Let's Get up and See the Light

January 7, 2018 Isaiah 60: 1-6 Let’s Get Up Epiphany Sunday Isaiah 60:1-6Common English Bible (CEB) Jerusalem’s coming radiance 60 Arise! Shine! Your light has come; the LORD’s glory has shone upon you. 2 Though darkness covers the earth and gloom the nations, the LORD will shine upon you; God’s glory will appear over you. 3 Nations will come to your light and kings to your dawning radiance. 4 Lift up your eyes and look all around: they are all gathered; they have come to you. Your sons will come from far away, and your daughters on caregivers’ hips. 5 Then you will see and be radiant; your heart will tremble and open wide, because the sea’s abundance will be turned over to you; the nations’ wealth will come to you. 6 Countless camels will cover your land, young camels from Midian and Ephah. They will all come from Sheba, carrying gold and incense, proclaiming the LORD’s praises. Common English Bible (CEB) Copyright © 2011 by Common English Bible Isaiah 60:1-5 "Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you." (v. 1) How many of you are afraid of the dark? (Let them answer.) Are you afraid to sleep with the light off? Don’t be embarrassed to admit it! It will be our little secret, just between you and me. What is it that scares you about the dark? (Let them answer.) Maybe it’s the way an ordinary thing in your room like a basketball hoop or a lamp or a large doll can look like a scary monster in the shadows of your vivid imaginations. Maybe it’s the way you lie in the dark and think about something scary you saw on television or in a movie. Maybe it’s the way your house or apartment is quiet when it is dark, which means that you can hear every little noise at night. Maybe you just don’t feel safe because you can’t see, and that is what makes the dark so scary. Well, most people stop being afraid of the dark as they get older, but there is another kind of darkness which scares even grown-ups. I am talking about moral darkness, the darkness of wrong and evil. There is a lot of that darkness in the world, and it is scary because it keeps us from God. Young and old alike, we all must struggle to know and do what is right, to see and follow the light of good amid the darkness of what is bad. Today we celebrate Epiphany and talk about how the light of God appeared in the world when Christ was born and made known to the world. The three wise men who visited the baby Jesus were among the first to see this light, but people had talked about it many centuries before. In fact, an ancient Hebrew prophet named Isaiah had written, "Arise, shine, for your light has come." Elsewhere, he had written, "The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness - on them light has shined" (9:2). For all people who were lost in darkness and couldn’t find their way to God, Jesus has come to be their light and show us the way. When you wake up from a bad dream in the middle of the night, think of how happy you are when your mother comes into your room and turns on the light. Then, after you have calmed down, she leaves the light on, and you aren’t scared any more. That’s sort of how we all feel now that Jesus is in the world. The light of goodness and salvation has been turned on in our souls, and we who were walking in darkness have seen the light. We aren’t scared anymore. Whenever you are tempted to do or say something you know is wrong, you are getting ready to enter this moral darkness I am talking about. It isn’t a darkness you can see, like the night is dark; instead, it is a darkness inside which tries to take you away from God. But now we have Jesus Christ to be our light. Whenever we wonder what is the right or wrong thing to do, we have the example of Jesus to show us the right. Learn the stories of His life. Learn the stories He told and the lessons He taught; talk to your parents about Him. The thick darkness which has covered the peoples no longer is quite so thick or scary, because now that Jesus Christ is in the world, we see that our light has come. Amen. CSS Publishing Co., Inc., More Urgent Season, A, by Erskine White Everything seems so bare in here without all of the Christmas decorations. It is time to put everything back in the box, it is time to take the lights down, time to go back to life as normal. But actually we have one more Sunday of Christmas. We have just a little bit of unfinished business to take care of. It is important for us not to think of this as an ending but a beginning. I love this poem by Howard Thurman, a united Methodist pastor When the song of the angels is stilled, When the star in the sky is gone, When the kings and the princes are home, When the shepherds are back with their flock, The work of Christmas begins: To find the lost, To heal the broken, To feed the hungry, To release the prisoner, To rebuild the nations, To bring peace among brothers, To make music in the heart. Christmas may be over, but the work of Christmas has just begun. That is why I thought that it was more important for us to honor Epiphany Sunday, than the baptism of our Lord. 12 days of Christmas ended yesterday. January 6th. That is epiphany, today January 7th is actually supposed to be the baptism of our Lord Sunday. For the church epiphany means a manifestation of the holy. The secular definition of epiphany is a revelation. Something that has been standing before you all of the time, but one day it hits you, and it makes sense in a way that you never thought of. Epiphany is a very strange season, a sort of off time between Christmas and lent. I just want to give everyone a heads up – Easter comes early this year. It will be on April 1st. That means that Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the Lenten season is February 14th, Valentine’s Day. Until then we are in epiphany season. The time when all of the lights are taken down. The time when the days are cold and dark. A time when not much is going on. Even our Scripture, Isaiah 60:2 says see , darkness covers the earth. A thick darkness covers the people. Sometimes it can seem like the darkness is not just all around us, but the darkness seeps in our soul and gets the best of us. The good news for us as Isaiah continues is that it is only in the darkness that we can truly see the light of God. It is only in the darkness that people are searching for answers, it is only in the darkness – that we have an epiphany – a realization that was not there before. A glimpse of the holy, of the divine. We celebrate January 6th – because it took twelve days for the wise men to find baby Jesus. They saw a star in the darkness and realized that God was sending a message of hope for the future. Even though Jesus was born in a place and a time – his mission would touch not just his family, his neighbors but all of the world. The words of Isaiah 60: 1-6 are important. The first words of the scripture – arise, in the midst of