Readings for January 29, 2017, the Fourth Sunday after Epiphany

• Micah 6:1-8  
• Psalm 15  
• 1 Corinthians 1:18-31  
• Matthew 5:1-12

Rabbi Jesus, by Pastor Kinsey
Jesus has been baptized.  He’s made his home base in Capernaum and called his first disciples there from their fishing boats.  And he’s visited all around Galilee teaching and preaching, and healing every disease.  And now he climbs up the proverbial Old Testament mountain, where close to the presence of God, he sits down in good Rabbinic fashion, to teach the Beatitudes, the core curriculum of his faith-filled vision and movement. 
 
In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus is, the great Teacher and Rabbi.  He is a messenger like the great Moses, who brought his people out of Egypt, through the waters, and met God on a mountain, sitting down to receive the 10 Commandments.  Teaching, for Matthew’s Jesus, is what initiates our faith.  And the Sermon on the Mount is his very first class!
 
Who was your favorite teacher in school?  Someone who made a difference for you, an impression on you, perhaps even to this day?  These days, teachers are too often maligned, and yet, most have the students’ heart, and best interest, in mind, and are still willing to suffer and make sacrifices to teach and inspire them.
 
I had a lot of good teachers growing up, but oddly enough the one teacher that sticks out in my mind was my music teacher in high school, Mr. Orville Matthias.  He was probably mid-career when I was there, and he had already acquired a nick-name, Boss!  No one seems to know the definitive story how that came about.  He was strict in some ways, but never mean or bossy.  And when you got to know him, he was actually extremely big hearted.  But he did get things done, and part of that was by demanding the best of you.  He also created a safe space for us.  The band room was a place you could hang out, it was open, though during school hours, you were also expected to be there to practice.  It was a pretty good sized high school, and Boss was singlehandedly in charge of the Concert Band, the Pep Band, the Jazz Band, and the Marching Band.  And nothing ever got past him.  He knew his students, not just their talent and commitment, but if they had personal challenges and problems that might affect the band as a whole, too.  Nothing got past him, not because he was nosy, but because he was compassionate and caring.
 
Truth be told, I was not the greatest musician in the band!  At least not first chair good.  I was accomplished, and was in the Concert Band, which was for credit and where everybody started, but I also got to be in Jazz and Marching Bands, which were extra-credit.  The cool thing about Marching Band was that we got to be in the Rose Bowl and Macy’s Day parades! 
 
But I was never under any illusion that I would be advancing my career after high school as an alto saxophonist.  It just wasn’t in the cards.  But that’s not because Boss, Mr Matthias, wasn’t a good teacher.  To me, he was the best!  I felt like I learned life lessons, well beyond the music lessons – like I belonged to something bigger than myself.  The tension of concert band, of being held accountable by Boss as the conductor, to play well technically, and in harmony with dozens of other musicians, my peers, made me feel alive and full of purpose.  We practiced hard, and when we brought all that tension-filled work together in a concert, well performed for our school and families, it was a triumph! 
 
Jesus brings his disciples together to deliver the Sermon of the Mount, and it changed them.  He began with what we call the Beatitudes, the “blessings.”  And they filled the disciples, and crowds surrounding them, with a creative tension we can still feel today:  blessings that surprisingly turn the tables on the dominant culture they lived in.  Not blessing for the rich and powerful; not an affirmation of the elites who fill the swamp.  But blessed are the poor in spirit and the oppressed; blessed are those who mourn; blessed are the meek, gentle, and non-violent; blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice; blessed are the merciful and compassionate; blessed are the pure in heart and contemplative in mind; and blessed are the peacemakers. 
 
In the first and last blessing – for the poor in spirit and oppressed, and for those who are persecuted for the sake of justice – Jesus promised the kingdom and realm of God was already theirs!  While the other blessings were promises of comfort, satisfaction, mercy, and so on, which were being initiated now, but were not yet fully realized in their lives.  The kingdom and realm of God had come near in Jesus, heaven was overlapping the creation on earth, and Jesus invited them into it already, to make it theirs forever! 
 
