by Fr. Bill Garrison
Please note that the following sermon text was provided prior to the audio recording. The two versions may differ substantially.
Luke 3:15-17, 21-22
As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah, John answered all of them by saying, "I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire."
Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased."
Today is the first Sunday in Epiphany. The word Epiphany tells us what the season is about. It’s the coming of a new understanding. It is seeing things in a new way. It is becoming aware for the first time. I want to chat with you about Epiphany, but before we get serious here is one of my favorite stories which I haven’t told in a while about seeing things in a fresh way.
John Smith was the only Protestant to move into a large Catholic neighborhood. On the first Friday of Lent, John was outside grilling a big juicy steak on his grill. Meanwhile, all of his neighbors were eating cold tuna fish for supper.
This went on each Friday of Lent. On the last Friday of Lent, the neighborhood men got together and decided that something had to be done about John, he was tempting them to eat meat each Friday of Lent, and they couldn't take it anymore. They decided to try and convert John to Catholicism.
They went over and talked to him and were so happy that he decided to join all of his neighbors and become a Catholic. They took him to Church, and the Priest sprinkled some water over him, and said, “You were born a Baptist, you were raised a Baptist, and now you are a Catholic.” The men were so relieved--now their biggest Lenten temptation was resolved.
The next year's Lenten season rolled around. The first Friday of Lent came, and just at supper time, when the neighborhood was setting down to their tuna fish dinner, came the wafting smell of steak cooking on a grill. The neighborhood men could not believe their noses!
They called each other up and decided to meet over in John's yard to see if he had forgotten it was the first Friday of Lent? The group arrived just in time to see John standing over his grill with a small pitcher of water. He was sprinkling some water over his steak on the grill, saying, “You were born a cow, you were raised a cow, and now you are a fish.”
The gospel today speaks about the baptism of Jesus. Let me quote the last couple of lines. “Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”
Jesus, the man John indicated was coming had arrived. The eyes and ears of those present were opened. In that moment their image and understanding of Jesus was permanently and irrevocably enhanced. And for us we understand this was the beginning of a series of Epiphanies during his time with us on earth. The New Testament is full of his teachings and miracles, each an epiphany that opens our eyes to new realizations about God and each other.
I think this might be a helpful metaphor for what we are discussing. Think about getting out of bed in the dark. The ambient light and your memory allows you to get around without running into things, and so you go wherever you intended to go, and do so safely. But perhaps while you are up you have a need to find something and you are not entirely sure of its location. You have to turn on the light, and when you do it’s blinding at first. You really can’t see at all. But as your eyes adjust the room looks entirely different than it did in the dark. It’s almost as if you are in a different place altogether. It’s an epiphany as you see things in the light that were impossible to see in the dark. Is it any wonder that the contrast of light and darkness is so often used in scripture? To finish the metaphor, we live in the darkness and get by day in and day out with the ambient light. Then when the lights get turned on we find things as a result that we hadn’t seen before. This is our epiphany.
And, interestingly, if there is a mirror available, we see ourselves more clearly, in a way we never could have before. Sometimes we approve of what we see. Sometimes we don’t. Epiphanies come in positives and negatives too, but either way we learn something we didn’t know beforehand.
As an example, I remember when my understanding of people and how folks view things changed in an instant. My favorite seminary professor introduced myself and the class to the idea of social location. Basically, if you are unfamiliar, social location concerns the influences that form each of us. Here are a few of those influences as an example. What is your gender, age, financial status, geographical location, race, religious persuasion, height, weight, community, parents, etcetera? Get the idea? Each of these helps to form us. And these examples are just the start of all the things that influence our development.
So as an example, how I view the Virgin Mary will be completely different than a little, barefoot and pregnant 15-year-old native girl in Bolivia will view her. She has a lot more in common with Mary than I do. But until I learned about social location, I had never considered her viewpoint. I had seen Mary from a theological viewpoint only. She probably sees Mary as a compatriot, one with whom she can personally relate.
Since that epiphany I have never observed any other human being the same way as before. Including myself! I was changed in an instant.
So where did this learning come from? Well, we might say my professor. And that would be true. But I would submit to you it’s more complicated than that. You see I found myself in that class with a man that had the knowledge to impart to those attending. Then I heard him speak and understood what he had to say. But most important of all, at least it seems to me, the information came to me highlighted in some way I cannot understand unless I credit God for turning on the lights in the room so to speak, to continue the metaphor.
I have since gone back and reviewed my class notes. I must admit there is much that I have forgotten. It’s almost embarrassing. But I have not forgotten the important concept of social location. Simply put, God turned on the lights in the room and I discovered and internalized this most important concept.
It helped me to overcome my life up to then of a white male who had never been challenged to consider or even understand that there could be multiple viewpoints in life. I had assumed that others saw the world around them in the same way as myself. And I could not have been more wrong about that. This epiphany had set me free to see and experience as I had been unable to do prior.
Thank you, God.