1/6/19 “The Star” by Nancy Petty
Text: Matthew 2:1-12
Historically, stars have been important to civilizations throughout the world. They have been part of religious practices and used for celestial navigation and orientation since the beginning of time. Many ancient astronomers believed that stars were permanently affixed to a heavenly sphere and that they were indisputable. The Gregorian calendar, currently used nearly everywhere in the world, is a solar calendar based on the angle of the Earth’s rotational axis relative to its local star, the Sun.
The concept of a constellation was known to exist as far back as the Babylonian period. Ancient sky watchers imagined that prominent arrangements of stars formed patterns, and they associated these with particular aspects of nature or their myths. To the Ancient Greeks, some “stars”, know as planets, represented various important deities, from which the names of the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn were taken.
One of the most famous stars in history is the star of Bethlehem – that bright celestial light that Matthew’s gospel proclaims leads the magi to the Christ child. Throughout history, all sorts of people – astronomers, astrologers, scientists and even theologians – have tried to explain the star. Complicated math theories and formulas have been devised to explain this strange bright light that appeared at the birth of Jesus. Was it a supernova? Was it comet? Was it a triple conjunction between Jupiter and Saturn – an event that only happens about every 900 years? Volumes have been written about the star. So many theories, so many formulas, so many explanations fill the pages of both scientific and theological books. The mysterious star that led these exotic travelers to the Christ child still to this day draws the listener into this story unlike any other part of the narrative. Why? Why are we taken so with this star? I wonder if it is because, still today, we are always looking for a sign – our star – to point us in the direction where we might find the Christ child in our world.
We have become so familiar with this story that it doesn’t even seem odd to us any longer that intelligent, well-studied astrologers (some even think they were religious scholars) would follow a star in search of a newborn king. Even for those of us who don’t read the story literally, who understand this more as myth, are taken with this star. Who doesn’t long for a bright light in the sky to lead them to discover something as life-changing as a Christ child? And who among us, at some point in our lives, has not chased after that mythical star in the sky longing for that something that will change our lives? Not literally a star in the sky. But a sign, a dream, a hunch, an intuition, a synchronicity, a feeling that we interpret as having meaning – that leads us to the event that will transform our lives. Oh, how often have I asked for a star to appear to show me the way? I get why Matthew takes the time in his narrative to tell of the star. He knows that the human spirit and soul longs for the star.
But here’s the twist – for all this talk about the star, it’s not about the star. The point of the star is what the star points to – the Christ child. Epiphany draws its name from the magi finding the child, and recognizing him as the king they have searched for. Their Epiphany is that this is the Christ child. So we are drawn into a story about a bright star, a clear sign from the heavens, that leads us to the Christ child. The star is about what that baby represents: God with us, in the flesh. That is the epiphany: that love came and dwelt among us in the flesh. No matter how taken we are with the star, it is what the star leads us to that really matters in this story, and in real life.
As a Baptist, I have come late in life to appreciate icons. As a child in a rural Southern Baptist church, the concepts of icon and idol were synonymous, and I was cautioned not to place faith in an object. But I have come to understand with knowledge and with experience that icons are powerful and mystical messages about universal archetypes of humanity and divinity that take us a lifetime to unpack and digest. Our friends in the Republic of Georgia understand this – there is actually a School of Iconography associated with the Cathedral in Tbilisi. The idea is that an image can become a doorway for us, a prayerful passage into the heart and the mind of God. We are never to confuse the message with the messenger – the image or the icon is NOT the Christ, but it is a visual and tactile way for us to set our intention and our senses as we seek the Christ.
The Magi, the star, and even the Christ child are all icons. The Magi is an icon for the seeker. When we dwell in our imagination and give our attention to the Magi we recognize the archetype of the seeker. The story tells us that to seek is noble, it is respectable, it is ancient, and it is dangerous. The star is an icon for discernment. When we focus on the star we are seeking humanity’s wisdom about how to know what we are to do, and where we are to go as we seek to do God’s will. The story tells us that the star is bright and yet only a few look beyond its brightness; that the star is a message, but it takes learning and knowledge to decipher it; that the star is a contradiction – it is hidden in plain sight.
