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Divine manifestations

Sojourners Magazine, Jan/Feb 2003 by Winner, Lauren F

BIBLE STUDY

Epiphany: It's one of the most "religious" words there is. The Bible gives us Paul's epiphany, the startling vision on the road to Damascus; and then there are those special things that super-spiritual people always seem to experience-epiphanies, words of knowledge, sudden bursts of God-clarity.

And here we are on the eve of another sort of Epiphany-the liturgical season that

has the unfortunate fate of

falling between two far more famous church seasons, Christmas and Lent.

Just what is Epiphany about? Jesus. During Advent we prepared for his coming. During Christmas we celebrated his arrival. During Epiphany, we are treated to readings that help us figure out who Jesus is and why he came.

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The readings take us straight to the central theme of this season: Jesus' extending God's grace to the whole of humanity. As Episcopal priest John Wall explains in A Dictionary for Episcopalians, "The season begins with the 'appearance' of Jesus (the extension of his ministry) to the Gentiles, specifically to the wise men of Matthew's gospel. Epiphany thus proclaims that Jesus Christ is the savior of the whole world and that God's promises of salvation to Israel now apply to all the peoples of the Earth."

JANUARY 5

Invited and Convicted

Jeremiah 31:7-14; Psalm 147.12-20,

Ephesians 1:3-14; John 1:1 -18

This week's scripture readings clearly chart the Epiphany theme, that of Jesus drawing all of humanity into a living relationship with God. Psalm 147:19-20 proclaims the special relationship between God and Israel. It is with Israel that God has covenanted: God "has done this for no other nation." But that exclusive covenant is expanded in our New Testament readings.

What John boldly declares is the heart of the whole story: All who receive Jesus-all!-are given "the right to become children of God" (John 1:12). God's grace, though marked in a very particular covenant made with Israel at Sinai, is not reserved for the children of Israel alone. Now God has made a covenant with all of humanity. Paul sounds the same theme again in Ephesians: We are "adopted as [God's children] through Jesus Christ."

But coupled with the glorious extension of God's grace to us all are some troubling questions. What does the coming of Jesus mean for the Jews who don't accept him? How will the church speak about Jews and the covenant God made with them in the desert? The reading from John is a difficult passage because of what it seems to say about Jews. For, of course, the church has often assumed that the antecedent in John 1:11 is the Jews-- that Jesus came for the Jews, but they did not receive him. There begins a very long, difficult, and consequential story about Jews and their failure to recognize Jesus for who he was, andthis is the consequential part-the Christian violence towards Jews enacted in the name of that rejection.

At the outset of a liturgical season we devote to recognizing and comprehending Jesus' ministry, let us consider an alternate reading of John 1:11. It is not "the Jews" to whom John speaks, but everyone who has rejected Jesus. As Pope Paul VI said in a 1974 address, "Christ came, but by a mysterious and terrible misfortune, not everyone accepted him.... It is the picture of humanity before us today, after 20 centuries of Christianity."

Isn't John speaking to us all? The readings leave us invited and convicted: A bold declaration of the ministry of Christ to extend God's grace to all, and a sharp reminder that we still fail to recognize and "receive" God. The task of Epiphany is no more, and no less, than paying attention, so that we might receive the one who has come to adopt us as members of the family of God.

JANUARY 12

The Waters of Life

Genesis 1:1-5; Psalm 29; Acts 19:1- 7, Mark 1:4-11

This week's readings are water readings: God's Spirit hovering over the first waters at the beginning of Creation; the powerful and majestic voice of the Lord "thunder[ing] over the mighty waters" in Psalm 29; the baptismal waters that cleanse us of our sins; and the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Then, of course, there are the baptismal waters that inaugurate Jesus' ministry. This is the first clue the gospel of Mark gives us about who Jesus is and what his task in coming to Earth was. In Mark, there is no angel making prophetic proclamations to a pregnant Mary, no nativity story Magi, and no Simeon dying easier now that he has seen the Messiah. At Jesus' baptism, something special and wonderfully strange happens: "the heavens opened and the Spirit descend[ed] upon him like a dove" (Mark 1:10).

Why, commentators have often asked, did the Holy Spirit appear in the form of a dove? So that we might connect these new baptismal waters with the great flood? The dove gives us our clue about who Jesus is and what he has come to do. The dove, explained third century bishop Gregory Thaumaturgus, shows Jesus to be "the new Noah..the good pilot of nature which is in shipwreck."

I am relatively new to the rhythms of the liturgical calendar. I'm working to get the hang of the Christian year, but I'm still very much a part of the American calendar, the Hallmark calendar, and the academic calendar. If you're like me, you will spend more time these weeks thinking about Martin Luther King Jr. than Epiphany.

Divine manifestations

Sojourners Magazine, Jan/Feb 2003 by Winner, Lauren F

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