God Is with us now here
“God Is with us here and now”
Isaiah 60:1-6 Matthew 2:1-12 Luke 3:15-17, 21-22
Epiphany Sunday combined with Baptism of the Lord Sunday, Year C January 9, 2022
First Presbyterian Church, Sandpoint, Idaho
Andy Kennaly, Pastor
God Is with us, now, here. Let me say that again. God Is, with us, now, here. That’s a loaded sentence and its fun to play with the words. Perhaps the most important words are the first two. That’s why they are both capitalized on my printed version. God Is. The shortest and most accurate description of God. God Is has no other need for qualification and it keeps us away from dualistic comparisons. For example, if we say God is Love, that sounds good but sets us up that there could be an opposite to love that God is not. If we say God is strong, that presumes weakness is an opposite that God is not, yet God embraces weakness by dying on the cross, through a position of strength. By adding any qualifier, language reduces the image of God to whatever our limitations and understandings are, and this is impossible to do with mystery. If you can define it, then it is not God. God’s is-ness is enough, all on its own.
“With us” are the next words in that sentence. Epiphany is the season of God with us, started on January 6th. We remember the travelers from the east who came to present gifts to young Jesus. They were likely Persians. Astrologers from someplace like Iran. They were following some sort of star they associated with the birth of a king. With us are important words because much of this story involves Herod and the ways we are deceived by the Empire, by powers and principalities of people in charge who are not serving the public or common good, but try, instead, to consolidate power, wealth, and prestige. Herod was very insecure about all this and his behavior is ruthless as he lies his way through the story.
That God is with us is a great comfort because we can also feel like those last words in the sentence I mentioned earlier. God Is with us, now, here. If we combine now with here, we get nowhere. Sometimes life feels like we’re stranded in the middle of nowhere and our existential angst gets the best of us. Yet even in those times when God seems distant, detached, or separate, this is not the case. Even in the middle of nowhere, God is with us now, here, and there is nowhere that is God forsaken. Learning to awaken our inner observer to notice God in our midst is a great spiritual lesson.
Tradition trips all over itself with this story as we say three wise men present gold, frankincense, and myrrh. The Bible does not call them kings, nor is the number of people specified. Neither are they said to be from the Orient, like that popular song says. Instead, Magi is a translation that can mean astrologers, or magicians, or sorcerers. These wise travelers from the east most likely traveled in a normal mode of transport known as a caravan, and in those days this meant dozens of people and the camels or other animals that carried them and their equipment. There was safety in numbers, especially if they carry valuables. They probably had guards. They certainly were noticed by the likes of King Herod, so their group must have drawn attention or been somewhat daunting, certainly imposing enough to get a meeting with Herod to ask about the newborn king.
Tradition takes the story and runs with it, embellishing and adding details that make a nice storyline. But a close study of Matthew would suggest other things, like Herod inviting the scribes to come and tell him what scripture says in relation to the coming Messiah just to point out to Jewish scribes in Matthew’s community who are rejecting Jesus as the Messiah. Or notice one of the main points of this story is that Jesus is born in Bethlehem. Scribes that Matthew was dealing with as wrote the Gospel argued that Jesus could not be the Messiah because he was from Nazareth. Matthew is sure to make Jesus from Bethlehem in order to fulfill scripture and silence his critics. He uses this story’s plot to show the hypocrisy of the Jewish leaders, that although they have seen and heard God’s truth they fail to act on it in their lives, actions, attitudes, and behaviors.
Another reason its helpful that God Is with us, now, here, is because we often struggle with faith even as we say we want spiritual growth. We want deeper faith, inner awakening, mystical union, but we usually these things on our terms, in ways that preserve our sense of self and keep our ego in control. We get attached to the contextual aspects of our lives and cling to the identities we have formed or inherited by the shaping of history.
But there is life that goes deeper than our self-made identities. There are truths that are not limited by the quaint storylines we choose to focus on. God’s Is-ness does not allow the powers of empire or corruptions of religion to limit the unlimited. In the power of Love, God chooses to reveal God’s Self. Christ comes to Christ’s own, and divinity is revealed as spirit and matter merge.
We see in Luke’s Gospel that John baptizes Jesus along with all the people. Jesus was praying and the heavens opened and the Holy Spirit “descended upon him in bodily form like a dove.” Like a dove. Like. This is an analogy. One cannot describe the mystery of God with words. Metaphor, analogy, symbol, image, these are called upon to express what words cannot capture. Doves are symbolic of peace, of renewed life, of God’s covenant relationship shared in love.
That voice is heard, at least by Jesus if not others, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” It says the voice came from heaven. If heaven is where God dwells, then that is where the voice comes from. If God lives in our hearts, then it’s in our hearts that heaven and Earth come together. Perhaps Jesus heard this confirmation as a felt-sense in his heart. This baptism and the confirmation that follows is what Jesus needs to have the confidence required for a life of ministry and service to God. Being named the Beloved of God is a deeper identity than any of the contextual definitions we might assume. Inside you, inside me, inside all created things, the image of God resides. We are created in and through and for Christ. As God is with us, disguised as our life, we are hidden in God through Christ.
Epiphany and the Baptism of the Lord are a great combination. These themes carry us forward as Good News of God Is with us, now, here. Thanks be to God. Amen.