A Matter of Interpretation

 

Text:  Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10

Theme:  "A Matter of Interpretation"

3rd Sunday after the Epiphany

January 27, 2013

First Presbyterian Church

Denton, Texas

Rev. Paul R. Dunklau

 

+In the Name of Jesus+

 

¹ All the people came together as one in the square before the Water Gate. They told Ezra the teacher of the Law to bring out the Book of the Law of Moses, which the Lord had commanded for Israel.

² So on the first day of the seventh month Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, which was made up of men and women and all who were able to understand. ³ He read it aloud from daybreak till noon as he faced the square before the Water Gate in the presence of the men, women and others who could understand. And all the people listened attentively to the Book of the Law.

⁵ Ezra opened the book. All the people could see him because he was standing above them; and as he opened it, the people all stood up. ⁶ Ezra praised the Lord, the great God; and all the people lifted their hands and responded, “Amen! Amen!” Then they bowed down and worshiped the Lord with their faces to the ground.

⁸ They read from the Book of the Law of God, making it clear^[a] and giving the meaning so that the people understood what was being read.

⁹ Then Nehemiah the governor, Ezra the priest and teacher of the Law, and the Levites who were instructing the people said to them all, “This day is holy to the Lord your God. Do not mourn or weep.” For all the people had been weeping as they listened to the words of the Law.

¹⁰ Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”

It was a long worship service -- so long, in fact, that it could never happen today in our age of instant everything.    They read the Laws of God -- and interpreted the Laws of God -- from daybreak to 12 o'clock noon.  That's six hours straight of reading and proclaiming the Scriptures.  Let's see:  our service begins at 11 o'clock AM.  That means that if we worshipped like they did in our reading, we'd be out of here late in the afternoon at around 5 o'clock PM.  How does that sound to you?   Were there times to get up and stretch, go to the bathroom, and have a lunch break? We are not told.

We are told, however,  that all the people came together as one. They had 100% membership attendance. Average membership attendance in churches today runs between 33% and 40% -- and that's being generous. The truth is unsettling:  over half of the people who claim membership in Christian congregations in America do not regularly attend church.  Most services ask for about an hour a week -- and certainly not six hours as in our reading.  Attendance would be less than one percent -- if anyone attended at all. 

Again, this service was six hours long. More than that, it looks as though no one fell asleep; no one nodded off; minds did not start to wander.  Little kids didn't start to fidget; teenagers did not start texting; father's didn't start wondering what to watch on TV between the championships and the Super Bowl; mothers didn't start compiling grocery lists.  The text says:  "All the people listened attentively."

It's hard today to "listen attentively", isn't it? Slammed with a multitude of distractions, adrift in a world where multi-tasking is idolized,  we find it harder and harder to focus on anyone or anything for any length of time!  There are hints of what we might call a spiritual "Attention Deficit Disorder".   Please don't think I'm pointing fingers at you. The other day someone asked me what I preached on last week, and, for the life of me, I couldn't remember.  "Wow, the sermon was that good?" my friend jokingly asked. 

The "patron saint" of those who lose attention, nod off, and fall asleep in church would have to be a man named Eutychus.  Mentioned in the New Testament Book of Acts, Eutychus was sitting on the windowsill of a house church while the great apostle Paul was preaching.  Apparently, the sermon was long (the text says it went past midnight). The young man sunk into a deep sleep and fell three stories to his death. Paul ran downstairs, threw himself on the man, and put his arms around him. He reassured the crowd.  "Don't be alarmed; he's alive."  At the end of the service, the people took the young man home and were greatly comforted, we are told. 

One of my pastoral hopes for you, after you leave this place following Lord's Day worship (which usually lasts an hour -- and not six), is that you be comforted by God's Word.  And this comfort is not due to getting out of church alive like Eutychus.  It's because God loves you. 

But I'll tell you what:  if I had the choice of coming out of church comforted or feeling comfortable versus coming out as a stronger person, I'd choose the strength over the comfort.  I want my spirit to be strong; I want my mind to be strong; I want my body to be as strong as it can be. 

But what exactly does it mean to be strong in your spirit or soul?  Does it mean that you pray 24/7/365?  What does it mean to be strong in your mind?  Does it mean that you read x number of books and have x number of post-graduate degrees?  What does it mean to be strong in body?  Is it eating all the right foods all the time and exercising the muscles that have atrophied? It's all a matter of personal interpretation, no? 

