Skip to main content

Epiphany

            Today is Epiphany.  On January 6 the church celebrates the Feast of Epiphany.  Protestants don’t normally think about it; the Western church attaches Epiphany to the Wise Men who searched out Jesus after His birth.  The Eastern church focuses on the baptism of Jesus when He was revealed as the Son of God as the Epiphany. 

            For me it has become the day that I finally turn off the Christmas lights that have brightened the dark world during the Christmas season.  After all the effort to get them up, I hate to take them down right after Christmas.  I wait the full twelve days after Christmas until Epiphany to carry out the sad but by now much needed task.  After all, I say I put them up partly as my Christmas Greeting to my neighbors.  I think they are very tired of them by January. 

            Of all the events in Jesus’ life that we celebrate, this one may seem the least important.  One may wonder why it got priority on the church calendar in light of more important happenings (like the calling of the disciples) that do not have their own feast day.

            I’m glad that I have Epiphany to think about the Magi who traveled to worship Jesus.  Immersed within the birth, ministry, and death of Jesus, Gentile interactions pop up.  The Magi are the first Gentiles to worship the one true King of all time.  They thought they were coming to celebrate the King of the Jews, but they discovered a connection to the God of the Universe.  They  certainly had a true epiphany. 

            As I take down my Christmas lights, I use Epiphany to reflect on what the Advent and Christmas season has meant to me this year.  I treasure my memories as I put away another Christmas season.  I will never come to fully comprehend all that God did for me at Christmas.  I certainly don’t have the desire nor the insight to figure out anything that God has hidden in the stars—I have a hard time finding the big dipper and the little dipper way up there.  No, I’ll spend my efforts concentrating on how to wind up the lights so that the right end is ready to connect for the next Christmas.

            What I can immolate from the Wise Men is the worship of Jesus Christ the New Born King.  I can stop on this day and behold Him by considering all that He came to this earth to do for me then and how much He does for me now from His seated position at the right hand of God.

            After all my gifts from Christmas are all put away, now I can think about Jesus the way the Magi show me.  Matthew 2:11 says: On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. 

            I’ll let this day remind me to bow down and worship Jesus and bring Him the gift He most desires: my surrendered and humble heart.

Copyright © 2014.  Deborah R. Newman www.teatimeforyoursoul.com  All Rights Reserved.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Moving Forward

It’s been half a decade since my husband of 27.5 years died suddenly of a brain bleed.  My life turned upside down that weekend, and nothing will ever be the same.  Someone commented to me that I had moved-on.  It was meant to be a compliment, and I totally get the affirmation that was intended.  The truth is I have not moved-on, nor do I ever expect that I will.  I love this quote sent to me in a sympathy card and have shared it over and over with others.  St Bernard of Clairvaux wrote: I can never lose one whom I have loved unto the end; one to whom my soul cleaves so firmly that it can never be separated does not go away but only goes before.               Grief should have a beginning, middle and end; that is true.  That first year or two I would have done anything to diminish my pain.  I was in so much pain that I wasn’t even a person.  It’s hard to believe that we humans will naturally grow more comfortable existing in our pit of despair of grief than to let it go…
Post a Comment
Read more

Thank You Dad

Recently I have been contemplating why it is ingrained in me that I must be quiet and respectful and look at the flag when the national anthem is played.  It’s as natural for me as standing for the Hallelujah Chorus during Handel’s Messiah or for the Bride when she walks through the back door.  Like a Pavlov dog, my instincts go into action, and I do not even think about my somewhat conditioned response. Why?  It was definitely my own father who had the most influence over me regarding the national anthem.  I am not a sports enthusiast.  However, from a young age I found myself at sports games because my older brother played every sport offered.  Our family faithfully attended those games, which normally started with the national anthem.  I found a way to enjoy the otherwise agonizing experience of being held prisoner to my brother’s sporting events by gravitating to my friends who were there under duress as well.  We made up games of our own; we would laugh and talk throughout the q…
Post a Comment
Read more

Traveling Through

I am writing this week’s Tea Time devotion from the airport in Houston, Texas.  When I set out my travel plans months earlier, I never expected to use the Houston International airport at all.  I’ve been here two times in the last three days, and the last time it was for about six hours due to weather at my destination!  In fact, for the last four days I have been traveling back and forth from two different Central American countries, and only one of my four days of flying proceeded as planned.  I’ve had a lot of time to ponder airline practices; and I can come up with a multitude of suggestions for what they could do better, but that is not my job.  The long, strenuous, and unexpected travel has driven home the instructions Peter gives to Christians in his two letters:But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do;for it is written: Be holy, because I am holy. (1 Peter 1:15-16) So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every ef…
Post a Comment
Read more