I n Epiphany, the church lives in the tension between our two lessons this morning from the prophet Isaiah and the Gospel of Matthew. Isaiah announces with bold confidence, “Arise, shine; for your light has come!” This is the what we celebrate in the season of Epiphany. Christmas Day has arrived! The Christ child is born! The Christ candle has been illuminated. As John puts it in the prologue to his gospel, “the true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.” If Advent was about waiting for the light to come, the season of Epiphany is about celebrating the light that is now present among us. “And the light shines in the darkness,” John tells us, “and the darkness has not overcome it.”

     Yet Matthew tells a different tale, and therein lies the tension. Jesus is born, but Herod still reigns. The magi seek the child who has been born king of the Jews, but Herod still occupies the Royal Palace. The lectionary for today cuts the story short. We hear of Herod’s fear, and all of Jerusalem with him, but all we’re told of is the magi’s narrow escape as they leave for their home country by another road. They leave their gifts, and for a moment it seems as if all is well.

     Here’s what the lectionary leaves out in our lesson for the day:

     When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the wise men. Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah: “A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled, because they are no more,” (vs. 16-18).

     This is the world in which the light of Christmas still shines. Christ is born, but Herod still rules. So we live yet within the tension between the announcement of Isaiah that the light now shines, and the narrative of Matthew that Herod still reigns with murderous intent.

     It’s not always easy to see that light while Herod is around. Perhaps it is helpful to notice that the shining of the light was not noticed by all the characters in the first story either. That seems to be something of the point of Matthew’s narrative. It’s only the magi– outsiders, gentiles, symbols of unbelief– who see the star and somehow find their way to Bethlehem. No one else in all of Israel apparently gave the strange traveling star any notice whatsoever. The religious leaders do not. Herod, the one with all the power and might, is surprised by what the magi tell him. The story is sometimes portrayed as a contrast between “rejecting Jews” and “believing Gentiles,” but that is to misconstrue the story. Rather, the division is between those with power and position– represented by Herod, the religious elite– and those apparently powerless and insignificant– represented by Mary, Joseph and the magi. Those at the settled center miss the movement of God. Those at the mobile margins discover God’s light.

     Which gives us some clue about where to look for the light among us that now shines. The light of Christ does not overwhelm the darkness. It shines in the darkness. Darkness is still what characterizes our world. So we can be forgiven if in the after mass of Christmas Day we also feel just a bit overwhelmed by the violence in Pakistan, and the never-ending war in Iraq, and the stalemate in the Middle East, not to mention the homeless that are even now gathering at our back door looking for something warm to eat. The darkness is everywhere apparent, but the light is sometimes hard to see.

P eople living in New Orleans know about the darkness. There are only a handful of Presbyterian churches left in New Orleans, part of the Presbytery of South Louisiana. Church buildings were destroyed, entire congregations dispersed. Money is everywhere tight. So when they searched last for a new General Presbyter last year, they were astonished by the number of applications they received from folks who wanted to come and serve with them. Robyn Leary tells their story in the current issue of Presbyterians Today:

     Alan Cutter knows something about stressful situations, having served in the Navy during the Vietnam conflict. He left a pastorate in Duluth, Minn., to accept a call to be general presbyter of South Louisiana Presbytery in July 2006, less than a year after Hurricane Katrina inundated the presbytery’s largest city. Cutter gets excited when he describes his concept of New Orleans as a “laboratory” for new ministry.

     “We’re a place looking for new ideas, and we’re open to testing them out,” he says. The challenge now, as he sees it, is to help people move from being survivors to being witnesses.

     “A witness is someone who can reflect back upon what happened to them and make a connection to God’s story. When survivors do that,” he explains, “they’re able to move forward. Instead of living in desperation, as many of the survivors of Katrina do, they can live in hope. They come to terms with the new reality around them.”

     So it is instructive that Isaiah’s announcement to the exiles begins with an imperative: Arise! Shine! The first imperative seems fairly straightforward. They are to stand up. For a people who have been living in exile, that alone will be hard enough. Then Isaiah invites the people of Israel to shine! That is, in their own living, they are to reflect the light of God that is now shining among them. This shining is not all their own doing. They are not the source of light. They are merely to reflect the light. Nevertheless, Isaiah calls them to shine! Not that Isaiah underestimates the darkness. “For darkness shall cover the earth,” the prophet writes, “and thick darkness the peoples.” Yet in the darkness, they are not to despair but to shine. “[For] the LORD will arise among you, and God’s glory will appear over you.”

     All of this helps to illumine what Jesus meant somewhat later in Matthew’s gospel when he said to his followers, “You are the light of the world... [So] let your light shine before others, so that they may see you good works, and give glory to God who is heaven.” Jesus was not speaking of a flood light that would banish the darkness, but, as the theologian Douglas John Hall puts it, of “a little city on a hill lighted with oil lamps guiding the wandering stranger in the dark night.” In the midst of the darkness, we are to seek the light of Christ, and then to reflect that light as best we can in our own lives. Or, as Alan Cutler puts it, in Epiphany we are called to move from survivors to witnesses.

S o in this season of Epiphany, at Church of the Pilgrims we have shifted our focus from Dreaming of a World Made New, to Sharing Our Light with the World. How do we, in our own lives and as a community of faith, share our light in a world in which very clearly Herod still occupies the Royal Palace? So we began today, as we will each week in Epiphany, by asking one of our own members or friends to reflect on how they share the light with the world in their own life.

     Also today we have a gift to help you along your Epiphany journey. Consider it a gift for the twelfth day of Christmas. In the basket in front of the communion table are stars. Lovingly created by Margee Iddings, each star has a word: illumine, risk, grow, deepen, expand, enlighten. Words for the Epiphany season. Star-words to help you focus on the light of Christ and the way in which you are called to reflect that light in the world through your own life. As Rob plays our hymn, you are invited to come forward and to take a star from the basket. You don’t get the choose. Don’t dig around in the basket for the word you want. Let the word you receive be at random, but let it be the word for you, receive it as your own, and let it speak to you, call to you, challenge you. You might take it home and put it on your refrigerator, tape it to your bathroom mirror, or next to your computer monitor. Let us close with this prayer by Ted Loder, which we read earlier in our service, from his book, Guerillas of Grace:

Let the Star of the Morning Rise

Lord God,

in the deepest night

there rises the star of the morning,

     of birth,

        the herald of a new day you are making,

a day of great joy dawning

     in yet faint shafts

        of light and love.

I hear whispers of peace in the stillness,

fresh breezes of promise

     stirring,

winter sparrows

     chirping of life,

a baby’s cry

     of need

        and hope–

           Christmas!

In the darkness I see the light

     and find in it comfort,

        confidence,

           cause for celebrations,

for the darkness cannot overcome it;

and I rejoice to nourish it

     in myself,

        in other people,

           In the world

for the sake of him

     in whom it was born

        and shines forever,

           even Jesus the Christ.                          ✞