Stop right there!  I don't want to think about these questions anymore. I don't want to hazard guesses.   Let the text, let the Word of God, weigh in.  Let our Lord put in the  two cents worth that actually count for something!  Here it is from Nehemiah chapter eight:  "Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared.  This day is holy to our Lord.  Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength."  Let me repeat:  THE JOY OF THE LORD IS YOUR STRENGTH!  There is enough in that sentence alone for you to meditate upon for the rest of your life, I say.

Let me share a word about the historical setting of our reading.  Let me "set the table", if you will.  In the year 586 BC, that's some six hundred years or so before Christ, the children of God, the Hebrews, were exiled from their capital city of Jerusalem.  They were invaded by a foreign army led by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, and they were taken into captivity in a part of the world which today is called Iraq.  Slowly, during a period of about one hundred and fifty years, the Israelites were allowed to return to their holy land and rebuild their capital city of Jerusalem. 

Our reading tells the story of when they finally and officially came back to their homeland. They were free again.   A man named Nehemiah was the leader of their fledgling government.  A man named Ezra was their priest.  Together with Ezra and Nehemiah, all the people gathered to hear what they hadn't heard for decades:  the Word of God's Law.

It touched them deeply.  They grieved; they cried; they mourned; they felt vulnerable, weak.   They remembered their history and its periods of weal and woe.  They remembered the faithfulness of God set against their on-again, off-again faithfulness.  God kept God's part of the covenant, but they didn't hold up their end -- and that explained why they had been activity. The word of God's Law hit them square between the eyes.  And it wasn't just read to them, it was also interpreted.  It was spoken to them in language that they could understand.  It wasn't just a dry, six hour reading out of a dusty book.  They were able to make the connections.  And they grieved and they cried. 

But then came the good news; then came the Gospel!  "Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength!" 

When we look back on our own lives and interpret what we see through the lense of God's Laws, we can only grieve.  The Law demands perfection, and we fall far short of that mark.  That hurts.  Then we look back and think of better times when our faith was stronger or our church was larger, and we pine to have those times again.  But we're afraid that they will never come.  Even our spiritual nostalgia has left us feeling weak. 

"Do not grieve," says our text.  "For the joy of the Lord is your strength." The law focuses on us, and we mourn.  The Gospel focuses on the Lord, and we rejoice; we gain strength! 

The Lord we gain strength from is the One, Jesus Christ, who was crucified in our place. But death could not hold Him.  He triumphed over that last enemy win His resurrection.  The joy and strength we have in the Lord is indestructible -- even death has to throw up the white flag of surrender. 

So go and enjoy choice foods and sweet drinks-- as the text invites us to do.  Don't forget to give some to those who have nothing prepared.  The joy of the Lord Jesus is your strength.  It's more than a matter of interpretation.  It's the way, the truth, and the life!

Amen.

 

 

 



Text:  John 2:1-11

Theme:  "Uh-oh, Jesus is on The Guest List"

Second Sunday after the Epiphany

January 20, 2013

First Presbyterian Church

Denton, Texas

Rev. Paul R. Dunklau

 

+In the Name of Jesus+

On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there, ² and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. ³ When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him, “They have no more wine.”

⁴ “Woman,^[a] why do you involve me?” Jesus replied. “My hour has not yet come.”

⁵ His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”

⁶ Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons.^[b]

⁷ Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water”; so they filled them to the brim.

⁸ Then he told them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.”

They did so, ⁹ and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside ¹⁰ and said, “Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now.”

¹¹ What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

 

This may or not interest you or hold your attention.  I hope it does, but one never knows.  Let me give it a shot.   My line of work includes what are referred to, for lack of a better phrase, as official acts.  For example, as a minister I'm occasionally called upon give an invocation, an opening or closing prayer, or a benediction in public.  Most recently, I was honored to do so at the Eagle presentation for Daniel Jones right here at FPC.  I've done it for the Texas Judicial Commission at their memorial breakfast and for the Salvation Army at their thank you luncheon for donors.  Then there are official acts such as baptisms and funerals and/or memorial services.