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in his book, Discipleship, called the Beatitudes, “programmatic value statements.”  They were addressed specifically to the disciples, said Bonhoeffer.  The beatitudes are only understandable to the converted, to the faithful, to “disciples.”  One must have had a change of heart, have repented, in the sense of turning around from the ways of the world, to be able to enter into the mindset, and kingdom, where the beatitudes exist.  The power and blessing of God, resides in the hurting and neglected and downtrodden.  But, said Bonhoeffer, that does not mean that suffering, is itself, the good that we seek.  Even though the call the Disciples received from Jesus has resulted in more poverty, temptation and hunger, that wasn’t what made them blessed!  Suffering, in and of itself, is not a blessing, but only the call to follow Jesus, and the promises, make the “life of want and renunciation” meaningful, for Disciples of the Great Teacher. 
 
Jesus calls 12 Disciples and teaches them, converts them to the kingdom message and kingdom thinking.  As the believers, Jesus will entrust them to carry on the mission he is inaugurating through God’s Holy Spirit.  (Teaching initiates faith, and)  “They have to know who they are in order to be able hear the rest of what Jesus has to say about who he needs them to be,” says Karoline Lewis (my emphasis).  “This first sermon has to be delivered to them so that the Great Commission, [the spreading of the good news,] might actually come to fruition.”
 
This is the beginning and all important first step of Christianity, and any religion – this transformation of the mind, a conversion, a change of heart.  It is where we discover our true selves, and find meaning in our everyday lives.
 
The Franciscan teacher of spirituality, Richard Rohr has said, “Until someone has had some level of inner religious experience, there is no point in asking them to follow the ethical ideals of Jesus or to really understand Christian doctrines beyond the formulaic level. In fact, moral mandates and doctrinal affirmations only become the source of deeper anxiety and more contentiousness! …You quite simply don’t have the power to …follow any ideal—such as loving others, …or humble use of power—except in and through union with God.  Nor do doctrines like the Trinity, …have any meaning that actually changes your life. They are merely books on shelves.” 
 
Jesus offers an inner experience and union with God, and inspires disciples and crowds of followers, who transformed many others, creating a new movement that became Christianity.  He is our greatest teacher, a Rabbi who taught in the Hebrew tradition as it was handed down to him, but also with new power, anointed with the Spirit, fulfilling and reforming tradition, and changes the hearts of many disciples, then and now. 
 
We will hear more of this, Sermon on the Mount, from Rabbi Jesus, in the coming weeks, a teacher who encourages us to hang out with him, who doesn’t teach in a “bossy” way, but who holds us accountable to our conversion and our faith, and promises Blessings to (Brian McLaren’s list):
The poor, and those in solidarity with them.
To mourners, feeling grief and loss.
(to) The nonviolent and gentle.
(to) Those who hunger and thirst for the common good and aren’t satisfied with the status quo.
(to) The merciful and compassionate.
(to) Those characterized by openness, sincerity, and unadulterated motives.
(to) Those who work for peace and reconciliation.
(to) Those who keep seeking justice even when they’re misunderstood and misjudged.
(and to) Those who stand for justice as the prophets did, who refuse to back down or quiet down when they are slandered, mocked, misrepresented, threatened, and harmed.
 
It’s a list that includes our whole congregation (and wider church), all the followers and disciples of Rabbi Jesus!  Blessed are you! 

Readings for January 22, 2017 + Epiphany 3A

• Isaiah 9:1-4 
• Psalm 27:1, 4-9 
• 1 Corinthians 1:10-18  
• Matthew 4:12-23

Healing Every Sickness, by Pastor Fred Kinsey
Back in my first parish in Upper Michigan one sunny June day, I called up Dale Fredrickson, the church Council’s brother-in-law, to ask that he bring his 2 sons to Vacation Bible School.  But he was out fishing on Gibson Lake.  Dale had never attended church before, but he knew everybody at Bethany Lutheran Church, small town and all.  So, I went down to the lake shore to visit him.  He was fishing with his eldest son, Ricky, and they had had a good day: three northern’s and two walleye. Perfect for a fish fry! 
 
