2023-01-04
Brooke Strong
Sermon Text...
January 1st, 2023 Homily Federated Church UCC Rev. Betsy Wooster
A reading from the Gospel according to Matthew, Chapter 2, verses 1-12:
In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem, asking, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star in the east and have come to pay him homage.”
3 When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him, 4 and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. 5 They told him,
“In Bethlehem of Judea, for so it has been written by the prophet:
6 ‘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.’ ”
7 Then Herod secretly called for the magi and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. 8 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.” 9 When they had heard the king, they set out, and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen in the east, until it stopped over the place where the child was.
10 When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. 11 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. 12 And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.
(End of reading, NRSVUE Translation.)
Today we celebrate in worship the feast day of Epiphany that is coming up this Friday, January 6. In the journey of the Christian year of worship, Epiphany is celebrated at the end of the 12 days of Christmas celebrations, which run from December 25th to January 5th, also known as twelfth night. On the next day, January 6th, Epiphany commemorates the visit of the magi to Jesus, which is the beginning of Jesus Christ being known by the wider world, a theme that will continue throughout the gospel according to Matthew, until the resurrected Jesus tells the disciples to go to all the world and to remember that “I will always be with you.”
There have been elaborations added to the gospel account over the years, wondering who these people were. Magi is the word in the gospel, as originally written in Greek. Magi means astronomers, which included in those days, both an understanding of the heavens and a reading of signs in the heavens, significantly the sign of a star to signify the birth of a King of the Jews, which they observed at its rising. It was magi who came to visit. The gospel does not say how many of them there were, but it does list three gifts: frankincense, gold, and myrrh, which surely gave rise to the idea that there were three. The gospel does not call them kings or wise men, does not even say that they were men or women or a group of both, though royalty and wisdom are good ideas, because they surely possessed both wealth and wisdom.
So, it’s fine to think of them as three kings, or three wise men, but I also invite you to think of them as 2 to 15 wise and important women and men from the east: the magi.
And I want to suggest to you on this Epiphany, and on this first day of the year 2023, that you consider what their devotion to honoring the newborn Jesus might mean in your life. The story of the magi, and their journey following the star to meet the infant king, is iconic in our Christmas story. Much of the story focuses on their long journey and its culmination in Bethlehem. They traveled from the East. There is no definitive scholarship confirming where the magi are from, though it is speculated that they likely traveled from Babylon, Persia or Arabia. These magi first sought out the puppet King, Herod, in Jerusalem. Of course they went to Jerusalem… these magi have seen the star at its rising, a sign to them that a new king of the Jews has been born. So, it is natural that they would go to Jerusalem, because that is where Jewish kings have resided since the days of Solomon. “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews?” they ask Herod. “For we observed his star in the east and have come to pay him homage.” They naturally assume that King Herod will know the answer. Herod, however, was “frightened” by the news the Magi brought. He is hearing news which suggests that his established power may be at risk. Herod’s fear leads him to immediately call in his priests and scribes to ask them where the Messiah was to be born. These scholars then quote the prophet, Micah, who reveals that this babe, born to lead God’s people Israel, will be found in Bethlehem.
It’s important here, for us to pay attention to some things here that might be missed in a story so often read with a primary focus on the gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. The first thing to pay attention to is that the magi were foreigners. And the second, is their reason for coming, because it was about more than the frankincense, gold, and myrrh. These eastern foreigners are outsiders who are devoted to honoring this newborn king. They trust that the star in its rising has led them to an extraordinary occurrence; a babe has been born who is destined to be king. Herod, the Judean ruler and current king, on the other hand, is invested in the hope that this won’t happen. However, the revelation that a new King of the Jews has been born has definitely caught Herod’s attention. Jesus has been revealed to Herod and the wider world by these outsiders, these Magi from the east, to be the Messiah, as was promised by God through the Hebrew prophets. I can imagine how word of mouth began to spread as the Magi set off for Bethlehem.