Today's gospel lesson reminds me of another official act which is usually -- but not always -- a happy occasion.  I'm talking about a wedding.  I've officiated weddings in churches, homes, backyards, chapels, rented banquet halls, and so forth. I've been to casual and formal rehearsal dinners before the big day.  Some weddings have been simple and economical -- just a handful of people besides the bride and groom.  On the other hand, I've seen lavish events with many, many, many bridesmaids and groomsmen.  The guest list was long and impressive on both sides of the family. The decorations and attention to detail were extravagant, expensive, and sometimes gaudy. Months and months of nervous, nail-biting planning obviously had gone into it.   I've seen fathers of the bride literally wince when they think of how much of a hit their American Express Gold Card will take when the bill for the reception -- with a sit-down dinner and open bar -- comes due. 

My own experience with conducting weddings is actually quite boring.  For example, I've never officiated a wedding on a bungee jumping platform.  Although that's where one couple tied the knot only to take the plunge after saying their "I do's".   Moreover, I didn't officiate the wedding where the bride wore the 200 meter long wedding dress to set the Guinness world record!  I wasn't around for the wedding where another record was set with one hundred bridesmaids. Then there was the wedding that was held in a submerged shark tank.  I didn't suit up in scuba gear to officiate that!   "You're gonna need a bigger boat" is my thought!  Then there was the wedding performed as the bride and groom rode bicycles.  Did the minister ride backwards on a unicycle so he or she could face the happy couple?  I don't know.

With all the weddings I've officiated, there is at least one common denominator:  none of them have been perfect.  There has always been at least one little mistake.  I'm talking about what happens in the ceremony.  At the rehearsal, I share this with the wedding party and families to get them used to the idea. I tell them to expect the unexpected!   Great Aunt Sophie might show up from Schenectedy with a coughing spell; little Joey the ring-bearer might trip and fall;  I don't know.   I say that "The difference between a good wedding and a great one is how well you cover up that mistake." 

If I read it correctly, there was a whopper of a mistake at the wedding featured in today's story from John chapter two.  The scene is set at the town of Cana in Galilee.  It's just as few miles north of Nazareth where Jesus grew up.  Over to the east from Cana was Capernaum on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee where our Lord had what I like to call His "Northern base of operation."  It was the home of the fishermen-turned-disciples, Peter and Andrew.

At any rate, back at Cana, the mistake was a difficult one to cover up because it was a problem of calculation.  In short, they didn't provide enough refreshments. They ran out of wine, and it wasn't like they could just dispatch someone to Kroger to pick up a case or two, throw them in the back of their Texas edition Ford F150, and head back to the party.  I wonder if there were angry words exchanged between the wedding families and what the text calls the "chief steward" or "master of the banquet."  That's who we, today, would call the "wedding coordinator" or "event planner."  I mean, c'mon!  You've got to figure!  You've got X number of guests; you need X amount of wine.  Do the math.  If you don't, you're going to commit an awkward, social faux pas. What's worse, by the time you run out of goodies it will be too late to fire the event planner and hire another.  What to do? 

Uh-oh, Jesus is on the guest list at the wedding. He must have responded positively to the RSVP.  His mother is too -- along with the twelve newly-called disciples of Jesus.  You can imagine them just blending in with the other guests.  Here Jesus and mother are merely faces in the crowd.  The happy bride and groom are the center of attention.

The mother Mary, like most mothers I know, was quite observant.  She mentions, in passing, to her son, Jesus, that "They have no more wine."  Oops!  Not good! 

The reply of Jesus, at first glance, seems rude.  He says to his mom:  "Woman, why do you involve me?"  I actually think He wasn't being rude.  I think it was more along the lines of "Mom, what are we supposed to do about it?  It's not our problem."  Mary and Jesus were not the center of attention.  Cryptically, Jesus says "My hour has not yet come." 

Not content to sit back and see what happens, mom takes charge -- like some mother do at weddings.  Referring to Jesus, she says to the waiters and waitresses (the text calls them servants), "Do whatever He tells you.  "I wonder if Jesus threw up his hands and rolled his eyes! 

Now there were six big jars nearby.  We are told they were used for ceremonial  cleansing-- for religious purposes, that is. They were big. They each held twenty to thirty gallons.  All together, that's 120-180 gallons of liquid. It's simple math, arithmetic!   They were empty at the time -- not in use.  "Fill them with water," says Jesus to waiters and waitresses.  They did.  "Now, take some to the wedding planner," Jesus says in effect.  Presumably, this took place apart from the wedding guests who had likely began to wonder about why the refreshments had run out. 

