Today’s Bible reading and an excerpt
Read Matthew 2:1-12, Matthew 3:11-4:4 .
When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him….
At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”
More thoughts for meditation about this day
Epiphany is a Greek word that means “manifestation.” The holiday celebrates two manifestations of God: 1) When the magi worship Jesus and present him gifts, they do it because God is made known, born in the baby. 2) When Jesus is baptized and John reports the voice of God denoting Jesus as his own Son, that is another significant epiphany.
In the history of the church, the holy day called Epiphany went two routes, as the church became separated during the turbulent time after the fall of the western Roman Empire in the late 400’s. The churches in the eastern and western parts of the Mediterranean developed separate identities. You can trace them through the Eastern “Orthodox” churches and the Roman “Catholic” church. In the Roman Catholic Church, Epiphany is usually celebrated on the Sunday between January 2-8. If you want to follow the traditional twelve days of Christmas, you celebrate it on January 6. The orthodox Churches have the same idea but on different days.
The different days came about like this. In the late 1500s Pope Gregory declared a new calendar to correct the inaccuracies in the old Julian calendar (which dated to Julius Caesar in 45BC). The Gregorian calendar added 12 days to the year and reset the functional spring equinox to March 21 so Easter could be properly observed. Most civil authorities eventually adopted the calendar, although Greece took over 300 years to do it.
Some Orthodox Churches still date events according to a revised Julian calendar. It is part of their identity. So many, but not all, Orthodox Christians celebrate Christmas Day on or near what is January 7 in the Gregorian calendar. As of 2012, there is a difference of 13 days between the modern Gregorian calendar and the older Julian calendar. Those who continue to use the Julian calendar or the equivalents mark December 25 and January 6 on what, for the majority of the world, is January 7 and January 19. For this reason, many people in Ethiopia, Russia, Ukraine, the Republic of Macedonia, and the Republic of Moldova celebrate Christmas on what, in the Gregorian calendar, is January 7.
All this goes to show that getting manifested is not that easy for God! Being born among humankind is subject to our politics and science. We might consider the date the celebration should be on to be more important than the reason for the celebration! We might divide up the church over an obvious change that needs to be made in the calendar just because we do not respect the person who suggested the change. It might take us a long time to get to the place we should have started: worshiping at the manger and hearing the voice of God at the baptism.
An article with a lot more: http://www.crivoice.org/cyepiph.html
Young man tells us to look for the “hidden” Jesus on Epiphany. [link]
A priest describes the manifestations, or “epiphanies” of the Lord we celebrate during the Epiphany season.
Suggestions for action
Appreciate the epiphanies the wise men and John the Baptist had. They happened a long time ago, but that history is yours, too — for the whole human race! We are invited into what God did in Jesus when we remember and allow ourselves to be part of the story.
Appreciate your own personal epiphanies, the many ways God has been manifested to you! The Spirit of God is revealed in creation, in the stories, teachings and practical applications of the Bible, in the people of the church, and directly spirit to Spirit. Maybe you could write an account of how you came and worshiped or heard the voice of God.