themselves to be lost in wonder, love, and praise.

Today is our day to join them. No matter if we have heard this tale of wonder over and over, no matter if we have seen countless tinsel stars held by generations of kids in robes in countless Epiphany pageants, today is the Now and the Wonder and the Glory. Today is our day to raise our eyes and join with humility the mystic pilgrims from the East. Today is our day to join with all pilgrims in our own midst, all those who still seek us out because their steps have led them here, all those who refresh our own weariness with the wonder in their eyes and in their hearts. The church of old chose this as one good day to celebrate Baptism, and called it “coming to the Light.” Sometime today let’s all reach up in silence and touch our own heads where the Baptismal waters once flowed, and renew our wonder and thanks that we too have been called to the stable, to the One who is Light and Hope and Life, to the One who is ever-new. He is ever-new, and our journey to him is ever-new.

Here is a prayer from another Baptismal pilgrim, the Celtic monk Brendan, as he set forth on his journey from the East, choosing the sea:

“Shall I abandon, O King of mysteries, the soft comforts of home?
 Shall I turn my back on my native land, and turn my face towards the sea?
“Shall I put myself wholly at your mercy, 
without silver, without a horse,
 without fame, without honor?
 Shall I throw myself wholly upon You,
 without sword and shield, without food and drink,
 without a bed to lie on?
 Shall I say farewell to my beautiful land, placing myself under Your yoke?
“Shall I pour out my heart to You, confessing my manifold sins and begging forgiveness,
 tears streaming down my cheeks?
 Shall I leave the prints of my knees on the sandy beach,
 a record of my final prayer in my native land?
“Shall I then suffer every kind of wound that the sea can inflict?
 Shall I take my tiny boat across the wide sparkling ocean?
 O King of the Glorious Heaven, shall I go of my own choice upon the sea?
“O Christ, will You help me on the wild waves?”

Shall we all walk our own pilgrim path today?