The wedding planner didn't see Jesus.  For all the wedding planner knew, he was just another face in the crowd.  The planner tasted the water that had become wine.  Perhaps the event planner was more of a sommelier -- or a wine connoisseur.  He calls the bridegroom aside and says:  "Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now."  "At most weddings, they serve the estate-bottled Cabernet Sauvignon first and then the Mogen-David from Kroger after the guests are happily buzzed.  But you saved the estate-bottled Cabernet, the best vintage, until now.  Cheers!"

The gospel-writer wraps things up by saying:  "What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he manifest his glory; and his disciples believed in him."

Did you catch that? There's a second miracle here -- and it is all but hidden.  We confess Jesus to be the Son of God or God in the flesh.  John declared in John chapter one that "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.  We have beheld His glory."  Turning water into wine, therefore,  is,  nothing -- a mere trifle -- for the One who brought the universe into being with just a word.  No, there is another miracle here.  John says that Jesus' disciples believed in him. 

Do we?  Or are we, instead, overcome with that modern, polished, and popular skepticism that says:  "When is our water going to get turned into wine?"  "When will our little loaf and fish get to feed five thousand?"  "When will God choreograph our hopes and dreams to perfection?"  "When will it be our time?"

"My hour has not yet come," says Jesus.  But come it did.  He prayed to His Father in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night before He died.  He cries out:  "Take this cup from me."  Psalm 78:5 says:  "For in the hand of the LORD there is a cup with foaming wine, well mixed, and he pours out from it, and all the wicked of the earth shall drain it down to the dregs."  Jesus drank that cup of wrath for us in His passion and death.   He did it so that we might, in turn, partake of the choicest vintage:  the cup of blessing at the marriage feast of the Son of God who is risen from the dead.  Every time you come to communion, you get a foretaste of that delightful vintage. 

No longer on the guest list, Jesus is now your host! 

Amen.

 



Jesus Also?

 

Text:  Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Theme:  "Jesus Also?"

Baptism of the Lord/First Sunday after the Epiphany

January 13, 2013

First Presbyterian Church

Denton, Texas

Rev. Paul R. Dunklau

 

+In the Name of Jesus+

The people were waiting expectantly and were all wondering in their hearts if John might possibly be the Messiah. ¹⁶ John answered them all, “I baptize you with^[b] water. But one who is more powerful than I will come, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with^[c] the Holy Spirit and fire. ¹⁷ His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” ¹⁸ And with many other words John exhorted the people and proclaimed the good news to them. ²¹ When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened ²² and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

My friend Brian is a pretty cool guy who is out there living life, as they say, "ninety to nothing".  I don't know how he manages everything he packs into one day.   He's traveled a lot of different places -- all over the world, actually --  doing a lot of good things.  That's not even to speak of the stuff he does here in Denton.  He's a firefighter, by the way.  When he's not on the job, he's running around on his motorcycle doing such things as organizing a golf tournament for the department and its charity.  Late last year when I caught up with him, I noticed he shaved his head. I thought, since he just bought a new Harley, that it was some biker thing.  As it turns out, a fellow firefighter was battling cancer.  As a way to identify with their friend and show solidarity with their friend (who had lost his hair during chemotherapy treatments), Brian and the other firemen decided to all shave their heads.  "You're our friend and our brother.  We love you and we're going to stick with you; you're not alone":  these are the thoughts that this gesture conveyed. 

The alternative to such gestures (and others like them) is, of course, to maintain the status quo.  "Hey, people get cancer; that's just the way it is.  They get killed in car accidents too.  Life is hard; life is unfair.  You're basically on your own.  It's survival of the fittest out there.  So quit whining and suck it up."   So goes the thinking of the status quo in this age that some call the age of "rugged individualism".

I have another friend, and I don't even know this guy's name.  I do know that he has lots of big muscles that he exercises regularly.  He's one of those guys that looks like you don't want to mess with him.  He's originally from New Jersey -- or, as he says, "Joisey"!  Over at the gym last week, we got to talking about our Christmas experiences this year, and this gentleman said that he and his wife made a two week road trip out to "Joisey" to see his grandmother. There was an awkward pause in the conversation.   He shook his head, and it looked like a tear was forming in the eye of this big, buff, brawny guy.  "It's worse than you think," he said.  He spoke of the devastation of Hurricane Sandy. 

