Sunday, January 4
Second Sunday after Christmas or Epiphany

 Focus Theme
Another Road

 Weekly Prayer
Radiant Morning Star, you are both guidance and mystery. Visit our rest with disturbing dreams, and our journeys with strange companions. Grace us with the hospitality to open our hearts and homes to visitors filled with unfamiliar wisdom bearing profound and unusual gifts. Amen.

 All Readings For Epiphany
Isaiah 60:1-6 with Psalm 72: 1-7, 10-14 and
Ephesians 3:1-12 and
Matthew 2:1-12

 Focus Reading
Matthew 2:1-12

In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, "Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage." When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, "In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet:

'And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
for from you shall come a ruler
who is to shepherd my people Israel.'"

Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, "Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage." When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure-chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

 Reflection and Focus Questions
by Kate Huey

Focus Questions 1. Has your search for God come only at times of need or suffering, or as an intellectual pursuit, or from a deep, personal hunger for meaning? 2. When has Scripture, read and studied in community, provided guidance to you in your search, especially when other means have fallen short? 3. "All Jerusalem" was afraid with Herod. Think of times when fear was your first response to something new, even if it was promising. What did you, and those around you, fear? 4. Who are the foreigners, nations, strangers, who are left out of this story as we tell it today? Do we recognize ourselves in their midst, or have we always experienced ourselves as insiders? 5. In all the celebrations of Christmas and the Epiphany, have you at any time been "overwhelmed with joy"? Text for Meditation On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; / and they knelt down and paid him homage. For ideas on how to meditate with the Bible, read our article on Praying With the Bible

It was "the time of King Herod," not a good and happy time, but one of oppression, suffering, and injustice. Herod was a brutal and fearful man, insecure because he was just a puppet of the hated Roman Empire, not a real king. Can you imagine how thrilled this pretend king was on that day when a little band of "wise men" from the East showed up at his palace and asked for directions to the real King of the Jews? These wise men were astrologers, priests, scholars--we're not sure exactly what they were or even how many of them came, but we know that they were, in any case, seekers on a mission, and very serious about it. They had dropped everything they were doing, left their country and the comforts of home to set out on a long, hard journey, guided by a spectacular natural phenomenon, a bright star that led them most of the way to this newborn king. William R. Herzog has observed that the star "was not necessarily an extraordinary celestial event, but an ordinary star seen through the extraordinary eyes of the magi." In any case, they needed help to reach their final destination, so they innocently, and naively, turned to this lesser king, an evil one at that, for directions to the real one.

Now here's Herod, already sensing that he's the "power-that-was" instead of the "powers that be," reacting in fear to the news about the birth of a baby bringing good news for the world. For Herod, this is bad news, and he turns to the chief priests and scribes, the religious establishment, the power elite, to help him figure out where this dangerous little baby is. So they all meet, Thomas G. Long says, and do a major "bible study," and find an answer in the words of the prophet Micah (5:2) and in 2 Samuel (5:2), pointing to Bethlehem, the hometown of David, the shepherd king, as the birthplace of the Messiah who would be the greatest shepherd of all. Those at the center read about what God is doing on the margins, Herzog says.

Herod survives, even thrives, on brutality and fear. Now he turns to secrecy and deception, too, calling the strangers in behind closed doors and pretending to be on the same page with them. He tells them what they need to know, and then makes a request. "Go and search diligently for the child," he says, "and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage." What a guy! All the right things are coming out of his mouth, but we know the story. We know what's coming, after the wise men make their way to Bethlehem, find the child, are overwhelmed with joy, offer their gifts, fit for a real king, and pay him homage, and then, after being warned in a dream, return home by a different road. We know what's coming because we've heard the story many times; we know what Herod will do with this knowledge. We've heard the story of the murder of the innocents, all the little boys in the town of Bethlehem under the age of two, the story that tells us so graphically just what lives in the heart of Herod, what fear and insecurity, arrogance and a greed for power can do.