So I called out to Dale.  Hey, we’re having a family picnic out in front of church this Sunday.  You oughta bring those fish and come!  Bring your family, Denise and your boys, and we’ll play some volleyball, and have an opening service for Vacation Bible School, and the boys can come to VBS during the week! 
 
So that Sunday Dale took the plunge and left his many fears behind – fear of having never been to church, fear of not being good enough to come, fear of looking weak to his friends by attending a place where people actually confessed their sins and sang songs about God – and he showed up!  Everyone had a great time eating, and worshipping outdoors.  And the volleyball was really fun, that is, until in one rapid exchange batting the ball back and forth, four of us, two on each side of the net, all went up after the volleyball and collapsed to the ground.  And everyone got back up, except Dale’s son Ricky, who lay on the grass moaning in pain.  It was his arm – bruised and broken.  The ambulance, being 12 miles away in the next town, Dale immediately ran to get his car a block away, and his wife called their doctor.  Luckily they both worked in the hospital, and the doctor met them there.  It was only a broken arm, but Dale drove as fast as he could down the rural highway, not wanting to prolong his son’s pain any longer than necessary.  I’m just glad he didn’t pass any police cars, or deer, on the road! 
 
On reflection, maybe Dale hadn’t anticipated everything he might have to give up, and was risking, when I had called to him at the lakeshore, to come and follow Jesus in coming to his local Lutheran Church!
 
Today’s gospel story, is the calling of the first 4 disciples, in Matthew, two sets of brothers, all fishermen.  Simon Peter and Andrew were subsistence fishers.  They had only their nets, fishing from the shoreline.  James and John were slightly better off.  They had a family business and worked for their dad, Mr. Zebedee, who owned a boat, which enabled them to seek larger catches, and so hopefully larger profits.  But either kind of fishing, like the carpentry Jesus came from, was never going to make you rich. 
 
When Jesus heard that John the Baptist had been arrested, he knew it was now going to be up to him to continue to announce the prophetic message: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”  He had been baptized by John and anointed by God to carry on this mission.  But he was a different kind of ruler than all the rest.  He started far from Jerusalem, Israel’s largest population center.  Instead, he “withdrew” to the little fishing village of Capernaum on the NW side of the Sea of Galilee.  When Jesus found the 2 sets of brothers, he called to them and said, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.”  And “immediately they left their nets and followed him.” 
 
They had little idea how risky it was going to be.  But the call, by this anointed one, this great light, this charismatic leader, this miracle worker, and healer, was too enticing. 
 
And yet, the question for us may not be, are you willing to give up everything, to take a risk, and follow Jesus?  Though that’s a good one!  The question might better be, are we willing to be Jesus’ healers in the world?
 
“Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people,” says Matthew.  “So his fame spread… and they brought to him all the sick, those who were afflicted with various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, and paralytics, broken arms, and [Jesus] cured them.”  This is the kind of leader Jesus was.  Building power amongst the people from the ground up, that they might have whole and salvific lives.
 
Why were there so many people who were sick in Galilee and Israel? 
 
The reason is well documented, by now.  Up to 90% of the people in Palestine lived hand-to-mouth jobs, subsistence living, like Simon Peter, his brother, and the Zebedee’s, that Jesus called from their fishing nets.  And of course, they had no microscopes then, and so knew nothing of germs.  Most of the diseases – that took 30% of their children and another 60% of adults before the age of 30 – we have since found cures for.  Hygiene was poor, food insecurity was high, and water was scarce and often unhealthy.  And, absent the knowledge of scientific explanations for these diseases and conditions, sickness was seen as a curse, and a sign of ill-favor.  And good health, on the other hand, was a blessing from God. 
 