Ironically, earlier in the day, I read a story from the Associated Press coming from Amityville, New York.  There's a six year old boy who lives there by the name of Steven Beckman.  Sadly, the little lad's home was wiped out by the aforementioned hurricane.  That's bad enough, but when you're fighting for your life against leukemia, well, that seems like more than one little boy and his family could possibly bear. 

Following the October 29th storm, the family lodged where they could.  The mother, Danielle Beckman, said they did a lot of couch-surfing at the homes of extended family and friends.  They went a stretch where the entire family -- the mother, father, and two other siblings along with Steven -- slept on a queen size air mattress. 

While all this displacement was going on, an organization called The National Association of the Remodeling Industry got wind of the Beckman family's plight.  They didn't spend a whole lot of time brainstorming; they just got to work.  As a result, a little over a week ago, little Steven and his family were back in their Long Island home.  It was rebuilt by volunteers.  The mother was so excited, as she walked in the front door, that she nearly hyperventilated.  She said, "It was just really an incredible feeling -- to walk in the door this morning and see that not only has the house been rebuilt, but it's also been furnished, literally from rugs to dressers, TVs and curtains."  They even painted the wall of Steven's new bedroom with images of his favorite character -- Indiana Jones. 

Firefighter Brian and his friends, my pal from "Joisey", and the good folks at The National Association of the Remodeling Industry have at least one thing in common:  they identified with people in need, and they do more than "just say" that they identify with people in need; they put themselves in solidarity with people in need.   Their actions say, "You are not alone; we are in this together." 

Folks, I have a birth certificate; I have a Social Security number; I have a driver's license number;  I have a phone number; I have an email address, a Facebook and a Twitter account.  I have DNA!   I have an identity; the evidence is clear.  So do you. 

But the question of the hour, here on the First Sunday after the Epiphany/The Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord, is this:  who identifies with us?   I'm challenging you to meditate on that and think about that today.

If we choose not to meditate on it or think about it, then we shouldn't be surprised if something happens.  We'll end up feeling like a number.  An American singer/songwriter put it this way:

I take my card and I stand in line
To make a buck I work overtime
I work my back till it's racked with pain
The boss can't even recall my name

I feel like just another
Spoke in a great big wheel
Like a tiny blade of grass
In a great big field
To workers I'm just another drone
To Ma Bell I'm just another phone
I'm just another statistic on a sheet
To teachers I'm just another child
To IRS I'm just another file
I'm just another consensus on the street

Gonna cruise out of this city
Head down to the sea
Gonna shout out at the ocean
Hey it's me
And I feel like a number
Feel like a number
Feel like a stranger in this land.

This is for you and for all of us who have ever felt -- or perhaps are feeling today -- that they are little more than a number.  This is for everyone who ever felt -- in one way or another -- that they were strangers in their own land.  The good news of today's Scripture, in a nutshell, is this:  you are strangers no more. 

In today's Gospel reading from Luke we are told that "When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too."  Jesus came to be baptized by John the Baptist in the Jordan River all those years ago.

It didn't seem right.  John had been blasting away at sinners, threatening judgment and doing the whole fire and brimstone thing.  He told all those numbers, those strangers, those sinners to repent!  Then along comes Jesus and He acts as if He's a number, a stranger, and a sinner just like the rest of us.   Wait just a minute, John must have thought.  Jesus should baptize him; he shouldn't baptize Jesus.  Jesus must stay separate, we must move to him and identify with Him.  He should not come to us, be a sinner with us, and identify with us. 

But that's what Jesus does.  He's Firefighter Brian, the friend from "Joisey", and the National Association of the Remodeling Agency -- and so much more! -- all rolled into one!  He identifies with us, is in solidarity with us, is one of us.  He takes on all that has gone wrong with us -- all our sins.  There is no difference or separation between us and Jesus Christ, the Son of God.  That is what Baptism is all about.  When John balked and didn't want to baptize Jesus, our Lord said:  "Suffer it to be so now:  for thus it is fitting to fulfill all righteousness." 

When the magi went in search for a king, they arrived in Jerusalem.  There was a king there named Herod, but that wasn't who they were looking for.  In order to find what they were looking for, they needed a word from God.  They got that word.  They learned that the king was to be born in Bethlehem! 