When Matthew told the story of the wise men, he placed it in this big picture, and also referred to what had gone before in the life of Israel so that those who heard the story were able to connect with the ancient story of God's marvelous work. The early Jewish Christians found and understood Jesus and themselves within the long, long story of God's work of saving and healing this world, the story of Israel and the promises of God which were, so the Bible tells us, for the nations, too, for all the people of the world. The whole story held together for them, it made sense, and they located themselves within it.

Don't we want to find ourselves in the story, too, to hear what happened so long ago, and to connect our own lives with it? We want to feel ourselves, strangers from a distant land and far-off time, kneeling with the wise ones from the East, in awe and joy for the gift before us. And we want to know how God is still at work in this world we live in now, how God is still speaking to us, today, as God spoke through the prophets, through dreams and angels and a bright, shining star, so long ago. It's deeply moving to hear of three foreigners traveling a long, hard way because they had an inkling--just an inkling--of something very important unfolding in a distant land. Something inside them must have been restless, or upset, or hungry for understanding; despite the reputation of the East as the place of wisdom and learning, there was something they still needed to find or learn on their westward trek. And what did they find but "an economically limited toddler, in modest surroundings, lying in a teen mother's arms," writes Shelley D.B. Copeland. "To the intellectually perceptive, this scene was not a scholar's formula for future success. Yet, by grace, the magi had the faith to experience unbridled joy."

The rest of the story

In this little story, these mysterious figures from the East play an important role in the bigger story of Matthew's Gospel. It was long believed that one day the wise and powerful of the world would come to Israel, acknowledge its God, and share in the blessings that God had bestowed on Israel (see Isaiah 60:1-6). It makes sense, then, that these wise ones from the East would seek out the newborn King of the Jews. However, John Pilch draws our attention to the "plain history, real politics, and human effort" at "the heart" of this story. These strangers from the East represent long-standing resistance to Western (at that time, Roman) imperialism, Pilch says, and they've come so far to "submit" to Jesus, the new king of the Judeans. In doing so, they're poking their finger in the eye of Rome and its puppets: "The Magi proclaim a message that resounds beyond the confines of Israel to the entire ancient Near East." Pilch suggests that the Magi were "very high ranking political-religious advisors to the rulers of the Median and then the Persian empires (roughly equivalent to the modern countries of Iran and Iraq)."

Thus, the biblical story leads us to ponder the meaning of visitors from the very places in the world that we seem to fear most right now. We get a better sense of the reaction of Matthew's earliest audience to this text about Magi from the East if we imagine a visit to our local church by religious or political leaders from that same part of the world, from Iran or Iraq. But Matthew wants his audience to hear about the Good News of God's universal and all-encompassing grace, even if they're offended that such "objectionable" people are included in the story. Scott Hoezee puts it this way: "What Matthew may be trying to convey, however, is the reach of grace. Matthew is giving a Gospel sneak preview: the Christ child who attracted these odd Magi to his cradle will later have the same magnetic effect on Samaritan adulterers, immoral prostitutes, greasy tax collectors on the take, despised Roman soldiers, and ostracized lepers." In Matthew's story, then, of God at work in the world--the good news, the gospel--these foreigners, these Gentiles, represent us, too, in a sense, for Matthew, twenty-six chapters later, would tell of Jesus commanding his disciples to "Go, make disciples of all nations." We are in this big picture, this tradition of hope rooted in the prophets and embodied by Jesus Christ himself.

This tradition of hope speaks of a different time, not the time of Herod but a time of restoration and peace, a time of a great feast at which all of God's children will gather and there will be plenty for everyone and everyone will be welcome, a time when all the nations of the world will beat their swords into plowshares and live together in harmony, when the lion and the lamb will lie down together because nature itself will embody a whole new way of being, and there will be no death of innocents, no violence or wretched injustice. (You have undoubtedly noticed that we are not yet living in that time.)

A story of God's compassion

This beautiful story of seekers from the East so long ago, bearing extravagant gifts for a king and being overwhelmed with joy, is not just a nice little story that decorates our Nativity sets and Christmas cards. This little story is part of a larger story that holds within it the suffering of the world, whether in sudden and spectacular devastation by earthquake, hurricane, or tidal wave, in the slow motion violence of poverty, in the anguish of those engulfed by war and the quiet agony of those who live and breathe the poisoned air of hatred and neglect caused by human sinfulness, in the pain of illness and injury, and in the private, personal sorrows of the human heart.

