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January 08, 2006

Feasting 2a

Happy Epiphany Sunday! :)

A Playmobil birthday party through a PDC lens.

I hope this Epiphany Sunday finds you doing well and able to rest. I Love Epiphany! Why? Good question. I think it is because I love birthdays (this does not mean that I am good at remembering people’s birthdays). :) I love them because of the celebration. It’s a purposeful opportunity to celebrate someone. To remember who they are, what your relationship is and what you want it to be, and that they are significant. Birthdays are an opportunity to remind a person, and your self, that you love, and most of the time like, each other. It is a time to party because you are glad they are here. That is why I like birthdays!

Epiphany is kind of a birthday party. It is the time when some kingly type men followed a star (for a heck of a long time) to a baby boy. The star had come about at the time when this boy was born and it signified that this was a very special birth and that he was a very special boy. The baby was, and still is, God himself who put on flesh for us. The boy’s name is Jesus.

The baby boy was not born in a fancy way in a fancy hospital. His parents were not fancy people either. They were a simple lower socio-economic family who were living in a barn while they visited a town. The whole ordeal of being birthed was probably not very pleasant for either the mom or the child. I see it being wet, cold, smelly, and messy. I say smelly and messy because of the whole birthing thing and because animals lived in their delivery room/nursery/living room/master suite/ dining room.

The baby cried like all babies, yes he is God but he is also a human and for all humans coming from the womb to the world is not a pleasant experience. He not only cried like us but he also suffered like we suffer. He laughs like we laugh, and he loves like we wish we could love. I am sure the parents were consumed with a mixture of wonder, dread and awe at he whole thing. I know I would probably… well there’s no probably about it… I would be freaking out!

Any way, kingly like men came to this barn by following a new star in order to find out what was going on and to worship and celebrate this boy. (This boy is no less than the genuine, authentic fulfillment of a promise that God himself would becoming human and fix his children and bring them home.) As a result they ended up having a birthday party. That’s pretty darn exciting if you ask me!

Yes I know that Christmas day is Christ’s birthday celebration in the Western Church. That is great. I love the time, so much so that I usually annoy most of my friends because I get so excited. But the time is so intense and I am so callous that I find it difficult to worship him in celebration. I get it in my mind but the reality of what I am celebrating has yet to pierce my heart. I long to feel and believe, not just believe. It is good and true that belief, love and commitment are not contingent upon feeling, but feeling it sure is nice.

Epiphany allows time to process and enjoy the season after the intensity of the Christmas moment. (Now you know why I leave my tree and decorations up after New Year’s Day.) I am more able to think, reflect, enjoy, and celebrate my friend and my God. It forces me to recon with the reality of him who actively loves me, even though I only sometimes love him. Even more than this is that it is he who first loved us, even though we did not love him. This gives time for conviction, grace, and gratitude instead of constant, and often sought after, opportunities for distraction and diversion. My heart becomes forced into momentary windows, some times long, sometimes short, of delicious moments. Moments where the reality of a baby boy’s birth moves from an isolated event in history to a more full understanding of reality and identity. Moments where I not only recognize and believe the wonder of it all, but I also feel it. This is why I love Epiphany!

Posted by tlloydjackson at 07:18 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack