A New Star
by Griff Martin
A Sermon for the Beloveds of First Austin: a baptist community of faith
On Isaiah 60:1-6 / Matthew 2:1-12
For Epiphany Sunday
January 3, 2021
*This document comes from an oral manuscript.
Incarnate and Coming God, we ask that you once again take the Word and transform it into a living and breathing reality we can all together experience. Make us attended to your presence here in this space and in these words God, for if we are aware of your being here then nothing else will matter, but if we are not aware of your being here then nothing else will matter. In the name of the Creator, the Christ and the Comforter.
I am not all that wise about astrology, this is a morning I am lamenting the loss of Saint Bill Nethercut, he would have been my guiding star.
What I know is that when I started thinking about the magi this year I started thinking about astrology and I realized I know very little about this. I don’t read a daily horoscope, I have always chalked that up to the same people who read the National Enquirer, "oh isn’t that sweet…."
So I did some research, I knew I was a Cancer, so I started there and I have to tell you what I found was a bit perplexing. First it told me, I tended to be domestically oriented in terms of loving a cozy, safe space that serves as my personal sanctuary, that I care deeply and I am quick to adapt to caregiving. All true but true in the way that a fortune cookie is true, generic enough to catch a lot.
I kept reading, that my sign was represented by the crab and this meant I was able to exist in different realms, in particular the emotional and material. That cancers were off-putting at first and hard to get to know, but gentle and compassionate and mystical underneath the shell… a bit too real and true…. Then it told me that I enjoyed the water as a way to relax, which is one of my deepest truths, a life rule of mine is to never skip a chance to swim in any body of water, there is baptism everywhere…. Still though, what was this really saying -- lots of people love the water….
Then I read this, as a cancer I feel strongly but had trouble expressing or even knowing my feelings…. Now this is liking reading my therapist's notes on me and our sessions together. This is her bread and butter when it comes to me in her office.
I stopped reading…. Loves safe, secure places… Struggles with feelings… Loves the water… can be off-putting before getting to know…. It was all closer to the true me than I wanted to admit.
I had to pause, maybe astrology was onto something, it was pretty close to the truth of me…. Which might be exactly why when God was figuring out the plot of this entire new experiment of love and skin, God went to the astrologists… they were onto something and they were pretty close to the truth.
I am going to assume you are like me and not well-versed in the beliefs of Zoroastrian priests, which is the fancier term for Readers of the Stars or also Magi. They were quite popular in Jesus’ day. And their beliefs were, well, I want you to judge that.
The primary prophet of Zoroastrianism was Zoroaster. Now, he believed that he was miraculously conceived by a 15-year-old teenage girl. He did not begin his ministry until the age of 30, right after he had defeated all of Satan’s temptations. And remember, this story comes first before Jesus’ story. Now, this is where the story gets a bit slant from our story, he believed that the future would be saved over and over again by future mystical powerful prophets who would also be born of miraculous conceptions involving teenage girls.
Which is why the Magi would be likely candidates to see and notice the star, they were so close to the truth of this whole thing already, like eerily close to the truth. So when God became flesh and blood and it involved a young teenager, well they might be the very first to see the truth of that entire story because they were already halfway there.
They were halfway to the truth so God started with what they had and built on that.
Now I don’t know about your entire journey with God, but I know that my history with God has some chapters that I have shut as quickly as possible when I realized truer truths. For example there are chapters of my life where God is a presence, all powerful and that God is only interested in where I fail and the things I don’t do that I should be doing. It’s that God I was scared to get close to because I believed that God would make my life’s calling something that I did not enjoy, I would be sent to a place I did not care for and my entire life calling would be there -- like I would be sent as a missionary to spend all of my life in Houston or Dallas, which is my hell. God was not interested in what pleased me and what I did, well, as much as my faults and where I needed to improve.
Then as my conversion continued and my faith grew I came to understand God as a lover, a presence of love that called me beloved and that wanted to celebrate me and the places where I did well, God was still interested in my failures but it was about learning from them, not punishing me for them. This God loved the things I loved and wanted my life calling to be something that brought me joy in a place that brought me joy. This God cared about my pleasure and joy, this God cared more about the places I shined and the things I was good at and the things I cared about.
God was not an angry high school principal who I only saw when I had been given a demerit for something I should not have done and would thus tell me what punishment I did to correct this wrong, instead God was the high school guidance counselor who wanted me to be as fully me as possibly and wanted to find places my life skills matched with something bigger.
Which is why when it comes to all the big questions of life, I think God is trying to find starting places in our hearts where we are more right than we are wrong. I think half truths in our souls are places that God loves to add on. God is not the editor who is throwing manuscripts away and telling you to start over, no God is the editor who is finding our half-baked short story ideas and saying let’s work with this, I see potential here.
So of course when God is writing this story, this epic, and God is trying to figure out how it’s going to work, who to include to get this whole thing going… of course God finds those who are already almost there and says, okay, now that I can work with.
So the star is put in the sky just like they were already looking for and yes there was something about a very important and unique birth and a mystical powerful prophet who was so much more than that, this was The mystical powerful prophet. And of course the Magi noticed the star and of course they went off looking for it.
And along the journey they stop and of course the first question they ask is always: “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.” It’s their thing, it’s like you all know if you talk to me longer than about 5 minutes I am going to suggest a book or sermon or taco that will enhance your life.
They are passionate about what they are passionate about and God honors that passion to bring them closer to the truth. And that passion leads them all the way to Bethlehem where they find Jesus and suddenly the old half truths they had believed in are enhanced to fuller truths and what was the Really Real just got Realer.
And there are two lines to the story that I just love here…. When they find Jesus, they are overwhelmed by joy. That is what happens when our life passions and life loves lead us further into truth, we are overwhelmed by joy.
