Arise Your Light Has Come...Epiphany Wonder

By Rev. Juliet Hampton, Assistant to the Bishop

My parents were married in the late 1960’s, and early in their marriage they purchased an item that would unknowingly change my perception of how a Christmas tree had to look to feel complete to me.  Their purchase was a golden star, with a rotating plastic tube that would heat up from a lightbulb and shine hundreds of little beams of colored light from the all over the room.  My earliest childhood memory is having some aliment that kept me up all night during the harsh winter, and being rocked in my mother’s arms watching this light. I was fascinated by the reflection of the light onto the walls.  Little beams of color dancing all around the room would lull me to sleep.  I knew this was good, but I didn’t have an understanding of why it was good.  I didn’t understand until the first Christmas when my own child was ill, and I rocked him in front of a similar star of light on my own tree.

Epiphany continues to resonate with me because of these childhood memories.  It wasn’t the Christmas rush, or the pageants, but the calm of the light in the darkness of winter that drew me in.  I loved those other things, but there was something in me that new that this comfort was more than just a gimmick.  This memory was for me the coming of something more, something amidst all the hustle and bustle that changed who I was.  As I look back, it was a time of calm and contemplation in a busy world. 

This for me describes the incarnation, what we celebrate as a people of God.  God’s incarnation is something so true, so bright, so deep that words can’t comprise the feeling.  It’s the feeling of comfort being in the darkness, and knowing I’m not the work of the darkness.  It’s being little, and knowing that there is hope and protection in something more powerful than myself.  It’s feeling the cold winter blast, and knowing there will be a time when bulbs that are resting in the ground are awakened. 

It’s easy in the cold wind to only hear our own voices.  It’s easy to stay in and feel the comfort of our own houses.  It’s nice to sit by the fire with a warm cup of cocoa, but it's also a time when the community around us needs us the most.  In a time of political unrest, of dividing lines and hurtful words, we are called to bring this light and hope into the world. The Epiphany, we are pushed out into a world that needs hope, and a world that needs light.  It’s our call to respond.

Last spring while in the Jerusalem I met a potter.  Her art was simple and clean, whites and greys.  There was beauty in the simplicity.  She is a Jewish woman, living in the midst of great political turmoil.  We started talking and she spoke some to me about what it was like to be a tradeswoman in a land of unrest.  I asked her how she could stay calm and do her work.  At first she laughed it off and said that it was the land of her strong willed people, then when she realized I really wanted to know, she went deeper.  She told me that often in her faith she has found that people try to make time for God, but that with such a broken world they never get anywhere.  She said that to her, Sabbath practice means to search for God in the everyday pauses, because he is already there, we just need to give him the space.

I wonder what this looks like for you.  I wonder how you live out Epiphany in a world of darkness.  How do you bring the love and comfort to the pain and brokenness of this land?  How is your voice different from every other screaming voice grabbing at our attention?  How do we bring pause into the moments when we are moving too quickly to slow down?  How does it change the way you live, that the Magi took time out to see the great incarnation of God?

In wonder of God’s awesomeness,
Rev. Juliet Hampton

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

First Lutheran of Lincoln - a Bit of History

Image
  First Lutheran Church of Lincoln began its life in 1870 as Swedish settlers founded a church in the newly established capital of Nebraska. Though we often assume early founders were heroic pastors, First was mostly a lay movement in its first 30 years, served by a shifting array of preachers who travelled among congregations struggling to establish themselves on the prairie. First Lutheran Swedish Church consisted mostly of new immigrants, many of them young Swedish women brought over as domestics to serve in the houses of the growing town. This early open outreach and service remained a mark of First's ministry, situated as it was in a small structure at 13th and K Street near the heart of the growing town. However, the development of First Lutheran didn't really accelerate until the turn to a new century, when a larger building with a pipe organ was established; the focus on the pipe organ in the expense of building a new structure reveals another long term orientation of t
Read more

Stories from Across the Synod

Image
 Three Rural Churches Doing Worship in a New Way   In response to the pandemic, the three congregations of Sonrise Parish (St. John’s, Eustis; American, Cozad; and St. John’s, Cozad) moved to video-only worship beginning on March 18, 2020.  Three months later, as warmer weather had arrived, the churches decided to do outdoor Word and Sacrament at each site on a weekly rotating basis, beginning at Eustis on June 14.  A weekly virtual brief worship recording was also continued!  The city street, parking lots, and grassy areas became the places to gather in lawn chairs or in cars in a physically-distanced manner.  A low-power FM transmitter broadcasted to those who wanted to stay in their vehicles.   A music group with percussion, guitar, horns, vocalists (and sometimes keyboard) led the services.  For sixteen weeks through the end of September the outdoor services continued, with attendance ranging from 50-60 to as high as over 100.  Two confirmations and one baptism were also done outdo
Read more

Proclaim the Good News

Image
 By Bishop Brian Maas When Jesus sent out the twelve, the first task they were given was to “proclaim the good news.” He gave many other instructions, including advice to “shake off the dust from your feet” if a community wouldn’t receive it. Not everybody will hear the good news as a good thing. The kingdom of heaven is disruptive. Throughout the pandemic, the church has done a pretty good job of going out to proclaim the good news—or at least going out beyond the building’s walls, livestreaming worship and other events, literally to the ends of the earth. Now things are beginning to change. Congregations are beginning to gather again in person, and they’re noticing something. The numbers in the pews now are smaller than they were before pandemic. And there’s a bit of anxiety and a lot of uncertainty about it.  That makes it all the more likely we’ll hear objection to the good news or its proclamation. We’ll hear calls to end online outreach and to ensure an appealing message. History
Read more