Epiphany 2nd January 2011

Today the church enters a glory-filled season, that of Epiphany. The coming of the wise men to Jesus brings the first showing of God’s glory to the nations in the face of Jesus Christ.

Epiphany means the revealing of glory.

This morning is an occasion for celebrating with you some occasions in my ministry I have been on the scene when the glory of Jesus illuminated someone.

Starting with myself!

Jesus first deeply impacted me in Oxford around 1970 through an extraordinary priest and an extraordinary Church.

I say extraordinary because the whole show was unconcerned about something our age is obsessed with and even the Church at times – I mean image.

There was no magazine or newsletter, hardly a noticeboard let alone an Internet Homepage or Church Logo. But there was presence!

There was something very deep and awesome about the worship at Mary Mags, the sure, unselfconscious majesty of the Sung Eucharist, of Sunday worship in the great tradition of the Church, evoked for me an awe before the mystery of God - something that many of our modern services, constructed out of ten minute sound-bites rarely attain!

Then there was charismatic presence in the old, richer sense of that word.

I recall being invited to tea by the Vicar and being strangely moved in my spirit at the encounter. Within weeks I had made a deeper surrender to Christ through making my First Confession.

I remember Epiphany in those days because it was at that time that the practice of genuflecting to the Blessed Sacrament became my own.

In Mary Mags there was a safe on the altar, like our Aumbry in the wall on the right of the old high altar containing bread consecrated bread kept over from the eucharist with a perpetual light burning alongside it. I noticed that when people came into or left church they went down on one knee or did a low bow towards it.

I had been brought up to believe scraping your knees before things was Roman Catholic. Mary Mags challenged my thinking so that one day kneeling at the Christmas Crib I realised that as the Kings fell down before the glory of Jesus there was nothing wrong with my doing so.

It was an Epiphany moment, a manifestation of Christ to me, seeing the glory of Jesus hidden behind the Aumbry veil as he lay hidden in the stable. 40 years on I still genuflect to the Blessed Sacrament. Indeed I would not have come here as parish priest had the sacrament not been reserved here because Jesus showed me that time that the bread is his glorious body and I should treat it as such. He has taught me since that he’s in people as well as in that bread, and in the bible and creation and everywhere – but I remain eternally grateful for that Epiphany experience in Oxford long ago.

The Christian faith spreads by Epiphany, by the manifestation of the glory of Jesus in word and sacrament to and through people. Evangelism has always been rooted in being more than doing. It is a process of spiritual awakening to the Real Presence of God alongside us and within us, inviting us forward on our spiritual journey.

For the faith to spread and the church to grow we need priests and people whose baptism is fully owned, who have presence, presence and conviction to challenge others to become more irradiated, more luminous with Christ’s glory. This Jesus, who walks besides us, would display himself, his Real Presence, in sacrament and word and, most tellingly, in lives lived surrendered to him.

I said I would share occasions in my ministry when I have been on the scene when the glory of Jesus illuminated someone. I’ve time for two more examples

I think of Bernard, a young man in my first mining parish who had been on our life in the Spirit course, a precursor of the Alpha Course. Bernard and Anne were stalwarts of SS Philip & James where I was Curate. Bernard had prayed for the Holy Spirit to come upon him as we encouraged people to pray. One morning he stumbled round to the Clergy House beaming all over his face. Was he drunk? I thought. No. Jesus had come real to him. The Holy Spirit had opened his inner eyes. He never looked back and possessed a great gift of joy and encouragement to us all.

Then I think of an older man to whose troubled deathbed I’d been summoned. The relatives were very concerned at his fearfulness and agitation as he moved towards his death. I came to his hospital bed myself with apprehension. Who was I to help a man faced with death? What on earth could I do to help? Shortly after I arrived I read the 23rd Psalm and as I read a deep peace descended upon him. It was as if Jesus manifested himself, appeared and just took him away. This man died joyfully as I read the words of assurance from Deuteronomy 33.27 The eternal God is your refuge and underneath are the everlasting arms.

What a difference it makes to someone when they see Jesus! They see glory – glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

To see Jesus is to catch hold of a radiant beauty quite out of this world, a beauty that is compelling and extraordinary in its attractiveness.

Could we wish anything more wonderful for anyone than a personal epiphany, a personal revelation of the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ?

I believe the Lord seeks always to manifest himself, chiefly through the bible and the eucharist, and that we need to make space for that to happen.

This season of the Epiphany is a season for looking to Jesus and his manifestation to us and through us to our village. Since it coincides with New Year it’s a time to refresh our daily discipline or prayer, to open our bibles, to seek Jesus in his Sweet Sacrament divine, especially at the quiet midweek celebrations.

In our eucharist we make space for such Epiphany in the silences of the word and sacrament. God bless us now as we ponder the gift of Jesus and help us mark and inwardly digest the divine words we need to hear deep into our hearts from the human speech I have been uttering.