And second, when they find Jesus they return home by another road. Which is also so true because when our life passions and love lead us further into truths and encounters with the Really Real, of course our lives have to change and we have to go by new roads.
I think a lot of the last year that we just survived was the naming of half truths, places were we had something kinda sorta right but had not yet gone all the way. We saw that there were truer truths we needed to learn and live into. We saw that we did not have the whole picture yet. It was like all of humanity at one point entered the same process of sanctification, which is the fancy theological word meaning God loving us so much that God leads us further into truth, into the Really Real and into the joy of Love.
As this story teaches us, this is the very nature of our God, our Good God. God is the chef who comes into the kitchen and sees the things that we love and that we always have in the pantry and says ‘I know what I can cook with that’ and then takes what we already have on hand and what we know and love and cooks us up something so delicious that we had never dreamed of before.
And I believe right now God is ready to serve a whole new banquet to us, to give us something to feast on because we are in the midst of creating something new and truer and realer together.
Which means that right now we need to be paying close attention because there are likely stars emerging all around us right now, places that God wants to give us an encounter that leads us so much further, to enhance our passion, to take our half based ideas and make them truer, to lead us further into the Truth of Love. There are epiphanies abounding around us this moment.
Stars that will guide us further into us and further into God and God’s kingdom for this world.
Of course all those stars do require something from us, the same thing that has been required of all the characters that we have studied the past few weeks, from shepherds to Mary to Jospeh to the very Christ Child to the magi today, each of them had to say yes to God. The star will be nothing more than just a big old shining star until we say yes to following it.
Just take heart in this… the one you are saying yes to is good and cares about you and what you love and all this God wants is to take you and all this goodness and make something better for all of us.
You are the 2021 Magis and God is counting on you, on us. It’s our turn now to find our stars, to discover the joy of a fuller Truth and a Realer Real and then to introduce the world to some new roads home.
Amen and Amen.
Star Words:
Formally and liturgically this is known as Epiphany Sunday in church circles, it’s 12 days after Christmas, or the Sunday closest to 12 days after Christmas. But at First Austin, this is more commonly known as Star Sunday because this is the day you get your star and star words.
In case you are new, let me explain this tradition a bit more to you. Most Star Sunday’s you will come forward and get your Star from myself and Carrie and we would bless you and your word. Each year the star words are created differently and by different groups in the church. But this is not most years.
This year you are going to open your envelope containing your stars for you and your household. But not yet.
First let me explain a bit more about these stars. I was not so sure about this whole concept when a dear friend who is also a pastor introduced me to it. I think she saw my skepticism and said “Griff, I was not sure of this either- I inherited this tradition.” Then she told me a story, a hard story of losing her first husband. He suffered from cancer and fought for a long time for her and the girls but the cancer eventually grew too strong and powerful. She took the holidays off from the church to be with him knowing this was his last Christmas. On Epiphany Sunday he asked to go back, this was a tradition he loved and that year he drew the star with the word Freedom on it and she drew the star with the word Surrender. He died not long after and she said, “Griff, the star words saved me.”
I have found that to be true each and every year. There is something mystical and wonderful about this exercise. This year I am thinking of my star as a way that will guide me further from a half truth to a whole truth and hopefully call me to something that will do this on a grander scale.
This year the stars were created by the staff. There are only a few stars this year though, all the star words were selected from a poem and prayer by Howard Thurman, simply titled The Work of Christmas. It’s printed in your worship guide today and the choir is going to sing an anthem of it for us this morning.
If you don’t know Howard Thurman, he is someone you should get to know. He is the creator of the title Really Real I used over and over this morning. He was the mystical prophetic voice behind the Civil Rights movement, every Civil Rights leader called him their foundation. Martin Luther King carried a copy of Thurman’s work everywhere he went. Howard Thurman dreamed of a better world for us. So it seemed fitting this morning and this year for our words to come from him.
“When the song of the angels is stilled,
when the star in the sky is gone,
when the kings and princes are home,
when the shepherds are back with their flocks,
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 the people,
to make music in the heart.”
Now if you will please open your envelope and find your star.
If you don’t have star, please get your cell phone and text me…. Please put your name to make this easier on me and I will send you a star word.
Once you find your star word please put it in the chat so we can all share our callings for this year, our star words that are going to guide us.
*artwork: Advent Triptych, by John Swanson
Traveling to a New Star
By: KB
It was November and I was making a cup of coffee. In it sat
speckles of amber -- all aromas reaching for the ceiling & smelling
half-true to its actual taste. I lost my best friend 2 weeks earlier.
With him went the only recipe that made coffee drinkable for me.
Unlike sorrow, grief gets truer when you feel it. I went to school
1 year later, and at night, the city wreaked of moscow mules
and old coffee grounds. No matter the light outside --
whether the pits of summer or 5pm during unforgiving winters --
I can count on the moon being true to every feeling. I read my birth
chart, and it is closer to true than I will admit. The word “Grief”
underestimates the feeling, but I swear this word comes close.
My best friend was close to the truth, and we built an entire world
of joy with that. My best friend put me through a hell, but is also
a heaven to me. What is your personal Hell? Vegas? Failure?
The arms of an anti-beloved? Until this year, It was the act
of making coffee for me, but this morning I have a french press
and a new brand; with joy, things are now feeling different. I cannot
see God if I cannot also see my joy. I started with a truth and ended
with me closer to it. Love is passion, and passion leads us to
our stars. My friend who was my sadness is the Star I never knew
I needed. Today, won’t you take what you have and turn it into
something beautiful. When pain is the only thing that feels true,
remember to ride the wave of the moon until it drops you off at
a new, speckle-filled home. There is baptism everywhere if you
can find it. It is January and I’m making a cup of coffee with my
loved ones. Won’t you share this stargaze with me?
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