Sermon for Year B, Epiphany: "A Kingdom That Will Hold All The People"

This sermon was preached on Tuesday, January 6th at Christ & Saint Stephen's Church. Lectionary texts this sermon is based on can be found here.

Today we commemorate the visit of the wise men to the Christ child as the manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles. It’s interesting that the story of the magi is found in, of all places (and the only place in the Bible) Matthew’s gospel.

Matthew’s gospel is the most Jewish of the gospels, and it is very concerned with portraying Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, the one that is expected and is attested to in the prophecies. So, why is Matthew the Gospel in which the magi appear, the foreigners who recognize Jesus as the Messiah, when as we know, many of his own people will not? There’s a tension in Matthew – a tension between those in Jesus’ own day who did not acclaim him as the

Messiah, and those who did.

There is also a tension between Herod, the titular king of Israel, and Jesus, the true king of Israel. The visit of the magi and the conflict with Herod are part of the same story in Matthew. Magi were not unusual in the period. It was common for emissaries from Armenia and Parthia and regions east of Judea to send gifts to a new king in the West. Other Roman writers tell of visits from Eastern emissaries bringing gifts to kings, particularly gifts of gold. The fact that the magi come to Herod not to do him homage, but rather for directions to the person to whom they really want to pay homage, is Matthew at his most ironic.

Can’t you just see Herod, reaching out for the gifts the magi bring, and then drawing back with a “No, not for me? For the real king of Israel, huh? Not sure who or where he is but if you find him, let me know, OK?” Yeah, right!

So, filtered down through our Western tradition this recognition of the kingship of Jesus by foreign diplomats has come to symbolize the revelation of Jesus as Messiah to and for the Gentiles in addition to the people of Israel. And Jews like Paul and Matthew see this as what was promised from the time of Isaiah, a ruler in Israel that would bring Gentile and Jew together under a single god, and that single God is the One God of the Hebrews.

Within the idea of the Epiphany there is a longing for unity and for peace among all God’s people and all God’s creation.

But many people in Israel at the time thought the Messiah that had been long predicted and long awaited would be an essentially political person. Someone who would reestablish the royal line of David and whose kingship would then be legitimate. And this kingship would usher in a new political era of self-rule for Judea and Israel -- and not just self rule, but a kind of hegemony in the ancient world. You can read some of the ancient prophecies and certainly come away with the expectation that once the real anointed one of God comes, then Jerusalem will be the new Rome, and all nations will bow at the feet of Israel’s king as the Israelite’s had been forced to do by Egypt, Babylon and Rome -- and all nations will worship Israel’s God as Israel had been forced to do to Rome’s gods.

But, in my experience, when you conflate God’s will and politic reality, you rarely get what you’re hoping for.

Recently, our President-elect stirred up quite a firestorm on the political left, especially Lesbian and gay lefties who helped get him elected (and who are ready for the gifts that they expect should come to them during his reign.) And let me be forthright with you, speaking not as your priest, but as a voter, I count myself among those gay lefties. But President-elect Obama did something that proved to be quite an epiphany for those on the left, and not a welcome one.

He revealed something of the president he is planning to be by inviting Pastor Rick Warren, a leading evangelical minister and best-selling author, to give an invocation at his inauguration. Rick Warren whose mega-church is in California fought for Proposition 8 which outlawed gay marriage in that state. And he has on many occasions made anti-gay statements, based in part on his understanding of the Bible. Sadly, there's nothing unusual in that. But Warren is also someone who has advocated for ministry to and advocacy for the poor and underprivileged. He may be a social conservative, but unlike many in the religious right, he is not solely concerned with social issues, but also issues about hunger, homelessness and the poor here in the US and in Africa. (Although, since preaching this sermon, more has come to light on Warren's work in Africa. See Max Blumenthal's article from The Daily Beast here. Hat tip to Towleroad.)

For some, Obama’s invitation to Warren to participate in the inauguration is a betrayal. As liberal commentator Rachel Maddow put it, this is ‘our’ inauguration. Obama is seen by many on the left as ‘our president’ and this is ‘our celebration’, and not theirs. Those who don’t agree with us don’t belong there. We’ve been down too long, and now it’s their turn to be down. Us versus them.

The President-elect has said that he wants to be president of all the people. And for him that means he is the president of those who disagree with him on issues that are the most important to people like me.

I’m not trying to make a political point or pronouncement from the pulpit. Though you may be able to discern that I’ve parted ways with my fellow gay lefties on the Warren invitation. And again, speaking strictly as a voter, and not as your priest, I think it’s a pretty savvy move. The best way to beat the religious right is to pick ‘em off one at a time. The fact that we’ve got a leading evangelical and social conservative at ‘our’ inauguration is a victory for us. But that’s just me. I have a bad habit of joining a side or a cause and then criticizing it rather than calling out the opposition. I figure there are plenty of folks doing that. I like being the voice of loyal dissent, rather than yet another person mad about and yelling about the same thing as everyone else.

File all of that under Full Disclosure, not Fr. Mark’s Gospel Message for the Day.

But here is my gospel message for the day. Sometimes the realizations and revelations that God gives us are not quite what we expect, and sometimes, quite frankly, they are not welcome. Our God has a bad habit of bringing truths to us and revelations to us that often challenge us, and force us out of our comfort zones. In his Christmas eve sermon, Bishop Mark Sisk said that our God is one who works from the edges. It was to a marginal family in a backwater of the Roman Empire that the son of God was born. From the edge of world came God’s revelation to the world.

I don’t always like it, but it’s the contradictions and paradoxes that seem so integral to the Christian gospel that, for me, hold the richest truths. The last shall be first, the king has come not to be crowned but crucified. God has become human not as an expression of God’ humility but as an expression of the divinity we share with God.

Yes there are times when God confirms our faith, and comforts our broken hearts, and there are times when God grants us what is our most fond desire, and times when God makes our dreams come true. But I find that when I want God to tell me that me and the one’s like me and the ones that agree with me and want what I want – that it really is us and not them whom God favors – that’s exactly when I’m reminded that God’s kingdom is a lot bigger than I may want it to be.

The revelation is to all the world and salvation is for all the world. ‘Our’ Messiah is everyone’s Messiah – and the gates of the kingdom of God have been opened to all (just like, it would appear, our next presidential inauguration is going to be.)

Epiphanies are tough. But in this case, when the going gets tough, the tough – along with the not so tough, the weak, the poor, the oppressed, the lowly, the forgotten, the outsider, the hated – get redeemed. The poet Margaret Walker has written about what she calls ‘a world that will hold all the people’. I hope we get there someday. Whether we do or not, I believe that our God has prepared a kingdom to come that will do exactly that.

+Amen

© The Rev. Mark R. Collins