Things get cleared up, confusion gives way to certainty, when a Word from God is put on the situation.  At the Baptism of our Lord, the Word of God was put upon it.  The voice came from heaven:  "You are my Son, whom I love, with You I am well-pleased." 

The delight and pleasure of God are in His beloved Son, and that is where we are too!  What is ours (sin) is His; what is His (righteousness) is ours.  So God delights in us too. 

Do you live where Christ is -- at that place where God is well-pleased?  The answer is yes.  There is a Word of God that has been put on it.  It is that Word put on you when YOU were baptized.  With the water, His Name was put upon you.  As one faithful and wise teacher once expressed it to his students:  "You are not just a doubtful, ambiguous, meaningless, hopeless bunch of atoms bouncing around."  You are not a number; you are not a strangers.  You have the Word of God put on you.  At your Baptism and at Jesus' baptism too, God identifies with us, is in solidarity with us -- and we with God.  "So you can't just drag along dreary, fearful, guilt-ridden, nobody-loves-me, me-against-the-rest, me-against-the-system, me-separate, all alone.  When John saw Jesus separate, Jesus said "No. Us."

"It is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness." 

Draw strength and comfort from the Lord's baptism and your own today.  In fact, do it every day.  Begin each day in the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit -- the Name, the Word, put upon you at your baptism.  And if you're not baptized or you're not sure if you've been baptized and want the certainty that you are, then let's do this!

Amen.

 



When You Wish Upon A Star?

Text:  Matthew 2:1-12

Theme:  "When You Wish Upon A Star?"

The Epiphany of Our Lord

January 6, 2013

First Presbyterian Church

Denton, Texas

Rev. Paul R. Dunklau

 

+In the Name of Jesus+

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi^[a] from the east came to Jerusalem ² and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”

³ When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. ⁴ When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born. ⁵ “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written:

⁶ “‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
for out of you will come a ruler
who will shepherd my people Israel.’^[b]”

⁷ Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. ⁸ He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.”

⁹ After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. ¹⁰ When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. ¹¹ 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. ¹² And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.

In early December, the folks at The Downtown Athletic Club in New York City give out an award called the Heisman Trophy.  Based on a pattern of voting, it is presented to the best college football player in the country.  Already known to the many Texas A&M fans we have among us, the Heisman went -- in December, 2012 -- to Johnny Manziel, who is also known as "Johnny Football".  He is only a freshman, and he certainly has made a believer out of me. 

I saw some pictures from his childhood watching the Cotton Bowl the other night which pitted Texas A&M and Oklahoma.  Long before he achieved national prominence, he was the image -- the epiphany, if you will --  of the all-American kid brimming with hopes and dreams for the future.  More than that, it appeared that he was gifted with the guidance and the commitment to do his part and see if those hopes and dreams would come true.  Well, to a certain degree, they have.

Perhaps when he was a youngster he heard that song with a melody probably as familiar to all of us as are the words, and they read as follows:

When you wish upon a star
Makes no difference who you are
Anything your heart desires
Will come to you

Have you ever walked out on a cold, clear winter's night to see if you could spot the brightest star?  And if you spotted it, did you make a wish? 

I don't want to take anything away from the lovely sentiment of wishing on a star, but I'll risk it anyway:  if all we did was gaze at stars and make wishes, we'd end up with a crooked neck.  We all have hopes and dreams for the new year and for the future.  We want to spend more time doing this (fill in the blank) and spend a lot less time doing that (fill in the blank).  We have every intention for good things to materialize.  We have high hopes!   "Everyone knows that ant can't move that rubber tree plant, but he's got high hopes, right?   We even make resolutions.  Then, later in the year as it often happens, we look back and take stock of how things are going.  The result?  Often we are disappointed.  It's almost as if, with all of this blathering on about new year's resolutions, that we set ourselves up for failure.  We threw our hopes and dreams into a box called "wishful thinking".  We then take a roll of duct tape and secure  it only to set it aside like so many Christmas decorations at the end of the holiday season.  Thus, we go on -- as we did in 2012 and now in 2013 --  doing the same things we've always done while expecting a different result.  Some call that insanity.

Today's Gospel for the Epiphany of Our Lord tells the story of the visit of the wise men to the infant Jesus.  Actually, to be more biblical, they were called magoi, or, transliterated, "magi". 

