Post these

Post These

Texts: Micah 6:1-8; Matthew 5:1-9

(Gary W. Charles, Cove Presbyterian Church, Covesville, VA 1-29-2017)

Wherever I have lived, I have run into the same argument. One group insists that a large version of the Ten Commandments be displayed in the state Capitol. Meanwhile, another group rises up in a fury to oppose the idea as a clear violation of the constitutional separation of church and state.  

Over the years, I have engaged in plenty church-state arguments, but I have always felt that this was a bit misguided. I am a fan of the wisdom gleaned in the Ten Commandments, but if someone were to ask me what biblical texts need the most public display, I would recommend the two texts read today – the beatitudes of Jesus in Matthew’s Gospel and the beatitudes of Micah 6:8. I would never fight to post them on the walls of a public building, but I would gladly insist that all who appeal to God in political and public discourse appeal to the God who is revealed in Micah 6 and Matthew 5.

The beatitudes of Micah and Jesus both address one of the world’s oldest questions:  “What does God expect of us?” The older I get, the more I am amazed at how many people seem dead certain that they know the exact answer to that profound question. God thinks this, some tell me. God thinks that, others say.

Just shy of 3,000 years ago, after noting an absurd listing of things that people confuse with God’s will, the young prophet Micah said, “Let me make it simple for you.” “God has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.”

Micah’s beatitudes – do justice, love mercy, walk in humility with God – along with Jesus’ beatitudes are blessings that still wear well in public and in private life today. About these beatitudes, Andrew Foster Connors says it well. They are where “faith finds its legs.”

Take care, though, because like any short, pithy sayings that would fit on a T-shirt or on a placard or inside a fortune cookie, Micah’s beatitudes and later, the beatitudes of Jesus, are easily subject to distortion. I can think of no greater distortion of Micah and Jesus’ beatific words than what happened at the Elmina Castle in Ghana in the 19^th century.

Built as a trading post by the Portuguese, merchants came from across the

globe to the Elmina Castle to buy and sell gold, silver, and cocoa. By far, the most valuable commodity to be traded, though, was slaves. Ironically and sadly, during the time when the castle was held by the Dutch, it was occupied not only by soldiers, a governor, and human chattel below, but also by a church above. A Dutch Reformed sanctuary was maintained on the upper floor of one part of the castle. 

On the bottom floor of this part of the castle were four slave dungeons. Imagine a classroom designed to hold fifty students, their desks, the teacher's desk, and other classroom materials. Instead of fifty students, packed into the room, one hundred and fifty women, barely clothed, if clothed at all, were forced to subsist in their own waste and fed only enough to keep them alive, so they would never gain the necessary strength to fight back.

Directly above this room, with only a single layer of construction between, was the room used by the Dutch as the sanctuary to worship God. I can imagine the preacher in the Dutch sanctuary above reading Micah 6:8 – “love justice, do mercy, walk in humility with God” – while below women were being shoved through the Door of No Return onto ships that would transport them into slavery in South America, the Caribbean, and North America.

Micah’s beatitudes were never intended to be pietistic platitudes to be spoken in worship and then ignored in our public life. These words are our ministry marching orders, where “faith finds its legs.” We do not help others because we hope that God might take note of our beneficence and shower down blessings upon us. We help, says Micah 6, because, though never deserving, you and I always walk in the beneficence of God.

As Jesus begins his beatitudes, he says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” In his book, Credo, William Sloane Coffin writes: “It is ironic to think of the number of people in this country who pray for the poor and needy on Sunday and spend the rest of the week complaining that the government is doing something to help them.”  For the last twelve years in Atlanta, I worked with poor families, many without shelter, who had to spend long hours to receive minimal public assistance. Meanwhile, they would listen to those with more than they need lament dollars being thrown at those who could help themselves, these well to do folks never once lamenting the countless and costly ways that the rich in our society can legally game the system. “The poor in spirit,” says Jesus, care for the poor with comment and without complaint.

When Jesus blesses peacemakers, he is not spinning language to suggest that those who have the most guns or the most drones and who torture the most often get to call themselves “peacemakers.” Jesus knows that most Roman emperors referred to themselves as “peacemakers.” No, “peacemakers,” for Jesus, are those who renounce violence as the weak deceiver and divider that it is, are those who eschew every form of violence within families and within the family of nations, who welcome refugees seeking asylum from any nation, who believe passionately that Micah was not fantasizing when he imagined and worked for the day when “they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more” (Micah 4:3).       

