Epiphany Is 60: 1-6; Eph 3: 2-3,5-6; Matt 2: 1-12`
The shepherds are the little people. We saw them yesterday, New Year’s Day. The three kings arrive today, the three kings, the magi from afar, from the east, highly educated philosophers from Persia. They are not Jews. But they come, too, paying attention to the star, the light, the source that has broken into their lives. They also worship and adore, bringing gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. “They prostrated themselves and did him homage” (Matthew). What can we learn from this? They of high station, pay serious attention to light and humbly, kneel in homage.
Whether we are big or small, we, by God’s gift, are “coheirs of Christ and members of the same body” (Ephesians). Like these kings, we give our gifts, and adore. Like the shepherds and the kings, we pay attention to the in-breaking of God in our lives, yes, in natural phenomena, seeing God’s action in the light source and “know the place for the first time” (T. S. Eliot).
Epiphanies happen. Revelations happen. Still, the journey is not easy. The light is with us. The Kings’ journey was not easy. Our journey is not easy. When the revelation –- or the epiphany –comes, it demands a change, a conversion. We are like the magi, persons of culture and education. So well, it’s harder for us perhaps to recognize the light breaking in, even in ordinary ways, because our accomplishments or our technologies can get in the way. Dr. Eben Alexander is a neurosurgeon. He had a near death experience that changed his life. It was a meeting with the Divine Life Force, God, Love. He wrote a book about it, Proof of Heaven. You might say he is a contemporary wise man. He urges us to pay attention to the mystical dimensions of our own ordinary lives. Light breaks in. Love breaks in. We are all loved. When one experiences this, nothing is the same.
We are called to imitate the magi, to bow low, to know we are small, the infant is great. ‘He must increase; we must decrease’ (John the Baptist). When we acknowledge the light, we radiate light; we are “radiant at what you [we] see” (Isaiah). We go back another way. We act differently. It demands a new way of living, from self, to God and neighbor. We radiate that light with the particular gifts, talents and treasures that we are for the benefit of others as Paul tells us today: “the stewardship of God’s grace given to me for your benefit.”
So we rejoice: the three kings remind us to follow light, to do homage and to give gifts to God and God’s people whom we are called to serve. These kings are big indeed, big examples.