And so, in Jesus – a healer who went around every town “curing every disease and every sickness among the people,” God’s anointed – he was enacting, in word and deed, the realm and kingdom of heaven, on earth. 
 
In addition, Jesus, according to Matthew, was fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah.  He was a great light shining in the darkness of all this sickness and poverty in Galilee.  The prophet Isaiah, back 700 years before Christ, had predicted that Galilee was about to be lost to the Assyrians, contrary to popular belief, but a light would come to save them at a later date.  And so as Jesus arrived in Galilee to start his public ministry after his baptism, this same land of Zebulun and Naphtali that Isaiah talked about, was again being occupied by another tyrant, Herod, of the Romans – and the people who sat in darkness needed another light. 
 
Warren Carter, Professor of New Testament, Brite Divinity School, describes it like this link : “Rome asserted control over the land and sea, [over] their production, and the transportation and marketing of their yields, with [binding] contracts and [heavy] taxes.  Jesus disrupts these [4 Disciples’] lives, calls them to a different loyalty and way of life, creates a new community, and gives them a new mission (fishing for people).  His summons [and announcement] exhibits God’s empire at work, this light shining in the darkness of Roman-ruled Galilee.” 
 
So the anointed one, Jesus, was calling the disciples, not just away from their families and their jobs, but into a whole new way of life, right in their own town.  This is the call of our baptism, to dive deeply and deliberately, submit ourselves, to the life of healing the world, and of being fishers of people. 
 
The realm and kingdom of heaven is, in the world, but not of the world, as Luther says.  The world of sickness and death that is created by elites, leaders who believe their success proves their blessed status, is rejected by Jesus, who calls us away from that life that lords it over others – and inaugurates the realm and kingdom of heaven in the midst of this world. 
 
Dale Fredrickson’s son Ricky, wore a cast on his arm for six weeks, after that volleyball incident!  But not even that could keep Dale from becoming a follower of Jesus, and a healer in the world.  He worked his way up to Building Chairperson and Council member, and became a loyal disciple of Jesus in the community.  And I became his regular fishing partner! 
 
Maybe when we hear the call of Jesus to follow, the hardest thing is not what we fear we have to give up – but it’s accepting, that we truly receive the joy of new life, and that we can reflect that joy, as members of the realm and kingdom of God – as fishers of people, and healers in the world. 
 
May God bless the world, through us! 

Readings for Baptism of Our Lord, Sunday January 8, 2017

• Isaiah 42:1-9 
• Psalm 29 
• Acts 10:34-43 
• Matthew 3:13-17

"Empowered Church," by Rev Fred Kinsey
“The baptismal [story] begins a pattern in Jesus’ ministry,” says Robert Saler, of Christian Theological Seminary, “that I’m not sure is taken with enough seriousness.”  What Jesus starts in his baptism, says Saler, is a pattern of “continually empowering the church for service, rather than limiting that power to himself.” 
 
In Thanksgiving for Baptism today, we were sprinkled with baptismal water as a part of our Gathering rite, a remembrance that we are a baptized people.  As one of our two sacraments in the Lutheran Church, baptism is a daily practice for us.  And here at Unity, we were blessed with 4 baptisms in the past year, another good way to remember our Baptism and the cleansing renewal of these baptismal waters, that wash away our sin and initiate a brand new day, a new opportunity, to worship the Lord, and serve our neighbors. 
 
And today, we celebrate the Baptism of Our Lord, as we do every year, on the first Sunday after the Epiphany.  It’s the perfect way to remember that Epiphany means “manifestation.”  The manifestation of Jesus in his baptism reveals to us that he is the Son of God, and is specifically made manifest in the person of Jesus, who is earthly, manifest in the ordinary things of our world, revered by other people and prophets, and blessed by God in a voice we can hear. 
 