 Carol Dempsey takes Micah’s beatitudes to a level not even anticipated by the ancient prophet when she writes:  “Given the scientific fact that all of creation is a part of one unified web of life, the practice of justice and love now needs to embrace both human and nonhuman life, and the humble walk with God is a walk of holy reverence and awe across the planet, with people being attuned to and learning from the divine Spirit that pulsates at the heart of all.” Just as I argued last week that words matter, so Carol would argue that “creation matters” and therefore “blessed are” those who tend to our fragile creation. Helping people and caring for creation, however it is done, by whomever it is done, and by whatever cost it takes, is at the heart of Micah’s and Matthew’s beatitudes.

Micah and Jesus are both realists. They warn that living into and out of the beatitudes will not likely win us gold stars, pats on the back, or great public approval ratings. Believers in God who insist on justice and mercy for all had better be willing to pay the price for such insistence. Tom Long writes, “Those who benefit from the weakness of others do not want the world to be compassionate. Much money and power are invested in maintaining injustice. If every wage were fair, if every person were honored as a child of God, if every human being were safe from exploitation, many would lose their grip on status, self-gratification, and affluence” (Tom Long, Matthew, Westminster Bible Companion).

When you and I live out Micah’s and Jesus’ beatitudes in and beyond the church, we not only avoid recreating the horrors of places like the Elmina Castle, we offer the world the most powerful public display of God’s just, merciful, and humble grace, a display that is far more powerful than any tablets ever posted in any public building.

The poet Mary Oliver opens a new collection of her poetry with “I Go Down to the Shore”:

I go down to the shore in the morning

and depending on the hour the waves

are rolling in or moving out, I say, oh, I am miserable,

what shall –

what should I do? And the sea says in its lovely voice:

Excuse me, I have work to do.

For those who follow Jesus and listen to Micah, the question is never “What shall/what should I do?” Those who would follow Jesus know the answer to that question. As followers of the Blessed One, we can tell the world in our own lovely voices:  “Excuse me, I have work to do.”

Excuse me, Cove Presbyterian Church, we have work to do – justice work, merciful work – and if you take Jesus seriously, all of it is blessed work, blessed work, indeed.

AMEN   

A Love Letter Revisited

A Love Letter Revisited

(Text: I Corinthians 1:10-18)

(Gary W. Charles at Cove Presbyterian Church on 1-22-2017)

          I give you Sarah’s story.

In the car after church, Sarah would cup her hands over her ears. She did not understand everything her parents were saying, but she knew enough to understand angry words. Despite her best efforts not to listen, she would still hear pieces of the post-worship analysis: “Can you believe what he said today? How can he stand in the pulpit and say such things?” “Did you see what Meredith was wearing? Someone needs to buy that woman a mirror.” “When will ever sing a familiar hymn?” “What were people thinking when they elected Eddie an elder?” 

          Sometimes Sarah’s mom or dad had a meeting after worship and while waiting, she would try to help the ushers, but she was shooed away – being told that she was too young to help. As Sarah moved into her teens, she managed to find other rides home, but sadly, she heard other unsatisfied voices in these cars as well, voices full of disgust and anger. Some of them said the church had never been the same since the last pastor left. Some fussed about how the church was always asking for money. Others objected at how often the church meddled in politics. Some chided the church for being too cold and anonymous and only open to the in-crowd.

          Sarah did not attend church while in college. That was alright though because she had heard that most students stray from the church during their college years. When she came home on break she usually slept in on Sunday.  She graduated and went to work in a city far from home. Later, she married in a lovely backyard service. In time, Sarah and her husband had three children. Now, neither Sarah nor her husband nor her children go to church.

          As I read Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth, I find myself wondering what Jesus expects from us, his church in 2017. The Apostle Paul writes his friends in Corinth because he has heard unsettling reports of their church life. His friend, Chloe, has shared that in Corinth love is torn and church is deeply divided. We do not know the precise reasons for the divisions, but we do know that they are not minor disputes about where the flowers should be placed in the sanctuary. The disputes are emotional and contentious, disputes of the heart where members have lined up and taken sides.

