The Second Sunday after the Epiphany

This Little Light of Mine

There’s a TV commercial I’ve seen a bit recently. It starts with a close up of a human eye. Then the voice over says: “Your eyes. Even at a distance of ten miles, the length of 146 football fields your eyes can see the light of a single candle. Your eyes are amazing.” It’s an ad for a multi-vitamin that’s supposed to improve eye health, but it says more to me about light, than about our eyes, however amazing they may be. The power of light. The power of one candle at a great distance to bring light into darkness.

Shakespeare was on to the same idea, long before this TV commercial was created. The quote is from the Merchant of Venice. You don’t need to know the whole story, although maybe you do. It is the last act. Portia is walking towards her home after a very challenging day. Looking from a distance at a candle burning in the window of her home, she exclaims:

How far that little candle throws his beams!
So shines a good deed in a naughty world. 

The power of just a single candle to bring goodness and light into a dark and naughty world.

Today’s collect is about light. It draws upon imagery from John’s Gospel, although not the Gospel reading for today.

Almighty God, whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ is the light of the world: Grant that your people, illumined by your Word and Sacraments, may shine with the radiance of Christ's glory, that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed to the ends of the earth… 

Thinking about light I just couldn’t suppress thoughts of the Christian song, “This little light of mine…” The words and music bubbled into my mind and they are still there.

Most of you undoubtedly know the song. I wonder what associations it has for you. I think of it first as a children’s song. In my mind, I hear children’s voices singing it. I associate it with Sunday School or children’s chapel or vacation Bible school. Within that context I think the gift of the light is what we might call Christian self-esteem. The song teaches children that they belong; each of them is a beloved child of God.  Each child shines as God’s beloved.

I recently came across another version of the song. As I was preparing for this year’s Feast, which had light as its theme, I found a version of “This Little Light of Mine” sung by Odetta. (A You Tube version is available here.)  Odetta just died recently. If you’re not familiar with her, she was an African American singer with a deep, rich, unmistakable voice. She felt called, I think, to sing and share the music of the African American tradition… blues and certainly spirituals. And she sings “This Little Light of Mine” as a spiritual.

That context is perhaps particularly relevant on this weekend when we remember the life and witness of Martin Luther King. I was 9 when King was assassinated. So I don’t really remember most of the historical events that are usually associated with the civil rights movement. But I understand that this song had a place in the civil rights movement. In that setting it seems to be a song about empowerment as people of color struggled to gain dignity and freedom. Even an unjust society cannot quench the Light of Christ burning in the souls of all of God’s children. The Light, and those who bear the light, will shine and prevail.

As I was googling around on the computer I found one other interesting event. I don’t watch late night TV, but evidently Odetta sang “This Little Light of Mine” on Letterman the first night he was back on the air after 9/11. In that context, the light is about resilience. And hope. Even in the darkest of times, the Light of Christ brings resilience and hope.

The gift of the Light of Christ, given to each of us by God. For each of us a symbol of belonging, empowerment and hope.

But do we let it shine? In the collect we pray that we may shine with the radiance of Christ’s glory. Yes, the Light is a wonderful gift to us. But as the Body of Christ, as people illumined by the Word of God and the sacraments of the church, we are called to be the light in the world, to share the light with others.

We are called to offer the light of belonging to others… to let others know Christ loves them. And not just children. Tell people that they are beloved of God. Show kindness and respect. Meet others’ needs. Help people know that they are loved as children of God. Share the light. Be forces for empowerment. Be just people in a world in which racism and other forms of subjugation are still very much with us. And live with resilience and hope in a world wracked with division. Be sources of peace and reconciliation in the midst of your daily interactions with others.

And remember, the smallest flicker of a single candle even at a distance can bring the light of Christ into a dark world. This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine.

The First Sunday after the Epiphany: The Baptism of Our Lord - January 12

Wispy Epiphanies
Psalm 29
Matthew 3:13-17

Pretty much since it happened, people have puzzled over Jesus’ baptism. Why was Jesus baptized? In this morning’s reading John expresses his own reservations. Remember that this is John’s baptism. A baptism of repentance. Over the centuries baptism has come to have a fuller and deeper meaning for Christians, but Jesus is baptized by John. “Repent and be baptized,” John says. Jesus did not need to repent.

