Lessons Of The Epiphany

EPIPHANY OF THE LORD (SOLEMNITY) YEAR (C)    03-01-2016

Scripture Reading:
Is 60:1-6
Ps 72:1-2.7-8.10-11.12-13 (R. 11)
Eph. 3:2-3a.5-6; Accl; Mt. 2:2.
Matt. 2:1-12.

Preamble:
Lord Jesus, I give you my mind, help me understand.
Lord Jesus, I give you my ears, help me hear your voice.
Lord Jesus, I give you my heart, help me welcome you.
Holy Spirit, rekindle in me the fire of your love. Amen.  

Beloved in Christ, we celebrate the Epiphany of the Lord or we say the manifestation of the Lord to the world, we are called once more this day to discover the glory of the hidden God who has allowed himself to be seen by the light of the cosmos. A light that shown brighter than the other celestial bodies for he is the true light of the world that has come to illumine the path of men and women that they may consistently walk on that path that leads to God- a mystery to be discovered only by a consistent closeness to him.
This journey requires a consistent movement out of the self to discover this God who has allowed himself to be noticed by a star even when those he came to abandoned him to their own ways and refused to offer him a suitable place to be born. He was made welcome by animals, protected by a spider from the hand of Herod who made an attempt on his life, visited and greeted by the shepherd, and adored by the wise men-men from the orient that is from the east. This signals for us the beginning of a new era-the journey of the gentiles to greet the Son of God to whom he would later send Paul to bring to them the good news.
This act gives us an intuition of the creator. It arouses the expectation, indeed the hope, that this God will one day reveal himself and at the same time arouses the awareness that man can and should approach Christ. But the knowledge that emerges from creation, and acquires concrete form in the religions, can also become disoriented, so that it no longer prompts man to transcend himself, but induces him to lock himself into systems with which he believes he can, in some way, oppose the hidden powers of the world.
We notice that though the star takes the wise men as far as Judea in search of the new born king of the Jews, it is quite natural that their search for the newborn king of the Jews should take them to Israel’s royal city and to the king’s palace. But they were greeted with some obstruction and yet devised another means to find David’s true heir.
St. Gregory Nazianzen says that at the very moment when the Magi adored Jesus, astrology came to an end, as the stars from then on traced the orbit determined by Christ.
In the ancient world, the heavenly bodies were regarded as divine powers, determining men’s fate. The planets bear the names of deities. According to the concept prevailing at the time, they somehow ruled over the world, and man had to try to appease these powers.
On entering the Gentile world, the Christian faith had to encounter once again with the question of the astral divinities. In St. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians and the Colossians, Paul emphasizes that the risen Christ has conquered all the powers and forces in the heavens, and that he reigns over the entire universe. The story of the wise men’s star makes a similar point: it is not the star that determines the child’s destiny, it is the child that directs the star to arouse in the magi the homage to him as the son of God and the lord of the universe.
The discovery of this great star arouses not only honour but joy-matt 2:10. It is the joy of one whose heart has received a ray of God’s light and who can now see that his hope has been realized-the joy of one who has found what he sought, and has himself been found.
“Going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshipped him” (Matt. 2:11). Here we encounter Mary his mother by the side of Jesus at the scene of adoration.
The wise men (magi) throw themselves onto the ground before him. This is the homage that is offered to a divine king. The gifts brought by the wise men are not practical gifts, of a kind that the holy family might have had a use for at this moment, rather they express the acknowledgment of the royal dignity of him to whom they are offered. Thus we see the child Jesus arousing adoration from men who were pagans-star gazers. This goes a long way to teach us something new that the gospel message was an inclusive package for the Jew as well as the Gentiles. No one is left out in the salvation plan of God expect he who decides to be left out. To discover this God one must set out-and such an encounter creates in the heart of the individual sincere worship for no one who encounters God remains the same.
Two of the gifts (Gold and Incense) that the Magi presented to Jesus are also mentioned in the first reading of today Is 60:6 as gifts of homage that the Gentiles will place before the God of Israel.
In the church’s tradition-with certain variations-the three gifts have been thought to represent three aspects of the mystery of Christ: the gold points to Jesus’ kingship, the incense to his Divine Sonship, the Myrrh to the mystery of his passion.
The myrrh actually appears in St. John’s Gospel after the death of Jesus: St. John tells us that Nicodemus had prepared myrrh, among other ointments, for the anointing of Jesus’ body (Jn 19:39). Through the Myrrh, then, the mystery of the Cross is once again associated with Jesus’ kingship and mysteriously proclaimed in the worship offered by the wise men.
Anointing is an attempt to resist death, which only becomes definitive with decomposition. By the time the women came to the tomb to anoint the body on Easter morning-a task that could not be carried out on the evening of the crucifixion because of the approaching feast day-Jesus had already risen. He no longer needed myrrh as a protection against death, because God’s lif itself had overcome death.
Lessons from the Epiphany
The Epiphany is the appearance of the Godhead-which indicates for us God setting out on a journey to encounter man anew and restore his dignity.
This appearance also requires our cooperation because he did it in an extraordinary yet in a simple manner-the star which shown brighter than other stars. The star of the child Jesus can only be discovered when we set out like the magi to encounter God anew.
The setting out requires faith to set out on a journey to discover GOD and truly finding him as well as the humility to allow him take the lead always.
The world tells us to seek success, power and money: in the epiphany, God tells us to seek faith in him, humility, service and love.
The Epiphany tells us to learn from the magi their adoration of the child Jesus. We cannot discover God if we don’t humble ourselves before him at Eucharistic celebrations such as kneeling before him in fervent adoration.
Dear friends on this day let us set out anew this year to discover our great God that we may find him and do him the honour that is his due for the reward is of immense worth.