          In some ways, it does not matter if we ever know the sordid details of the divisive, angry situation in Corinth that led Paul to write this congregation. We do not need to know, for most of us have suffered through such some divisive, angry church conflict, whether at Cove or elsewhere in our church past. Words are spoken that should never have been spoken. Threats are made. If things do not go a certain way – if the church does not get rid of the pastor or the musician or the educator, people leave or stop giving. When love is torn in the church, people loose their humor and every word has a barb to it, intended to do harm.  

When conflict reigns in the church, people find themselves in their own silos, feeling that the weight of the church rests on their shoulders. Secrets are kept lest another group or person twist their words. Anxiety flies around the church lighting on any unsuspecting victim. Judgment gets clouded and any search for truth hardens into having to believe a certain way to be a true member.

            At first glance, Paul’s recipe for reconciliation in Corinth sounds a tad trite, “Now I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you be in agreement and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same purpose” (I Cor. 1:10). This plea sounds a bit like the cry of a defeated parent asking her two children who are yelling at the top of their lungs at each other in the backseat of the car, “Now, now, children, lower your voices and be sweet. After all, you are brother and sister.”

          Listen carefully to Paul once more. “I appeal to you . . . by the name of Jesus Christ . . . that you be united in the same mind and purpose.” Paul does not ask the Corinthians to stop their bickering because it is what enlightened, civilized, grown-up people do. Paul’s logic never suffers such false optimism about human behavior. Nor does Paul ask the Corinthians to stop fighting out of sheer human decency because of the damage it is causing the church. Paul well knew that zealots never think themselves wrong and when damage is done, it is always the other group or person at fault. Paul writes at least two long letters to Corinth because he fears for the future of the church there.

          Now, if the situation in Corinth was serious, the situation facing the church in America today is absolutely dire, not so much for any one particular church but for the whole church of Jesus Christ. Theologian William Stacy Johnson writes, “We have failed to make the faith persuasive for our young people.  We are perishing and find ourselves struggling to devise ways to survive. For this reason it is all the more illogical that we spend our ecclesial energies on quarrels between liberals and conservatives, between advocates of gays and lesbians and their opponents, between those who look to scripture and those who look to experience - between Paul and Apollos, Cephas and Christ.”

          What then does Paul say to a church badly divided then or in 2017? For sixteen chapters Paul points to the love of the crucified Christ. The love of Christ, says Paul, binds together different people with different attitudes with different work styles with different backgrounds with different tastes with different political viewpoints. The love of Christ, says Paul, has as much to do with how we live with other people as it does with how we feel about God. 

          As a child, I often heard and said, “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me.” What a devastating lie. Words matter and nowhere do they matter more than in the body of Christ. The love of Christ does not ask us to agree with each other about doctrine or worship or what color to paint the sanctuary, but the love of Christ does demand that we respect each other, cherishing even those with whom we could not differ more. The love of Christ simply allows no excuse for cutting remarks and stinging sarcasm and unapologetic arrogance toward those we feel less enlightened than ourselves.

Paul knew that words could do more lasting damage than any stick or stone, wounding not just an individual but an entire church, an entire society. I pray that our new President will quickly learn this truth in his public rhetoric and on Twitter even as I pray for those who oppose him and his policies the most vociferously. For words matter and love demands respect.  

          Paul knew personally the corrosive power carried by some words, but he also knew the healing power of many words, most especially, the forgiving, reconciling, and empowering word of Christ from the cross. His is the word by which you and I are judged, redeemed, inspired, and humbled. His is the word that needs to stick in our throat whenever we are tempted to devalue another member, deride a pastor, castigate an elder, criticize the choir, or demean a child. His is the word of love that simply will not allow us finally to demonize or dismiss each other no matter how strong our differences, how firmly held our convictions. 

          Father Walter Burghardt asks his Catholic congregation a series of questions that beg for an answer from any Christian community: “Can we differ without disliking? Can we contradict without condemning? Can we debate without hating?” Then in a wonderful flourish, he answers himself, “We had better-for our salvation’s sake. You know, I spend most of my waking day playing theological detective, trying to unravel the mystery of God-with-us. But when I stand before the judgment seat of God, the judge who died for me will not ask me:  did you solve the mystery? He [God] will simply ask: did you love me above all else? And did you love your brothers and sisters as if they were your own self?” (Is Christ Divided? A sermon preached in his book, Grace on Crutches).