Years ago, a Christian church leader in China named Wang Weifan wrote about the three wise men from the East: "Christ, the savior of humankind, is the great light that shines upon all peoples. But the very first to be called to worship the holy infant were the wise men from the East. Why them, in particular? Was it that the ancient cultures of the East had received more of God's revelation and were thus better prepared to accept Christ? Or was it that the East stood in greater need of Christ because of the endless river of tears which is its history? I do not know. Perhaps the answer lies in the star that lit their path. What I do know is that the East, in its recent history, has been hammered on the anvil of extreme adversity, here forged and tempered for over a hundred years. Precisely because of this, should not the East be able to offer up an even more refined gold when it worships Christ? Out of this pain and agony, should not the East be ready to bring forth even more fragrant frankincense and myrrh?"

Scripture guides us

The Magi follow a star, guided by God, looking to nature for signs and guidance. God would also provide direction through a dream (just as Joseph was guided by a dream), but it's significant that they're also helped by scripture, when they hear from the religious authorities who know right where to look for the answer. There are many ways that we find our way to God, to the little baby born King of Kings: nature does indeed point to the glory of God, the care of God, the presence of God, but we need scripture, too, and personal experience, and the community that helps us understand all those gifts. Then, like the Magi, we're drawn to worship the One we seek. Thomas Long says that "the world is full of 'stars in the East'--events in nature, personal experience, and history that point toward the mystery of God"--but we need "the defining and clarifying word of scripture" to "recognize these holy moments for what they are...to see God's face clearly in them." Without scripture, he claims, we would be like the wise men, "aware that something had happened, but we would not, without the revelation of God in scripture, know where or how to worship." Just being a biblical scholar isn't enough, either: the chief priests and the scribes missed the meaning of the text, and Herod turns to scripture to use it for his own panicked purposes: "One can, like Herod, be in favor of studying the scripture and still be on the wrong side of God's will." Now, there's a challenging thought at the beginning of this new year!

So, what do we hear in this story? We hear that God has sent a gentle shepherd who will nevertheless upset the powers-that-have-been. We hear that the smallest things, like a newborn baby, can terrify the mighty, and bring them down. We learn that God's reach of grace goes far beyond every obstacle within or without, and pushes us beyond them, too. We learn that a great light has dawned that draws all people and calls us to live our lives illuminated by its truth. That's what the Epiphany season is about, writes Herman Waetjen: "If the light has come, those who have been seated in darkness awaiting its arrival are exhorted to greet that light and the new age that it inaugurates by shining in order to reflect its glory in all the activities and relationships of everyday life...to be the light of the world." Waetjen puts it simply by quoting W.H. Auden's poem, "For the Time Being": "To discover how to be human now / is the reason we follow this star." And nothing will ever be the same, says James Howell: "You don't take the old road any longer. You unfold a new map, and discover an alternate path."

 For Further Reflection
Andrew Schelling, 21st century

The pilgrim resolves that the one who returns will not be the same person as the one who set out. 

 For Further Reflection
Natalie Angier, 20th century

From an article about scientists who studied neural activity:
Hard as it may be to believe in these days of infectious greed and sabers unsheathed, scientists have discovered that the small, brave act of cooperating with another person, of choosing trust over cynicism, generosity over selfishness, makes the brain light up with quiet joy.

Weekly Seeds is a source for meditation and prayer based on the readings of the "Lectionary," a plan for weekly Bible readings used in Protestant, Anglican and Roman Catholic churches throughout the world. When we pray and study the Bible using the Lectionary, we are praying and studying with millions of others. We invite you to continue the conversation on our "Opening the Bible" forum at http://i.ucc.org.

Weekly Seeds is a service of the Congregational Vitality Initiative, Local Church Ministries, United Church of Christ. Bible texts are from the New Revised Standard Version, © 1989 Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. The Revised Common Lectionary is © 1992 Consultation on Common Texts. Used by permission. The Ancient Christian Devotional is © 2007 by Thomas C. Oden and ICCS, and is published by InterVarsity Press. Used by permission.