Sermon delivered at All Saints’ Church, Whiteparish – Sunday 7 January 2024 – Epiphany Sunday
Isaiah 60:1-6; Ephesians 3:1-12; Matthew 2:1-12
May I
speak in the name of the Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen
May I start this morning’s sermon by wishing you all a Very
Happy New Year and I look forward to continuing to minister to you in this
lovely church and parish for many years to come. As we enter this New Year let us continue to
pray for peace and prosperity not only in our own community and country but
throughout the world. Jesus came into
the world to bring light to a dark world and to proclaim the coming of the
Kingdom of God and so, as we enter 2024 let us, as his Christian Family do all
we can to make that dream a reality.
I am particularly fond of this morning’s gospel passage
introducing the wise men who came from the east following the “star” which
would lead them to Bethlehem and the birthplace of our Saviour, Jesus
Christ. As an astronomer I have always
been fixated on trying to discover what this strange, and obviously unusual
celestial occurrence might be and also intrigued by trying to figure out who
these “wise men” were and where they had come from.
We are told in our gospel passage – and here it is
interesting to note that they only appear in Matthew’s Gospel – that they came
from the east and that they clearly knew their night sky as they had observed
something distinct and interesting.
There have been many theories as what it was that they saw – some
historians and astronomers believe that it was a comet, others a triple
conjunction of planets, others a nova or supernova. For me, I think that it was probably an
exceptional comet because it was seen to move through the sky and the
Renaissance painter Giotto, in his Adoration of the Magi, depicts a large
bright comet over the roof of the stable. Indeed, a spacecraft which visited
Halley’s Comet in 1986 was named Giotto after the painter of this depiction.
But to what extent does it really matter? We know that God is capable of all sorts of
supernatural acts and if we astronomers cannot explain this phenomenon then why
not be content to accept that it was something supernatural from God?
The other mystery, where did the wise men come from? might
not be such a mystery and clues may be found back in the Old Testament and the
Book of Daniel.
We know, pretty accurately from historical records that the
Jews were exiled in Babylon between 597 BC and 538 BC. During that time the cream of Jewish Society,
the wise intelligentsia, were taken into captivity and integrated first with
the Babylonians and later their Persian successors. The Persians, especially, relied heavily on
the Jewish administrators and advisors to assist them in ruling Babylon and
other lands incorporated into their Empire, and it is these same Jews who,
despite being subsumed into Persian culture and religions would have continued
to study and remember their own heritage and religious upbringing. They therefore, as the court advisers and
astrologers, would know of the prophesies and would be looking out for the
signs of the coming of God incarnate, the Messiah. It is highly likely, therefore, that these
“wise men from the east” were indeed descendants of those same captured Jews
serving the Persian Empire and would indeed have come from the east with
knowledge of the prophesies of the Old Testament.
They were clearly wealthy – bringing with them three of the
most expensive commodities of their time – gold for kingship, frankincense for
divinity and myrrh, the bitter perfume used in time of burial to represent
sorrow and suffering. The wise men,
expecting the “star” to announce the birth of an earthly king, assumed that
Jesus would be born in a palace – hence their trip first to Jerusalem to the
palace of King Herod to be told that this wasn’t the place they were seeking.
In our nativity scenes we place the Magi with the shepherds in the stable
whereas in Matthew we are not told exactly where they ended up except that it
seems to have been in a house rather than the stable of Luke’s gospel – and
possibly sometime after his birth.
We have given them names too – Balthasar from Arabia,
Melchior from Persia and Gasper from India yet nowhere in the bible are they
identified as such, nor are we told their number; so they still remain a
mystery. What is significant, however,
is that they are identified as foreigners coming from the east and together
with the shepherds they represent the outcasts of the Jewish faith – shepherds
being poor and lowly – the butt of many Jewish jokes of the time - and the wise
men, albeit rich and well educated, being foreigners, identified as gentiles.
Yet, here we have these two groups being especially chosen – one set with a
heavenly Angelic host and the other with an unusual astronomical phenomenon -
to be the first to hear the good news of Christ’s coming.
It always gives me such comfort that the light – Jesus –
came for the poor and outcast of the world.
“The word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us” as John puts it at
the beginning of his Gospel. “The
light shines in the darkness and the darkness does not overwhelm it; but the
darkness does not understand it”
This leads me to say something about how this story has
such a great significance and relevance to us today – some 2,000 years later.
Psychologists will tell you that people will always flock to their own kind – a
type of herding instinct; something which the journalist James O’Brien has
termed “footballing” - taking the example of the tribal nature of football fans
for the way in which we stick to our own group come what may. The birth of Jesus tried to break that mould
as did his ministry. He came for all –
rich and poor, homegrown and foreigner.
We seem, today, to live in a deeply divided and ungodly world. Once more a very dark world with war and
conflict now also in Europe once more. Our culture seems to be one of
selfishness and self-centredness. Instead of being in a state of self-awareness
we seem to be living in a world of self-righteousness and blame.
God gave us his only Son so that we might be saved and
receive eternal life; that we might see the light and understand it – just as
the wise men saw the star and understood that. That process began with his
birth in Bethlehem, a town which is currently seeing the worst of inhumanity
surrounding it as the Israeli-Arab conflict continues unabated.
So, in conclusion, in addition to prayer for the world and
the darkness of war, conflict, famine, climate change and natural disasters is
there an area of pain and darkness in your life or the life of your family and
friends or community? How can you ask
God to bring his light within it to shine away the fear which that darkness
brings? How will you seek out that light
– be it bright or dim in your life just now?
Let us pause for a moment and reflect upon this – PAUSE –
Let us pray
God of
light, we thank you that you are present everywhere, even when we cannot see
you. As the Wise Men saw the unusual light in night sky all those years ago and
followed it to Jesus please shine your light into the difficult places of the
world and our lives.
Amen
MFB/196/06012024
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