Collect
O God, who by the leading of a star manifested your only Son to the peoples of the earth: mercifully grant that we, who know you now by faith, may at last behold your glory face to face; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
or
Creator of the heavens, who led the Magi by a star to worship the Christ–child: guide and sustain us, that we may find our journey’s end in Jesus Christ our Lord.
Post Communion
Lord God, the bright splendour whom the nations seek: may we who with the wise men have been drawn by your light discern the glory of your presence in your Son, the Word made flesh, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Readings
Old Testament – Isaiah 60.1–6
Arise, shine; for your light has come,
and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.
For darkness shall cover the earth,
and thick darkness the peoples;
but the Lord will arise upon you,
and his glory will appear over you.
Nations shall come to your light,
and kings to the brightness of your dawn.
Lift up your eyes and look around;
they all gather together, they come to you;
your sons shall come from far away,
and your daughters shall be carried on their nurses’ arms.
Then you shall see and be radiant;
your heart shall thrill and rejoice,
because the abundance of the sea shall be brought to you,
the wealth of the nations shall come to you.
A multitude of camels shall cover you,
the young camels of Midian and Ephah;
all those from Sheba shall come.
They shall bring gold and frankincense,
and shall proclaim the praise of the Lord.
Psalm 72.[1–9] 10–15
[1 Give the king your judgements, O God, ♦
and your righteousness to the son of a king.
2 Then shall he judge your people righteously ♦
and your poor with justice.
3 May the mountains bring forth peace, ♦
and the little hills righteousness for the people.
4 May he defend the poor among the people, ♦
deliver the children of the needy and crush the oppressor.
5 May he live as long as the sun and moon endure, ♦
from one generation to another.
6 May he come down like rain upon the mown grass, ♦
like the showers that water the earth.
7 In his time shall righteousness flourish, ♦
and abundance of peace till the moon shall be no more.
8 May his dominion extend from sea to sea ♦
and from the River to the ends of the earth.
9 May his foes kneel before him ♦
and his enemies lick the dust.]
10 The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall pay tribute; ♦
the kings of Sheba and Seba shall bring gifts.
11 All kings shall fall down before him; ♦
all nations shall do him service.
12 For he shall deliver the poor that cry out, ♦
the needy and those who have no helper.
13 He shall have pity on the weak and poor; ♦
he shall preserve the lives of the needy.
14 He shall redeem their lives from oppression and violence, ♦
and dear shall their blood be in his sight.
15 Long may he live;
unto him may be given gold from Sheba; ♦
may prayer be made for him continually
and may they bless him all the day long.
Epistle – Ephesians 3.1–12
This is the reason that I Paul am a prisoner for Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles – for surely you have already heard of the commission of God’s grace that was given to me for you, and how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I wrote above in a few words, a reading of which will enable you to perceive my understanding of the mystery of Christ. In former generations this mystery was not made known to humankind, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit: that is, the Gentiles have become fellow-heirs, members of the same body, and sharers in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.
Of this gospel I have become a servant according to the gift of God’s grace that was given to me by the working of his power. Although I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given to me to bring to the Gentiles the news of the boundless riches of Christ, and to make everyone see what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things; so that through the church the wisdom of God in its rich variety might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. This was in accordance with the eternal purpose that he has carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have access to God in boldness and confidence through faith in him.
Gospel – Matthew 2.1–12
In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, ‘Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.’ When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, ‘In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet:
“And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
for from you shall come a ruler
who is to shepherd my people Israel.” ’
Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, ‘Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.’ When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure-chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.
Sermon on Epiphany
Today we are celebrating Epiphany, when we remember the arrival of the three kings in Jerusalem and Bethlehem. But like in the whole of Advent and even Christmas Day, everything is disrupted. We say, “There is a new King!” And with this King, everything we expect, everything that is normal in this world, has been brought into question. Change is clear when we read that the magi said,
‘Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.’ When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him …
A king has been born. These wise men from the East had seen his star rising; they followed it to where it stopped – near Jerusalem, at Bethlehem. Being sagacious, these magicians went straight to the head of state to ask about this newly born king – they boldly asked the leader of the region in which they found themselves, “Where is the child-king?” After all, it was only polite to do that. So, why did Herod become frightened? Why was the whole of Jerusalem with him scared at this question?
I am sure this episode in the life of Jesus gives us the very common phrase “his star is rising”. – It is something we say about people becoming more influential in their own bailiwick. When established politicians, whose glory is at its zenith or perhaps even beginning to fade, when they hear these words, these politicos get scared, everyone in the area begins to worry about their positions, both high and low. They begin to wonder whether their time has come to an end and their star is falling, or in fact, fading.