          So, let me suggest another version of Sarah’s story. As a child Sarah often wandered about in the sanctuary after services collecting leftover bulletins and occasional dimes and pennies left underneath the pew cushions. The other adult ushers always had a good word for Sarah and gave her a job that made her feel important, not patronized. After greeting the members, Sarah’s pastor would stroll through the sanctuary and her father and the pastor would frequently raise their voices and Sarah would cower at first, but she soon learned that their loud words were not hateful or hurtful words. In fact, after the sanctuary debate, she and her dad would often walk to lunch with the pastor and her family.

          At home, Sarah learned that personal differences and preferences did not give her permission to treat people differently or harshly. At church, she learned that people had lots of ideas about how best to worship God, about how to spend money, and what youth should or should not do in the church, yet still, they refused to let their differences divide them. At college, Sarah went to church more often than her classmates and when she came home, she always came to worship because she knew how much she was missed and loved.

          No one will ever forget Sarah’s wedding because even church members who did not know Sarah well, knew that she deserved their support on this special day. Sarah and her husband found jobs that required they move across the country. They found another church in their new town where each child was baptized and later confirmed. Most Sundays now Sarah ushers and her eldest stays with her after services gathering bulletins as her mom did as a child, both glad to know the love of Christ made real within the church of Christ.

          What happened in Corinth that required Paul to plea for them to revisit Christ’s love? We will never know. What we do know is that you and I write a version of Sarah’s story with each action and every word we speak, day by day, Sunday after Sunday. What I do know is that after six month in Covesville that this congregation is remarkably gifted in writing a narrative of love and refusing to sink into the abyss of fear and division. Never has such a gift been needed more than today.

As you and I enter into a new era in American life, may our witness of love, inclusive love, expansive love, respectful love, forgiving love, broaden far beyond the walls of this sanctuary into a society that will never be whole until love abides.

                                        AMEN

Drought Busters

Drought-Busters

Text:  Matthew 3:13-17

Gary W. Charles, Cove Presbyterian Church, Atlanta, GA, 1-15-2017)

         

I have never lived through a drought.  I have never seen trees bend over and shrubs shrivel and plush lawns become clay pits because the skies went mute. I have never watched people fear for their livelihood because their jobs depended on rain. I have never watched huge lakes and reservoirs recede to the point that they look like kiddy pools. I have lived most of my life never thinking much about the length of my shower or how much water I used to wash the dishes or how long I ran the faucet when brushing my teeth. There is something about a drought that can bring on a profound respect for water. 

I have, though, lived through another kind of drought that can be just, if not more, severe. Unlike droughts that are cyclical, affecting some and not others, this drought affects us all. And unlike most droughts from which the results are easily visible, this drought’s results are largely invisible but still quite devastating.   

I have watched this other kind of drought develop from the day I was ordained. It is the drought of loss of meaning in life. I witness this other kind of drought nearly every direction I turn and I meet more and more people who yearn for and are in constant search for a way to end this drought.          

Some try to quell this other kind of drought through work – convinced that if they get the promotion or work enough overtime or finally land the right job then the drought will end and their life will have meaning. Some people slip on a wedding ring or move in with a partner, sure that a lasting relationship will end the drought. Some go for long nature walks, train for the Iron Man or travel to exotic, “spiritual” spots, hoping to find that elusive something to end the drought. Some people grab a hammer or bunk down in shelters or stack cans in food banks, hoping that with one more good deed they will stop feeling like their lives are parched and their souls are bone dry. Some have given up on the drought ever ending and try to drown it out at the bar or dull it with the latest drug of choice.

The Gospel of Matthew today takes us to the water’s edge, to the banks of the Jordan where the two kinds of drought intersect in the baptism of Jesus. It is an odd story, but when you get right down to it, the whole notion of baptism is odd.

I got a phone call some years ago from a couple wanting me “do their baby” in a garden party one Saturday afternoon. Once I figured out that “do their baby” meant to baptize their child, I explained the Presbyterian theology of baptism, how it is a sacrament of the gathered community, requiring parents and the congregation to answer some profound questions and therefore should occur in a worship service. “Yes, yes, we understand all that, pastor. What we want to know is if you can do our baby at the garden party next Saturday?” I felt like the losing contestant on a “Reality” baptism show!