As an aside… The fact that Christians including the Gospel writers themselves have trouble with Jesus’ baptism, but still include it in the Gospels, pretty much insures that it was, in fact, a historical occurrence. They would have left it out had they not been sure it really happened.

Having said all that, this is the first Sunday after the Epiphany. And we have this reading today, as we enter Epiphany season, not because of its focus on baptism.

This is an Epiphany story because of the voice. The voice from heaven. Epiphany is all about revelation. Recognition. In particular the revelation and recognition that Jesus shines forth with the actual glory of God. After Jesus’ baptism, the voice from heaven proclaims, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

At least today, Jesus’ baptism is just an occasion for the voice. The voice that reveals him as God’s Son.

The psalmist talks about the Lord’s voice, too. The voice that thunders upon the waters. A voice of power and splendor that breaks the cedar trees of Lebanon and shakes the wilderness.

There is debate also about whom the voice addressed. In Matthew as we heard this morning and also Mark the voice seems to speak just to Jesus. In Luke, written later, the voice speaks to the crowd. One commentator reminds us that it is not irreverent to think that Jesus needed to hear what the voice proclaimed… that Jesus’ awareness of who he was and what he was called to do became more clear to him as he matured. Regardless, it was quite an epiphany.

What does it mean for us? First, of course, it is a Scriptural affirmation of Jesus’ divinity. Second, it reminds and challenges us to be open to present day epiphanies. The Gospel stories we hear during Epiphany season tell how people in Jesus’ own day came to recognize God in him. God continues to offer us occasions for epiphanies, chances to recognize God’s living presence with us in our own lives today.

Thinking about present day epiphanies, I want to contrast the epiphany of Jesus’ baptism with another epiphany—the one that we celebrate on the actual feast day of “The” Epiphany—the epiphany experienced by the magi.

At Jesus’ baptism a heavenly voice thundered. Some visible manifestation of the spirit, like a dove descended. It was an earth shaking event—audible and visible.

Quite a contrast to the visit of the magi. Stripped of later legends, Matthew’s account of the arrival of the magi is pretty spare. We don’t know how many there were. In the Greek, they are called “magi,” wise ones. They studied the stars and their scientific curiosity led them to follow a particular star. They surely were not seeking God; nor as foreign gentiles, did they seek a Messiah. They saw a curious star in the heavens and sought to understand its meaning. They came to a nondescript house in an out of the way town. Inside they found poor teenaged parents dealing with a new baby. No booming voice from heaven. No heavenly choir of angels (that’s in Luke). No descending dove or miraculous manifestation of God’s power.

But something affected them. There was some stirring of awe within them. Some scientifically unexplainable birth of joy in their hearts. Some intangible sense of the divine with them. Somehow they knew God was there. An epiphany.

For myself, at least occasionally I would like one of the baptism sorts of epiphanies… the booming voice, a dove I can see. I’d really like that sort of clarity. But my own epiphanies (and maybe yours) tend to be little nudges, sideways glimpses, belated recognitions of God’s presence. Wisps of the divine. Subtle epiphanies.

Maybe these subtle epiphanies are more like what the magi experienced. If so, I think the magi have something to teach us.

 Their response to their subtle epiphany appears to have been pretty enthusiastic. They prostrated themselves in spontaneous worship; they fell down in joy; and they offered very generous gifts. As I said when we celebrated The Epiphany, “you can lead a magus to Bethlehem, but you cannot make him worship.” No earthshaking thunderbolt from heaven made them worship. But they did. They more or less threw themselves into worship and offered treasure of significant value.

So in our lives how do we respond when the voice doesn’t boom of the dove gets lost on the way? Whether we actually articulate it or not, a temptation to say: “If the voice boomed in my life, then I would really throw myself into this faith-thing. If God would just really knock me off my feet and get my attention, well, then I would give God more of my attention… But as long as my epiphanies are the subtle, wispy ones, well my response is going to be pretty wispy, too.”

Or we can take a page from the magi. Even if all we experience is a nudge or a wisp of the divine. Even if all we have is some subtle sense we cannot explain that God is with us, we can respond as the magi did. Throw ourselves fully into worship and praise. Let loose our joy. Offer all that we can.

Try it, and see what happens.