Arise, Shine!

by The Rev. Shelby Ochs Owen

Feast of the Epiphany

This sermon is based on Isaiah 60:1-6 and Matthew 2:1-12.


“Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.”

Today is the Feast of the Epiphany, one of those rare years when this major feast day actually falls on Sunday.  For many of us, we have to be reminded year by year, just what is Epiphany and what does it represent?  Christmas is easy to remember-we celebrate the birth of Jesus.   Easter, too, is easy enough, we celebrate that Christ is risen from the dead. But for many of us Epiphany seems a bit more vague.  And yet, Epiphany, when we unpack its significance, holds all kinds of good news for us in our everyday lives.  The word Epiphany comes from the Greek word meaning revelation or manifestation, and so on the Feast of the Epiphany as well as throughout the rest of this liturgical season, we are given glimpses in Scripture of ways in which God is made known to his people.   An epiphany is often seen as a moment when an important truth becomes clear, which allows us new vision as we move forward in our lives.

In today’s reading from Isaiah, the writer is speaking to a people who have known great darkness for they have been in exile in Babylon for a long time.  Many have been forced from their homeland of Jerusalem and they have suffered greatly.  Isaiah, the prophet, not one to live in denial, declares the darkness as real and pervasive.  He says, “For darkness shall cover the earth and thick darkness the peoples.”   Isaiah knows there is reason for disappointment, reason for despair.  What the Israelites have been through has truly been awful.  And yet, right alongside the speaking of darkness he is also saying “Arise, shine, for your light has come!...Lift up your eyes and look around…then you shall see and be radiant, your heart shall thrill and rejoice.”  

Isaiah names the truth: he knows the grim realities of life and yet he names the even more important reality that something else is going on.  God is at work in the world around the exiles; God has not left them and God shines his light even in the midst of darkness.  (This concept ties into last week’s gospel reading from John, “The light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it.”)  And in Isaiah’s words lie hope but hope that calls for action on the people’s part.  “Arise, shine!” These words are not an invitation and they are certainly not a suggestion; these words are a command.  No, he says, you are not to dawdle in the darkness, you are not to get comfortable with your distress, you are not to succumb to the temptation of your negative thinking.  Right alongside the difficulties, the people are to choose to live in God’s light. And with the people reflecting God’s light they shall draw others to them, that others will see with greater clarity the goodness of God, the universal love that God has for them.  “(God’s) glory will appear over you, Nations shall come to your light and kings to the brightness of your dawn.” So once again, as has been plain throughout the scripture, life does not revolve around the chosen people; they are to be a blessing that others may be blessed; they are to live in the light that others may dwell in that same light.

I have a true story that occurred just a couple of weeks ago.  A man with a drug addiction had gone to an in-patient rehabilitation facility grumbling and griping.  He did not want to be there, had no plans of recovering, and kept saying to the group, “I’m going to leave this place; I need to get out of here.”  He had nothing positive to say about rehab. So he left.  He got as far as the local gas station. The man was in line buying something when an old woman looked at him and asked him what she could do for him.  “Do you need food?  Do you need a ride? Do you need money?”  The woman didn’t ask him a lot of questions about why he looked so depressed; she simply offered what she had.  The man was so floored by her kindness, by her not judging him, by her incredible generosity, that he ended up just asking her for a ride back to rehab!  I imagine he could have used the food and money she offered, and yet he was so knocked off his feet by her simple act of love that he went back to the place that could offer him healing, drug rehab.  There is a lot of darkness for one addicted to drugs and in the midst of this man’s darkness, he encountered a shaft of light in an old woman, so powerful that it changed his path.  Her dwelling in light allowed that light to penetrate into this man’s own being, enabling a change in perspective and encouraging him toward wholeness.  By the woman’s act of love, she was the instrument of an epiphany that changed the course of this man’s life.  

Today is my last Sunday with you as your Associate Rector, and one of the great gifts of my time with you these past three and a half years is in getting to know you, hearing your stories, walking this segment of our faith journey together.   As I have gotten to know you, I realize that even in the midst of joys and celebrations, many of you have experienced times of sadness, times of darkness- the loss of a loved one, divorce, alienation from your children, financial woes, addiction, loneliness, outrage at the massacre of school children, and yet in the midst of those sorrows you keep coming to the altar rail with hands outstretched to receive the gift of God incarnate, the gift of Jesus, the gift of love.  The very act of your empty hands lifted up is a powerful act of faith, faith that there is light even in the darkness, that there is love even in a world that would at times have us believe otherwise.

I have seen the power of God’s love at work in you these past three and a half years, as you gather in worship, as you reach out to others, as you live out your faith. Again and again I have seen you act as shafts of light in dark places.  And I have experienced God’s love in how you have shared that love with me.  Thank you for this incredible gift.   Now I urge you, brothers and sisters in Christ, to live in confidence and hope that the new realm of which Isaiah speaks is coming to pass.  Live in confidence and hope that your light has come.  Arise, shine! Cling to the deepest truth that God loves you.  May the love of Christ make you radiant!

Amen.