There is a lot of mystery surrounding the magi; it revolves around how many there were, where they came from, and so on.  But on this there is no doubt:  they didn't wish upon the star, they followed it.  They took deliberate steps -- based on their beliefs, based on what they had learned.  To wit, they made a decision. They saw that star in the east.  They did their calculations.  Sure, there may have been doubts. Sure, they may have been skeptical.  But based on what they believed and based on what they knew, they had enough information to take action.  They were not content to leave it all in a box called wishful thinking.  You might say that they applied for their passports, packed their bags, and hit the road.  As the carol "The First Noel" puts it:  "To seek for a King was their intent, and to follow the star wherever it went."

Their first stop was Jerusalem, the capital city of the Jewish nation.  The visual we get is actually not of three solitary figures riding donkeys and/or camels.  Actually, it looks as though it may have been an entire diplomatic delegation.  They did, indeed, come from the east -- likely Persia or Mesopotamia.  That's what we could call the "Middle East" today. Contrary to the Christmas carol, they were not kings and they were not from the Orient  -- which is the "Far East".  There is historical evidence of a caste, or grouping, of sages.  They were what we today might call "highly educated" people -- tenured professors with Ph.D's, if you will.  In addition, they were deep thinkers and philosophers who dabbled in all kinds of things:  medicine, religion, astronomy, astrology, divination, and even magic.  Historian Paul L. Maier has written:  "Whatever the origin of the Eastern sages, their visit was of great significance for later Christianity:  the Wise Men were pagans, not Hebrews, and the fact that Gentile magi performed the same adoration as Jewish shepherds symbolized the universal outreach for future Christianity."  The prophet Isaiah stated it as clear as crystal in our Old Testament Reading this morning:  "Nations (or Gentiles) shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn."

This is one of the great takeaways of the Epiphany story:  our Gospel and our faith is universal;  it is for everyone!  In the founding documents of our country, it is declared that we are "endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights -- and among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." These rights were not thought to be the private domain of who were born in Boston, New York, Philadelphia,  Washington D.C., or Williamsburg. Similarly, the Gospel -- the good news of God's love for us in sending His Son -- was not limited to those who live in Shechem, Shiloh, Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Rome,  or even Denton some two thousand years later.  The grace of God is truly for everyone -- of all times and places!  Indeed, this is a great takeaway.

But there's another takeaway that's not as familiar.  But, in my view, it is  taking on increasing if not massive importance for life today.  I've already stated it, and it bears stating again:  the magi did not wish upon a star; they followed it.  They didn't wait until they had all the information.  In fact, they didn't even know where the Messiah, the infant Jesus, was to be born.  "Where," they ask, "is he who has been born King of the Jews?"  They knew he was born; they just didn't know where he was.  Their information was incomplete, but that didn't stop them from acting.  There are tons of people out there today who have incomplete information about Christianity.  Yet, contrary to the magi, they do not act.  They're left with their wishful thinking, some vestigial thought,  that there may be a god and that this god may have some good ideas on how to live and behave, but that's really about it.  They've determined that there's nothing to decide, nothing worth acting upon. Then they wonder, in their honest moments, why so much despair has gripped them, why they are so disturbed.

Meanwhile, King Herod was disturbed -- and all of Jerusalem with him, we are told. They didn't know of any royal birth. They were too busy with other things.  Herod consulted the Jewish religious establishment.  They dusted off their Old Testaments and concluded that the royal birth was to take place in Bethlehem!

That was good enough for the magi.  They bid farewell to King Herod and headed down the road to Bethlehem!  Shortly thereafter, we are told that they were "overjoyed".  Why?  Because they saw the star again.  It led.  They followed.  In the end, it was mission accomplished. They found something; they found someone infinitely more precious than an infinite number of Heisman trophies. They bowed down and worshipped the child. 

Do you see this phrase in smaller print on the front of your service folder?  It says "Growing in God's Grace."  My question to you is this:  does that statement come under the heading of wishful thinking?  If it is, then we are setting ourselves up for failure.  But if it comes under the heading of something to decide about and to act upon, then we are in league with the magi and have learned the lesson of their story. 

What needs a decision in your life?  What action needs to be taken so that you can grow in God's grace?  You don't need perfect faith or perfect knowledge.  The magi didn't.  But they had enough -- as do all of us -- to decide, to act, and to follow the grace of God wherever it leads.  Happy New Year!

Amen.