the darkness your light has come. That light is Jesus Christ. Christmas is the time that we acknowledge that Christ has come into the world. Epiphany is the time for us to take it to heart. T o believe it for ourselves. For us to not just look at the lights, but to feel the lights and to be the light for a still very dark world. It is time for us to think about what it means to be a believer. What difference does it make, what difference do I make. The special theme of Epiphany is that God has revealed himself to all people everywhere. This is an important truth. God is the God of all people and all nations. Epiphany does not last very long, it is just a glimpse of realization of the light, and then we are plunged back into darkness. Our task in the darkness is to ask ourselves and to ask all others, where is God in all of this. Where can we find God in the midst of the darkness. We have to find Christ as the answer to the darkness for ourselves. So that we can let our light shine within. There are a couple of things we need to see at the opening of this New year. THE FIRST IS THAT WE ARE KEEPERS OF THE LIGHT. That is what it means to be the church of Jesus Christ. We have seen his light. And it is our job to make certain the light we have seen is kept burning until his return. Back in the 1770s or 1780s, a man named John Morris built a house in Rutherfordton, North Carolina. Using flint and steel, John Morris started a fire in his fireplace. And nobody knows why, but it became a point of pride in the Morris household not to let that fire go out. When John built another cabin for his family later on, coals from the original fire were transplanted to the fireplace of the new house. Members of the Morris family proudly declared that they would keep the fire going, to honor the wishes of John, who had charged his family, "œThe fire must never be allowed to go out." That fire became the catalyst for passing down family history through the generations. In the 1920s, the care of the fire rested with one man, William Morris --the great-great-grandson of John Morris. William had never married or had children, and he was nearing eighty. He tried to inspire his nieces and nephews with tales of the family fire, but none of them seemed interested in keeping the fire alive after William was gone. The fire was 150 years old by now. It marked a proud family tradition, one that everyone in the area admired. Would that tradition end once William died? William took it upon himself to see that it didn't. From an interview in the Spartanburg Herald, his story spread to newspapers all over North Carolina. William was invited to Washington, D.C., to tell the story over a national radio program. He began getting phone calls and letters from all over the country, many from people with the last name Morris. The National Park Service considered buying William's cabin, fireplace and all, and moving it to one of their national parks, where it could become a tourist attraction and the park rangers could tend to the fire. By now the "œSaluda fire," named after the town where William Morris lived, had sparked the public imagination. Preserving the Saluda fire seemed like a noble undertaking. One day, not long after the publicity stir over the fire had started, one of William's neighbors came to see him. The neighbor, Hamp Alexander Owen, had only one thing to say that day, "œI've come to tell you that I'll keep your fire going." Owens wasn't doing it for the publicity or the glory. He just admired the legacy, and believed that it was worth preserving. We don't know when William Morris died. But when Hamp Alexander Owens died in 1948, his obituary stated that he was "œthe keeper of the Saluda fire." The fire itself had been burning continuously for more than 170 years. But that is the last record anyone has of the Saluda fire. Did it die out? Or is it still burning somewhere, tended by some anonymous soul who believes in what it stands for? We just don't know. (4) We are the keepers of a fire that has been burning for 2,000 years. Arise and Shine – your light has come! Additional illustrations…… Following a long and bitter congregational conflict, a pastor was asked what kept her going until reconciliation and renewal finally resulted. She replied, "The Five P's of ministry: Prayer, Persistence, Prayer, Play, and Prayer." Notice that prayer was at the beginning, middle, and end of her list. Prayer connects us to the true Light. Prayer keeps the vision of the true Light in view as darkness threatens to overcome it. Prayer enables us to place one foot in front of the other in the long and difficult journey through unknown darkness. Reach for the true Light in prayer. Lift up your eyes to see the guiding light of Christ along your life journey. There appear to be several significant factors present in healthy, vital, faithful congregations. Although there are many variables, one principal feature has emerged. This is the eagerness of members to share faith stories, their journey in the Light with one another and in their neighborhoods. Members eagerly share "Where Is God In All This?" stories for themselves and their congregations. They share them as part of committee and choir devotions, in temple talks during worship, in Sunday School classes, and in parish retreats. No, they are not "fanatics." They are just like you and me, struggling against the darkness that threatens to overcome us all. More than today's typical "sideline" Christian, these folks have let God become the subject of more verbs in their vocabularies. They have taken seriously Isaiah's call to arise, and shine, for they know that their Light, our Light, has indeed come. It is like a children’s story that author James Thurber once wrote titled, “The White Deer.” “The White Deer” is about a beautiful princess who had been transformed by a witch into a white deer. A king named King Clode and his three sons (Thag and Gallow, the hunters, and Jorn, the poet) are out hunting game and they come upon this white deer and they raise their bows to slay it. Just before they shoot, however, the deer is changed back into the princess. King Clode and his sons take this beautiful princess home with them but she is unable to remember anything about her past including who she is. It is finally discovered that the only thing that will cause the princess to regain her memory is the unconditional love of a young man. In order to determine who this young man will be--Thag, Gallow and Jorn are each given perilous tasks to perform. It is Jorn the poet who ultimately wins the princess’ hand. He gives her the kind of love that allows her to remember where she came from and who she is. (3) My friends, is this not what God has called us to do for a fallen world? By His grace we are to show the world the unfailing love of God at work in our lives so that the world may truly see where it came from and why it exists.