Jesus arrives at the banks of the Jordan and tells John that he has come for the same water treatment that everyone else is getting. John is not wild about the idea and suggests that he be baptized by Jesus. Jesus insists that he get the same treatment as everyone else and when the baptism is over, he walks right out of that water and heads dead center into a drought-suffering world. 

The water of baptism was not for Jesus some sort of first century “power drink” that turned him into a “super hero”; the baptismal waters were a life’s reminder to Jesus and to every follower of Jesus that not a day goes by when we are anything less than beloved children of God. Baptism is the water mark that we could not get rid of even if we tried.    

  Baptism can set us free from an endless search for meaning so that we can start living out the full meaning of our divine vocation as “drought-busters.” You want the drought of loss of meaning to end in your life? Follow Jesus out of the waters of the Jordan, says Matthew.  Never forget who else is in the waters with you, says Matthew. Be drought-busters, say Matthew.

There is a problem, though, with these lofty imperatives about baptism. A large majority of people today are turning almost anywhere to end the drought of loss of meaning in life except to the body that is born in the waters of baptism – the church. Pollsters say that a majority of citizens describe themselves as spiritual but not religious; they believe in God but do so without a perceived need for church or synagogue or mosque, for that matter. In fact, for many, the church is the last place they would go to look for life’s meaning and if baptism still means anything for them; it is not much more than a quaint water feature for children at a summer garden party.

So, where does that leave those of us who wear the divine water mark?  What are we who are called to be “drought-busters” to do? To begin with, we are to do nothing and to do nothing regularly. That is, if you consider praying “doing nothing.” Protestant Reformer, Martin Luther argued that he was far too busy not to spend considerable hours daily in prayer. 

In addition to prayer, we, drought-busters do what most people no longer do as we set the alarm, wrestle with the kids, put off important work that is waiting, dust off our doubts and join other drought-busters in worship Sunday after Sunday. Whatever we do, pray, worship or serve, we do so not in a desperate search to find life’s meaning, but in celebration that the meaning of life finds us in the waters of baptism.   

And the meaning of life finds not just us; we meet all kinds of

drought-busters in these waters. Heidi Neumark tells of a reticent, soon-to-be drought-buster in the Bronx. “Stardeshia came in with a question about her upcoming baptism,” writes Heidi. “When she went to the doctor, he told her that he had just the medicine she needed but would not prescribe it for her.  Why not?  . . . `As long as you smoke pot, there’s no point in my prescribing this medicine, because the chemical reaction of the medicine with the pot makes the medicine ineffective – so prescribing it would be a waste’.

“The question Stardeshia then asked me was whether or not her inconsistent behavior and her doubts would cancel out the power of her baptism as marijuana cancels out the power of the medicine.” Heidi answered, “Nothing we do cancels out God” (Heidi Neumark, Breathing Lessons, p. 252).  

God claims reluctant, even scarred drought-busters in the waters of baptism, whether they are as young as Oliver or as old as Stardeshia. Drought-busters do not wear halos, but they do wear the same water mark worn by Jesus and with eloquent voices and sometimes clumsy, even unintended invitations, they help lead others out of the drought of loss of meaning and into the great baptismal waters, through which life’s meaning can be found.   

As I said earlier, there is something about a drought that brings on a profound respect for water. 

AMEN  

On the Eigth Day of Christmas

On the Eighth Day of Christmas

Matthew 2:1-12

(Gary W. Charles, Cove Presbyterian Church, Covesville, VA, 1-1-2017)

 Most say that Christmas ended a week ago. So, why is the sanctuary still decorated for Christmas and why are we still singing Christmas carols on New Year’s Day?

Christmas did not end a week ago, but only began and lasts for twelve holy days, this being the eighth day of Christmas. Christmas will end on Thursday of this week, on January 5, a day before the great feast of the Epiphany.

Epiphany is an English rendering of the Greek word meaning: “to show,” “to shed light on,” “to reveal.” The text for Epiphany is always from the second chapter of Matthew, the telling of the coming of the Magi to Bethlehem. Most folks cannot name the first five books of the Bible, but they can tell you about the Magi, the ones who followed that fateful star, bringing gold, frankincense, and myrrh to the infant king. For Matthew, the first to worship the new born king of the Jews were Gentiles.