“Frederick Dale Bruner, in his book, Matthew: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004), says, that he considers Jesus’ first miracle to have occurred at his baptism.  The miracle is that Jesus was humble!  
 
“The divine Son of God humbles himself by allowing John to baptize him. This act of humility is an act of obedience to God and solidarity with all humankind. Jesus has no sins to be forgiven,” as we’ll confess later in the Nicene Creed.  “However, for us, he goes down to the river of repentance with all the other sinners to be baptized.” 
 
This was not an issue when Matthew wrote this gospel, late in the 1st century, around 85 A.D.  Only later, in the 4th century, when the Christianity became a state religion by decree of Emperor Constantine, a legal religion of the Roman Empire for the first time, did the issue begin to rise up for those theologians and politicians who wanted to match up Jesus’ divinity with a kingly, above reproach, image.  And the doctrine of Jesus’ sinlessness began to take form. 
 
But to live within the biblical picture of Jesus and John the Baptist, in Matthew, we find a bit more ambiguity.  In our gospel reading this morning, Jesus appears in the wilderness where John is, to receive the baptism John is offering, which is a baptism for the repentance of sins.  Just as the people came confessing their sins – so did Jesus.  It’s true that John sees something extraordinary in Jesus, and is surprised that it’s not the other way around, that Jesus should baptize him!  But Jesus is adamant that he be baptized with the same baptism as everyone else – “for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness,” he says.  In other words, this it is what God desires. 
 
Jesus has come to take on our form, our nature, as the offspring of God.  And so, the ‘manifestation’ of God in Jesus, is localized and particular.  Jesus wades in the Jordan River, in Palestine, during the reign of Herod, in order that we, in our baptism into Christ, are, continually being empowered in the church for service, because God’s Son did not limit that power to himself.  Jesus disperses the divine gift of righteousness and love to all the baptized!
 
And this is what is confirmed by the heavenly parent from above: “the Spirit of God descends like a dove and alights on Jesus,” says Matthew.  And a voice from heaven says, ‘This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’”
 
God is with us!  The same One – the Emanuel – we heard about at Christmas, born humbly in a manger. 
 
Pope Francis makes a confession, you could say, in his new book just published last year in 2016:  “At times I have surprised myself,” he says, “by thinking that a few very rigid people would do well to slip a little, so that they could remember that they are sinners, and thus meet Jesus.”  Jesus knows what it is like to live in a sinful world.  Jesus comes to meet us so we don’t have to pretend we are equal to gods.
 
Jesus comes to John at the Jordan, with all the other people confessing their sins, as Matthew says, but before that discussion can happen about Jesus, he is being baptized, and God proudly seals his moment of washing with the declaration of his son-ship! 
 
And so, of one thing there can be no doubt, that of Jesus’ humility.  The one chosen and blessed by God, identifies with us.  There is nothing we experience that Jesus has not gone through, for us, and with us – even a death, more torturous than most of us will ever experience. 
 
For us then, to be baptized into Christ, the same baptism that Jesus was baptized with, means we too will die with him, so that we might have the promise of rising again, and having life beyond fear of the enemy, of death.  As Paul says in Romans:  “Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”
 
What other God can offer such particularity, such a comforting identity with our humanity, and at the same time, such a universal promise of life everlasting? 
 
But even this is not the sole purpose of his coming, perhaps not even what is most important to his humility.  Jesus immersed himself fully into our world, to open up and spread out the power of the divine for our discipleship and service in the world.  How we live, and who we are, are marked by this baptismal immersion.  Like Jesus, we are to heal, and to teach, and to preach, and to worship and celebrate, to prophesy and be workers for justice and peace.  When we become Jesus’ disciples, we begin to hear and trust God’s blessing too – you are my children, whom I love and am well pleased with! 
 