Herod’s concern surely became more severe when this news from the Magi was confirmed by Hebrew scholars whom Herod called together, when these priests and scribes proclaimed that Bethlehem was the place where this child would be born. At this point in the story, what we aren’t certain about yet is why the Magi followed the star to find the child born to rule another nation. While their long journey to Bethlehem is a breathtaking pilgrimage story in and of itself, there is something more than the dazzling star in its rising that drew these Magi to Judea.
The Magi tell Herod that they come to pay homage to this child king. It is easy to breeze over that word “homage,” for one thing, we’re often paying more attention about how to pronounce it, with that tricky letter H, then we are to what the word means in its fullness.
As it turns out, the word homage has great meaning and it is the reason that the magi journeyed to Bethlehem. The Greek word that means to pay homage is Prose-ki-now. The word Prose-ki-now was commonly used to describe the custom of prostrating oneself at the feet of a king - face down, in complete submission. The physical posture of planting oneself face down at the feet of a king expresses something larger than the gifts the Magi bore on their journey; their physical posture suggests a giving of their entire selves to the Christ child, the King.
It is significant, and easily missed, that the wise men gave homage before they offered their gold, frankincense and Myrrh. They followed the star to Bethlehem; they found Mary, Joseph and Jesus, and they prostrated their bodies on the ground where the baby lay. This devotion, this complete giving of themselves to the child, Jesus, is their first and most important gift.
Theologian Alan Culpepper puts it in these words: the devotion of the magi, although less spectacular than the astronomical phenomenon of the star, was more impressive than the other gifts they bore. The Magi are giving a full response of devotion to Jesus. Ironically, Herod also claimed that he wanted to pay homage to the child. But we know that his claim was really just a ruse, a lie, so that he could find out where the child was. So, Herod sends them off to Bethlehem, telling them he wants to know when they find the child. But still, he recognizes the importance of this birth, and his reaction to it is also dramatic. Our reading ended with the Magi returning home by another way, having been warned by God in a dream to avoid King Herod. But what we later learn in Matthew’s Gospel is that when King Herod doesn’t get the information about which child it is, he gives an order to have all children in and around Bethlehem, who were two years old or under, killed, which Jesus only escaped because Joseph and Mary fled with him to Egypt.
This story gives us two responses to the birth of Jesus, neither one lukewarm or partial. There are ways in which these two different responses exist within us. Like the Magi, we want to devote our lives to Jesus, to completely give ourselves to God and to the work of God’s light and love for the world. And there are also ways in which we are like Herod: we have things that we want to hold on to that could be lost in a life of full devotion to God. We are reluctant about what a more complete devotion to Jesus might require of us. There are things in our lives that we are reluctant to change or relinquish…fearful about what may have to change or what a life of full devotion may require of us.
And isn’t this the spiritual work of our lifetime? To recognize the impulses within us to seek to grow in our devotion to God and God’s good gifts, to allow God to help us in letting go of our fear, to lead us toward a devotion that instills in us a joy that is in and of itself the safety that we seek. The Magi in this story are an archetype of fully realized devotion to God, and the journey one is willing to go on in order to achieve it. They came to their task filled with joy. Joy preceded their homage. They expected the joy that they found. Yet, this is also a story in which the Magi worship a king who is not their own. They recognize and celebrate the precious gift that Jesus is, but they do eventually go home. Perhaps they take home more joy than they arrived with, and wouldn’t this be the best gift for us, as well?
We bring to the Christ Child, and to God, all the devotion that we can muster, and in the act of doing so, we go back out into the world with yet more devotion within us. This is the gift that we receive that we can never predict in advance. The love we give is mirrored back to us at level deeper than our understanding. We go to God with our love, and we are given such love in return as to be partners in spreading this love to all whom we meet. We learn that there is nothing to fear when we experience the full measure of God’s devotion. Yes, there are still fears and sorrows that we face in our lives, no doubt, but the co-existing gift of love brightens our horizons in the midst of struggle. Both fear and devotion live within us. This is the spiritual journey we’ve been given to walk. We’ve also been given a story, a story that teaches us to look for the stars that will brighten our journey and to follow them, to see where they will lead us. Thanks be to God for the story of the Magi, the stars, and the newborn king. Amen.