           The Gentile Magi not only bring gifts; they bring trouble. They stir up the curiosity and animosity of King Herod. He sings his not-so-lilting lullaby about wanting to bring his own gifts to the infant king. And, by their disobedience, the Magi bring on the supposed slaughter of all the male children in Bethlehem.    

           Matthew knows that God’s good news always has its enemies; that grace for all is a threat to any who believe grace is only for the few. One has but to love to arouse hatred, to speak truth to awaken a network of deception and lies. Matthew’s Epiphany story is a story of hatred unleashed when love is en-fleshed.

Today is not Epiphany, but by next Sunday the feast of the Epiphany will have passed. So, on this eighth day of Christmas, I invite us to look a few days ahead, look ahead to Matthew’s Epiphany story. When we do, we remember not only Magi who sought light amid the darkness; we remember courageous souls in all times who have lived in love despite blatant hatred and violence. We remember souls like the late Oscar Romero, Archbishop of El Salvador.

Initially slow to address the abuses of the poor by his government, finally Father Romero found his voice and soon after the government militia found him.

Gunned down while presiding at the Lord’s Table, these were his final words:

“I have been threatened with death. Nevertheless, as a Christian, I

do not believe in death without resurrection. If they kill me, I shall arise in the people. . . . I will die, but the church of God, which is the people, will never perish.” 

Father Romero learned at the cost of his own life about the hatred that is unleashed when love in en-fleshed.

          We remember Benjamin Weir, former moderator of our denomination, who was held hostage in Lebanon in the 1980s. Faced daily with torture and the threats of death, Weir recounts how he kept his spiritual sanity: 

“Sunday morning in captivity I awoke. In my mind’s eye I could

see Christians all awaking and proceeding to places of worship. There they gathered at the Lord’s Table. My mind moved westward with the sun. I envisioned people of various cultural backgrounds gathering. I was part of this far-flung family, the very body of Christ.   I unwrapped my piece of bread held back from my previous meager meal and began the Presbyterian order of worship. When it came to sharing the cup I had no visible wine, but this didn’t seem to matter. I knew that others were taking the cup for me elsewhere at this universal table. As others prayed for me, so I prayed for them.” 

Faced with the harangues of hatred, Romero and Weir sustained

life and faced death living out the sacrament of non-violent love. 

I realize that these two Christians are exceptional. I also know that for many Christians today, the season of Epiphany is a footnote that is long ago forgotten. For many, the story of the Magi is arcane and irrelevant, as rusty and useless as an old two-wheeler left out in the rain for years.

          For many churches and for most Christians, today is not the eighth day of Christmas or the approaching Eve of Epiphany. It is New Year’s Day. It is time to start making resolutions so we can break them in good order.

Why fight culture? For Matthew, it is well worth the fight for Epiphany gives notice to the church that the One we follow was born in rags, lest we neglect those who still live in them. The One we follow was forced into exile, lest we ignore and even persecute those who are aliens in our land. The One we follow was executed for trumped-up reasons, lest we forget those who die in our prisons because of justice denied.    

Epiphany declares to the faithful the edgy truth not that if we just believe hard enough then something good is going to happen to us. That is, at best, a naïve, churchy lie. The edgy truth of Epiphany for sophisticated, urbane, well-educated, often cynical Christians is that God’s hope and promise shines with the same luster now as on the first Epiphany. Neither Herod nor Pilate nor Caesar nor any person since has been able to stop the loving and redemptive purposes of God.   

          The Epiphany faith still shines like the brightest star on the darkest night. The Epiphany faith is what creates in us a spirit of non-violent love despite the rousing choruses of hatred, a spirit of invitation to extend a warm welcome to the “other” despite the word on the street to keep to ourselves, a spirit of acceptance to embrace expressions of doubt despite our absolute enchantment with certainty.   

          The Epiphany faith is the gift that Matthew wants us to claim on this first day of the calendar year 2017, on this 8^th day of Christmas, and on the great feast day ahead. It is claimed every time we feast at this table and every time the waters of baptism flow. It is a star-shining, hope-giving, life-renewing Epiphany faith in God’s resolution to shine light into utter darkness, a resolution of life and light that God never breaks!       

So, on this eighth day of Christmas and this New Year’s Day, let me be the first to wish you a blessed, a holy, and a star-shining Epiphany!

AMEN