This is what is made manifest in the Baptism of Our Lord.  God desires us to receive the power of serving, as we come to know it through the ministry and example of the Son of God, a humble king, strong in love for neighbor, as we ourselves desire to be loved, otherwise know as, The Golden Rule, which I’m afraid is fast becoming a lost gift.  But without it, we descend into a world farther from the kingdom of God here on earth, which Jesus came to bring us. 
 
What Would Jesus Do, in such a moment as this?  In the very next story after his baptism, we find Jesus going out to confront the root cause of sin in our world – in his temptation in the wilderness – that’s what Jesus does.  As disciples, we can recognize and must stand up to the power of the Evil One in our world.  The temptation to greatness without humility, leads to the illusion of stardom, and the love of wealth.  We see this vanity oozing into our culture and world.  In baptism, we vow to squash it, stomp it out, and not follow after it. 
 
Jesus, the Son of God, came to totally immerse himself in the particularities of our world, not to keep the power of the divine for himself, leaving us downtrodden, but to disperse that power to us for service in the world, that we may follow and be formed into his disciples.  If Jesus can immerse himself in the world, we can certainly immerse ourselves too, empowered to give life, and share it, after the model of the Beloved Son, rather than grasp it away as our own possession.  
 
In our daily baptism, a baptism into Christ, the kingdom and realm of God are made manifest, and God is well pleased!  

Readings for Epiphany of Our Lord, January 1, 2017 
​(transfered from January 6th) 

• Isaiah 60:1-6 
• Psalm 72:1-7, 10-14 
• Ephesians 3:1-12  
• Matthew 2:1-12

"Two Herod's, One King," by Reverend Fred Kinsey
“Then Herod secretly called for the [Magi] and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared.  Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, "Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.” 
 
This is what Christmas was all about for me.  I must have been a weird kid, looking forward to hearing this Christmas story, as much or more than the story of Santa.  Sure, I remember those days, when I still believed in Santa.  I remember the days we had a real Christmas tree and spent hours decorating it with lights and ornaments, and finally how we set out a glass of milk and mom’s home-made Christmas cookies for Santa on Christmas Eve, and went to bed obediently, so we could wake up early and find all Santa’s presents under the tree.  Maybe that was the year my brother and I got the Johnny-7 gun, the hottest toy of the year, but ending up playing more with the boxes and making up our own games!  That must have been the year my parents told me!
 
But my more lasting memories are actually of our family ritual of going to 11:00 Christmas Eve service – the cold and snow, the Carols, holding lit candles in the dark singing Silent Night with the packed crowd, and the Nativity gospel story.  Coming home after midnight and collapsing in bed.
 
And  I remember in the post-Santa years, how we got up a bit later Christmas morning, not rushed or consumed with present opening, and went back to Christmas Day services, a different, more relaxed feeling, a slimmer crowd, the joy of the light come into the world without candles, and a shared experience of accomplishing something, just in the hearing John’s Gospel, “in the beginning was the word…”  and feeling that all was well, even in the midst of the darkest days.  All that we needed, had been revealed, made manifest, in the birth of Jesus.  Going home for egg nog and opening the rest of the presents was so much more relaxed and meaningful, after that.
 
In Matthew’s Nativity story, the “wise men,” or Magi – that came to pay homage to the new born king of the Jews – brought some pretty fabulous gifts with them, on their long quest from the east!  Gold, for his kingly royalty, frankincense, a perfumed-oil used for worshiping the divine, and myrrh, the ointment of embalming, for the crucified, King Jesus. 
 
So when the Magi come to Herod, the one called “the Great,” asking him where the new born King of the Jews was, it’s understandable that King Herod is upset with this news, frightened even, says Matthew, and all Jerusalem with him.  Herod reacts, as all tyrants do, immediately going into executive session, secretly reprimanding his chief priests and scribes.  Give me something, he demands!  And they tell Herod that according to the prophet Micah, the Messiah is to be born in Bethlehem.  Which makes sense, because it’s just a few miles down the road.  No wonder the Magi, in following the star, stopped here, in Jerusalem! 
 
