“What Are You Looking At?”
January 7, 2018
Matthew 2:1-12
Matthew tells of the journey of the Magi: “And there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was.”
What are you looking at?
Perhaps as we conclude our Christmas celebrations you are looking at a star. That would almost be expected today, wouldn’t it?
The carol with which we opened our worship this morning mixes the nativity accounts of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke and sings of those “certain poor shepherds” who “look-ed up and saw a star.” You know, of course, that Matthew mentions no shepherds and that Luke says no such thing about them. In Luke’s Gospel the shepherds, to their great fear, encounter an angel in the middle of the night and the glory of the Lord shines around them—but a star they do not see.
The wise men—the astrologers, the magi of Matthew’s gospel—do see a star, and as we sang, by the light of that same star they came from country far.
So maybe this morning you are looking at a star.
Which means that you are looking at creation in all its vast grandeur.
The nearest stars are Alpha Centauri A and B, a binary pair about 4.3 light years away—about 25 trillion miles—and they are our closest neighbors. When we look at those stars we are seeing light that began its journey to earth over four years ago.
The most distant star in our Milky Way galaxy is some 900 thousand light-years from Earth—a distance that even astronomers find almost too large to comprehend. When the light left from that star our early human ancestors were just starting to make fires here on Earth.[i]
Beyond this, there are known galaxies some 13 gigalightyears away. Now a gigalightyear is 1 billion light years—you do the math on that kind of distance.
To look at the stars is to be reminded of our finitude, our smallness. In the vastness of the universe, our own solar system is almost non-existent.
To look at the stars is to be reminded of our limits. We are bound to this earth, bound to these few years, watching star light that started toward us long before this church was founded, long before the time of Jesus or the Hebrew prophets.
Sometimes to look at the stars is to feel small and limited and painfully alone in it all.
Remember how the psalmist put it?
When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established;
what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mere mortals that you care for them?
To look at the stars is also to sense something even greater. In faith we claim that beyond the distant stars is the creative power that gives being to all things; that there is a great and loving purpose that sustains the heavens and this earth; that beyond all that light and all that darkness in the night there is a Creator who still knows us creatures.
We look up to the heavens in the hope that beyond the beginning—and beyond the ending—is One who is both beginning and end, first and last.
We hope. In our finitude and our smallness, in our wonder and awe, we look at a star and hope.
What are you looking at?
Perhaps you are looking at a child.
That, too, would be expected around Christmas. Ultimately our focus in these days is directed toward a baby lying in a manger—or as Matthew’s Gospel has it, a child inside a house.
To look at a child is also to look at creation in all its grandeur—unlike a star, however, this grandeur is not vast but specific, limited. We can hold this magnificence in our arms. Indeed, a child is the splendor of creation that we must care for.
The old Congregational service of baptism spoke of “the hope and happiness that come into our lives through the presence of a child.” You have known that hope and happiness, haven’t you? You don’t have to be a parent to experience it. I love that phrase. “The hope and happiness that come into our lives through the presence of a child.” How could you not want to be a part of church that speaks like that?
By faith, we say the strangest thing about this child that the magi found in the house with Mary his mother. We say that in Jesus, God becomes incarnate—takes on human flesh, human life. That’s always kind of embarrassing for Christians because it means we don’t worship a grand and noble God, distant in the heavens. We worship a God best known in human flesh. We announce a God who takes on the limitations of earthly, fleshy existence. The God made known in Jesus accepts humanity fully—born as we are, dying as we will—and not an elegant death at that.
Together with the Magi, we look at this child and learn once more that God loves this world and graces us with worldly things: with the warmth of family and friends and the goodwill of strangers, with the gladness of giving, with the scent of pine, the glow of candles, the joy of music. God even gives this world and us an abundance of rain and ice and snow.
God has come to us in human flesh that we might love our time, our world even more. God has come to us in human flesh that we might love our neighbors as ourselves. And in loving family and neighbors, in welcoming strangers, we might glimpse something greater about all of us.
Looking at a child in these days, I keep coming back to that ancient affirmation that we are created “in the image of God.” It is one of the most wonderful religious ideas. Who could ever plumb the depths of its meaning? I am convinced that it points at least to the unique nature of each one of us, that you are special and to be cherished. Yes, I’m talking about you. We are the sisters and brothers of this child that we look at. So let us love one another
What are you looking at?
Perhaps you are looking at the gifts, at the gold and frankincense and myrrh. In listing these, Matthew’s Gospel seems to recall the gifts that the prophet Isaiah said the nations would bring to the Temple in the restored Jerusalem after the people returned from exile in Babylon. The renewed city would be a place of light, attracting people who would bring with them the wealth of their countries.
Good gifts often say something about the receiver—you are the kind of person who would like this music; these tools might be just what you are looking for; this color is right for you. Gold and frankincense suggest that the child who receives them will be a great ruler.
Myrrh suggests he will die.
Looking at those gifts we remember other gifts as well.
This life is a gift. The earth is a gift. Love is a gift. In many ways this church is a gift—both the church as a building and the church as a congregation. For this church is the legacy of faithful members in the past, an offering of faithful members today. We care for it in our time here. And freely we will pass it on to new members, a new generation, for ongoing ministry and mission.
God gives all gifts—life, love, this planet. And God gives us gifts for the building up of the church, for our common good. Each of us, all of us have gifts—received from God—that can be used both in the ministry of this congregation and far beyond these four walls.
The gifts of God keep showing up where we would least expect them.
The light of God is found shining brightest in the places of deep shadows.
The fullness of God is found in those places where people are hungry and poor, as we work together and together seek the abundance that justice makes possible.
The peace of God in the turmoil of our lives and the chaos of our world is found as we challenge the ways in which we make violence and warfare the preferred option.
The wholeness of God in our grief and illness, indeed in our sin, is found when we look for it in places of brokenness.
This morning we are once again invited to the table, to this feast of Christ broken and poured out. For this meal we bring the gifts of God—wheat of the field, fruit of the vineyard—gifts that by human effort have been transformed into bread and wine. These gifts that we bring are given back to us as the bread of life and the cup of salvation.
This is a meal for those who are empty, who seek wholeness, who actively hope for peace and life. That is to say, this is a meal for people like you and me. The German theologian Michael Welker reminds us that each time we come to this table we, like the Magi, are at the beginning of a journey. The bread and cup nourish us so that we can set out once more, following in the way of Jesus Christ.
What are you looking at?
A star—the vastness of creation.
A child—the hope and happiness of this life.
The gifts—signs of God’s own great generosity in which we find the life we seek.
Each of them, all of them showing God’s great love for all of creation and for each of us. When we look, what we see is all creation, all good gifts around us, held in the love of God who became like us in the child of Bethlehem.
[i] https://www.space.com/26483-milky-way-most-distant-stars.html