They might ask, Is this the beginning of a revolution when nothing will remain the same, when everything is overturned, when my everyday, my good life, becomes a life of toil and strife? Didn’t we begin asking these disturbing questions during Advent as we prepared, and longed for, the birth of Christ in our hearts and expected a change of heart in the world. Didn’t we sing “Come thou long-expected Jesus” as we became so busy up to the 25th of December?
Isn’t that what frightens us – all that change – all that expectation? And then we have the realisation that those things we earnestly desire can overturn our everyday lives? … Don’t we all begin to have second thoughts when we think clearly about this Messiah, whose Kingdom is not of this world, but makes demands of us in this world. We are now expected to love our neighbours just as intensely as we love ourselves here and now. Jesus sets a very high standard for our behaviour with his golden rule in his Kingdom. I would suggest that Jesus is demanding activity of us which will transform the world. This burden is so very much a challenge to our ordinary thinking, isn’t it? Don’t we become scared at this load? However, doesn’t Jesus say his is no heavy weight, that he will give us rest if we come to him? So even though there is a new King born to us, we should not be overwhelmed or frightened of the change he is bringing on. Wasn’t this the case when Elizabeth died and Charles ascended the throne for us? Jesus does transform everything in a way that the everyday world does not understand. We have to admit that the crowd so fears any change of the status quo that they will do just about anything to forestall it.
However, I think we should take heart that the King has arrived in our lives. “There is nothing to fear except fear itself” as FDR said when the US entered WWII. And Jesus himself says so many times, “Do not Fear!” (μη φοβου, which we talked about some time ago.) We must fight against fear, and by conquering fear in ourselves we will be courageous and ready to love others as we love ourselves. We shall overcome the darkness of this world, just as Jesus did, as we read in the first chapter of the Gospel of St John on Christmass Day. We still sing, “We shall overcome” as the gospel songs proclaimed in the civil rights marches so long ago – we shall usher in the King and we will enter into his otherworldly Kingdom with joy as we love one another.
But too often we are stuck in the rut of the everyday. We don’t lift our heads up to see the sky and the horizon stretching out all around us, that horizon which is only limited by expectation. If we don’t rise above the everyday, our world is so very small. In the normal world’s expectation, nothing can change, nothing is supposed to change, but if we lift ourselves up, by conquering that fear which the crowd presses upon us, we can look to the horizon. We certainly do find our horizons infinitely challenging – they are perilous and glorious at the same time. Isn’t that what scares Herod – he is frightened because he is asked to look beyond his very limited world? Isn’t that what frightens “all Jerusalem”? – That crowd has no vision of the infinite possibilities stretching out all around them, freeing them to travel to a new land following that rising star of the King. We must be more like those Magi from the East, the three kings who approached Herod with their very innocent question, “Where is the new-born king?” I think we need to express our wish to see Jesus, just as the early followers did, when they said, “We would see Jesus.” We need to ask ourselves just what we are looking for, when we are in the crowd and then when we make that journey to the centre of the world at Christmass, when we approach the crib where we worship Jesus, the Christ-Child.
When we look at a new-born child, what do we see? We see impossibly small fingers reaching out to us, fingers which begin to explore the infinite possibilities of new life. We may be jaded with life, but the new-born is yet to experience us as the surrounding destructive crowd, that crowd which says “No!” to those questions about the very strange all around revealed by distant horizons. The crowd huddles in masses even though each person yearns to be free – free to explore the infinite possibilities of life in all its fullness. But aren’t we that crowd sometimes? Don’t we want to blend into that homogenous mass, keeping our heads down, not making waves about what is good and right, accepting everything that is wrong in the world just because “that is the way it is.” The lesson of Christmass in the new-born has not been learned by so many. But isn’t this why Paul is so keen to write so many letters to the young churches? He accepts “the Gentiles have become fellow-heirs, members of the same body, and sharers in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” He accepts new horizons. This body into which Paul enters is glorious, allowing all of us great personal freedom through the mutual support of the love of Christ.
We stand in faith on Epiphany at the centre of infinite horizons, limited only by our weak sinfulness, when we don’t grasp the message of the Word which dwells amongst us, shedding light on how love strengthens us. Let our epiphany experience be that of loving one another as we love ourselves, that infinite horizon which others offer us when we look into their eyes with care.