Then Herod meets secretly with the Magi, and gives them the good news, how close they are.  Go down to neighboring little Bethlehem, he says, and search diligently for the child, for I too am very interested in paying him a visit – I mean, paying him homage, of course!  Herod hastily pushes them out the back door, still secretly upset, but confident he has a plan for this rival king, which of course he won’t tell his enemies about – he’s too smart to do that!. 
 
So the Magi set out once again; “and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising.”  How odd, thought the Magi, that King Herod had not already gone to worship this new born king himself, seeing he knew he was so close by, in Bethlehem!  But the Magi were outsiders, Gentiles, and perhaps they couldn’t understand the ways of Jerusalem’s kings. 
 
When later, they were warned in a dream not to return to Herod, and reveal where Jesus was born, the Magi left for their own country by another road, says Matthew, and Herod was foiled.  Sometimes we see best with our eyes closed, while sleeping or praying, with hearts open for the Holy Spirit to enter our lives. 
 
Herod, ruled in a closed network of secrecy, to ensure his power and authority remained unchallenged.  But, he couldn’t control the baby Jesus, born of the Spirit, and of the bloodline of the chosen people, whose first worshipers came from eastern, Gentile nations.  The wise men of Jerusalem that Herod called on, were not nearly that wise, themselves.  Or, as we heard in John’s gospel last week: “[Jesus] came to what was his own, but his own people did not accept him, but …those who believed…” even strangers and outsiders, “he gave them power to be the children of God.” 
 
So, Herod-the-Great figures he can still get what he wants, with his new plan, which he hatches from his own despotic fears.  He orders all the children in Bethlehem, 2 years old and less, to be slaughtered, just to make sure that this ‘pretender’ to the throne, Jesus, is taken out, once and for all.  But the Holy Spirit has already told Joseph in a dream, to take Mary and the child and flee to Egypt to keep Jesus from Herod’s murderous intentions. 
 
Of course, there are two Herod’s in Matthew’s gospel.  And what the father couldn’t accomplish, the son will complete.  Herod Antipas, Herod the Great’s son, is ruler of Israel when Jesus is arrested, and tried, and convicted, as an innocent man, as the people’s King.  Family dynasties, and father and son rulers, can and do, wield weapons of revenge, which so clearly overstep God’s righteousness. 
 
And there continue to be many Herod’s in our world today.  What is sacrificed, of course, is truth and equity, life and light.  It’s interesting that, originally “Epiphany” meant the abrupt manifestation, or surprise appearance, of a sovereign ruler, to come and inspect a subordinate; but the Gospels changed the meaning of Epiphany, to the appearance of the poor [and new born] Jesus, come to inspect the powerful!  (cf. Eliseo Pérez-Álvarez)
 
Jesus operates in plain sight, never in secret.  He reveals the truth – he is the life and the light of all people.  That is his gift to the world.  A gift of dearest treasure!  In the middle of the night, when the world is asleep and dreaming, his star guided the Magi to his manger in Bethlehem, and God protected him by Joseph’s dream, so he could be our light, in the day-time, as well. 
 
In this magnificent, and unparalleled gift, we receive our life and find our true light.  And it is a gift that we can re-gift, over and over again, to any, and all, in the world. 
 
Presents under the tree can be a small token of this, best gift of all, but really, there is nothing to buy, that can communicate to us, or infuse in us, the love and grace of our king and savior.  And the gift of the Messiah, is not something that ends after it is given to us, but is meant to fill us with new life, and with light, that like a candle’s flame, we can pass it on as many times as we want. 
 
On this New Year’s Day, we remember that our gift of faith is stronger than any opposition that is born out of fear, secrecy or violence.  Our gift is an open-secret, that is freely given, and thrives on non-violence, justice and love. 
 
And so, in the gift of our new born king, which is given to you this day, I say to you, rejoice in this gospel good news – Merry Christmas and a blessed New Year!