It may seem like heresy to say that even the Christ child is an icon. Yes, Christ came into the world as flesh – I am not trying to take away baby Jesus! Jesus was born. That is a historical fact. But something can be both real and iconic at the same time. The literal interpretation is that God became flesh in Christ. The iconic interpretation is that God was always flesh, but humanity needed to see God born in order to understand what already was. In order for humankind to have the real Epiphany, the revelation of what is true, we needed a historical event with names and costumes and context.
Epiphany is a word and a concept I love. In common use it can mean a few things – all close, but subtly different. First, it can mean an illuminating discovery, realization or disclosure. For sure we can say the birth of the Christ was this kind of epiphany – the Christ in a manger in Bethlehem! Second, epiphany can mean an intuitive grasp of reality through something (such as an event) usually simple and striking. Again, this is easy to map to the story – the Christ came into the world just as every human has since time began, from a mother’s womb, and so we intuitively understand the significance of God coming to us, to be with us, in a completely vulnerable way. And finally, epiphany can mean a sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature of the meaning of something. I would offer that this definition also fits – that the birth of Jesus was an icon for the reality that the Christ has always been with us, not in a distant or ephemeral way, but in the flesh and blood of our very bodies. The nativity is our icon for the cosmic Christ who was with God in the beginning, and has been with us since the beginning.
But back to the star! My question to us on this Epiphany Sunday is this: To what place, or places is the star leading us? What does the icon of the star tell us about our own time? Where do we see the Star of Bethlehem today – that place where the Christ child is dwelling among us in the flesh? Do we see the star that hangs over U.S. border fence in San Diego? Do we see the star that hangs over the Stewart Detention Center for immigrants in Lumpkin, Ga.? Do we see the star hanging over the U.S. detention facility at the southwest border where an 8-year-old boy from Guatemala died on Christmas Day while in custody of the United States? Do we see the star that hangs over the 3.9 million children in the US who do not have healthcare coverage? Do we see the star that hangs over the more than 550,000 homeless people in the United States on a given night? Oh, are we willing – are we willing to follow the star to where the teenager sits lonely, struggling with depression and longing for someone to listen to what matters to her? Are we willing to follow the star to those places that ask us to relinquish some of our privilege and power so that those whose voices have been silenced might have a voice. Are we willing to follow the star to places where we are the minority? Are we willing to follow the star that will lead us to places of building relationships with people of other faiths? Are we willing to follow the star that will ultimately take us home by another road?
If we are to find and adore the Christ child, we must be willing to follow the star, to look where it is pointing, no matter how distressing or disheartening. The Magi had to be wiling to take on enormous risk to find this Christ. To leave their safety and security. To travel in difficult conditions. To face potentially hostile forces. All of this just to see the face of the promised one. What risks are we willing to take? What if Epiphany for us is no longer about the finding of the Christ child, but about the caring for the displaced baby? Our Epiphany is to realize not just that Christ came into the world two thousand years ago, but that Christ is still here, waiting on the margins, for us to be willing to turn from our routines to stare into the face of an unwanted child, of a refugee family, of a teenage mother, of a homeless family in need, of that family member struggling with addiction. What would be different if we stopped wishing for a star to tell us what to do, and instead, we looked upon the Christ children among us? Our Epiphany may be to respond to the Epiphany of the Magi – not to leave our homes in search of the Christ, but to accept the presence of the Christ in need right outside our back door, right on the front page of the N&O, right in your newsfeed.
Are we willing to let go of our very human hopes for a celestial message that tells us what to do, where to go, and when to do it? Are we willing instead to do the theological adulting it takes to realize that, as the country music song says, we are already there? Hear this, on Epiphany 2019. You do not need to search for the Christ. The Christ is here. The Christ has, in fact, always been here. The baby who came to make that clear to us, to provide us the Epiphany of incarnation was a gift to help us know what had always been true. And our Christmas season, our rituals, our pageantry, our magi and our star – they are all to remind us again that what we seek is here and now.
