Epiphany is being able to step back and see how all the puzzle pieces that have already been put into place form the picture–and realize what the picture makes. It doesn’t change the picture, it just allows you to understand the picture better!
That’s why, when big changes happen, a good thing to do is to go back to the things you know for sure: identity, facts, spiritual disciplines.
And of course, in the story of the Magi, the answer is Jesus! Same for John the Baptist and the Shepherds! And each of them figured it out by doing what they do best–studying the stars, baptizing and preaching, tending the sheep, etc. For the Magi, its a good news picture, for Herod, not so much. But when they look at the pieces of the puzzle and they go back and look at it, they realize, the answer is Jesus!
As we enter this year after 20 months of Monumental changes–people moving, changing jobs, retiring and dying. And all of these changes are happening on a huge global level, we can be pretty sure that humanity is ripe for an Epiphany, we are about to discover some things about ourselves.
So, now is a good time to hone in on the basics–who are we? what do we love? what are our spiritual practices?
So when we are finally able to step back and see how the puzzle pieces fit together, we are well grounded for that moment of epiphany.
All right, let’s go 2022. Let’s get ready for our Epiphany.
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Author: katyandtheword
Pastor Katy has enjoyed ministry at New Covenant since 2010, where the church has solidified its community focus. Prior to that she studied both Theology and Christian Formation at Princeton Theological Seminary. She also served as an Assistant Chaplain at Trenton Psychiatric Hospital and as the Christian Educational Coordinator at Bethany Presbyterian at Bloomfield, NJ.
She is an writer and is published in Enfleshed, Sermonsuite, Presbyterian's today and Outlook. She writes prayers, liturgy, poems and public theology and is pursuing her doctorate in ministry in Creative Write and Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
She enjoys working within and connecting to the community, is known to laugh a lot during service, and tells as many stories as possible. Pastor Katy loves reading Science Fiction and Fantasy, theater, arts and crafts, music, playing with children and sunshine, and continues to try to be as (w)holistically Christian as possible.
"Publisher after publisher turned down A Wrinkle in Time," L'Engle wrote, "because it deals overtly with the problem of evil, and it was too difficult for children, and was it a children's or an adult's book, anyhow?" The next year it won the prestigious John Newbery Medal.
Tolkien states in the foreword to The Lord of the Rings that he disliked allegories and that the story was not one.[66] Instead he preferred what he termed "applicability", the freedom of the reader to interpret the work in the light of his or her own life and times.
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