PROPERS: 2 EPIPHANY, YEAR A
TEXT: COLLECT OF THE DAY; PSALM 40:1-12
PREACHED AT HOLY TRINITY, PENSACOLA, ON SUNDAY, JANUARY 19, 2020.
ONE SENTENCE: The light which is characteristic of Epiphany casts shadows in our lives which are to be brought into the light, offered to God, and healed.
In these days after Christmas, we hear much about light.
In the gospel lesson on the First Sunday of Christmas, we heard the prologue to the Gospel according to John. It included these words: “What has come into being is life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.”
In the Feast of the Epiphany, we hear the story of the three magi being guided to the newborn savior by a star in the heavens. And today, in the collect, we prayed, “Almighty God, whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ is the light of the world…”
We would agree, I think, that the light is what we seek. And that light, in general, is healing and renewing. Light illumines. Especially, as Christians, the light of Jesus.
We seek to bring to light those things which fester, corrupt, or damage. Appropriate light will help heal damaged skin. Light is something we seek.
But light does something else. We hardly consider its effects, because we so want to avoid what it does.
Light casts shadows.
I recall a game we used to play at my grandmother’s house in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. She had a two-story house that her mother had ordered from Sears-Roebuck. Yes, they used to sell houses! It was old and spooky.
We would creep down the inside stairs at night, when all was dark. We would reach quietly around the corner and press the button which turned the lights on in the kitchen. Then we would giggle as the various creatures of the night would scurry for the darkness. The floor would move!
There are events, moments, relationships in life which we seek to keep in darkness. We keep them hidden – maybe even from ourselves. They are those things in life of which we are ashamed – or at least not proud of.
Perhaps it is not something we are aware of. Carl Jung, the great psychological theorist, wrote of the shadow. It is the aspect of ourselves and our personalities that we keep in the darkness – ignored, hidden, and denied. We may not even be conscious of it, but, rest assured, it is there for all of us.
My dear friend, Merrill Wade, who is a retired priest in Texas, once spoke to me of the “dark, unbaptized corners of our hearts.” The light cannot reach those hidden parts – they remain unaffected by the healing powers of the light.Theologically, he was spot-on with human nature and with Carl Jung.
We tend to ignore that aspect of ourselves. As a result, there is a tendency to have those hidden, unhealed shadows affect our lives. That inaccessibility of the light – the fact that the tendencies function from the darkness -- leads to behaviors or actions which separate us from our own best interests, one another, and the fullness of life for which we yearn. The shadow affects our actions and we are not even aware – the tendency is so hidden from the light.
But we are not helpless. The shadow does not have to remain in the darkness. Consider the victorious words of one who was touched by God – the author of Psalm 40:
1I waited patiently upon the Lord; *
he stooped to me and heard my cry.
he stooped to me and heard my cry.
2 He lifted me out of the desolate pit, out of the mire and clay; *
he set my feet upon a high cliff and made my footing sure.
he set my feet upon a high cliff and made my footing sure.
3 He put a new song in my mouth,
a song of praise to our God; *
many shall see, and stand in awe,
and put their trust in the Lord.
a song of praise to our God; *
many shall see, and stand in awe,
and put their trust in the Lord.
4 Happy are they who trust in the Lord! *
they do not resort to evil spirits or turn to false gods.
they do not resort to evil spirits or turn to false gods.
5 Great things are they that you have done, O Lord my God!
how great your wonders and your plans for us! *
there is none who can be compared with you.
how great your wonders and your plans for us! *
there is none who can be compared with you.
6 Oh, that I could make them known and tell them! *
but they are more than I can count.
but they are more than I can count.
We can only theorize or speculate on what the psalmist had experienced – the precise nature of the desolate pit. But I suspect he did not get there overnight, nor did he get out of it overnight. Many, if not most, times, the work of the Spirit takes time.
We may seek to do what is right, but we cannot. The Apostle Paul puts that plaintive cry so succinctly: “For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing." [Romans 7:18b-19]
And, so it is with the shadow – the hidden part of ourselves that is our desolate pit. To emerge from the muck and the mire that weighs us down, we need to turn inward. We need to inspect our feelings, our motivations, our actions and then bring them to the light.
Once we have exposed the unbaptized corners of our hearts to the light which Christ brings, we are freed from the control it lorded over us from the dark recesses of our souls. In fact, we share in Christ’s victory over the forces of darkness and we become more whole through that healing light.
It takes time, though – and rigorous self-examination. We need to turn an unblinking eye within, and listen with unguarded ears to those who would help us find the light.
And when we come to the power of the light, we will have found our Epiphany.
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