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A Little Light Traveling
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6 January 2008 Monterey Bay is one of the “go to” places for Monarch butterflies. Each winter, they are there in force, hanging together in huge, yard-long clusters that look something like a very elongated cluster of grapes…dusty grapes. Because in the winter, they don’t move around much, so mostly what you see is the underside of their wings. Except when the sun hits, then a few of them will open those jeweled wings like a cat taking a languid stretch. My Nature-watching friend Bev tells me that monarch butterflies out-perform some of the largest migrating animals on the planet. Every fall, monarchs migrate thousands of miles from Canada and the Eastern United States to a handful of sites in Mexico—and Monterey Bay. Like any snowbird, that’s where they spend the winter, and then they head north. But the really amazing part is that no single butterfly lives long enough to make the return trip. They know where to go…but they’ve never been there before. “A monarch born in August in New York will fly all the way to Mexico and stay there till March. Then it leaves to fly north, laying eggs on milkweed along the Gulf Coast and Florida before it dies. The butterflies born from the eggs continue flying north, breeding and laying more eggs along the way. So do the grandchildren of the first monarch. By the following August, four generations of monarchs will keep aiming for places they’ve never been but already know by heart.”[1] Like the magi from our scripture reading, the monarchs are guided by a star, a compass visible to them that helps them “journey to the home they’ve seen in the place they’ve never been.”[1] Epiphany is our monarch story. It’s the story that reminds us that we each are looking for that place of the heart that calls us Godward, that place of the heart that calls us to the home we’ve never seen but somehow know.[1] Third-century bishop, St. Augustine writes in his Confessions “You have made us for Yourself, O God, and our hearts are restless till they rest in Thee’ (Confessions ch.1). But for all the charm of his story of guiding stars and magi and gifts fit for a king, Matthew is here to tell us that our journey is not an easy one, nor is its outcome assured. Even if the journey itself is not challenging in its own right, Herod and his forces add their own death-dealing ploys. So we look at the magi, a caste of astrologers from Persia, and understand, as Matthew’s very Jewish audience understands, what Matthew is telling us: that Jesus is our heart’s home, that Jesus shows us the face of God, that Jesus is Emmanuel, God-with-us. But Jesus/Emmanuel is not just with us Christians, not just with the Jewish community of which Jesus is a member, but as the magi symbolize, with the whole world, with all people, even with those beyond Israel. To underscore this message even further, Matthew does what all of the gospel writers do: he borrows shamelessly, enthusiastically, intentionally, from his own Jewish roots to tell the story. Jewish folklore sees bright light as a way of identifying a heavenly object. Jewish rabbis, in their commentary on the Torah, write that a star appears when Abraham, Isaac, and Moses are born. Taken together, stars are signs from God that announce important events. The prophet Isaiah uses the image of light for the nation of Israel itself:
So Matthew takes the bright light that captures the attention of kings in Isaiah, and in a twist of spiritual magic, turns it into a star. But we’re not talking Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star. Matthew is laying a serious dynamic before us. Israel is to be a light to the nations; Israel is to treat people with justice; the weak the poor, the needy with care and compassion. So Israel’s oppression of the weak in Isaiah’s time and in Herod’s, its murder of its citizens, directly contradicts God’s commandments to that nation. Matthew lifts up this contrast not so much by quoting the laws and commandments as by holding up a mirror before Herod. In that mirror, Israel can see a nation whose corporate image, personified in its king, is in stark contrast to that of a ruler of justice—which is what God calls him to be. The mirror is the one whose name is Emmanuel, God with us. Jesus/Joshua: God saves. Herod is reminded of the covenant. And when the light shines, it shines not on Herod and Jerusalem, but on Jesus and Bethlehem. In fact, our story suggests that the star’s light is not visible in the city of Jerusalem, in the city ruled by Herod, who has failed to walk in the light. Only upon leaving the seat of Herod’s rule does the light reappear. Those who see the light are not of Jerusalem, but of foreign places. Those who see the light. Did you ever wonder about that? About the suggestion that the magi come to Herod for direction, but the star guiding the magi is not at all apparent to Herod and his court. Herod’s failure to see the light is also our own—both metaphorically and actually. Just this week, even with Barack Obama’s historic win in Iowa, who does the Washington Post feature on the front page of its morning paper? Mike Huckabee. Think about our shameful history in the whole arena of racial justice. And here Barack Obama wins decisively in the state’s Democratic caucuses—the first African American ever to be chosen as a viable presidential candidate in any state, and the Post doesn’t even do a split page and feature the two winners. You may not be a fan of Obama’s, that isn’t the issue; but to my mind, that piece of history is something we Americans can take pride in, and there is no question that the Post missed it that day. I guess their slogan is true: if you don’t get it, you just don’t get it. My friends, whether it is the magi of Matthew’s writing, the political caucus goers of Iowa, or the editors of the Washington Post, we each in our own way are seeking the light, the place where God’s love becomes manifest. For those of us gathered here today, that place is at this table, where the gifts of life have meaning as they are taken and blessed, broken and shared. Here we remember our story, the story of the word become flesh in a world of Herod’s reign, a world of torture, starvation, murder, warfare—realities that haven’t changed. But. But in the face of those realities, the light still shines. Even in the face of tyranny, we can choose to follow that light, and take another way home. In its lifespan, a monarch butterfly completes only half the journey. But by the same light that guided the magi, we can go the distance, because the love of Christ will always be the light of home. * * * [1] Bev Lewis, Epiphany A08 Matt 2:1-12, Isaiah 60:1-6 |